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] | C_25016f006f8643f982493cfaa6e82b7f_1 | What was their focus? | 5 | What was the band Joy Division's focus? | Joy Division | Joy Division's style quickly evolved from their punk roots. Their sound during their early inception as Warsaw was described as generic and "undistinguished punk-inflected hard-rock". Critic Simon Reynolds observed how the band's originality only "really became apparent as the songs got slower", and their music took on a "sparse" quality. According to Reynolds, "Hook's bass carried the melody, Bernard Sumner's guitar left gaps rather than filling up the group's sound with dense riffage and Steve Morris' drums seemed to circle the rim of a crater." According to music critic Jon Savage, "Joy Division were not punk but they were directly inspired by its energy". In 1994 Sumner said the band's characteristic sound "came out naturally: I'm more rhythm and chords, and Hooky was melody. He used to play high lead bass because I liked my guitar to sound distorted, and the amplifier I had would only work when it was at full volume. When Hooky played low, he couldn't hear himself. Steve has his own style which is different to other drummers. To me, a drummer in the band is the clock, but Steve wouldn't be the clock, because he's passive: he would follow the rhythm of the band, which gave us our own edge." By Closer, Curtis had adapted a low baritone voice, drawing comparisons to Jim Morrison of the Doors (one of Curtis's favourite bands). Sumner largely acted as the band's director, a role he continued in New Order. While Sumner was the group's primary guitarist, Curtis played the instrument on a few recorded songs and during a few shows. Curtis hated playing guitar, but the band insisted he do so. Sumner said, "He played in quite a bizarre way and that to us was interesting, because no one else would play like Ian". During the recording sessions for Closer, Sumner began using self-built synthesisers and Hook used a six-string bass for more melody. Hannett "dedicated himself to capturing and intensifying Joy Division's eerie spatiality". Hannett believed punk rock was sonically conservative because of its refusal to use studio technology to create sonic space. The producer instead aimed to create a more expansive sound on the group's records. Hannett said, "[Joy Division] were a gift to a producer, because they didn't have a clue. They didn't argue". Hannett demanded clean and clear "sound separation" not only for individual instruments, but even for individual pieces of Morris's drumkit. Morris recalled, "Typically on tracks he considered to be potential singles, he'd get me to play each drum on its own to avoid any bleed-through of sound". Music journalist Richard Cook noted that Hannett's role was "crucial". There are "devices of distance" in his production and "the sound is an illusion of physicality". CANNOTANSWER | devices of distance | Joy Division were an English rock band formed in Salford in 1976. The group consisted of vocalist Ian Curtis, guitarist/keyboardist Bernard Sumner, bassist Peter Hook and drummer Stephen Morris.
Sumner and Hook formed the band after attending a Sex Pistols concert. While Joy Division's first recordings were heavily influenced by early punk, they soon developed a sparse sound and style that made them one of the pioneers of the post-punk movement. Their self-released 1978 debut EP An Ideal for Living drew the attention of the Manchester television personality Tony Wilson, who signed them to his independent label Factory Records. Their debut album Unknown Pleasures, recorded with producer Martin Hannett, was released in 1979.
Curtis suffered from personal problems and health conditions, including a failing marriage, depression, and epilepsy. As the band's popularity grew, Curtis's condition made it increasingly difficult for him to perform; he occasionally experienced seizures on stage. He died by suicide on the eve of the band's first US/Canada tour in May 1980, aged 23. Joy Division's second and final album, Closer, was released two months later; it and the single "Love Will Tear Us Apart" became their highest charting releases.
The remaining members regrouped under the name New Order. They were successful throughout the next decade, blending post-punk with electronic and dance music influences.
History
Formation
On 4 June 1976, childhood friends Bernard Sumner and Peter Hook separately attended a Sex Pistols show at the Manchester Lesser Free Trade Hall. Both were inspired by the Pistols' performance. Sumner said that he felt the Pistols "destroyed the myth of being a pop star, of a musician being some kind of god that you had to worship". The following day Hook borrowed £35 from his mother to buy a bass guitar. They formed a band with Terry Mason, who had also attended the gig; Sumner bought a guitar, and Mason a drum kit. After their schoolfriend Martin Gresty declined an invitation to join as vocalist after getting a job at a factory, the band placed an advertisement for a vocalist in the Manchester Virgin Records shop. Ian Curtis, who knew them from earlier gigs, responded and was hired without audition. Sumner said that he "knew he was all right to get on with and that's what we based the whole group on. If we liked someone, they were in."
Buzzcocks manager Richard Boon and frontman Pete Shelley have both been credited with suggesting the band name "Stiff Kittens", but the band settled on "Warsaw" shortly before their first gig, a reference to David Bowie's song "Warszawa". Warsaw debuted on 29 May 1977 at the Electric Circus, supporting the Buzzcocks, Penetration and John Cooper Clarke. Tony Tabac played drums that night after joining the band two days earlier. Reviews in the NME by Paul Morley and in Sounds by Ian Wood brought them immediate national exposure. Mason became the band's manager and Tabac was replaced on drums in June 1977 by Steve Brotherdale, who also played in the punk band The Panik. Brotherdale tried to get Curtis to leave the band and join The Panik, and even had Curtis audition. On 18 July 1977, Warsaw recorded five demo tracks at Pennine Sound Studios, Oldham. Uneasy with Brotherdale's aggressive personality, the band fired him soon after the sessions: driving home from the studio, they pulled over and asked Brotherdale to check on a flat tyre; when he got out of the car, they drove off.
In August 1977, Warsaw placed an advertisement in a music shop window seeking a replacement drummer. Stephen Morris, who had attended the same school as Curtis, was the sole respondent. Deborah Curtis, Ian's wife, stated that Morris "fitted perfectly" with the band, and that with his addition Warsaw became a "complete 'family. To avoid confusion with the London punk band Warsaw Pakt, the band renamed themselves Joy Division in early 1978, borrowing the name from the sexual slavery wing of a Nazi concentration camp mentioned in the 1955 novel House of Dolls. On 14 December, the group recorded their debut EP, An Ideal for Living, at Pennine Sound Studio and played their final gig as Warsaw on New Year's Eve at the Swinging Apple in Liverpool. Billed as Warsaw to ensure an audience, the band played their first gig as Joy Division on 25 January 1978 at Pip's Disco in Manchester.
Early releases
Joy Division were approached by RCA Records to record a cover of Nolan "N.F." Porter's "Keep on Keepin' On" at a Manchester recording studio. The band spent late March and April 1978 writing and rehearsing material. During the Stiff/Chiswick Challenge concert at Manchester's Rafters club on 14 April, they caught the attention of music producer Tony Wilson and manager Rob Gretton. Curtis berated Wilson for not putting the group on his Granada Television show So It Goes; Wilson responded that Joy Division would be the next band he would showcase on TV. Gretton, the venue's resident DJ, was so impressed by the band's performance that he convinced them to take him on as their manager. Gretton, whose "dogged determination" was later credited for much of the band's public success, contributed the business skills to provide Joy Division with a better foundation for creativity. Joy Division spent the first week of May 1978 recording at Manchester's Arrow Studios. The band were unhappy with the Grapevine Records head John Anderson's insistence on adding synthesiser into the mix to soften the sound, and asked to be dropped from the contract with RCA.
Joy Division made their recorded debut in June 1978 when the band self-released An Ideal for Living, and two weeks later their track "At a Later Date" was featured on the compilation album Short Circuit: Live at the Electric Circus (which had been recorded live in October 1977). In the Melody Maker review, Chris Brazier said that it "has the familiar rough-hewn nature of home-produced records, but they're no mere drone-vendors—there are a lot of good ideas here, and they could be a very interesting band by now, seven months on". The packaging of An Ideal for Living—which featured a drawing of a Hitler Youth member on the cover—coupled with the nature of the band's name fuelled speculation about their political affiliations. While Hook and Sumner later said they were intrigued by fascism at the time, Morris believed that the group's dalliance with Nazi imagery came from a desire to keep memories of the sacrifices of their parents and grandparents during World War II alive. He argued that accusations of neo-Nazi sympathies merely provoked the band "to keep on doing it, because that's the kind of people we are".
In September 1978, Joy Division made their television debut performing "Shadowplay" on So It Goes, with an introduction by Wilson. In October, Joy Division contributed two tracks recorded with producer Martin Hannett to the compilation double-7" EP A Factory Sample, the first release by Tony Wilson's record label, Factory Records. In the NME review of the EP, Paul Morley praised the band as "the missing link" between Elvis Presley and Siouxsie and the Banshees. Joy Division joined Factory's roster, after buying themselves out of the RCA deal. Gretton was made a label partner to represent the interests of the band. On 27 December, during the drive home from gig at the Hope and Anchor in London, Curtis suffered his first recognised severe epileptic seizure and was hospitalised. Meanwhile, Joy Division's career progressed, and Curtis appeared on the 13 January 1979 cover of NME. That month the band recorded their session for BBC Radio 1 DJ John Peel. According to Deborah Curtis, "Sandwiched in between these two important landmarks was the realisation that Ian's illness was something we would have to learn to accommodate".
Unknown Pleasures and breakthrough
Joy Division's debut album, Unknown Pleasures, was recorded at Strawberry Studios, Stockport, in April 1979. Producer Martin Hannett significantly altered their live sound, a fact that greatly displeased the band at the time; however, in 2006, Hook said that in retrospect Hannett had done a good job and "created the Joy Division sound". The album cover was designed by Peter Saville, who went on to provide artwork for future Joy Division and New Order releases.
Unknown Pleasures was released in June and sold through its initial pressing of 10,000 copies. Wilson said the success turned the indie label into a true business and a "revolutionary force" that operated outside of the major record label system. Reviewing the album for Melody Maker, writer Jon Savage described the album as an "opaque manifesto" and declared it "one of the best, white, English, debut LPs of the year".
Joy Division performed on Granada TV again in July 1979, and made their only nationwide TV appearance in September on BBC2's Something Else. They supported the Buzzcocks in a 24-venue UK tour that began that October, which allowed the band to quit their regular jobs. The non-album single "Transmission" was released in November. Joy Division's burgeoning success drew a devoted following who were stereotyped as "intense young men dressed in grey overcoats".
Closer and health problems
Joy Division toured Europe in January 1980. Although the schedule was demanding, Curtis experienced only two grand mal seizures, both in the final two months of the tour. That March, the band recorded their second album, Closer, with Hannett at London's Britannia Row Studios. That month they released the "Licht und Blindheit" single, with "Atmosphere" as the A-side and "Dead Souls" as the B-side, on the French independent label Sordide Sentimental.
A lack of sleep and long hours destabilised Curtis's epilepsy, and his seizures became almost uncontrollable. He often had seizures during performances, which some audience members believed were part of the performance. The seizures left him feeling ashamed and depressed, and the band became increasingly worried about Curtis's condition. On 7 April 1980, Curtis attempted suicide by overdosing on his anti-seizure medication, phenobarbitone. The following evening, Joy Division were scheduled to play a gig at the Derby Hall in Bury. Curtis was too ill to perform, so at Gretton's insistence the band played a combined set with Alan Hempsall of Crispy Ambulance and Simon Topping of A Certain Ratio singing on the first few songs. When Topping came back towards the end of the set, some audience members threw bottles at the stage. Curtis's ill health led to the cancellation of several other gigs that April. Joy Division's final live performance was held at the University of Birmingham's High Hall on 2 May, and included their only performance of "Ceremony", one of the last songs written by Curtis.
Hannett's production has been widely praised. However, as with Unknown Pleasures, both Hook and Sumner were unhappy with the production. Hook said that when he heard the final mix of "Atrocity Exhibition" he was disappointed that the abrasiveness had been toned down. He wrote; "I was like, head in hands, 'Oh fucking hell, it's happening again ... Martin had fucking melted the guitar with his Marshall Time Waster. Made it sound like someone strangling a cat and, to my mind, absolutely killed the song. I was so annoyed with him and went in and gave him a piece of my mind but he just turned round and told me to fuck off."
Curtis' suicide and aftermath
Joy Division were scheduled to commence their first US/Canada tour in May 1980. Curtis had expressed enthusiasm about the tour, but his relationship with his wife, Deborah, was under strain; Deborah was excluded from the band's inner circle, and Curtis was having an affair with Belgian journalist and music promoter Annik Honoré, whom he met on tour in Europe in 1979. He was also anxious about how American audiences would react to his epilepsy.
The evening before the band were due to depart for America, Curtis returned to his Macclesfield home to talk to Deborah. He asked her to drop an impending divorce suit, and asked her to leave him alone in the house until he caught a train to Manchester the following morning. Early on 18 May 1980, having spent the night watching the Werner Herzog film Stroszek, Curtis hanged himself in his kitchen. Deborah discovered his body later that day when she returned.
The suicide shocked the band and their management. In 2005, Wilson said: "I think all of us made the mistake of not thinking his suicide was going to happen ... We all completely underestimated the danger. We didn't take it seriously. That's how stupid we were." Music critic Simon Reynolds said Curtis's suicide "made for instant myth". Jon Savage's obituary said that "now no one will remember what his work with Joy Division was like when he was alive; it will be perceived as tragic rather than courageous". In June 1980, Joy Division's single "Love Will Tear Us Apart" was released, which hit number thirteen on the UK Singles Chart. In July 1980, Closer was released, and peaked at number six on the UK Albums Chart. NME reviewer Charles Shaar Murray wrote, "Closer is as magnificent a memorial (for 'Joy Division' as much as for Ian Curtis) as any post-Presley popular musician could have."
Morris said that even without Curtis's death, it is unlikely that Joy Division would have endured. The members had made a pact long before Curtis's death that, should any member leave, the remaining members would change the band name. The band re-formed as New Order, with Sumner on vocals; they later recruited Morris's girlfriend Gillian Gilbert as keyboardist and second guitarist. Gilbert had befriended the band and played guitar at a Joy Division performance when Curtis had been unable to play.
New Order's debut single, "Ceremony" (1981), was formed from the last two songs written with Curtis. New Order struggled in their early years to escape the shadow of Joy Division, but went on to achieve far greater commercial success with a different, more upbeat and dance-orientated sound.
Various Joy Division outtakes and live material have been released. Still, featuring live tracks and rare recordings, was issued in 1981. Factory issued the Substance compilation in 1988, including several out-of-print singles. Permanent was released in 1995 by London Records, which had acquired the Joy Division catalogue after Factory's 1992 bankruptcy. A comprehensive box set, Heart and Soul, appeared in 1997.
Musical style
Sound
Joy Division took time to develop their style and quickly evolved from their punk roots. Their sound during their early inception as Warsaw was described as fairly generic and "undistinguished punk-inflected hard-rock". Critic Simon Reynolds observed how the band's originality only "really became apparent as the songs got slower", and their music took on a "sparse" quality. According to Reynolds, "Hook's bass carried the melody, Bernard Sumner's guitar left gaps rather than filling up the group's sound with dense riffage and Steve Morris' drums seemed to circle the rim of a crater." According to music critic Jon Savage, "Joy Division were not punk but they were directly inspired by its energy". In 1994 Sumner said the band's characteristic sound "came out naturally: I'm more rhythm and chords, and Hooky was melody. He used to play high lead bass because I liked my guitar to sound distorted, and the amplifier I had would only work when it was at full volume. When Hooky played low, he couldn't hear himself. Steve has his own style which is different to other drummers. To me, a drummer in the band is the clock, but Steve wouldn't be the clock, because he's passive: he would follow the rhythm of the band, which gave us our own edge." By Closer, Curtis had adapted a low baritone voice, drawing comparisons to Jim Morrison of the Doors (one of Curtis's favourite bands).
Sumner largely acted as the band's director, a role he continued in New Order. While Sumner was the group's primary guitarist, Curtis played the instrument on a few recorded songs and during a few shows. Curtis hated playing guitar, but the band insisted he do so. Sumner said, "He played in quite a bizarre way and that to us was interesting, because no one else would play like Ian". During the recording sessions for Closer, Sumner began using self-built synthesisers and Hook used a six-string bass for more melody.
Producer Martin Hannett "dedicated himself to capturing and intensifying Joy Division's eerie spatiality". Hannett believed punk rock was sonically conservative because of its refusal to use studio technology to create sonic space. The producer instead aimed to create a more expansive sound on the group's records. Hannett said, "[Joy Division] were a gift to a producer, because they didn't have a clue. They didn't argue". Hannett demanded clean and clear "sound separation" not only for individual instruments, but even for individual pieces of Morris's drumkit. Morris recalled, "Typically on tracks he considered to be potential singles, he'd get me to play each drum on its own to avoid any bleed-through of sound". Music journalist Richard Cook noted that Hannett's role was "crucial". There are "devices of distance" in his production and "the sound is an illusion of physicality".
Lyrics
Curtis was the band's sole lyricist, and he typically composed his lyrics in a notebook, independently of the eventual music to evolve. The music itself was largely written by Sumner and Hook as the group jammed during rehearsals. Curtis's imagery and word choice often referenced "coldness, pressure, darkness, crisis, failure, collapse, loss of control". In 1979, NME journalist Paul Rambali wrote, "The themes of Joy Division's music are sorrowful, painful and sometimes deeply sad." Music journalist Jon Savage wrote that "Curtis's great lyrical achievement was to capture the underlying reality of a society in turmoil, and to make it both universal and personal," while noting that "the lyrics reflected, in mood and approach, his interest in romantic and science-fiction literature." Critic Robert Palmer wrote that William S. Burroughs and J. G. Ballard were "obvious influences" to Curtis, and Morris also remembered the singer reading T. S. Eliot. Deborah Curtis also remembered Curtis reading works by writers such as Fyodor Dostoevsky, Friedrich Nietzsche, Jean-Paul Sartre, Franz Kafka, and Hermann Hesse.
Curtis was unwilling to explain the meaning behind his lyrics and Joy Division releases were absent of any lyric sheets. He told the fanzine Printed Noise, "We haven't got a message really; the lyrics are open to interpretation. They're multidimensional. You can read into them what you like." The other Joy Division members have said that at the time, they paid little attention to the contents of Curtis' lyrics. In a 1987 interview with Option, Morris said that they "just thought the songs were sort of sympathetic and more uplifting than depressing. But everyone's got their own opinion." Deborah Curtis recalled that only with the release of Closer did many who were close to the singer realise "[h]is intentions and feelings were all there within the lyrics". The surviving members regret not seeing the warning signs in Curtis's lyrics. Morris said that "it was only after Ian died that we sat down and listened to the lyrics...you'd find yourself thinking, 'Oh my God, I missed this one'. Because I'd look at Ian's lyrics and think how clever he was putting himself in the position of someone else. I never believed he was writing about himself. Looking back, how could I have been so bleedin' stupid? Of course he was writing about himself. But I didn't go in and grab him and ask, 'What's up?' I have to live with that".
Live performances
In contrast to the sound of their studio recordings, Joy Division typically played loudly and aggressively during live performances. The band were especially unhappy with Hannett's mix of Unknown Pleasures, which reduced the abrasiveness of their live sound for a more cerebral and ghostly sound. According to Sumner "the music was loud and heavy, and we felt that Martin had toned it down, especially with the guitars".
During their live performances, the group did not interact with the audience; according to Paul Morley, "During a Joy Division set, outside of the songs, you'll be lucky to hear more than two or three words. Hello and goodbye. No introductions, no promotion." Curtis would often perform what became known as his "'dead fly' dance", as if imitating a seizure; his arms would "start flying in [a] semicircular, hypnotic curve". Simon Reynolds noted that Curtis's dancing style was reminiscent of an epileptic fit, and that he was dancing in the manner for some months before he was diagnosed with epilepsy. Live performances became problematic for Joy Division, due to Curtis's condition. Sumner later said, "We didn't have flashing lights, but sometimes a particular drum beat would do something to him. He'd go off in a trance for a bit, then he'd lose it and have an epileptic fit. We'd have to stop the show and carry him off to the dressing room where he'd cry his eyes out because this appalling thing had just happened to him".
Influences
Sumner wrote that Curtis was inspired by artists such as the Doors, Iggy Pop, David Bowie, Kraftwerk, the Velvet Underground and Neu!. Hook has also related that Curtis was particularly influenced by Iggy Pop's stage persona. The group were inspired by Kraftwerk's "marriage between humans and machines", and the inventiveness of their electronic music. Joy Division played Trans-Europe Express through the PA before they went on stage, "to get a momentum". Bowie's "Berlin Trilogy" elaborated with Brian Eno, influenced them; the "cold austerity" of the synthesisers on the b-sides of Heroes and Low albums, was a "music looking at the future". Morris cited the "unique style" of Velvet Underground's Maureen Tucker and the motorik drum beats, from Neu! and Can. Morris also credited Siouxsie and the Banshees because their "first drummer Kenny Morris played mostly toms" and "the sound of cymbals was forbidden". Hook said that "Siouxsie and the Banshees were one of our big influences ... The way the guitarist and the drummer played was a really unusual way of playing". Hook drew inspiration from the style of bassist Jean-Jacques Burnel and his early material with the Stranglers; he also credited Carol Kaye and her musical basslines on early 1970s work of the Temptations. Sumner mentioned "the raw, nasty, unpolished edge" in the guitars of the Rolling Stones, the simple riff of "Vicious" on Lou Reed's Transformer, and Neil Young. His musical horizon went up a notch with Jimi Hendrix, he realised "it wasn't about little catchy tunes ... it was what you could do sonically with a guitar."
Legacy
Despite their short career, Joy Division have exerted a wide-reaching influence. John Bush of AllMusic argues that Joy Division "became the first band in the post-punk movement by ... emphasizing not anger and energy but mood and expression, pointing ahead to the rise of melancholy alternative music in the '80s."
Joy Division have influenced bands including their contemporaries the Cure and U2, to later acts such as Bloc Party, Editors, Interpol, The Proclaimers, and Soundgarden. In 1980, U2 singer Bono said that Joy Division were "one of the most important bands of the last four or five years". Rapper Danny Brown named his album Atrocity Exhibition after the Joy Division song, whose title was partially inspired by the 1970 J. G. Ballard collection of condensed novels of the same name. In 2005 both New Order and Joy Division were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame.
The band's dark and gloomy sound, which Martin Hannett described in 1979 as "dancing music with Gothic overtones", presaged the gothic rock genre. While the term "gothic" originally described a "doomy atmosphere" in music of the late 1970s, the term was soon applied to specific bands like Bauhaus that followed in the wake of Joy Division and Siouxsie and the Banshees. Standard musical fixtures of early gothic rock bands included "high-pitched post-Joy Division basslines usurp[ing] the melodic role" and "vocals that were either near operatic and Teutonic or deep, droning alloys of Jim Morrison and Ian Curtis."
Joy Division have been dramatised in two biopics. 24 Hour Party People (2002) is a fictionalised account of Factory Records in which members of the band appear as supporting characters. Tony Wilson said of the film, "It's all true, it's all not true. It's not a fucking documentary," and that he favoured the "myth" over the truth. The 2007 film Control, directed by Anton Corbijn, is a biography of Ian Curtis (portrayed by Sam Riley) that uses Deborah Curtis's biography of her late husband, Touching from a Distance (1995), as its basis. Control had its international premiere on the opening night of Director's Fortnight at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival, where it was critically well received. That year Grant Gee directed the band documentary Joy Division.
Band members
Ian Curtis – lead vocals, guitar, melodica (1976–1980)
Bernard Sumner – lead guitar, keyboards, backing vocals, bass (1976–1980)
Peter Hook – bass, backing vocals, guitar (1976–1980)
Terry Mason – drums (1976–1977)
Tony Tabac – drums (1977)
Steve Brotherdale – drums (1977)
Stephen Morris – drums, percussion (1977–1980)
Timeline
Discography
Unknown Pleasures (1979)
Closer (1980)
References
Works cited
Further reading
External links
1976 establishments in England
1980 disestablishments in England
English gothic rock groups
English post-punk music groups
English new wave musical groups
Enigma Records artists
Factory Records artists
Music in Salford
Musical groups disestablished in 1980
Musical groups established in 1976
Musical groups from Greater Manchester
Musical quartets
New Order (band)
Qwest Records artists
Virgin Records artists | true | [
"Bobby Jacobs (born 1965) is a Dutch bassist, songwriter and producer best known as the former bassist for the Dutch rock band Focus, from 2002 to December 2016.\n\nBiography \nJacobs was born in Hilversum, Netherlands. He is the second son of famed Dutch musician Ruud Jacobs and therefore the nephew of Pim Jacobs. Jacobs has two brothers, Jeroen and Roeland, and is the stepson of Thijs van Leer, the founding member of Focus. Jacobs was a member of van Leer's side bands Van Leer and Conxi, and Olivia.\n\nFrom 2002 to December 2016, Jacobs was a member of Focus as their bassist as is featured on their studio albums Focus 8 (2002), Focus 9 / New Skin (2009), Focus X (2012), and Golden Oldies (2014). During his tenure with the band, Jacobs also served as their producer and was credited as a writer on \"De Ti O De Me\", \"Sylvia's Stepson\", \"Aya-Yuppie-Hippy-Yee\" and \"Hoeratio\". He was replaced by Dutch player Udo Pannekeet.\n\nDiscography \nwith Focus\n\nFocus 8 (2002)\nFocus 9 / New Skin (2009)\nFocus X (2012)\nGolden Oldies (2014)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nOfficial Focus website at FocusTheBand.com\n\n1965 births\nLiving people\nDutch bass guitarists\nProgressive rock guitarists\nDutch composers\nPeople from Hilversum\nFocus (band) members",
"Micom was a manufacturer of telecommunications equipment, best known for their line of concentrators. The company was founded by serial entrepreneur Stephen Bernard Dorsey in 1975 and sold to Philips NV in 1984. Micom acquired Spectrum Digital Corporation in 1987.\n\nMicom concentrators\nMicom became known for its ads, often run on the back pages of popular-in-their-day computer industry publications, with the slogan \"Concentrate. Because it's cheaper!\" The initial ads showed oranges and what resembled a can of frozen orange juice, with a \"brand name\" of Micom. After adding variations, they began advertising on television. The focus of the ads, within their telecommunications products, was their line of concentrators.\n\nTheir print ads included the trademarked phrase \"MICOM: MicroComputers for DataCommunications(tm)\"\n\nReferences\n\nDefunct networking companies\nHistory of telecommunications"
] |
[
"Joy Division",
"Sound",
"What was her sound?",
"generic and \"undistinguished punk-inflected hard-rock",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"Critic Simon Reynolds observed how the band's originality only \"really became apparent as the songs got slower\",",
"why did she come to this conclusion?",
"\"Hook's bass carried the melody,",
"Did she release any sounds?",
"more rhythm and chords,",
"What was their focus?",
"devices of distance"
] | C_25016f006f8643f982493cfaa6e82b7f_1 | Did they make their own songs? | 6 | Did the band Joy Division make their own songs? | Joy Division | Joy Division's style quickly evolved from their punk roots. Their sound during their early inception as Warsaw was described as generic and "undistinguished punk-inflected hard-rock". Critic Simon Reynolds observed how the band's originality only "really became apparent as the songs got slower", and their music took on a "sparse" quality. According to Reynolds, "Hook's bass carried the melody, Bernard Sumner's guitar left gaps rather than filling up the group's sound with dense riffage and Steve Morris' drums seemed to circle the rim of a crater." According to music critic Jon Savage, "Joy Division were not punk but they were directly inspired by its energy". In 1994 Sumner said the band's characteristic sound "came out naturally: I'm more rhythm and chords, and Hooky was melody. He used to play high lead bass because I liked my guitar to sound distorted, and the amplifier I had would only work when it was at full volume. When Hooky played low, he couldn't hear himself. Steve has his own style which is different to other drummers. To me, a drummer in the band is the clock, but Steve wouldn't be the clock, because he's passive: he would follow the rhythm of the band, which gave us our own edge." By Closer, Curtis had adapted a low baritone voice, drawing comparisons to Jim Morrison of the Doors (one of Curtis's favourite bands). Sumner largely acted as the band's director, a role he continued in New Order. While Sumner was the group's primary guitarist, Curtis played the instrument on a few recorded songs and during a few shows. Curtis hated playing guitar, but the band insisted he do so. Sumner said, "He played in quite a bizarre way and that to us was interesting, because no one else would play like Ian". During the recording sessions for Closer, Sumner began using self-built synthesisers and Hook used a six-string bass for more melody. Hannett "dedicated himself to capturing and intensifying Joy Division's eerie spatiality". Hannett believed punk rock was sonically conservative because of its refusal to use studio technology to create sonic space. The producer instead aimed to create a more expansive sound on the group's records. Hannett said, "[Joy Division] were a gift to a producer, because they didn't have a clue. They didn't argue". Hannett demanded clean and clear "sound separation" not only for individual instruments, but even for individual pieces of Morris's drumkit. Morris recalled, "Typically on tracks he considered to be potential singles, he'd get me to play each drum on its own to avoid any bleed-through of sound". Music journalist Richard Cook noted that Hannett's role was "crucial". There are "devices of distance" in his production and "the sound is an illusion of physicality". CANNOTANSWER | Typically on tracks he considered to be potential singles, | Joy Division were an English rock band formed in Salford in 1976. The group consisted of vocalist Ian Curtis, guitarist/keyboardist Bernard Sumner, bassist Peter Hook and drummer Stephen Morris.
Sumner and Hook formed the band after attending a Sex Pistols concert. While Joy Division's first recordings were heavily influenced by early punk, they soon developed a sparse sound and style that made them one of the pioneers of the post-punk movement. Their self-released 1978 debut EP An Ideal for Living drew the attention of the Manchester television personality Tony Wilson, who signed them to his independent label Factory Records. Their debut album Unknown Pleasures, recorded with producer Martin Hannett, was released in 1979.
Curtis suffered from personal problems and health conditions, including a failing marriage, depression, and epilepsy. As the band's popularity grew, Curtis's condition made it increasingly difficult for him to perform; he occasionally experienced seizures on stage. He died by suicide on the eve of the band's first US/Canada tour in May 1980, aged 23. Joy Division's second and final album, Closer, was released two months later; it and the single "Love Will Tear Us Apart" became their highest charting releases.
The remaining members regrouped under the name New Order. They were successful throughout the next decade, blending post-punk with electronic and dance music influences.
History
Formation
On 4 June 1976, childhood friends Bernard Sumner and Peter Hook separately attended a Sex Pistols show at the Manchester Lesser Free Trade Hall. Both were inspired by the Pistols' performance. Sumner said that he felt the Pistols "destroyed the myth of being a pop star, of a musician being some kind of god that you had to worship". The following day Hook borrowed £35 from his mother to buy a bass guitar. They formed a band with Terry Mason, who had also attended the gig; Sumner bought a guitar, and Mason a drum kit. After their schoolfriend Martin Gresty declined an invitation to join as vocalist after getting a job at a factory, the band placed an advertisement for a vocalist in the Manchester Virgin Records shop. Ian Curtis, who knew them from earlier gigs, responded and was hired without audition. Sumner said that he "knew he was all right to get on with and that's what we based the whole group on. If we liked someone, they were in."
Buzzcocks manager Richard Boon and frontman Pete Shelley have both been credited with suggesting the band name "Stiff Kittens", but the band settled on "Warsaw" shortly before their first gig, a reference to David Bowie's song "Warszawa". Warsaw debuted on 29 May 1977 at the Electric Circus, supporting the Buzzcocks, Penetration and John Cooper Clarke. Tony Tabac played drums that night after joining the band two days earlier. Reviews in the NME by Paul Morley and in Sounds by Ian Wood brought them immediate national exposure. Mason became the band's manager and Tabac was replaced on drums in June 1977 by Steve Brotherdale, who also played in the punk band The Panik. Brotherdale tried to get Curtis to leave the band and join The Panik, and even had Curtis audition. On 18 July 1977, Warsaw recorded five demo tracks at Pennine Sound Studios, Oldham. Uneasy with Brotherdale's aggressive personality, the band fired him soon after the sessions: driving home from the studio, they pulled over and asked Brotherdale to check on a flat tyre; when he got out of the car, they drove off.
In August 1977, Warsaw placed an advertisement in a music shop window seeking a replacement drummer. Stephen Morris, who had attended the same school as Curtis, was the sole respondent. Deborah Curtis, Ian's wife, stated that Morris "fitted perfectly" with the band, and that with his addition Warsaw became a "complete 'family. To avoid confusion with the London punk band Warsaw Pakt, the band renamed themselves Joy Division in early 1978, borrowing the name from the sexual slavery wing of a Nazi concentration camp mentioned in the 1955 novel House of Dolls. On 14 December, the group recorded their debut EP, An Ideal for Living, at Pennine Sound Studio and played their final gig as Warsaw on New Year's Eve at the Swinging Apple in Liverpool. Billed as Warsaw to ensure an audience, the band played their first gig as Joy Division on 25 January 1978 at Pip's Disco in Manchester.
Early releases
Joy Division were approached by RCA Records to record a cover of Nolan "N.F." Porter's "Keep on Keepin' On" at a Manchester recording studio. The band spent late March and April 1978 writing and rehearsing material. During the Stiff/Chiswick Challenge concert at Manchester's Rafters club on 14 April, they caught the attention of music producer Tony Wilson and manager Rob Gretton. Curtis berated Wilson for not putting the group on his Granada Television show So It Goes; Wilson responded that Joy Division would be the next band he would showcase on TV. Gretton, the venue's resident DJ, was so impressed by the band's performance that he convinced them to take him on as their manager. Gretton, whose "dogged determination" was later credited for much of the band's public success, contributed the business skills to provide Joy Division with a better foundation for creativity. Joy Division spent the first week of May 1978 recording at Manchester's Arrow Studios. The band were unhappy with the Grapevine Records head John Anderson's insistence on adding synthesiser into the mix to soften the sound, and asked to be dropped from the contract with RCA.
Joy Division made their recorded debut in June 1978 when the band self-released An Ideal for Living, and two weeks later their track "At a Later Date" was featured on the compilation album Short Circuit: Live at the Electric Circus (which had been recorded live in October 1977). In the Melody Maker review, Chris Brazier said that it "has the familiar rough-hewn nature of home-produced records, but they're no mere drone-vendors—there are a lot of good ideas here, and they could be a very interesting band by now, seven months on". The packaging of An Ideal for Living—which featured a drawing of a Hitler Youth member on the cover—coupled with the nature of the band's name fuelled speculation about their political affiliations. While Hook and Sumner later said they were intrigued by fascism at the time, Morris believed that the group's dalliance with Nazi imagery came from a desire to keep memories of the sacrifices of their parents and grandparents during World War II alive. He argued that accusations of neo-Nazi sympathies merely provoked the band "to keep on doing it, because that's the kind of people we are".
In September 1978, Joy Division made their television debut performing "Shadowplay" on So It Goes, with an introduction by Wilson. In October, Joy Division contributed two tracks recorded with producer Martin Hannett to the compilation double-7" EP A Factory Sample, the first release by Tony Wilson's record label, Factory Records. In the NME review of the EP, Paul Morley praised the band as "the missing link" between Elvis Presley and Siouxsie and the Banshees. Joy Division joined Factory's roster, after buying themselves out of the RCA deal. Gretton was made a label partner to represent the interests of the band. On 27 December, during the drive home from gig at the Hope and Anchor in London, Curtis suffered his first recognised severe epileptic seizure and was hospitalised. Meanwhile, Joy Division's career progressed, and Curtis appeared on the 13 January 1979 cover of NME. That month the band recorded their session for BBC Radio 1 DJ John Peel. According to Deborah Curtis, "Sandwiched in between these two important landmarks was the realisation that Ian's illness was something we would have to learn to accommodate".
Unknown Pleasures and breakthrough
Joy Division's debut album, Unknown Pleasures, was recorded at Strawberry Studios, Stockport, in April 1979. Producer Martin Hannett significantly altered their live sound, a fact that greatly displeased the band at the time; however, in 2006, Hook said that in retrospect Hannett had done a good job and "created the Joy Division sound". The album cover was designed by Peter Saville, who went on to provide artwork for future Joy Division and New Order releases.
Unknown Pleasures was released in June and sold through its initial pressing of 10,000 copies. Wilson said the success turned the indie label into a true business and a "revolutionary force" that operated outside of the major record label system. Reviewing the album for Melody Maker, writer Jon Savage described the album as an "opaque manifesto" and declared it "one of the best, white, English, debut LPs of the year".
Joy Division performed on Granada TV again in July 1979, and made their only nationwide TV appearance in September on BBC2's Something Else. They supported the Buzzcocks in a 24-venue UK tour that began that October, which allowed the band to quit their regular jobs. The non-album single "Transmission" was released in November. Joy Division's burgeoning success drew a devoted following who were stereotyped as "intense young men dressed in grey overcoats".
Closer and health problems
Joy Division toured Europe in January 1980. Although the schedule was demanding, Curtis experienced only two grand mal seizures, both in the final two months of the tour. That March, the band recorded their second album, Closer, with Hannett at London's Britannia Row Studios. That month they released the "Licht und Blindheit" single, with "Atmosphere" as the A-side and "Dead Souls" as the B-side, on the French independent label Sordide Sentimental.
A lack of sleep and long hours destabilised Curtis's epilepsy, and his seizures became almost uncontrollable. He often had seizures during performances, which some audience members believed were part of the performance. The seizures left him feeling ashamed and depressed, and the band became increasingly worried about Curtis's condition. On 7 April 1980, Curtis attempted suicide by overdosing on his anti-seizure medication, phenobarbitone. The following evening, Joy Division were scheduled to play a gig at the Derby Hall in Bury. Curtis was too ill to perform, so at Gretton's insistence the band played a combined set with Alan Hempsall of Crispy Ambulance and Simon Topping of A Certain Ratio singing on the first few songs. When Topping came back towards the end of the set, some audience members threw bottles at the stage. Curtis's ill health led to the cancellation of several other gigs that April. Joy Division's final live performance was held at the University of Birmingham's High Hall on 2 May, and included their only performance of "Ceremony", one of the last songs written by Curtis.
Hannett's production has been widely praised. However, as with Unknown Pleasures, both Hook and Sumner were unhappy with the production. Hook said that when he heard the final mix of "Atrocity Exhibition" he was disappointed that the abrasiveness had been toned down. He wrote; "I was like, head in hands, 'Oh fucking hell, it's happening again ... Martin had fucking melted the guitar with his Marshall Time Waster. Made it sound like someone strangling a cat and, to my mind, absolutely killed the song. I was so annoyed with him and went in and gave him a piece of my mind but he just turned round and told me to fuck off."
Curtis' suicide and aftermath
Joy Division were scheduled to commence their first US/Canada tour in May 1980. Curtis had expressed enthusiasm about the tour, but his relationship with his wife, Deborah, was under strain; Deborah was excluded from the band's inner circle, and Curtis was having an affair with Belgian journalist and music promoter Annik Honoré, whom he met on tour in Europe in 1979. He was also anxious about how American audiences would react to his epilepsy.
The evening before the band were due to depart for America, Curtis returned to his Macclesfield home to talk to Deborah. He asked her to drop an impending divorce suit, and asked her to leave him alone in the house until he caught a train to Manchester the following morning. Early on 18 May 1980, having spent the night watching the Werner Herzog film Stroszek, Curtis hanged himself in his kitchen. Deborah discovered his body later that day when she returned.
The suicide shocked the band and their management. In 2005, Wilson said: "I think all of us made the mistake of not thinking his suicide was going to happen ... We all completely underestimated the danger. We didn't take it seriously. That's how stupid we were." Music critic Simon Reynolds said Curtis's suicide "made for instant myth". Jon Savage's obituary said that "now no one will remember what his work with Joy Division was like when he was alive; it will be perceived as tragic rather than courageous". In June 1980, Joy Division's single "Love Will Tear Us Apart" was released, which hit number thirteen on the UK Singles Chart. In July 1980, Closer was released, and peaked at number six on the UK Albums Chart. NME reviewer Charles Shaar Murray wrote, "Closer is as magnificent a memorial (for 'Joy Division' as much as for Ian Curtis) as any post-Presley popular musician could have."
Morris said that even without Curtis's death, it is unlikely that Joy Division would have endured. The members had made a pact long before Curtis's death that, should any member leave, the remaining members would change the band name. The band re-formed as New Order, with Sumner on vocals; they later recruited Morris's girlfriend Gillian Gilbert as keyboardist and second guitarist. Gilbert had befriended the band and played guitar at a Joy Division performance when Curtis had been unable to play.
New Order's debut single, "Ceremony" (1981), was formed from the last two songs written with Curtis. New Order struggled in their early years to escape the shadow of Joy Division, but went on to achieve far greater commercial success with a different, more upbeat and dance-orientated sound.
Various Joy Division outtakes and live material have been released. Still, featuring live tracks and rare recordings, was issued in 1981. Factory issued the Substance compilation in 1988, including several out-of-print singles. Permanent was released in 1995 by London Records, which had acquired the Joy Division catalogue after Factory's 1992 bankruptcy. A comprehensive box set, Heart and Soul, appeared in 1997.
Musical style
Sound
Joy Division took time to develop their style and quickly evolved from their punk roots. Their sound during their early inception as Warsaw was described as fairly generic and "undistinguished punk-inflected hard-rock". Critic Simon Reynolds observed how the band's originality only "really became apparent as the songs got slower", and their music took on a "sparse" quality. According to Reynolds, "Hook's bass carried the melody, Bernard Sumner's guitar left gaps rather than filling up the group's sound with dense riffage and Steve Morris' drums seemed to circle the rim of a crater." According to music critic Jon Savage, "Joy Division were not punk but they were directly inspired by its energy". In 1994 Sumner said the band's characteristic sound "came out naturally: I'm more rhythm and chords, and Hooky was melody. He used to play high lead bass because I liked my guitar to sound distorted, and the amplifier I had would only work when it was at full volume. When Hooky played low, he couldn't hear himself. Steve has his own style which is different to other drummers. To me, a drummer in the band is the clock, but Steve wouldn't be the clock, because he's passive: he would follow the rhythm of the band, which gave us our own edge." By Closer, Curtis had adapted a low baritone voice, drawing comparisons to Jim Morrison of the Doors (one of Curtis's favourite bands).
Sumner largely acted as the band's director, a role he continued in New Order. While Sumner was the group's primary guitarist, Curtis played the instrument on a few recorded songs and during a few shows. Curtis hated playing guitar, but the band insisted he do so. Sumner said, "He played in quite a bizarre way and that to us was interesting, because no one else would play like Ian". During the recording sessions for Closer, Sumner began using self-built synthesisers and Hook used a six-string bass for more melody.
Producer Martin Hannett "dedicated himself to capturing and intensifying Joy Division's eerie spatiality". Hannett believed punk rock was sonically conservative because of its refusal to use studio technology to create sonic space. The producer instead aimed to create a more expansive sound on the group's records. Hannett said, "[Joy Division] were a gift to a producer, because they didn't have a clue. They didn't argue". Hannett demanded clean and clear "sound separation" not only for individual instruments, but even for individual pieces of Morris's drumkit. Morris recalled, "Typically on tracks he considered to be potential singles, he'd get me to play each drum on its own to avoid any bleed-through of sound". Music journalist Richard Cook noted that Hannett's role was "crucial". There are "devices of distance" in his production and "the sound is an illusion of physicality".
Lyrics
Curtis was the band's sole lyricist, and he typically composed his lyrics in a notebook, independently of the eventual music to evolve. The music itself was largely written by Sumner and Hook as the group jammed during rehearsals. Curtis's imagery and word choice often referenced "coldness, pressure, darkness, crisis, failure, collapse, loss of control". In 1979, NME journalist Paul Rambali wrote, "The themes of Joy Division's music are sorrowful, painful and sometimes deeply sad." Music journalist Jon Savage wrote that "Curtis's great lyrical achievement was to capture the underlying reality of a society in turmoil, and to make it both universal and personal," while noting that "the lyrics reflected, in mood and approach, his interest in romantic and science-fiction literature." Critic Robert Palmer wrote that William S. Burroughs and J. G. Ballard were "obvious influences" to Curtis, and Morris also remembered the singer reading T. S. Eliot. Deborah Curtis also remembered Curtis reading works by writers such as Fyodor Dostoevsky, Friedrich Nietzsche, Jean-Paul Sartre, Franz Kafka, and Hermann Hesse.
Curtis was unwilling to explain the meaning behind his lyrics and Joy Division releases were absent of any lyric sheets. He told the fanzine Printed Noise, "We haven't got a message really; the lyrics are open to interpretation. They're multidimensional. You can read into them what you like." The other Joy Division members have said that at the time, they paid little attention to the contents of Curtis' lyrics. In a 1987 interview with Option, Morris said that they "just thought the songs were sort of sympathetic and more uplifting than depressing. But everyone's got their own opinion." Deborah Curtis recalled that only with the release of Closer did many who were close to the singer realise "[h]is intentions and feelings were all there within the lyrics". The surviving members regret not seeing the warning signs in Curtis's lyrics. Morris said that "it was only after Ian died that we sat down and listened to the lyrics...you'd find yourself thinking, 'Oh my God, I missed this one'. Because I'd look at Ian's lyrics and think how clever he was putting himself in the position of someone else. I never believed he was writing about himself. Looking back, how could I have been so bleedin' stupid? Of course he was writing about himself. But I didn't go in and grab him and ask, 'What's up?' I have to live with that".
Live performances
In contrast to the sound of their studio recordings, Joy Division typically played loudly and aggressively during live performances. The band were especially unhappy with Hannett's mix of Unknown Pleasures, which reduced the abrasiveness of their live sound for a more cerebral and ghostly sound. According to Sumner "the music was loud and heavy, and we felt that Martin had toned it down, especially with the guitars".
During their live performances, the group did not interact with the audience; according to Paul Morley, "During a Joy Division set, outside of the songs, you'll be lucky to hear more than two or three words. Hello and goodbye. No introductions, no promotion." Curtis would often perform what became known as his "'dead fly' dance", as if imitating a seizure; his arms would "start flying in [a] semicircular, hypnotic curve". Simon Reynolds noted that Curtis's dancing style was reminiscent of an epileptic fit, and that he was dancing in the manner for some months before he was diagnosed with epilepsy. Live performances became problematic for Joy Division, due to Curtis's condition. Sumner later said, "We didn't have flashing lights, but sometimes a particular drum beat would do something to him. He'd go off in a trance for a bit, then he'd lose it and have an epileptic fit. We'd have to stop the show and carry him off to the dressing room where he'd cry his eyes out because this appalling thing had just happened to him".
Influences
Sumner wrote that Curtis was inspired by artists such as the Doors, Iggy Pop, David Bowie, Kraftwerk, the Velvet Underground and Neu!. Hook has also related that Curtis was particularly influenced by Iggy Pop's stage persona. The group were inspired by Kraftwerk's "marriage between humans and machines", and the inventiveness of their electronic music. Joy Division played Trans-Europe Express through the PA before they went on stage, "to get a momentum". Bowie's "Berlin Trilogy" elaborated with Brian Eno, influenced them; the "cold austerity" of the synthesisers on the b-sides of Heroes and Low albums, was a "music looking at the future". Morris cited the "unique style" of Velvet Underground's Maureen Tucker and the motorik drum beats, from Neu! and Can. Morris also credited Siouxsie and the Banshees because their "first drummer Kenny Morris played mostly toms" and "the sound of cymbals was forbidden". Hook said that "Siouxsie and the Banshees were one of our big influences ... The way the guitarist and the drummer played was a really unusual way of playing". Hook drew inspiration from the style of bassist Jean-Jacques Burnel and his early material with the Stranglers; he also credited Carol Kaye and her musical basslines on early 1970s work of the Temptations. Sumner mentioned "the raw, nasty, unpolished edge" in the guitars of the Rolling Stones, the simple riff of "Vicious" on Lou Reed's Transformer, and Neil Young. His musical horizon went up a notch with Jimi Hendrix, he realised "it wasn't about little catchy tunes ... it was what you could do sonically with a guitar."
Legacy
Despite their short career, Joy Division have exerted a wide-reaching influence. John Bush of AllMusic argues that Joy Division "became the first band in the post-punk movement by ... emphasizing not anger and energy but mood and expression, pointing ahead to the rise of melancholy alternative music in the '80s."
Joy Division have influenced bands including their contemporaries the Cure and U2, to later acts such as Bloc Party, Editors, Interpol, The Proclaimers, and Soundgarden. In 1980, U2 singer Bono said that Joy Division were "one of the most important bands of the last four or five years". Rapper Danny Brown named his album Atrocity Exhibition after the Joy Division song, whose title was partially inspired by the 1970 J. G. Ballard collection of condensed novels of the same name. In 2005 both New Order and Joy Division were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame.
The band's dark and gloomy sound, which Martin Hannett described in 1979 as "dancing music with Gothic overtones", presaged the gothic rock genre. While the term "gothic" originally described a "doomy atmosphere" in music of the late 1970s, the term was soon applied to specific bands like Bauhaus that followed in the wake of Joy Division and Siouxsie and the Banshees. Standard musical fixtures of early gothic rock bands included "high-pitched post-Joy Division basslines usurp[ing] the melodic role" and "vocals that were either near operatic and Teutonic or deep, droning alloys of Jim Morrison and Ian Curtis."
Joy Division have been dramatised in two biopics. 24 Hour Party People (2002) is a fictionalised account of Factory Records in which members of the band appear as supporting characters. Tony Wilson said of the film, "It's all true, it's all not true. It's not a fucking documentary," and that he favoured the "myth" over the truth. The 2007 film Control, directed by Anton Corbijn, is a biography of Ian Curtis (portrayed by Sam Riley) that uses Deborah Curtis's biography of her late husband, Touching from a Distance (1995), as its basis. Control had its international premiere on the opening night of Director's Fortnight at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival, where it was critically well received. That year Grant Gee directed the band documentary Joy Division.
Band members
Ian Curtis – lead vocals, guitar, melodica (1976–1980)
Bernard Sumner – lead guitar, keyboards, backing vocals, bass (1976–1980)
Peter Hook – bass, backing vocals, guitar (1976–1980)
Terry Mason – drums (1976–1977)
Tony Tabac – drums (1977)
Steve Brotherdale – drums (1977)
Stephen Morris – drums, percussion (1977–1980)
Timeline
Discography
Unknown Pleasures (1979)
Closer (1980)
References
Works cited
Further reading
External links
1976 establishments in England
1980 disestablishments in England
English gothic rock groups
English post-punk music groups
English new wave musical groups
Enigma Records artists
Factory Records artists
Music in Salford
Musical groups disestablished in 1980
Musical groups established in 1976
Musical groups from Greater Manchester
Musical quartets
New Order (band)
Qwest Records artists
Virgin Records artists | true | [
"\"East Side Story\" is an early Bob Seger single. It was Seger's first single with his group The Last Heard, marking his departure from Doug Brown and the Omens and the beginning of his own career. The song reached #3 on the Detroit charts.\n\nHistory \nSeger had originally written the song for a local Detroit band called the Underdogs, managed by Edward \"Punch\" Andrews along with Seger. Andrews was looking for a song for the Underdogs to follow up their successful \"Man in the Glass\", so Doug Brown and Seger each wrote a song. Seger recalls: \"They liked what I wrote, which was 'East Side Story.' But they didn't like the way the Underdogs did it. So we recorded it ourselves, and then Doug and I went our own ways. I started my own band.\" Members of both the Omens and Seger's own Town Criers played on the studio version. The single, which cost $1,200 to make, sold 50,000 copies. Seger made his television debut performing this song on the show Swingin' Time, hosted by Robin Seymour.\n\nReferences \n\n1966 songs\nBob Seger songs\nSongs written by Bob Seger\n1966 singles",
"\"Sexual Guarantee\" is a 2000 song by Swedish band Alcazar. It was released as the fourth single from their debut studio album, Casino (2000) and samples Chic's 1979 hit \"My Forbidden Lover\". The song got many good reviews, but failed to make much of an impact on the charts across Europe. While a favorite of radio stations, it lacked the success of their previous single.\n\nChart performance\nThe single was released in Europe, but in different formats and sleeves. For instance England once again made their own sleeves and used their own Alcazar logo. Alcazar's Record Company BMG, in the UK made big effort in promoting Sexual Guarantee. Several promotion posters had been made all across London. And even one of them used the slogan 'Bye Bye Steps, Welcome Alcazar', referring to the sudden disappearance of British pop band Steps. .\n\nThe first country to release the single was Sweden and Finland and then the rest of Europe followed. Some territories weren't too sure about releasing this track as a single because of the explicit title. Australia for example never did - they released a cover of The Human League's \"Don't You Want Me\" instead.\n\nFormats and track listings\nThese are the formats and track listings of promotional single releases of \"Sexual Guarantee\".\n\n CD single\n\"Original Version\" - 3:34\n\"Johan S Vocal Club Mix\" - 5:25\n\"Fu-Tourist Remix\" - 5:35\n\"Johan S Dub Mix\" - 7:27\n\n Cassette single\n\"Original Version\" - 3:34\n\"Fu-Tourist Remix\" - 5:35\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nNu-disco songs\nAlcazar (band) songs\n2000 songs\n2001 singles\nSongs about sexuality\nSongs written by Alexander Bard\nSongs written by Anders Hansson (songwriter)"
] |
[
"Leonard Bernstein",
"Influence and characteristics as a conductor"
] | C_2e4ae84d3c6444c9a25724baadcf9a53_0 | What are Leonard's characteristics as conductor? | 1 | What are Leonard's characteristics as conductor? | Leonard Bernstein | Bernstein recorded extensively from the mid-1940s until just a few months before his death. Aside from those 1940s recordings, which were made for RCA Victor, Bernstein recorded primarily for Columbia Masterworks Records, especially when he was music director of the New York Philharmonic between 1958 and 1971. His typical pattern of recording at that time was to record major works in the studio immediately after they were presented in the orchestra's subscription concerts or on one of the Young People's Concerts, with any spare time used to record short orchestral showpieces and similar works. Many of these performances were digitally remastered and reissued by Sony as part of their 100 Volume, 125 CDs "Royal Edition" and their later "Bernstein Century" series. In 2010 many of these recordings were repackaged in a 60 CD "Bernstein Symphony Edition". His later recordings (starting with Bizet's Carmen in 1972) were mostly made for Deutsche Grammophon, though he would occasionally return to the Columbia Masterworks label. Notable exceptions include recordings of Gustav Mahler's Song of the Earth and Mozart's 15th piano concerto and "Linz" symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra for Decca Records (1966); Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique and Harold in Italy (1976) for EMI; and Wagner's Tristan und Isolde (1981) for Philips Records, a label that like Deutsche Grammophon was part of PolyGram at that time. Unlike his studio recordings for Columbia Masterworks, most of his later Deutsche Grammophon recordings were taken from live concerts (or edited together from several concerts with additional sessions to correct errors). Many replicate repertoire that he recorded in the 1950s and 60s. In addition to his audio recordings, many of Bernstein's concerts from the 1970s onwards were recorded on motion picture film by the German film company Unitel. This included a complete cycle of the Mahler symphonies (with the Vienna Philharmonic and London Symphony Orchestra), as well as complete cycles of the Beethoven, Brahms and Schumann symphonies recorded at the same series of concerts as the audio recordings by Deutsche Grammophon. Many of these films appeared on Laserdisc and are now on DVD. In total Bernstein was awarded 16 Grammys for his recordings in various categories, including several for posthumously released recordings. He was also awarded a Lifetime Achievement Grammy in 1985. CANNOTANSWER | 1971. His typical pattern of recording at that time was to record major works in the studio immediately after they were presented in the orchestra's subscription concerts | Leonard Bernstein ( ; August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, pianist, music educator, author, and humanitarian. Among the most important conductors of his time, he was also the first American conductor to receive international acclaim. According to music critic Donal Henahan, he was "one of the most prodigiously talented and successful musicians in American history". Bernstein was the recipient of many honors, including seven Emmy Awards, two Tony Awards, sixteen Grammy Awards, including the Lifetime Achievement, and the Kennedy Center Honor.
As a composer he wrote in many genres, including symphonic and orchestral music, ballet, film and theatre music, choral works, opera, chamber music and works for the piano. His best-known work is the Broadway musical West Side Story, which continues to be regularly performed worldwide, and has been adapted into two (1961 and 2021) feature films. His works include three symphonies, Chichester Psalms, Serenade after Plato's "Symposium", the original score for the film On the Waterfront, and theater works including On the Town, Wonderful Town, Candide, and his MASS.
Bernstein was the first American-born conductor to lead a major American symphony orchestra. He was music director of the New York Philharmonic and conducted the world's major orchestras, generating a significant legacy of audio and video recordings. He was also a critical figure in the modern revival of the music of Gustav Mahler, in whose music he was most passionately interested. A skilled pianist, he often conducted piano concertos from the keyboard. He was the first conductor to share and explore music on television with a mass audience. Through dozens of national and international broadcasts, including the Emmy Award–winning Young People's Concerts with the New York Philharmonic, he made even the most rigorous elements of classical music an adventure in which everyone could join. Through his educational efforts, including several books and the creation of two major international music festivals, he influenced several generations of young musicians.
A lifelong humanitarian, Bernstein worked in support of civil rights; protested against the Vietnam War; advocated for nuclear disarmament; raised money for HIV/AIDS research and awareness; and engaged in multiple international initiatives for human rights and world peace. Near the end of his life, he conducted a historic performance of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 in Berlin to celebrate the fall of the Berlin Wall. The concert was televised live, worldwide, on Christmas Day, 1989.
Early life and education
1918–1934: Early life and family
Born Louis Bernstein in Lawrence, Massachusetts, he was the son of Ukrainian-Jewish parents, Jennie (née Resnick) and Samuel Joseph Bernstein, both of whom immigrated to the United States from Rovno (now Ukraine). His grandmother insisted that his first name be Louis, but his parents always called him Leonard. He legally changed his name to Leonard when he was eighteen, shortly after his grandmother's death. To his friends and many others he was simply known as "Lenny".
His father was the owner of The Samuel Bernstein Hair and Beauty Supply Company. It held the New England franchise for the Frederick's Permanent Wave Machine, whose immense popularity helped Sam get his family through The Great Depression.
In Leonard's early youth, his only exposure to music was the household radio and music on Friday nights at Congregation Mishkan Tefila in Roxbury, Massachusetts. When Leonard was ten years old, Samuel's sister Clara deposited her upright piano at her brother's house. Bernstein began teaching himself piano and music theory and was soon clamoring for lessons. He had a variety of piano teachers in his youth, including Helen Coates, who later became his secretary. In the summers, the Bernstein family would go to their vacation home in Sharon, Massachusetts, where young Leonard conscripted all the neighborhood children to put on shows ranging from Bizet's Carmen to Gilbert and Sullivan's The Pirates of Penzance. He would often play entire operas or Beethoven symphonies with his younger sister Shirley.
Leonard's youngest sibling Burton was born in 1932, thirteen years after Leonard. Despite the large span in age, the three siblings remained close their entire lives.
Sam was initially opposed to young Leonard's interest in music and attempted to discourage his son's interest by refusing to pay for his piano lessons. Leonard then took to giving lessons to young people in his neighborhood. One of his students, Sid Ramin, became Bernstein's most frequent orchestrator and lifelong beloved friend.
Sam took his son to orchestral concerts in his teenage years and eventually supported his music education. In May 1932, Leonard attended his first orchestral concert with the Boston Pops Orchestra conducted by Arthur Fiedler. Bernstein recalled, "To me, in those days, the Pops was heaven itself ... I thought ... it was the supreme achievement of the human race." It was at this concert that Bernstein first heard Ravel's Boléro, which made a tremendous impression on him.
Another strong musical influence was George Gershwin. Bernstein was a counselor at a summer camp when news came over the radio of Gershwin's death. In the mess hall, a shaken Bernstein demanded a moment of silence, and then played Gershwin's second Prelude as a memorial.
On March 30, 1932, Bernstein played Brahms's Rhapsody in G Minor at his first public piano performance in Susan Williams's studio recital at the New England Conservatory. Two years later, he made his solo debut with orchestra in Grieg's Piano Concerto in A Minor with the Boston Public School Orchestra.
1935–1940: College years
Bernstein's first two education environments were both public schools: the William Lloyd Garrison School, followed by the prestigious Boston Latin School, for which Bernstein and classmate Lawrence F. Ebb wrote the Class Song.
Harvard University
In 1935, Bernstein enrolled at Harvard University, where he studied music with, among others, Edward Burlingame Hill and Walter Piston. His first extant composition, Psalm 148 set for voice and piano, is dated in 1935. He majored in music with a final year thesis titled "The Absorption of Race Elements into American Music" (1939; reproduced in his book Findings). One of Bernstein's intellectual influences at Harvard was the aesthetics Professor David Prall, whose multidisciplinary outlook on the arts inspired Bernstein for the rest of his life.
One of his friends at Harvard was future philosopher Donald Davidson, with whom Bernstein played piano duets. Bernstein wrote and conducted the musical score for the production Davidson mounted of Aristophanes' play The Birds, performed in the original Greek. Bernstein recycled some of this music in future works.
While a student, he was briefly an accompanist for the Harvard Glee Club as well as an unpaid pianist for Harvard Film Society's silent film presentations.
Bernstein mounted a student production of The Cradle Will Rock, directing its action from the piano as the composer Marc Blitzstein had done at the infamous premiere. Blitzstein, who attended the performance, subsequently became a close friend and mentor to Bernstein.
As a sophomore at Harvard, Bernstein met the conductor Dimitri Mitropoulos. Mitropoulos's charisma and power as a musician were major influences on Bernstein's eventual decision to become a conductor. Mitropoulos invited Bernstein to come to Minneapolis for the 1940–41 season to be his assistant, but the plan fell through due to union issues.
Bernstein met Aaron Copland on the latter's birthday in 1937; the elder composer was sitting next to Bernstein at a dance recital at Town Hall in New York City. Copland invited Bernstein to his birthday party afterwards, where Bernstein impressed the guests by playing Copland's challenging Piano Variations, a work Bernstein loved. Although he was never a formal student of Copland's, Bernstein would regularly seek his advice, often citing him as his "only real composition teacher".
Bernstein graduated from Harvard in 1939 with a Bachelor of Arts cum laude.
Curtis Institute of Music
After graduating from Harvard, Bernstein enrolled at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. At Curtis, Bernstein studied conducting with Fritz Reiner (who anecdotally is said to have given Bernstein the only "A" grade he ever awarded); piano with Isabelle Vengerova; orchestration with Randall Thompson; counterpoint with Richard Stöhr; and score reading with Renée Longy Miquelle.
In 1940, Bernstein attended the inaugural year of the Tanglewood Music Center (then called the Berkshire Music Center) at the Boston Symphony Orchestra's summer home. Bernstein studied conducting with the BSO's music director, Serge Koussevitzky, who became a profound lifelong inspiration to Bernstein. He became Koussevitzky's conducting assistant at Tanglewood and later dedicated his Symphony No. 2: The Age of Anxiety to his beloved mentor. One of Bernstein's classmates, both at Curtis and at Tanglewood, was Lukas Foss, who remained a lifelong friend and colleague. Bernstein returned to Tanglewood nearly every summer for the rest of his life to teach and conduct the young music students.
Life and career
The 1940s
Soon after he left Curtis, Bernstein moved to New York City where he lived in various apartments in Manhattan. Bernstein supported himself by coaching singers, teaching piano, and playing the piano for dance classes in Carnegie Hall. He found work with Harms-Witmark, transcribing jazz and pop music and publishing his work under the pseudonym "Lenny Amber". (Bernstein means "amber" in German.)
Bernstein briefly shared an apartment in Greenwich Village with his friend Adolph Green. Green was part of a satirical music troupe called The Revuers, featuring Betty Comden and Judy Holliday. With Bernstein sometimes providing piano accompaniment, the Revuers often performed at the legendary jazz club the Village Vanguard.
On April 21, 1942, Bernstein performed the premiere of his first published work, Sonata for Clarinet and Piano, with clarinetist David Glazer at the Institute of Modern Art in Boston.
New York Philharmonic conducting debut
On November 14, 1943, having recently been appointed assistant conductor to Artur Rodziński of the New York Philharmonic, Bernstein made his major conducting debut at short notice—and without any rehearsal—after guest conductor Bruno Walter came down with the flu. The challenging program included works by Robert Schumann, Miklós Rózsa, Richard Wagner, and Richard Strauss.
The next day, The New York Times carried the story on its front page and remarked in an editorial, "It's a good American success story. The warm, friendly triumph of it filled Carnegie Hall and spread far over the air waves."
Many newspapers throughout the country carried the story, which, in combination with the concert's live national CBS Radio Network broadcast, propelled Bernstein to instant fame.
Over the next two years, Bernstein made conducting debuts with ten different orchestras in the United States and Canada, greatly broadening his repertoire and initiating a lifelong frequent practice of conducting concertos from the piano.
Symphony No. 1: Jeremiah, Fancy Free, and On the Town
On January 28, 1944, he conducted the premiere of his Symphony No. 1: Jeremiah with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra with Jennie Tourel as soloist.
In the fall of 1943, Bernstein and Jerome Robbins began work on their first collaboration, Fancy Free, a ballet about three young sailors on leave in wartime New York City. Fancy Free premiered on April 18, 1944, with the Ballet Theatre (now the American Ballet Theatre) at the old Metropolitan Opera House, with scenery by Oliver Smith and costumes by Kermit Love.
Bernstein and Robbins decided to expand the ballet into a musical and invited Comden and Green to write the book and lyrics. On the Town opened on Broadway's Adelphi Theatre on December 28, 1944. The show resonated with audiences during World War II, and it broke race barriers on Broadway: Japanese-American dancer Sono Osato in a leading role; a multiracial cast dancing as mixed race couples; and a Black concertmaster, Everett Lee, who eventually took over as music director of the show. On the Town became an MGM motion picture in 1949, starring Gene Kelly, Frank Sinatra, and Jules Munshin as the three sailors. Only part of Bernstein's score was used in the film and additional songs were provided by Roger Edens.
Rising conducting career
From 1945 to 1947, Bernstein was the music director of the New York City Symphony, which had been founded the previous year by the conductor Leopold Stokowski. The orchestra (with support from Mayor Fiorello La Guardia) had modern programs and affordable tickets.
In 1946, he made his overseas debut with the Czech Philharmonic in Prague. He also recorded Ravel's Piano Concerto in G as soloist and conductor with the Philharmonia Orchestra. On July 4, 1946, Bernstein conducted the European premiere of Fancy Free with the Ballet Theatre at the Royal Opera House in London.
In 1946, he conducted opera professionally for the first time at Tanglewood with the American premiere of Benjamin Britten's Peter Grimes, which was commissioned by Koussevitzky. That same year, Arturo Toscanini invited Bernstein to guest conduct two concerts with the NBC Symphony Orchestra, one of which also featured Bernstein as soloist in Ravel's Piano Concerto in G.
Israel Philharmonic Orchestra
In 1947, Bernstein conducted in Tel Aviv for the first time, beginning a lifelong association with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, then known as the Palestine Symphony Orchestra. The next year he conducted an open-air concert for Israeli troops at Beersheba in the middle of the desert during the Arab-Israeli war. In 1957, he conducted the inaugural concert of the Mann Auditorium in Tel Aviv. In 1967, he conducted a concert on Mount Scopus to commemorate the Reunification of Jerusalem, featuring Mahler's Symphony No. 2 and Mendelssohn Violin Concerto with soloist Isaac Stern. During the 1970s, Bernstein recorded his symphonies and other works with the Israel Philharmonic on Deutsche Grammophon. The city of Tel Aviv added his name to the Orchestra Plaza in the center of the city.
First television appearance
On December 10, 1949, he made his first television appearance as conductor with the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Carnegie Hall. The concert, which also included an address by Eleanor Roosevelt, celebrated the one-year anniversary of the United Nations General Assembly's ratification of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and included the premiere of Aaron Copland's "Preamble" with Sir Laurence Olivier narrating text from the UN Charter. The concert was televised by NBC Television Network.
Summer at Tanglewood
In April 1949, Bernstein performed as piano soloist in the world premiere of his Symphony No. 2: The Age of Anxiety with Koussevitzy conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Later that year, Bernstein conducted the world premiere of the Turangalîla-Symphonie by Olivier Messiaen, with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Part of the rehearsal for the concert was recorded and released by the orchestra. When Koussevitzky died in 1951, Bernstein became head of the orchestra and conducting departments at Tanglewood.
The 1950s
The 1950s comprised among the most active years of Bernstein's career. He created five new works for the Broadway stage; he composed several symphonic works and an iconic film score; he was appointed music director of the New York Philharmonic with whom he toured the world, including concerts behind the Iron Curtain; he harnessed the power of television to expand his educational reach; and he married and started a family.
Compositions in the 1950s
Theatrical works
Peter Pan
In 1950, Bernstein composed incidental music for a Broadway production of J. M. Barrie's play Peter Pan. The production, which opened on Broadway on April 24, 1950, starred Jean Arthur as Peter Pan and Boris Karloff in the dual roles of George Darling and Captain Hook. The show ran for 321 performances.
Trouble in Tahiti
In 1951, Bernstein composed Trouble in Tahiti, a one-act opera in seven scenes with an English libretto by the composer. The opera portrays the troubled marriage of a couple whose idyllic suburban post-war environment belies their inner turmoil. Ironically, Bernstein wrote most of the opera while on his honeymoon in Mexico with his wife, Felicia Montealegre.
Bernstein was a visiting music professor at Brandeis University from 1951 to 1956. In 1952, he created the Brandeis Festival of the Creative Arts, where he conducted the premiere of Trouble in Tahiti on June 12 of that year.
The NBC Opera Theatre subsequently presented the opera on television in November 1952. It opened on Broadway at the Playhouse Theatre on April 19, 1955 and ran for six weeks.
Three decades later, Bernstein wrote a second opera, A Quiet Place, which picked up the story and characters of Trouble in Tahiti in a later period.
Wonderful Town
In 1953, Bernstein wrote the score for the musical Wonderful Town on very short notice, with a book by Joseph A. Fields and Jerome Chodorov and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green. The musical tells the story of two sisters from Ohio who move to New York City and seek success from their squalid basement apartment in Greenwich Village.
Wonderful Town opened on Broadway on February 25, 1953 at the Winter Garden Theatre, starring Rosalind Russell in the role of Ruth Sherwood, Edie Adams as Eileen Sherwood, and George Gaynes as Robert Baker. It won five Tony Awards, including Best Musical and Best Actress.
Candide
In the three years leading up to Bernstein's appointment as music director of the New York Philharmonic, Bernstein was simultaneously working on the scores for two Broadway shows. The first of the two was the operetta-style musical Candide. Lillian Hellman originally brought Bernstein her idea of adapting Voltaire's novella. The original collaborators on the show were book writer John Latouche and lyricist Richard Wilbur.
Candide opened on Broadway on December 1, 1956 at the Martin Beck Theatre, in a production directed by Tyrone Guthrie. Anxious about the parallels Hellman had deliberately drawn between Voltaire's story and the ongoing hearings conducted by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Guthrie persuaded the collaborators to cut their most incendiary sections prior to opening night.
While the production was a box office disaster, running only two months for a total of 73 performances, the cast album became a cult classic, which kept Bernstein's score alive. The elements of the music that have remained best known and performed over the decades are the Overture, which quickly became one of the most frequently performed orchestral compositions by a 20th century American composer; the coloratura aria "Glitter and Be Gay", which Barbara Cook sang in the original production; and the grand finale "Make Our Garden Grow".
West Side Story
The other musical Bernstein was writing simultaneously with Candide was West Side Story. Bernstein collaborated with director and choreographer Jerome Robbins, book writer Arthur Laurents, and lyricist Stephen Sondheim.
The story is an updated retelling of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, set in the mid-1950s in the slums of New York City's Upper West Side. The Romeo character, Tony, is affiliated with the Jets gang, who are of white Northern European descent. The Juliet character is Maria, who is connected to the Sharks gang, recently arrived immigrants from Puerto Rico.
The original Broadway production opened at the Winter Garden Theatre on September 26, 1957, and ran 732 performances. Robbins won the Tony Award for Best Choreographer, and Oliver Smith won the Tony for Best Scenic Designer.
Bernstein's score for West Side Story blends "jazz, Latin rhythms, symphonic sweep and musical-comedy conventions in groundbreaking ways for Broadway". It was orchestrated by Sid Ramin and Irwin Kostal following detailed instructions from Bernstein. The dark theme, sophisticated music, extended dance scenes, and focus on social problems marked a turning point in musical theatre.
In 1960, Bernstein prepared a suite of orchestral music from the show, titled Symphonic Dances from West Side Story, which continues to be popular with orchestras worldwide.
A 1961 United Artists film adaptation, directed by Robert Wise and starred Natalie Wood as Maria and Richard Beymer as Tony. The film won ten Academy Awards, including Best Picture and a ground-breaking Best Supporting Actress award for Puerto Rican-born Rita Moreno playing the role of Anita.
A new film adaptation directed by Steven Spielberg opened in theaters on December 10, 2021.
Serenade, Prelude, Fugue and Riffs, and On The Waterfront
In addition to Bernstein's compositional activity for the stage, he also wrote a symphonic work, Serenade after Plato's "Symposium"; the score to the Academy Award-winning film On The Waterfront; and Prelude, Fugue and Riffs, composed for jazz big band and solo clarinet.
First American to conduct at La Scala
In 1953, Bernstein became the first American conductor to appear at La Scala in Milan, conducting Cherubini's Medea, with Maria Callas in the title role and directed by Luchino Visconti. Callas and Bernstein reunited at La Scala to perform in Bellini's La sonnambula in 1955.
Omnibus
On November 14, 1954, Bernstein presented the first of his television lectures for the CBS Television Network arts program Omnibus. The live lecture, entitled "Beethoven's Fifth Symphony", involved Bernstein explaining the symphony's first movement with the aid of musicians from the "Symphony of the Air" (formerly NBC Symphony Orchestra). The program featured manuscripts from Beethoven's own hand, as well as a giant painting of the first page of the score covering the studio floor. Six more Omnibus lectures followed from 1955 to 1961 (later on ABC and then NBC) covering a broad range of topics: jazz, conducting, American musical comedy, modern music, J.S. Bach, and grand opera.
Music director of the New York Philharmonic
Bernstein was appointed the music director of the New York Philharmonic in 1957, sharing the post jointly with Dimitri Mitropoulos until he took sole charge in 1958. Bernstein held the music directorship until 1969 when he was appointed "Laureate Conductor". He continued to conduct and make recordings with the orchestra for the rest of his life.
Young People's Concerts with the New York Philharmonic
Bernstein's television teaching took a quantum leap when, as the new music director of the New York Philharmonic, he put the orchestra's traditional Saturday afternoon Young People's Concerts on the CBS Television Network. Millions of viewers of all ages and around the world enthusiastically embraced Bernstein and his engaging presentations about classical music. Bernstein often presented talented young performers on the broadcasts. Many of them became celebrated in their own right, including conductors Claudio Abbado and Seiji Ozawa; flutist Paula Robison; and pianist André Watts. From 1958–1972, the fifty-three Young People's Concerts comprised the most influential series of music education programs ever produced on television. They were highly acclaimed by critics and won numerous Emmy Awards.
Some of Bernstein's scripts, all of which he wrote himself, were released in book form and on records. A recording of Humor in Music was awarded a Grammy award for Best Documentary or Spoken Word Recording (other than comedy) in 1961. The programs were shown in many countries around the world, often with Bernstein dubbed into other languages, and the concerts were later released on home video by Kultur Video.
United States Department of State tours
In 1958, Bernstein and Mitropoulos led the New York Philharmonic on its first tour south of the border, through 12 countries in Central and South America. The United States Department of State sponsored the tour to improve the nation's relations with its southern neighbors.
In 1959, the Department of State also sponsored Bernstein and the Philharmonic on a 50-concert tour through Europe and the Soviet Union, portions of which were filmed by the CBS Television Network. A highlight of the tour was Bernstein's performance of Shostakovich's Fifth Symphony, in the presence of the composer, who came on stage at the end to congratulate Bernstein and the musicians.
The 1960s
New York Philharmonic Innovations
Bernstein's innovative approach to themed programming included introducing audiences to lesser performed composers at the time such as Gustav Mahler, Carl Nielsen, Jean Sibelius, and Charles Ives (including the world premiere of his Symphony No. 2). Bernstein actively advocated for the commission and performance of works by contemporary composers, conducting over 40 world premieres by a diverse roster of composers ranging from John Cage to Alberto Ginastera to Luciano Berio. He also conducted US premieres of 19 major works from around the globe, including works by Dmitri Shostakovich, Pierre Boulez, and György Ligeti.
Bernstein championed American composers, especially with whom he had a close friendship, such as Aaron Copland, William Schuman, and David Diamond. This decade saw a significant expansion of Bernstein and the Philharmonic's collaboration with Columbia Records, together they released over 400 compositions, covering a broad swath of the classical music canon.
Bernstein welcomed the Philharmonic's additions of its first Black musician, Sanford Allen, and its second woman musician, Orin O'Brien. Bernstein also shared the Philharmonic’s commitment to connecting with as many New Yorkers as possible. That vision became a reality with the launch of the Concerts in the Parks in 1965, which Bernstein conducted often.
Another milestone was the Philharmonic’s first visit to Japan in 1961, when Bernstein led acclaimed Philharmonic concerts and engaged in cultural exchange. Over the years he led the Orchestra on tours to 144 cities in 38 countries.
He initiated the Philharmonic's informal Thursday Evening Preview Concerts, which included Bernstein's talks from the stage, a practice that was unheard of at the time.
In one oft-reported incident, on April 6, 1962, Bernstein appeared on stage before a performance of the Brahms Piano Concerto No. 1 in D Minor to explain that the soloist, Glenn Gould, had chosen an idiosyncratic approach to the work. Bernstein explained that while he didn't totally agree with it, he thought Gould's interpretation was an artistically worthy exploration. Bernstein questioned: "In a concerto, who is the boss: the soloist or the conductor?" The incident created a stir that reverberated in the press for decades.
Bernstein and Mahler
In 1960, Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic introduced American audiences to the music of Gustav Mahler, beginning with a festival marking the centennial of the composer's birth. The composer's widow, Alma, attended some of Bernstein's rehearsals. In that same year, Bernstein made his first commercial recording of a Mahler symphony (the Fourth). Over the next seven years, he recorded the entire Mahler symphony cycle with the New York Philharmonic (except for the 8th Symphony, which was recorded with the London Symphony Orchestra).
The combination of concert performances, television talks, and recordings led to a renewed interest in Mahler, especially in the United States. Bernstein claimed that he identified with the works on a personal level, and once wrote of the composer: "I'm so sympathetic to Mahler: I understand his problem. It's like being two different men locked up in the same body; one man is a conductor and the other a composer ... It's like being a double man."
Opening Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
On May 14, 1959, President Dwight D. Eisenhower broke ground for Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. On September 23, 1962, the New York Philharmonic moved from Carnegie Hall to its new home, Philharmonic Hall (now David Geffen Hall). Bernstein conducted the gala opening concert featuring works by Mahler, Beethoven and Vaughan Williams, as well as the premiere of Aaron Copland's Connotations.
Metropolitan Opera debut
In 1964, Bernstein conducted at The Metropolitan Opera for the first time in Franco Zeffirelli's production of Verdi's Falstaff. In subsequent years, Bernstein returned to The Met to conduct Cavalleria Rusticana (1970) and Carmen (1972), as well as at the Centennial Gala in 1983.
An Artist's Response to Violence
In 1961, Bernstein had conducted at President John F. Kennedy's pre-inaugural gala, and he was an occasional guest in the White House. Years later he conducted at the funeral mass in 1968 for President Kennedy's brother Robert F. Kennedy, featuring the Adagietto from Mahler's 5th Symphony. Jackie Kennedy famously wrote to Bernstein after the event: "When your Mahler started to fill (but that is the wrong word — because it was more this sensitive trembling) the Cathedral today — I thought it the most beautiful music I had ever heard".
On November 23, 1963, the day after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Bernstein conducted the New York Philharmonic and the Schola Cantorum of New York in a nationally televised memorial featuring the "Resurrection Symphony" by Gustav Mahler. This was the first televised performance of the complete symphony. Mahler's music had never been performed for such an event, and since the tribute to JFK, Mahler symphonies have become part of the Philharmonic's standard repertoire for national mourning.
Kaddish and Chichester Psalms
With his commitment to the New York Philharmonic and his many other activities, Bernstein had little time for composition during the 1960s. The two major works he produced at this time were his Kaddish Symphony, dedicated to the recently assassinated President John F. Kennedy, and the Chichester Psalms, which he produced during a sabbatical year he took from the Philharmonic in 1965 to concentrate on composition. Wanting to make more time for composition was probably a major factor in his decision to step down as music director of the Philharmonic in 1969, and to never again accept such a position elsewhere.
International conductor
In 1966, he made his debut at the Vienna State Opera conducting Luchino Visconti's production of the same opera with Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau as Falstaff. During his time in Vienna he also recorded the opera for Columbia Records and conducted his first subscription concert with the Vienna Philharmonic (which is made up of players from the Vienna State Opera) featuring Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde with Fischer-Dieskau and James King. He returned to the State Opera in 1968 for a production of Der Rosenkavalier and in 1970 for Otto Schenk's production of Beethoven's Fidelio.
After stepping down from the New York Philharmonic, Bernstein continued to appear with them in most years until his death, and he toured with them to Europe in 1976 and to Asia in 1979. He also strengthened his relationship with the Vienna Philharmonic—he conducted all nine completed Mahler symphonies with them (plus the Adagio from the 10th) in the period from 1967 to 1976. All of these were filmed for Unitel with the exception of the 1967 Mahler 2nd, which instead Bernstein filmed with the London Symphony Orchestra in Ely Cathedral in 1973. In the late 1970s Bernstein conducted a complete Beethoven symphony cycle with the Vienna Philharmonic, and cycles of Brahms and Schumann were to follow in the 1980s. Other orchestras he conducted on numerous occasions in the 1970s include the Israel Philharmonic, the Orchestre National de France, and the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
In 1970 Bernstein wrote and narrated a ninety-minute program filmed on location in and around Vienna as a celebration of Beethoven's 200th birthday. It featured parts of Bernstein's rehearsals and performance for the Otto Schenk production of Fidelio, Bernstein playing the 1st piano concerto and conducting the Ninth Symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic, with the young Plácido Domingo amongst the soloists. The program was first telecast in 1970 on Austrian and British television, and then on CBS in the U.S. on Christmas Eve 1971. The show, originally entitled Beethoven's Birthday: A Celebration in Vienna, won an Emmy and was issued on DVD in 2005. In the summer of 1970, during the Festival of London, he conducted Verdi's Requiem Mass in St. Paul's Cathedral, with the London Symphony Orchestra.
Early 1970s
Bernstein's major compositions during the 1970s were his Mass: A Theatre Piece for Singers, Players, and Dancers; his score for the ballet Dybbuk; his orchestral vocal work Songfest; and his U.S. bicentenary musical 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue written with lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner which was his first real theatrical flop, and last original Broadway show.
Mass: A Theatre Piece for Singers, Players, and Dancers
In 1966, Jacqueline Kennedy commissioned Bernstein to compose a work for the inauguration of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. Bernstein began writing Mass in 1969 as a large-scale theatrical work based on the Tridentine Mass of the Catholic Church, and in 1971, Bernstein invited the young composer and lyricist Stephen Schwartz, who had recently opened the musical Godspell off-Broadway, to collaborate as co-lyricist. The world premiere of took place on September 8, 1971, conducted by Maurice Peress and choreographed by Alvin Ailey.
Bernstein's score combines elements of musical theater, jazz, gospel, folk, rock, and symphonic music, and the libretto combines Latin and English liturgy, Hebrew prayer, and additional lyrics written by Bernstein and Schwartz.
Mass was originally criticized by both the Catholic Church and those who opposed its anti-Vietnam War message, as well as by some music critics. Viewpoints on Mass continue to evolve over time, and Edward Seckerson wrote in 2021, 50 years after its premiere: "Put simply, no other work of Bernstein's encapsulates exactly who he was as a man or as a musician; no other work displays his genius, his intellect, his musical virtuosity and innate theatricality quite like MASS."
Deutsche Grammophon recordings
In 1972, Bernstein recorded Bizet's Carmen, with Marilyn Horne in the title role and James McCracken as Don Jose, after leading several stage performances of the opera at the Metropolitan Opera. The recording was one of the first in stereo to use the original spoken dialogue between the sung portions of the opera, rather than the musical recitatives that were composed by Ernest Guiraud after Bizet's death. The recording was Bernstein's first for Deutsche Grammophon and won a Grammy.
Norton Lectures at Harvard
Bernstein was appointed in 1973 to the Charles Eliot Norton Chair as Professor of Poetry at his alma mater, Harvard University, and delivered a series of six televised lectures on music with musical examples played by the Boston Symphony Orchestra. However, these lectures were not televised until 1976. Taking the title from a Charles Ives work, he called the series The Unanswered Question; it was a set of interdisciplinary lectures in which he borrowed terminology from contemporary linguistics to analyze and compare musical construction to language. The lectures are presently available in both book and DVD form. The DVD video was not taken directly from the lectures at Harvard, rather they were recreated again at the WGBH studios for filming. This appears to be the only surviving Norton lectures series available to the general public in video format. Noam Chomsky wrote in 2007 on the Znet forums about the linguistic aspects of the lecture: "I spent some time with Bernstein during the preparation and performance of the lectures. My feeling was that he was onto something, but I couldn't really judge how significant it was."
Rostropovich
Bernstein played an instrumental role in the release of renowned cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich from the USSR in 1974. Rostropovich, a strong believer in free speech and democracy, had been officially held in disgrace; his concerts and tours both at home and abroad cancelled, and in 1972 he was prohibited to travel outside of the Soviet Union. During a trip to the USSR in 1974, Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy and his wife Joan, urged by Bernstein and others in the cultural sphere, mentioned Rostropovich's situation to Leonid Brezhnev, the Soviet Union Communist Party Leader. Two days later, Rostropovich was granted his exit visa.
SNL
Chevy Chase stated in his biography that Lorne Michaels wanted Bernstein to host Saturday Night Live in the show's first season (1975–76). Chase was seated next to Bernstein at a birthday party for Kurt Vonnegut and made the request in person. However, the pitch involved a Bernstein-conducted SNL version of West Side Story, and Bernstein was uninterested.
Felicia Montealegre Bernstein Fund of Amnesty International USA
In October 1976, Bernstein led the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and pianist Claudio Arrau in an Amnesty International Benefit Concert in Munich. To honor his late wife and to continue their joint support for human rights, Bernstein established the Felicia Montealegre Bernstein Fund of Amnesty International USA to provide aid for human rights activists with limited resources.
Late 1970s
In 1978, Bernstein returned to the Vienna State Opera to conduct a revival of the Otto Schenk production of Fidelio, now featuring Gundula Janowitz and René Kollo in the lead roles. At the same time, Bernstein made a studio recording of the opera for Deutsche Grammophon and the opera itself was filmed by Unitel and released on DVD by Deutsche Grammophon in late 2006. In May 1978, the Israel Philharmonic played two U.S. concerts under his direction to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the founding of the Orchestra under that name. On consecutive nights, the Orchestra, with the Choral Arts Society of Washington, performed Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and Bernstein's Chichester Psalms at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., and at Carnegie Hall in New York.
In 1979, Bernstein conducted the Berlin Philharmonic for the first time, in two charity concerts for Amnesty International involving performances of Mahler's Ninth Symphony. The invitation for the concerts had come from the orchestra and not from its principal conductor Herbert von Karajan. There has been speculation about why Karajan never invited Bernstein to conduct his orchestra. (Karajan did conduct the New York Philharmonic during Bernstein's tenure.) The full reasons will probably never be known—reports suggest they were on friendly terms when they met, but sometimes practiced a little mutual one-upmanship. One of the concerts was broadcast on radio and was posthumously released on CD by Deutsche Grammophon. One oddity of the recording is that the trombone section fails to enter at the climax of the finale, as a result of an audience member fainting just behind the trombones a few seconds earlier.
Early 1980s
Bernstein received the Kennedy Center Honors award in 1980. For the rest of the 1980s he continued to conduct, teach, compose, and produce the occasional TV documentary. His most significant compositions of the decade were probably his opera A Quiet Place, which he wrote with Stephen Wadsworth and which premiered, in its original version, in Houston in 1983; his Divertimento for Orchestra; his Ḥalil for flute and orchestra; his Concerto for Orchestra "Jubilee Games"; and his song cycle Arias and Barcarolles, which was named after a comment President Dwight D. Eisenhower had made to him in 1960.
International fame
In 1982 in the U.S., PBS aired an 11-part series of Bernstein's late 1970s films for Unitel of the Vienna Philharmonic playing all nine Beethoven symphonies and various other Beethoven works. Bernstein gave spoken introduction and actor Maximilian Schell was also featured on the programs, reading from Beethoven's letters. The original films have since been released on DVD by Deutsche Grammophon. In addition to conducting in New York, Vienna and Israel, Bernstein was a regular guest conductor of other orchestras in the 1980s. These included the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam, with whom he recorded Mahler's First, Fourth, and Ninth Symphonies amongst other works; the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in Munich, with whom he recorded Wagner's Tristan und Isolde; Haydn's Creation; Mozart's Requiem and Great Mass in C minor; and the orchestra of Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, with whom he recorded some Debussy and Puccini's La bohème.
In 1982, he and Ernest Fleischmann founded the Los Angeles Philharmonic Institute as a summer training academy along the lines of Tanglewood. Bernstein served as artistic director and taught conducting there until 1984. Around the same time, he performed and recorded some of his own works with the Los Angeles Philharmonic for Deutsche Grammophon. Bernstein was also at the time a committed supporter of nuclear disarmament. In 1985 he took the European Community Youth Orchestra in a "Journey for Peace" tour across Europe and Japan.
In 1984, he conducted a recording of West Side Story, the first time he had conducted the entire work. The recording, featuring what some critics felt were miscast opera singers such as Kiri Te Kanawa, José Carreras, and Tatiana Troyanos in the leading roles, was nevertheless an international bestseller. A TV documentary The Making of West Side Story about the recording was made at the same time and has been released as a DVD. Bernstein also continued to make his own TV documentaries during the 1980s, including The Little Drummer Boy, in which he discussed the music of Gustav Mahler, perhaps the composer he was most passionately interested in, and The Love of Three Orchestras, in which he discussed his work in New York, Vienna, and Israel.
In his later years, Bernstein's life and work were celebrated around the world (as they have been since his death). The Israel Philharmonic celebrated his involvement with them at festivals in Israel and Austria in 1977. In 1986 the London Symphony Orchestra mounted a Bernstein Festival in London with one concert that Bernstein himself conducted attended by the Queen. In 1988 Bernstein's 70th birthday was celebrated by a lavish televised gala at Tanglewood featuring many performers who had worked with him over the years.
During summer 1987, he celebrated the 100th anniversary of Nadia Boulanger at the American Conservatory in Fontainebleau. He gave a masterclass inside the castle of Fontainebleau.
In December 1989, Bernstein conducted live performances and recorded in the studio his operetta Candide with the London Symphony Orchestra. The recording starred Jerry Hadley, June Anderson, Adolph Green, and Christa Ludwig in the leading roles. The use of opera singers in some roles perhaps fitted the style of operetta better than some critics had thought was the case for West Side Story, and the posthumously released recording was universally praised. One of the live concerts from the Barbican Centre in London is available on DVD. Candide had had a troubled history, with many rewrites and writers involved. Bernstein's concert and recording were based on a final version that had been first performed by Scottish Opera in 1988. The opening night, which Bernstein attended in Glasgow, was conducted by his former student John Mauceri.
Ode to "Freedom"
On December 25, 1989, Bernstein conducted Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 in East Berlin's Schauspielhaus as part of a celebration of the fall of the Berlin Wall. He had conducted the same work in West Berlin the previous day. The concert was broadcast live in more than twenty countries to an estimated audience of 100 million people. For the occasion, Bernstein reworded Friedrich Schiller's text of the Ode to Joy, using the word Freiheit (freedom) instead of the original Freude (joy). Bernstein, in his spoken introduction, said that they had "taken the liberty" of doing this because of a "most likely phony" story, apparently believed in some quarters, that Schiller wrote an "Ode to Freedom" that is now presumed lost. Bernstein added, "I'm sure that Beethoven would have given us his blessing."
Founding of Pacific Music Festival
In the summer of 1990, Bernstein and Michael Tilson Thomas founded the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan. Like his earlier activity in Los Angeles, this was a summer training school for musicians modeled on Tanglewood and is still in existence. At this time, Bernstein was already suffering from the lung disease that would lead to his death. In his opening address Bernstein said that he had decided to devote what time he had left to education. A video showing Bernstein speaking and rehearsing at the first Festival is available on DVD in Japan.
In the same year, Bernstein received the Praemium Imperiale, an international prize awarded by the Japan Arts Association for lifetime achievement in the arts. Bernstein used the $100,000 prize to establish The Bernstein Education Through the Arts (BETA) Fund, Inc. He provided this grant to develop an arts-based education program. The Leonard Bernstein Center was established in April 1992, and initiated extensive school-based research, resulting in the Bernstein Model, the Leonard Bernstein Artful Learning Program.
Last concert
Bernstein conducted his last concert on August 19, 1990, with the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood. The program consisted of Benjamin Britten's Four Sea Interludes from Peter Grimes and Beethoven's Symphony No. 7. He suffered a coughing fit during the third movement of the Beethoven symphony, but continued to conduct the piece until its conclusion, leaving the stage during the ovation, appearing exhausted and in pain. The concert was later issued in edited form on CD as Leonard Bernstein – The Final Concert by Deutsche Grammophon. Also included was Bernstein's own Arias and Barcarolles in an orchestration by Bright Sheng. However, poor health prevented Bernstein from performing it. Carl St. Clair was engaged to conduct it in his stead.
Personal life
After much personal struggle and a turbulent on-off engagement, Bernstein married actress Felicia Cohn Montealegre on September 10, 1951. One suggestion is that he chose to marry partly to dispel rumors about his private life to help secure a major conducting appointment, following advice from his mentor Dimitri Mitropoulos about the conservative nature of orchestra boards. Bernstein had expressed the same internal conflict and sought similar advice from Aaron Copland in 1943, suggesting he could resolve it by marrying his then "girl-friend ... my dentist's daughter". In a book released in October 2013, The Leonard Bernstein Letters, his wife acknowledges his homosexuality. Felicia writes: "You are a homosexual and may never change—you don't admit to the possibility of a double life, but if your peace of mind, your health, your whole nervous system depend on a certain sexual pattern what can you do?" Arthur Laurents (Bernstein's collaborator in West Side Story) said that Bernstein was "a gay man who got married. He wasn't conflicted about it at all. He was just gay." Shirley Rhoades Perle, another friend of Bernstein, said that she thought "he required men sexually and women emotionally". But the early years of his marriage seem to have been happy, and no one has suggested Bernstein and his wife did not love each other. They had three children, Jamie, Alexander, and Nina. There are reports, though, that Bernstein did sometimes have brief extramarital liaisons with young men, which several family friends have said his wife knew about.
A major period of upheaval in Bernstein's personal life began in 1976 when he decided that he could no longer conceal his homosexuality and he left his wife Felicia for a period to live with the musical director of the classical music radio station KKHI in San Francisco, Tom Cothran. The next year Felicia was diagnosed with lung cancer and eventually Bernstein moved back in with her and cared for her until she died on June 16, 1978. Bernstein is reported to have often spoken of his terrible guilt over his wife's death. Most biographies of Bernstein state that his lifestyle became more excessive and his personal behavior sometimes more reckless and crude after her death. However, his public standing and many of his close friendships appear to have remained unaffected, and he resumed his busy schedule of musical activity.
His affairs with men included a ten-year relationship with Kunihiko Hashimoto, a Tokyo insurance employee. The two met when the New York Philharmonic was performing in Tokyo. Hashimoto went backstage and they ended up spending the night together. It was a long distance affair, but according to letters, they both cared about each other deeply. Dearest Lenny: Letters from Japan and the Making of the World Maestro by Mari Yoshihara (Oxford University Press, 2019) goes into detail about their letters and relationship including interviews with Hashimoto. The book also includes other letters Bernstein received from Japanese fans.
Bernstein had asthma, which kept him from serving in the military during World War II.
Death and legacy
Bernstein announced his retirement from conducting on October 9, 1990 and died five days later, in his New York apartment at The Dakota, of a heart attack brought on by mesothelioma. He was 72 years old. A longtime heavy smoker, he had had emphysema from his mid-50s. On the day of his funeral procession through the streets of Manhattan, construction workers removed their hats and waved, calling out "Goodbye, Lenny". Bernstein is buried in Green-Wood Cemetery, Brooklyn, New York, next to his wife and with a copy of Mahler's Fifth Symphony opened to the famous Adagietto lying across his heart. On August 25, 2018 (his 100th birthday), he was honored with a Google Doodle. Also for his centennial, the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles created an exhibition titled Leonard Bernstein at 100.
Social activism
While Bernstein was very well known for his music compositions and conducting, he was also known for his outspoken political views and his strong desire to further social change. His first aspirations for social change were made apparent in his producing (as a student) a recently banned opera, The Cradle Will Rock, by Marc Blitzstein, about the disparity between the working and upper class. His first opera, Trouble in Tahiti, was dedicated to Blitzstein and has a strong social theme, criticizing American civilization and suburban upper-class life in particular. As he went on in his career, Bernstein would go on to fight for everything from the influences of "American Music" to the disarming of western nuclear weapons.
Like many of his friends and colleagues, Bernstein had been involved in various left-wing causes and organizations since the 1940s. He was blacklisted by the US State Department and CBS in the early 1950s, but unlike others his career was not greatly affected, and he was never required to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee. His political life received substantial press coverage though in 1970, due to a gathering hosted at his Manhattan apartment at 895 Park Avenue on January 14, 1970. Bernstein and his wife held the event seeking to raise awareness and money for the defense of several members of the Black Panther Party against a variety of charges, especially the case of the Panther 21. The New York Times initially covered the gathering as a lifestyle item, but later posted an editorial harshly unfavorable to Bernstein following generally negative reaction to the widely publicized story. This reaction culminated in June 1970 with the appearance of "Radical Chic: That Party at Lenny's", an essay by journalist Tom Wolfe featured on the cover of the magazine New York. The article contrasted the Bernsteins' comfortable lifestyle in one of the world's most expensive neighborhoods with the anti-establishment politics of the Black Panthers. It led to the popularization of "radical chic" as a critical term. Both Bernstein and his wife Felicia responded to the criticism, arguing that they were motivated not by a shallow desire to express fashionable sympathy but by their concern for civil liberties.
Bernstein was named in the book Red Channels: The Report of Communist Influence in Radio and Television (1950) as a Communist along with Aaron Copland, Lena Horne, Pete Seeger, Artie Shaw and other prominent figures of the performing arts. Red Channels was issued by the right-wing journal Counterattack and was edited by Vincent Hartnett, who was later found to have libeled and defamed the noted radio personality John Henry Faulk.
Philanthropy
Among the many awards Bernstein earned throughout his life, one allowed him to make one of his philanthropic dreams a reality. He had for a long time wanted to develop an international school to help promote the integration of arts into education. When he won the Praemium Imperiale, Japan Arts Association award for lifetime achievement in 1990, he used the $100,000 that came with the award to build such a school in Nashville, that would strive to teach teachers how to better integrate music, dance, and theater into the school system which was "not working". Unfortunately, the school was not able to open until shortly after Bernstein's death. This would eventually yield an initiative known as Artful Learning as part of the Leonard Bernstein Center.
Influence and characteristics as a conductor
Bernstein was one of the major figures in orchestral conducting in the second half of the 20th century. He was held in high regard amongst many musicians, including the members of the Vienna Philharmonic, evidenced by his honorary membership; the London Symphony Orchestra, of which he was president; and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, with which he appeared regularly as guest conductor. He was probably the main conductor from the 1960s onwards who acquired a sort of superstar status similar to that of Herbert von Karajan, although unlike Karajan he conducted relatively little opera and part of Bernstein's fame was based on his role as a composer. As the first American-born music director of the New York Philharmonic, his rise to prominence was a factor in overcoming the perception of the time that the top conductors were necessarily trained in Europe.
Bernstein's conducting was characterized by extremes of emotion with the rhythmic pulse of the music conveyed visually through his balletic podium manner. Musicians often reported that his manner in rehearsal was the same as in concert. As he got older his performances tended to be overlaid to a greater extent with a personal expressiveness which often divided critical opinion. Extreme examples of this style can be found in his Deutsche Grammophon recordings of "Nimrod" from Elgar's Enigma Variations (1982), the end of Mahler's 9th Symphony (1985), and the finale of Tchaikovsky's Pathétique Symphony (1986), where in each case the tempos are well below those typically chosen. A skilled pianist, he used to perform the piano parts himself and conduct orchestras from the keyboard (for instance, when he conducted Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue).
Bernstein performed a wide repertoire from the Baroque era to the 20th century, although perhaps from the 1970s onwards he tended to focus more on music from the Romantic era. He was considered especially accomplished with the works of Gustav Mahler and with American composers in general, including George Gershwin, Aaron Copland, Charles Ives, Roy Harris, William Schuman, and of course himself. Some of his recordings of works by these composers would likely appear on many music critics' lists of recommended recordings. A list of his other well-thought-of recordings would include, among others, individual works from Haydn, Beethoven, Berlioz, Schumann, Liszt, Nielsen, Sibelius, Stravinsky, Hindemith, and Shostakovich. His recordings of Rhapsody in Blue (full-orchestra version) and An American in Paris for Columbia Records, released in 1959, are considered definitive by many, although Bernstein cut the Rhapsody slightly, and his more 'symphonic' approach with slower tempi is quite far from Gershwin's own conception of the piece, evident from his two recordings. (Oscar Levant, Earl Wild, and others come closer to Gershwin's own style.) Bernstein never conducted Gershwin's Piano Concerto in F, or more than a few excerpts from Porgy and Bess, although he did discuss the latter in his article Why Don't You Run Upstairs and Write a Nice Gershwin Tune?, originally published in The New York Times and later reprinted in his 1959 book The Joy of Music.
In addition to being an active conductor, Bernstein was an influential teacher of conducting. During his many years of teaching at Tanglewood and elsewhere, he directly taught or mentored many conductors who are performing now, including John Mauceri, Marin Alsop, Herbert Blomstedt, Edo de Waart, Alexander Frey, Paavo Järvi, Eiji Oue, Maurice Peress, Seiji Ozawa (who made his American TV debut as the guest conductor on one of the Young People's Concerts), Carl St.Clair, Helmuth Rilling, Michael Tilson Thomas, and Jaap van Zweden. He also undoubtedly influenced the career choices of many American musicians who grew up watching his television programmes in the 1950s and 60s.
Recordings
Bernstein recorded extensively from the mid-1940s until just a few months before his death. Aside from those 1940s recordings, which were made for RCA Victor, Bernstein recorded primarily for Columbia Masterworks Records, especially when he was music director of the New York Philharmonic between 1958 and 1971. His typical pattern of recording at that time was to record major works in the studio immediately after they were presented in the orchestra's subscription concerts or on one of the Young People's Concerts, with any spare time used to record short orchestral showpieces and similar works. Many of these performances were digitally remastered and reissued by Sony Classical Records (the successor to American Columbia/CBS Masterworks following Sony's 1990 acquisition of Columbia/CBS Records) between 1992 and 1993 as part of its 100 volume, 125-CD "Royal Edition", as well as its 1997–2001 "Bernstein Century" series. The rights to Bernstein's 1940s RCA Victor recordings became fully owned by Sony following its 2008 acquisition of Bertelsmann Music Group's (BMG), and now controls both the RCA Victor and Columbia archives. The complete Bernstein Columbia and RCA Victor catalog was reissued on CD in a three-volume series of box sets (released in 2010, 2014, and 2018, respectively) comprising a total of 198 discs under the mantle "Leonard Bernstein Edition".
His later recordings (starting with Bizet's Carmen in 1972) were mostly made for Deutsche Grammophon, though he would occasionally return to the Columbia label. Notable exceptions include recordings of Gustav Mahler's Song of the Earth and Mozart's 15th piano concerto and "Linz" symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic for Decca Records (1966); Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique and Harold in Italy (1976) for EMI; and Wagner's Tristan und Isolde (1981) for Philips Records, a label that like Deutsche Grammophon was part of PolyGram at that time. Unlike his studio recordings for Columbia Masterworks, most of his later Deutsche Grammophon recordings were taken from live concerts (or edited together from several concerts with additional sessions to correct errors). Many replicate repertoire that he recorded in the 1950s and 60s.
In addition to his audio recordings, many of Bernstein's concerts from the 1970s onwards were recorded on motion picture film by the German film company Unitel. This included a complete cycle of the Mahler symphonies (with the Vienna Philharmonic and London Symphony Orchestra), as well as complete cycles of the Beethoven, Brahms and Schumann symphonies recorded at the same series of concerts as the audio recordings by Deutsche Grammophon. Many of these films appeared on LaserDisc and are now on DVD.
In total Bernstein was awarded 16 Grammys for his recordings in various categories, including several for posthumously released recordings. He was also awarded a Lifetime Achievement Grammy in 1985.
Influence and characteristics as a composer
Bernstein was an eclectic composer whose music fused elements of jazz, Jewish music, theatre music, and the work of earlier composers like Aaron Copland, Igor Stravinsky, Darius Milhaud, George Gershwin, and Marc Blitzstein. Some of his works, especially his score for West Side Story, helped bridge the gap between classical and popular music. His music was rooted in tonality but in some works like his Kaddish Symphony and the opera A Quiet Place he mixed in 12-tone elements. Bernstein himself said his main motivation for composing was "to communicate" and that all his pieces, including his symphonies and concert works, "could in some sense be thought of as 'theatre' pieces".
According to the League of American Orchestras, he was the second most frequently performed American composer by U.S. orchestras in 2008–09 behind Copland, and he was the 16th most frequently performed composer overall by U.S. orchestras. (Some performances were probably due to the 2008 90th anniversary of his birth.) His most popular pieces were the Overture to Candide, the Symphonic Dances from West Side Story, the Serenade after Plato's "Symposium" and the Three Dance Episodes from On the Town. His shows West Side Story, On the Town, Wonderful Town and Candide are regularly performed, and his symphonies and concert works are programmed from time to time by orchestras around the world. Since his death many of his works have been commercially recorded by artists other than himself. The Serenade, which has been recorded more than 10 times, is probably his most recorded work not taken from an actual theatre piece.
Despite the fact that he was a popular success as a composer, Bernstein himself is reported to have been disillusioned that some of his more serious works were not rated more highly by critics, and that he himself had not been able to devote more time to composing because of his conducting and other activities. Professional criticism of Bernstein's music often involves discussing the degree to which he created something new as art versus simply skillfully borrowing and fusing together elements from others. In the late 1960s, Bernstein himself reflected that his eclecticism was in part due to his lack of lengthy periods devoted to composition, and that he was still seeking to enrich his own personal musical language in the manner of the great composers of the past, all of whom had borrowed elements from others. Perhaps the harshest criticism he received from some critics in his lifetime though was directed at works like his Kaddish Symphony, his MASS and the opera A Quiet Place, where they found the underlying message of the piece or the text as either mildly embarrassing, clichéd or offensive. Despite this, all these pieces have been performed, discussed and reconsidered since his death.
The Chichester Psalms, and excerpts from his Third Symphony and MASS were performed for Pope John Paul II, including at World Youth Day in Denver on August 14, 1993, and at the Papal Concert to Commemorate the Shoah on April 7, 1994, with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in the Sala Nervi at the Vatican. Both performances were conducted by Gilbert Levine.
Although he taught conducting, Bernstein did not teach composition and left no direct legacy of students in that field.
Bibliography
Videography
The Unanswered Question: Six Talks at Harvard. West Long Branch, New Jersey: Kultur Video. VHS . DVD . (videotape of the Charles Eliot Norton Lectures given at Harvard in 1973.)
Leonard Bernstein's Young People's Concerts with the New York Philharmonic. West Long Branch, New Jersey: Kultur Video. DVD .
Bernstein on Beethoven: A Celebration in Vienna/Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 1. West Long Branch, Kultur Video. DVD
Leonard Bernstein: Omnibus – The Historic TV Broadcasts, 2010, E1 Ent.
Bernstein: Reflections (1978), A rare personal portrait of Leonard Bernstein by Peter Rosen. Euroarts DVD
Bernstein/Beethoven (1982), Deutsche Grammophon, DVD
The Metropolitan Opera Centennial Gala (1983), Deutsche Grammophon, DVD 00440-073-4538
Bernstein Conducts "West Side Story" (1985) (retitled The Making of West Side Story in re-releases) Deutsche Grammophon. DVD
"The Rite of Spring" in Rehearsal
Mozart's Great Mass in C minor, Exsultate, jubilate & Ave verum corpus (1990), Deutsche Grammophon. DVD 00440-073-4240
"Leonard Bernstein: Reaching for the Note" (1998) Documentary on his life and music. Originally aired on PBS's American Masters series. DVD
Awards
Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1951
Fellow at the MacDowell 1962, 1970, 1972
Sonning Award (Denmark), 1965
Ditson Conductor's Award, 1958
George Peabody Medal – Johns Hopkins University, 1980
Ernst von Siemens Music Prize, 1987
Royal Philharmonic Society Gold Medal (UK), 1987
Edward MacDowell Medal, 1987
Knight Grand Cross Order of Merit (Italy), 1989
Grammy Award for Best Album for Children
Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Performance
Grammy Award for Best Choral Performance
Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording
Grammy Award for Best Classical Vocal Performance
Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Soloist(s) Performance
Grammy Award for Best Classical Contemporary Composition
Grammy Award for Best Classical Album
Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award
Tony Award for Best Musical
Special Tony Award
Japan Arts Association Lifetime Achievement Award
Gramophone Hall of Fame entrant
Commandeur de la Légion d'honneur, 1986
Bernstein is also a member of both the American Theater Hall of Fame, and the Television Hall of Fame. In 2015 he was inducted into the Legacy Walk.
References
Citations
Sources
(Doubleday edition)
Further reading
Bernstein, Burton (1982). Family Matters: Sam, Jennie, and the Kids. Simon & Schuster. .
Bernstein, Jamie (2018). Famous Father Girl: A Memoir of Growing Up Bernstein. HarperCollins Publishers. .
Bernstein, Shirley (1963). Making Music: Leonard Bernstein. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica Press. .
Briggs, John (1961). Leonard Bernstein: The Man, His Works and His World. World Publishing Co. .
Burton, William W. (1995). Conversations about Bernstein. New York: Oxford University Press, New York. .
Cone, Molly and Robert Galster (1970). Leonard Bernstein. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Co.
Ewen, David (1960). Leonard Bernstein, A Biography for Young People. Philadelphia: Chilton Co.
Fluegel, Jane (ed.) (1991). Bernstein: Remembered: a life in pictures. New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc. .
Freedland, Michael (1987). Leonard Bernstein. London, England: Harrap. Ltd. .
Gottlieb, Jack (2010). Working With Bernstein. Amadeus Press. .
Green, Diane Huss (1963). Lenny's Surprise Piano. San Carlos, California: Golden Gate Junior Books. .
Hurwitz, Johanna (1963). Leonard Bernstein: A Passion of Music. Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society. .
Ledbetter, Steven (1988). Sennets & Tuckets, A Bernstein Celebration. Boston: Boston Symphony Orchestra in association with David Godine Publisher, Inc.. .
Reidy, John P. & Norman Richards (1967). People of Destiny: Leonard Bernstein. Chicago: Children's Press. .
Robinson, Paul (1982). Bernstein (The Art of Conducting Series). New York: Vangard Press. .
Shawn, Allen (2014). Leonard Bernstein: An American Musician. Yale University Press. .
Wolfe, Tom (1987). Radical Chic and Mau Mauing the Flak Catchers. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux. .
External links
Archival records
Leonard Bernstein collection, circa 1900–1995, Library of Congress
Bernstein Online Collection, Library of Congress
Mildred Spiegel Zucker collection of Leonard Bernstein correspondence and related materials, 1936–1991, Library of Congress
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Tony Award winners | true | [
"Carl Walter Roskott (March 4, 1953 - June 18, 2008) was an American composer, conductor and academic. He served as associate professor of music at Northern Illinois University and the University of Virginia, and as associate conductor at the Eastern Music Festival in Greensboro, North Carolina. He studied at the Peabody Conservatory of Music and New England Conservatory of Music ; his principal teachers included Leonard Bernstein, Gunther Schuller, Sheldon Morgenstern, Leo Mueller, Richard Pittman and Michael Tilson Thomas.\n\nRoskott’s compositions included works for full orchestra, chamber ensembles, and solo works for trumpet, trombone, horn and violin. He was also a double recipient of the Leonard Bernstein Fellowship to Tanglewood.\n\nIn 1972, when he was 19, two of his works were included at the 1972 Eastern Music Festival in Greensboro, North Carolina. Four years later he returned to the festival as a conductor; the following year he was named the festival’s associate conductor, a position he held until 1997. \n\nIn 1979 Roskott was a finalist for the assistant conductor position with the National Symphony also served as associate professor of music and principal conductor at Northern Illinois University (1980-1991) and the University of Virginia (1991-2005).\n\nAwards \n\n 1969 Junior Composer Award from National Federation of Music Clubs\n George Whitefield Chadwick Medal\n Dimitri Mitropoulos Award\n Downbeat Magazine Award for Best Symphony Orchestra Recording, 1980-1989\n Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching Awards (Northern Illinois University) (1989)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Carl Roskott, Concerto for Two Trumpets\n Carl Roskott, Violin Concerto in G Major\n\n1953 births\n2008 deaths\n20th-century American composers\n21st-century American composers\nModernism (music)\nPeabody Institute alumni",
"Goin' Fishin' is a 1940 Our Gang short comedy film directed by Edward Cahn. It was the 191st Our Gang short (192nd episode, 103rd talking short, 104th talking episode, and 23rd MGM produced episode) that was released.\n\nPlot\nHoping to get an early start on a fishing trip to the East River, the gang boards a double-decker bus at the crack of dawn. Alas, the kids' bulky fishing equipment causes nothing but discomfort for the rest of the passengers, to say nothing of the irascible bus conductor. Thanks to the gang's unintentional interference, the bus' regular pick-up and drop-off schedule is thoroughly disrupted, and even worse, it turns out that the kids are on the wrong bus.\n\nCast\n\nThe Gang\n Mickey Gubitosi as Mickey\n George McFarland as Spanky\n Carl Switzer as Alfalfa\n Billie Thomas as Buckwheat\n Leonard Landy as Leonard\n\nAdditional cast\n Paul Hurst as Bus conductor\n Robert Emmett as Police officer\n Ben Hall as Man on bus\n Arthur Hoyt as Man on bus\n Anne O'Neal as Woman on bus\n\nSee also\n Our Gang filmography\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n \n\n1940 films\nAmerican films\nAmerican black-and-white films\nFilms directed by Edward L. Cahn\nMetro-Goldwyn-Mayer short films\n1940 comedy films\nOur Gang films\n1940 short films\nComedy short films"
] |
[
"Leonard Bernstein",
"Influence and characteristics as a conductor",
"What are Leonard's characteristics as conductor?",
"1971. His typical pattern of recording at that time was to record major works in the studio immediately after they were presented in the orchestra's subscription concerts"
] | C_2e4ae84d3c6444c9a25724baadcf9a53_0 | What influences did he have? | 2 | What influences did Leonard Bernstein have? | Leonard Bernstein | Bernstein recorded extensively from the mid-1940s until just a few months before his death. Aside from those 1940s recordings, which were made for RCA Victor, Bernstein recorded primarily for Columbia Masterworks Records, especially when he was music director of the New York Philharmonic between 1958 and 1971. His typical pattern of recording at that time was to record major works in the studio immediately after they were presented in the orchestra's subscription concerts or on one of the Young People's Concerts, with any spare time used to record short orchestral showpieces and similar works. Many of these performances were digitally remastered and reissued by Sony as part of their 100 Volume, 125 CDs "Royal Edition" and their later "Bernstein Century" series. In 2010 many of these recordings were repackaged in a 60 CD "Bernstein Symphony Edition". His later recordings (starting with Bizet's Carmen in 1972) were mostly made for Deutsche Grammophon, though he would occasionally return to the Columbia Masterworks label. Notable exceptions include recordings of Gustav Mahler's Song of the Earth and Mozart's 15th piano concerto and "Linz" symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra for Decca Records (1966); Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique and Harold in Italy (1976) for EMI; and Wagner's Tristan und Isolde (1981) for Philips Records, a label that like Deutsche Grammophon was part of PolyGram at that time. Unlike his studio recordings for Columbia Masterworks, most of his later Deutsche Grammophon recordings were taken from live concerts (or edited together from several concerts with additional sessions to correct errors). Many replicate repertoire that he recorded in the 1950s and 60s. In addition to his audio recordings, many of Bernstein's concerts from the 1970s onwards were recorded on motion picture film by the German film company Unitel. This included a complete cycle of the Mahler symphonies (with the Vienna Philharmonic and London Symphony Orchestra), as well as complete cycles of the Beethoven, Brahms and Schumann symphonies recorded at the same series of concerts as the audio recordings by Deutsche Grammophon. Many of these films appeared on Laserdisc and are now on DVD. In total Bernstein was awarded 16 Grammys for his recordings in various categories, including several for posthumously released recordings. He was also awarded a Lifetime Achievement Grammy in 1985. CANNOTANSWER | Aside from those 1940s recordings, which were made for RCA Victor, Bernstein recorded primarily for Columbia Masterworks Records, | Leonard Bernstein ( ; August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, pianist, music educator, author, and humanitarian. Among the most important conductors of his time, he was also the first American conductor to receive international acclaim. According to music critic Donal Henahan, he was "one of the most prodigiously talented and successful musicians in American history". Bernstein was the recipient of many honors, including seven Emmy Awards, two Tony Awards, sixteen Grammy Awards, including the Lifetime Achievement, and the Kennedy Center Honor.
As a composer he wrote in many genres, including symphonic and orchestral music, ballet, film and theatre music, choral works, opera, chamber music and works for the piano. His best-known work is the Broadway musical West Side Story, which continues to be regularly performed worldwide, and has been adapted into two (1961 and 2021) feature films. His works include three symphonies, Chichester Psalms, Serenade after Plato's "Symposium", the original score for the film On the Waterfront, and theater works including On the Town, Wonderful Town, Candide, and his MASS.
Bernstein was the first American-born conductor to lead a major American symphony orchestra. He was music director of the New York Philharmonic and conducted the world's major orchestras, generating a significant legacy of audio and video recordings. He was also a critical figure in the modern revival of the music of Gustav Mahler, in whose music he was most passionately interested. A skilled pianist, he often conducted piano concertos from the keyboard. He was the first conductor to share and explore music on television with a mass audience. Through dozens of national and international broadcasts, including the Emmy Award–winning Young People's Concerts with the New York Philharmonic, he made even the most rigorous elements of classical music an adventure in which everyone could join. Through his educational efforts, including several books and the creation of two major international music festivals, he influenced several generations of young musicians.
A lifelong humanitarian, Bernstein worked in support of civil rights; protested against the Vietnam War; advocated for nuclear disarmament; raised money for HIV/AIDS research and awareness; and engaged in multiple international initiatives for human rights and world peace. Near the end of his life, he conducted a historic performance of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 in Berlin to celebrate the fall of the Berlin Wall. The concert was televised live, worldwide, on Christmas Day, 1989.
Early life and education
1918–1934: Early life and family
Born Louis Bernstein in Lawrence, Massachusetts, he was the son of Ukrainian-Jewish parents, Jennie (née Resnick) and Samuel Joseph Bernstein, both of whom immigrated to the United States from Rovno (now Ukraine). His grandmother insisted that his first name be Louis, but his parents always called him Leonard. He legally changed his name to Leonard when he was eighteen, shortly after his grandmother's death. To his friends and many others he was simply known as "Lenny".
His father was the owner of The Samuel Bernstein Hair and Beauty Supply Company. It held the New England franchise for the Frederick's Permanent Wave Machine, whose immense popularity helped Sam get his family through The Great Depression.
In Leonard's early youth, his only exposure to music was the household radio and music on Friday nights at Congregation Mishkan Tefila in Roxbury, Massachusetts. When Leonard was ten years old, Samuel's sister Clara deposited her upright piano at her brother's house. Bernstein began teaching himself piano and music theory and was soon clamoring for lessons. He had a variety of piano teachers in his youth, including Helen Coates, who later became his secretary. In the summers, the Bernstein family would go to their vacation home in Sharon, Massachusetts, where young Leonard conscripted all the neighborhood children to put on shows ranging from Bizet's Carmen to Gilbert and Sullivan's The Pirates of Penzance. He would often play entire operas or Beethoven symphonies with his younger sister Shirley.
Leonard's youngest sibling Burton was born in 1932, thirteen years after Leonard. Despite the large span in age, the three siblings remained close their entire lives.
Sam was initially opposed to young Leonard's interest in music and attempted to discourage his son's interest by refusing to pay for his piano lessons. Leonard then took to giving lessons to young people in his neighborhood. One of his students, Sid Ramin, became Bernstein's most frequent orchestrator and lifelong beloved friend.
Sam took his son to orchestral concerts in his teenage years and eventually supported his music education. In May 1932, Leonard attended his first orchestral concert with the Boston Pops Orchestra conducted by Arthur Fiedler. Bernstein recalled, "To me, in those days, the Pops was heaven itself ... I thought ... it was the supreme achievement of the human race." It was at this concert that Bernstein first heard Ravel's Boléro, which made a tremendous impression on him.
Another strong musical influence was George Gershwin. Bernstein was a counselor at a summer camp when news came over the radio of Gershwin's death. In the mess hall, a shaken Bernstein demanded a moment of silence, and then played Gershwin's second Prelude as a memorial.
On March 30, 1932, Bernstein played Brahms's Rhapsody in G Minor at his first public piano performance in Susan Williams's studio recital at the New England Conservatory. Two years later, he made his solo debut with orchestra in Grieg's Piano Concerto in A Minor with the Boston Public School Orchestra.
1935–1940: College years
Bernstein's first two education environments were both public schools: the William Lloyd Garrison School, followed by the prestigious Boston Latin School, for which Bernstein and classmate Lawrence F. Ebb wrote the Class Song.
Harvard University
In 1935, Bernstein enrolled at Harvard University, where he studied music with, among others, Edward Burlingame Hill and Walter Piston. His first extant composition, Psalm 148 set for voice and piano, is dated in 1935. He majored in music with a final year thesis titled "The Absorption of Race Elements into American Music" (1939; reproduced in his book Findings). One of Bernstein's intellectual influences at Harvard was the aesthetics Professor David Prall, whose multidisciplinary outlook on the arts inspired Bernstein for the rest of his life.
One of his friends at Harvard was future philosopher Donald Davidson, with whom Bernstein played piano duets. Bernstein wrote and conducted the musical score for the production Davidson mounted of Aristophanes' play The Birds, performed in the original Greek. Bernstein recycled some of this music in future works.
While a student, he was briefly an accompanist for the Harvard Glee Club as well as an unpaid pianist for Harvard Film Society's silent film presentations.
Bernstein mounted a student production of The Cradle Will Rock, directing its action from the piano as the composer Marc Blitzstein had done at the infamous premiere. Blitzstein, who attended the performance, subsequently became a close friend and mentor to Bernstein.
As a sophomore at Harvard, Bernstein met the conductor Dimitri Mitropoulos. Mitropoulos's charisma and power as a musician were major influences on Bernstein's eventual decision to become a conductor. Mitropoulos invited Bernstein to come to Minneapolis for the 1940–41 season to be his assistant, but the plan fell through due to union issues.
Bernstein met Aaron Copland on the latter's birthday in 1937; the elder composer was sitting next to Bernstein at a dance recital at Town Hall in New York City. Copland invited Bernstein to his birthday party afterwards, where Bernstein impressed the guests by playing Copland's challenging Piano Variations, a work Bernstein loved. Although he was never a formal student of Copland's, Bernstein would regularly seek his advice, often citing him as his "only real composition teacher".
Bernstein graduated from Harvard in 1939 with a Bachelor of Arts cum laude.
Curtis Institute of Music
After graduating from Harvard, Bernstein enrolled at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. At Curtis, Bernstein studied conducting with Fritz Reiner (who anecdotally is said to have given Bernstein the only "A" grade he ever awarded); piano with Isabelle Vengerova; orchestration with Randall Thompson; counterpoint with Richard Stöhr; and score reading with Renée Longy Miquelle.
In 1940, Bernstein attended the inaugural year of the Tanglewood Music Center (then called the Berkshire Music Center) at the Boston Symphony Orchestra's summer home. Bernstein studied conducting with the BSO's music director, Serge Koussevitzky, who became a profound lifelong inspiration to Bernstein. He became Koussevitzky's conducting assistant at Tanglewood and later dedicated his Symphony No. 2: The Age of Anxiety to his beloved mentor. One of Bernstein's classmates, both at Curtis and at Tanglewood, was Lukas Foss, who remained a lifelong friend and colleague. Bernstein returned to Tanglewood nearly every summer for the rest of his life to teach and conduct the young music students.
Life and career
The 1940s
Soon after he left Curtis, Bernstein moved to New York City where he lived in various apartments in Manhattan. Bernstein supported himself by coaching singers, teaching piano, and playing the piano for dance classes in Carnegie Hall. He found work with Harms-Witmark, transcribing jazz and pop music and publishing his work under the pseudonym "Lenny Amber". (Bernstein means "amber" in German.)
Bernstein briefly shared an apartment in Greenwich Village with his friend Adolph Green. Green was part of a satirical music troupe called The Revuers, featuring Betty Comden and Judy Holliday. With Bernstein sometimes providing piano accompaniment, the Revuers often performed at the legendary jazz club the Village Vanguard.
On April 21, 1942, Bernstein performed the premiere of his first published work, Sonata for Clarinet and Piano, with clarinetist David Glazer at the Institute of Modern Art in Boston.
New York Philharmonic conducting debut
On November 14, 1943, having recently been appointed assistant conductor to Artur Rodziński of the New York Philharmonic, Bernstein made his major conducting debut at short notice—and without any rehearsal—after guest conductor Bruno Walter came down with the flu. The challenging program included works by Robert Schumann, Miklós Rózsa, Richard Wagner, and Richard Strauss.
The next day, The New York Times carried the story on its front page and remarked in an editorial, "It's a good American success story. The warm, friendly triumph of it filled Carnegie Hall and spread far over the air waves."
Many newspapers throughout the country carried the story, which, in combination with the concert's live national CBS Radio Network broadcast, propelled Bernstein to instant fame.
Over the next two years, Bernstein made conducting debuts with ten different orchestras in the United States and Canada, greatly broadening his repertoire and initiating a lifelong frequent practice of conducting concertos from the piano.
Symphony No. 1: Jeremiah, Fancy Free, and On the Town
On January 28, 1944, he conducted the premiere of his Symphony No. 1: Jeremiah with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra with Jennie Tourel as soloist.
In the fall of 1943, Bernstein and Jerome Robbins began work on their first collaboration, Fancy Free, a ballet about three young sailors on leave in wartime New York City. Fancy Free premiered on April 18, 1944, with the Ballet Theatre (now the American Ballet Theatre) at the old Metropolitan Opera House, with scenery by Oliver Smith and costumes by Kermit Love.
Bernstein and Robbins decided to expand the ballet into a musical and invited Comden and Green to write the book and lyrics. On the Town opened on Broadway's Adelphi Theatre on December 28, 1944. The show resonated with audiences during World War II, and it broke race barriers on Broadway: Japanese-American dancer Sono Osato in a leading role; a multiracial cast dancing as mixed race couples; and a Black concertmaster, Everett Lee, who eventually took over as music director of the show. On the Town became an MGM motion picture in 1949, starring Gene Kelly, Frank Sinatra, and Jules Munshin as the three sailors. Only part of Bernstein's score was used in the film and additional songs were provided by Roger Edens.
Rising conducting career
From 1945 to 1947, Bernstein was the music director of the New York City Symphony, which had been founded the previous year by the conductor Leopold Stokowski. The orchestra (with support from Mayor Fiorello La Guardia) had modern programs and affordable tickets.
In 1946, he made his overseas debut with the Czech Philharmonic in Prague. He also recorded Ravel's Piano Concerto in G as soloist and conductor with the Philharmonia Orchestra. On July 4, 1946, Bernstein conducted the European premiere of Fancy Free with the Ballet Theatre at the Royal Opera House in London.
In 1946, he conducted opera professionally for the first time at Tanglewood with the American premiere of Benjamin Britten's Peter Grimes, which was commissioned by Koussevitzky. That same year, Arturo Toscanini invited Bernstein to guest conduct two concerts with the NBC Symphony Orchestra, one of which also featured Bernstein as soloist in Ravel's Piano Concerto in G.
Israel Philharmonic Orchestra
In 1947, Bernstein conducted in Tel Aviv for the first time, beginning a lifelong association with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, then known as the Palestine Symphony Orchestra. The next year he conducted an open-air concert for Israeli troops at Beersheba in the middle of the desert during the Arab-Israeli war. In 1957, he conducted the inaugural concert of the Mann Auditorium in Tel Aviv. In 1967, he conducted a concert on Mount Scopus to commemorate the Reunification of Jerusalem, featuring Mahler's Symphony No. 2 and Mendelssohn Violin Concerto with soloist Isaac Stern. During the 1970s, Bernstein recorded his symphonies and other works with the Israel Philharmonic on Deutsche Grammophon. The city of Tel Aviv added his name to the Orchestra Plaza in the center of the city.
First television appearance
On December 10, 1949, he made his first television appearance as conductor with the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Carnegie Hall. The concert, which also included an address by Eleanor Roosevelt, celebrated the one-year anniversary of the United Nations General Assembly's ratification of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and included the premiere of Aaron Copland's "Preamble" with Sir Laurence Olivier narrating text from the UN Charter. The concert was televised by NBC Television Network.
Summer at Tanglewood
In April 1949, Bernstein performed as piano soloist in the world premiere of his Symphony No. 2: The Age of Anxiety with Koussevitzy conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Later that year, Bernstein conducted the world premiere of the Turangalîla-Symphonie by Olivier Messiaen, with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Part of the rehearsal for the concert was recorded and released by the orchestra. When Koussevitzky died in 1951, Bernstein became head of the orchestra and conducting departments at Tanglewood.
The 1950s
The 1950s comprised among the most active years of Bernstein's career. He created five new works for the Broadway stage; he composed several symphonic works and an iconic film score; he was appointed music director of the New York Philharmonic with whom he toured the world, including concerts behind the Iron Curtain; he harnessed the power of television to expand his educational reach; and he married and started a family.
Compositions in the 1950s
Theatrical works
Peter Pan
In 1950, Bernstein composed incidental music for a Broadway production of J. M. Barrie's play Peter Pan. The production, which opened on Broadway on April 24, 1950, starred Jean Arthur as Peter Pan and Boris Karloff in the dual roles of George Darling and Captain Hook. The show ran for 321 performances.
Trouble in Tahiti
In 1951, Bernstein composed Trouble in Tahiti, a one-act opera in seven scenes with an English libretto by the composer. The opera portrays the troubled marriage of a couple whose idyllic suburban post-war environment belies their inner turmoil. Ironically, Bernstein wrote most of the opera while on his honeymoon in Mexico with his wife, Felicia Montealegre.
Bernstein was a visiting music professor at Brandeis University from 1951 to 1956. In 1952, he created the Brandeis Festival of the Creative Arts, where he conducted the premiere of Trouble in Tahiti on June 12 of that year.
The NBC Opera Theatre subsequently presented the opera on television in November 1952. It opened on Broadway at the Playhouse Theatre on April 19, 1955 and ran for six weeks.
Three decades later, Bernstein wrote a second opera, A Quiet Place, which picked up the story and characters of Trouble in Tahiti in a later period.
Wonderful Town
In 1953, Bernstein wrote the score for the musical Wonderful Town on very short notice, with a book by Joseph A. Fields and Jerome Chodorov and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green. The musical tells the story of two sisters from Ohio who move to New York City and seek success from their squalid basement apartment in Greenwich Village.
Wonderful Town opened on Broadway on February 25, 1953 at the Winter Garden Theatre, starring Rosalind Russell in the role of Ruth Sherwood, Edie Adams as Eileen Sherwood, and George Gaynes as Robert Baker. It won five Tony Awards, including Best Musical and Best Actress.
Candide
In the three years leading up to Bernstein's appointment as music director of the New York Philharmonic, Bernstein was simultaneously working on the scores for two Broadway shows. The first of the two was the operetta-style musical Candide. Lillian Hellman originally brought Bernstein her idea of adapting Voltaire's novella. The original collaborators on the show were book writer John Latouche and lyricist Richard Wilbur.
Candide opened on Broadway on December 1, 1956 at the Martin Beck Theatre, in a production directed by Tyrone Guthrie. Anxious about the parallels Hellman had deliberately drawn between Voltaire's story and the ongoing hearings conducted by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Guthrie persuaded the collaborators to cut their most incendiary sections prior to opening night.
While the production was a box office disaster, running only two months for a total of 73 performances, the cast album became a cult classic, which kept Bernstein's score alive. The elements of the music that have remained best known and performed over the decades are the Overture, which quickly became one of the most frequently performed orchestral compositions by a 20th century American composer; the coloratura aria "Glitter and Be Gay", which Barbara Cook sang in the original production; and the grand finale "Make Our Garden Grow".
West Side Story
The other musical Bernstein was writing simultaneously with Candide was West Side Story. Bernstein collaborated with director and choreographer Jerome Robbins, book writer Arthur Laurents, and lyricist Stephen Sondheim.
The story is an updated retelling of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, set in the mid-1950s in the slums of New York City's Upper West Side. The Romeo character, Tony, is affiliated with the Jets gang, who are of white Northern European descent. The Juliet character is Maria, who is connected to the Sharks gang, recently arrived immigrants from Puerto Rico.
The original Broadway production opened at the Winter Garden Theatre on September 26, 1957, and ran 732 performances. Robbins won the Tony Award for Best Choreographer, and Oliver Smith won the Tony for Best Scenic Designer.
Bernstein's score for West Side Story blends "jazz, Latin rhythms, symphonic sweep and musical-comedy conventions in groundbreaking ways for Broadway". It was orchestrated by Sid Ramin and Irwin Kostal following detailed instructions from Bernstein. The dark theme, sophisticated music, extended dance scenes, and focus on social problems marked a turning point in musical theatre.
In 1960, Bernstein prepared a suite of orchestral music from the show, titled Symphonic Dances from West Side Story, which continues to be popular with orchestras worldwide.
A 1961 United Artists film adaptation, directed by Robert Wise and starred Natalie Wood as Maria and Richard Beymer as Tony. The film won ten Academy Awards, including Best Picture and a ground-breaking Best Supporting Actress award for Puerto Rican-born Rita Moreno playing the role of Anita.
A new film adaptation directed by Steven Spielberg opened in theaters on December 10, 2021.
Serenade, Prelude, Fugue and Riffs, and On The Waterfront
In addition to Bernstein's compositional activity for the stage, he also wrote a symphonic work, Serenade after Plato's "Symposium"; the score to the Academy Award-winning film On The Waterfront; and Prelude, Fugue and Riffs, composed for jazz big band and solo clarinet.
First American to conduct at La Scala
In 1953, Bernstein became the first American conductor to appear at La Scala in Milan, conducting Cherubini's Medea, with Maria Callas in the title role and directed by Luchino Visconti. Callas and Bernstein reunited at La Scala to perform in Bellini's La sonnambula in 1955.
Omnibus
On November 14, 1954, Bernstein presented the first of his television lectures for the CBS Television Network arts program Omnibus. The live lecture, entitled "Beethoven's Fifth Symphony", involved Bernstein explaining the symphony's first movement with the aid of musicians from the "Symphony of the Air" (formerly NBC Symphony Orchestra). The program featured manuscripts from Beethoven's own hand, as well as a giant painting of the first page of the score covering the studio floor. Six more Omnibus lectures followed from 1955 to 1961 (later on ABC and then NBC) covering a broad range of topics: jazz, conducting, American musical comedy, modern music, J.S. Bach, and grand opera.
Music director of the New York Philharmonic
Bernstein was appointed the music director of the New York Philharmonic in 1957, sharing the post jointly with Dimitri Mitropoulos until he took sole charge in 1958. Bernstein held the music directorship until 1969 when he was appointed "Laureate Conductor". He continued to conduct and make recordings with the orchestra for the rest of his life.
Young People's Concerts with the New York Philharmonic
Bernstein's television teaching took a quantum leap when, as the new music director of the New York Philharmonic, he put the orchestra's traditional Saturday afternoon Young People's Concerts on the CBS Television Network. Millions of viewers of all ages and around the world enthusiastically embraced Bernstein and his engaging presentations about classical music. Bernstein often presented talented young performers on the broadcasts. Many of them became celebrated in their own right, including conductors Claudio Abbado and Seiji Ozawa; flutist Paula Robison; and pianist André Watts. From 1958–1972, the fifty-three Young People's Concerts comprised the most influential series of music education programs ever produced on television. They were highly acclaimed by critics and won numerous Emmy Awards.
Some of Bernstein's scripts, all of which he wrote himself, were released in book form and on records. A recording of Humor in Music was awarded a Grammy award for Best Documentary or Spoken Word Recording (other than comedy) in 1961. The programs were shown in many countries around the world, often with Bernstein dubbed into other languages, and the concerts were later released on home video by Kultur Video.
United States Department of State tours
In 1958, Bernstein and Mitropoulos led the New York Philharmonic on its first tour south of the border, through 12 countries in Central and South America. The United States Department of State sponsored the tour to improve the nation's relations with its southern neighbors.
In 1959, the Department of State also sponsored Bernstein and the Philharmonic on a 50-concert tour through Europe and the Soviet Union, portions of which were filmed by the CBS Television Network. A highlight of the tour was Bernstein's performance of Shostakovich's Fifth Symphony, in the presence of the composer, who came on stage at the end to congratulate Bernstein and the musicians.
The 1960s
New York Philharmonic Innovations
Bernstein's innovative approach to themed programming included introducing audiences to lesser performed composers at the time such as Gustav Mahler, Carl Nielsen, Jean Sibelius, and Charles Ives (including the world premiere of his Symphony No. 2). Bernstein actively advocated for the commission and performance of works by contemporary composers, conducting over 40 world premieres by a diverse roster of composers ranging from John Cage to Alberto Ginastera to Luciano Berio. He also conducted US premieres of 19 major works from around the globe, including works by Dmitri Shostakovich, Pierre Boulez, and György Ligeti.
Bernstein championed American composers, especially with whom he had a close friendship, such as Aaron Copland, William Schuman, and David Diamond. This decade saw a significant expansion of Bernstein and the Philharmonic's collaboration with Columbia Records, together they released over 400 compositions, covering a broad swath of the classical music canon.
Bernstein welcomed the Philharmonic's additions of its first Black musician, Sanford Allen, and its second woman musician, Orin O'Brien. Bernstein also shared the Philharmonic’s commitment to connecting with as many New Yorkers as possible. That vision became a reality with the launch of the Concerts in the Parks in 1965, which Bernstein conducted often.
Another milestone was the Philharmonic’s first visit to Japan in 1961, when Bernstein led acclaimed Philharmonic concerts and engaged in cultural exchange. Over the years he led the Orchestra on tours to 144 cities in 38 countries.
He initiated the Philharmonic's informal Thursday Evening Preview Concerts, which included Bernstein's talks from the stage, a practice that was unheard of at the time.
In one oft-reported incident, on April 6, 1962, Bernstein appeared on stage before a performance of the Brahms Piano Concerto No. 1 in D Minor to explain that the soloist, Glenn Gould, had chosen an idiosyncratic approach to the work. Bernstein explained that while he didn't totally agree with it, he thought Gould's interpretation was an artistically worthy exploration. Bernstein questioned: "In a concerto, who is the boss: the soloist or the conductor?" The incident created a stir that reverberated in the press for decades.
Bernstein and Mahler
In 1960, Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic introduced American audiences to the music of Gustav Mahler, beginning with a festival marking the centennial of the composer's birth. The composer's widow, Alma, attended some of Bernstein's rehearsals. In that same year, Bernstein made his first commercial recording of a Mahler symphony (the Fourth). Over the next seven years, he recorded the entire Mahler symphony cycle with the New York Philharmonic (except for the 8th Symphony, which was recorded with the London Symphony Orchestra).
The combination of concert performances, television talks, and recordings led to a renewed interest in Mahler, especially in the United States. Bernstein claimed that he identified with the works on a personal level, and once wrote of the composer: "I'm so sympathetic to Mahler: I understand his problem. It's like being two different men locked up in the same body; one man is a conductor and the other a composer ... It's like being a double man."
Opening Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
On May 14, 1959, President Dwight D. Eisenhower broke ground for Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. On September 23, 1962, the New York Philharmonic moved from Carnegie Hall to its new home, Philharmonic Hall (now David Geffen Hall). Bernstein conducted the gala opening concert featuring works by Mahler, Beethoven and Vaughan Williams, as well as the premiere of Aaron Copland's Connotations.
Metropolitan Opera debut
In 1964, Bernstein conducted at The Metropolitan Opera for the first time in Franco Zeffirelli's production of Verdi's Falstaff. In subsequent years, Bernstein returned to The Met to conduct Cavalleria Rusticana (1970) and Carmen (1972), as well as at the Centennial Gala in 1983.
An Artist's Response to Violence
In 1961, Bernstein had conducted at President John F. Kennedy's pre-inaugural gala, and he was an occasional guest in the White House. Years later he conducted at the funeral mass in 1968 for President Kennedy's brother Robert F. Kennedy, featuring the Adagietto from Mahler's 5th Symphony. Jackie Kennedy famously wrote to Bernstein after the event: "When your Mahler started to fill (but that is the wrong word — because it was more this sensitive trembling) the Cathedral today — I thought it the most beautiful music I had ever heard".
On November 23, 1963, the day after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Bernstein conducted the New York Philharmonic and the Schola Cantorum of New York in a nationally televised memorial featuring the "Resurrection Symphony" by Gustav Mahler. This was the first televised performance of the complete symphony. Mahler's music had never been performed for such an event, and since the tribute to JFK, Mahler symphonies have become part of the Philharmonic's standard repertoire for national mourning.
Kaddish and Chichester Psalms
With his commitment to the New York Philharmonic and his many other activities, Bernstein had little time for composition during the 1960s. The two major works he produced at this time were his Kaddish Symphony, dedicated to the recently assassinated President John F. Kennedy, and the Chichester Psalms, which he produced during a sabbatical year he took from the Philharmonic in 1965 to concentrate on composition. Wanting to make more time for composition was probably a major factor in his decision to step down as music director of the Philharmonic in 1969, and to never again accept such a position elsewhere.
International conductor
In 1966, he made his debut at the Vienna State Opera conducting Luchino Visconti's production of the same opera with Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau as Falstaff. During his time in Vienna he also recorded the opera for Columbia Records and conducted his first subscription concert with the Vienna Philharmonic (which is made up of players from the Vienna State Opera) featuring Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde with Fischer-Dieskau and James King. He returned to the State Opera in 1968 for a production of Der Rosenkavalier and in 1970 for Otto Schenk's production of Beethoven's Fidelio.
After stepping down from the New York Philharmonic, Bernstein continued to appear with them in most years until his death, and he toured with them to Europe in 1976 and to Asia in 1979. He also strengthened his relationship with the Vienna Philharmonic—he conducted all nine completed Mahler symphonies with them (plus the Adagio from the 10th) in the period from 1967 to 1976. All of these were filmed for Unitel with the exception of the 1967 Mahler 2nd, which instead Bernstein filmed with the London Symphony Orchestra in Ely Cathedral in 1973. In the late 1970s Bernstein conducted a complete Beethoven symphony cycle with the Vienna Philharmonic, and cycles of Brahms and Schumann were to follow in the 1980s. Other orchestras he conducted on numerous occasions in the 1970s include the Israel Philharmonic, the Orchestre National de France, and the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
In 1970 Bernstein wrote and narrated a ninety-minute program filmed on location in and around Vienna as a celebration of Beethoven's 200th birthday. It featured parts of Bernstein's rehearsals and performance for the Otto Schenk production of Fidelio, Bernstein playing the 1st piano concerto and conducting the Ninth Symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic, with the young Plácido Domingo amongst the soloists. The program was first telecast in 1970 on Austrian and British television, and then on CBS in the U.S. on Christmas Eve 1971. The show, originally entitled Beethoven's Birthday: A Celebration in Vienna, won an Emmy and was issued on DVD in 2005. In the summer of 1970, during the Festival of London, he conducted Verdi's Requiem Mass in St. Paul's Cathedral, with the London Symphony Orchestra.
Early 1970s
Bernstein's major compositions during the 1970s were his Mass: A Theatre Piece for Singers, Players, and Dancers; his score for the ballet Dybbuk; his orchestral vocal work Songfest; and his U.S. bicentenary musical 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue written with lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner which was his first real theatrical flop, and last original Broadway show.
Mass: A Theatre Piece for Singers, Players, and Dancers
In 1966, Jacqueline Kennedy commissioned Bernstein to compose a work for the inauguration of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. Bernstein began writing Mass in 1969 as a large-scale theatrical work based on the Tridentine Mass of the Catholic Church, and in 1971, Bernstein invited the young composer and lyricist Stephen Schwartz, who had recently opened the musical Godspell off-Broadway, to collaborate as co-lyricist. The world premiere of took place on September 8, 1971, conducted by Maurice Peress and choreographed by Alvin Ailey.
Bernstein's score combines elements of musical theater, jazz, gospel, folk, rock, and symphonic music, and the libretto combines Latin and English liturgy, Hebrew prayer, and additional lyrics written by Bernstein and Schwartz.
Mass was originally criticized by both the Catholic Church and those who opposed its anti-Vietnam War message, as well as by some music critics. Viewpoints on Mass continue to evolve over time, and Edward Seckerson wrote in 2021, 50 years after its premiere: "Put simply, no other work of Bernstein's encapsulates exactly who he was as a man or as a musician; no other work displays his genius, his intellect, his musical virtuosity and innate theatricality quite like MASS."
Deutsche Grammophon recordings
In 1972, Bernstein recorded Bizet's Carmen, with Marilyn Horne in the title role and James McCracken as Don Jose, after leading several stage performances of the opera at the Metropolitan Opera. The recording was one of the first in stereo to use the original spoken dialogue between the sung portions of the opera, rather than the musical recitatives that were composed by Ernest Guiraud after Bizet's death. The recording was Bernstein's first for Deutsche Grammophon and won a Grammy.
Norton Lectures at Harvard
Bernstein was appointed in 1973 to the Charles Eliot Norton Chair as Professor of Poetry at his alma mater, Harvard University, and delivered a series of six televised lectures on music with musical examples played by the Boston Symphony Orchestra. However, these lectures were not televised until 1976. Taking the title from a Charles Ives work, he called the series The Unanswered Question; it was a set of interdisciplinary lectures in which he borrowed terminology from contemporary linguistics to analyze and compare musical construction to language. The lectures are presently available in both book and DVD form. The DVD video was not taken directly from the lectures at Harvard, rather they were recreated again at the WGBH studios for filming. This appears to be the only surviving Norton lectures series available to the general public in video format. Noam Chomsky wrote in 2007 on the Znet forums about the linguistic aspects of the lecture: "I spent some time with Bernstein during the preparation and performance of the lectures. My feeling was that he was onto something, but I couldn't really judge how significant it was."
Rostropovich
Bernstein played an instrumental role in the release of renowned cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich from the USSR in 1974. Rostropovich, a strong believer in free speech and democracy, had been officially held in disgrace; his concerts and tours both at home and abroad cancelled, and in 1972 he was prohibited to travel outside of the Soviet Union. During a trip to the USSR in 1974, Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy and his wife Joan, urged by Bernstein and others in the cultural sphere, mentioned Rostropovich's situation to Leonid Brezhnev, the Soviet Union Communist Party Leader. Two days later, Rostropovich was granted his exit visa.
SNL
Chevy Chase stated in his biography that Lorne Michaels wanted Bernstein to host Saturday Night Live in the show's first season (1975–76). Chase was seated next to Bernstein at a birthday party for Kurt Vonnegut and made the request in person. However, the pitch involved a Bernstein-conducted SNL version of West Side Story, and Bernstein was uninterested.
Felicia Montealegre Bernstein Fund of Amnesty International USA
In October 1976, Bernstein led the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and pianist Claudio Arrau in an Amnesty International Benefit Concert in Munich. To honor his late wife and to continue their joint support for human rights, Bernstein established the Felicia Montealegre Bernstein Fund of Amnesty International USA to provide aid for human rights activists with limited resources.
Late 1970s
In 1978, Bernstein returned to the Vienna State Opera to conduct a revival of the Otto Schenk production of Fidelio, now featuring Gundula Janowitz and René Kollo in the lead roles. At the same time, Bernstein made a studio recording of the opera for Deutsche Grammophon and the opera itself was filmed by Unitel and released on DVD by Deutsche Grammophon in late 2006. In May 1978, the Israel Philharmonic played two U.S. concerts under his direction to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the founding of the Orchestra under that name. On consecutive nights, the Orchestra, with the Choral Arts Society of Washington, performed Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and Bernstein's Chichester Psalms at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., and at Carnegie Hall in New York.
In 1979, Bernstein conducted the Berlin Philharmonic for the first time, in two charity concerts for Amnesty International involving performances of Mahler's Ninth Symphony. The invitation for the concerts had come from the orchestra and not from its principal conductor Herbert von Karajan. There has been speculation about why Karajan never invited Bernstein to conduct his orchestra. (Karajan did conduct the New York Philharmonic during Bernstein's tenure.) The full reasons will probably never be known—reports suggest they were on friendly terms when they met, but sometimes practiced a little mutual one-upmanship. One of the concerts was broadcast on radio and was posthumously released on CD by Deutsche Grammophon. One oddity of the recording is that the trombone section fails to enter at the climax of the finale, as a result of an audience member fainting just behind the trombones a few seconds earlier.
Early 1980s
Bernstein received the Kennedy Center Honors award in 1980. For the rest of the 1980s he continued to conduct, teach, compose, and produce the occasional TV documentary. His most significant compositions of the decade were probably his opera A Quiet Place, which he wrote with Stephen Wadsworth and which premiered, in its original version, in Houston in 1983; his Divertimento for Orchestra; his Ḥalil for flute and orchestra; his Concerto for Orchestra "Jubilee Games"; and his song cycle Arias and Barcarolles, which was named after a comment President Dwight D. Eisenhower had made to him in 1960.
International fame
In 1982 in the U.S., PBS aired an 11-part series of Bernstein's late 1970s films for Unitel of the Vienna Philharmonic playing all nine Beethoven symphonies and various other Beethoven works. Bernstein gave spoken introduction and actor Maximilian Schell was also featured on the programs, reading from Beethoven's letters. The original films have since been released on DVD by Deutsche Grammophon. In addition to conducting in New York, Vienna and Israel, Bernstein was a regular guest conductor of other orchestras in the 1980s. These included the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam, with whom he recorded Mahler's First, Fourth, and Ninth Symphonies amongst other works; the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in Munich, with whom he recorded Wagner's Tristan und Isolde; Haydn's Creation; Mozart's Requiem and Great Mass in C minor; and the orchestra of Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, with whom he recorded some Debussy and Puccini's La bohème.
In 1982, he and Ernest Fleischmann founded the Los Angeles Philharmonic Institute as a summer training academy along the lines of Tanglewood. Bernstein served as artistic director and taught conducting there until 1984. Around the same time, he performed and recorded some of his own works with the Los Angeles Philharmonic for Deutsche Grammophon. Bernstein was also at the time a committed supporter of nuclear disarmament. In 1985 he took the European Community Youth Orchestra in a "Journey for Peace" tour across Europe and Japan.
In 1984, he conducted a recording of West Side Story, the first time he had conducted the entire work. The recording, featuring what some critics felt were miscast opera singers such as Kiri Te Kanawa, José Carreras, and Tatiana Troyanos in the leading roles, was nevertheless an international bestseller. A TV documentary The Making of West Side Story about the recording was made at the same time and has been released as a DVD. Bernstein also continued to make his own TV documentaries during the 1980s, including The Little Drummer Boy, in which he discussed the music of Gustav Mahler, perhaps the composer he was most passionately interested in, and The Love of Three Orchestras, in which he discussed his work in New York, Vienna, and Israel.
In his later years, Bernstein's life and work were celebrated around the world (as they have been since his death). The Israel Philharmonic celebrated his involvement with them at festivals in Israel and Austria in 1977. In 1986 the London Symphony Orchestra mounted a Bernstein Festival in London with one concert that Bernstein himself conducted attended by the Queen. In 1988 Bernstein's 70th birthday was celebrated by a lavish televised gala at Tanglewood featuring many performers who had worked with him over the years.
During summer 1987, he celebrated the 100th anniversary of Nadia Boulanger at the American Conservatory in Fontainebleau. He gave a masterclass inside the castle of Fontainebleau.
In December 1989, Bernstein conducted live performances and recorded in the studio his operetta Candide with the London Symphony Orchestra. The recording starred Jerry Hadley, June Anderson, Adolph Green, and Christa Ludwig in the leading roles. The use of opera singers in some roles perhaps fitted the style of operetta better than some critics had thought was the case for West Side Story, and the posthumously released recording was universally praised. One of the live concerts from the Barbican Centre in London is available on DVD. Candide had had a troubled history, with many rewrites and writers involved. Bernstein's concert and recording were based on a final version that had been first performed by Scottish Opera in 1988. The opening night, which Bernstein attended in Glasgow, was conducted by his former student John Mauceri.
Ode to "Freedom"
On December 25, 1989, Bernstein conducted Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 in East Berlin's Schauspielhaus as part of a celebration of the fall of the Berlin Wall. He had conducted the same work in West Berlin the previous day. The concert was broadcast live in more than twenty countries to an estimated audience of 100 million people. For the occasion, Bernstein reworded Friedrich Schiller's text of the Ode to Joy, using the word Freiheit (freedom) instead of the original Freude (joy). Bernstein, in his spoken introduction, said that they had "taken the liberty" of doing this because of a "most likely phony" story, apparently believed in some quarters, that Schiller wrote an "Ode to Freedom" that is now presumed lost. Bernstein added, "I'm sure that Beethoven would have given us his blessing."
Founding of Pacific Music Festival
In the summer of 1990, Bernstein and Michael Tilson Thomas founded the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan. Like his earlier activity in Los Angeles, this was a summer training school for musicians modeled on Tanglewood and is still in existence. At this time, Bernstein was already suffering from the lung disease that would lead to his death. In his opening address Bernstein said that he had decided to devote what time he had left to education. A video showing Bernstein speaking and rehearsing at the first Festival is available on DVD in Japan.
In the same year, Bernstein received the Praemium Imperiale, an international prize awarded by the Japan Arts Association for lifetime achievement in the arts. Bernstein used the $100,000 prize to establish The Bernstein Education Through the Arts (BETA) Fund, Inc. He provided this grant to develop an arts-based education program. The Leonard Bernstein Center was established in April 1992, and initiated extensive school-based research, resulting in the Bernstein Model, the Leonard Bernstein Artful Learning Program.
Last concert
Bernstein conducted his last concert on August 19, 1990, with the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood. The program consisted of Benjamin Britten's Four Sea Interludes from Peter Grimes and Beethoven's Symphony No. 7. He suffered a coughing fit during the third movement of the Beethoven symphony, but continued to conduct the piece until its conclusion, leaving the stage during the ovation, appearing exhausted and in pain. The concert was later issued in edited form on CD as Leonard Bernstein – The Final Concert by Deutsche Grammophon. Also included was Bernstein's own Arias and Barcarolles in an orchestration by Bright Sheng. However, poor health prevented Bernstein from performing it. Carl St. Clair was engaged to conduct it in his stead.
Personal life
After much personal struggle and a turbulent on-off engagement, Bernstein married actress Felicia Cohn Montealegre on September 10, 1951. One suggestion is that he chose to marry partly to dispel rumors about his private life to help secure a major conducting appointment, following advice from his mentor Dimitri Mitropoulos about the conservative nature of orchestra boards. Bernstein had expressed the same internal conflict and sought similar advice from Aaron Copland in 1943, suggesting he could resolve it by marrying his then "girl-friend ... my dentist's daughter". In a book released in October 2013, The Leonard Bernstein Letters, his wife acknowledges his homosexuality. Felicia writes: "You are a homosexual and may never change—you don't admit to the possibility of a double life, but if your peace of mind, your health, your whole nervous system depend on a certain sexual pattern what can you do?" Arthur Laurents (Bernstein's collaborator in West Side Story) said that Bernstein was "a gay man who got married. He wasn't conflicted about it at all. He was just gay." Shirley Rhoades Perle, another friend of Bernstein, said that she thought "he required men sexually and women emotionally". But the early years of his marriage seem to have been happy, and no one has suggested Bernstein and his wife did not love each other. They had three children, Jamie, Alexander, and Nina. There are reports, though, that Bernstein did sometimes have brief extramarital liaisons with young men, which several family friends have said his wife knew about.
A major period of upheaval in Bernstein's personal life began in 1976 when he decided that he could no longer conceal his homosexuality and he left his wife Felicia for a period to live with the musical director of the classical music radio station KKHI in San Francisco, Tom Cothran. The next year Felicia was diagnosed with lung cancer and eventually Bernstein moved back in with her and cared for her until she died on June 16, 1978. Bernstein is reported to have often spoken of his terrible guilt over his wife's death. Most biographies of Bernstein state that his lifestyle became more excessive and his personal behavior sometimes more reckless and crude after her death. However, his public standing and many of his close friendships appear to have remained unaffected, and he resumed his busy schedule of musical activity.
His affairs with men included a ten-year relationship with Kunihiko Hashimoto, a Tokyo insurance employee. The two met when the New York Philharmonic was performing in Tokyo. Hashimoto went backstage and they ended up spending the night together. It was a long distance affair, but according to letters, they both cared about each other deeply. Dearest Lenny: Letters from Japan and the Making of the World Maestro by Mari Yoshihara (Oxford University Press, 2019) goes into detail about their letters and relationship including interviews with Hashimoto. The book also includes other letters Bernstein received from Japanese fans.
Bernstein had asthma, which kept him from serving in the military during World War II.
Death and legacy
Bernstein announced his retirement from conducting on October 9, 1990 and died five days later, in his New York apartment at The Dakota, of a heart attack brought on by mesothelioma. He was 72 years old. A longtime heavy smoker, he had had emphysema from his mid-50s. On the day of his funeral procession through the streets of Manhattan, construction workers removed their hats and waved, calling out "Goodbye, Lenny". Bernstein is buried in Green-Wood Cemetery, Brooklyn, New York, next to his wife and with a copy of Mahler's Fifth Symphony opened to the famous Adagietto lying across his heart. On August 25, 2018 (his 100th birthday), he was honored with a Google Doodle. Also for his centennial, the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles created an exhibition titled Leonard Bernstein at 100.
Social activism
While Bernstein was very well known for his music compositions and conducting, he was also known for his outspoken political views and his strong desire to further social change. His first aspirations for social change were made apparent in his producing (as a student) a recently banned opera, The Cradle Will Rock, by Marc Blitzstein, about the disparity between the working and upper class. His first opera, Trouble in Tahiti, was dedicated to Blitzstein and has a strong social theme, criticizing American civilization and suburban upper-class life in particular. As he went on in his career, Bernstein would go on to fight for everything from the influences of "American Music" to the disarming of western nuclear weapons.
Like many of his friends and colleagues, Bernstein had been involved in various left-wing causes and organizations since the 1940s. He was blacklisted by the US State Department and CBS in the early 1950s, but unlike others his career was not greatly affected, and he was never required to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee. His political life received substantial press coverage though in 1970, due to a gathering hosted at his Manhattan apartment at 895 Park Avenue on January 14, 1970. Bernstein and his wife held the event seeking to raise awareness and money for the defense of several members of the Black Panther Party against a variety of charges, especially the case of the Panther 21. The New York Times initially covered the gathering as a lifestyle item, but later posted an editorial harshly unfavorable to Bernstein following generally negative reaction to the widely publicized story. This reaction culminated in June 1970 with the appearance of "Radical Chic: That Party at Lenny's", an essay by journalist Tom Wolfe featured on the cover of the magazine New York. The article contrasted the Bernsteins' comfortable lifestyle in one of the world's most expensive neighborhoods with the anti-establishment politics of the Black Panthers. It led to the popularization of "radical chic" as a critical term. Both Bernstein and his wife Felicia responded to the criticism, arguing that they were motivated not by a shallow desire to express fashionable sympathy but by their concern for civil liberties.
Bernstein was named in the book Red Channels: The Report of Communist Influence in Radio and Television (1950) as a Communist along with Aaron Copland, Lena Horne, Pete Seeger, Artie Shaw and other prominent figures of the performing arts. Red Channels was issued by the right-wing journal Counterattack and was edited by Vincent Hartnett, who was later found to have libeled and defamed the noted radio personality John Henry Faulk.
Philanthropy
Among the many awards Bernstein earned throughout his life, one allowed him to make one of his philanthropic dreams a reality. He had for a long time wanted to develop an international school to help promote the integration of arts into education. When he won the Praemium Imperiale, Japan Arts Association award for lifetime achievement in 1990, he used the $100,000 that came with the award to build such a school in Nashville, that would strive to teach teachers how to better integrate music, dance, and theater into the school system which was "not working". Unfortunately, the school was not able to open until shortly after Bernstein's death. This would eventually yield an initiative known as Artful Learning as part of the Leonard Bernstein Center.
Influence and characteristics as a conductor
Bernstein was one of the major figures in orchestral conducting in the second half of the 20th century. He was held in high regard amongst many musicians, including the members of the Vienna Philharmonic, evidenced by his honorary membership; the London Symphony Orchestra, of which he was president; and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, with which he appeared regularly as guest conductor. He was probably the main conductor from the 1960s onwards who acquired a sort of superstar status similar to that of Herbert von Karajan, although unlike Karajan he conducted relatively little opera and part of Bernstein's fame was based on his role as a composer. As the first American-born music director of the New York Philharmonic, his rise to prominence was a factor in overcoming the perception of the time that the top conductors were necessarily trained in Europe.
Bernstein's conducting was characterized by extremes of emotion with the rhythmic pulse of the music conveyed visually through his balletic podium manner. Musicians often reported that his manner in rehearsal was the same as in concert. As he got older his performances tended to be overlaid to a greater extent with a personal expressiveness which often divided critical opinion. Extreme examples of this style can be found in his Deutsche Grammophon recordings of "Nimrod" from Elgar's Enigma Variations (1982), the end of Mahler's 9th Symphony (1985), and the finale of Tchaikovsky's Pathétique Symphony (1986), where in each case the tempos are well below those typically chosen. A skilled pianist, he used to perform the piano parts himself and conduct orchestras from the keyboard (for instance, when he conducted Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue).
Bernstein performed a wide repertoire from the Baroque era to the 20th century, although perhaps from the 1970s onwards he tended to focus more on music from the Romantic era. He was considered especially accomplished with the works of Gustav Mahler and with American composers in general, including George Gershwin, Aaron Copland, Charles Ives, Roy Harris, William Schuman, and of course himself. Some of his recordings of works by these composers would likely appear on many music critics' lists of recommended recordings. A list of his other well-thought-of recordings would include, among others, individual works from Haydn, Beethoven, Berlioz, Schumann, Liszt, Nielsen, Sibelius, Stravinsky, Hindemith, and Shostakovich. His recordings of Rhapsody in Blue (full-orchestra version) and An American in Paris for Columbia Records, released in 1959, are considered definitive by many, although Bernstein cut the Rhapsody slightly, and his more 'symphonic' approach with slower tempi is quite far from Gershwin's own conception of the piece, evident from his two recordings. (Oscar Levant, Earl Wild, and others come closer to Gershwin's own style.) Bernstein never conducted Gershwin's Piano Concerto in F, or more than a few excerpts from Porgy and Bess, although he did discuss the latter in his article Why Don't You Run Upstairs and Write a Nice Gershwin Tune?, originally published in The New York Times and later reprinted in his 1959 book The Joy of Music.
In addition to being an active conductor, Bernstein was an influential teacher of conducting. During his many years of teaching at Tanglewood and elsewhere, he directly taught or mentored many conductors who are performing now, including John Mauceri, Marin Alsop, Herbert Blomstedt, Edo de Waart, Alexander Frey, Paavo Järvi, Eiji Oue, Maurice Peress, Seiji Ozawa (who made his American TV debut as the guest conductor on one of the Young People's Concerts), Carl St.Clair, Helmuth Rilling, Michael Tilson Thomas, and Jaap van Zweden. He also undoubtedly influenced the career choices of many American musicians who grew up watching his television programmes in the 1950s and 60s.
Recordings
Bernstein recorded extensively from the mid-1940s until just a few months before his death. Aside from those 1940s recordings, which were made for RCA Victor, Bernstein recorded primarily for Columbia Masterworks Records, especially when he was music director of the New York Philharmonic between 1958 and 1971. His typical pattern of recording at that time was to record major works in the studio immediately after they were presented in the orchestra's subscription concerts or on one of the Young People's Concerts, with any spare time used to record short orchestral showpieces and similar works. Many of these performances were digitally remastered and reissued by Sony Classical Records (the successor to American Columbia/CBS Masterworks following Sony's 1990 acquisition of Columbia/CBS Records) between 1992 and 1993 as part of its 100 volume, 125-CD "Royal Edition", as well as its 1997–2001 "Bernstein Century" series. The rights to Bernstein's 1940s RCA Victor recordings became fully owned by Sony following its 2008 acquisition of Bertelsmann Music Group's (BMG), and now controls both the RCA Victor and Columbia archives. The complete Bernstein Columbia and RCA Victor catalog was reissued on CD in a three-volume series of box sets (released in 2010, 2014, and 2018, respectively) comprising a total of 198 discs under the mantle "Leonard Bernstein Edition".
His later recordings (starting with Bizet's Carmen in 1972) were mostly made for Deutsche Grammophon, though he would occasionally return to the Columbia label. Notable exceptions include recordings of Gustav Mahler's Song of the Earth and Mozart's 15th piano concerto and "Linz" symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic for Decca Records (1966); Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique and Harold in Italy (1976) for EMI; and Wagner's Tristan und Isolde (1981) for Philips Records, a label that like Deutsche Grammophon was part of PolyGram at that time. Unlike his studio recordings for Columbia Masterworks, most of his later Deutsche Grammophon recordings were taken from live concerts (or edited together from several concerts with additional sessions to correct errors). Many replicate repertoire that he recorded in the 1950s and 60s.
In addition to his audio recordings, many of Bernstein's concerts from the 1970s onwards were recorded on motion picture film by the German film company Unitel. This included a complete cycle of the Mahler symphonies (with the Vienna Philharmonic and London Symphony Orchestra), as well as complete cycles of the Beethoven, Brahms and Schumann symphonies recorded at the same series of concerts as the audio recordings by Deutsche Grammophon. Many of these films appeared on LaserDisc and are now on DVD.
In total Bernstein was awarded 16 Grammys for his recordings in various categories, including several for posthumously released recordings. He was also awarded a Lifetime Achievement Grammy in 1985.
Influence and characteristics as a composer
Bernstein was an eclectic composer whose music fused elements of jazz, Jewish music, theatre music, and the work of earlier composers like Aaron Copland, Igor Stravinsky, Darius Milhaud, George Gershwin, and Marc Blitzstein. Some of his works, especially his score for West Side Story, helped bridge the gap between classical and popular music. His music was rooted in tonality but in some works like his Kaddish Symphony and the opera A Quiet Place he mixed in 12-tone elements. Bernstein himself said his main motivation for composing was "to communicate" and that all his pieces, including his symphonies and concert works, "could in some sense be thought of as 'theatre' pieces".
According to the League of American Orchestras, he was the second most frequently performed American composer by U.S. orchestras in 2008–09 behind Copland, and he was the 16th most frequently performed composer overall by U.S. orchestras. (Some performances were probably due to the 2008 90th anniversary of his birth.) His most popular pieces were the Overture to Candide, the Symphonic Dances from West Side Story, the Serenade after Plato's "Symposium" and the Three Dance Episodes from On the Town. His shows West Side Story, On the Town, Wonderful Town and Candide are regularly performed, and his symphonies and concert works are programmed from time to time by orchestras around the world. Since his death many of his works have been commercially recorded by artists other than himself. The Serenade, which has been recorded more than 10 times, is probably his most recorded work not taken from an actual theatre piece.
Despite the fact that he was a popular success as a composer, Bernstein himself is reported to have been disillusioned that some of his more serious works were not rated more highly by critics, and that he himself had not been able to devote more time to composing because of his conducting and other activities. Professional criticism of Bernstein's music often involves discussing the degree to which he created something new as art versus simply skillfully borrowing and fusing together elements from others. In the late 1960s, Bernstein himself reflected that his eclecticism was in part due to his lack of lengthy periods devoted to composition, and that he was still seeking to enrich his own personal musical language in the manner of the great composers of the past, all of whom had borrowed elements from others. Perhaps the harshest criticism he received from some critics in his lifetime though was directed at works like his Kaddish Symphony, his MASS and the opera A Quiet Place, where they found the underlying message of the piece or the text as either mildly embarrassing, clichéd or offensive. Despite this, all these pieces have been performed, discussed and reconsidered since his death.
The Chichester Psalms, and excerpts from his Third Symphony and MASS were performed for Pope John Paul II, including at World Youth Day in Denver on August 14, 1993, and at the Papal Concert to Commemorate the Shoah on April 7, 1994, with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in the Sala Nervi at the Vatican. Both performances were conducted by Gilbert Levine.
Although he taught conducting, Bernstein did not teach composition and left no direct legacy of students in that field.
Bibliography
Videography
The Unanswered Question: Six Talks at Harvard. West Long Branch, New Jersey: Kultur Video. VHS . DVD . (videotape of the Charles Eliot Norton Lectures given at Harvard in 1973.)
Leonard Bernstein's Young People's Concerts with the New York Philharmonic. West Long Branch, New Jersey: Kultur Video. DVD .
Bernstein on Beethoven: A Celebration in Vienna/Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 1. West Long Branch, Kultur Video. DVD
Leonard Bernstein: Omnibus – The Historic TV Broadcasts, 2010, E1 Ent.
Bernstein: Reflections (1978), A rare personal portrait of Leonard Bernstein by Peter Rosen. Euroarts DVD
Bernstein/Beethoven (1982), Deutsche Grammophon, DVD
The Metropolitan Opera Centennial Gala (1983), Deutsche Grammophon, DVD 00440-073-4538
Bernstein Conducts "West Side Story" (1985) (retitled The Making of West Side Story in re-releases) Deutsche Grammophon. DVD
"The Rite of Spring" in Rehearsal
Mozart's Great Mass in C minor, Exsultate, jubilate & Ave verum corpus (1990), Deutsche Grammophon. DVD 00440-073-4240
"Leonard Bernstein: Reaching for the Note" (1998) Documentary on his life and music. Originally aired on PBS's American Masters series. DVD
Awards
Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1951
Fellow at the MacDowell 1962, 1970, 1972
Sonning Award (Denmark), 1965
Ditson Conductor's Award, 1958
George Peabody Medal – Johns Hopkins University, 1980
Ernst von Siemens Music Prize, 1987
Royal Philharmonic Society Gold Medal (UK), 1987
Edward MacDowell Medal, 1987
Knight Grand Cross Order of Merit (Italy), 1989
Grammy Award for Best Album for Children
Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Performance
Grammy Award for Best Choral Performance
Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording
Grammy Award for Best Classical Vocal Performance
Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Soloist(s) Performance
Grammy Award for Best Classical Contemporary Composition
Grammy Award for Best Classical Album
Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award
Tony Award for Best Musical
Special Tony Award
Japan Arts Association Lifetime Achievement Award
Gramophone Hall of Fame entrant
Commandeur de la Légion d'honneur, 1986
Bernstein is also a member of both the American Theater Hall of Fame, and the Television Hall of Fame. In 2015 he was inducted into the Legacy Walk.
References
Citations
Sources
(Doubleday edition)
Further reading
Bernstein, Burton (1982). Family Matters: Sam, Jennie, and the Kids. Simon & Schuster. .
Bernstein, Jamie (2018). Famous Father Girl: A Memoir of Growing Up Bernstein. HarperCollins Publishers. .
Bernstein, Shirley (1963). Making Music: Leonard Bernstein. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica Press. .
Briggs, John (1961). Leonard Bernstein: The Man, His Works and His World. World Publishing Co. .
Burton, William W. (1995). Conversations about Bernstein. New York: Oxford University Press, New York. .
Cone, Molly and Robert Galster (1970). Leonard Bernstein. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Co.
Ewen, David (1960). Leonard Bernstein, A Biography for Young People. Philadelphia: Chilton Co.
Fluegel, Jane (ed.) (1991). Bernstein: Remembered: a life in pictures. New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc. .
Freedland, Michael (1987). Leonard Bernstein. London, England: Harrap. Ltd. .
Gottlieb, Jack (2010). Working With Bernstein. Amadeus Press. .
Green, Diane Huss (1963). Lenny's Surprise Piano. San Carlos, California: Golden Gate Junior Books. .
Hurwitz, Johanna (1963). Leonard Bernstein: A Passion of Music. Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society. .
Ledbetter, Steven (1988). Sennets & Tuckets, A Bernstein Celebration. Boston: Boston Symphony Orchestra in association with David Godine Publisher, Inc.. .
Reidy, John P. & Norman Richards (1967). People of Destiny: Leonard Bernstein. Chicago: Children's Press. .
Robinson, Paul (1982). Bernstein (The Art of Conducting Series). New York: Vangard Press. .
Shawn, Allen (2014). Leonard Bernstein: An American Musician. Yale University Press. .
Wolfe, Tom (1987). Radical Chic and Mau Mauing the Flak Catchers. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux. .
External links
Archival records
Leonard Bernstein collection, circa 1900–1995, Library of Congress
Bernstein Online Collection, Library of Congress
Mildred Spiegel Zucker collection of Leonard Bernstein correspondence and related materials, 1936–1991, Library of Congress
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Tony Award winners | true | [
"Ladilla Rusa is a Spanish musical group formed in 2017 and originally from Montcada i Reixac, which is a municipality of the Province of Barcelona.\n\nHistory\nTania Lozano and Víctor F. Clares, originally from Moncada y Reixach, friends since childhood and journalists by training, decided in 2017 to create a musical duo, initially as a joke. Their style has influences of electropop, Catalan rumba and other influences from the Barcelona periphery, in what has been dubbed as \"charnego pride. They have played at the Sonorama and Arenal Sound festivals.\n\nDiscography\nEstado del Malestar. La Mundial Records (2018).\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Official website\n\nSpanish musical groups",
"John Wesley \"Dick\" Summers (1887-1976) was an old-time fiddler from Indiana. He learned to play from his family, but a Tom Riley of Kentucky was also an influence. Summers did not originally read music, but did learn to do so in his 70s. He was one of the only old-time Midwestern fiddlers to have a commercially distributed album in the post-World War II era. As indicated though his style had Southern, and as mentioned Kentucky, influences.\n\nReferences\n\nOld-time fiddlers\nMusicians from Indiana\n1887 births\n1976 deaths\nPlace of birth missing\n20th-century violinists"
] |
[
"Leonard Bernstein",
"Influence and characteristics as a conductor",
"What are Leonard's characteristics as conductor?",
"1971. His typical pattern of recording at that time was to record major works in the studio immediately after they were presented in the orchestra's subscription concerts",
"What influences did he have?",
"Aside from those 1940s recordings, which were made for RCA Victor, Bernstein recorded primarily for Columbia Masterworks Records,"
] | C_2e4ae84d3c6444c9a25724baadcf9a53_0 | Did he work with another record company? | 3 | Did Leonard Bernstein work with another record company besides RCA and Columbia Masterworks Records? | Leonard Bernstein | Bernstein recorded extensively from the mid-1940s until just a few months before his death. Aside from those 1940s recordings, which were made for RCA Victor, Bernstein recorded primarily for Columbia Masterworks Records, especially when he was music director of the New York Philharmonic between 1958 and 1971. His typical pattern of recording at that time was to record major works in the studio immediately after they were presented in the orchestra's subscription concerts or on one of the Young People's Concerts, with any spare time used to record short orchestral showpieces and similar works. Many of these performances were digitally remastered and reissued by Sony as part of their 100 Volume, 125 CDs "Royal Edition" and their later "Bernstein Century" series. In 2010 many of these recordings were repackaged in a 60 CD "Bernstein Symphony Edition". His later recordings (starting with Bizet's Carmen in 1972) were mostly made for Deutsche Grammophon, though he would occasionally return to the Columbia Masterworks label. Notable exceptions include recordings of Gustav Mahler's Song of the Earth and Mozart's 15th piano concerto and "Linz" symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra for Decca Records (1966); Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique and Harold in Italy (1976) for EMI; and Wagner's Tristan und Isolde (1981) for Philips Records, a label that like Deutsche Grammophon was part of PolyGram at that time. Unlike his studio recordings for Columbia Masterworks, most of his later Deutsche Grammophon recordings were taken from live concerts (or edited together from several concerts with additional sessions to correct errors). Many replicate repertoire that he recorded in the 1950s and 60s. In addition to his audio recordings, many of Bernstein's concerts from the 1970s onwards were recorded on motion picture film by the German film company Unitel. This included a complete cycle of the Mahler symphonies (with the Vienna Philharmonic and London Symphony Orchestra), as well as complete cycles of the Beethoven, Brahms and Schumann symphonies recorded at the same series of concerts as the audio recordings by Deutsche Grammophon. Many of these films appeared on Laserdisc and are now on DVD. In total Bernstein was awarded 16 Grammys for his recordings in various categories, including several for posthumously released recordings. He was also awarded a Lifetime Achievement Grammy in 1985. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Leonard Bernstein ( ; August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, pianist, music educator, author, and humanitarian. Among the most important conductors of his time, he was also the first American conductor to receive international acclaim. According to music critic Donal Henahan, he was "one of the most prodigiously talented and successful musicians in American history". Bernstein was the recipient of many honors, including seven Emmy Awards, two Tony Awards, sixteen Grammy Awards, including the Lifetime Achievement, and the Kennedy Center Honor.
As a composer he wrote in many genres, including symphonic and orchestral music, ballet, film and theatre music, choral works, opera, chamber music and works for the piano. His best-known work is the Broadway musical West Side Story, which continues to be regularly performed worldwide, and has been adapted into two (1961 and 2021) feature films. His works include three symphonies, Chichester Psalms, Serenade after Plato's "Symposium", the original score for the film On the Waterfront, and theater works including On the Town, Wonderful Town, Candide, and his MASS.
Bernstein was the first American-born conductor to lead a major American symphony orchestra. He was music director of the New York Philharmonic and conducted the world's major orchestras, generating a significant legacy of audio and video recordings. He was also a critical figure in the modern revival of the music of Gustav Mahler, in whose music he was most passionately interested. A skilled pianist, he often conducted piano concertos from the keyboard. He was the first conductor to share and explore music on television with a mass audience. Through dozens of national and international broadcasts, including the Emmy Award–winning Young People's Concerts with the New York Philharmonic, he made even the most rigorous elements of classical music an adventure in which everyone could join. Through his educational efforts, including several books and the creation of two major international music festivals, he influenced several generations of young musicians.
A lifelong humanitarian, Bernstein worked in support of civil rights; protested against the Vietnam War; advocated for nuclear disarmament; raised money for HIV/AIDS research and awareness; and engaged in multiple international initiatives for human rights and world peace. Near the end of his life, he conducted a historic performance of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 in Berlin to celebrate the fall of the Berlin Wall. The concert was televised live, worldwide, on Christmas Day, 1989.
Early life and education
1918–1934: Early life and family
Born Louis Bernstein in Lawrence, Massachusetts, he was the son of Ukrainian-Jewish parents, Jennie (née Resnick) and Samuel Joseph Bernstein, both of whom immigrated to the United States from Rovno (now Ukraine). His grandmother insisted that his first name be Louis, but his parents always called him Leonard. He legally changed his name to Leonard when he was eighteen, shortly after his grandmother's death. To his friends and many others he was simply known as "Lenny".
His father was the owner of The Samuel Bernstein Hair and Beauty Supply Company. It held the New England franchise for the Frederick's Permanent Wave Machine, whose immense popularity helped Sam get his family through The Great Depression.
In Leonard's early youth, his only exposure to music was the household radio and music on Friday nights at Congregation Mishkan Tefila in Roxbury, Massachusetts. When Leonard was ten years old, Samuel's sister Clara deposited her upright piano at her brother's house. Bernstein began teaching himself piano and music theory and was soon clamoring for lessons. He had a variety of piano teachers in his youth, including Helen Coates, who later became his secretary. In the summers, the Bernstein family would go to their vacation home in Sharon, Massachusetts, where young Leonard conscripted all the neighborhood children to put on shows ranging from Bizet's Carmen to Gilbert and Sullivan's The Pirates of Penzance. He would often play entire operas or Beethoven symphonies with his younger sister Shirley.
Leonard's youngest sibling Burton was born in 1932, thirteen years after Leonard. Despite the large span in age, the three siblings remained close their entire lives.
Sam was initially opposed to young Leonard's interest in music and attempted to discourage his son's interest by refusing to pay for his piano lessons. Leonard then took to giving lessons to young people in his neighborhood. One of his students, Sid Ramin, became Bernstein's most frequent orchestrator and lifelong beloved friend.
Sam took his son to orchestral concerts in his teenage years and eventually supported his music education. In May 1932, Leonard attended his first orchestral concert with the Boston Pops Orchestra conducted by Arthur Fiedler. Bernstein recalled, "To me, in those days, the Pops was heaven itself ... I thought ... it was the supreme achievement of the human race." It was at this concert that Bernstein first heard Ravel's Boléro, which made a tremendous impression on him.
Another strong musical influence was George Gershwin. Bernstein was a counselor at a summer camp when news came over the radio of Gershwin's death. In the mess hall, a shaken Bernstein demanded a moment of silence, and then played Gershwin's second Prelude as a memorial.
On March 30, 1932, Bernstein played Brahms's Rhapsody in G Minor at his first public piano performance in Susan Williams's studio recital at the New England Conservatory. Two years later, he made his solo debut with orchestra in Grieg's Piano Concerto in A Minor with the Boston Public School Orchestra.
1935–1940: College years
Bernstein's first two education environments were both public schools: the William Lloyd Garrison School, followed by the prestigious Boston Latin School, for which Bernstein and classmate Lawrence F. Ebb wrote the Class Song.
Harvard University
In 1935, Bernstein enrolled at Harvard University, where he studied music with, among others, Edward Burlingame Hill and Walter Piston. His first extant composition, Psalm 148 set for voice and piano, is dated in 1935. He majored in music with a final year thesis titled "The Absorption of Race Elements into American Music" (1939; reproduced in his book Findings). One of Bernstein's intellectual influences at Harvard was the aesthetics Professor David Prall, whose multidisciplinary outlook on the arts inspired Bernstein for the rest of his life.
One of his friends at Harvard was future philosopher Donald Davidson, with whom Bernstein played piano duets. Bernstein wrote and conducted the musical score for the production Davidson mounted of Aristophanes' play The Birds, performed in the original Greek. Bernstein recycled some of this music in future works.
While a student, he was briefly an accompanist for the Harvard Glee Club as well as an unpaid pianist for Harvard Film Society's silent film presentations.
Bernstein mounted a student production of The Cradle Will Rock, directing its action from the piano as the composer Marc Blitzstein had done at the infamous premiere. Blitzstein, who attended the performance, subsequently became a close friend and mentor to Bernstein.
As a sophomore at Harvard, Bernstein met the conductor Dimitri Mitropoulos. Mitropoulos's charisma and power as a musician were major influences on Bernstein's eventual decision to become a conductor. Mitropoulos invited Bernstein to come to Minneapolis for the 1940–41 season to be his assistant, but the plan fell through due to union issues.
Bernstein met Aaron Copland on the latter's birthday in 1937; the elder composer was sitting next to Bernstein at a dance recital at Town Hall in New York City. Copland invited Bernstein to his birthday party afterwards, where Bernstein impressed the guests by playing Copland's challenging Piano Variations, a work Bernstein loved. Although he was never a formal student of Copland's, Bernstein would regularly seek his advice, often citing him as his "only real composition teacher".
Bernstein graduated from Harvard in 1939 with a Bachelor of Arts cum laude.
Curtis Institute of Music
After graduating from Harvard, Bernstein enrolled at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. At Curtis, Bernstein studied conducting with Fritz Reiner (who anecdotally is said to have given Bernstein the only "A" grade he ever awarded); piano with Isabelle Vengerova; orchestration with Randall Thompson; counterpoint with Richard Stöhr; and score reading with Renée Longy Miquelle.
In 1940, Bernstein attended the inaugural year of the Tanglewood Music Center (then called the Berkshire Music Center) at the Boston Symphony Orchestra's summer home. Bernstein studied conducting with the BSO's music director, Serge Koussevitzky, who became a profound lifelong inspiration to Bernstein. He became Koussevitzky's conducting assistant at Tanglewood and later dedicated his Symphony No. 2: The Age of Anxiety to his beloved mentor. One of Bernstein's classmates, both at Curtis and at Tanglewood, was Lukas Foss, who remained a lifelong friend and colleague. Bernstein returned to Tanglewood nearly every summer for the rest of his life to teach and conduct the young music students.
Life and career
The 1940s
Soon after he left Curtis, Bernstein moved to New York City where he lived in various apartments in Manhattan. Bernstein supported himself by coaching singers, teaching piano, and playing the piano for dance classes in Carnegie Hall. He found work with Harms-Witmark, transcribing jazz and pop music and publishing his work under the pseudonym "Lenny Amber". (Bernstein means "amber" in German.)
Bernstein briefly shared an apartment in Greenwich Village with his friend Adolph Green. Green was part of a satirical music troupe called The Revuers, featuring Betty Comden and Judy Holliday. With Bernstein sometimes providing piano accompaniment, the Revuers often performed at the legendary jazz club the Village Vanguard.
On April 21, 1942, Bernstein performed the premiere of his first published work, Sonata for Clarinet and Piano, with clarinetist David Glazer at the Institute of Modern Art in Boston.
New York Philharmonic conducting debut
On November 14, 1943, having recently been appointed assistant conductor to Artur Rodziński of the New York Philharmonic, Bernstein made his major conducting debut at short notice—and without any rehearsal—after guest conductor Bruno Walter came down with the flu. The challenging program included works by Robert Schumann, Miklós Rózsa, Richard Wagner, and Richard Strauss.
The next day, The New York Times carried the story on its front page and remarked in an editorial, "It's a good American success story. The warm, friendly triumph of it filled Carnegie Hall and spread far over the air waves."
Many newspapers throughout the country carried the story, which, in combination with the concert's live national CBS Radio Network broadcast, propelled Bernstein to instant fame.
Over the next two years, Bernstein made conducting debuts with ten different orchestras in the United States and Canada, greatly broadening his repertoire and initiating a lifelong frequent practice of conducting concertos from the piano.
Symphony No. 1: Jeremiah, Fancy Free, and On the Town
On January 28, 1944, he conducted the premiere of his Symphony No. 1: Jeremiah with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra with Jennie Tourel as soloist.
In the fall of 1943, Bernstein and Jerome Robbins began work on their first collaboration, Fancy Free, a ballet about three young sailors on leave in wartime New York City. Fancy Free premiered on April 18, 1944, with the Ballet Theatre (now the American Ballet Theatre) at the old Metropolitan Opera House, with scenery by Oliver Smith and costumes by Kermit Love.
Bernstein and Robbins decided to expand the ballet into a musical and invited Comden and Green to write the book and lyrics. On the Town opened on Broadway's Adelphi Theatre on December 28, 1944. The show resonated with audiences during World War II, and it broke race barriers on Broadway: Japanese-American dancer Sono Osato in a leading role; a multiracial cast dancing as mixed race couples; and a Black concertmaster, Everett Lee, who eventually took over as music director of the show. On the Town became an MGM motion picture in 1949, starring Gene Kelly, Frank Sinatra, and Jules Munshin as the three sailors. Only part of Bernstein's score was used in the film and additional songs were provided by Roger Edens.
Rising conducting career
From 1945 to 1947, Bernstein was the music director of the New York City Symphony, which had been founded the previous year by the conductor Leopold Stokowski. The orchestra (with support from Mayor Fiorello La Guardia) had modern programs and affordable tickets.
In 1946, he made his overseas debut with the Czech Philharmonic in Prague. He also recorded Ravel's Piano Concerto in G as soloist and conductor with the Philharmonia Orchestra. On July 4, 1946, Bernstein conducted the European premiere of Fancy Free with the Ballet Theatre at the Royal Opera House in London.
In 1946, he conducted opera professionally for the first time at Tanglewood with the American premiere of Benjamin Britten's Peter Grimes, which was commissioned by Koussevitzky. That same year, Arturo Toscanini invited Bernstein to guest conduct two concerts with the NBC Symphony Orchestra, one of which also featured Bernstein as soloist in Ravel's Piano Concerto in G.
Israel Philharmonic Orchestra
In 1947, Bernstein conducted in Tel Aviv for the first time, beginning a lifelong association with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, then known as the Palestine Symphony Orchestra. The next year he conducted an open-air concert for Israeli troops at Beersheba in the middle of the desert during the Arab-Israeli war. In 1957, he conducted the inaugural concert of the Mann Auditorium in Tel Aviv. In 1967, he conducted a concert on Mount Scopus to commemorate the Reunification of Jerusalem, featuring Mahler's Symphony No. 2 and Mendelssohn Violin Concerto with soloist Isaac Stern. During the 1970s, Bernstein recorded his symphonies and other works with the Israel Philharmonic on Deutsche Grammophon. The city of Tel Aviv added his name to the Orchestra Plaza in the center of the city.
First television appearance
On December 10, 1949, he made his first television appearance as conductor with the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Carnegie Hall. The concert, which also included an address by Eleanor Roosevelt, celebrated the one-year anniversary of the United Nations General Assembly's ratification of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and included the premiere of Aaron Copland's "Preamble" with Sir Laurence Olivier narrating text from the UN Charter. The concert was televised by NBC Television Network.
Summer at Tanglewood
In April 1949, Bernstein performed as piano soloist in the world premiere of his Symphony No. 2: The Age of Anxiety with Koussevitzy conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Later that year, Bernstein conducted the world premiere of the Turangalîla-Symphonie by Olivier Messiaen, with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Part of the rehearsal for the concert was recorded and released by the orchestra. When Koussevitzky died in 1951, Bernstein became head of the orchestra and conducting departments at Tanglewood.
The 1950s
The 1950s comprised among the most active years of Bernstein's career. He created five new works for the Broadway stage; he composed several symphonic works and an iconic film score; he was appointed music director of the New York Philharmonic with whom he toured the world, including concerts behind the Iron Curtain; he harnessed the power of television to expand his educational reach; and he married and started a family.
Compositions in the 1950s
Theatrical works
Peter Pan
In 1950, Bernstein composed incidental music for a Broadway production of J. M. Barrie's play Peter Pan. The production, which opened on Broadway on April 24, 1950, starred Jean Arthur as Peter Pan and Boris Karloff in the dual roles of George Darling and Captain Hook. The show ran for 321 performances.
Trouble in Tahiti
In 1951, Bernstein composed Trouble in Tahiti, a one-act opera in seven scenes with an English libretto by the composer. The opera portrays the troubled marriage of a couple whose idyllic suburban post-war environment belies their inner turmoil. Ironically, Bernstein wrote most of the opera while on his honeymoon in Mexico with his wife, Felicia Montealegre.
Bernstein was a visiting music professor at Brandeis University from 1951 to 1956. In 1952, he created the Brandeis Festival of the Creative Arts, where he conducted the premiere of Trouble in Tahiti on June 12 of that year.
The NBC Opera Theatre subsequently presented the opera on television in November 1952. It opened on Broadway at the Playhouse Theatre on April 19, 1955 and ran for six weeks.
Three decades later, Bernstein wrote a second opera, A Quiet Place, which picked up the story and characters of Trouble in Tahiti in a later period.
Wonderful Town
In 1953, Bernstein wrote the score for the musical Wonderful Town on very short notice, with a book by Joseph A. Fields and Jerome Chodorov and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green. The musical tells the story of two sisters from Ohio who move to New York City and seek success from their squalid basement apartment in Greenwich Village.
Wonderful Town opened on Broadway on February 25, 1953 at the Winter Garden Theatre, starring Rosalind Russell in the role of Ruth Sherwood, Edie Adams as Eileen Sherwood, and George Gaynes as Robert Baker. It won five Tony Awards, including Best Musical and Best Actress.
Candide
In the three years leading up to Bernstein's appointment as music director of the New York Philharmonic, Bernstein was simultaneously working on the scores for two Broadway shows. The first of the two was the operetta-style musical Candide. Lillian Hellman originally brought Bernstein her idea of adapting Voltaire's novella. The original collaborators on the show were book writer John Latouche and lyricist Richard Wilbur.
Candide opened on Broadway on December 1, 1956 at the Martin Beck Theatre, in a production directed by Tyrone Guthrie. Anxious about the parallels Hellman had deliberately drawn between Voltaire's story and the ongoing hearings conducted by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Guthrie persuaded the collaborators to cut their most incendiary sections prior to opening night.
While the production was a box office disaster, running only two months for a total of 73 performances, the cast album became a cult classic, which kept Bernstein's score alive. The elements of the music that have remained best known and performed over the decades are the Overture, which quickly became one of the most frequently performed orchestral compositions by a 20th century American composer; the coloratura aria "Glitter and Be Gay", which Barbara Cook sang in the original production; and the grand finale "Make Our Garden Grow".
West Side Story
The other musical Bernstein was writing simultaneously with Candide was West Side Story. Bernstein collaborated with director and choreographer Jerome Robbins, book writer Arthur Laurents, and lyricist Stephen Sondheim.
The story is an updated retelling of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, set in the mid-1950s in the slums of New York City's Upper West Side. The Romeo character, Tony, is affiliated with the Jets gang, who are of white Northern European descent. The Juliet character is Maria, who is connected to the Sharks gang, recently arrived immigrants from Puerto Rico.
The original Broadway production opened at the Winter Garden Theatre on September 26, 1957, and ran 732 performances. Robbins won the Tony Award for Best Choreographer, and Oliver Smith won the Tony for Best Scenic Designer.
Bernstein's score for West Side Story blends "jazz, Latin rhythms, symphonic sweep and musical-comedy conventions in groundbreaking ways for Broadway". It was orchestrated by Sid Ramin and Irwin Kostal following detailed instructions from Bernstein. The dark theme, sophisticated music, extended dance scenes, and focus on social problems marked a turning point in musical theatre.
In 1960, Bernstein prepared a suite of orchestral music from the show, titled Symphonic Dances from West Side Story, which continues to be popular with orchestras worldwide.
A 1961 United Artists film adaptation, directed by Robert Wise and starred Natalie Wood as Maria and Richard Beymer as Tony. The film won ten Academy Awards, including Best Picture and a ground-breaking Best Supporting Actress award for Puerto Rican-born Rita Moreno playing the role of Anita.
A new film adaptation directed by Steven Spielberg opened in theaters on December 10, 2021.
Serenade, Prelude, Fugue and Riffs, and On The Waterfront
In addition to Bernstein's compositional activity for the stage, he also wrote a symphonic work, Serenade after Plato's "Symposium"; the score to the Academy Award-winning film On The Waterfront; and Prelude, Fugue and Riffs, composed for jazz big band and solo clarinet.
First American to conduct at La Scala
In 1953, Bernstein became the first American conductor to appear at La Scala in Milan, conducting Cherubini's Medea, with Maria Callas in the title role and directed by Luchino Visconti. Callas and Bernstein reunited at La Scala to perform in Bellini's La sonnambula in 1955.
Omnibus
On November 14, 1954, Bernstein presented the first of his television lectures for the CBS Television Network arts program Omnibus. The live lecture, entitled "Beethoven's Fifth Symphony", involved Bernstein explaining the symphony's first movement with the aid of musicians from the "Symphony of the Air" (formerly NBC Symphony Orchestra). The program featured manuscripts from Beethoven's own hand, as well as a giant painting of the first page of the score covering the studio floor. Six more Omnibus lectures followed from 1955 to 1961 (later on ABC and then NBC) covering a broad range of topics: jazz, conducting, American musical comedy, modern music, J.S. Bach, and grand opera.
Music director of the New York Philharmonic
Bernstein was appointed the music director of the New York Philharmonic in 1957, sharing the post jointly with Dimitri Mitropoulos until he took sole charge in 1958. Bernstein held the music directorship until 1969 when he was appointed "Laureate Conductor". He continued to conduct and make recordings with the orchestra for the rest of his life.
Young People's Concerts with the New York Philharmonic
Bernstein's television teaching took a quantum leap when, as the new music director of the New York Philharmonic, he put the orchestra's traditional Saturday afternoon Young People's Concerts on the CBS Television Network. Millions of viewers of all ages and around the world enthusiastically embraced Bernstein and his engaging presentations about classical music. Bernstein often presented talented young performers on the broadcasts. Many of them became celebrated in their own right, including conductors Claudio Abbado and Seiji Ozawa; flutist Paula Robison; and pianist André Watts. From 1958–1972, the fifty-three Young People's Concerts comprised the most influential series of music education programs ever produced on television. They were highly acclaimed by critics and won numerous Emmy Awards.
Some of Bernstein's scripts, all of which he wrote himself, were released in book form and on records. A recording of Humor in Music was awarded a Grammy award for Best Documentary or Spoken Word Recording (other than comedy) in 1961. The programs were shown in many countries around the world, often with Bernstein dubbed into other languages, and the concerts were later released on home video by Kultur Video.
United States Department of State tours
In 1958, Bernstein and Mitropoulos led the New York Philharmonic on its first tour south of the border, through 12 countries in Central and South America. The United States Department of State sponsored the tour to improve the nation's relations with its southern neighbors.
In 1959, the Department of State also sponsored Bernstein and the Philharmonic on a 50-concert tour through Europe and the Soviet Union, portions of which were filmed by the CBS Television Network. A highlight of the tour was Bernstein's performance of Shostakovich's Fifth Symphony, in the presence of the composer, who came on stage at the end to congratulate Bernstein and the musicians.
The 1960s
New York Philharmonic Innovations
Bernstein's innovative approach to themed programming included introducing audiences to lesser performed composers at the time such as Gustav Mahler, Carl Nielsen, Jean Sibelius, and Charles Ives (including the world premiere of his Symphony No. 2). Bernstein actively advocated for the commission and performance of works by contemporary composers, conducting over 40 world premieres by a diverse roster of composers ranging from John Cage to Alberto Ginastera to Luciano Berio. He also conducted US premieres of 19 major works from around the globe, including works by Dmitri Shostakovich, Pierre Boulez, and György Ligeti.
Bernstein championed American composers, especially with whom he had a close friendship, such as Aaron Copland, William Schuman, and David Diamond. This decade saw a significant expansion of Bernstein and the Philharmonic's collaboration with Columbia Records, together they released over 400 compositions, covering a broad swath of the classical music canon.
Bernstein welcomed the Philharmonic's additions of its first Black musician, Sanford Allen, and its second woman musician, Orin O'Brien. Bernstein also shared the Philharmonic’s commitment to connecting with as many New Yorkers as possible. That vision became a reality with the launch of the Concerts in the Parks in 1965, which Bernstein conducted often.
Another milestone was the Philharmonic’s first visit to Japan in 1961, when Bernstein led acclaimed Philharmonic concerts and engaged in cultural exchange. Over the years he led the Orchestra on tours to 144 cities in 38 countries.
He initiated the Philharmonic's informal Thursday Evening Preview Concerts, which included Bernstein's talks from the stage, a practice that was unheard of at the time.
In one oft-reported incident, on April 6, 1962, Bernstein appeared on stage before a performance of the Brahms Piano Concerto No. 1 in D Minor to explain that the soloist, Glenn Gould, had chosen an idiosyncratic approach to the work. Bernstein explained that while he didn't totally agree with it, he thought Gould's interpretation was an artistically worthy exploration. Bernstein questioned: "In a concerto, who is the boss: the soloist or the conductor?" The incident created a stir that reverberated in the press for decades.
Bernstein and Mahler
In 1960, Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic introduced American audiences to the music of Gustav Mahler, beginning with a festival marking the centennial of the composer's birth. The composer's widow, Alma, attended some of Bernstein's rehearsals. In that same year, Bernstein made his first commercial recording of a Mahler symphony (the Fourth). Over the next seven years, he recorded the entire Mahler symphony cycle with the New York Philharmonic (except for the 8th Symphony, which was recorded with the London Symphony Orchestra).
The combination of concert performances, television talks, and recordings led to a renewed interest in Mahler, especially in the United States. Bernstein claimed that he identified with the works on a personal level, and once wrote of the composer: "I'm so sympathetic to Mahler: I understand his problem. It's like being two different men locked up in the same body; one man is a conductor and the other a composer ... It's like being a double man."
Opening Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
On May 14, 1959, President Dwight D. Eisenhower broke ground for Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. On September 23, 1962, the New York Philharmonic moved from Carnegie Hall to its new home, Philharmonic Hall (now David Geffen Hall). Bernstein conducted the gala opening concert featuring works by Mahler, Beethoven and Vaughan Williams, as well as the premiere of Aaron Copland's Connotations.
Metropolitan Opera debut
In 1964, Bernstein conducted at The Metropolitan Opera for the first time in Franco Zeffirelli's production of Verdi's Falstaff. In subsequent years, Bernstein returned to The Met to conduct Cavalleria Rusticana (1970) and Carmen (1972), as well as at the Centennial Gala in 1983.
An Artist's Response to Violence
In 1961, Bernstein had conducted at President John F. Kennedy's pre-inaugural gala, and he was an occasional guest in the White House. Years later he conducted at the funeral mass in 1968 for President Kennedy's brother Robert F. Kennedy, featuring the Adagietto from Mahler's 5th Symphony. Jackie Kennedy famously wrote to Bernstein after the event: "When your Mahler started to fill (but that is the wrong word — because it was more this sensitive trembling) the Cathedral today — I thought it the most beautiful music I had ever heard".
On November 23, 1963, the day after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Bernstein conducted the New York Philharmonic and the Schola Cantorum of New York in a nationally televised memorial featuring the "Resurrection Symphony" by Gustav Mahler. This was the first televised performance of the complete symphony. Mahler's music had never been performed for such an event, and since the tribute to JFK, Mahler symphonies have become part of the Philharmonic's standard repertoire for national mourning.
Kaddish and Chichester Psalms
With his commitment to the New York Philharmonic and his many other activities, Bernstein had little time for composition during the 1960s. The two major works he produced at this time were his Kaddish Symphony, dedicated to the recently assassinated President John F. Kennedy, and the Chichester Psalms, which he produced during a sabbatical year he took from the Philharmonic in 1965 to concentrate on composition. Wanting to make more time for composition was probably a major factor in his decision to step down as music director of the Philharmonic in 1969, and to never again accept such a position elsewhere.
International conductor
In 1966, he made his debut at the Vienna State Opera conducting Luchino Visconti's production of the same opera with Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau as Falstaff. During his time in Vienna he also recorded the opera for Columbia Records and conducted his first subscription concert with the Vienna Philharmonic (which is made up of players from the Vienna State Opera) featuring Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde with Fischer-Dieskau and James King. He returned to the State Opera in 1968 for a production of Der Rosenkavalier and in 1970 for Otto Schenk's production of Beethoven's Fidelio.
After stepping down from the New York Philharmonic, Bernstein continued to appear with them in most years until his death, and he toured with them to Europe in 1976 and to Asia in 1979. He also strengthened his relationship with the Vienna Philharmonic—he conducted all nine completed Mahler symphonies with them (plus the Adagio from the 10th) in the period from 1967 to 1976. All of these were filmed for Unitel with the exception of the 1967 Mahler 2nd, which instead Bernstein filmed with the London Symphony Orchestra in Ely Cathedral in 1973. In the late 1970s Bernstein conducted a complete Beethoven symphony cycle with the Vienna Philharmonic, and cycles of Brahms and Schumann were to follow in the 1980s. Other orchestras he conducted on numerous occasions in the 1970s include the Israel Philharmonic, the Orchestre National de France, and the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
In 1970 Bernstein wrote and narrated a ninety-minute program filmed on location in and around Vienna as a celebration of Beethoven's 200th birthday. It featured parts of Bernstein's rehearsals and performance for the Otto Schenk production of Fidelio, Bernstein playing the 1st piano concerto and conducting the Ninth Symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic, with the young Plácido Domingo amongst the soloists. The program was first telecast in 1970 on Austrian and British television, and then on CBS in the U.S. on Christmas Eve 1971. The show, originally entitled Beethoven's Birthday: A Celebration in Vienna, won an Emmy and was issued on DVD in 2005. In the summer of 1970, during the Festival of London, he conducted Verdi's Requiem Mass in St. Paul's Cathedral, with the London Symphony Orchestra.
Early 1970s
Bernstein's major compositions during the 1970s were his Mass: A Theatre Piece for Singers, Players, and Dancers; his score for the ballet Dybbuk; his orchestral vocal work Songfest; and his U.S. bicentenary musical 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue written with lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner which was his first real theatrical flop, and last original Broadway show.
Mass: A Theatre Piece for Singers, Players, and Dancers
In 1966, Jacqueline Kennedy commissioned Bernstein to compose a work for the inauguration of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. Bernstein began writing Mass in 1969 as a large-scale theatrical work based on the Tridentine Mass of the Catholic Church, and in 1971, Bernstein invited the young composer and lyricist Stephen Schwartz, who had recently opened the musical Godspell off-Broadway, to collaborate as co-lyricist. The world premiere of took place on September 8, 1971, conducted by Maurice Peress and choreographed by Alvin Ailey.
Bernstein's score combines elements of musical theater, jazz, gospel, folk, rock, and symphonic music, and the libretto combines Latin and English liturgy, Hebrew prayer, and additional lyrics written by Bernstein and Schwartz.
Mass was originally criticized by both the Catholic Church and those who opposed its anti-Vietnam War message, as well as by some music critics. Viewpoints on Mass continue to evolve over time, and Edward Seckerson wrote in 2021, 50 years after its premiere: "Put simply, no other work of Bernstein's encapsulates exactly who he was as a man or as a musician; no other work displays his genius, his intellect, his musical virtuosity and innate theatricality quite like MASS."
Deutsche Grammophon recordings
In 1972, Bernstein recorded Bizet's Carmen, with Marilyn Horne in the title role and James McCracken as Don Jose, after leading several stage performances of the opera at the Metropolitan Opera. The recording was one of the first in stereo to use the original spoken dialogue between the sung portions of the opera, rather than the musical recitatives that were composed by Ernest Guiraud after Bizet's death. The recording was Bernstein's first for Deutsche Grammophon and won a Grammy.
Norton Lectures at Harvard
Bernstein was appointed in 1973 to the Charles Eliot Norton Chair as Professor of Poetry at his alma mater, Harvard University, and delivered a series of six televised lectures on music with musical examples played by the Boston Symphony Orchestra. However, these lectures were not televised until 1976. Taking the title from a Charles Ives work, he called the series The Unanswered Question; it was a set of interdisciplinary lectures in which he borrowed terminology from contemporary linguistics to analyze and compare musical construction to language. The lectures are presently available in both book and DVD form. The DVD video was not taken directly from the lectures at Harvard, rather they were recreated again at the WGBH studios for filming. This appears to be the only surviving Norton lectures series available to the general public in video format. Noam Chomsky wrote in 2007 on the Znet forums about the linguistic aspects of the lecture: "I spent some time with Bernstein during the preparation and performance of the lectures. My feeling was that he was onto something, but I couldn't really judge how significant it was."
Rostropovich
Bernstein played an instrumental role in the release of renowned cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich from the USSR in 1974. Rostropovich, a strong believer in free speech and democracy, had been officially held in disgrace; his concerts and tours both at home and abroad cancelled, and in 1972 he was prohibited to travel outside of the Soviet Union. During a trip to the USSR in 1974, Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy and his wife Joan, urged by Bernstein and others in the cultural sphere, mentioned Rostropovich's situation to Leonid Brezhnev, the Soviet Union Communist Party Leader. Two days later, Rostropovich was granted his exit visa.
SNL
Chevy Chase stated in his biography that Lorne Michaels wanted Bernstein to host Saturday Night Live in the show's first season (1975–76). Chase was seated next to Bernstein at a birthday party for Kurt Vonnegut and made the request in person. However, the pitch involved a Bernstein-conducted SNL version of West Side Story, and Bernstein was uninterested.
Felicia Montealegre Bernstein Fund of Amnesty International USA
In October 1976, Bernstein led the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and pianist Claudio Arrau in an Amnesty International Benefit Concert in Munich. To honor his late wife and to continue their joint support for human rights, Bernstein established the Felicia Montealegre Bernstein Fund of Amnesty International USA to provide aid for human rights activists with limited resources.
Late 1970s
In 1978, Bernstein returned to the Vienna State Opera to conduct a revival of the Otto Schenk production of Fidelio, now featuring Gundula Janowitz and René Kollo in the lead roles. At the same time, Bernstein made a studio recording of the opera for Deutsche Grammophon and the opera itself was filmed by Unitel and released on DVD by Deutsche Grammophon in late 2006. In May 1978, the Israel Philharmonic played two U.S. concerts under his direction to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the founding of the Orchestra under that name. On consecutive nights, the Orchestra, with the Choral Arts Society of Washington, performed Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and Bernstein's Chichester Psalms at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., and at Carnegie Hall in New York.
In 1979, Bernstein conducted the Berlin Philharmonic for the first time, in two charity concerts for Amnesty International involving performances of Mahler's Ninth Symphony. The invitation for the concerts had come from the orchestra and not from its principal conductor Herbert von Karajan. There has been speculation about why Karajan never invited Bernstein to conduct his orchestra. (Karajan did conduct the New York Philharmonic during Bernstein's tenure.) The full reasons will probably never be known—reports suggest they were on friendly terms when they met, but sometimes practiced a little mutual one-upmanship. One of the concerts was broadcast on radio and was posthumously released on CD by Deutsche Grammophon. One oddity of the recording is that the trombone section fails to enter at the climax of the finale, as a result of an audience member fainting just behind the trombones a few seconds earlier.
Early 1980s
Bernstein received the Kennedy Center Honors award in 1980. For the rest of the 1980s he continued to conduct, teach, compose, and produce the occasional TV documentary. His most significant compositions of the decade were probably his opera A Quiet Place, which he wrote with Stephen Wadsworth and which premiered, in its original version, in Houston in 1983; his Divertimento for Orchestra; his Ḥalil for flute and orchestra; his Concerto for Orchestra "Jubilee Games"; and his song cycle Arias and Barcarolles, which was named after a comment President Dwight D. Eisenhower had made to him in 1960.
International fame
In 1982 in the U.S., PBS aired an 11-part series of Bernstein's late 1970s films for Unitel of the Vienna Philharmonic playing all nine Beethoven symphonies and various other Beethoven works. Bernstein gave spoken introduction and actor Maximilian Schell was also featured on the programs, reading from Beethoven's letters. The original films have since been released on DVD by Deutsche Grammophon. In addition to conducting in New York, Vienna and Israel, Bernstein was a regular guest conductor of other orchestras in the 1980s. These included the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam, with whom he recorded Mahler's First, Fourth, and Ninth Symphonies amongst other works; the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in Munich, with whom he recorded Wagner's Tristan und Isolde; Haydn's Creation; Mozart's Requiem and Great Mass in C minor; and the orchestra of Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, with whom he recorded some Debussy and Puccini's La bohème.
In 1982, he and Ernest Fleischmann founded the Los Angeles Philharmonic Institute as a summer training academy along the lines of Tanglewood. Bernstein served as artistic director and taught conducting there until 1984. Around the same time, he performed and recorded some of his own works with the Los Angeles Philharmonic for Deutsche Grammophon. Bernstein was also at the time a committed supporter of nuclear disarmament. In 1985 he took the European Community Youth Orchestra in a "Journey for Peace" tour across Europe and Japan.
In 1984, he conducted a recording of West Side Story, the first time he had conducted the entire work. The recording, featuring what some critics felt were miscast opera singers such as Kiri Te Kanawa, José Carreras, and Tatiana Troyanos in the leading roles, was nevertheless an international bestseller. A TV documentary The Making of West Side Story about the recording was made at the same time and has been released as a DVD. Bernstein also continued to make his own TV documentaries during the 1980s, including The Little Drummer Boy, in which he discussed the music of Gustav Mahler, perhaps the composer he was most passionately interested in, and The Love of Three Orchestras, in which he discussed his work in New York, Vienna, and Israel.
In his later years, Bernstein's life and work were celebrated around the world (as they have been since his death). The Israel Philharmonic celebrated his involvement with them at festivals in Israel and Austria in 1977. In 1986 the London Symphony Orchestra mounted a Bernstein Festival in London with one concert that Bernstein himself conducted attended by the Queen. In 1988 Bernstein's 70th birthday was celebrated by a lavish televised gala at Tanglewood featuring many performers who had worked with him over the years.
During summer 1987, he celebrated the 100th anniversary of Nadia Boulanger at the American Conservatory in Fontainebleau. He gave a masterclass inside the castle of Fontainebleau.
In December 1989, Bernstein conducted live performances and recorded in the studio his operetta Candide with the London Symphony Orchestra. The recording starred Jerry Hadley, June Anderson, Adolph Green, and Christa Ludwig in the leading roles. The use of opera singers in some roles perhaps fitted the style of operetta better than some critics had thought was the case for West Side Story, and the posthumously released recording was universally praised. One of the live concerts from the Barbican Centre in London is available on DVD. Candide had had a troubled history, with many rewrites and writers involved. Bernstein's concert and recording were based on a final version that had been first performed by Scottish Opera in 1988. The opening night, which Bernstein attended in Glasgow, was conducted by his former student John Mauceri.
Ode to "Freedom"
On December 25, 1989, Bernstein conducted Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 in East Berlin's Schauspielhaus as part of a celebration of the fall of the Berlin Wall. He had conducted the same work in West Berlin the previous day. The concert was broadcast live in more than twenty countries to an estimated audience of 100 million people. For the occasion, Bernstein reworded Friedrich Schiller's text of the Ode to Joy, using the word Freiheit (freedom) instead of the original Freude (joy). Bernstein, in his spoken introduction, said that they had "taken the liberty" of doing this because of a "most likely phony" story, apparently believed in some quarters, that Schiller wrote an "Ode to Freedom" that is now presumed lost. Bernstein added, "I'm sure that Beethoven would have given us his blessing."
Founding of Pacific Music Festival
In the summer of 1990, Bernstein and Michael Tilson Thomas founded the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan. Like his earlier activity in Los Angeles, this was a summer training school for musicians modeled on Tanglewood and is still in existence. At this time, Bernstein was already suffering from the lung disease that would lead to his death. In his opening address Bernstein said that he had decided to devote what time he had left to education. A video showing Bernstein speaking and rehearsing at the first Festival is available on DVD in Japan.
In the same year, Bernstein received the Praemium Imperiale, an international prize awarded by the Japan Arts Association for lifetime achievement in the arts. Bernstein used the $100,000 prize to establish The Bernstein Education Through the Arts (BETA) Fund, Inc. He provided this grant to develop an arts-based education program. The Leonard Bernstein Center was established in April 1992, and initiated extensive school-based research, resulting in the Bernstein Model, the Leonard Bernstein Artful Learning Program.
Last concert
Bernstein conducted his last concert on August 19, 1990, with the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood. The program consisted of Benjamin Britten's Four Sea Interludes from Peter Grimes and Beethoven's Symphony No. 7. He suffered a coughing fit during the third movement of the Beethoven symphony, but continued to conduct the piece until its conclusion, leaving the stage during the ovation, appearing exhausted and in pain. The concert was later issued in edited form on CD as Leonard Bernstein – The Final Concert by Deutsche Grammophon. Also included was Bernstein's own Arias and Barcarolles in an orchestration by Bright Sheng. However, poor health prevented Bernstein from performing it. Carl St. Clair was engaged to conduct it in his stead.
Personal life
After much personal struggle and a turbulent on-off engagement, Bernstein married actress Felicia Cohn Montealegre on September 10, 1951. One suggestion is that he chose to marry partly to dispel rumors about his private life to help secure a major conducting appointment, following advice from his mentor Dimitri Mitropoulos about the conservative nature of orchestra boards. Bernstein had expressed the same internal conflict and sought similar advice from Aaron Copland in 1943, suggesting he could resolve it by marrying his then "girl-friend ... my dentist's daughter". In a book released in October 2013, The Leonard Bernstein Letters, his wife acknowledges his homosexuality. Felicia writes: "You are a homosexual and may never change—you don't admit to the possibility of a double life, but if your peace of mind, your health, your whole nervous system depend on a certain sexual pattern what can you do?" Arthur Laurents (Bernstein's collaborator in West Side Story) said that Bernstein was "a gay man who got married. He wasn't conflicted about it at all. He was just gay." Shirley Rhoades Perle, another friend of Bernstein, said that she thought "he required men sexually and women emotionally". But the early years of his marriage seem to have been happy, and no one has suggested Bernstein and his wife did not love each other. They had three children, Jamie, Alexander, and Nina. There are reports, though, that Bernstein did sometimes have brief extramarital liaisons with young men, which several family friends have said his wife knew about.
A major period of upheaval in Bernstein's personal life began in 1976 when he decided that he could no longer conceal his homosexuality and he left his wife Felicia for a period to live with the musical director of the classical music radio station KKHI in San Francisco, Tom Cothran. The next year Felicia was diagnosed with lung cancer and eventually Bernstein moved back in with her and cared for her until she died on June 16, 1978. Bernstein is reported to have often spoken of his terrible guilt over his wife's death. Most biographies of Bernstein state that his lifestyle became more excessive and his personal behavior sometimes more reckless and crude after her death. However, his public standing and many of his close friendships appear to have remained unaffected, and he resumed his busy schedule of musical activity.
His affairs with men included a ten-year relationship with Kunihiko Hashimoto, a Tokyo insurance employee. The two met when the New York Philharmonic was performing in Tokyo. Hashimoto went backstage and they ended up spending the night together. It was a long distance affair, but according to letters, they both cared about each other deeply. Dearest Lenny: Letters from Japan and the Making of the World Maestro by Mari Yoshihara (Oxford University Press, 2019) goes into detail about their letters and relationship including interviews with Hashimoto. The book also includes other letters Bernstein received from Japanese fans.
Bernstein had asthma, which kept him from serving in the military during World War II.
Death and legacy
Bernstein announced his retirement from conducting on October 9, 1990 and died five days later, in his New York apartment at The Dakota, of a heart attack brought on by mesothelioma. He was 72 years old. A longtime heavy smoker, he had had emphysema from his mid-50s. On the day of his funeral procession through the streets of Manhattan, construction workers removed their hats and waved, calling out "Goodbye, Lenny". Bernstein is buried in Green-Wood Cemetery, Brooklyn, New York, next to his wife and with a copy of Mahler's Fifth Symphony opened to the famous Adagietto lying across his heart. On August 25, 2018 (his 100th birthday), he was honored with a Google Doodle. Also for his centennial, the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles created an exhibition titled Leonard Bernstein at 100.
Social activism
While Bernstein was very well known for his music compositions and conducting, he was also known for his outspoken political views and his strong desire to further social change. His first aspirations for social change were made apparent in his producing (as a student) a recently banned opera, The Cradle Will Rock, by Marc Blitzstein, about the disparity between the working and upper class. His first opera, Trouble in Tahiti, was dedicated to Blitzstein and has a strong social theme, criticizing American civilization and suburban upper-class life in particular. As he went on in his career, Bernstein would go on to fight for everything from the influences of "American Music" to the disarming of western nuclear weapons.
Like many of his friends and colleagues, Bernstein had been involved in various left-wing causes and organizations since the 1940s. He was blacklisted by the US State Department and CBS in the early 1950s, but unlike others his career was not greatly affected, and he was never required to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee. His political life received substantial press coverage though in 1970, due to a gathering hosted at his Manhattan apartment at 895 Park Avenue on January 14, 1970. Bernstein and his wife held the event seeking to raise awareness and money for the defense of several members of the Black Panther Party against a variety of charges, especially the case of the Panther 21. The New York Times initially covered the gathering as a lifestyle item, but later posted an editorial harshly unfavorable to Bernstein following generally negative reaction to the widely publicized story. This reaction culminated in June 1970 with the appearance of "Radical Chic: That Party at Lenny's", an essay by journalist Tom Wolfe featured on the cover of the magazine New York. The article contrasted the Bernsteins' comfortable lifestyle in one of the world's most expensive neighborhoods with the anti-establishment politics of the Black Panthers. It led to the popularization of "radical chic" as a critical term. Both Bernstein and his wife Felicia responded to the criticism, arguing that they were motivated not by a shallow desire to express fashionable sympathy but by their concern for civil liberties.
Bernstein was named in the book Red Channels: The Report of Communist Influence in Radio and Television (1950) as a Communist along with Aaron Copland, Lena Horne, Pete Seeger, Artie Shaw and other prominent figures of the performing arts. Red Channels was issued by the right-wing journal Counterattack and was edited by Vincent Hartnett, who was later found to have libeled and defamed the noted radio personality John Henry Faulk.
Philanthropy
Among the many awards Bernstein earned throughout his life, one allowed him to make one of his philanthropic dreams a reality. He had for a long time wanted to develop an international school to help promote the integration of arts into education. When he won the Praemium Imperiale, Japan Arts Association award for lifetime achievement in 1990, he used the $100,000 that came with the award to build such a school in Nashville, that would strive to teach teachers how to better integrate music, dance, and theater into the school system which was "not working". Unfortunately, the school was not able to open until shortly after Bernstein's death. This would eventually yield an initiative known as Artful Learning as part of the Leonard Bernstein Center.
Influence and characteristics as a conductor
Bernstein was one of the major figures in orchestral conducting in the second half of the 20th century. He was held in high regard amongst many musicians, including the members of the Vienna Philharmonic, evidenced by his honorary membership; the London Symphony Orchestra, of which he was president; and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, with which he appeared regularly as guest conductor. He was probably the main conductor from the 1960s onwards who acquired a sort of superstar status similar to that of Herbert von Karajan, although unlike Karajan he conducted relatively little opera and part of Bernstein's fame was based on his role as a composer. As the first American-born music director of the New York Philharmonic, his rise to prominence was a factor in overcoming the perception of the time that the top conductors were necessarily trained in Europe.
Bernstein's conducting was characterized by extremes of emotion with the rhythmic pulse of the music conveyed visually through his balletic podium manner. Musicians often reported that his manner in rehearsal was the same as in concert. As he got older his performances tended to be overlaid to a greater extent with a personal expressiveness which often divided critical opinion. Extreme examples of this style can be found in his Deutsche Grammophon recordings of "Nimrod" from Elgar's Enigma Variations (1982), the end of Mahler's 9th Symphony (1985), and the finale of Tchaikovsky's Pathétique Symphony (1986), where in each case the tempos are well below those typically chosen. A skilled pianist, he used to perform the piano parts himself and conduct orchestras from the keyboard (for instance, when he conducted Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue).
Bernstein performed a wide repertoire from the Baroque era to the 20th century, although perhaps from the 1970s onwards he tended to focus more on music from the Romantic era. He was considered especially accomplished with the works of Gustav Mahler and with American composers in general, including George Gershwin, Aaron Copland, Charles Ives, Roy Harris, William Schuman, and of course himself. Some of his recordings of works by these composers would likely appear on many music critics' lists of recommended recordings. A list of his other well-thought-of recordings would include, among others, individual works from Haydn, Beethoven, Berlioz, Schumann, Liszt, Nielsen, Sibelius, Stravinsky, Hindemith, and Shostakovich. His recordings of Rhapsody in Blue (full-orchestra version) and An American in Paris for Columbia Records, released in 1959, are considered definitive by many, although Bernstein cut the Rhapsody slightly, and his more 'symphonic' approach with slower tempi is quite far from Gershwin's own conception of the piece, evident from his two recordings. (Oscar Levant, Earl Wild, and others come closer to Gershwin's own style.) Bernstein never conducted Gershwin's Piano Concerto in F, or more than a few excerpts from Porgy and Bess, although he did discuss the latter in his article Why Don't You Run Upstairs and Write a Nice Gershwin Tune?, originally published in The New York Times and later reprinted in his 1959 book The Joy of Music.
In addition to being an active conductor, Bernstein was an influential teacher of conducting. During his many years of teaching at Tanglewood and elsewhere, he directly taught or mentored many conductors who are performing now, including John Mauceri, Marin Alsop, Herbert Blomstedt, Edo de Waart, Alexander Frey, Paavo Järvi, Eiji Oue, Maurice Peress, Seiji Ozawa (who made his American TV debut as the guest conductor on one of the Young People's Concerts), Carl St.Clair, Helmuth Rilling, Michael Tilson Thomas, and Jaap van Zweden. He also undoubtedly influenced the career choices of many American musicians who grew up watching his television programmes in the 1950s and 60s.
Recordings
Bernstein recorded extensively from the mid-1940s until just a few months before his death. Aside from those 1940s recordings, which were made for RCA Victor, Bernstein recorded primarily for Columbia Masterworks Records, especially when he was music director of the New York Philharmonic between 1958 and 1971. His typical pattern of recording at that time was to record major works in the studio immediately after they were presented in the orchestra's subscription concerts or on one of the Young People's Concerts, with any spare time used to record short orchestral showpieces and similar works. Many of these performances were digitally remastered and reissued by Sony Classical Records (the successor to American Columbia/CBS Masterworks following Sony's 1990 acquisition of Columbia/CBS Records) between 1992 and 1993 as part of its 100 volume, 125-CD "Royal Edition", as well as its 1997–2001 "Bernstein Century" series. The rights to Bernstein's 1940s RCA Victor recordings became fully owned by Sony following its 2008 acquisition of Bertelsmann Music Group's (BMG), and now controls both the RCA Victor and Columbia archives. The complete Bernstein Columbia and RCA Victor catalog was reissued on CD in a three-volume series of box sets (released in 2010, 2014, and 2018, respectively) comprising a total of 198 discs under the mantle "Leonard Bernstein Edition".
His later recordings (starting with Bizet's Carmen in 1972) were mostly made for Deutsche Grammophon, though he would occasionally return to the Columbia label. Notable exceptions include recordings of Gustav Mahler's Song of the Earth and Mozart's 15th piano concerto and "Linz" symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic for Decca Records (1966); Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique and Harold in Italy (1976) for EMI; and Wagner's Tristan und Isolde (1981) for Philips Records, a label that like Deutsche Grammophon was part of PolyGram at that time. Unlike his studio recordings for Columbia Masterworks, most of his later Deutsche Grammophon recordings were taken from live concerts (or edited together from several concerts with additional sessions to correct errors). Many replicate repertoire that he recorded in the 1950s and 60s.
In addition to his audio recordings, many of Bernstein's concerts from the 1970s onwards were recorded on motion picture film by the German film company Unitel. This included a complete cycle of the Mahler symphonies (with the Vienna Philharmonic and London Symphony Orchestra), as well as complete cycles of the Beethoven, Brahms and Schumann symphonies recorded at the same series of concerts as the audio recordings by Deutsche Grammophon. Many of these films appeared on LaserDisc and are now on DVD.
In total Bernstein was awarded 16 Grammys for his recordings in various categories, including several for posthumously released recordings. He was also awarded a Lifetime Achievement Grammy in 1985.
Influence and characteristics as a composer
Bernstein was an eclectic composer whose music fused elements of jazz, Jewish music, theatre music, and the work of earlier composers like Aaron Copland, Igor Stravinsky, Darius Milhaud, George Gershwin, and Marc Blitzstein. Some of his works, especially his score for West Side Story, helped bridge the gap between classical and popular music. His music was rooted in tonality but in some works like his Kaddish Symphony and the opera A Quiet Place he mixed in 12-tone elements. Bernstein himself said his main motivation for composing was "to communicate" and that all his pieces, including his symphonies and concert works, "could in some sense be thought of as 'theatre' pieces".
According to the League of American Orchestras, he was the second most frequently performed American composer by U.S. orchestras in 2008–09 behind Copland, and he was the 16th most frequently performed composer overall by U.S. orchestras. (Some performances were probably due to the 2008 90th anniversary of his birth.) His most popular pieces were the Overture to Candide, the Symphonic Dances from West Side Story, the Serenade after Plato's "Symposium" and the Three Dance Episodes from On the Town. His shows West Side Story, On the Town, Wonderful Town and Candide are regularly performed, and his symphonies and concert works are programmed from time to time by orchestras around the world. Since his death many of his works have been commercially recorded by artists other than himself. The Serenade, which has been recorded more than 10 times, is probably his most recorded work not taken from an actual theatre piece.
Despite the fact that he was a popular success as a composer, Bernstein himself is reported to have been disillusioned that some of his more serious works were not rated more highly by critics, and that he himself had not been able to devote more time to composing because of his conducting and other activities. Professional criticism of Bernstein's music often involves discussing the degree to which he created something new as art versus simply skillfully borrowing and fusing together elements from others. In the late 1960s, Bernstein himself reflected that his eclecticism was in part due to his lack of lengthy periods devoted to composition, and that he was still seeking to enrich his own personal musical language in the manner of the great composers of the past, all of whom had borrowed elements from others. Perhaps the harshest criticism he received from some critics in his lifetime though was directed at works like his Kaddish Symphony, his MASS and the opera A Quiet Place, where they found the underlying message of the piece or the text as either mildly embarrassing, clichéd or offensive. Despite this, all these pieces have been performed, discussed and reconsidered since his death.
The Chichester Psalms, and excerpts from his Third Symphony and MASS were performed for Pope John Paul II, including at World Youth Day in Denver on August 14, 1993, and at the Papal Concert to Commemorate the Shoah on April 7, 1994, with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in the Sala Nervi at the Vatican. Both performances were conducted by Gilbert Levine.
Although he taught conducting, Bernstein did not teach composition and left no direct legacy of students in that field.
Bibliography
Videography
The Unanswered Question: Six Talks at Harvard. West Long Branch, New Jersey: Kultur Video. VHS . DVD . (videotape of the Charles Eliot Norton Lectures given at Harvard in 1973.)
Leonard Bernstein's Young People's Concerts with the New York Philharmonic. West Long Branch, New Jersey: Kultur Video. DVD .
Bernstein on Beethoven: A Celebration in Vienna/Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 1. West Long Branch, Kultur Video. DVD
Leonard Bernstein: Omnibus – The Historic TV Broadcasts, 2010, E1 Ent.
Bernstein: Reflections (1978), A rare personal portrait of Leonard Bernstein by Peter Rosen. Euroarts DVD
Bernstein/Beethoven (1982), Deutsche Grammophon, DVD
The Metropolitan Opera Centennial Gala (1983), Deutsche Grammophon, DVD 00440-073-4538
Bernstein Conducts "West Side Story" (1985) (retitled The Making of West Side Story in re-releases) Deutsche Grammophon. DVD
"The Rite of Spring" in Rehearsal
Mozart's Great Mass in C minor, Exsultate, jubilate & Ave verum corpus (1990), Deutsche Grammophon. DVD 00440-073-4240
"Leonard Bernstein: Reaching for the Note" (1998) Documentary on his life and music. Originally aired on PBS's American Masters series. DVD
Awards
Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1951
Fellow at the MacDowell 1962, 1970, 1972
Sonning Award (Denmark), 1965
Ditson Conductor's Award, 1958
George Peabody Medal – Johns Hopkins University, 1980
Ernst von Siemens Music Prize, 1987
Royal Philharmonic Society Gold Medal (UK), 1987
Edward MacDowell Medal, 1987
Knight Grand Cross Order of Merit (Italy), 1989
Grammy Award for Best Album for Children
Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Performance
Grammy Award for Best Choral Performance
Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording
Grammy Award for Best Classical Vocal Performance
Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Soloist(s) Performance
Grammy Award for Best Classical Contemporary Composition
Grammy Award for Best Classical Album
Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award
Tony Award for Best Musical
Special Tony Award
Japan Arts Association Lifetime Achievement Award
Gramophone Hall of Fame entrant
Commandeur de la Légion d'honneur, 1986
Bernstein is also a member of both the American Theater Hall of Fame, and the Television Hall of Fame. In 2015 he was inducted into the Legacy Walk.
References
Citations
Sources
(Doubleday edition)
Further reading
Bernstein, Burton (1982). Family Matters: Sam, Jennie, and the Kids. Simon & Schuster. .
Bernstein, Jamie (2018). Famous Father Girl: A Memoir of Growing Up Bernstein. HarperCollins Publishers. .
Bernstein, Shirley (1963). Making Music: Leonard Bernstein. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica Press. .
Briggs, John (1961). Leonard Bernstein: The Man, His Works and His World. World Publishing Co. .
Burton, William W. (1995). Conversations about Bernstein. New York: Oxford University Press, New York. .
Cone, Molly and Robert Galster (1970). Leonard Bernstein. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Co.
Ewen, David (1960). Leonard Bernstein, A Biography for Young People. Philadelphia: Chilton Co.
Fluegel, Jane (ed.) (1991). Bernstein: Remembered: a life in pictures. New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc. .
Freedland, Michael (1987). Leonard Bernstein. London, England: Harrap. Ltd. .
Gottlieb, Jack (2010). Working With Bernstein. Amadeus Press. .
Green, Diane Huss (1963). Lenny's Surprise Piano. San Carlos, California: Golden Gate Junior Books. .
Hurwitz, Johanna (1963). Leonard Bernstein: A Passion of Music. Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society. .
Ledbetter, Steven (1988). Sennets & Tuckets, A Bernstein Celebration. Boston: Boston Symphony Orchestra in association with David Godine Publisher, Inc.. .
Reidy, John P. & Norman Richards (1967). People of Destiny: Leonard Bernstein. Chicago: Children's Press. .
Robinson, Paul (1982). Bernstein (The Art of Conducting Series). New York: Vangard Press. .
Shawn, Allen (2014). Leonard Bernstein: An American Musician. Yale University Press. .
Wolfe, Tom (1987). Radical Chic and Mau Mauing the Flak Catchers. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux. .
External links
Archival records
Leonard Bernstein collection, circa 1900–1995, Library of Congress
Bernstein Online Collection, Library of Congress
Mildred Spiegel Zucker collection of Leonard Bernstein correspondence and related materials, 1936–1991, Library of Congress
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Tony Award winners | false | [
"Hillery Johnson was a record label owner, record producer, manager and songwriter and vice-president of a major record American record label.\n\nBackground\nIn 1966, Hilary Johnson along with Leo Austell and Archie Russell founded Brainstorm Records and Productions. Later he worked for United Artists and then Capitol Records. By 1973 he was working for MCA Records where he held the position of promotional manager for special marketing. By the mid-1970s he was with Playboy Records as their national r&b promotion director. By 1977 he was vice-president of Atlantic Records.\n\nAs a composer, along with Michael Wycoff he co-composed \"Try And Love Again for The Manhattans.\n\nIn 1993, Johnson was involved in legal action against Joseph Jack Productions. He was suing the production company and its owner Joseph Jackson over money he alleged was owed to him for negotiating a recording agreement. He claimed he was owed $15,000 for representing Jackson in an attempt to work out an A&M recording deal for Janet Jackson.\n\nLabels founded \nIn 1966, as a young man, Johnson and Archie Russell along with Leo Austell, a veteran in the record scene co-founded Brainstorm Records. This came about as a result of the label Austell was with, Vee Jay records collapsing. Another label creation that Johnson responsible for was Twin Stacks. It was the subsidiary of Brainstorm. Both labels lasted for four years and were successful mainly in their geographical region. They did however have some real solid success. As a production company they did extremely well with Betty Everett scoring several national hits including \"There'll Come A Time\".\n\nHe founded the Palm Springs based label Valley Vue Records Another label he started was one he co-founded along with Tom Takayoshi, was Hilltak Records. Takayoshi was the former president of Playboy Records. The Hilltak label was a subsidiary of Atlantic Records.\n\nActs\nJohnson introduced the Temptations to a party crowd of 500 that included Bette Midler and Teddy Pendergrass at Studio 54 in Manhattan in May 1977. The party was to announce the Temptations leaving Motown for Atlantic.\nSome of the acts Johnson has managed include Rene & Angela and Lalah Hathaway.\n\nReferences\n\nAmerican entertainment industry businesspeople\nRecord producers from California\nLiving people\nYear of birth missing (living people)",
"Mission Records was created by Glenn Frey and Peter Lopez in 1998 as an independent record label. The company is distributed by Navarre Corp. Its first album was One Planet, One Groove by Max Carl & Big Dance, released January 20, 1998. The company was originally intended as an outlet for Frey's solo records due to his dissatisfaction with the bigger labels; however, he did not release any of his own work on it, and the label is now inactive.\n\nReferences\n\nSee also\n List of record labels\n\nRecord labels established in 1998\nDefunct record labels of the United States\nVanity record labels"
] |
[
"Leonard Bernstein",
"Influence and characteristics as a conductor",
"What are Leonard's characteristics as conductor?",
"1971. His typical pattern of recording at that time was to record major works in the studio immediately after they were presented in the orchestra's subscription concerts",
"What influences did he have?",
"Aside from those 1940s recordings, which were made for RCA Victor, Bernstein recorded primarily for Columbia Masterworks Records,",
"Did he work with another record company?",
"I don't know."
] | C_2e4ae84d3c6444c9a25724baadcf9a53_0 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | 4 | Are there any other interesting aspects about Leonard Bernstein and his influence and characteristics as a conductor other than what influences Leonard had, the characteristics Leonard had as a conductor, and the record companies Leonard worked with.? | Leonard Bernstein | Bernstein recorded extensively from the mid-1940s until just a few months before his death. Aside from those 1940s recordings, which were made for RCA Victor, Bernstein recorded primarily for Columbia Masterworks Records, especially when he was music director of the New York Philharmonic between 1958 and 1971. His typical pattern of recording at that time was to record major works in the studio immediately after they were presented in the orchestra's subscription concerts or on one of the Young People's Concerts, with any spare time used to record short orchestral showpieces and similar works. Many of these performances were digitally remastered and reissued by Sony as part of their 100 Volume, 125 CDs "Royal Edition" and their later "Bernstein Century" series. In 2010 many of these recordings were repackaged in a 60 CD "Bernstein Symphony Edition". His later recordings (starting with Bizet's Carmen in 1972) were mostly made for Deutsche Grammophon, though he would occasionally return to the Columbia Masterworks label. Notable exceptions include recordings of Gustav Mahler's Song of the Earth and Mozart's 15th piano concerto and "Linz" symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra for Decca Records (1966); Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique and Harold in Italy (1976) for EMI; and Wagner's Tristan und Isolde (1981) for Philips Records, a label that like Deutsche Grammophon was part of PolyGram at that time. Unlike his studio recordings for Columbia Masterworks, most of his later Deutsche Grammophon recordings were taken from live concerts (or edited together from several concerts with additional sessions to correct errors). Many replicate repertoire that he recorded in the 1950s and 60s. In addition to his audio recordings, many of Bernstein's concerts from the 1970s onwards were recorded on motion picture film by the German film company Unitel. This included a complete cycle of the Mahler symphonies (with the Vienna Philharmonic and London Symphony Orchestra), as well as complete cycles of the Beethoven, Brahms and Schumann symphonies recorded at the same series of concerts as the audio recordings by Deutsche Grammophon. Many of these films appeared on Laserdisc and are now on DVD. In total Bernstein was awarded 16 Grammys for his recordings in various categories, including several for posthumously released recordings. He was also awarded a Lifetime Achievement Grammy in 1985. CANNOTANSWER | many of Bernstein's concerts from the 1970s onwards were recorded on motion picture film by the German film company Unitel. | Leonard Bernstein ( ; August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, pianist, music educator, author, and humanitarian. Among the most important conductors of his time, he was also the first American conductor to receive international acclaim. According to music critic Donal Henahan, he was "one of the most prodigiously talented and successful musicians in American history". Bernstein was the recipient of many honors, including seven Emmy Awards, two Tony Awards, sixteen Grammy Awards, including the Lifetime Achievement, and the Kennedy Center Honor.
As a composer he wrote in many genres, including symphonic and orchestral music, ballet, film and theatre music, choral works, opera, chamber music and works for the piano. His best-known work is the Broadway musical West Side Story, which continues to be regularly performed worldwide, and has been adapted into two (1961 and 2021) feature films. His works include three symphonies, Chichester Psalms, Serenade after Plato's "Symposium", the original score for the film On the Waterfront, and theater works including On the Town, Wonderful Town, Candide, and his MASS.
Bernstein was the first American-born conductor to lead a major American symphony orchestra. He was music director of the New York Philharmonic and conducted the world's major orchestras, generating a significant legacy of audio and video recordings. He was also a critical figure in the modern revival of the music of Gustav Mahler, in whose music he was most passionately interested. A skilled pianist, he often conducted piano concertos from the keyboard. He was the first conductor to share and explore music on television with a mass audience. Through dozens of national and international broadcasts, including the Emmy Award–winning Young People's Concerts with the New York Philharmonic, he made even the most rigorous elements of classical music an adventure in which everyone could join. Through his educational efforts, including several books and the creation of two major international music festivals, he influenced several generations of young musicians.
A lifelong humanitarian, Bernstein worked in support of civil rights; protested against the Vietnam War; advocated for nuclear disarmament; raised money for HIV/AIDS research and awareness; and engaged in multiple international initiatives for human rights and world peace. Near the end of his life, he conducted a historic performance of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 in Berlin to celebrate the fall of the Berlin Wall. The concert was televised live, worldwide, on Christmas Day, 1989.
Early life and education
1918–1934: Early life and family
Born Louis Bernstein in Lawrence, Massachusetts, he was the son of Ukrainian-Jewish parents, Jennie (née Resnick) and Samuel Joseph Bernstein, both of whom immigrated to the United States from Rovno (now Ukraine). His grandmother insisted that his first name be Louis, but his parents always called him Leonard. He legally changed his name to Leonard when he was eighteen, shortly after his grandmother's death. To his friends and many others he was simply known as "Lenny".
His father was the owner of The Samuel Bernstein Hair and Beauty Supply Company. It held the New England franchise for the Frederick's Permanent Wave Machine, whose immense popularity helped Sam get his family through The Great Depression.
In Leonard's early youth, his only exposure to music was the household radio and music on Friday nights at Congregation Mishkan Tefila in Roxbury, Massachusetts. When Leonard was ten years old, Samuel's sister Clara deposited her upright piano at her brother's house. Bernstein began teaching himself piano and music theory and was soon clamoring for lessons. He had a variety of piano teachers in his youth, including Helen Coates, who later became his secretary. In the summers, the Bernstein family would go to their vacation home in Sharon, Massachusetts, where young Leonard conscripted all the neighborhood children to put on shows ranging from Bizet's Carmen to Gilbert and Sullivan's The Pirates of Penzance. He would often play entire operas or Beethoven symphonies with his younger sister Shirley.
Leonard's youngest sibling Burton was born in 1932, thirteen years after Leonard. Despite the large span in age, the three siblings remained close their entire lives.
Sam was initially opposed to young Leonard's interest in music and attempted to discourage his son's interest by refusing to pay for his piano lessons. Leonard then took to giving lessons to young people in his neighborhood. One of his students, Sid Ramin, became Bernstein's most frequent orchestrator and lifelong beloved friend.
Sam took his son to orchestral concerts in his teenage years and eventually supported his music education. In May 1932, Leonard attended his first orchestral concert with the Boston Pops Orchestra conducted by Arthur Fiedler. Bernstein recalled, "To me, in those days, the Pops was heaven itself ... I thought ... it was the supreme achievement of the human race." It was at this concert that Bernstein first heard Ravel's Boléro, which made a tremendous impression on him.
Another strong musical influence was George Gershwin. Bernstein was a counselor at a summer camp when news came over the radio of Gershwin's death. In the mess hall, a shaken Bernstein demanded a moment of silence, and then played Gershwin's second Prelude as a memorial.
On March 30, 1932, Bernstein played Brahms's Rhapsody in G Minor at his first public piano performance in Susan Williams's studio recital at the New England Conservatory. Two years later, he made his solo debut with orchestra in Grieg's Piano Concerto in A Minor with the Boston Public School Orchestra.
1935–1940: College years
Bernstein's first two education environments were both public schools: the William Lloyd Garrison School, followed by the prestigious Boston Latin School, for which Bernstein and classmate Lawrence F. Ebb wrote the Class Song.
Harvard University
In 1935, Bernstein enrolled at Harvard University, where he studied music with, among others, Edward Burlingame Hill and Walter Piston. His first extant composition, Psalm 148 set for voice and piano, is dated in 1935. He majored in music with a final year thesis titled "The Absorption of Race Elements into American Music" (1939; reproduced in his book Findings). One of Bernstein's intellectual influences at Harvard was the aesthetics Professor David Prall, whose multidisciplinary outlook on the arts inspired Bernstein for the rest of his life.
One of his friends at Harvard was future philosopher Donald Davidson, with whom Bernstein played piano duets. Bernstein wrote and conducted the musical score for the production Davidson mounted of Aristophanes' play The Birds, performed in the original Greek. Bernstein recycled some of this music in future works.
While a student, he was briefly an accompanist for the Harvard Glee Club as well as an unpaid pianist for Harvard Film Society's silent film presentations.
Bernstein mounted a student production of The Cradle Will Rock, directing its action from the piano as the composer Marc Blitzstein had done at the infamous premiere. Blitzstein, who attended the performance, subsequently became a close friend and mentor to Bernstein.
As a sophomore at Harvard, Bernstein met the conductor Dimitri Mitropoulos. Mitropoulos's charisma and power as a musician were major influences on Bernstein's eventual decision to become a conductor. Mitropoulos invited Bernstein to come to Minneapolis for the 1940–41 season to be his assistant, but the plan fell through due to union issues.
Bernstein met Aaron Copland on the latter's birthday in 1937; the elder composer was sitting next to Bernstein at a dance recital at Town Hall in New York City. Copland invited Bernstein to his birthday party afterwards, where Bernstein impressed the guests by playing Copland's challenging Piano Variations, a work Bernstein loved. Although he was never a formal student of Copland's, Bernstein would regularly seek his advice, often citing him as his "only real composition teacher".
Bernstein graduated from Harvard in 1939 with a Bachelor of Arts cum laude.
Curtis Institute of Music
After graduating from Harvard, Bernstein enrolled at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. At Curtis, Bernstein studied conducting with Fritz Reiner (who anecdotally is said to have given Bernstein the only "A" grade he ever awarded); piano with Isabelle Vengerova; orchestration with Randall Thompson; counterpoint with Richard Stöhr; and score reading with Renée Longy Miquelle.
In 1940, Bernstein attended the inaugural year of the Tanglewood Music Center (then called the Berkshire Music Center) at the Boston Symphony Orchestra's summer home. Bernstein studied conducting with the BSO's music director, Serge Koussevitzky, who became a profound lifelong inspiration to Bernstein. He became Koussevitzky's conducting assistant at Tanglewood and later dedicated his Symphony No. 2: The Age of Anxiety to his beloved mentor. One of Bernstein's classmates, both at Curtis and at Tanglewood, was Lukas Foss, who remained a lifelong friend and colleague. Bernstein returned to Tanglewood nearly every summer for the rest of his life to teach and conduct the young music students.
Life and career
The 1940s
Soon after he left Curtis, Bernstein moved to New York City where he lived in various apartments in Manhattan. Bernstein supported himself by coaching singers, teaching piano, and playing the piano for dance classes in Carnegie Hall. He found work with Harms-Witmark, transcribing jazz and pop music and publishing his work under the pseudonym "Lenny Amber". (Bernstein means "amber" in German.)
Bernstein briefly shared an apartment in Greenwich Village with his friend Adolph Green. Green was part of a satirical music troupe called The Revuers, featuring Betty Comden and Judy Holliday. With Bernstein sometimes providing piano accompaniment, the Revuers often performed at the legendary jazz club the Village Vanguard.
On April 21, 1942, Bernstein performed the premiere of his first published work, Sonata for Clarinet and Piano, with clarinetist David Glazer at the Institute of Modern Art in Boston.
New York Philharmonic conducting debut
On November 14, 1943, having recently been appointed assistant conductor to Artur Rodziński of the New York Philharmonic, Bernstein made his major conducting debut at short notice—and without any rehearsal—after guest conductor Bruno Walter came down with the flu. The challenging program included works by Robert Schumann, Miklós Rózsa, Richard Wagner, and Richard Strauss.
The next day, The New York Times carried the story on its front page and remarked in an editorial, "It's a good American success story. The warm, friendly triumph of it filled Carnegie Hall and spread far over the air waves."
Many newspapers throughout the country carried the story, which, in combination with the concert's live national CBS Radio Network broadcast, propelled Bernstein to instant fame.
Over the next two years, Bernstein made conducting debuts with ten different orchestras in the United States and Canada, greatly broadening his repertoire and initiating a lifelong frequent practice of conducting concertos from the piano.
Symphony No. 1: Jeremiah, Fancy Free, and On the Town
On January 28, 1944, he conducted the premiere of his Symphony No. 1: Jeremiah with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra with Jennie Tourel as soloist.
In the fall of 1943, Bernstein and Jerome Robbins began work on their first collaboration, Fancy Free, a ballet about three young sailors on leave in wartime New York City. Fancy Free premiered on April 18, 1944, with the Ballet Theatre (now the American Ballet Theatre) at the old Metropolitan Opera House, with scenery by Oliver Smith and costumes by Kermit Love.
Bernstein and Robbins decided to expand the ballet into a musical and invited Comden and Green to write the book and lyrics. On the Town opened on Broadway's Adelphi Theatre on December 28, 1944. The show resonated with audiences during World War II, and it broke race barriers on Broadway: Japanese-American dancer Sono Osato in a leading role; a multiracial cast dancing as mixed race couples; and a Black concertmaster, Everett Lee, who eventually took over as music director of the show. On the Town became an MGM motion picture in 1949, starring Gene Kelly, Frank Sinatra, and Jules Munshin as the three sailors. Only part of Bernstein's score was used in the film and additional songs were provided by Roger Edens.
Rising conducting career
From 1945 to 1947, Bernstein was the music director of the New York City Symphony, which had been founded the previous year by the conductor Leopold Stokowski. The orchestra (with support from Mayor Fiorello La Guardia) had modern programs and affordable tickets.
In 1946, he made his overseas debut with the Czech Philharmonic in Prague. He also recorded Ravel's Piano Concerto in G as soloist and conductor with the Philharmonia Orchestra. On July 4, 1946, Bernstein conducted the European premiere of Fancy Free with the Ballet Theatre at the Royal Opera House in London.
In 1946, he conducted opera professionally for the first time at Tanglewood with the American premiere of Benjamin Britten's Peter Grimes, which was commissioned by Koussevitzky. That same year, Arturo Toscanini invited Bernstein to guest conduct two concerts with the NBC Symphony Orchestra, one of which also featured Bernstein as soloist in Ravel's Piano Concerto in G.
Israel Philharmonic Orchestra
In 1947, Bernstein conducted in Tel Aviv for the first time, beginning a lifelong association with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, then known as the Palestine Symphony Orchestra. The next year he conducted an open-air concert for Israeli troops at Beersheba in the middle of the desert during the Arab-Israeli war. In 1957, he conducted the inaugural concert of the Mann Auditorium in Tel Aviv. In 1967, he conducted a concert on Mount Scopus to commemorate the Reunification of Jerusalem, featuring Mahler's Symphony No. 2 and Mendelssohn Violin Concerto with soloist Isaac Stern. During the 1970s, Bernstein recorded his symphonies and other works with the Israel Philharmonic on Deutsche Grammophon. The city of Tel Aviv added his name to the Orchestra Plaza in the center of the city.
First television appearance
On December 10, 1949, he made his first television appearance as conductor with the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Carnegie Hall. The concert, which also included an address by Eleanor Roosevelt, celebrated the one-year anniversary of the United Nations General Assembly's ratification of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and included the premiere of Aaron Copland's "Preamble" with Sir Laurence Olivier narrating text from the UN Charter. The concert was televised by NBC Television Network.
Summer at Tanglewood
In April 1949, Bernstein performed as piano soloist in the world premiere of his Symphony No. 2: The Age of Anxiety with Koussevitzy conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Later that year, Bernstein conducted the world premiere of the Turangalîla-Symphonie by Olivier Messiaen, with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Part of the rehearsal for the concert was recorded and released by the orchestra. When Koussevitzky died in 1951, Bernstein became head of the orchestra and conducting departments at Tanglewood.
The 1950s
The 1950s comprised among the most active years of Bernstein's career. He created five new works for the Broadway stage; he composed several symphonic works and an iconic film score; he was appointed music director of the New York Philharmonic with whom he toured the world, including concerts behind the Iron Curtain; he harnessed the power of television to expand his educational reach; and he married and started a family.
Compositions in the 1950s
Theatrical works
Peter Pan
In 1950, Bernstein composed incidental music for a Broadway production of J. M. Barrie's play Peter Pan. The production, which opened on Broadway on April 24, 1950, starred Jean Arthur as Peter Pan and Boris Karloff in the dual roles of George Darling and Captain Hook. The show ran for 321 performances.
Trouble in Tahiti
In 1951, Bernstein composed Trouble in Tahiti, a one-act opera in seven scenes with an English libretto by the composer. The opera portrays the troubled marriage of a couple whose idyllic suburban post-war environment belies their inner turmoil. Ironically, Bernstein wrote most of the opera while on his honeymoon in Mexico with his wife, Felicia Montealegre.
Bernstein was a visiting music professor at Brandeis University from 1951 to 1956. In 1952, he created the Brandeis Festival of the Creative Arts, where he conducted the premiere of Trouble in Tahiti on June 12 of that year.
The NBC Opera Theatre subsequently presented the opera on television in November 1952. It opened on Broadway at the Playhouse Theatre on April 19, 1955 and ran for six weeks.
Three decades later, Bernstein wrote a second opera, A Quiet Place, which picked up the story and characters of Trouble in Tahiti in a later period.
Wonderful Town
In 1953, Bernstein wrote the score for the musical Wonderful Town on very short notice, with a book by Joseph A. Fields and Jerome Chodorov and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green. The musical tells the story of two sisters from Ohio who move to New York City and seek success from their squalid basement apartment in Greenwich Village.
Wonderful Town opened on Broadway on February 25, 1953 at the Winter Garden Theatre, starring Rosalind Russell in the role of Ruth Sherwood, Edie Adams as Eileen Sherwood, and George Gaynes as Robert Baker. It won five Tony Awards, including Best Musical and Best Actress.
Candide
In the three years leading up to Bernstein's appointment as music director of the New York Philharmonic, Bernstein was simultaneously working on the scores for two Broadway shows. The first of the two was the operetta-style musical Candide. Lillian Hellman originally brought Bernstein her idea of adapting Voltaire's novella. The original collaborators on the show were book writer John Latouche and lyricist Richard Wilbur.
Candide opened on Broadway on December 1, 1956 at the Martin Beck Theatre, in a production directed by Tyrone Guthrie. Anxious about the parallels Hellman had deliberately drawn between Voltaire's story and the ongoing hearings conducted by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Guthrie persuaded the collaborators to cut their most incendiary sections prior to opening night.
While the production was a box office disaster, running only two months for a total of 73 performances, the cast album became a cult classic, which kept Bernstein's score alive. The elements of the music that have remained best known and performed over the decades are the Overture, which quickly became one of the most frequently performed orchestral compositions by a 20th century American composer; the coloratura aria "Glitter and Be Gay", which Barbara Cook sang in the original production; and the grand finale "Make Our Garden Grow".
West Side Story
The other musical Bernstein was writing simultaneously with Candide was West Side Story. Bernstein collaborated with director and choreographer Jerome Robbins, book writer Arthur Laurents, and lyricist Stephen Sondheim.
The story is an updated retelling of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, set in the mid-1950s in the slums of New York City's Upper West Side. The Romeo character, Tony, is affiliated with the Jets gang, who are of white Northern European descent. The Juliet character is Maria, who is connected to the Sharks gang, recently arrived immigrants from Puerto Rico.
The original Broadway production opened at the Winter Garden Theatre on September 26, 1957, and ran 732 performances. Robbins won the Tony Award for Best Choreographer, and Oliver Smith won the Tony for Best Scenic Designer.
Bernstein's score for West Side Story blends "jazz, Latin rhythms, symphonic sweep and musical-comedy conventions in groundbreaking ways for Broadway". It was orchestrated by Sid Ramin and Irwin Kostal following detailed instructions from Bernstein. The dark theme, sophisticated music, extended dance scenes, and focus on social problems marked a turning point in musical theatre.
In 1960, Bernstein prepared a suite of orchestral music from the show, titled Symphonic Dances from West Side Story, which continues to be popular with orchestras worldwide.
A 1961 United Artists film adaptation, directed by Robert Wise and starred Natalie Wood as Maria and Richard Beymer as Tony. The film won ten Academy Awards, including Best Picture and a ground-breaking Best Supporting Actress award for Puerto Rican-born Rita Moreno playing the role of Anita.
A new film adaptation directed by Steven Spielberg opened in theaters on December 10, 2021.
Serenade, Prelude, Fugue and Riffs, and On The Waterfront
In addition to Bernstein's compositional activity for the stage, he also wrote a symphonic work, Serenade after Plato's "Symposium"; the score to the Academy Award-winning film On The Waterfront; and Prelude, Fugue and Riffs, composed for jazz big band and solo clarinet.
First American to conduct at La Scala
In 1953, Bernstein became the first American conductor to appear at La Scala in Milan, conducting Cherubini's Medea, with Maria Callas in the title role and directed by Luchino Visconti. Callas and Bernstein reunited at La Scala to perform in Bellini's La sonnambula in 1955.
Omnibus
On November 14, 1954, Bernstein presented the first of his television lectures for the CBS Television Network arts program Omnibus. The live lecture, entitled "Beethoven's Fifth Symphony", involved Bernstein explaining the symphony's first movement with the aid of musicians from the "Symphony of the Air" (formerly NBC Symphony Orchestra). The program featured manuscripts from Beethoven's own hand, as well as a giant painting of the first page of the score covering the studio floor. Six more Omnibus lectures followed from 1955 to 1961 (later on ABC and then NBC) covering a broad range of topics: jazz, conducting, American musical comedy, modern music, J.S. Bach, and grand opera.
Music director of the New York Philharmonic
Bernstein was appointed the music director of the New York Philharmonic in 1957, sharing the post jointly with Dimitri Mitropoulos until he took sole charge in 1958. Bernstein held the music directorship until 1969 when he was appointed "Laureate Conductor". He continued to conduct and make recordings with the orchestra for the rest of his life.
Young People's Concerts with the New York Philharmonic
Bernstein's television teaching took a quantum leap when, as the new music director of the New York Philharmonic, he put the orchestra's traditional Saturday afternoon Young People's Concerts on the CBS Television Network. Millions of viewers of all ages and around the world enthusiastically embraced Bernstein and his engaging presentations about classical music. Bernstein often presented talented young performers on the broadcasts. Many of them became celebrated in their own right, including conductors Claudio Abbado and Seiji Ozawa; flutist Paula Robison; and pianist André Watts. From 1958–1972, the fifty-three Young People's Concerts comprised the most influential series of music education programs ever produced on television. They were highly acclaimed by critics and won numerous Emmy Awards.
Some of Bernstein's scripts, all of which he wrote himself, were released in book form and on records. A recording of Humor in Music was awarded a Grammy award for Best Documentary or Spoken Word Recording (other than comedy) in 1961. The programs were shown in many countries around the world, often with Bernstein dubbed into other languages, and the concerts were later released on home video by Kultur Video.
United States Department of State tours
In 1958, Bernstein and Mitropoulos led the New York Philharmonic on its first tour south of the border, through 12 countries in Central and South America. The United States Department of State sponsored the tour to improve the nation's relations with its southern neighbors.
In 1959, the Department of State also sponsored Bernstein and the Philharmonic on a 50-concert tour through Europe and the Soviet Union, portions of which were filmed by the CBS Television Network. A highlight of the tour was Bernstein's performance of Shostakovich's Fifth Symphony, in the presence of the composer, who came on stage at the end to congratulate Bernstein and the musicians.
The 1960s
New York Philharmonic Innovations
Bernstein's innovative approach to themed programming included introducing audiences to lesser performed composers at the time such as Gustav Mahler, Carl Nielsen, Jean Sibelius, and Charles Ives (including the world premiere of his Symphony No. 2). Bernstein actively advocated for the commission and performance of works by contemporary composers, conducting over 40 world premieres by a diverse roster of composers ranging from John Cage to Alberto Ginastera to Luciano Berio. He also conducted US premieres of 19 major works from around the globe, including works by Dmitri Shostakovich, Pierre Boulez, and György Ligeti.
Bernstein championed American composers, especially with whom he had a close friendship, such as Aaron Copland, William Schuman, and David Diamond. This decade saw a significant expansion of Bernstein and the Philharmonic's collaboration with Columbia Records, together they released over 400 compositions, covering a broad swath of the classical music canon.
Bernstein welcomed the Philharmonic's additions of its first Black musician, Sanford Allen, and its second woman musician, Orin O'Brien. Bernstein also shared the Philharmonic’s commitment to connecting with as many New Yorkers as possible. That vision became a reality with the launch of the Concerts in the Parks in 1965, which Bernstein conducted often.
Another milestone was the Philharmonic’s first visit to Japan in 1961, when Bernstein led acclaimed Philharmonic concerts and engaged in cultural exchange. Over the years he led the Orchestra on tours to 144 cities in 38 countries.
He initiated the Philharmonic's informal Thursday Evening Preview Concerts, which included Bernstein's talks from the stage, a practice that was unheard of at the time.
In one oft-reported incident, on April 6, 1962, Bernstein appeared on stage before a performance of the Brahms Piano Concerto No. 1 in D Minor to explain that the soloist, Glenn Gould, had chosen an idiosyncratic approach to the work. Bernstein explained that while he didn't totally agree with it, he thought Gould's interpretation was an artistically worthy exploration. Bernstein questioned: "In a concerto, who is the boss: the soloist or the conductor?" The incident created a stir that reverberated in the press for decades.
Bernstein and Mahler
In 1960, Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic introduced American audiences to the music of Gustav Mahler, beginning with a festival marking the centennial of the composer's birth. The composer's widow, Alma, attended some of Bernstein's rehearsals. In that same year, Bernstein made his first commercial recording of a Mahler symphony (the Fourth). Over the next seven years, he recorded the entire Mahler symphony cycle with the New York Philharmonic (except for the 8th Symphony, which was recorded with the London Symphony Orchestra).
The combination of concert performances, television talks, and recordings led to a renewed interest in Mahler, especially in the United States. Bernstein claimed that he identified with the works on a personal level, and once wrote of the composer: "I'm so sympathetic to Mahler: I understand his problem. It's like being two different men locked up in the same body; one man is a conductor and the other a composer ... It's like being a double man."
Opening Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
On May 14, 1959, President Dwight D. Eisenhower broke ground for Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. On September 23, 1962, the New York Philharmonic moved from Carnegie Hall to its new home, Philharmonic Hall (now David Geffen Hall). Bernstein conducted the gala opening concert featuring works by Mahler, Beethoven and Vaughan Williams, as well as the premiere of Aaron Copland's Connotations.
Metropolitan Opera debut
In 1964, Bernstein conducted at The Metropolitan Opera for the first time in Franco Zeffirelli's production of Verdi's Falstaff. In subsequent years, Bernstein returned to The Met to conduct Cavalleria Rusticana (1970) and Carmen (1972), as well as at the Centennial Gala in 1983.
An Artist's Response to Violence
In 1961, Bernstein had conducted at President John F. Kennedy's pre-inaugural gala, and he was an occasional guest in the White House. Years later he conducted at the funeral mass in 1968 for President Kennedy's brother Robert F. Kennedy, featuring the Adagietto from Mahler's 5th Symphony. Jackie Kennedy famously wrote to Bernstein after the event: "When your Mahler started to fill (but that is the wrong word — because it was more this sensitive trembling) the Cathedral today — I thought it the most beautiful music I had ever heard".
On November 23, 1963, the day after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Bernstein conducted the New York Philharmonic and the Schola Cantorum of New York in a nationally televised memorial featuring the "Resurrection Symphony" by Gustav Mahler. This was the first televised performance of the complete symphony. Mahler's music had never been performed for such an event, and since the tribute to JFK, Mahler symphonies have become part of the Philharmonic's standard repertoire for national mourning.
Kaddish and Chichester Psalms
With his commitment to the New York Philharmonic and his many other activities, Bernstein had little time for composition during the 1960s. The two major works he produced at this time were his Kaddish Symphony, dedicated to the recently assassinated President John F. Kennedy, and the Chichester Psalms, which he produced during a sabbatical year he took from the Philharmonic in 1965 to concentrate on composition. Wanting to make more time for composition was probably a major factor in his decision to step down as music director of the Philharmonic in 1969, and to never again accept such a position elsewhere.
International conductor
In 1966, he made his debut at the Vienna State Opera conducting Luchino Visconti's production of the same opera with Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau as Falstaff. During his time in Vienna he also recorded the opera for Columbia Records and conducted his first subscription concert with the Vienna Philharmonic (which is made up of players from the Vienna State Opera) featuring Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde with Fischer-Dieskau and James King. He returned to the State Opera in 1968 for a production of Der Rosenkavalier and in 1970 for Otto Schenk's production of Beethoven's Fidelio.
After stepping down from the New York Philharmonic, Bernstein continued to appear with them in most years until his death, and he toured with them to Europe in 1976 and to Asia in 1979. He also strengthened his relationship with the Vienna Philharmonic—he conducted all nine completed Mahler symphonies with them (plus the Adagio from the 10th) in the period from 1967 to 1976. All of these were filmed for Unitel with the exception of the 1967 Mahler 2nd, which instead Bernstein filmed with the London Symphony Orchestra in Ely Cathedral in 1973. In the late 1970s Bernstein conducted a complete Beethoven symphony cycle with the Vienna Philharmonic, and cycles of Brahms and Schumann were to follow in the 1980s. Other orchestras he conducted on numerous occasions in the 1970s include the Israel Philharmonic, the Orchestre National de France, and the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
In 1970 Bernstein wrote and narrated a ninety-minute program filmed on location in and around Vienna as a celebration of Beethoven's 200th birthday. It featured parts of Bernstein's rehearsals and performance for the Otto Schenk production of Fidelio, Bernstein playing the 1st piano concerto and conducting the Ninth Symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic, with the young Plácido Domingo amongst the soloists. The program was first telecast in 1970 on Austrian and British television, and then on CBS in the U.S. on Christmas Eve 1971. The show, originally entitled Beethoven's Birthday: A Celebration in Vienna, won an Emmy and was issued on DVD in 2005. In the summer of 1970, during the Festival of London, he conducted Verdi's Requiem Mass in St. Paul's Cathedral, with the London Symphony Orchestra.
Early 1970s
Bernstein's major compositions during the 1970s were his Mass: A Theatre Piece for Singers, Players, and Dancers; his score for the ballet Dybbuk; his orchestral vocal work Songfest; and his U.S. bicentenary musical 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue written with lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner which was his first real theatrical flop, and last original Broadway show.
Mass: A Theatre Piece for Singers, Players, and Dancers
In 1966, Jacqueline Kennedy commissioned Bernstein to compose a work for the inauguration of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. Bernstein began writing Mass in 1969 as a large-scale theatrical work based on the Tridentine Mass of the Catholic Church, and in 1971, Bernstein invited the young composer and lyricist Stephen Schwartz, who had recently opened the musical Godspell off-Broadway, to collaborate as co-lyricist. The world premiere of took place on September 8, 1971, conducted by Maurice Peress and choreographed by Alvin Ailey.
Bernstein's score combines elements of musical theater, jazz, gospel, folk, rock, and symphonic music, and the libretto combines Latin and English liturgy, Hebrew prayer, and additional lyrics written by Bernstein and Schwartz.
Mass was originally criticized by both the Catholic Church and those who opposed its anti-Vietnam War message, as well as by some music critics. Viewpoints on Mass continue to evolve over time, and Edward Seckerson wrote in 2021, 50 years after its premiere: "Put simply, no other work of Bernstein's encapsulates exactly who he was as a man or as a musician; no other work displays his genius, his intellect, his musical virtuosity and innate theatricality quite like MASS."
Deutsche Grammophon recordings
In 1972, Bernstein recorded Bizet's Carmen, with Marilyn Horne in the title role and James McCracken as Don Jose, after leading several stage performances of the opera at the Metropolitan Opera. The recording was one of the first in stereo to use the original spoken dialogue between the sung portions of the opera, rather than the musical recitatives that were composed by Ernest Guiraud after Bizet's death. The recording was Bernstein's first for Deutsche Grammophon and won a Grammy.
Norton Lectures at Harvard
Bernstein was appointed in 1973 to the Charles Eliot Norton Chair as Professor of Poetry at his alma mater, Harvard University, and delivered a series of six televised lectures on music with musical examples played by the Boston Symphony Orchestra. However, these lectures were not televised until 1976. Taking the title from a Charles Ives work, he called the series The Unanswered Question; it was a set of interdisciplinary lectures in which he borrowed terminology from contemporary linguistics to analyze and compare musical construction to language. The lectures are presently available in both book and DVD form. The DVD video was not taken directly from the lectures at Harvard, rather they were recreated again at the WGBH studios for filming. This appears to be the only surviving Norton lectures series available to the general public in video format. Noam Chomsky wrote in 2007 on the Znet forums about the linguistic aspects of the lecture: "I spent some time with Bernstein during the preparation and performance of the lectures. My feeling was that he was onto something, but I couldn't really judge how significant it was."
Rostropovich
Bernstein played an instrumental role in the release of renowned cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich from the USSR in 1974. Rostropovich, a strong believer in free speech and democracy, had been officially held in disgrace; his concerts and tours both at home and abroad cancelled, and in 1972 he was prohibited to travel outside of the Soviet Union. During a trip to the USSR in 1974, Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy and his wife Joan, urged by Bernstein and others in the cultural sphere, mentioned Rostropovich's situation to Leonid Brezhnev, the Soviet Union Communist Party Leader. Two days later, Rostropovich was granted his exit visa.
SNL
Chevy Chase stated in his biography that Lorne Michaels wanted Bernstein to host Saturday Night Live in the show's first season (1975–76). Chase was seated next to Bernstein at a birthday party for Kurt Vonnegut and made the request in person. However, the pitch involved a Bernstein-conducted SNL version of West Side Story, and Bernstein was uninterested.
Felicia Montealegre Bernstein Fund of Amnesty International USA
In October 1976, Bernstein led the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and pianist Claudio Arrau in an Amnesty International Benefit Concert in Munich. To honor his late wife and to continue their joint support for human rights, Bernstein established the Felicia Montealegre Bernstein Fund of Amnesty International USA to provide aid for human rights activists with limited resources.
Late 1970s
In 1978, Bernstein returned to the Vienna State Opera to conduct a revival of the Otto Schenk production of Fidelio, now featuring Gundula Janowitz and René Kollo in the lead roles. At the same time, Bernstein made a studio recording of the opera for Deutsche Grammophon and the opera itself was filmed by Unitel and released on DVD by Deutsche Grammophon in late 2006. In May 1978, the Israel Philharmonic played two U.S. concerts under his direction to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the founding of the Orchestra under that name. On consecutive nights, the Orchestra, with the Choral Arts Society of Washington, performed Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and Bernstein's Chichester Psalms at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., and at Carnegie Hall in New York.
In 1979, Bernstein conducted the Berlin Philharmonic for the first time, in two charity concerts for Amnesty International involving performances of Mahler's Ninth Symphony. The invitation for the concerts had come from the orchestra and not from its principal conductor Herbert von Karajan. There has been speculation about why Karajan never invited Bernstein to conduct his orchestra. (Karajan did conduct the New York Philharmonic during Bernstein's tenure.) The full reasons will probably never be known—reports suggest they were on friendly terms when they met, but sometimes practiced a little mutual one-upmanship. One of the concerts was broadcast on radio and was posthumously released on CD by Deutsche Grammophon. One oddity of the recording is that the trombone section fails to enter at the climax of the finale, as a result of an audience member fainting just behind the trombones a few seconds earlier.
Early 1980s
Bernstein received the Kennedy Center Honors award in 1980. For the rest of the 1980s he continued to conduct, teach, compose, and produce the occasional TV documentary. His most significant compositions of the decade were probably his opera A Quiet Place, which he wrote with Stephen Wadsworth and which premiered, in its original version, in Houston in 1983; his Divertimento for Orchestra; his Ḥalil for flute and orchestra; his Concerto for Orchestra "Jubilee Games"; and his song cycle Arias and Barcarolles, which was named after a comment President Dwight D. Eisenhower had made to him in 1960.
International fame
In 1982 in the U.S., PBS aired an 11-part series of Bernstein's late 1970s films for Unitel of the Vienna Philharmonic playing all nine Beethoven symphonies and various other Beethoven works. Bernstein gave spoken introduction and actor Maximilian Schell was also featured on the programs, reading from Beethoven's letters. The original films have since been released on DVD by Deutsche Grammophon. In addition to conducting in New York, Vienna and Israel, Bernstein was a regular guest conductor of other orchestras in the 1980s. These included the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam, with whom he recorded Mahler's First, Fourth, and Ninth Symphonies amongst other works; the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in Munich, with whom he recorded Wagner's Tristan und Isolde; Haydn's Creation; Mozart's Requiem and Great Mass in C minor; and the orchestra of Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, with whom he recorded some Debussy and Puccini's La bohème.
In 1982, he and Ernest Fleischmann founded the Los Angeles Philharmonic Institute as a summer training academy along the lines of Tanglewood. Bernstein served as artistic director and taught conducting there until 1984. Around the same time, he performed and recorded some of his own works with the Los Angeles Philharmonic for Deutsche Grammophon. Bernstein was also at the time a committed supporter of nuclear disarmament. In 1985 he took the European Community Youth Orchestra in a "Journey for Peace" tour across Europe and Japan.
In 1984, he conducted a recording of West Side Story, the first time he had conducted the entire work. The recording, featuring what some critics felt were miscast opera singers such as Kiri Te Kanawa, José Carreras, and Tatiana Troyanos in the leading roles, was nevertheless an international bestseller. A TV documentary The Making of West Side Story about the recording was made at the same time and has been released as a DVD. Bernstein also continued to make his own TV documentaries during the 1980s, including The Little Drummer Boy, in which he discussed the music of Gustav Mahler, perhaps the composer he was most passionately interested in, and The Love of Three Orchestras, in which he discussed his work in New York, Vienna, and Israel.
In his later years, Bernstein's life and work were celebrated around the world (as they have been since his death). The Israel Philharmonic celebrated his involvement with them at festivals in Israel and Austria in 1977. In 1986 the London Symphony Orchestra mounted a Bernstein Festival in London with one concert that Bernstein himself conducted attended by the Queen. In 1988 Bernstein's 70th birthday was celebrated by a lavish televised gala at Tanglewood featuring many performers who had worked with him over the years.
During summer 1987, he celebrated the 100th anniversary of Nadia Boulanger at the American Conservatory in Fontainebleau. He gave a masterclass inside the castle of Fontainebleau.
In December 1989, Bernstein conducted live performances and recorded in the studio his operetta Candide with the London Symphony Orchestra. The recording starred Jerry Hadley, June Anderson, Adolph Green, and Christa Ludwig in the leading roles. The use of opera singers in some roles perhaps fitted the style of operetta better than some critics had thought was the case for West Side Story, and the posthumously released recording was universally praised. One of the live concerts from the Barbican Centre in London is available on DVD. Candide had had a troubled history, with many rewrites and writers involved. Bernstein's concert and recording were based on a final version that had been first performed by Scottish Opera in 1988. The opening night, which Bernstein attended in Glasgow, was conducted by his former student John Mauceri.
Ode to "Freedom"
On December 25, 1989, Bernstein conducted Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 in East Berlin's Schauspielhaus as part of a celebration of the fall of the Berlin Wall. He had conducted the same work in West Berlin the previous day. The concert was broadcast live in more than twenty countries to an estimated audience of 100 million people. For the occasion, Bernstein reworded Friedrich Schiller's text of the Ode to Joy, using the word Freiheit (freedom) instead of the original Freude (joy). Bernstein, in his spoken introduction, said that they had "taken the liberty" of doing this because of a "most likely phony" story, apparently believed in some quarters, that Schiller wrote an "Ode to Freedom" that is now presumed lost. Bernstein added, "I'm sure that Beethoven would have given us his blessing."
Founding of Pacific Music Festival
In the summer of 1990, Bernstein and Michael Tilson Thomas founded the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan. Like his earlier activity in Los Angeles, this was a summer training school for musicians modeled on Tanglewood and is still in existence. At this time, Bernstein was already suffering from the lung disease that would lead to his death. In his opening address Bernstein said that he had decided to devote what time he had left to education. A video showing Bernstein speaking and rehearsing at the first Festival is available on DVD in Japan.
In the same year, Bernstein received the Praemium Imperiale, an international prize awarded by the Japan Arts Association for lifetime achievement in the arts. Bernstein used the $100,000 prize to establish The Bernstein Education Through the Arts (BETA) Fund, Inc. He provided this grant to develop an arts-based education program. The Leonard Bernstein Center was established in April 1992, and initiated extensive school-based research, resulting in the Bernstein Model, the Leonard Bernstein Artful Learning Program.
Last concert
Bernstein conducted his last concert on August 19, 1990, with the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood. The program consisted of Benjamin Britten's Four Sea Interludes from Peter Grimes and Beethoven's Symphony No. 7. He suffered a coughing fit during the third movement of the Beethoven symphony, but continued to conduct the piece until its conclusion, leaving the stage during the ovation, appearing exhausted and in pain. The concert was later issued in edited form on CD as Leonard Bernstein – The Final Concert by Deutsche Grammophon. Also included was Bernstein's own Arias and Barcarolles in an orchestration by Bright Sheng. However, poor health prevented Bernstein from performing it. Carl St. Clair was engaged to conduct it in his stead.
Personal life
After much personal struggle and a turbulent on-off engagement, Bernstein married actress Felicia Cohn Montealegre on September 10, 1951. One suggestion is that he chose to marry partly to dispel rumors about his private life to help secure a major conducting appointment, following advice from his mentor Dimitri Mitropoulos about the conservative nature of orchestra boards. Bernstein had expressed the same internal conflict and sought similar advice from Aaron Copland in 1943, suggesting he could resolve it by marrying his then "girl-friend ... my dentist's daughter". In a book released in October 2013, The Leonard Bernstein Letters, his wife acknowledges his homosexuality. Felicia writes: "You are a homosexual and may never change—you don't admit to the possibility of a double life, but if your peace of mind, your health, your whole nervous system depend on a certain sexual pattern what can you do?" Arthur Laurents (Bernstein's collaborator in West Side Story) said that Bernstein was "a gay man who got married. He wasn't conflicted about it at all. He was just gay." Shirley Rhoades Perle, another friend of Bernstein, said that she thought "he required men sexually and women emotionally". But the early years of his marriage seem to have been happy, and no one has suggested Bernstein and his wife did not love each other. They had three children, Jamie, Alexander, and Nina. There are reports, though, that Bernstein did sometimes have brief extramarital liaisons with young men, which several family friends have said his wife knew about.
A major period of upheaval in Bernstein's personal life began in 1976 when he decided that he could no longer conceal his homosexuality and he left his wife Felicia for a period to live with the musical director of the classical music radio station KKHI in San Francisco, Tom Cothran. The next year Felicia was diagnosed with lung cancer and eventually Bernstein moved back in with her and cared for her until she died on June 16, 1978. Bernstein is reported to have often spoken of his terrible guilt over his wife's death. Most biographies of Bernstein state that his lifestyle became more excessive and his personal behavior sometimes more reckless and crude after her death. However, his public standing and many of his close friendships appear to have remained unaffected, and he resumed his busy schedule of musical activity.
His affairs with men included a ten-year relationship with Kunihiko Hashimoto, a Tokyo insurance employee. The two met when the New York Philharmonic was performing in Tokyo. Hashimoto went backstage and they ended up spending the night together. It was a long distance affair, but according to letters, they both cared about each other deeply. Dearest Lenny: Letters from Japan and the Making of the World Maestro by Mari Yoshihara (Oxford University Press, 2019) goes into detail about their letters and relationship including interviews with Hashimoto. The book also includes other letters Bernstein received from Japanese fans.
Bernstein had asthma, which kept him from serving in the military during World War II.
Death and legacy
Bernstein announced his retirement from conducting on October 9, 1990 and died five days later, in his New York apartment at The Dakota, of a heart attack brought on by mesothelioma. He was 72 years old. A longtime heavy smoker, he had had emphysema from his mid-50s. On the day of his funeral procession through the streets of Manhattan, construction workers removed their hats and waved, calling out "Goodbye, Lenny". Bernstein is buried in Green-Wood Cemetery, Brooklyn, New York, next to his wife and with a copy of Mahler's Fifth Symphony opened to the famous Adagietto lying across his heart. On August 25, 2018 (his 100th birthday), he was honored with a Google Doodle. Also for his centennial, the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles created an exhibition titled Leonard Bernstein at 100.
Social activism
While Bernstein was very well known for his music compositions and conducting, he was also known for his outspoken political views and his strong desire to further social change. His first aspirations for social change were made apparent in his producing (as a student) a recently banned opera, The Cradle Will Rock, by Marc Blitzstein, about the disparity between the working and upper class. His first opera, Trouble in Tahiti, was dedicated to Blitzstein and has a strong social theme, criticizing American civilization and suburban upper-class life in particular. As he went on in his career, Bernstein would go on to fight for everything from the influences of "American Music" to the disarming of western nuclear weapons.
Like many of his friends and colleagues, Bernstein had been involved in various left-wing causes and organizations since the 1940s. He was blacklisted by the US State Department and CBS in the early 1950s, but unlike others his career was not greatly affected, and he was never required to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee. His political life received substantial press coverage though in 1970, due to a gathering hosted at his Manhattan apartment at 895 Park Avenue on January 14, 1970. Bernstein and his wife held the event seeking to raise awareness and money for the defense of several members of the Black Panther Party against a variety of charges, especially the case of the Panther 21. The New York Times initially covered the gathering as a lifestyle item, but later posted an editorial harshly unfavorable to Bernstein following generally negative reaction to the widely publicized story. This reaction culminated in June 1970 with the appearance of "Radical Chic: That Party at Lenny's", an essay by journalist Tom Wolfe featured on the cover of the magazine New York. The article contrasted the Bernsteins' comfortable lifestyle in one of the world's most expensive neighborhoods with the anti-establishment politics of the Black Panthers. It led to the popularization of "radical chic" as a critical term. Both Bernstein and his wife Felicia responded to the criticism, arguing that they were motivated not by a shallow desire to express fashionable sympathy but by their concern for civil liberties.
Bernstein was named in the book Red Channels: The Report of Communist Influence in Radio and Television (1950) as a Communist along with Aaron Copland, Lena Horne, Pete Seeger, Artie Shaw and other prominent figures of the performing arts. Red Channels was issued by the right-wing journal Counterattack and was edited by Vincent Hartnett, who was later found to have libeled and defamed the noted radio personality John Henry Faulk.
Philanthropy
Among the many awards Bernstein earned throughout his life, one allowed him to make one of his philanthropic dreams a reality. He had for a long time wanted to develop an international school to help promote the integration of arts into education. When he won the Praemium Imperiale, Japan Arts Association award for lifetime achievement in 1990, he used the $100,000 that came with the award to build such a school in Nashville, that would strive to teach teachers how to better integrate music, dance, and theater into the school system which was "not working". Unfortunately, the school was not able to open until shortly after Bernstein's death. This would eventually yield an initiative known as Artful Learning as part of the Leonard Bernstein Center.
Influence and characteristics as a conductor
Bernstein was one of the major figures in orchestral conducting in the second half of the 20th century. He was held in high regard amongst many musicians, including the members of the Vienna Philharmonic, evidenced by his honorary membership; the London Symphony Orchestra, of which he was president; and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, with which he appeared regularly as guest conductor. He was probably the main conductor from the 1960s onwards who acquired a sort of superstar status similar to that of Herbert von Karajan, although unlike Karajan he conducted relatively little opera and part of Bernstein's fame was based on his role as a composer. As the first American-born music director of the New York Philharmonic, his rise to prominence was a factor in overcoming the perception of the time that the top conductors were necessarily trained in Europe.
Bernstein's conducting was characterized by extremes of emotion with the rhythmic pulse of the music conveyed visually through his balletic podium manner. Musicians often reported that his manner in rehearsal was the same as in concert. As he got older his performances tended to be overlaid to a greater extent with a personal expressiveness which often divided critical opinion. Extreme examples of this style can be found in his Deutsche Grammophon recordings of "Nimrod" from Elgar's Enigma Variations (1982), the end of Mahler's 9th Symphony (1985), and the finale of Tchaikovsky's Pathétique Symphony (1986), where in each case the tempos are well below those typically chosen. A skilled pianist, he used to perform the piano parts himself and conduct orchestras from the keyboard (for instance, when he conducted Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue).
Bernstein performed a wide repertoire from the Baroque era to the 20th century, although perhaps from the 1970s onwards he tended to focus more on music from the Romantic era. He was considered especially accomplished with the works of Gustav Mahler and with American composers in general, including George Gershwin, Aaron Copland, Charles Ives, Roy Harris, William Schuman, and of course himself. Some of his recordings of works by these composers would likely appear on many music critics' lists of recommended recordings. A list of his other well-thought-of recordings would include, among others, individual works from Haydn, Beethoven, Berlioz, Schumann, Liszt, Nielsen, Sibelius, Stravinsky, Hindemith, and Shostakovich. His recordings of Rhapsody in Blue (full-orchestra version) and An American in Paris for Columbia Records, released in 1959, are considered definitive by many, although Bernstein cut the Rhapsody slightly, and his more 'symphonic' approach with slower tempi is quite far from Gershwin's own conception of the piece, evident from his two recordings. (Oscar Levant, Earl Wild, and others come closer to Gershwin's own style.) Bernstein never conducted Gershwin's Piano Concerto in F, or more than a few excerpts from Porgy and Bess, although he did discuss the latter in his article Why Don't You Run Upstairs and Write a Nice Gershwin Tune?, originally published in The New York Times and later reprinted in his 1959 book The Joy of Music.
In addition to being an active conductor, Bernstein was an influential teacher of conducting. During his many years of teaching at Tanglewood and elsewhere, he directly taught or mentored many conductors who are performing now, including John Mauceri, Marin Alsop, Herbert Blomstedt, Edo de Waart, Alexander Frey, Paavo Järvi, Eiji Oue, Maurice Peress, Seiji Ozawa (who made his American TV debut as the guest conductor on one of the Young People's Concerts), Carl St.Clair, Helmuth Rilling, Michael Tilson Thomas, and Jaap van Zweden. He also undoubtedly influenced the career choices of many American musicians who grew up watching his television programmes in the 1950s and 60s.
Recordings
Bernstein recorded extensively from the mid-1940s until just a few months before his death. Aside from those 1940s recordings, which were made for RCA Victor, Bernstein recorded primarily for Columbia Masterworks Records, especially when he was music director of the New York Philharmonic between 1958 and 1971. His typical pattern of recording at that time was to record major works in the studio immediately after they were presented in the orchestra's subscription concerts or on one of the Young People's Concerts, with any spare time used to record short orchestral showpieces and similar works. Many of these performances were digitally remastered and reissued by Sony Classical Records (the successor to American Columbia/CBS Masterworks following Sony's 1990 acquisition of Columbia/CBS Records) between 1992 and 1993 as part of its 100 volume, 125-CD "Royal Edition", as well as its 1997–2001 "Bernstein Century" series. The rights to Bernstein's 1940s RCA Victor recordings became fully owned by Sony following its 2008 acquisition of Bertelsmann Music Group's (BMG), and now controls both the RCA Victor and Columbia archives. The complete Bernstein Columbia and RCA Victor catalog was reissued on CD in a three-volume series of box sets (released in 2010, 2014, and 2018, respectively) comprising a total of 198 discs under the mantle "Leonard Bernstein Edition".
His later recordings (starting with Bizet's Carmen in 1972) were mostly made for Deutsche Grammophon, though he would occasionally return to the Columbia label. Notable exceptions include recordings of Gustav Mahler's Song of the Earth and Mozart's 15th piano concerto and "Linz" symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic for Decca Records (1966); Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique and Harold in Italy (1976) for EMI; and Wagner's Tristan und Isolde (1981) for Philips Records, a label that like Deutsche Grammophon was part of PolyGram at that time. Unlike his studio recordings for Columbia Masterworks, most of his later Deutsche Grammophon recordings were taken from live concerts (or edited together from several concerts with additional sessions to correct errors). Many replicate repertoire that he recorded in the 1950s and 60s.
In addition to his audio recordings, many of Bernstein's concerts from the 1970s onwards were recorded on motion picture film by the German film company Unitel. This included a complete cycle of the Mahler symphonies (with the Vienna Philharmonic and London Symphony Orchestra), as well as complete cycles of the Beethoven, Brahms and Schumann symphonies recorded at the same series of concerts as the audio recordings by Deutsche Grammophon. Many of these films appeared on LaserDisc and are now on DVD.
In total Bernstein was awarded 16 Grammys for his recordings in various categories, including several for posthumously released recordings. He was also awarded a Lifetime Achievement Grammy in 1985.
Influence and characteristics as a composer
Bernstein was an eclectic composer whose music fused elements of jazz, Jewish music, theatre music, and the work of earlier composers like Aaron Copland, Igor Stravinsky, Darius Milhaud, George Gershwin, and Marc Blitzstein. Some of his works, especially his score for West Side Story, helped bridge the gap between classical and popular music. His music was rooted in tonality but in some works like his Kaddish Symphony and the opera A Quiet Place he mixed in 12-tone elements. Bernstein himself said his main motivation for composing was "to communicate" and that all his pieces, including his symphonies and concert works, "could in some sense be thought of as 'theatre' pieces".
According to the League of American Orchestras, he was the second most frequently performed American composer by U.S. orchestras in 2008–09 behind Copland, and he was the 16th most frequently performed composer overall by U.S. orchestras. (Some performances were probably due to the 2008 90th anniversary of his birth.) His most popular pieces were the Overture to Candide, the Symphonic Dances from West Side Story, the Serenade after Plato's "Symposium" and the Three Dance Episodes from On the Town. His shows West Side Story, On the Town, Wonderful Town and Candide are regularly performed, and his symphonies and concert works are programmed from time to time by orchestras around the world. Since his death many of his works have been commercially recorded by artists other than himself. The Serenade, which has been recorded more than 10 times, is probably his most recorded work not taken from an actual theatre piece.
Despite the fact that he was a popular success as a composer, Bernstein himself is reported to have been disillusioned that some of his more serious works were not rated more highly by critics, and that he himself had not been able to devote more time to composing because of his conducting and other activities. Professional criticism of Bernstein's music often involves discussing the degree to which he created something new as art versus simply skillfully borrowing and fusing together elements from others. In the late 1960s, Bernstein himself reflected that his eclecticism was in part due to his lack of lengthy periods devoted to composition, and that he was still seeking to enrich his own personal musical language in the manner of the great composers of the past, all of whom had borrowed elements from others. Perhaps the harshest criticism he received from some critics in his lifetime though was directed at works like his Kaddish Symphony, his MASS and the opera A Quiet Place, where they found the underlying message of the piece or the text as either mildly embarrassing, clichéd or offensive. Despite this, all these pieces have been performed, discussed and reconsidered since his death.
The Chichester Psalms, and excerpts from his Third Symphony and MASS were performed for Pope John Paul II, including at World Youth Day in Denver on August 14, 1993, and at the Papal Concert to Commemorate the Shoah on April 7, 1994, with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in the Sala Nervi at the Vatican. Both performances were conducted by Gilbert Levine.
Although he taught conducting, Bernstein did not teach composition and left no direct legacy of students in that field.
Bibliography
Videography
The Unanswered Question: Six Talks at Harvard. West Long Branch, New Jersey: Kultur Video. VHS . DVD . (videotape of the Charles Eliot Norton Lectures given at Harvard in 1973.)
Leonard Bernstein's Young People's Concerts with the New York Philharmonic. West Long Branch, New Jersey: Kultur Video. DVD .
Bernstein on Beethoven: A Celebration in Vienna/Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 1. West Long Branch, Kultur Video. DVD
Leonard Bernstein: Omnibus – The Historic TV Broadcasts, 2010, E1 Ent.
Bernstein: Reflections (1978), A rare personal portrait of Leonard Bernstein by Peter Rosen. Euroarts DVD
Bernstein/Beethoven (1982), Deutsche Grammophon, DVD
The Metropolitan Opera Centennial Gala (1983), Deutsche Grammophon, DVD 00440-073-4538
Bernstein Conducts "West Side Story" (1985) (retitled The Making of West Side Story in re-releases) Deutsche Grammophon. DVD
"The Rite of Spring" in Rehearsal
Mozart's Great Mass in C minor, Exsultate, jubilate & Ave verum corpus (1990), Deutsche Grammophon. DVD 00440-073-4240
"Leonard Bernstein: Reaching for the Note" (1998) Documentary on his life and music. Originally aired on PBS's American Masters series. DVD
Awards
Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1951
Fellow at the MacDowell 1962, 1970, 1972
Sonning Award (Denmark), 1965
Ditson Conductor's Award, 1958
George Peabody Medal – Johns Hopkins University, 1980
Ernst von Siemens Music Prize, 1987
Royal Philharmonic Society Gold Medal (UK), 1987
Edward MacDowell Medal, 1987
Knight Grand Cross Order of Merit (Italy), 1989
Grammy Award for Best Album for Children
Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Performance
Grammy Award for Best Choral Performance
Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording
Grammy Award for Best Classical Vocal Performance
Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Soloist(s) Performance
Grammy Award for Best Classical Contemporary Composition
Grammy Award for Best Classical Album
Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award
Tony Award for Best Musical
Special Tony Award
Japan Arts Association Lifetime Achievement Award
Gramophone Hall of Fame entrant
Commandeur de la Légion d'honneur, 1986
Bernstein is also a member of both the American Theater Hall of Fame, and the Television Hall of Fame. In 2015 he was inducted into the Legacy Walk.
References
Citations
Sources
(Doubleday edition)
Further reading
Bernstein, Burton (1982). Family Matters: Sam, Jennie, and the Kids. Simon & Schuster. .
Bernstein, Jamie (2018). Famous Father Girl: A Memoir of Growing Up Bernstein. HarperCollins Publishers. .
Bernstein, Shirley (1963). Making Music: Leonard Bernstein. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica Press. .
Briggs, John (1961). Leonard Bernstein: The Man, His Works and His World. World Publishing Co. .
Burton, William W. (1995). Conversations about Bernstein. New York: Oxford University Press, New York. .
Cone, Molly and Robert Galster (1970). Leonard Bernstein. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Co.
Ewen, David (1960). Leonard Bernstein, A Biography for Young People. Philadelphia: Chilton Co.
Fluegel, Jane (ed.) (1991). Bernstein: Remembered: a life in pictures. New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc. .
Freedland, Michael (1987). Leonard Bernstein. London, England: Harrap. Ltd. .
Gottlieb, Jack (2010). Working With Bernstein. Amadeus Press. .
Green, Diane Huss (1963). Lenny's Surprise Piano. San Carlos, California: Golden Gate Junior Books. .
Hurwitz, Johanna (1963). Leonard Bernstein: A Passion of Music. Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society. .
Ledbetter, Steven (1988). Sennets & Tuckets, A Bernstein Celebration. Boston: Boston Symphony Orchestra in association with David Godine Publisher, Inc.. .
Reidy, John P. & Norman Richards (1967). People of Destiny: Leonard Bernstein. Chicago: Children's Press. .
Robinson, Paul (1982). Bernstein (The Art of Conducting Series). New York: Vangard Press. .
Shawn, Allen (2014). Leonard Bernstein: An American Musician. Yale University Press. .
Wolfe, Tom (1987). Radical Chic and Mau Mauing the Flak Catchers. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux. .
External links
Archival records
Leonard Bernstein collection, circa 1900–1995, Library of Congress
Bernstein Online Collection, Library of Congress
Mildred Spiegel Zucker collection of Leonard Bernstein correspondence and related materials, 1936–1991, Library of Congress
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Tony Award winners | 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"
] |
[
"Stevie Ray Vaughan",
"First recordings"
] | C_156015fd0dc74c469a47cbc6a542733a_0 | In what year did Stevie Ray Vaughan start recording? | 1 | In what year did Stevie Ray Vaughan start recording? | Stevie Ray Vaughan | In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Country Club, a venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined a rock band named Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months. In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were disastrous. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed. In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras that included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King. Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde Pharaoh. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band. CANNOTANSWER | In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, | Stephen Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954August 27, 1990) was an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer, best known as the guitarist and frontman of the blues rock trio Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble. Although his mainstream career only spanned seven years, he is considered an icon and one of the most influential musicians in the history of blues music, and one of the greatest guitarists of all time.
Born and raised in Dallas, Texas, Vaughan began playing guitar at age seven, initially inspired by his elder brother, Jimmie Vaughan. In 1972, he dropped out of high school and moved to Austin, where he began to gain a following after playing gigs on the local club circuit. Vaughan joined forces with Tommy Shannon on bass and Chris Layton on drums as Double Trouble in 1978 and established it as part of the Austin music scene; it soon became one of the most popular acts in Texas. He performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1982, where David Bowie saw him play and contacted him for a studio gig, resulting in Stevie playing his blues guitar on the album Let's Dance (1983), before being discovered by John Hammond, who interested major label Epic Records in signing Vaughan and his band to a record deal. Within months, they achieved mainstream success for the critically acclaimed debut album Texas Flood. With a series of successful network television appearances and extensive concert tours, Vaughan became the leading figure in the blues revival of the 1980s.
Playing his guitar behind his back or plucking the strings with his teeth as Jimi Hendrix did, he earned unprecedented stardom in Europe, which later resulted in breakthroughs for guitar players like Robert Cray, Jeff Healey, Robben Ford and Walter Trout, amongst others.
During the majority of his life, Vaughan struggled with drug and alcohol addiction. He also struggled with the personal and professional pressures of fame and his marriage to Lenora "Lenny" Bailey. He successfully completed rehabilitation and began touring again with Double Trouble in November 1986. His fourth and final studio album In Step reached number 33 in the United States in 1989; it was one of Vaughan's most critically and commercially successful releases and included his only number-one hit, "Crossfire". He became one of the world's most highly demanded blues performers, and he headlined Madison Square Garden in 1989 and the Beale Street Music Festival in 1990.
On August 27, 1990, Vaughan and four others were killed in a helicopter crash in East Troy, Wisconsin, after performing with Double Trouble at Alpine Valley Music Theatre. An investigation concluded that the cause was pilot error and Vaughan's family later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Omniflight Helicopters that was settled out of court. Vaughan's music continued to achieve commercial success with several posthumous releases and has sold over 15 million albums in the United States alone. In 2003, David Fricke of Rolling Stone ranked him the seventh greatest guitarist of all time. Vaughan was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015, along with Double Trouble bandmates Chris Layton, Tommy Shannon, and Reese Wynans.
Family and early life
Stevie's grandfather, Thomas Lee Vaughan, married Laura Belle LaRue and moved to Rockwall County, Texas, where they lived by sharecropping.
Stevie's father, Jimmie Lee Vaughan, was born on September 6, 1921. Jimmie, also known as Jim and Big Jim, dropped out of school at age sixteen and enlisted in the U.S. Navy during World War II. After his discharge, he married Martha Jean (née Cook; 1928–2009) on January 13, 1950. They had a son, Jimmie, in 1951. Stephen was born at Methodist Hospital on October 3, 1954, in Dallas, Texas. Big Jim secured a job as an asbestos worker. The family moved frequently, living in other states such as Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Oklahoma before ultimately moving to the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. A shy and insecure boy, Vaughan was deeply affected by his childhood experiences. His father struggled with alcohol abuse and often terrorized his family and friends with his bad temper. In later years, Vaughan recalled that he had been a victim of his father's violence. His father died on August 27, 1986, exactly four years before Vaughan himself.
First instruments
In the early 1960s, Vaughan's admiration for his brother Jimmie resulted in his trying different instruments such as the drums and saxophone. In 1961, for his seventh birthday, Vaughan received his first guitar, a toy from Sears with Western motif. Learning by ear, he diligently committed himself, following along to songs by the Nightcaps, particularly "Wine, Wine, Wine" and "Thunderbird". He listened to blues artists such as Albert King, Otis Rush, and Muddy Waters, and rock guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix and Lonnie Mack, as well as jazz guitarists including Kenny Burrell. In 1963, he acquired his first electric guitar, a Gibson ES-125T, as a hand-me-down from Jimmie.
Soon after he acquired the electric guitar, Vaughan joined his first band, the Chantones, in 1965. Their first show was at a talent contest held in Dallas' Hill Theatre, but after realizing that they could not perform a Jimmy Reed song in its entirety, Vaughan left the band and joined the Brooklyn Underground, playing professionally at local bars and clubs. He received Jimmie's Fender Broadcaster, which he later traded for an Epiphone Riviera. When Jimmie left home at age sixteen, Vaughan's apparent obsession with the instrument caused a lack of support from his parents. Miserable at home, he took a job at a local hamburger stand, where he washed dishes and dumped trash for seventy cents an hour. After falling into a barrel of grease, he grew tired of the job and quit to devote his life to a music career.
Music career
Early years
In May 1969, after leaving the Brooklyn Underground, Vaughan joined a band called the Southern Distributor. He had learned the Yardbirds' "Jeff's Boogie" and played the song at the audition. Mike Steinbach, the group's drummer, commented: "The kid was fourteen. We auditioned him on 'Jeff's Boogie,' really fast instrumental guitar, and he played it note for note." Although they played pop rock covers, Vaughan conveyed his interest in the addition of blues songs to the group's repertoire; he was told that he wouldn't earn a living playing blues music and he and the band parted ways. Later that year, bassist Tommy Shannon walked into a Dallas club and heard Vaughan playing guitar. Fascinated by the skillful playing, which he described as "incredible even then", Shannon borrowed a bass guitar and the two jammed. Within a few years, they began performing together in a band called Krackerjack.
In February 1970, Vaughan joined a band called Liberation, which was a nine-piece group with a horn section. Having spent the past month briefly playing bass with Jimmie in Texas Storm, he had originally auditioned as bassist. Impressed by Vaughan's guitar playing, Scott Phares, the group's original guitarist, modestly became the bassist. In mid-1970, they performed at the Adolphus Hotel in downtown Dallas, where ZZ Top asked them to perform. During Liberation's break, Vaughan jammed with ZZ Top on the Nightcaps song "Thunderbird". Phares later described the performance: "they tore the house down. It was awesome. It was one of those magical evenings. Stevie fit in like a glove on a hand."
Attending Justin F. Kimball High School during the early 1970s, Vaughan's late-night shows contributed to his neglect in his studies, including music theory; he would often sleep during class. His pursuit of a musical career was disapproved of by many of the school's administrators but he was also encouraged by many people, including his art teacher, to strive for a career in art. In his sophomore year, he attended an evening class for experimental art at Southern Methodist University, but left when it conflicted with rehearsal. Vaughan later spoke of his dislike of the school and recalled having received daily notes from the principal about his grooming.
First recordings
In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Club, a local blues venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months.
In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were unsuccessful. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed.
In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras which included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King.
Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde "Pharaoh" Walden. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band.
Double Trouble
In mid-May 1978, Clark left to form his own group and Vaughan renamed the band Double Trouble, taken from the title of an Otis Rush song. Following the recruitment of bassist Jackie Newhouse, Walden quit in July, and was briefly replaced by Jack Moore, who had moved to Texas from Boston; he performed with the band for about two months. Vaughan then began looking for a drummer and soon after, he met Chris Layton through Sublett, who was his roommate. Layton, who had recently parted ways with Greezy Wheels, was taught by Vaughan to play a shuffle rhythm. When Vaughan offered Layton the position, he agreed. In early July, Vaughan befriended Lenora Bailey, known as "Lenny", who became his girlfriend, and ultimately his wife. The marriage was to last for six and a half years.
In early October 1978, Vaughan and Double Trouble earned a frequent residency performing at one of Austin's most popular nightspots, the Rome Inn. During a performance, Edi Johnson, an accountant at Manor Downs, noticed Vaughan. She remembered: "I'm not an authority on music—it's whatever turned me on—but this did." She recommended him to Manor Downs owner Frances Carr and general manager Chesley Millikin, who was interested in managing artists and saw Vaughan's musical potential. After Barton quit Double Trouble in mid-November 1979, Millikin signed Vaughan to a management contract. Vaughan also hired Robert "Cutter" Brandenburg as road manager, whom he had met in 1969. Addressing him as "Stevie Ray", Brandenburg convinced Vaughan to use his middle name on stage.
In October 1980, bassist Tommy Shannon attended a Double Trouble performance at Rockefeller's in Houston. Shannon, who was playing with Alan Haynes at the time, participated in a jam session with Vaughan and Layton halfway through their set. Shannon later commented: "I went down there that night, and I'll never forget this: it was like, when I walked in the door and I heard them playing, it was like a revelation. 'That's where I want to be; that's where I belong, right there.' During the break, I went up to Stevie and told him that. I didn't try to sneak around and hide it from the bass player [Jackie Newhouse]—I didn't know if he was listening or not. I just really wanted to be in that band. I sat in that night and it sounded great." Almost three months later, when Vaughan offered Shannon the position, he readily accepted.
Drug charge and trial
On December 5, 1979, while Vaughan was in a dressing room before a performance in Houston, an off-duty police officer arrested him after witnessing his usage of cocaine near an open window. He was formally charged with cocaine possession and subsequently released on $1,000 bail. Double Trouble was the opening act for Muddy Waters, who said about Vaughan's substance abuse: "Stevie could perhaps be the greatest guitar player that ever lived, but he won't live to get 40 years old if he doesn't leave that white powder alone." The following year, he was required to return on January 16 and February 29 for court appearances.
During the final court date, on April 17, 1980, Vaughan was sentenced with two years' probation and was prohibited from leaving Texas. Along with a stipulation of entering treatment for drug abuse, he was required to "avoid persons or places of known disreputable or harmful character"; he refused to comply with both of these orders. After a lawyer was hired, his probation officer had the sentence revised to allow him to work outside of the state. The incident later caused him to refuse maid service while staying in hotels during concert tours.
Montreux Jazz Festival
Although popular in Texas at the time, Double Trouble failed to gain national attention. The group's visibility improved when record producer Jerry Wexler recommended them to Claude Nobs, organizer of the Montreux Jazz Festival. He insisted the festival's blues night would be great with Vaughan, whom he called "a jewel, one of those rarities who comes along once in a lifetime", and Nobs agreed to book Double Trouble on July 17.
Vaughan opened with a medley arrangement of Freddie King's song "Hide Away" and his own fast instrumental composition, "Rude Mood". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", Hound Dog Taylor's "Give Me Back My Wig", and Albert Collins' "Collins Shuffle", as well as three original compositions: "Pride and Joy", "Love Struck Baby", and "Dirty Pool". The set ended with boos from the audience. People's James McBride wrote:
According to road manager Don Opperman: "the way I remember it, the 'ooos' and the 'boos' were mixed together, but Stevie was pretty disappointed. Stevie [had] just handed me his guitar and walked off stage, and I'm like, 'are you coming back?' There was a doorway back there; the audience couldn't see the guys, but I could. He went back to the dressing room with his head in his hands. I went back there finally, and that was the end of the show." According to Vaughan: "it wasn't the whole crowd [that booed]. It was just a few people sitting right up front. The room there was built for acoustic jazz. When five or six people boo, wow, it sounds like the whole world hates you. They thought we were too loud, but shoot, I had four army blankets folded over my amp, and the volume level was on 2. I'm used to playin' on 10!" The performance was filmed and later released on DVD in September 2004.
On the following night, Double Trouble was booked in the lounge of the Montreux Casino, with Jackson Browne in attendance. Browne jammed with Double Trouble until the early morning hours and offered them free use of his personal recording studio in downtown Los Angeles. In late November the band accepted his offer and recorded ten songs in two days. While they were in the studio, Vaughan received a telephone call from David Bowie, who met him after the Montreux performance, and he invited him to participate in a recording session for his next studio album, Let's Dance. In January 1983, Vaughan recorded guitar on six of the album's eight songs, including the title track and "China Girl". The album was released on April 14, 1983, and sold over three times as many copies as Bowie's previous album.
National success
In mid-March 1983, Gregg Geller, vice president of A&R at Epic Records, signed Double Trouble to the label at the recommendation of record producer John Hammond. Soon afterward, Epic financed a music video for "Love Struck Baby", which was filmed at the Cherry Tavern in New York City. Vaughan recalled: "we changed the name of the place in the video. Four years ago I got married in a club where we used to play all the time called the Rome Inn. When they closed it down, the owner gave me the sign, so in the video we put that up behind me on the stage."
With the success of Let's Dance, Bowie requested Vaughan as the featured instrumentalist for the upcoming Serious Moonlight Tour, realizing that he was an essential aspect of the album's groundbreaking success. In late April, Vaughan began rehearsals for the tour in Las Colinas, Texas. When contract renegotiations for his performance fee failed, Vaughan abandoned the tour days before its opening date, and he was replaced by Earl Slick. Vaughan commented: "I couldn't gear everything on something I didn't really care a whole lot about. It was kind of risky, but I really didn't need all the headaches." Although contributing factors were widely disputed, Vaughan soon gained major publicity for quitting the tour.
On May 9, the band performed at The Bottom Line in New York City, where they opened for Bryan Adams, with Hammond, Mick Jagger, John McEnroe, Rick Nielsen, Billy Gibbons, and Johnny Winter in attendance. Brandenburg described the performance as "ungodly": "I think Stevie played every lick as loud and as hard and with as much intensity as I've ever heard him." The performance earned Vaughan a positive review published in the New York Post, asserting that Double Trouble outperformed Adams. "Fortunately, Bryan Adams, the Canadian rocker who is opening arena dates for Journey, doesn't headline too often", wrote Martin Porter, who claimed that after the band's performance, the stage had been "rendered to cinders by the most explosively original showmanship to grace the New York stage in some time."
Texas Flood
After acquiring the recordings from Browne's studio, Double Trouble began assembling the material for a full-length LP. The album, Texas Flood, opens with the track "Love Struck Baby", which was written for Lenny on their "love-struck day". He composed "Pride and Joy" and "I'm Cryin'" for one of his former girlfriends, Lindi Bethel. Although both are musically similar, their lyrics are two different perspectives of the relationship. Along with covers of Howlin' Wolf, the Isley Brothers, and Buddy Guy, the album included Vaughan's cover of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", a song which he became strongly associated with. "Lenny" served as a tribute to his wife, which he composed at the end of their bed.
Texas Flood featured cover art by illustrator Brad Holland, who is known for his artwork for Playboy and The New York Times. Originally envisioned with Vaughan sitting on a horse depicting a promotable resemblance, Holland painted an image of him leaning against a wall with a guitar, using a photograph as a reference. Released on June 13, 1983, Texas Flood peaked at number 38 and ultimately sold half a million copies. While Rolling Stone editor Kurt Loder asserted that Vaughan did not possess a distinctive voice, according to AllMusic senior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the release was a "monumental impact". Billboard described it as "a guitar boogie lovers delight". Agent Alex Hodges commented: "No one knew how big that record would be, because guitar players weren't necessarily in vogue, except for some that were so established they were undeniable ... he was one of the few artists that was recouped on every record in a short period of time."
On June 16, Vaughan gave a performance at Tango nightclub in Dallas, which celebrated the album's release. Assorted VIPs attended the performance, including Ted Nugent, Sammy Hagar, and members of The Kinks and Uriah Heep. Jack Chase, vice president of marketing for Epic, recalled: "the coming-out party at Tango was very important; it was absolutely huge. All the radio station personalities, DJs, program directors, all the retail record store owners and the important managers, press, all the executives from New York came down—about seven hundred people. We attacked in Dallas first with Q102-FM and [DJ] Redbeard. We had the Tango party—it was hot. It was the ticket." The Dallas Morning News reviewed the performance, starting with the rhetorical question; "what if Stevie Ray Vaughan had an album release party and everybody came? It happened Thursday night at Tango. ... The adrenalin must have been gushing through the musicians' veins as they performed with rare finesse and skill."
Following a brief tour in Europe, Hodges arranged an engagement for Double Trouble as The Moody Blues' opening act during a two-month tour of North America. Hodges stated that many people disliked the idea of Double Trouble opening for The Moody Blues, but asserted that a common thread which both bands shared was "album-oriented rock". Shannon described the tour as "glorious": "Our record hadn't become that successful yet, but we were playing in front of coliseums full of people. We just went out and played, and it fit like a glove. The sound rang through those big coliseums like a monster. People were going crazy, and they had no idea who we were!" After appearing on the television series Austin City Limits, the band played a sold-out concert at New York City's Beacon Theatre. Variety wrote that their ninety-minute set at the Beacon "left no doubt that this young Texas musician is indeed the 'guitar hero of the present era.'"
Couldn't Stand the Weather
In January 1984, Double Trouble began recording their second studio album, Couldn't Stand the Weather, at the Power Station, with John Hammond as executive producer and engineer Richard Mullen. Layton later recalled working with Hammond: "he was kind of like a nice hand on your shoulder, as opposed to someone that jumped in and said, 'let's redo this, let's do that more.' He didn't get involved in that way at all. He was a feedback person." As the sessions began, Vaughan's cover of Bob Geddins' "Tin Pan Alley" was recorded while audio levels were being checked. Layton remembers the performance: "... we did probably the quietest version we ever did up 'til that point. We ended it and [Hammond] said; 'that's the best that song will ever sound,' and we went; 'we haven't even got sounds, have we?' He goes, 'that doesn't matter. That's the best you'll ever do that song.' We tried it again five, six, seven times- I can't even remember. But it never quite sounded like it did that first time."
During recording sessions, Vaughan began experimenting with other combinations of musicians, including Fran Christina and Stan Harrison, who played drums and saxophone respectively on the jazz instrumental, "Stang's Swang". Jimmie Vaughan played rhythm guitar on his cover of Guitar Slim's "The Things That I Used to Do" and the title track, the latter of which Vaughan carries a worldly message in his lyrics. According to musicologist Andy Aledort, Vaughan's guitar playing throughout the song is marked by steady rhythmic strumming patterns and improvised lead lines, with a distinctive R&B and soul single-note riff, doubled in octaves by guitar and bass.
Couldn't Stand the Weather was released on May 15, 1984, and two weeks later it had rapidly outpaced the sales of Texas Flood. It peaked at number 31 and spent 38 weeks on the charts. The album includes Vaughan's cover of Jimi Hendrix's song, "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", which provoked inevitable comparisons to Hendrix. According to AllMusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Couldn't Stand the Weather "confirmed that the acclaimed debut was no fluke, while matching, if not bettering, the sales of its predecessor, thereby cementing Vaughan's status as a giant of modern blues." According to authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford, the album "was a major turning point in Stevie Ray Vaughan's development" and Vaughan's singing improved.
Carnegie Hall
On October 4, 1984, Vaughan headlined a performance at Carnegie Hall that included many guest musicians. For the second half of the concert, he added Jimmie as rhythm guitarist, drummer George Rains, keyboardist Dr. John, Roomful of Blues horn section, and featured vocalist Angela Strehli. The ensemble rehearsed for less than two weeks before the performance, and despite the solid dynamics of Double Trouble for the first half of the performance, according to Patoski and Crawford, the big band concept never entirely took form. Before arriving at the engagement, the venue sold out, which made Vaughan overexcited and nervous as he did not calm down until halfway through the third song. A benefit for the T.J. Martell Foundation's work in leukemia and cancer research, he was an important draw for the event. As his scheduled time slot drew closer, he indicated that he preferred traveling to the venue by limousine to avoid being swarmed by fans on the street; the band took the stage around 8:00 p.m. The audience of 2,200 people, which included Vaughan's wife, family and friends, transformed the venue into what Stephen Holden of The New York Times described as "a whistling, stomping roadhouse".
Introduced by Hammond as "one of the greatest guitar players of all time", Vaughan opened with "Scuttle Buttin'", wearing a custom-made mariachi suit he described as a "Mexican tuxedo". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of the Isley Brothers' "Testify", The Jimi Hendrix Experience's "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", "Tin Pan Alley", Elmore James' "The Sky Is Crying", and W. C. Clark's "Cold Shot", along with four original compositions including "Love Struck Baby", "Honey Bee", "Couldn't Stand the Weather", and "Rude Mood". During the second half of the performance, Vaughan performed covers by Larry Davis, Buddy Guy, Guitar Slim, Albert King, Jackie Wilson, and Albert Collins. The set ended with Vaughan performing solo renditions of "Lenny" and "Rude Mood".
The Dallas Times-Herald wrote of the performance at Carnegie Hall as; "was full of stomping feet and swaying bodies, kids in blue jeans hanging off the balconies, dancing bodies that clogged the aisles." The New York Times asserted that, despite the venue's "muddy" acoustics, their performance was "filled with verve", and Vaughan's playing was "handsomely displayed". Jimmie Vaughan later commented: "I was worried the crowd might be a little stiff. Turned out they're just like any other beer joint." Vaughan commented: "We won't be limited to just the trio, although that doesn't mean we'll stop doing the trio. I'm planning on doing that too. I ain't gonna stay in one place. If I do, I'm stupid." The performance was recorded and later released as an official live LP. The album was released posthumously on July 29, 1997, by Epic Records; it was ultimately certified gold.
Immediately after the concert, Vaughan attended a private party at a downtown club in New York, which was sponsored by MTV, where he was greeted by an hour's worth of supporters. On the following day, Double Trouble made an appearance at a record store in Greenwich Village, where they signed autographs for fans. In late October 1984, the band toured Australia and New Zealand, which included one of their first appearances on Australian television—on Hey Hey It's Saturday—where they performed "Texas Flood", and an interview on Sounds. On November 5 and 9, they played sold-out concerts at the Sydney Opera House. Upon returning to the U.S., Double Trouble went on a brief tour in California. Soon afterward, Vaughan and Lenny went to the island of Saint Croix, on the U.S. Virgin Islands in the Caribbean Sea, where they had spent some time vacationing in December. The next month, Double Trouble flew to Japan, where they appeared for five performances, including at Kōsei Nenkin Kaikan in Osaka.
Soul to Soul
In March 1985, recording for Double Trouble's third studio album, Soul to Soul, began at the Dallas Sound Lab. As the sessions progressed, Vaughan became increasingly frustrated with his own lack of inspiration. He was also allowed a relaxed pace of recording the album, which contributed to a lack of focus due to excesses in alcohol and other drugs. Roadie Byron Barr later recalled: "the routine was to go to the studio, do dope, and play ping-pong." Vaughan, who found it increasingly difficult to be able to play rhythm guitar parts and sing at the same time, wanted to add another dimension to the band, so he hired keyboardist Reese Wynans to record on the album; he joined the band soon thereafter.
During the album's production, Vaughan appeared at the Houston Astrodome on April 10, 1985, where he performed a slide guitar rendition of the U.S. national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner"; his performance was met with booing. Upon leaving the stage, Vaughan acquired an autograph from former player for the New York Yankees, Mickey Mantle. Astrodome publicist Molly Glentzer wrote in the Houston Press: "as Vaughan shuffled back behind home plate, he was only lucid enough to know that he wanted Mickey Mantle's autograph. Mantle obliged. 'I never signed a guitar before.' Nobody asked Vaughan for his autograph. I was sure he'd be dead before he hit 30." Critics associated his performance with Jimi Hendrix's rendition at Woodstock in 1969, yet Vaughan disliked this comparison: "I heard they even wrote about it in one of the music magazines and they tried to put the two versions side by side. I hate that stuff. His version was great."
Released on September 30, 1985, Soul to Soul peaked at number 34 and remained on the Billboard 200 through mid-1986, eventually certified gold. Critic Jimmy Guterman of Rolling Stone wrote: "there's some life left in their blues rock pastiche; it's also possible that they've run out of gas." According to Patoski and Crawford, sales of the album "did not match Couldn't Stand the Weather, suggesting Stevie Ray and Double Trouble were plateauing". Vaughan commented: "as far as what's on there song-wise, I like the album a lot. It meant a lot to us what we went through to get this record. There were a lot of odds and we still stayed strong. We grew a lot with the people in the band and immediate friends around us; we learned a lot and grew a lot closer. That has a lot to do with why it's called [Soul to Soul]."
Live Alive
After touring for nine and a half months, Epic requested a fourth album from Double Trouble as part of their contractual obligation. In July 1986, Vaughan decided that they would record the LP, Live Alive, during three live appearances in Austin and Dallas. On July 17 and 18, the band performed sold-out concerts at the Austin Opera House, and July 19 at the Dallas Starfest. They used recordings of these concerts to assemble the LP, which was produced by Vaughan. Shannon was backstage before the Austin concert and predicted to new manager Alex Hodges that both Vaughan and himself were "headed for a brick wall". Guitarist Denny Freeman attended the Austin performances; he called the shows a "musical mess, because they would go into these chaotic jams with no control. I didn't know what exactly was going on, but I was concerned." Both Layton and Shannon remarked that their work schedule and drugs were causing the band to lose focus. According to Wynans: "Things were getting illogical and crazy."
The Live Alive album was released on November 17, 1986, and the only official live Double Trouble LP made commercially available during Vaughan's lifetime, though it never appeared on the Billboard 200 chart. Though many critics claimed that most of the album was overdubbed, engineer Gary Olazabal, who mixed the album, asserted that most of the material was recorded poorly. Vaughan later admitted that it was not one of his better efforts; he recalled: "I wasn't in very good shape when we recorded Live Alive. At the time, I didn't realize how bad a shape I was in. There were more fix-it jobs done on the album than I would have liked. Some of the work sounds like [it was] the work of half-dead people. There were some great notes that came out, but I just wasn't in control; nobody was."
Drugs and alcohol
In 1960, when Vaughan was six years old, he began stealing his father's drinks. Drawn in by its effects, he started making his own drinks and this resulted in alcohol dependence. He explained: "that's when I first started stealing daddy's drinks. Or when my parents were gone, I'd find the bottle and make myself one. I thought it was cool ... thought the kids down the street would think it was cool. That's where it began, and I had been depending on it ever since." According to the authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford: "In the ensuing twenty-five years, he had worked his way through the Physicians' Desk Reference before finding his poisons of preference—alcohol and cocaine."
While Vaughan asserted that he first experienced the effects of cocaine when a doctor prescribed him a liquid solution of the stimulant as a nasal spray, according to Patoski and Crawford, the earliest that Vaughan is known to have ingested the drug is in 1975, while performing with the Cobras. Before that, Vaughan had briefly used other drugs such as cannabis, methamphetamine, and Quaaludes, the brand name for methaqualone. After 1975, he regularly drank whiskey and used cocaine, particularly mixing the two substances together. According to Hopkins, by the time of Double Trouble's European tour in September 1986, "his lifestyle of substance abuse had reached a peak, probably better characterized as the bottom of a deep chasm."
At the height of Vaughan's substance abuse, he drank of whiskey and used of cocaine each day. Personal assistant Tim Duckworth explained: "I would make sure he would eat breakfast instead of waking up drinking every morning, which was probably the worst thing he was doing." According to Vaughan: "it got to the point where if I'd try to say "hi" to somebody, I would just fall apart crying. It was like solid doom."
In September 1986, Double Trouble traveled to Denmark for a one-month tour of Europe. During the late night hours of September 28, Vaughan became ill after a performance in Ludwigshafen, Germany, suffering from near-death dehydration, for which he received medical treatment. The incident resulted in his checking into The London Clinic under the care of Dr. Victor Bloom, who warned him that he was a month away from death. After staying in London for more than a week, he returned to the United States and entered Peachford Hospital in Atlanta, where he spent four weeks in rehabilitation, and then checked into rehab in Austin.
Live Alive tour
In November 1986, following his departure from rehab, Vaughan moved back into his mother's Glenfield Avenue house in Dallas, which is where he had spent much of his childhood. During this time, Double Trouble began rehearsals for the Live Alive tour. Although Vaughan was nervous about performing after achieving sobriety, he received positive reassurance. Wynans later recalled: "Stevie was real worried about playing after he'd gotten sober...he didn't know if he had anything left to offer. Once we got back out on the road, he was very inspired and motivated." The tour began on November 23 at Towson State University, which was Vaughan's first performance with Double Trouble after rehab. On December 31, 1986, they played a concert at Atlanta's Fox Theatre, which featured encore performances with Lonnie Mack.
As the tour progressed, Vaughan was longing to work on material for his next LP, but in January 1987, he filed for a divorce from Lenny, which restricted him from any projects until the proceedings were finalized. This prevented him from writing and recording songs for almost two years, but Double Trouble wrote the song "Crossfire" with Bill Carter and Ruth Ellsworth. Layton recalled: "we wrote the music, and they had to write the lyrics. We had just gotten together; Stevie was unable to be there at that time. He was in Dallas doing some things, and we just got together and started writing some songs. That was the first one we wrote." On August 6, 1987, Double Trouble appeared at the Austin Aqua Festival, where they played to one of the largest audiences of their career. According to biographer Craig Hopkins, as many as 20,000 people attended the concert. Following a month-long tour as the opening act for Robert Plant in May 1988, which included a concert at Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens, the band was booked for a European leg, which included 22 performances, and ended in Oulu, Finland on July 17. This would be Vaughan's last concert appearance in Europe.
In Step
After Vaughan's divorce from Lenora "Lenny" Darlene Bailey became final, recording for Double Trouble's fourth and final studio album, In Step, began at Kiva Studios in Memphis, Tennessee, working with producer Jim Gaines and co-songwriter Doyle Bramhall. Initially, he had doubts about his musical and creative abilities after achieving sobriety, but he gained confidence as the sessions progressed. Shannon later recalled: "In Step was, for him, a big growing experience. In my opinion, it's our best studio album, and I think he felt that way, too." Bramhall, who had also entered rehab, wrote songs with Vaughan about addiction and redemption. According to Vaughan, the album was titled In Step because "I'm finally in step with life, in step with myself, in step with my music." The album's liner notes include the quote; "'thank God the elevator's broken," a reference to the twelve-step program proposed by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA).
After the In Step recording sessions moved to Los Angeles, Vaughan added horn players Joe Sublett and Darrell Leonard, who played saxophone and trumpet respectively on both "Crossfire" and "Love Me Darlin". Shortly before the album's production was complete, Vaughan and Double Trouble appeared at a presidential inaugural party in Washington, D.C. for George H. W. Bush. In Step was released on June 13, 1989, and eight months later, it was certified gold. The album was Vaughan's most commercially successful release and his first one to win a Grammy Award. It peaked at number 33 on the Billboard 200, spending 47 weeks on the chart. In Step included the song, "Crossfire", which was written by Double Trouble, Bill Carter, and Ruth Ellsworth; it became his only number one hit. The album also included one of his first recordings to feature the use of a Fuzz Face on Vaughan's cover of the Howlin' Wolf song, "Love Me Darlin.
In July 1989, Neil Perry, a writer for Sounds magazine, wrote: "the album closes with the brow-soothing swoon of 'Riviera Paradise,' a slow, lengthy guitar and piano workout that proves just why Vaughan is to the guitar what Nureyev is to ballet." According to music journalist Robert Christgau, Vaughan was "writing blues for AA...he escapes the blues undamaged for the first time in his career." In October 1989, the Boca Raton News described Vaughan's guitar solos as "determined, clear-headed and downright stinging" and his lyrics as "tension-filled allegories".
Death
On Monday, August 27, 1990, at 12:50 a.m. (CDT), Vaughan and members of Eric Clapton's touring entourage played an all-star encore jam session at Alpine Valley Music Theatre in Alpine Valley Resort in East Troy, Wisconsin. They then left for Midway International Airport in Chicago in a Bell 206B helicopter, the most common way for acts to enter and exit the venue, as there is only one road in and out, heavily used by fans. The helicopter crashed into a nearby ski hill shortly after takeoff. Vaughan and the four others on board—pilot Jeff Brown, agent Bobby Brooks, bodyguard Nigel Browne, and tour manager Colin Smythe—died. The helicopter was identified as being owned by Chicago-based company Omniflight Helicopters. Initial reports of the crash erroneously claimed that Clapton had also been killed. According to findings from an inquest conducted by the coroner's office in Elkhorn, all five victims were killed instantly.
The investigation determined the aircraft departed in foggy conditions with visibility reportedly under two miles, according to a local forecast. The National Transportation Safety Board report stated: "As the third helicopter was departing, it remained at a lower altitude than the others, and the pilot turned southeasterly toward rising terrain. Subsequently, the helicopter crashed on hilly terrain about three fifths of a mile from the takeoff point." Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) records showed that Brown was qualified to fly by instruments in a fixed-wing aircraft, but not in a helicopter. Toxicology tests performed on the victims revealed no traces of drugs or alcohol in their systems. Vaughan's funeral service was held on August 31, 1990, at Laurel Land Cemetery in Dallas, Texas. His wooden casket quickly became adorned with bouquets of flowers. An estimated 3,000 mourners joined a procession led by a white hearse. Among those at the public ceremony were Jeff Healey, Charlie Sexton, ZZ Top, Colin James, Stevie Wonder, Bonnie Raitt and Buddy Guy. Vaughan's grave marker reads: "Thank you ... for all the love you passed our way."
Musical style
Vaughan's music was rooted in blues, rock, and jazz. He was influenced by Jimi Hendrix, Albert King, Lonnie Mack, B.B. King, Freddie King, Albert Collins, Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Otis Rush, Guitar Slim, Chuck Berry, and Muddy Waters. According to nightclub owner Clifford Antone, who opened Antone's in 1975, Vaughan jammed with Albert King at Antone's in July 1977 and it almost "scared him to death", saying that "it was the best I've ever saw Albert or the best I ever saw Stevie". While Albert King had a substantial influence on Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix was Vaughan's greatest inspiration. Vaughan declared: "I love Hendrix for so many reasons. He was so much more than just a blues guitarist—he played damn well any kind of guitar he wanted. In fact I'm not sure if he even played the guitar—he played music." He was also influenced by such jazz guitarists as Django Reinhardt, Wes Montgomery, Kenny Burrell, and George Benson.
In 1987, Vaughan listed Lonnie Mack first among the guitarists he had listened to, both as a youngster and as an adult. Vaughan observed that Mack was "ahead of his time" and said, "I got a lot of my fast stuff from Lonnie". On another occasion, Vaughan said that he had learned tremolo picking and vibrato from Mack and that Mack had taught him to "play guitar from the heart." Mack recalled his first meeting with Vaughan in 1978:
Vaughan's relationship with another Texas blues legend, Johnny Winter, was a little more complex. Although they met several times, and often played sessions with the same musicians or even performed the same material, as in the case of Boot Hill, Vaughan always refrained from acknowledging Winter in any form. In his biography, "Raisin' Cain", Winter says that he was unnerved after reading Vaughan stating in an interview that he never met or knew Johnny Winter. "We even played together over at Tommy Shannon's house one time." Vaughan settled the issue in 1988 on the occasion of a blues festival in Europe where both he and Winter were on the bill, explaining that he has been misquoted and that "Every musician in Texas knows Johnny and has learned something from him". Asked to compare their playing styles in an interview in 2010, Winter admitted that "mine's a little bit rawer, I think."
Equipment
Guitars
Vaughan owned and used a variety of guitars during his career. His guitar of choice, and the instrument that he became most associated with, was the Fender Stratocaster, his favorite being a 1963 body with a 1962 neck and pickups dated from 1959. This is why Vaughan usually referred to his Stratocaster as a "1959 Strat". He explained why he favored this guitar in a 1983 interview: "I like the strength of its sound. Any guitar I play has got to be pretty versatile. It's got a big, strong tone and it'll take anything I do to it." Vaughan also referred to this instrument as his "first wife", or "Number One". Another favourite guitar was a slightly later Strat he named 'Lenny' after his wife, Lenora. While at a local pawn shop in 1980, Vaughan had noticed this particular guitar, a 1965 Stratocaster that had been refinished in red, with the original sunburst finish peeking through. It also had a 1910 Mandolin inlay just below the bridge. The pawn shop was asking $300 for it, which was way more than Vaughan had at the time. Lenny saw how badly he wanted this guitar, so she got six of their friends to chip in $50 each, and bought it for him. The guitar was presented to him on his birthday in 1980, and that night, after bringing "Lenny" (the guitar, and wife) home with him, he wrote the song, "Lenny". He started using a borrowed Stratocaster during high school and used Stratocasters predominantly in his live performances and recordings, although he did play other guitars, including custom guitars.
One of the custom guitars—nicknamed "Main"—was built by James Hamilton of Hamiltone Guitars in Buffalo, New York. It was a gift from Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top. Gibbons had commissioned Hamilton to build the guitar in 1979. There were some delays, including having to re-do the mother of pearl inlay of Vaughan's name on the fretboard when he changed his stage name from Stevie Vaughan to Stevie Ray Vaughan. The guitar was presented to him by Jim Hamilton on April 29, 1984. Hamilton recalls that Stevie Ray Vaughan was so happy with the guitar that he played it that night at Springfest on the University of Buffalo campus. It remained one of the main guitars he used on stage and in studio. Vaughan made some alterations to the guitar, including replacing the bronze color Gibson knobs with white Fender knobs, as he preferred the ribbing on the Fender knobs. The pickups had to be changed after the guitar was used in the "Couldn't Stand the Weather" video, in which Stevie and "Main" were drenched with water, and the pickups were ruined. Vaughan preferred guitar has been summarized as his,
Number One Strat, which Stevie claimed to be a ’59, since that was the date stamped on the back of the pickups… this was incorrect, however, as guitar tech Rene Martinez (who oversaw SRV’s guitars since 1980) found the stamp of 1963 on the body and 1962 on the original neck (the neck was replaced in 1989 after it could no longer be refretted properly; Rene used the neck from another SRV favorite, “Red”, as it was also a 1962 model). The pickups are also relatively low output, not the hot overwound myth that gained legs during the 80s… all 3 pickups are rumored to be under 6k ohms output impedance, which would be typical of a 1959 set (the neck pickups tended to be hottest, but not by much). Although the Fender SRV signature model uses Texas Special pickups, which Stevie was heavily involved in the making of, they do not accurately represent the sound of his original Number One.
Vaughan bought many Stratocasters and gave some away as gifts. A sunburst Diplomat Strat-style guitar was purchased by Vaughan and given to his girlfriend Janna Lapidus to learn to play on. Vaughan used a custom set of uncommonly heavy strings, gauges .013, .015, .019, .028, .038, .058, and tuned a half-step below standard tuning. He played with so much tension that it was not uncommon for him to separate his fingernail from the quick movement along the strings. The owner of an Austin club recalled Vaughan coming into the office between sets to borrow super glue, which he used to keep fingernail split from widening while he continued to play. The super glue was suggested by Rene Martinez, who was Stevie's guitar technician. Martinez eventually convinced Stevie to change to slightly lighter strings. He preferred a guitar neck with an asymmetrical profile (thicker at the top) which was more comfortable for his thumb-over style of playing. Heavy use of the vibrato bar necessitated frequent replacements; Vaughan often had his roadie, Byron Barr, obtain custom stainless steel bars made by Barr's father.
Vaughan was also photographed playing a Rickenbacker Capri, a National Duolian, Epiphone Riviera, Gibson Flying V, as well as several other models. Vaughan used a Gibson Johnny Smith to record "Stang's Swang", and a Guild 12-string acoustic for his performance on MTV Unplugged in January 1990. On June 24, 2004, one of Vaughan's Stratocasters, the aforementioned "Lenny" strat, was sold at an auction to benefit Eric Clapton's Crossroads Centre in Antigua; the instrument was bought by Guitar Center for $623,500.
Amplifiers and effects
Vaughan was a catalyst in the revival of vintage amplifiers and effects during the 1980s. His loud volume and use of heavy strings required powerful and robust amplifiers. Vaughan used two black-face Fender Super Reverbs, which were crucial in shaping his clear overdriven sound. He would often blend other amps with the Super Reverbs, including black-face Fender Vibroverbs, and brands such as Dumble, and Marshall, which he used for his clean sound.
While his mainstay effects were the Ibanez Tube Screamer and a Vox wah-wah pedal, Vaughan experimented with a range of effects. He used a Fender Vibratone, designed as a Leslie speaker for electric guitars, and provided a warbling chorus effect, which can be heard on the track "Cold Shot". He used a vintage Dallas Arbiter Fuzz Face that can be heard on In Step, as well as an Octavia. The Guitar Geek website provides a detailed illustration of Vaughan's 1985 equipment set up based on interviews with his guitar tech and effects builder, Cesar Diaz.
Legacy
Vaughan throughout his career revived blues rock and paved the way for many other artists. Vaughan's work continues to influence numerous blues, rock and alternative artists, including John Mayer, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Mike McCready, Albert Cummings, Los Lonely Boys and Chris Duarte, among others. AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine described Vaughan as "the leading light in American blues" and developed "a uniquely eclectic and fiery style that sounded like no other guitarist, regardless of genre". In 1983, Variety magazine called Vaughan the "guitar hero of the present era".
In the months that followed his death, Vaughan sold over 5.5 million albums in the United States. On September 25, 1990, Epic released Family Style, an LP the Vaughan brothers cut at Ardent Studios in Memphis, Tennessee. The label released several promotional singles and videos for the collaborative effort. In November 1990, CMV Enterprises released Pride and Joy, a collection of eight Double Trouble music videos. Sony signed a deal with the Vaughan estate to obtain control of his back catalog, as well as permission to release albums with previously unreleased material and new collections of released work. On October 29, 1991, The Sky Is Crying was released as Vaughan's first posthumous album with Double Trouble, and featured studio recordings from 1984 to 1985. Other compilations, live albums, and films have also been released since his death.
On October 3, 1991, Texas governor Ann Richards proclaimed "Stevie Ray Vaughan Commemoration Day", during which a memorial concert was held at the Texas Theatre. In 1993, a memorial statue of Vaughan was unveiled on Auditorium Shores and is the first public monument of a musician in Austin. In September 1994, a Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Run for Recovery was held in Dallas; the event was a benefit for the Ethel Daniels Foundation, established to help those in recovery from alcoholism and drug addiction who cannot afford treatment. In 1999, the Musicians' Assistance Program (later renamed MusiCares MAP Fund) created the "Stevie Ray Vaughan Award" to honor the memory of Vaughan and to recognize musicians for their devotion to helping other addicts struggling with the recovery process. The recipients include Eric Clapton, David Crosby, Steven Tyler, Alice Cooper, Ozzy Osbourne, Pete Townshend, Chris Cornell, Jerry Cantrell, Mike McCready, among others. In 1993, Martha Vaughan established the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Scholarship Fund, awarded to students at W.E. Greiner Middle School in Oakcliff who intend to attend college and pursue the arts as a profession.
Awards and honors
Vaughan won five W. C. Handy Awards and was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2000. In 1985, he was named an honorary admiral in the Texas Navy. Vaughan had a single number-one hit on the Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart for the song "Crossfire". His album sales in the U.S. stand at over 15 million units. Family Style, released shortly after his death, won the 1991 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album and became his best-selling, non-Double Trouble studio album with over a million shipments in the U.S. In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked him seventh among the "100 Greatest Guitar Players of All Time". He also became eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008, but did not appear on a nominations roster until 2014. He was inducted in the RRHOF alongside Double Trouble in 2015. Guitar World magazine ranked him as Number One in its list of the greatest blues guitarists.
In 1994 the city of Austin, Texas, erected the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial on the hiking trail beside Lady Bird Lake.
Discography
Texas Flood (1983)
Couldn't Stand the Weather (1984)
Soul to Soul (1985)
In Step (1989)
Family Style (1990)
The Sky is Crying (1991)
See also
1980s in music
List of blues rock musicians
List of electric blues musicians
List of guitarists
List of Texas blues musicians
Music of Austin, Texas
Music of Texas
Notes
Footnotes
Citations
Sources
Further reading
External links
The Stevie Ray Vaughan Archive
1954 births
1990 deaths
Accidental deaths in Wisconsin
American blues guitarists
American male guitarists
American blues singers
American blues singer-songwriters
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
Blues rock musicians
Double Trouble (band) members
Electric blues musicians
Epic Records artists
Sony Music artists
Grammy Award winners
Lead guitarists
Musicians from Dallas
Texas blues musicians
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1990
Victims of helicopter accidents or incidents in the United States
20th-century American singers
Slide guitarists
Resonator guitarists
Guitarists from Texas
20th-century American guitarists
People from Oak Cliff, Texas
20th-century American male singers
Musicians killed in aviation accidents or incidents
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Pipe smokers | true | [
"The Stevie Ray Vaughan Stratocaster is the signature model electric guitar of American guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan, based on his favorite guitar, Number One. The guitar debuted at the NAMM Show in January 1992 and began selling at various music stores.\n\nNumber One, also called First Wife, was the nickname given by Stevie Ray Vaughan to his favorite Fender Stratocaster, built ca. 1963. In 1974, he acquired the guitar as a trade at a music store in Austin, Texas. In 1990, it was retired due to many replacements of frets, though he continued to play it occasionally. In 1992, the Stevie Ray Vaughan Stratocaster was released, based on the specifications of Number One. Vaughan used Number One on almost every recording with Double Trouble.\n\nBackground\nIn the late 1980s, Fender had informally planned to release a standard Stevie Ray Vaughan Stratocaster, with 500 limited edition tribute guitars being produced by the Fender Custom Shop. The project was delayed until 1990, when Fender presented Vaughan with three prototypes of his signature guitar on June 7, 1990, backstage at the taping of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. With the notable \"SRV\" stickers on the pickguard being completely worn off, Vaughan requested for replacement stickers to the staff of The Tonight Show, giving him Letraset script-style lettering. Vaughan liked the lettering so much that he proposed that the lettering be engraved into the pickguard, as it appears today.\n\nThe signature model didn't go into production until 1991 at the direction of Vaughan's brother Jimmie. The Stevie Ray Vaughan Stratocaster made its debut at the NAMM Show in January 1992, with Double Trouble drummer Chris Layton, Jimmie, Buddy Guy, Albert Collins, and Eric Gales attending the event.\n\nFeatures\nThe final product is essentially what Number One would be if brand new, featuring an alder body with a three-color sunburst and a polyurethane varnish; a thick, oval-shaped maple neck finished in a polyurethane gloss with 21 Dunlop 6105 narrow jumbo frets, 12\" radius, and pau ferro fingerboard. Earlier models featured a Brazilian rosewood fingerboard. Three Texas Special single coil pickups were wired into the guitar, similar to the original 1959 pickups in Vaughan's \"Number One\" guitar. Other unique features include gold plated hardware, left-handed vintage synchronized tremolo, and the \"SRV\" script-style initials engraved into the pickguard.\n\nLimited Edition \"Number One\" Tribute Guitar\n\nA team from Fender visited Jimmie Vaughan in Austin to examine the original Number One. They recorded every aspect, recording the output of each pickup, weighing the wood and hardware, measuring the shape of the neck, and using calipers to reproduce every scratch, dent, or wear on the guitar.\n\nIn November 2003, the Fender Custom Shop announced a limited run of 100 Number One tribute Stratocasters. They debuted at the NAMM Show on January 15, 2004. The original Number One was thoroughly examined and measured for the reproduction. The Number One tribute Strats were constructed by master builder John Cruz, who made all of the 100 replicas. Each guitar was priced at $10,000.\n\nReferences\n\nFender Stratocasters\nStevie Ray Vaughan",
"In Session is a blues album by Albert King with Stevie Ray Vaughan recorded live for television on December 6, 1983, at CHCH-TV studios in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, when Vaughan was 29 and King was 60. It was released as an album on August 17, 1999 and re-released with a supplemental video recording on DVD on September 28, 2010. It has also been released on CD and SACD.\n\nIt was the first of two collaborations captured for television, the second being as invited guests on a show led by B.B. King in 1987. It was recorded for one of a series of live television sessions recording the performances of various artists. The show was called In Session. The album includes a few short segments of the banter by King and Vaughan between songs.\n\nInitially, King was not going to do the show as he did not know who Vaughan was. He did not realize that Vaughan was actually 'little Stevie', the 'skinny kid' that he let sit in when King played in Texas. King talks about this on one of the conversation tracks. When he realized who Vaughan was, he agreed to play.\n\nThe album's material is mostly King's concert line up, with one Vaughan cut, \"Pride and Joy\" on the audio CD (the DVD also features Vaughan's \"Texas Flood\"). King is 'driving' the session, but he features Vaughan's guitar extensively on most of the songs. According to the introductory credits on the DVD, a number of the tunes are included there for the first time, having been omitted from the original TV broadcast for reasons of time.\n\nTrack listing\nAudio CD:\n\"Call It Stormy Monday\" (Aaron \"T-Bone\" Walker) - 8:59\n\"Old Times\" [talk] - 1:15\n\"Pride and Joy\" (Stevie Ray Vaughan) - 5:57\n\"Ask Me No Questions\" (B.B. King) - 5:02\n\"Pep Talk\" [talk] - 0:51\n\"Blues at Sunrise\" (Albert King) - 15:08\n\"Turn It Over\" [talk] - 0:51\n\"Overall Junction\" (Albert King) - 8:19\n\"Match Box Blues\" (Blind Lemon Jefferson) - 7:38\n\"Who Is Stevie?\" [talk] - 0:43\n\"Don't Lie to Me\" (Hudson Whittaker) - 8:56\n\nDVD:\n[Introduction]\n\"Born Under a Bad Sign\" *\n\"Texas Flood\" (featuring Stevie Ray Vaughan on vocals) *\n\"Call It Stormy Monday\"\n\"Old Times\" [talk]\n\"Match Box Blues\"\n\"Pep Talk\" [talk]\n\"Don't Lie To Me\"\n\"Who Is Stevie?\" [talk]\n\"Pride and Joy\" (featuring Stevie Ray Vaughan on vocals)\n\"I'm Gonna Move to the Outskirts of Town\" *\n[Outtro]\n\n(* = not previously released/not on audio CD)\n\nBased on the conversations, key changes and tempo count-offs, the tracks for the full performance were in the following order:\n[Introduction]\n\"Born Under a Bad Sign\"\n\"Texas Flood\"\n\"Call It Stormy Monday\"\n\"Old Times\" [talk] [version from CD]\n\"Pride and Joy\"\n\"Ask Me No Questions\"\n\"Pep Talk\" [talk]\n\"Blues at Sunrise\"\n\"Turn It Over\" [talk]\n\"Overall Junction\"\n\"Match Box Blues\"\n\"Who Is Stevie?\" [talk]\n\"Don't Lie to Me\"\n\"I'm Gonna Move to the Outskirts of Town\"\n[Outtro]\n\nPersonnel\n Albert King - electric guitar, vocals\n Stevie Ray Vaughan - electric guitar, vocals on \"Pride and Joy\"\n Tony Llorens - piano, organ\n Gus Thornton - bass\n Michael Llorens - drums\n\nProduction\nIan Anderson - original recordings\nDoug McClement - engineer\nBill Belmont - producer\nStephen Hart - remixing\nChris Clough - reissue A&R\nBill Belmont - reissue A&R\nGeorge Horn - remastering\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n STLBlues.net – Interview of Gus Thornton includes information on the session\n\nAlbert King live albums\nStevie Ray Vaughan live albums\n1999 live albums\nStax Records live albums\nLive blues albums"
] |
[
"Stevie Ray Vaughan",
"First recordings",
"In what year did Stevie Ray Vaughan start recording?",
"In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands,"
] | C_156015fd0dc74c469a47cbc6a542733a_0 | What songs were on his first album? | 2 | What songs were on Stevie Ray Vaughan's first album? | Stevie Ray Vaughan | In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Country Club, a venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined a rock band named Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months. In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were disastrous. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed. In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras that included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King. Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde Pharaoh. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band. CANNOTANSWER | They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", | Stephen Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954August 27, 1990) was an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer, best known as the guitarist and frontman of the blues rock trio Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble. Although his mainstream career only spanned seven years, he is considered an icon and one of the most influential musicians in the history of blues music, and one of the greatest guitarists of all time.
Born and raised in Dallas, Texas, Vaughan began playing guitar at age seven, initially inspired by his elder brother, Jimmie Vaughan. In 1972, he dropped out of high school and moved to Austin, where he began to gain a following after playing gigs on the local club circuit. Vaughan joined forces with Tommy Shannon on bass and Chris Layton on drums as Double Trouble in 1978 and established it as part of the Austin music scene; it soon became one of the most popular acts in Texas. He performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1982, where David Bowie saw him play and contacted him for a studio gig, resulting in Stevie playing his blues guitar on the album Let's Dance (1983), before being discovered by John Hammond, who interested major label Epic Records in signing Vaughan and his band to a record deal. Within months, they achieved mainstream success for the critically acclaimed debut album Texas Flood. With a series of successful network television appearances and extensive concert tours, Vaughan became the leading figure in the blues revival of the 1980s.
Playing his guitar behind his back or plucking the strings with his teeth as Jimi Hendrix did, he earned unprecedented stardom in Europe, which later resulted in breakthroughs for guitar players like Robert Cray, Jeff Healey, Robben Ford and Walter Trout, amongst others.
During the majority of his life, Vaughan struggled with drug and alcohol addiction. He also struggled with the personal and professional pressures of fame and his marriage to Lenora "Lenny" Bailey. He successfully completed rehabilitation and began touring again with Double Trouble in November 1986. His fourth and final studio album In Step reached number 33 in the United States in 1989; it was one of Vaughan's most critically and commercially successful releases and included his only number-one hit, "Crossfire". He became one of the world's most highly demanded blues performers, and he headlined Madison Square Garden in 1989 and the Beale Street Music Festival in 1990.
On August 27, 1990, Vaughan and four others were killed in a helicopter crash in East Troy, Wisconsin, after performing with Double Trouble at Alpine Valley Music Theatre. An investigation concluded that the cause was pilot error and Vaughan's family later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Omniflight Helicopters that was settled out of court. Vaughan's music continued to achieve commercial success with several posthumous releases and has sold over 15 million albums in the United States alone. In 2003, David Fricke of Rolling Stone ranked him the seventh greatest guitarist of all time. Vaughan was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015, along with Double Trouble bandmates Chris Layton, Tommy Shannon, and Reese Wynans.
Family and early life
Stevie's grandfather, Thomas Lee Vaughan, married Laura Belle LaRue and moved to Rockwall County, Texas, where they lived by sharecropping.
Stevie's father, Jimmie Lee Vaughan, was born on September 6, 1921. Jimmie, also known as Jim and Big Jim, dropped out of school at age sixteen and enlisted in the U.S. Navy during World War II. After his discharge, he married Martha Jean (née Cook; 1928–2009) on January 13, 1950. They had a son, Jimmie, in 1951. Stephen was born at Methodist Hospital on October 3, 1954, in Dallas, Texas. Big Jim secured a job as an asbestos worker. The family moved frequently, living in other states such as Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Oklahoma before ultimately moving to the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. A shy and insecure boy, Vaughan was deeply affected by his childhood experiences. His father struggled with alcohol abuse and often terrorized his family and friends with his bad temper. In later years, Vaughan recalled that he had been a victim of his father's violence. His father died on August 27, 1986, exactly four years before Vaughan himself.
First instruments
In the early 1960s, Vaughan's admiration for his brother Jimmie resulted in his trying different instruments such as the drums and saxophone. In 1961, for his seventh birthday, Vaughan received his first guitar, a toy from Sears with Western motif. Learning by ear, he diligently committed himself, following along to songs by the Nightcaps, particularly "Wine, Wine, Wine" and "Thunderbird". He listened to blues artists such as Albert King, Otis Rush, and Muddy Waters, and rock guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix and Lonnie Mack, as well as jazz guitarists including Kenny Burrell. In 1963, he acquired his first electric guitar, a Gibson ES-125T, as a hand-me-down from Jimmie.
Soon after he acquired the electric guitar, Vaughan joined his first band, the Chantones, in 1965. Their first show was at a talent contest held in Dallas' Hill Theatre, but after realizing that they could not perform a Jimmy Reed song in its entirety, Vaughan left the band and joined the Brooklyn Underground, playing professionally at local bars and clubs. He received Jimmie's Fender Broadcaster, which he later traded for an Epiphone Riviera. When Jimmie left home at age sixteen, Vaughan's apparent obsession with the instrument caused a lack of support from his parents. Miserable at home, he took a job at a local hamburger stand, where he washed dishes and dumped trash for seventy cents an hour. After falling into a barrel of grease, he grew tired of the job and quit to devote his life to a music career.
Music career
Early years
In May 1969, after leaving the Brooklyn Underground, Vaughan joined a band called the Southern Distributor. He had learned the Yardbirds' "Jeff's Boogie" and played the song at the audition. Mike Steinbach, the group's drummer, commented: "The kid was fourteen. We auditioned him on 'Jeff's Boogie,' really fast instrumental guitar, and he played it note for note." Although they played pop rock covers, Vaughan conveyed his interest in the addition of blues songs to the group's repertoire; he was told that he wouldn't earn a living playing blues music and he and the band parted ways. Later that year, bassist Tommy Shannon walked into a Dallas club and heard Vaughan playing guitar. Fascinated by the skillful playing, which he described as "incredible even then", Shannon borrowed a bass guitar and the two jammed. Within a few years, they began performing together in a band called Krackerjack.
In February 1970, Vaughan joined a band called Liberation, which was a nine-piece group with a horn section. Having spent the past month briefly playing bass with Jimmie in Texas Storm, he had originally auditioned as bassist. Impressed by Vaughan's guitar playing, Scott Phares, the group's original guitarist, modestly became the bassist. In mid-1970, they performed at the Adolphus Hotel in downtown Dallas, where ZZ Top asked them to perform. During Liberation's break, Vaughan jammed with ZZ Top on the Nightcaps song "Thunderbird". Phares later described the performance: "they tore the house down. It was awesome. It was one of those magical evenings. Stevie fit in like a glove on a hand."
Attending Justin F. Kimball High School during the early 1970s, Vaughan's late-night shows contributed to his neglect in his studies, including music theory; he would often sleep during class. His pursuit of a musical career was disapproved of by many of the school's administrators but he was also encouraged by many people, including his art teacher, to strive for a career in art. In his sophomore year, he attended an evening class for experimental art at Southern Methodist University, but left when it conflicted with rehearsal. Vaughan later spoke of his dislike of the school and recalled having received daily notes from the principal about his grooming.
First recordings
In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Club, a local blues venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months.
In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were unsuccessful. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed.
In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras which included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King.
Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde "Pharaoh" Walden. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band.
Double Trouble
In mid-May 1978, Clark left to form his own group and Vaughan renamed the band Double Trouble, taken from the title of an Otis Rush song. Following the recruitment of bassist Jackie Newhouse, Walden quit in July, and was briefly replaced by Jack Moore, who had moved to Texas from Boston; he performed with the band for about two months. Vaughan then began looking for a drummer and soon after, he met Chris Layton through Sublett, who was his roommate. Layton, who had recently parted ways with Greezy Wheels, was taught by Vaughan to play a shuffle rhythm. When Vaughan offered Layton the position, he agreed. In early July, Vaughan befriended Lenora Bailey, known as "Lenny", who became his girlfriend, and ultimately his wife. The marriage was to last for six and a half years.
In early October 1978, Vaughan and Double Trouble earned a frequent residency performing at one of Austin's most popular nightspots, the Rome Inn. During a performance, Edi Johnson, an accountant at Manor Downs, noticed Vaughan. She remembered: "I'm not an authority on music—it's whatever turned me on—but this did." She recommended him to Manor Downs owner Frances Carr and general manager Chesley Millikin, who was interested in managing artists and saw Vaughan's musical potential. After Barton quit Double Trouble in mid-November 1979, Millikin signed Vaughan to a management contract. Vaughan also hired Robert "Cutter" Brandenburg as road manager, whom he had met in 1969. Addressing him as "Stevie Ray", Brandenburg convinced Vaughan to use his middle name on stage.
In October 1980, bassist Tommy Shannon attended a Double Trouble performance at Rockefeller's in Houston. Shannon, who was playing with Alan Haynes at the time, participated in a jam session with Vaughan and Layton halfway through their set. Shannon later commented: "I went down there that night, and I'll never forget this: it was like, when I walked in the door and I heard them playing, it was like a revelation. 'That's where I want to be; that's where I belong, right there.' During the break, I went up to Stevie and told him that. I didn't try to sneak around and hide it from the bass player [Jackie Newhouse]—I didn't know if he was listening or not. I just really wanted to be in that band. I sat in that night and it sounded great." Almost three months later, when Vaughan offered Shannon the position, he readily accepted.
Drug charge and trial
On December 5, 1979, while Vaughan was in a dressing room before a performance in Houston, an off-duty police officer arrested him after witnessing his usage of cocaine near an open window. He was formally charged with cocaine possession and subsequently released on $1,000 bail. Double Trouble was the opening act for Muddy Waters, who said about Vaughan's substance abuse: "Stevie could perhaps be the greatest guitar player that ever lived, but he won't live to get 40 years old if he doesn't leave that white powder alone." The following year, he was required to return on January 16 and February 29 for court appearances.
During the final court date, on April 17, 1980, Vaughan was sentenced with two years' probation and was prohibited from leaving Texas. Along with a stipulation of entering treatment for drug abuse, he was required to "avoid persons or places of known disreputable or harmful character"; he refused to comply with both of these orders. After a lawyer was hired, his probation officer had the sentence revised to allow him to work outside of the state. The incident later caused him to refuse maid service while staying in hotels during concert tours.
Montreux Jazz Festival
Although popular in Texas at the time, Double Trouble failed to gain national attention. The group's visibility improved when record producer Jerry Wexler recommended them to Claude Nobs, organizer of the Montreux Jazz Festival. He insisted the festival's blues night would be great with Vaughan, whom he called "a jewel, one of those rarities who comes along once in a lifetime", and Nobs agreed to book Double Trouble on July 17.
Vaughan opened with a medley arrangement of Freddie King's song "Hide Away" and his own fast instrumental composition, "Rude Mood". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", Hound Dog Taylor's "Give Me Back My Wig", and Albert Collins' "Collins Shuffle", as well as three original compositions: "Pride and Joy", "Love Struck Baby", and "Dirty Pool". The set ended with boos from the audience. People's James McBride wrote:
According to road manager Don Opperman: "the way I remember it, the 'ooos' and the 'boos' were mixed together, but Stevie was pretty disappointed. Stevie [had] just handed me his guitar and walked off stage, and I'm like, 'are you coming back?' There was a doorway back there; the audience couldn't see the guys, but I could. He went back to the dressing room with his head in his hands. I went back there finally, and that was the end of the show." According to Vaughan: "it wasn't the whole crowd [that booed]. It was just a few people sitting right up front. The room there was built for acoustic jazz. When five or six people boo, wow, it sounds like the whole world hates you. They thought we were too loud, but shoot, I had four army blankets folded over my amp, and the volume level was on 2. I'm used to playin' on 10!" The performance was filmed and later released on DVD in September 2004.
On the following night, Double Trouble was booked in the lounge of the Montreux Casino, with Jackson Browne in attendance. Browne jammed with Double Trouble until the early morning hours and offered them free use of his personal recording studio in downtown Los Angeles. In late November the band accepted his offer and recorded ten songs in two days. While they were in the studio, Vaughan received a telephone call from David Bowie, who met him after the Montreux performance, and he invited him to participate in a recording session for his next studio album, Let's Dance. In January 1983, Vaughan recorded guitar on six of the album's eight songs, including the title track and "China Girl". The album was released on April 14, 1983, and sold over three times as many copies as Bowie's previous album.
National success
In mid-March 1983, Gregg Geller, vice president of A&R at Epic Records, signed Double Trouble to the label at the recommendation of record producer John Hammond. Soon afterward, Epic financed a music video for "Love Struck Baby", which was filmed at the Cherry Tavern in New York City. Vaughan recalled: "we changed the name of the place in the video. Four years ago I got married in a club where we used to play all the time called the Rome Inn. When they closed it down, the owner gave me the sign, so in the video we put that up behind me on the stage."
With the success of Let's Dance, Bowie requested Vaughan as the featured instrumentalist for the upcoming Serious Moonlight Tour, realizing that he was an essential aspect of the album's groundbreaking success. In late April, Vaughan began rehearsals for the tour in Las Colinas, Texas. When contract renegotiations for his performance fee failed, Vaughan abandoned the tour days before its opening date, and he was replaced by Earl Slick. Vaughan commented: "I couldn't gear everything on something I didn't really care a whole lot about. It was kind of risky, but I really didn't need all the headaches." Although contributing factors were widely disputed, Vaughan soon gained major publicity for quitting the tour.
On May 9, the band performed at The Bottom Line in New York City, where they opened for Bryan Adams, with Hammond, Mick Jagger, John McEnroe, Rick Nielsen, Billy Gibbons, and Johnny Winter in attendance. Brandenburg described the performance as "ungodly": "I think Stevie played every lick as loud and as hard and with as much intensity as I've ever heard him." The performance earned Vaughan a positive review published in the New York Post, asserting that Double Trouble outperformed Adams. "Fortunately, Bryan Adams, the Canadian rocker who is opening arena dates for Journey, doesn't headline too often", wrote Martin Porter, who claimed that after the band's performance, the stage had been "rendered to cinders by the most explosively original showmanship to grace the New York stage in some time."
Texas Flood
After acquiring the recordings from Browne's studio, Double Trouble began assembling the material for a full-length LP. The album, Texas Flood, opens with the track "Love Struck Baby", which was written for Lenny on their "love-struck day". He composed "Pride and Joy" and "I'm Cryin'" for one of his former girlfriends, Lindi Bethel. Although both are musically similar, their lyrics are two different perspectives of the relationship. Along with covers of Howlin' Wolf, the Isley Brothers, and Buddy Guy, the album included Vaughan's cover of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", a song which he became strongly associated with. "Lenny" served as a tribute to his wife, which he composed at the end of their bed.
Texas Flood featured cover art by illustrator Brad Holland, who is known for his artwork for Playboy and The New York Times. Originally envisioned with Vaughan sitting on a horse depicting a promotable resemblance, Holland painted an image of him leaning against a wall with a guitar, using a photograph as a reference. Released on June 13, 1983, Texas Flood peaked at number 38 and ultimately sold half a million copies. While Rolling Stone editor Kurt Loder asserted that Vaughan did not possess a distinctive voice, according to AllMusic senior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the release was a "monumental impact". Billboard described it as "a guitar boogie lovers delight". Agent Alex Hodges commented: "No one knew how big that record would be, because guitar players weren't necessarily in vogue, except for some that were so established they were undeniable ... he was one of the few artists that was recouped on every record in a short period of time."
On June 16, Vaughan gave a performance at Tango nightclub in Dallas, which celebrated the album's release. Assorted VIPs attended the performance, including Ted Nugent, Sammy Hagar, and members of The Kinks and Uriah Heep. Jack Chase, vice president of marketing for Epic, recalled: "the coming-out party at Tango was very important; it was absolutely huge. All the radio station personalities, DJs, program directors, all the retail record store owners and the important managers, press, all the executives from New York came down—about seven hundred people. We attacked in Dallas first with Q102-FM and [DJ] Redbeard. We had the Tango party—it was hot. It was the ticket." The Dallas Morning News reviewed the performance, starting with the rhetorical question; "what if Stevie Ray Vaughan had an album release party and everybody came? It happened Thursday night at Tango. ... The adrenalin must have been gushing through the musicians' veins as they performed with rare finesse and skill."
Following a brief tour in Europe, Hodges arranged an engagement for Double Trouble as The Moody Blues' opening act during a two-month tour of North America. Hodges stated that many people disliked the idea of Double Trouble opening for The Moody Blues, but asserted that a common thread which both bands shared was "album-oriented rock". Shannon described the tour as "glorious": "Our record hadn't become that successful yet, but we were playing in front of coliseums full of people. We just went out and played, and it fit like a glove. The sound rang through those big coliseums like a monster. People were going crazy, and they had no idea who we were!" After appearing on the television series Austin City Limits, the band played a sold-out concert at New York City's Beacon Theatre. Variety wrote that their ninety-minute set at the Beacon "left no doubt that this young Texas musician is indeed the 'guitar hero of the present era.'"
Couldn't Stand the Weather
In January 1984, Double Trouble began recording their second studio album, Couldn't Stand the Weather, at the Power Station, with John Hammond as executive producer and engineer Richard Mullen. Layton later recalled working with Hammond: "he was kind of like a nice hand on your shoulder, as opposed to someone that jumped in and said, 'let's redo this, let's do that more.' He didn't get involved in that way at all. He was a feedback person." As the sessions began, Vaughan's cover of Bob Geddins' "Tin Pan Alley" was recorded while audio levels were being checked. Layton remembers the performance: "... we did probably the quietest version we ever did up 'til that point. We ended it and [Hammond] said; 'that's the best that song will ever sound,' and we went; 'we haven't even got sounds, have we?' He goes, 'that doesn't matter. That's the best you'll ever do that song.' We tried it again five, six, seven times- I can't even remember. But it never quite sounded like it did that first time."
During recording sessions, Vaughan began experimenting with other combinations of musicians, including Fran Christina and Stan Harrison, who played drums and saxophone respectively on the jazz instrumental, "Stang's Swang". Jimmie Vaughan played rhythm guitar on his cover of Guitar Slim's "The Things That I Used to Do" and the title track, the latter of which Vaughan carries a worldly message in his lyrics. According to musicologist Andy Aledort, Vaughan's guitar playing throughout the song is marked by steady rhythmic strumming patterns and improvised lead lines, with a distinctive R&B and soul single-note riff, doubled in octaves by guitar and bass.
Couldn't Stand the Weather was released on May 15, 1984, and two weeks later it had rapidly outpaced the sales of Texas Flood. It peaked at number 31 and spent 38 weeks on the charts. The album includes Vaughan's cover of Jimi Hendrix's song, "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", which provoked inevitable comparisons to Hendrix. According to AllMusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Couldn't Stand the Weather "confirmed that the acclaimed debut was no fluke, while matching, if not bettering, the sales of its predecessor, thereby cementing Vaughan's status as a giant of modern blues." According to authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford, the album "was a major turning point in Stevie Ray Vaughan's development" and Vaughan's singing improved.
Carnegie Hall
On October 4, 1984, Vaughan headlined a performance at Carnegie Hall that included many guest musicians. For the second half of the concert, he added Jimmie as rhythm guitarist, drummer George Rains, keyboardist Dr. John, Roomful of Blues horn section, and featured vocalist Angela Strehli. The ensemble rehearsed for less than two weeks before the performance, and despite the solid dynamics of Double Trouble for the first half of the performance, according to Patoski and Crawford, the big band concept never entirely took form. Before arriving at the engagement, the venue sold out, which made Vaughan overexcited and nervous as he did not calm down until halfway through the third song. A benefit for the T.J. Martell Foundation's work in leukemia and cancer research, he was an important draw for the event. As his scheduled time slot drew closer, he indicated that he preferred traveling to the venue by limousine to avoid being swarmed by fans on the street; the band took the stage around 8:00 p.m. The audience of 2,200 people, which included Vaughan's wife, family and friends, transformed the venue into what Stephen Holden of The New York Times described as "a whistling, stomping roadhouse".
Introduced by Hammond as "one of the greatest guitar players of all time", Vaughan opened with "Scuttle Buttin'", wearing a custom-made mariachi suit he described as a "Mexican tuxedo". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of the Isley Brothers' "Testify", The Jimi Hendrix Experience's "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", "Tin Pan Alley", Elmore James' "The Sky Is Crying", and W. C. Clark's "Cold Shot", along with four original compositions including "Love Struck Baby", "Honey Bee", "Couldn't Stand the Weather", and "Rude Mood". During the second half of the performance, Vaughan performed covers by Larry Davis, Buddy Guy, Guitar Slim, Albert King, Jackie Wilson, and Albert Collins. The set ended with Vaughan performing solo renditions of "Lenny" and "Rude Mood".
The Dallas Times-Herald wrote of the performance at Carnegie Hall as; "was full of stomping feet and swaying bodies, kids in blue jeans hanging off the balconies, dancing bodies that clogged the aisles." The New York Times asserted that, despite the venue's "muddy" acoustics, their performance was "filled with verve", and Vaughan's playing was "handsomely displayed". Jimmie Vaughan later commented: "I was worried the crowd might be a little stiff. Turned out they're just like any other beer joint." Vaughan commented: "We won't be limited to just the trio, although that doesn't mean we'll stop doing the trio. I'm planning on doing that too. I ain't gonna stay in one place. If I do, I'm stupid." The performance was recorded and later released as an official live LP. The album was released posthumously on July 29, 1997, by Epic Records; it was ultimately certified gold.
Immediately after the concert, Vaughan attended a private party at a downtown club in New York, which was sponsored by MTV, where he was greeted by an hour's worth of supporters. On the following day, Double Trouble made an appearance at a record store in Greenwich Village, where they signed autographs for fans. In late October 1984, the band toured Australia and New Zealand, which included one of their first appearances on Australian television—on Hey Hey It's Saturday—where they performed "Texas Flood", and an interview on Sounds. On November 5 and 9, they played sold-out concerts at the Sydney Opera House. Upon returning to the U.S., Double Trouble went on a brief tour in California. Soon afterward, Vaughan and Lenny went to the island of Saint Croix, on the U.S. Virgin Islands in the Caribbean Sea, where they had spent some time vacationing in December. The next month, Double Trouble flew to Japan, where they appeared for five performances, including at Kōsei Nenkin Kaikan in Osaka.
Soul to Soul
In March 1985, recording for Double Trouble's third studio album, Soul to Soul, began at the Dallas Sound Lab. As the sessions progressed, Vaughan became increasingly frustrated with his own lack of inspiration. He was also allowed a relaxed pace of recording the album, which contributed to a lack of focus due to excesses in alcohol and other drugs. Roadie Byron Barr later recalled: "the routine was to go to the studio, do dope, and play ping-pong." Vaughan, who found it increasingly difficult to be able to play rhythm guitar parts and sing at the same time, wanted to add another dimension to the band, so he hired keyboardist Reese Wynans to record on the album; he joined the band soon thereafter.
During the album's production, Vaughan appeared at the Houston Astrodome on April 10, 1985, where he performed a slide guitar rendition of the U.S. national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner"; his performance was met with booing. Upon leaving the stage, Vaughan acquired an autograph from former player for the New York Yankees, Mickey Mantle. Astrodome publicist Molly Glentzer wrote in the Houston Press: "as Vaughan shuffled back behind home plate, he was only lucid enough to know that he wanted Mickey Mantle's autograph. Mantle obliged. 'I never signed a guitar before.' Nobody asked Vaughan for his autograph. I was sure he'd be dead before he hit 30." Critics associated his performance with Jimi Hendrix's rendition at Woodstock in 1969, yet Vaughan disliked this comparison: "I heard they even wrote about it in one of the music magazines and they tried to put the two versions side by side. I hate that stuff. His version was great."
Released on September 30, 1985, Soul to Soul peaked at number 34 and remained on the Billboard 200 through mid-1986, eventually certified gold. Critic Jimmy Guterman of Rolling Stone wrote: "there's some life left in their blues rock pastiche; it's also possible that they've run out of gas." According to Patoski and Crawford, sales of the album "did not match Couldn't Stand the Weather, suggesting Stevie Ray and Double Trouble were plateauing". Vaughan commented: "as far as what's on there song-wise, I like the album a lot. It meant a lot to us what we went through to get this record. There were a lot of odds and we still stayed strong. We grew a lot with the people in the band and immediate friends around us; we learned a lot and grew a lot closer. That has a lot to do with why it's called [Soul to Soul]."
Live Alive
After touring for nine and a half months, Epic requested a fourth album from Double Trouble as part of their contractual obligation. In July 1986, Vaughan decided that they would record the LP, Live Alive, during three live appearances in Austin and Dallas. On July 17 and 18, the band performed sold-out concerts at the Austin Opera House, and July 19 at the Dallas Starfest. They used recordings of these concerts to assemble the LP, which was produced by Vaughan. Shannon was backstage before the Austin concert and predicted to new manager Alex Hodges that both Vaughan and himself were "headed for a brick wall". Guitarist Denny Freeman attended the Austin performances; he called the shows a "musical mess, because they would go into these chaotic jams with no control. I didn't know what exactly was going on, but I was concerned." Both Layton and Shannon remarked that their work schedule and drugs were causing the band to lose focus. According to Wynans: "Things were getting illogical and crazy."
The Live Alive album was released on November 17, 1986, and the only official live Double Trouble LP made commercially available during Vaughan's lifetime, though it never appeared on the Billboard 200 chart. Though many critics claimed that most of the album was overdubbed, engineer Gary Olazabal, who mixed the album, asserted that most of the material was recorded poorly. Vaughan later admitted that it was not one of his better efforts; he recalled: "I wasn't in very good shape when we recorded Live Alive. At the time, I didn't realize how bad a shape I was in. There were more fix-it jobs done on the album than I would have liked. Some of the work sounds like [it was] the work of half-dead people. There were some great notes that came out, but I just wasn't in control; nobody was."
Drugs and alcohol
In 1960, when Vaughan was six years old, he began stealing his father's drinks. Drawn in by its effects, he started making his own drinks and this resulted in alcohol dependence. He explained: "that's when I first started stealing daddy's drinks. Or when my parents were gone, I'd find the bottle and make myself one. I thought it was cool ... thought the kids down the street would think it was cool. That's where it began, and I had been depending on it ever since." According to the authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford: "In the ensuing twenty-five years, he had worked his way through the Physicians' Desk Reference before finding his poisons of preference—alcohol and cocaine."
While Vaughan asserted that he first experienced the effects of cocaine when a doctor prescribed him a liquid solution of the stimulant as a nasal spray, according to Patoski and Crawford, the earliest that Vaughan is known to have ingested the drug is in 1975, while performing with the Cobras. Before that, Vaughan had briefly used other drugs such as cannabis, methamphetamine, and Quaaludes, the brand name for methaqualone. After 1975, he regularly drank whiskey and used cocaine, particularly mixing the two substances together. According to Hopkins, by the time of Double Trouble's European tour in September 1986, "his lifestyle of substance abuse had reached a peak, probably better characterized as the bottom of a deep chasm."
At the height of Vaughan's substance abuse, he drank of whiskey and used of cocaine each day. Personal assistant Tim Duckworth explained: "I would make sure he would eat breakfast instead of waking up drinking every morning, which was probably the worst thing he was doing." According to Vaughan: "it got to the point where if I'd try to say "hi" to somebody, I would just fall apart crying. It was like solid doom."
In September 1986, Double Trouble traveled to Denmark for a one-month tour of Europe. During the late night hours of September 28, Vaughan became ill after a performance in Ludwigshafen, Germany, suffering from near-death dehydration, for which he received medical treatment. The incident resulted in his checking into The London Clinic under the care of Dr. Victor Bloom, who warned him that he was a month away from death. After staying in London for more than a week, he returned to the United States and entered Peachford Hospital in Atlanta, where he spent four weeks in rehabilitation, and then checked into rehab in Austin.
Live Alive tour
In November 1986, following his departure from rehab, Vaughan moved back into his mother's Glenfield Avenue house in Dallas, which is where he had spent much of his childhood. During this time, Double Trouble began rehearsals for the Live Alive tour. Although Vaughan was nervous about performing after achieving sobriety, he received positive reassurance. Wynans later recalled: "Stevie was real worried about playing after he'd gotten sober...he didn't know if he had anything left to offer. Once we got back out on the road, he was very inspired and motivated." The tour began on November 23 at Towson State University, which was Vaughan's first performance with Double Trouble after rehab. On December 31, 1986, they played a concert at Atlanta's Fox Theatre, which featured encore performances with Lonnie Mack.
As the tour progressed, Vaughan was longing to work on material for his next LP, but in January 1987, he filed for a divorce from Lenny, which restricted him from any projects until the proceedings were finalized. This prevented him from writing and recording songs for almost two years, but Double Trouble wrote the song "Crossfire" with Bill Carter and Ruth Ellsworth. Layton recalled: "we wrote the music, and they had to write the lyrics. We had just gotten together; Stevie was unable to be there at that time. He was in Dallas doing some things, and we just got together and started writing some songs. That was the first one we wrote." On August 6, 1987, Double Trouble appeared at the Austin Aqua Festival, where they played to one of the largest audiences of their career. According to biographer Craig Hopkins, as many as 20,000 people attended the concert. Following a month-long tour as the opening act for Robert Plant in May 1988, which included a concert at Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens, the band was booked for a European leg, which included 22 performances, and ended in Oulu, Finland on July 17. This would be Vaughan's last concert appearance in Europe.
In Step
After Vaughan's divorce from Lenora "Lenny" Darlene Bailey became final, recording for Double Trouble's fourth and final studio album, In Step, began at Kiva Studios in Memphis, Tennessee, working with producer Jim Gaines and co-songwriter Doyle Bramhall. Initially, he had doubts about his musical and creative abilities after achieving sobriety, but he gained confidence as the sessions progressed. Shannon later recalled: "In Step was, for him, a big growing experience. In my opinion, it's our best studio album, and I think he felt that way, too." Bramhall, who had also entered rehab, wrote songs with Vaughan about addiction and redemption. According to Vaughan, the album was titled In Step because "I'm finally in step with life, in step with myself, in step with my music." The album's liner notes include the quote; "'thank God the elevator's broken," a reference to the twelve-step program proposed by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA).
After the In Step recording sessions moved to Los Angeles, Vaughan added horn players Joe Sublett and Darrell Leonard, who played saxophone and trumpet respectively on both "Crossfire" and "Love Me Darlin". Shortly before the album's production was complete, Vaughan and Double Trouble appeared at a presidential inaugural party in Washington, D.C. for George H. W. Bush. In Step was released on June 13, 1989, and eight months later, it was certified gold. The album was Vaughan's most commercially successful release and his first one to win a Grammy Award. It peaked at number 33 on the Billboard 200, spending 47 weeks on the chart. In Step included the song, "Crossfire", which was written by Double Trouble, Bill Carter, and Ruth Ellsworth; it became his only number one hit. The album also included one of his first recordings to feature the use of a Fuzz Face on Vaughan's cover of the Howlin' Wolf song, "Love Me Darlin.
In July 1989, Neil Perry, a writer for Sounds magazine, wrote: "the album closes with the brow-soothing swoon of 'Riviera Paradise,' a slow, lengthy guitar and piano workout that proves just why Vaughan is to the guitar what Nureyev is to ballet." According to music journalist Robert Christgau, Vaughan was "writing blues for AA...he escapes the blues undamaged for the first time in his career." In October 1989, the Boca Raton News described Vaughan's guitar solos as "determined, clear-headed and downright stinging" and his lyrics as "tension-filled allegories".
Death
On Monday, August 27, 1990, at 12:50 a.m. (CDT), Vaughan and members of Eric Clapton's touring entourage played an all-star encore jam session at Alpine Valley Music Theatre in Alpine Valley Resort in East Troy, Wisconsin. They then left for Midway International Airport in Chicago in a Bell 206B helicopter, the most common way for acts to enter and exit the venue, as there is only one road in and out, heavily used by fans. The helicopter crashed into a nearby ski hill shortly after takeoff. Vaughan and the four others on board—pilot Jeff Brown, agent Bobby Brooks, bodyguard Nigel Browne, and tour manager Colin Smythe—died. The helicopter was identified as being owned by Chicago-based company Omniflight Helicopters. Initial reports of the crash erroneously claimed that Clapton had also been killed. According to findings from an inquest conducted by the coroner's office in Elkhorn, all five victims were killed instantly.
The investigation determined the aircraft departed in foggy conditions with visibility reportedly under two miles, according to a local forecast. The National Transportation Safety Board report stated: "As the third helicopter was departing, it remained at a lower altitude than the others, and the pilot turned southeasterly toward rising terrain. Subsequently, the helicopter crashed on hilly terrain about three fifths of a mile from the takeoff point." Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) records showed that Brown was qualified to fly by instruments in a fixed-wing aircraft, but not in a helicopter. Toxicology tests performed on the victims revealed no traces of drugs or alcohol in their systems. Vaughan's funeral service was held on August 31, 1990, at Laurel Land Cemetery in Dallas, Texas. His wooden casket quickly became adorned with bouquets of flowers. An estimated 3,000 mourners joined a procession led by a white hearse. Among those at the public ceremony were Jeff Healey, Charlie Sexton, ZZ Top, Colin James, Stevie Wonder, Bonnie Raitt and Buddy Guy. Vaughan's grave marker reads: "Thank you ... for all the love you passed our way."
Musical style
Vaughan's music was rooted in blues, rock, and jazz. He was influenced by Jimi Hendrix, Albert King, Lonnie Mack, B.B. King, Freddie King, Albert Collins, Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Otis Rush, Guitar Slim, Chuck Berry, and Muddy Waters. According to nightclub owner Clifford Antone, who opened Antone's in 1975, Vaughan jammed with Albert King at Antone's in July 1977 and it almost "scared him to death", saying that "it was the best I've ever saw Albert or the best I ever saw Stevie". While Albert King had a substantial influence on Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix was Vaughan's greatest inspiration. Vaughan declared: "I love Hendrix for so many reasons. He was so much more than just a blues guitarist—he played damn well any kind of guitar he wanted. In fact I'm not sure if he even played the guitar—he played music." He was also influenced by such jazz guitarists as Django Reinhardt, Wes Montgomery, Kenny Burrell, and George Benson.
In 1987, Vaughan listed Lonnie Mack first among the guitarists he had listened to, both as a youngster and as an adult. Vaughan observed that Mack was "ahead of his time" and said, "I got a lot of my fast stuff from Lonnie". On another occasion, Vaughan said that he had learned tremolo picking and vibrato from Mack and that Mack had taught him to "play guitar from the heart." Mack recalled his first meeting with Vaughan in 1978:
Vaughan's relationship with another Texas blues legend, Johnny Winter, was a little more complex. Although they met several times, and often played sessions with the same musicians or even performed the same material, as in the case of Boot Hill, Vaughan always refrained from acknowledging Winter in any form. In his biography, "Raisin' Cain", Winter says that he was unnerved after reading Vaughan stating in an interview that he never met or knew Johnny Winter. "We even played together over at Tommy Shannon's house one time." Vaughan settled the issue in 1988 on the occasion of a blues festival in Europe where both he and Winter were on the bill, explaining that he has been misquoted and that "Every musician in Texas knows Johnny and has learned something from him". Asked to compare their playing styles in an interview in 2010, Winter admitted that "mine's a little bit rawer, I think."
Equipment
Guitars
Vaughan owned and used a variety of guitars during his career. His guitar of choice, and the instrument that he became most associated with, was the Fender Stratocaster, his favorite being a 1963 body with a 1962 neck and pickups dated from 1959. This is why Vaughan usually referred to his Stratocaster as a "1959 Strat". He explained why he favored this guitar in a 1983 interview: "I like the strength of its sound. Any guitar I play has got to be pretty versatile. It's got a big, strong tone and it'll take anything I do to it." Vaughan also referred to this instrument as his "first wife", or "Number One". Another favourite guitar was a slightly later Strat he named 'Lenny' after his wife, Lenora. While at a local pawn shop in 1980, Vaughan had noticed this particular guitar, a 1965 Stratocaster that had been refinished in red, with the original sunburst finish peeking through. It also had a 1910 Mandolin inlay just below the bridge. The pawn shop was asking $300 for it, which was way more than Vaughan had at the time. Lenny saw how badly he wanted this guitar, so she got six of their friends to chip in $50 each, and bought it for him. The guitar was presented to him on his birthday in 1980, and that night, after bringing "Lenny" (the guitar, and wife) home with him, he wrote the song, "Lenny". He started using a borrowed Stratocaster during high school and used Stratocasters predominantly in his live performances and recordings, although he did play other guitars, including custom guitars.
One of the custom guitars—nicknamed "Main"—was built by James Hamilton of Hamiltone Guitars in Buffalo, New York. It was a gift from Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top. Gibbons had commissioned Hamilton to build the guitar in 1979. There were some delays, including having to re-do the mother of pearl inlay of Vaughan's name on the fretboard when he changed his stage name from Stevie Vaughan to Stevie Ray Vaughan. The guitar was presented to him by Jim Hamilton on April 29, 1984. Hamilton recalls that Stevie Ray Vaughan was so happy with the guitar that he played it that night at Springfest on the University of Buffalo campus. It remained one of the main guitars he used on stage and in studio. Vaughan made some alterations to the guitar, including replacing the bronze color Gibson knobs with white Fender knobs, as he preferred the ribbing on the Fender knobs. The pickups had to be changed after the guitar was used in the "Couldn't Stand the Weather" video, in which Stevie and "Main" were drenched with water, and the pickups were ruined. Vaughan preferred guitar has been summarized as his,
Number One Strat, which Stevie claimed to be a ’59, since that was the date stamped on the back of the pickups… this was incorrect, however, as guitar tech Rene Martinez (who oversaw SRV’s guitars since 1980) found the stamp of 1963 on the body and 1962 on the original neck (the neck was replaced in 1989 after it could no longer be refretted properly; Rene used the neck from another SRV favorite, “Red”, as it was also a 1962 model). The pickups are also relatively low output, not the hot overwound myth that gained legs during the 80s… all 3 pickups are rumored to be under 6k ohms output impedance, which would be typical of a 1959 set (the neck pickups tended to be hottest, but not by much). Although the Fender SRV signature model uses Texas Special pickups, which Stevie was heavily involved in the making of, they do not accurately represent the sound of his original Number One.
Vaughan bought many Stratocasters and gave some away as gifts. A sunburst Diplomat Strat-style guitar was purchased by Vaughan and given to his girlfriend Janna Lapidus to learn to play on. Vaughan used a custom set of uncommonly heavy strings, gauges .013, .015, .019, .028, .038, .058, and tuned a half-step below standard tuning. He played with so much tension that it was not uncommon for him to separate his fingernail from the quick movement along the strings. The owner of an Austin club recalled Vaughan coming into the office between sets to borrow super glue, which he used to keep fingernail split from widening while he continued to play. The super glue was suggested by Rene Martinez, who was Stevie's guitar technician. Martinez eventually convinced Stevie to change to slightly lighter strings. He preferred a guitar neck with an asymmetrical profile (thicker at the top) which was more comfortable for his thumb-over style of playing. Heavy use of the vibrato bar necessitated frequent replacements; Vaughan often had his roadie, Byron Barr, obtain custom stainless steel bars made by Barr's father.
Vaughan was also photographed playing a Rickenbacker Capri, a National Duolian, Epiphone Riviera, Gibson Flying V, as well as several other models. Vaughan used a Gibson Johnny Smith to record "Stang's Swang", and a Guild 12-string acoustic for his performance on MTV Unplugged in January 1990. On June 24, 2004, one of Vaughan's Stratocasters, the aforementioned "Lenny" strat, was sold at an auction to benefit Eric Clapton's Crossroads Centre in Antigua; the instrument was bought by Guitar Center for $623,500.
Amplifiers and effects
Vaughan was a catalyst in the revival of vintage amplifiers and effects during the 1980s. His loud volume and use of heavy strings required powerful and robust amplifiers. Vaughan used two black-face Fender Super Reverbs, which were crucial in shaping his clear overdriven sound. He would often blend other amps with the Super Reverbs, including black-face Fender Vibroverbs, and brands such as Dumble, and Marshall, which he used for his clean sound.
While his mainstay effects were the Ibanez Tube Screamer and a Vox wah-wah pedal, Vaughan experimented with a range of effects. He used a Fender Vibratone, designed as a Leslie speaker for electric guitars, and provided a warbling chorus effect, which can be heard on the track "Cold Shot". He used a vintage Dallas Arbiter Fuzz Face that can be heard on In Step, as well as an Octavia. The Guitar Geek website provides a detailed illustration of Vaughan's 1985 equipment set up based on interviews with his guitar tech and effects builder, Cesar Diaz.
Legacy
Vaughan throughout his career revived blues rock and paved the way for many other artists. Vaughan's work continues to influence numerous blues, rock and alternative artists, including John Mayer, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Mike McCready, Albert Cummings, Los Lonely Boys and Chris Duarte, among others. AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine described Vaughan as "the leading light in American blues" and developed "a uniquely eclectic and fiery style that sounded like no other guitarist, regardless of genre". In 1983, Variety magazine called Vaughan the "guitar hero of the present era".
In the months that followed his death, Vaughan sold over 5.5 million albums in the United States. On September 25, 1990, Epic released Family Style, an LP the Vaughan brothers cut at Ardent Studios in Memphis, Tennessee. The label released several promotional singles and videos for the collaborative effort. In November 1990, CMV Enterprises released Pride and Joy, a collection of eight Double Trouble music videos. Sony signed a deal with the Vaughan estate to obtain control of his back catalog, as well as permission to release albums with previously unreleased material and new collections of released work. On October 29, 1991, The Sky Is Crying was released as Vaughan's first posthumous album with Double Trouble, and featured studio recordings from 1984 to 1985. Other compilations, live albums, and films have also been released since his death.
On October 3, 1991, Texas governor Ann Richards proclaimed "Stevie Ray Vaughan Commemoration Day", during which a memorial concert was held at the Texas Theatre. In 1993, a memorial statue of Vaughan was unveiled on Auditorium Shores and is the first public monument of a musician in Austin. In September 1994, a Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Run for Recovery was held in Dallas; the event was a benefit for the Ethel Daniels Foundation, established to help those in recovery from alcoholism and drug addiction who cannot afford treatment. In 1999, the Musicians' Assistance Program (later renamed MusiCares MAP Fund) created the "Stevie Ray Vaughan Award" to honor the memory of Vaughan and to recognize musicians for their devotion to helping other addicts struggling with the recovery process. The recipients include Eric Clapton, David Crosby, Steven Tyler, Alice Cooper, Ozzy Osbourne, Pete Townshend, Chris Cornell, Jerry Cantrell, Mike McCready, among others. In 1993, Martha Vaughan established the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Scholarship Fund, awarded to students at W.E. Greiner Middle School in Oakcliff who intend to attend college and pursue the arts as a profession.
Awards and honors
Vaughan won five W. C. Handy Awards and was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2000. In 1985, he was named an honorary admiral in the Texas Navy. Vaughan had a single number-one hit on the Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart for the song "Crossfire". His album sales in the U.S. stand at over 15 million units. Family Style, released shortly after his death, won the 1991 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album and became his best-selling, non-Double Trouble studio album with over a million shipments in the U.S. In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked him seventh among the "100 Greatest Guitar Players of All Time". He also became eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008, but did not appear on a nominations roster until 2014. He was inducted in the RRHOF alongside Double Trouble in 2015. Guitar World magazine ranked him as Number One in its list of the greatest blues guitarists.
In 1994 the city of Austin, Texas, erected the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial on the hiking trail beside Lady Bird Lake.
Discography
Texas Flood (1983)
Couldn't Stand the Weather (1984)
Soul to Soul (1985)
In Step (1989)
Family Style (1990)
The Sky is Crying (1991)
See also
1980s in music
List of blues rock musicians
List of electric blues musicians
List of guitarists
List of Texas blues musicians
Music of Austin, Texas
Music of Texas
Notes
Footnotes
Citations
Sources
Further reading
External links
The Stevie Ray Vaughan Archive
1954 births
1990 deaths
Accidental deaths in Wisconsin
American blues guitarists
American male guitarists
American blues singers
American blues singer-songwriters
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
Blues rock musicians
Double Trouble (band) members
Electric blues musicians
Epic Records artists
Sony Music artists
Grammy Award winners
Lead guitarists
Musicians from Dallas
Texas blues musicians
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1990
Victims of helicopter accidents or incidents in the United States
20th-century American singers
Slide guitarists
Resonator guitarists
Guitarists from Texas
20th-century American guitarists
People from Oak Cliff, Texas
20th-century American male singers
Musicians killed in aviation accidents or incidents
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Pipe smokers | true | [
"\"What's Forever For\" is a song written by Rafe Van Hoy and first recorded by England Dan & John Ford Coley on their 1979 album Dr. Heckle and Mr. Jive.\n\nThe song saw its biggest success when it was recorded by American country music artist Michael Martin Murphey. It was released in June 1982 as the second single from his album, Michael Martin Murphey. \"What's Forever For\" was Murphey's first of two number ones on the country chart. The single went to number one for one week and spent 16 weeks in the country top 40. On the Hot 100, \"What's Forever For\" was his final Top 40 hit, peaking at number 19. The song is also one of his most well known in the Philippines, along with \"Maybe This Time\".\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nCover versions\nAnne Murray on her 1980 album Somebody's Waiting, released by Capitol Records. \"What's Forever For\" was also included as the B-side of her Beatles cover hit, \"I'm Happy Just to Dance with You\".\nT. G. Sheppard on his 1981 album I Love 'Em All, released by Warner Bros. Records.\nDaryl Somers on his 1982 single.\nJohnny Mathis on his 1982 album Friends in Love, released on Columbia Records.\nBilly Gilman on his 2000 album One Voice, released by Epic Records.\nFilipino acoustic singer Nyoy Volante covered the song on his 2008 album, Heartstrings.\nJeff Trachta and Bobbie Eakes, on the soap opera The Bold and the Beautiful.\nTonny Willé and Marco Bakker.\nJohn Conlee on the album With Love in 1981 on MCA.\nB.J. Thomas on his 2000 album You Call That a Mountain.\n\nReferences\n\n1982 singles\nEngland Dan & John Ford Coley songs\nAnne Murray songs\nJohn Conlee songs\nT. G. Sheppard songs\nMichael Martin Murphey songs\nBilly Gilman songs\nB. J. Thomas songs\nSong recordings produced by Jim Ed Norman\nLiberty Records singles\nSongs written by Rafe Van Hoy\n1979 songs",
"\"What's Right Is Right\" is the first single from Taylor Hicks' second studio album The Distance.\n\nSingle release\nThe single was released to Adult Contemporary radio adds and digital outlets on January 27, 2009. A music video for the song was filmed on January 12, 2009 in Chicago by director Jake Davis. \"What's Right Is Right\" represents the start of a musical comeback for Hicks, who has not released new music since his major label debut album Taylor Hicks in December 2006. It is the first single to be released by Hicks on an independent label; his first three were released and promoted by Arista Records. It has peaked at number 24 on the Hot Adult Contemporary Tracks on billboard.\n\nChart performance\n\nReferences\n\nTaylor Hicks songs\nSongs written by Simon Climie\nSongs written by Dennis Morgan (songwriter)\n2009 singles\n2009 songs"
] |
[
"Stevie Ray Vaughan",
"First recordings",
"In what year did Stevie Ray Vaughan start recording?",
"In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands,",
"What songs were on his first album?",
"They recorded two songs, \"Red, White and Blue\" and \"I Heard a Voice Last Night\","
] | C_156015fd0dc74c469a47cbc6a542733a_0 | What other musicians did SRV play with on his first recordings? | 3 | Besides the band Cast of Thousands, what other musicians did SRV play with on his first recordings? | Stevie Ray Vaughan | In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Country Club, a venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined a rock band named Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months. In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were disastrous. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed. In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras that included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King. Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde Pharaoh. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band. CANNOTANSWER | feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. | Stephen Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954August 27, 1990) was an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer, best known as the guitarist and frontman of the blues rock trio Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble. Although his mainstream career only spanned seven years, he is considered an icon and one of the most influential musicians in the history of blues music, and one of the greatest guitarists of all time.
Born and raised in Dallas, Texas, Vaughan began playing guitar at age seven, initially inspired by his elder brother, Jimmie Vaughan. In 1972, he dropped out of high school and moved to Austin, where he began to gain a following after playing gigs on the local club circuit. Vaughan joined forces with Tommy Shannon on bass and Chris Layton on drums as Double Trouble in 1978 and established it as part of the Austin music scene; it soon became one of the most popular acts in Texas. He performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1982, where David Bowie saw him play and contacted him for a studio gig, resulting in Stevie playing his blues guitar on the album Let's Dance (1983), before being discovered by John Hammond, who interested major label Epic Records in signing Vaughan and his band to a record deal. Within months, they achieved mainstream success for the critically acclaimed debut album Texas Flood. With a series of successful network television appearances and extensive concert tours, Vaughan became the leading figure in the blues revival of the 1980s.
Playing his guitar behind his back or plucking the strings with his teeth as Jimi Hendrix did, he earned unprecedented stardom in Europe, which later resulted in breakthroughs for guitar players like Robert Cray, Jeff Healey, Robben Ford and Walter Trout, amongst others.
During the majority of his life, Vaughan struggled with drug and alcohol addiction. He also struggled with the personal and professional pressures of fame and his marriage to Lenora "Lenny" Bailey. He successfully completed rehabilitation and began touring again with Double Trouble in November 1986. His fourth and final studio album In Step reached number 33 in the United States in 1989; it was one of Vaughan's most critically and commercially successful releases and included his only number-one hit, "Crossfire". He became one of the world's most highly demanded blues performers, and he headlined Madison Square Garden in 1989 and the Beale Street Music Festival in 1990.
On August 27, 1990, Vaughan and four others were killed in a helicopter crash in East Troy, Wisconsin, after performing with Double Trouble at Alpine Valley Music Theatre. An investigation concluded that the cause was pilot error and Vaughan's family later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Omniflight Helicopters that was settled out of court. Vaughan's music continued to achieve commercial success with several posthumous releases and has sold over 15 million albums in the United States alone. In 2003, David Fricke of Rolling Stone ranked him the seventh greatest guitarist of all time. Vaughan was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015, along with Double Trouble bandmates Chris Layton, Tommy Shannon, and Reese Wynans.
Family and early life
Stevie's grandfather, Thomas Lee Vaughan, married Laura Belle LaRue and moved to Rockwall County, Texas, where they lived by sharecropping.
Stevie's father, Jimmie Lee Vaughan, was born on September 6, 1921. Jimmie, also known as Jim and Big Jim, dropped out of school at age sixteen and enlisted in the U.S. Navy during World War II. After his discharge, he married Martha Jean (née Cook; 1928–2009) on January 13, 1950. They had a son, Jimmie, in 1951. Stephen was born at Methodist Hospital on October 3, 1954, in Dallas, Texas. Big Jim secured a job as an asbestos worker. The family moved frequently, living in other states such as Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Oklahoma before ultimately moving to the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. A shy and insecure boy, Vaughan was deeply affected by his childhood experiences. His father struggled with alcohol abuse and often terrorized his family and friends with his bad temper. In later years, Vaughan recalled that he had been a victim of his father's violence. His father died on August 27, 1986, exactly four years before Vaughan himself.
First instruments
In the early 1960s, Vaughan's admiration for his brother Jimmie resulted in his trying different instruments such as the drums and saxophone. In 1961, for his seventh birthday, Vaughan received his first guitar, a toy from Sears with Western motif. Learning by ear, he diligently committed himself, following along to songs by the Nightcaps, particularly "Wine, Wine, Wine" and "Thunderbird". He listened to blues artists such as Albert King, Otis Rush, and Muddy Waters, and rock guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix and Lonnie Mack, as well as jazz guitarists including Kenny Burrell. In 1963, he acquired his first electric guitar, a Gibson ES-125T, as a hand-me-down from Jimmie.
Soon after he acquired the electric guitar, Vaughan joined his first band, the Chantones, in 1965. Their first show was at a talent contest held in Dallas' Hill Theatre, but after realizing that they could not perform a Jimmy Reed song in its entirety, Vaughan left the band and joined the Brooklyn Underground, playing professionally at local bars and clubs. He received Jimmie's Fender Broadcaster, which he later traded for an Epiphone Riviera. When Jimmie left home at age sixteen, Vaughan's apparent obsession with the instrument caused a lack of support from his parents. Miserable at home, he took a job at a local hamburger stand, where he washed dishes and dumped trash for seventy cents an hour. After falling into a barrel of grease, he grew tired of the job and quit to devote his life to a music career.
Music career
Early years
In May 1969, after leaving the Brooklyn Underground, Vaughan joined a band called the Southern Distributor. He had learned the Yardbirds' "Jeff's Boogie" and played the song at the audition. Mike Steinbach, the group's drummer, commented: "The kid was fourteen. We auditioned him on 'Jeff's Boogie,' really fast instrumental guitar, and he played it note for note." Although they played pop rock covers, Vaughan conveyed his interest in the addition of blues songs to the group's repertoire; he was told that he wouldn't earn a living playing blues music and he and the band parted ways. Later that year, bassist Tommy Shannon walked into a Dallas club and heard Vaughan playing guitar. Fascinated by the skillful playing, which he described as "incredible even then", Shannon borrowed a bass guitar and the two jammed. Within a few years, they began performing together in a band called Krackerjack.
In February 1970, Vaughan joined a band called Liberation, which was a nine-piece group with a horn section. Having spent the past month briefly playing bass with Jimmie in Texas Storm, he had originally auditioned as bassist. Impressed by Vaughan's guitar playing, Scott Phares, the group's original guitarist, modestly became the bassist. In mid-1970, they performed at the Adolphus Hotel in downtown Dallas, where ZZ Top asked them to perform. During Liberation's break, Vaughan jammed with ZZ Top on the Nightcaps song "Thunderbird". Phares later described the performance: "they tore the house down. It was awesome. It was one of those magical evenings. Stevie fit in like a glove on a hand."
Attending Justin F. Kimball High School during the early 1970s, Vaughan's late-night shows contributed to his neglect in his studies, including music theory; he would often sleep during class. His pursuit of a musical career was disapproved of by many of the school's administrators but he was also encouraged by many people, including his art teacher, to strive for a career in art. In his sophomore year, he attended an evening class for experimental art at Southern Methodist University, but left when it conflicted with rehearsal. Vaughan later spoke of his dislike of the school and recalled having received daily notes from the principal about his grooming.
First recordings
In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Club, a local blues venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months.
In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were unsuccessful. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed.
In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras which included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King.
Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde "Pharaoh" Walden. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band.
Double Trouble
In mid-May 1978, Clark left to form his own group and Vaughan renamed the band Double Trouble, taken from the title of an Otis Rush song. Following the recruitment of bassist Jackie Newhouse, Walden quit in July, and was briefly replaced by Jack Moore, who had moved to Texas from Boston; he performed with the band for about two months. Vaughan then began looking for a drummer and soon after, he met Chris Layton through Sublett, who was his roommate. Layton, who had recently parted ways with Greezy Wheels, was taught by Vaughan to play a shuffle rhythm. When Vaughan offered Layton the position, he agreed. In early July, Vaughan befriended Lenora Bailey, known as "Lenny", who became his girlfriend, and ultimately his wife. The marriage was to last for six and a half years.
In early October 1978, Vaughan and Double Trouble earned a frequent residency performing at one of Austin's most popular nightspots, the Rome Inn. During a performance, Edi Johnson, an accountant at Manor Downs, noticed Vaughan. She remembered: "I'm not an authority on music—it's whatever turned me on—but this did." She recommended him to Manor Downs owner Frances Carr and general manager Chesley Millikin, who was interested in managing artists and saw Vaughan's musical potential. After Barton quit Double Trouble in mid-November 1979, Millikin signed Vaughan to a management contract. Vaughan also hired Robert "Cutter" Brandenburg as road manager, whom he had met in 1969. Addressing him as "Stevie Ray", Brandenburg convinced Vaughan to use his middle name on stage.
In October 1980, bassist Tommy Shannon attended a Double Trouble performance at Rockefeller's in Houston. Shannon, who was playing with Alan Haynes at the time, participated in a jam session with Vaughan and Layton halfway through their set. Shannon later commented: "I went down there that night, and I'll never forget this: it was like, when I walked in the door and I heard them playing, it was like a revelation. 'That's where I want to be; that's where I belong, right there.' During the break, I went up to Stevie and told him that. I didn't try to sneak around and hide it from the bass player [Jackie Newhouse]—I didn't know if he was listening or not. I just really wanted to be in that band. I sat in that night and it sounded great." Almost three months later, when Vaughan offered Shannon the position, he readily accepted.
Drug charge and trial
On December 5, 1979, while Vaughan was in a dressing room before a performance in Houston, an off-duty police officer arrested him after witnessing his usage of cocaine near an open window. He was formally charged with cocaine possession and subsequently released on $1,000 bail. Double Trouble was the opening act for Muddy Waters, who said about Vaughan's substance abuse: "Stevie could perhaps be the greatest guitar player that ever lived, but he won't live to get 40 years old if he doesn't leave that white powder alone." The following year, he was required to return on January 16 and February 29 for court appearances.
During the final court date, on April 17, 1980, Vaughan was sentenced with two years' probation and was prohibited from leaving Texas. Along with a stipulation of entering treatment for drug abuse, he was required to "avoid persons or places of known disreputable or harmful character"; he refused to comply with both of these orders. After a lawyer was hired, his probation officer had the sentence revised to allow him to work outside of the state. The incident later caused him to refuse maid service while staying in hotels during concert tours.
Montreux Jazz Festival
Although popular in Texas at the time, Double Trouble failed to gain national attention. The group's visibility improved when record producer Jerry Wexler recommended them to Claude Nobs, organizer of the Montreux Jazz Festival. He insisted the festival's blues night would be great with Vaughan, whom he called "a jewel, one of those rarities who comes along once in a lifetime", and Nobs agreed to book Double Trouble on July 17.
Vaughan opened with a medley arrangement of Freddie King's song "Hide Away" and his own fast instrumental composition, "Rude Mood". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", Hound Dog Taylor's "Give Me Back My Wig", and Albert Collins' "Collins Shuffle", as well as three original compositions: "Pride and Joy", "Love Struck Baby", and "Dirty Pool". The set ended with boos from the audience. People's James McBride wrote:
According to road manager Don Opperman: "the way I remember it, the 'ooos' and the 'boos' were mixed together, but Stevie was pretty disappointed. Stevie [had] just handed me his guitar and walked off stage, and I'm like, 'are you coming back?' There was a doorway back there; the audience couldn't see the guys, but I could. He went back to the dressing room with his head in his hands. I went back there finally, and that was the end of the show." According to Vaughan: "it wasn't the whole crowd [that booed]. It was just a few people sitting right up front. The room there was built for acoustic jazz. When five or six people boo, wow, it sounds like the whole world hates you. They thought we were too loud, but shoot, I had four army blankets folded over my amp, and the volume level was on 2. I'm used to playin' on 10!" The performance was filmed and later released on DVD in September 2004.
On the following night, Double Trouble was booked in the lounge of the Montreux Casino, with Jackson Browne in attendance. Browne jammed with Double Trouble until the early morning hours and offered them free use of his personal recording studio in downtown Los Angeles. In late November the band accepted his offer and recorded ten songs in two days. While they were in the studio, Vaughan received a telephone call from David Bowie, who met him after the Montreux performance, and he invited him to participate in a recording session for his next studio album, Let's Dance. In January 1983, Vaughan recorded guitar on six of the album's eight songs, including the title track and "China Girl". The album was released on April 14, 1983, and sold over three times as many copies as Bowie's previous album.
National success
In mid-March 1983, Gregg Geller, vice president of A&R at Epic Records, signed Double Trouble to the label at the recommendation of record producer John Hammond. Soon afterward, Epic financed a music video for "Love Struck Baby", which was filmed at the Cherry Tavern in New York City. Vaughan recalled: "we changed the name of the place in the video. Four years ago I got married in a club where we used to play all the time called the Rome Inn. When they closed it down, the owner gave me the sign, so in the video we put that up behind me on the stage."
With the success of Let's Dance, Bowie requested Vaughan as the featured instrumentalist for the upcoming Serious Moonlight Tour, realizing that he was an essential aspect of the album's groundbreaking success. In late April, Vaughan began rehearsals for the tour in Las Colinas, Texas. When contract renegotiations for his performance fee failed, Vaughan abandoned the tour days before its opening date, and he was replaced by Earl Slick. Vaughan commented: "I couldn't gear everything on something I didn't really care a whole lot about. It was kind of risky, but I really didn't need all the headaches." Although contributing factors were widely disputed, Vaughan soon gained major publicity for quitting the tour.
On May 9, the band performed at The Bottom Line in New York City, where they opened for Bryan Adams, with Hammond, Mick Jagger, John McEnroe, Rick Nielsen, Billy Gibbons, and Johnny Winter in attendance. Brandenburg described the performance as "ungodly": "I think Stevie played every lick as loud and as hard and with as much intensity as I've ever heard him." The performance earned Vaughan a positive review published in the New York Post, asserting that Double Trouble outperformed Adams. "Fortunately, Bryan Adams, the Canadian rocker who is opening arena dates for Journey, doesn't headline too often", wrote Martin Porter, who claimed that after the band's performance, the stage had been "rendered to cinders by the most explosively original showmanship to grace the New York stage in some time."
Texas Flood
After acquiring the recordings from Browne's studio, Double Trouble began assembling the material for a full-length LP. The album, Texas Flood, opens with the track "Love Struck Baby", which was written for Lenny on their "love-struck day". He composed "Pride and Joy" and "I'm Cryin'" for one of his former girlfriends, Lindi Bethel. Although both are musically similar, their lyrics are two different perspectives of the relationship. Along with covers of Howlin' Wolf, the Isley Brothers, and Buddy Guy, the album included Vaughan's cover of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", a song which he became strongly associated with. "Lenny" served as a tribute to his wife, which he composed at the end of their bed.
Texas Flood featured cover art by illustrator Brad Holland, who is known for his artwork for Playboy and The New York Times. Originally envisioned with Vaughan sitting on a horse depicting a promotable resemblance, Holland painted an image of him leaning against a wall with a guitar, using a photograph as a reference. Released on June 13, 1983, Texas Flood peaked at number 38 and ultimately sold half a million copies. While Rolling Stone editor Kurt Loder asserted that Vaughan did not possess a distinctive voice, according to AllMusic senior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the release was a "monumental impact". Billboard described it as "a guitar boogie lovers delight". Agent Alex Hodges commented: "No one knew how big that record would be, because guitar players weren't necessarily in vogue, except for some that were so established they were undeniable ... he was one of the few artists that was recouped on every record in a short period of time."
On June 16, Vaughan gave a performance at Tango nightclub in Dallas, which celebrated the album's release. Assorted VIPs attended the performance, including Ted Nugent, Sammy Hagar, and members of The Kinks and Uriah Heep. Jack Chase, vice president of marketing for Epic, recalled: "the coming-out party at Tango was very important; it was absolutely huge. All the radio station personalities, DJs, program directors, all the retail record store owners and the important managers, press, all the executives from New York came down—about seven hundred people. We attacked in Dallas first with Q102-FM and [DJ] Redbeard. We had the Tango party—it was hot. It was the ticket." The Dallas Morning News reviewed the performance, starting with the rhetorical question; "what if Stevie Ray Vaughan had an album release party and everybody came? It happened Thursday night at Tango. ... The adrenalin must have been gushing through the musicians' veins as they performed with rare finesse and skill."
Following a brief tour in Europe, Hodges arranged an engagement for Double Trouble as The Moody Blues' opening act during a two-month tour of North America. Hodges stated that many people disliked the idea of Double Trouble opening for The Moody Blues, but asserted that a common thread which both bands shared was "album-oriented rock". Shannon described the tour as "glorious": "Our record hadn't become that successful yet, but we were playing in front of coliseums full of people. We just went out and played, and it fit like a glove. The sound rang through those big coliseums like a monster. People were going crazy, and they had no idea who we were!" After appearing on the television series Austin City Limits, the band played a sold-out concert at New York City's Beacon Theatre. Variety wrote that their ninety-minute set at the Beacon "left no doubt that this young Texas musician is indeed the 'guitar hero of the present era.'"
Couldn't Stand the Weather
In January 1984, Double Trouble began recording their second studio album, Couldn't Stand the Weather, at the Power Station, with John Hammond as executive producer and engineer Richard Mullen. Layton later recalled working with Hammond: "he was kind of like a nice hand on your shoulder, as opposed to someone that jumped in and said, 'let's redo this, let's do that more.' He didn't get involved in that way at all. He was a feedback person." As the sessions began, Vaughan's cover of Bob Geddins' "Tin Pan Alley" was recorded while audio levels were being checked. Layton remembers the performance: "... we did probably the quietest version we ever did up 'til that point. We ended it and [Hammond] said; 'that's the best that song will ever sound,' and we went; 'we haven't even got sounds, have we?' He goes, 'that doesn't matter. That's the best you'll ever do that song.' We tried it again five, six, seven times- I can't even remember. But it never quite sounded like it did that first time."
During recording sessions, Vaughan began experimenting with other combinations of musicians, including Fran Christina and Stan Harrison, who played drums and saxophone respectively on the jazz instrumental, "Stang's Swang". Jimmie Vaughan played rhythm guitar on his cover of Guitar Slim's "The Things That I Used to Do" and the title track, the latter of which Vaughan carries a worldly message in his lyrics. According to musicologist Andy Aledort, Vaughan's guitar playing throughout the song is marked by steady rhythmic strumming patterns and improvised lead lines, with a distinctive R&B and soul single-note riff, doubled in octaves by guitar and bass.
Couldn't Stand the Weather was released on May 15, 1984, and two weeks later it had rapidly outpaced the sales of Texas Flood. It peaked at number 31 and spent 38 weeks on the charts. The album includes Vaughan's cover of Jimi Hendrix's song, "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", which provoked inevitable comparisons to Hendrix. According to AllMusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Couldn't Stand the Weather "confirmed that the acclaimed debut was no fluke, while matching, if not bettering, the sales of its predecessor, thereby cementing Vaughan's status as a giant of modern blues." According to authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford, the album "was a major turning point in Stevie Ray Vaughan's development" and Vaughan's singing improved.
Carnegie Hall
On October 4, 1984, Vaughan headlined a performance at Carnegie Hall that included many guest musicians. For the second half of the concert, he added Jimmie as rhythm guitarist, drummer George Rains, keyboardist Dr. John, Roomful of Blues horn section, and featured vocalist Angela Strehli. The ensemble rehearsed for less than two weeks before the performance, and despite the solid dynamics of Double Trouble for the first half of the performance, according to Patoski and Crawford, the big band concept never entirely took form. Before arriving at the engagement, the venue sold out, which made Vaughan overexcited and nervous as he did not calm down until halfway through the third song. A benefit for the T.J. Martell Foundation's work in leukemia and cancer research, he was an important draw for the event. As his scheduled time slot drew closer, he indicated that he preferred traveling to the venue by limousine to avoid being swarmed by fans on the street; the band took the stage around 8:00 p.m. The audience of 2,200 people, which included Vaughan's wife, family and friends, transformed the venue into what Stephen Holden of The New York Times described as "a whistling, stomping roadhouse".
Introduced by Hammond as "one of the greatest guitar players of all time", Vaughan opened with "Scuttle Buttin'", wearing a custom-made mariachi suit he described as a "Mexican tuxedo". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of the Isley Brothers' "Testify", The Jimi Hendrix Experience's "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", "Tin Pan Alley", Elmore James' "The Sky Is Crying", and W. C. Clark's "Cold Shot", along with four original compositions including "Love Struck Baby", "Honey Bee", "Couldn't Stand the Weather", and "Rude Mood". During the second half of the performance, Vaughan performed covers by Larry Davis, Buddy Guy, Guitar Slim, Albert King, Jackie Wilson, and Albert Collins. The set ended with Vaughan performing solo renditions of "Lenny" and "Rude Mood".
The Dallas Times-Herald wrote of the performance at Carnegie Hall as; "was full of stomping feet and swaying bodies, kids in blue jeans hanging off the balconies, dancing bodies that clogged the aisles." The New York Times asserted that, despite the venue's "muddy" acoustics, their performance was "filled with verve", and Vaughan's playing was "handsomely displayed". Jimmie Vaughan later commented: "I was worried the crowd might be a little stiff. Turned out they're just like any other beer joint." Vaughan commented: "We won't be limited to just the trio, although that doesn't mean we'll stop doing the trio. I'm planning on doing that too. I ain't gonna stay in one place. If I do, I'm stupid." The performance was recorded and later released as an official live LP. The album was released posthumously on July 29, 1997, by Epic Records; it was ultimately certified gold.
Immediately after the concert, Vaughan attended a private party at a downtown club in New York, which was sponsored by MTV, where he was greeted by an hour's worth of supporters. On the following day, Double Trouble made an appearance at a record store in Greenwich Village, where they signed autographs for fans. In late October 1984, the band toured Australia and New Zealand, which included one of their first appearances on Australian television—on Hey Hey It's Saturday—where they performed "Texas Flood", and an interview on Sounds. On November 5 and 9, they played sold-out concerts at the Sydney Opera House. Upon returning to the U.S., Double Trouble went on a brief tour in California. Soon afterward, Vaughan and Lenny went to the island of Saint Croix, on the U.S. Virgin Islands in the Caribbean Sea, where they had spent some time vacationing in December. The next month, Double Trouble flew to Japan, where they appeared for five performances, including at Kōsei Nenkin Kaikan in Osaka.
Soul to Soul
In March 1985, recording for Double Trouble's third studio album, Soul to Soul, began at the Dallas Sound Lab. As the sessions progressed, Vaughan became increasingly frustrated with his own lack of inspiration. He was also allowed a relaxed pace of recording the album, which contributed to a lack of focus due to excesses in alcohol and other drugs. Roadie Byron Barr later recalled: "the routine was to go to the studio, do dope, and play ping-pong." Vaughan, who found it increasingly difficult to be able to play rhythm guitar parts and sing at the same time, wanted to add another dimension to the band, so he hired keyboardist Reese Wynans to record on the album; he joined the band soon thereafter.
During the album's production, Vaughan appeared at the Houston Astrodome on April 10, 1985, where he performed a slide guitar rendition of the U.S. national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner"; his performance was met with booing. Upon leaving the stage, Vaughan acquired an autograph from former player for the New York Yankees, Mickey Mantle. Astrodome publicist Molly Glentzer wrote in the Houston Press: "as Vaughan shuffled back behind home plate, he was only lucid enough to know that he wanted Mickey Mantle's autograph. Mantle obliged. 'I never signed a guitar before.' Nobody asked Vaughan for his autograph. I was sure he'd be dead before he hit 30." Critics associated his performance with Jimi Hendrix's rendition at Woodstock in 1969, yet Vaughan disliked this comparison: "I heard they even wrote about it in one of the music magazines and they tried to put the two versions side by side. I hate that stuff. His version was great."
Released on September 30, 1985, Soul to Soul peaked at number 34 and remained on the Billboard 200 through mid-1986, eventually certified gold. Critic Jimmy Guterman of Rolling Stone wrote: "there's some life left in their blues rock pastiche; it's also possible that they've run out of gas." According to Patoski and Crawford, sales of the album "did not match Couldn't Stand the Weather, suggesting Stevie Ray and Double Trouble were plateauing". Vaughan commented: "as far as what's on there song-wise, I like the album a lot. It meant a lot to us what we went through to get this record. There were a lot of odds and we still stayed strong. We grew a lot with the people in the band and immediate friends around us; we learned a lot and grew a lot closer. That has a lot to do with why it's called [Soul to Soul]."
Live Alive
After touring for nine and a half months, Epic requested a fourth album from Double Trouble as part of their contractual obligation. In July 1986, Vaughan decided that they would record the LP, Live Alive, during three live appearances in Austin and Dallas. On July 17 and 18, the band performed sold-out concerts at the Austin Opera House, and July 19 at the Dallas Starfest. They used recordings of these concerts to assemble the LP, which was produced by Vaughan. Shannon was backstage before the Austin concert and predicted to new manager Alex Hodges that both Vaughan and himself were "headed for a brick wall". Guitarist Denny Freeman attended the Austin performances; he called the shows a "musical mess, because they would go into these chaotic jams with no control. I didn't know what exactly was going on, but I was concerned." Both Layton and Shannon remarked that their work schedule and drugs were causing the band to lose focus. According to Wynans: "Things were getting illogical and crazy."
The Live Alive album was released on November 17, 1986, and the only official live Double Trouble LP made commercially available during Vaughan's lifetime, though it never appeared on the Billboard 200 chart. Though many critics claimed that most of the album was overdubbed, engineer Gary Olazabal, who mixed the album, asserted that most of the material was recorded poorly. Vaughan later admitted that it was not one of his better efforts; he recalled: "I wasn't in very good shape when we recorded Live Alive. At the time, I didn't realize how bad a shape I was in. There were more fix-it jobs done on the album than I would have liked. Some of the work sounds like [it was] the work of half-dead people. There were some great notes that came out, but I just wasn't in control; nobody was."
Drugs and alcohol
In 1960, when Vaughan was six years old, he began stealing his father's drinks. Drawn in by its effects, he started making his own drinks and this resulted in alcohol dependence. He explained: "that's when I first started stealing daddy's drinks. Or when my parents were gone, I'd find the bottle and make myself one. I thought it was cool ... thought the kids down the street would think it was cool. That's where it began, and I had been depending on it ever since." According to the authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford: "In the ensuing twenty-five years, he had worked his way through the Physicians' Desk Reference before finding his poisons of preference—alcohol and cocaine."
While Vaughan asserted that he first experienced the effects of cocaine when a doctor prescribed him a liquid solution of the stimulant as a nasal spray, according to Patoski and Crawford, the earliest that Vaughan is known to have ingested the drug is in 1975, while performing with the Cobras. Before that, Vaughan had briefly used other drugs such as cannabis, methamphetamine, and Quaaludes, the brand name for methaqualone. After 1975, he regularly drank whiskey and used cocaine, particularly mixing the two substances together. According to Hopkins, by the time of Double Trouble's European tour in September 1986, "his lifestyle of substance abuse had reached a peak, probably better characterized as the bottom of a deep chasm."
At the height of Vaughan's substance abuse, he drank of whiskey and used of cocaine each day. Personal assistant Tim Duckworth explained: "I would make sure he would eat breakfast instead of waking up drinking every morning, which was probably the worst thing he was doing." According to Vaughan: "it got to the point where if I'd try to say "hi" to somebody, I would just fall apart crying. It was like solid doom."
In September 1986, Double Trouble traveled to Denmark for a one-month tour of Europe. During the late night hours of September 28, Vaughan became ill after a performance in Ludwigshafen, Germany, suffering from near-death dehydration, for which he received medical treatment. The incident resulted in his checking into The London Clinic under the care of Dr. Victor Bloom, who warned him that he was a month away from death. After staying in London for more than a week, he returned to the United States and entered Peachford Hospital in Atlanta, where he spent four weeks in rehabilitation, and then checked into rehab in Austin.
Live Alive tour
In November 1986, following his departure from rehab, Vaughan moved back into his mother's Glenfield Avenue house in Dallas, which is where he had spent much of his childhood. During this time, Double Trouble began rehearsals for the Live Alive tour. Although Vaughan was nervous about performing after achieving sobriety, he received positive reassurance. Wynans later recalled: "Stevie was real worried about playing after he'd gotten sober...he didn't know if he had anything left to offer. Once we got back out on the road, he was very inspired and motivated." The tour began on November 23 at Towson State University, which was Vaughan's first performance with Double Trouble after rehab. On December 31, 1986, they played a concert at Atlanta's Fox Theatre, which featured encore performances with Lonnie Mack.
As the tour progressed, Vaughan was longing to work on material for his next LP, but in January 1987, he filed for a divorce from Lenny, which restricted him from any projects until the proceedings were finalized. This prevented him from writing and recording songs for almost two years, but Double Trouble wrote the song "Crossfire" with Bill Carter and Ruth Ellsworth. Layton recalled: "we wrote the music, and they had to write the lyrics. We had just gotten together; Stevie was unable to be there at that time. He was in Dallas doing some things, and we just got together and started writing some songs. That was the first one we wrote." On August 6, 1987, Double Trouble appeared at the Austin Aqua Festival, where they played to one of the largest audiences of their career. According to biographer Craig Hopkins, as many as 20,000 people attended the concert. Following a month-long tour as the opening act for Robert Plant in May 1988, which included a concert at Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens, the band was booked for a European leg, which included 22 performances, and ended in Oulu, Finland on July 17. This would be Vaughan's last concert appearance in Europe.
In Step
After Vaughan's divorce from Lenora "Lenny" Darlene Bailey became final, recording for Double Trouble's fourth and final studio album, In Step, began at Kiva Studios in Memphis, Tennessee, working with producer Jim Gaines and co-songwriter Doyle Bramhall. Initially, he had doubts about his musical and creative abilities after achieving sobriety, but he gained confidence as the sessions progressed. Shannon later recalled: "In Step was, for him, a big growing experience. In my opinion, it's our best studio album, and I think he felt that way, too." Bramhall, who had also entered rehab, wrote songs with Vaughan about addiction and redemption. According to Vaughan, the album was titled In Step because "I'm finally in step with life, in step with myself, in step with my music." The album's liner notes include the quote; "'thank God the elevator's broken," a reference to the twelve-step program proposed by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA).
After the In Step recording sessions moved to Los Angeles, Vaughan added horn players Joe Sublett and Darrell Leonard, who played saxophone and trumpet respectively on both "Crossfire" and "Love Me Darlin". Shortly before the album's production was complete, Vaughan and Double Trouble appeared at a presidential inaugural party in Washington, D.C. for George H. W. Bush. In Step was released on June 13, 1989, and eight months later, it was certified gold. The album was Vaughan's most commercially successful release and his first one to win a Grammy Award. It peaked at number 33 on the Billboard 200, spending 47 weeks on the chart. In Step included the song, "Crossfire", which was written by Double Trouble, Bill Carter, and Ruth Ellsworth; it became his only number one hit. The album also included one of his first recordings to feature the use of a Fuzz Face on Vaughan's cover of the Howlin' Wolf song, "Love Me Darlin.
In July 1989, Neil Perry, a writer for Sounds magazine, wrote: "the album closes with the brow-soothing swoon of 'Riviera Paradise,' a slow, lengthy guitar and piano workout that proves just why Vaughan is to the guitar what Nureyev is to ballet." According to music journalist Robert Christgau, Vaughan was "writing blues for AA...he escapes the blues undamaged for the first time in his career." In October 1989, the Boca Raton News described Vaughan's guitar solos as "determined, clear-headed and downright stinging" and his lyrics as "tension-filled allegories".
Death
On Monday, August 27, 1990, at 12:50 a.m. (CDT), Vaughan and members of Eric Clapton's touring entourage played an all-star encore jam session at Alpine Valley Music Theatre in Alpine Valley Resort in East Troy, Wisconsin. They then left for Midway International Airport in Chicago in a Bell 206B helicopter, the most common way for acts to enter and exit the venue, as there is only one road in and out, heavily used by fans. The helicopter crashed into a nearby ski hill shortly after takeoff. Vaughan and the four others on board—pilot Jeff Brown, agent Bobby Brooks, bodyguard Nigel Browne, and tour manager Colin Smythe—died. The helicopter was identified as being owned by Chicago-based company Omniflight Helicopters. Initial reports of the crash erroneously claimed that Clapton had also been killed. According to findings from an inquest conducted by the coroner's office in Elkhorn, all five victims were killed instantly.
The investigation determined the aircraft departed in foggy conditions with visibility reportedly under two miles, according to a local forecast. The National Transportation Safety Board report stated: "As the third helicopter was departing, it remained at a lower altitude than the others, and the pilot turned southeasterly toward rising terrain. Subsequently, the helicopter crashed on hilly terrain about three fifths of a mile from the takeoff point." Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) records showed that Brown was qualified to fly by instruments in a fixed-wing aircraft, but not in a helicopter. Toxicology tests performed on the victims revealed no traces of drugs or alcohol in their systems. Vaughan's funeral service was held on August 31, 1990, at Laurel Land Cemetery in Dallas, Texas. His wooden casket quickly became adorned with bouquets of flowers. An estimated 3,000 mourners joined a procession led by a white hearse. Among those at the public ceremony were Jeff Healey, Charlie Sexton, ZZ Top, Colin James, Stevie Wonder, Bonnie Raitt and Buddy Guy. Vaughan's grave marker reads: "Thank you ... for all the love you passed our way."
Musical style
Vaughan's music was rooted in blues, rock, and jazz. He was influenced by Jimi Hendrix, Albert King, Lonnie Mack, B.B. King, Freddie King, Albert Collins, Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Otis Rush, Guitar Slim, Chuck Berry, and Muddy Waters. According to nightclub owner Clifford Antone, who opened Antone's in 1975, Vaughan jammed with Albert King at Antone's in July 1977 and it almost "scared him to death", saying that "it was the best I've ever saw Albert or the best I ever saw Stevie". While Albert King had a substantial influence on Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix was Vaughan's greatest inspiration. Vaughan declared: "I love Hendrix for so many reasons. He was so much more than just a blues guitarist—he played damn well any kind of guitar he wanted. In fact I'm not sure if he even played the guitar—he played music." He was also influenced by such jazz guitarists as Django Reinhardt, Wes Montgomery, Kenny Burrell, and George Benson.
In 1987, Vaughan listed Lonnie Mack first among the guitarists he had listened to, both as a youngster and as an adult. Vaughan observed that Mack was "ahead of his time" and said, "I got a lot of my fast stuff from Lonnie". On another occasion, Vaughan said that he had learned tremolo picking and vibrato from Mack and that Mack had taught him to "play guitar from the heart." Mack recalled his first meeting with Vaughan in 1978:
Vaughan's relationship with another Texas blues legend, Johnny Winter, was a little more complex. Although they met several times, and often played sessions with the same musicians or even performed the same material, as in the case of Boot Hill, Vaughan always refrained from acknowledging Winter in any form. In his biography, "Raisin' Cain", Winter says that he was unnerved after reading Vaughan stating in an interview that he never met or knew Johnny Winter. "We even played together over at Tommy Shannon's house one time." Vaughan settled the issue in 1988 on the occasion of a blues festival in Europe where both he and Winter were on the bill, explaining that he has been misquoted and that "Every musician in Texas knows Johnny and has learned something from him". Asked to compare their playing styles in an interview in 2010, Winter admitted that "mine's a little bit rawer, I think."
Equipment
Guitars
Vaughan owned and used a variety of guitars during his career. His guitar of choice, and the instrument that he became most associated with, was the Fender Stratocaster, his favorite being a 1963 body with a 1962 neck and pickups dated from 1959. This is why Vaughan usually referred to his Stratocaster as a "1959 Strat". He explained why he favored this guitar in a 1983 interview: "I like the strength of its sound. Any guitar I play has got to be pretty versatile. It's got a big, strong tone and it'll take anything I do to it." Vaughan also referred to this instrument as his "first wife", or "Number One". Another favourite guitar was a slightly later Strat he named 'Lenny' after his wife, Lenora. While at a local pawn shop in 1980, Vaughan had noticed this particular guitar, a 1965 Stratocaster that had been refinished in red, with the original sunburst finish peeking through. It also had a 1910 Mandolin inlay just below the bridge. The pawn shop was asking $300 for it, which was way more than Vaughan had at the time. Lenny saw how badly he wanted this guitar, so she got six of their friends to chip in $50 each, and bought it for him. The guitar was presented to him on his birthday in 1980, and that night, after bringing "Lenny" (the guitar, and wife) home with him, he wrote the song, "Lenny". He started using a borrowed Stratocaster during high school and used Stratocasters predominantly in his live performances and recordings, although he did play other guitars, including custom guitars.
One of the custom guitars—nicknamed "Main"—was built by James Hamilton of Hamiltone Guitars in Buffalo, New York. It was a gift from Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top. Gibbons had commissioned Hamilton to build the guitar in 1979. There were some delays, including having to re-do the mother of pearl inlay of Vaughan's name on the fretboard when he changed his stage name from Stevie Vaughan to Stevie Ray Vaughan. The guitar was presented to him by Jim Hamilton on April 29, 1984. Hamilton recalls that Stevie Ray Vaughan was so happy with the guitar that he played it that night at Springfest on the University of Buffalo campus. It remained one of the main guitars he used on stage and in studio. Vaughan made some alterations to the guitar, including replacing the bronze color Gibson knobs with white Fender knobs, as he preferred the ribbing on the Fender knobs. The pickups had to be changed after the guitar was used in the "Couldn't Stand the Weather" video, in which Stevie and "Main" were drenched with water, and the pickups were ruined. Vaughan preferred guitar has been summarized as his,
Number One Strat, which Stevie claimed to be a ’59, since that was the date stamped on the back of the pickups… this was incorrect, however, as guitar tech Rene Martinez (who oversaw SRV’s guitars since 1980) found the stamp of 1963 on the body and 1962 on the original neck (the neck was replaced in 1989 after it could no longer be refretted properly; Rene used the neck from another SRV favorite, “Red”, as it was also a 1962 model). The pickups are also relatively low output, not the hot overwound myth that gained legs during the 80s… all 3 pickups are rumored to be under 6k ohms output impedance, which would be typical of a 1959 set (the neck pickups tended to be hottest, but not by much). Although the Fender SRV signature model uses Texas Special pickups, which Stevie was heavily involved in the making of, they do not accurately represent the sound of his original Number One.
Vaughan bought many Stratocasters and gave some away as gifts. A sunburst Diplomat Strat-style guitar was purchased by Vaughan and given to his girlfriend Janna Lapidus to learn to play on. Vaughan used a custom set of uncommonly heavy strings, gauges .013, .015, .019, .028, .038, .058, and tuned a half-step below standard tuning. He played with so much tension that it was not uncommon for him to separate his fingernail from the quick movement along the strings. The owner of an Austin club recalled Vaughan coming into the office between sets to borrow super glue, which he used to keep fingernail split from widening while he continued to play. The super glue was suggested by Rene Martinez, who was Stevie's guitar technician. Martinez eventually convinced Stevie to change to slightly lighter strings. He preferred a guitar neck with an asymmetrical profile (thicker at the top) which was more comfortable for his thumb-over style of playing. Heavy use of the vibrato bar necessitated frequent replacements; Vaughan often had his roadie, Byron Barr, obtain custom stainless steel bars made by Barr's father.
Vaughan was also photographed playing a Rickenbacker Capri, a National Duolian, Epiphone Riviera, Gibson Flying V, as well as several other models. Vaughan used a Gibson Johnny Smith to record "Stang's Swang", and a Guild 12-string acoustic for his performance on MTV Unplugged in January 1990. On June 24, 2004, one of Vaughan's Stratocasters, the aforementioned "Lenny" strat, was sold at an auction to benefit Eric Clapton's Crossroads Centre in Antigua; the instrument was bought by Guitar Center for $623,500.
Amplifiers and effects
Vaughan was a catalyst in the revival of vintage amplifiers and effects during the 1980s. His loud volume and use of heavy strings required powerful and robust amplifiers. Vaughan used two black-face Fender Super Reverbs, which were crucial in shaping his clear overdriven sound. He would often blend other amps with the Super Reverbs, including black-face Fender Vibroverbs, and brands such as Dumble, and Marshall, which he used for his clean sound.
While his mainstay effects were the Ibanez Tube Screamer and a Vox wah-wah pedal, Vaughan experimented with a range of effects. He used a Fender Vibratone, designed as a Leslie speaker for electric guitars, and provided a warbling chorus effect, which can be heard on the track "Cold Shot". He used a vintage Dallas Arbiter Fuzz Face that can be heard on In Step, as well as an Octavia. The Guitar Geek website provides a detailed illustration of Vaughan's 1985 equipment set up based on interviews with his guitar tech and effects builder, Cesar Diaz.
Legacy
Vaughan throughout his career revived blues rock and paved the way for many other artists. Vaughan's work continues to influence numerous blues, rock and alternative artists, including John Mayer, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Mike McCready, Albert Cummings, Los Lonely Boys and Chris Duarte, among others. AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine described Vaughan as "the leading light in American blues" and developed "a uniquely eclectic and fiery style that sounded like no other guitarist, regardless of genre". In 1983, Variety magazine called Vaughan the "guitar hero of the present era".
In the months that followed his death, Vaughan sold over 5.5 million albums in the United States. On September 25, 1990, Epic released Family Style, an LP the Vaughan brothers cut at Ardent Studios in Memphis, Tennessee. The label released several promotional singles and videos for the collaborative effort. In November 1990, CMV Enterprises released Pride and Joy, a collection of eight Double Trouble music videos. Sony signed a deal with the Vaughan estate to obtain control of his back catalog, as well as permission to release albums with previously unreleased material and new collections of released work. On October 29, 1991, The Sky Is Crying was released as Vaughan's first posthumous album with Double Trouble, and featured studio recordings from 1984 to 1985. Other compilations, live albums, and films have also been released since his death.
On October 3, 1991, Texas governor Ann Richards proclaimed "Stevie Ray Vaughan Commemoration Day", during which a memorial concert was held at the Texas Theatre. In 1993, a memorial statue of Vaughan was unveiled on Auditorium Shores and is the first public monument of a musician in Austin. In September 1994, a Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Run for Recovery was held in Dallas; the event was a benefit for the Ethel Daniels Foundation, established to help those in recovery from alcoholism and drug addiction who cannot afford treatment. In 1999, the Musicians' Assistance Program (later renamed MusiCares MAP Fund) created the "Stevie Ray Vaughan Award" to honor the memory of Vaughan and to recognize musicians for their devotion to helping other addicts struggling with the recovery process. The recipients include Eric Clapton, David Crosby, Steven Tyler, Alice Cooper, Ozzy Osbourne, Pete Townshend, Chris Cornell, Jerry Cantrell, Mike McCready, among others. In 1993, Martha Vaughan established the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Scholarship Fund, awarded to students at W.E. Greiner Middle School in Oakcliff who intend to attend college and pursue the arts as a profession.
Awards and honors
Vaughan won five W. C. Handy Awards and was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2000. In 1985, he was named an honorary admiral in the Texas Navy. Vaughan had a single number-one hit on the Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart for the song "Crossfire". His album sales in the U.S. stand at over 15 million units. Family Style, released shortly after his death, won the 1991 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album and became his best-selling, non-Double Trouble studio album with over a million shipments in the U.S. In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked him seventh among the "100 Greatest Guitar Players of All Time". He also became eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008, but did not appear on a nominations roster until 2014. He was inducted in the RRHOF alongside Double Trouble in 2015. Guitar World magazine ranked him as Number One in its list of the greatest blues guitarists.
In 1994 the city of Austin, Texas, erected the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial on the hiking trail beside Lady Bird Lake.
Discography
Texas Flood (1983)
Couldn't Stand the Weather (1984)
Soul to Soul (1985)
In Step (1989)
Family Style (1990)
The Sky is Crying (1991)
See also
1980s in music
List of blues rock musicians
List of electric blues musicians
List of guitarists
List of Texas blues musicians
Music of Austin, Texas
Music of Texas
Notes
Footnotes
Citations
Sources
Further reading
External links
The Stevie Ray Vaughan Archive
1954 births
1990 deaths
Accidental deaths in Wisconsin
American blues guitarists
American male guitarists
American blues singers
American blues singer-songwriters
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
Blues rock musicians
Double Trouble (band) members
Electric blues musicians
Epic Records artists
Sony Music artists
Grammy Award winners
Lead guitarists
Musicians from Dallas
Texas blues musicians
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1990
Victims of helicopter accidents or incidents in the United States
20th-century American singers
Slide guitarists
Resonator guitarists
Guitarists from Texas
20th-century American guitarists
People from Oak Cliff, Texas
20th-century American male singers
Musicians killed in aviation accidents or incidents
Singer-songwriters from Texas
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"Joey Daleboudt (; born ), better known by his stage name Joey Dale, is a Dutch DJ, record producer and musician from Rotterdam.\n\nThe majority of his releases are on Hardwell's label Revealed Recordings.\n\nCareer \nIn 2014, Dale collaborated with Dutch DJ Hardwell to release the song \"Arcadia\" which charted in Belgium and France. In 2015, he released \"Winds\" with Rico & Miella. In 2016, he collaborated with American producer Ryos to release the song \"Armageddon\" featuring singer/songwriter Tony Rodini via Revealed Recordings. He also released \"Crowd Control\" with Pitchback and \"Lights Out\" with Quintino.\n\nDiscography\n\nSingles\n\nCharting singles\n\nOther singles\n 2013: Cracked [Oxygen (Spinnin')]\n 2013: POING! (with Justin Prime) (Original Mix) [Dim Mak Records]\n 2014: Ready for Action (with Alvaro) [Spinnin Records]\n 2014: Shockwave [Revealed Recordings]\n 2014: Watcha Called Me [Revealed Recordings]\n 2014: About the Drop Out [Revealed Recordings]\n 2014: Arcadia (with Hardwell) [Revealed Recordings]\n 2014: Step Into Your Light (featuring Natalie Angiuli) (with Ares Carter) [Zouk Recordings (Armada)]\n 2014: Deja Vu (featuring Delora) (with Dvbbs) [Spinnin Records]\n 2014: Access Denied [Doorn (Spinnin)]\n 2015: Gladiator [Revealed Recordings]\n 2015: Zodiac [Revealed Recordings]\n 2015: Haunted House [Revealed Recordings]\n 2015: The Harder They Fall [Revealed Recordings]\n 2015: Timecode (with Thomas Newson) [Revealed Recordings]\n 2015: Winds (with Rico & Miella) [Revealed Recordings]\n 2015: Epsilon [Revealed Recordings]\n 2016: Where Dreams Are Made (featuring Monstere) [Revealed Recordings]\n 2016: Long Way Home (with Paris & Simo and Brandon Lethi) [Revealed Recordings]\n 2016: Lights Out (with Quintino and Channi Monroe) [Spinnin Records]\n 2016: \"Makes Me Wonder\" (with Reece Low) [Armada Trice] \n 2016: \"Armageddon\" (with Ryos and Tony Rodini) [Revealed Recordings]\n 2016: \"Everest\" (with Ravitez) [Wall Recordings]\n 2016: \"Higher\" (with Olly James) [Revealed Recordings]\n 2016: \"Crowd Control\" (with Pitchback) [Revealed Recordings]\n 2016: \"Shake It\" (with Maddix) [Revealed Recordings]\n 2017: \"Rogue Ones\" (with Adventurer and Micah Martin) [Revealed Recordings]\n 2017: \"Show Me\" [Mixmash Deep]\n 2017: \"Taking Me Home\" (with Anthony Dircson featuring Kennedy Ihaka) [Houston, Taxes]\n 2017: \"Under My Sheets\" (with Rico & Miella) [Joey Dale Music]\n 2017: \"Black Sahara\" (with Kaaze featuring Aloma Steele) [Revealed Recordings]\n 2018: \"All In My Head\" (with Luca Testa featuring Phillip Matta) [Maxximize]\n\nRemixes\n 2015: Swanky Tunes, C. Todd Nielsen - Fire In Our Hearts (Joey Dale Remix) [Revealed Recordings]\n\nReferences\n\nNotes\n A Did not enter the Ultratop 50, but peaked on the Flemish Ultratip chart.\n B Did not enter the Ultratop 50, but peaked on the Walloon Ultratip chart.\n C Did not enter the Ultratop 50, but peaked on the Dance Bubbling Under chart.\n\nSources\n\nExternal links\n \n\n1993 births\nLiving people\nDutch dance musicians\nDutch DJs\nDutch record producers\nDutch house musicians\nRemixers\nMusicians from Rotterdam\nRevealed Recordings artists\nElectronic dance music DJs",
"Augustus \"Gus\" Aiken (July 26, 1902 in Charleston, South Carolina – April 1, 1973 in New York City) was an early jazz trumpeter who also did blues. He started with the Jenkins Orphanage band.\n\nHe was first recorded professionally in 1919. In the 1920s he worked with several groups, but his best known work would be with Louis Armstrong. He went on to play with Sid Catlett, Roy Eldridge, and Elmer Snowden before his career declined. The end of the Big Band era and the rise of rock and roll is seen as causing the decline.\n\nHis name is often incorrectly spelled as \"Gus Aitken\".\n\nWeb sources\n\nExternal links\nJazz database (In French)\n Gus Aiken recordings at the Discography of American Historical Recordings.\n\nAmerican jazz trumpeters\nAmerican male trumpeters\n1973 deaths\n1902 births\n20th-century American musicians\n20th-century trumpeters\n20th-century American male musicians\nAmerican male jazz musicians"
] |
[
"Stevie Ray Vaughan",
"First recordings",
"In what year did Stevie Ray Vaughan start recording?",
"In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands,",
"What songs were on his first album?",
"They recorded two songs, \"Red, White and Blue\" and \"I Heard a Voice Last Night\",",
"What other musicians did SRV play with on his first recordings?",
"feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird."
] | C_156015fd0dc74c469a47cbc6a542733a_0 | How did critics receive his first recordings? | 4 | How did critics receive Stevie Ray Vaughan's first recordings? | Stevie Ray Vaughan | In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Country Club, a venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined a rock band named Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months. In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were disastrous. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed. In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras that included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King. Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde Pharaoh. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band. CANNOTANSWER | the album was rejected by A&M, | Stephen Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954August 27, 1990) was an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer, best known as the guitarist and frontman of the blues rock trio Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble. Although his mainstream career only spanned seven years, he is considered an icon and one of the most influential musicians in the history of blues music, and one of the greatest guitarists of all time.
Born and raised in Dallas, Texas, Vaughan began playing guitar at age seven, initially inspired by his elder brother, Jimmie Vaughan. In 1972, he dropped out of high school and moved to Austin, where he began to gain a following after playing gigs on the local club circuit. Vaughan joined forces with Tommy Shannon on bass and Chris Layton on drums as Double Trouble in 1978 and established it as part of the Austin music scene; it soon became one of the most popular acts in Texas. He performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1982, where David Bowie saw him play and contacted him for a studio gig, resulting in Stevie playing his blues guitar on the album Let's Dance (1983), before being discovered by John Hammond, who interested major label Epic Records in signing Vaughan and his band to a record deal. Within months, they achieved mainstream success for the critically acclaimed debut album Texas Flood. With a series of successful network television appearances and extensive concert tours, Vaughan became the leading figure in the blues revival of the 1980s.
Playing his guitar behind his back or plucking the strings with his teeth as Jimi Hendrix did, he earned unprecedented stardom in Europe, which later resulted in breakthroughs for guitar players like Robert Cray, Jeff Healey, Robben Ford and Walter Trout, amongst others.
During the majority of his life, Vaughan struggled with drug and alcohol addiction. He also struggled with the personal and professional pressures of fame and his marriage to Lenora "Lenny" Bailey. He successfully completed rehabilitation and began touring again with Double Trouble in November 1986. His fourth and final studio album In Step reached number 33 in the United States in 1989; it was one of Vaughan's most critically and commercially successful releases and included his only number-one hit, "Crossfire". He became one of the world's most highly demanded blues performers, and he headlined Madison Square Garden in 1989 and the Beale Street Music Festival in 1990.
On August 27, 1990, Vaughan and four others were killed in a helicopter crash in East Troy, Wisconsin, after performing with Double Trouble at Alpine Valley Music Theatre. An investigation concluded that the cause was pilot error and Vaughan's family later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Omniflight Helicopters that was settled out of court. Vaughan's music continued to achieve commercial success with several posthumous releases and has sold over 15 million albums in the United States alone. In 2003, David Fricke of Rolling Stone ranked him the seventh greatest guitarist of all time. Vaughan was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015, along with Double Trouble bandmates Chris Layton, Tommy Shannon, and Reese Wynans.
Family and early life
Stevie's grandfather, Thomas Lee Vaughan, married Laura Belle LaRue and moved to Rockwall County, Texas, where they lived by sharecropping.
Stevie's father, Jimmie Lee Vaughan, was born on September 6, 1921. Jimmie, also known as Jim and Big Jim, dropped out of school at age sixteen and enlisted in the U.S. Navy during World War II. After his discharge, he married Martha Jean (née Cook; 1928–2009) on January 13, 1950. They had a son, Jimmie, in 1951. Stephen was born at Methodist Hospital on October 3, 1954, in Dallas, Texas. Big Jim secured a job as an asbestos worker. The family moved frequently, living in other states such as Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Oklahoma before ultimately moving to the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. A shy and insecure boy, Vaughan was deeply affected by his childhood experiences. His father struggled with alcohol abuse and often terrorized his family and friends with his bad temper. In later years, Vaughan recalled that he had been a victim of his father's violence. His father died on August 27, 1986, exactly four years before Vaughan himself.
First instruments
In the early 1960s, Vaughan's admiration for his brother Jimmie resulted in his trying different instruments such as the drums and saxophone. In 1961, for his seventh birthday, Vaughan received his first guitar, a toy from Sears with Western motif. Learning by ear, he diligently committed himself, following along to songs by the Nightcaps, particularly "Wine, Wine, Wine" and "Thunderbird". He listened to blues artists such as Albert King, Otis Rush, and Muddy Waters, and rock guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix and Lonnie Mack, as well as jazz guitarists including Kenny Burrell. In 1963, he acquired his first electric guitar, a Gibson ES-125T, as a hand-me-down from Jimmie.
Soon after he acquired the electric guitar, Vaughan joined his first band, the Chantones, in 1965. Their first show was at a talent contest held in Dallas' Hill Theatre, but after realizing that they could not perform a Jimmy Reed song in its entirety, Vaughan left the band and joined the Brooklyn Underground, playing professionally at local bars and clubs. He received Jimmie's Fender Broadcaster, which he later traded for an Epiphone Riviera. When Jimmie left home at age sixteen, Vaughan's apparent obsession with the instrument caused a lack of support from his parents. Miserable at home, he took a job at a local hamburger stand, where he washed dishes and dumped trash for seventy cents an hour. After falling into a barrel of grease, he grew tired of the job and quit to devote his life to a music career.
Music career
Early years
In May 1969, after leaving the Brooklyn Underground, Vaughan joined a band called the Southern Distributor. He had learned the Yardbirds' "Jeff's Boogie" and played the song at the audition. Mike Steinbach, the group's drummer, commented: "The kid was fourteen. We auditioned him on 'Jeff's Boogie,' really fast instrumental guitar, and he played it note for note." Although they played pop rock covers, Vaughan conveyed his interest in the addition of blues songs to the group's repertoire; he was told that he wouldn't earn a living playing blues music and he and the band parted ways. Later that year, bassist Tommy Shannon walked into a Dallas club and heard Vaughan playing guitar. Fascinated by the skillful playing, which he described as "incredible even then", Shannon borrowed a bass guitar and the two jammed. Within a few years, they began performing together in a band called Krackerjack.
In February 1970, Vaughan joined a band called Liberation, which was a nine-piece group with a horn section. Having spent the past month briefly playing bass with Jimmie in Texas Storm, he had originally auditioned as bassist. Impressed by Vaughan's guitar playing, Scott Phares, the group's original guitarist, modestly became the bassist. In mid-1970, they performed at the Adolphus Hotel in downtown Dallas, where ZZ Top asked them to perform. During Liberation's break, Vaughan jammed with ZZ Top on the Nightcaps song "Thunderbird". Phares later described the performance: "they tore the house down. It was awesome. It was one of those magical evenings. Stevie fit in like a glove on a hand."
Attending Justin F. Kimball High School during the early 1970s, Vaughan's late-night shows contributed to his neglect in his studies, including music theory; he would often sleep during class. His pursuit of a musical career was disapproved of by many of the school's administrators but he was also encouraged by many people, including his art teacher, to strive for a career in art. In his sophomore year, he attended an evening class for experimental art at Southern Methodist University, but left when it conflicted with rehearsal. Vaughan later spoke of his dislike of the school and recalled having received daily notes from the principal about his grooming.
First recordings
In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Club, a local blues venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months.
In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were unsuccessful. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed.
In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras which included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King.
Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde "Pharaoh" Walden. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band.
Double Trouble
In mid-May 1978, Clark left to form his own group and Vaughan renamed the band Double Trouble, taken from the title of an Otis Rush song. Following the recruitment of bassist Jackie Newhouse, Walden quit in July, and was briefly replaced by Jack Moore, who had moved to Texas from Boston; he performed with the band for about two months. Vaughan then began looking for a drummer and soon after, he met Chris Layton through Sublett, who was his roommate. Layton, who had recently parted ways with Greezy Wheels, was taught by Vaughan to play a shuffle rhythm. When Vaughan offered Layton the position, he agreed. In early July, Vaughan befriended Lenora Bailey, known as "Lenny", who became his girlfriend, and ultimately his wife. The marriage was to last for six and a half years.
In early October 1978, Vaughan and Double Trouble earned a frequent residency performing at one of Austin's most popular nightspots, the Rome Inn. During a performance, Edi Johnson, an accountant at Manor Downs, noticed Vaughan. She remembered: "I'm not an authority on music—it's whatever turned me on—but this did." She recommended him to Manor Downs owner Frances Carr and general manager Chesley Millikin, who was interested in managing artists and saw Vaughan's musical potential. After Barton quit Double Trouble in mid-November 1979, Millikin signed Vaughan to a management contract. Vaughan also hired Robert "Cutter" Brandenburg as road manager, whom he had met in 1969. Addressing him as "Stevie Ray", Brandenburg convinced Vaughan to use his middle name on stage.
In October 1980, bassist Tommy Shannon attended a Double Trouble performance at Rockefeller's in Houston. Shannon, who was playing with Alan Haynes at the time, participated in a jam session with Vaughan and Layton halfway through their set. Shannon later commented: "I went down there that night, and I'll never forget this: it was like, when I walked in the door and I heard them playing, it was like a revelation. 'That's where I want to be; that's where I belong, right there.' During the break, I went up to Stevie and told him that. I didn't try to sneak around and hide it from the bass player [Jackie Newhouse]—I didn't know if he was listening or not. I just really wanted to be in that band. I sat in that night and it sounded great." Almost three months later, when Vaughan offered Shannon the position, he readily accepted.
Drug charge and trial
On December 5, 1979, while Vaughan was in a dressing room before a performance in Houston, an off-duty police officer arrested him after witnessing his usage of cocaine near an open window. He was formally charged with cocaine possession and subsequently released on $1,000 bail. Double Trouble was the opening act for Muddy Waters, who said about Vaughan's substance abuse: "Stevie could perhaps be the greatest guitar player that ever lived, but he won't live to get 40 years old if he doesn't leave that white powder alone." The following year, he was required to return on January 16 and February 29 for court appearances.
During the final court date, on April 17, 1980, Vaughan was sentenced with two years' probation and was prohibited from leaving Texas. Along with a stipulation of entering treatment for drug abuse, he was required to "avoid persons or places of known disreputable or harmful character"; he refused to comply with both of these orders. After a lawyer was hired, his probation officer had the sentence revised to allow him to work outside of the state. The incident later caused him to refuse maid service while staying in hotels during concert tours.
Montreux Jazz Festival
Although popular in Texas at the time, Double Trouble failed to gain national attention. The group's visibility improved when record producer Jerry Wexler recommended them to Claude Nobs, organizer of the Montreux Jazz Festival. He insisted the festival's blues night would be great with Vaughan, whom he called "a jewel, one of those rarities who comes along once in a lifetime", and Nobs agreed to book Double Trouble on July 17.
Vaughan opened with a medley arrangement of Freddie King's song "Hide Away" and his own fast instrumental composition, "Rude Mood". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", Hound Dog Taylor's "Give Me Back My Wig", and Albert Collins' "Collins Shuffle", as well as three original compositions: "Pride and Joy", "Love Struck Baby", and "Dirty Pool". The set ended with boos from the audience. People's James McBride wrote:
According to road manager Don Opperman: "the way I remember it, the 'ooos' and the 'boos' were mixed together, but Stevie was pretty disappointed. Stevie [had] just handed me his guitar and walked off stage, and I'm like, 'are you coming back?' There was a doorway back there; the audience couldn't see the guys, but I could. He went back to the dressing room with his head in his hands. I went back there finally, and that was the end of the show." According to Vaughan: "it wasn't the whole crowd [that booed]. It was just a few people sitting right up front. The room there was built for acoustic jazz. When five or six people boo, wow, it sounds like the whole world hates you. They thought we were too loud, but shoot, I had four army blankets folded over my amp, and the volume level was on 2. I'm used to playin' on 10!" The performance was filmed and later released on DVD in September 2004.
On the following night, Double Trouble was booked in the lounge of the Montreux Casino, with Jackson Browne in attendance. Browne jammed with Double Trouble until the early morning hours and offered them free use of his personal recording studio in downtown Los Angeles. In late November the band accepted his offer and recorded ten songs in two days. While they were in the studio, Vaughan received a telephone call from David Bowie, who met him after the Montreux performance, and he invited him to participate in a recording session for his next studio album, Let's Dance. In January 1983, Vaughan recorded guitar on six of the album's eight songs, including the title track and "China Girl". The album was released on April 14, 1983, and sold over three times as many copies as Bowie's previous album.
National success
In mid-March 1983, Gregg Geller, vice president of A&R at Epic Records, signed Double Trouble to the label at the recommendation of record producer John Hammond. Soon afterward, Epic financed a music video for "Love Struck Baby", which was filmed at the Cherry Tavern in New York City. Vaughan recalled: "we changed the name of the place in the video. Four years ago I got married in a club where we used to play all the time called the Rome Inn. When they closed it down, the owner gave me the sign, so in the video we put that up behind me on the stage."
With the success of Let's Dance, Bowie requested Vaughan as the featured instrumentalist for the upcoming Serious Moonlight Tour, realizing that he was an essential aspect of the album's groundbreaking success. In late April, Vaughan began rehearsals for the tour in Las Colinas, Texas. When contract renegotiations for his performance fee failed, Vaughan abandoned the tour days before its opening date, and he was replaced by Earl Slick. Vaughan commented: "I couldn't gear everything on something I didn't really care a whole lot about. It was kind of risky, but I really didn't need all the headaches." Although contributing factors were widely disputed, Vaughan soon gained major publicity for quitting the tour.
On May 9, the band performed at The Bottom Line in New York City, where they opened for Bryan Adams, with Hammond, Mick Jagger, John McEnroe, Rick Nielsen, Billy Gibbons, and Johnny Winter in attendance. Brandenburg described the performance as "ungodly": "I think Stevie played every lick as loud and as hard and with as much intensity as I've ever heard him." The performance earned Vaughan a positive review published in the New York Post, asserting that Double Trouble outperformed Adams. "Fortunately, Bryan Adams, the Canadian rocker who is opening arena dates for Journey, doesn't headline too often", wrote Martin Porter, who claimed that after the band's performance, the stage had been "rendered to cinders by the most explosively original showmanship to grace the New York stage in some time."
Texas Flood
After acquiring the recordings from Browne's studio, Double Trouble began assembling the material for a full-length LP. The album, Texas Flood, opens with the track "Love Struck Baby", which was written for Lenny on their "love-struck day". He composed "Pride and Joy" and "I'm Cryin'" for one of his former girlfriends, Lindi Bethel. Although both are musically similar, their lyrics are two different perspectives of the relationship. Along with covers of Howlin' Wolf, the Isley Brothers, and Buddy Guy, the album included Vaughan's cover of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", a song which he became strongly associated with. "Lenny" served as a tribute to his wife, which he composed at the end of their bed.
Texas Flood featured cover art by illustrator Brad Holland, who is known for his artwork for Playboy and The New York Times. Originally envisioned with Vaughan sitting on a horse depicting a promotable resemblance, Holland painted an image of him leaning against a wall with a guitar, using a photograph as a reference. Released on June 13, 1983, Texas Flood peaked at number 38 and ultimately sold half a million copies. While Rolling Stone editor Kurt Loder asserted that Vaughan did not possess a distinctive voice, according to AllMusic senior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the release was a "monumental impact". Billboard described it as "a guitar boogie lovers delight". Agent Alex Hodges commented: "No one knew how big that record would be, because guitar players weren't necessarily in vogue, except for some that were so established they were undeniable ... he was one of the few artists that was recouped on every record in a short period of time."
On June 16, Vaughan gave a performance at Tango nightclub in Dallas, which celebrated the album's release. Assorted VIPs attended the performance, including Ted Nugent, Sammy Hagar, and members of The Kinks and Uriah Heep. Jack Chase, vice president of marketing for Epic, recalled: "the coming-out party at Tango was very important; it was absolutely huge. All the radio station personalities, DJs, program directors, all the retail record store owners and the important managers, press, all the executives from New York came down—about seven hundred people. We attacked in Dallas first with Q102-FM and [DJ] Redbeard. We had the Tango party—it was hot. It was the ticket." The Dallas Morning News reviewed the performance, starting with the rhetorical question; "what if Stevie Ray Vaughan had an album release party and everybody came? It happened Thursday night at Tango. ... The adrenalin must have been gushing through the musicians' veins as they performed with rare finesse and skill."
Following a brief tour in Europe, Hodges arranged an engagement for Double Trouble as The Moody Blues' opening act during a two-month tour of North America. Hodges stated that many people disliked the idea of Double Trouble opening for The Moody Blues, but asserted that a common thread which both bands shared was "album-oriented rock". Shannon described the tour as "glorious": "Our record hadn't become that successful yet, but we were playing in front of coliseums full of people. We just went out and played, and it fit like a glove. The sound rang through those big coliseums like a monster. People were going crazy, and they had no idea who we were!" After appearing on the television series Austin City Limits, the band played a sold-out concert at New York City's Beacon Theatre. Variety wrote that their ninety-minute set at the Beacon "left no doubt that this young Texas musician is indeed the 'guitar hero of the present era.'"
Couldn't Stand the Weather
In January 1984, Double Trouble began recording their second studio album, Couldn't Stand the Weather, at the Power Station, with John Hammond as executive producer and engineer Richard Mullen. Layton later recalled working with Hammond: "he was kind of like a nice hand on your shoulder, as opposed to someone that jumped in and said, 'let's redo this, let's do that more.' He didn't get involved in that way at all. He was a feedback person." As the sessions began, Vaughan's cover of Bob Geddins' "Tin Pan Alley" was recorded while audio levels were being checked. Layton remembers the performance: "... we did probably the quietest version we ever did up 'til that point. We ended it and [Hammond] said; 'that's the best that song will ever sound,' and we went; 'we haven't even got sounds, have we?' He goes, 'that doesn't matter. That's the best you'll ever do that song.' We tried it again five, six, seven times- I can't even remember. But it never quite sounded like it did that first time."
During recording sessions, Vaughan began experimenting with other combinations of musicians, including Fran Christina and Stan Harrison, who played drums and saxophone respectively on the jazz instrumental, "Stang's Swang". Jimmie Vaughan played rhythm guitar on his cover of Guitar Slim's "The Things That I Used to Do" and the title track, the latter of which Vaughan carries a worldly message in his lyrics. According to musicologist Andy Aledort, Vaughan's guitar playing throughout the song is marked by steady rhythmic strumming patterns and improvised lead lines, with a distinctive R&B and soul single-note riff, doubled in octaves by guitar and bass.
Couldn't Stand the Weather was released on May 15, 1984, and two weeks later it had rapidly outpaced the sales of Texas Flood. It peaked at number 31 and spent 38 weeks on the charts. The album includes Vaughan's cover of Jimi Hendrix's song, "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", which provoked inevitable comparisons to Hendrix. According to AllMusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Couldn't Stand the Weather "confirmed that the acclaimed debut was no fluke, while matching, if not bettering, the sales of its predecessor, thereby cementing Vaughan's status as a giant of modern blues." According to authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford, the album "was a major turning point in Stevie Ray Vaughan's development" and Vaughan's singing improved.
Carnegie Hall
On October 4, 1984, Vaughan headlined a performance at Carnegie Hall that included many guest musicians. For the second half of the concert, he added Jimmie as rhythm guitarist, drummer George Rains, keyboardist Dr. John, Roomful of Blues horn section, and featured vocalist Angela Strehli. The ensemble rehearsed for less than two weeks before the performance, and despite the solid dynamics of Double Trouble for the first half of the performance, according to Patoski and Crawford, the big band concept never entirely took form. Before arriving at the engagement, the venue sold out, which made Vaughan overexcited and nervous as he did not calm down until halfway through the third song. A benefit for the T.J. Martell Foundation's work in leukemia and cancer research, he was an important draw for the event. As his scheduled time slot drew closer, he indicated that he preferred traveling to the venue by limousine to avoid being swarmed by fans on the street; the band took the stage around 8:00 p.m. The audience of 2,200 people, which included Vaughan's wife, family and friends, transformed the venue into what Stephen Holden of The New York Times described as "a whistling, stomping roadhouse".
Introduced by Hammond as "one of the greatest guitar players of all time", Vaughan opened with "Scuttle Buttin'", wearing a custom-made mariachi suit he described as a "Mexican tuxedo". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of the Isley Brothers' "Testify", The Jimi Hendrix Experience's "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", "Tin Pan Alley", Elmore James' "The Sky Is Crying", and W. C. Clark's "Cold Shot", along with four original compositions including "Love Struck Baby", "Honey Bee", "Couldn't Stand the Weather", and "Rude Mood". During the second half of the performance, Vaughan performed covers by Larry Davis, Buddy Guy, Guitar Slim, Albert King, Jackie Wilson, and Albert Collins. The set ended with Vaughan performing solo renditions of "Lenny" and "Rude Mood".
The Dallas Times-Herald wrote of the performance at Carnegie Hall as; "was full of stomping feet and swaying bodies, kids in blue jeans hanging off the balconies, dancing bodies that clogged the aisles." The New York Times asserted that, despite the venue's "muddy" acoustics, their performance was "filled with verve", and Vaughan's playing was "handsomely displayed". Jimmie Vaughan later commented: "I was worried the crowd might be a little stiff. Turned out they're just like any other beer joint." Vaughan commented: "We won't be limited to just the trio, although that doesn't mean we'll stop doing the trio. I'm planning on doing that too. I ain't gonna stay in one place. If I do, I'm stupid." The performance was recorded and later released as an official live LP. The album was released posthumously on July 29, 1997, by Epic Records; it was ultimately certified gold.
Immediately after the concert, Vaughan attended a private party at a downtown club in New York, which was sponsored by MTV, where he was greeted by an hour's worth of supporters. On the following day, Double Trouble made an appearance at a record store in Greenwich Village, where they signed autographs for fans. In late October 1984, the band toured Australia and New Zealand, which included one of their first appearances on Australian television—on Hey Hey It's Saturday—where they performed "Texas Flood", and an interview on Sounds. On November 5 and 9, they played sold-out concerts at the Sydney Opera House. Upon returning to the U.S., Double Trouble went on a brief tour in California. Soon afterward, Vaughan and Lenny went to the island of Saint Croix, on the U.S. Virgin Islands in the Caribbean Sea, where they had spent some time vacationing in December. The next month, Double Trouble flew to Japan, where they appeared for five performances, including at Kōsei Nenkin Kaikan in Osaka.
Soul to Soul
In March 1985, recording for Double Trouble's third studio album, Soul to Soul, began at the Dallas Sound Lab. As the sessions progressed, Vaughan became increasingly frustrated with his own lack of inspiration. He was also allowed a relaxed pace of recording the album, which contributed to a lack of focus due to excesses in alcohol and other drugs. Roadie Byron Barr later recalled: "the routine was to go to the studio, do dope, and play ping-pong." Vaughan, who found it increasingly difficult to be able to play rhythm guitar parts and sing at the same time, wanted to add another dimension to the band, so he hired keyboardist Reese Wynans to record on the album; he joined the band soon thereafter.
During the album's production, Vaughan appeared at the Houston Astrodome on April 10, 1985, where he performed a slide guitar rendition of the U.S. national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner"; his performance was met with booing. Upon leaving the stage, Vaughan acquired an autograph from former player for the New York Yankees, Mickey Mantle. Astrodome publicist Molly Glentzer wrote in the Houston Press: "as Vaughan shuffled back behind home plate, he was only lucid enough to know that he wanted Mickey Mantle's autograph. Mantle obliged. 'I never signed a guitar before.' Nobody asked Vaughan for his autograph. I was sure he'd be dead before he hit 30." Critics associated his performance with Jimi Hendrix's rendition at Woodstock in 1969, yet Vaughan disliked this comparison: "I heard they even wrote about it in one of the music magazines and they tried to put the two versions side by side. I hate that stuff. His version was great."
Released on September 30, 1985, Soul to Soul peaked at number 34 and remained on the Billboard 200 through mid-1986, eventually certified gold. Critic Jimmy Guterman of Rolling Stone wrote: "there's some life left in their blues rock pastiche; it's also possible that they've run out of gas." According to Patoski and Crawford, sales of the album "did not match Couldn't Stand the Weather, suggesting Stevie Ray and Double Trouble were plateauing". Vaughan commented: "as far as what's on there song-wise, I like the album a lot. It meant a lot to us what we went through to get this record. There were a lot of odds and we still stayed strong. We grew a lot with the people in the band and immediate friends around us; we learned a lot and grew a lot closer. That has a lot to do with why it's called [Soul to Soul]."
Live Alive
After touring for nine and a half months, Epic requested a fourth album from Double Trouble as part of their contractual obligation. In July 1986, Vaughan decided that they would record the LP, Live Alive, during three live appearances in Austin and Dallas. On July 17 and 18, the band performed sold-out concerts at the Austin Opera House, and July 19 at the Dallas Starfest. They used recordings of these concerts to assemble the LP, which was produced by Vaughan. Shannon was backstage before the Austin concert and predicted to new manager Alex Hodges that both Vaughan and himself were "headed for a brick wall". Guitarist Denny Freeman attended the Austin performances; he called the shows a "musical mess, because they would go into these chaotic jams with no control. I didn't know what exactly was going on, but I was concerned." Both Layton and Shannon remarked that their work schedule and drugs were causing the band to lose focus. According to Wynans: "Things were getting illogical and crazy."
The Live Alive album was released on November 17, 1986, and the only official live Double Trouble LP made commercially available during Vaughan's lifetime, though it never appeared on the Billboard 200 chart. Though many critics claimed that most of the album was overdubbed, engineer Gary Olazabal, who mixed the album, asserted that most of the material was recorded poorly. Vaughan later admitted that it was not one of his better efforts; he recalled: "I wasn't in very good shape when we recorded Live Alive. At the time, I didn't realize how bad a shape I was in. There were more fix-it jobs done on the album than I would have liked. Some of the work sounds like [it was] the work of half-dead people. There were some great notes that came out, but I just wasn't in control; nobody was."
Drugs and alcohol
In 1960, when Vaughan was six years old, he began stealing his father's drinks. Drawn in by its effects, he started making his own drinks and this resulted in alcohol dependence. He explained: "that's when I first started stealing daddy's drinks. Or when my parents were gone, I'd find the bottle and make myself one. I thought it was cool ... thought the kids down the street would think it was cool. That's where it began, and I had been depending on it ever since." According to the authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford: "In the ensuing twenty-five years, he had worked his way through the Physicians' Desk Reference before finding his poisons of preference—alcohol and cocaine."
While Vaughan asserted that he first experienced the effects of cocaine when a doctor prescribed him a liquid solution of the stimulant as a nasal spray, according to Patoski and Crawford, the earliest that Vaughan is known to have ingested the drug is in 1975, while performing with the Cobras. Before that, Vaughan had briefly used other drugs such as cannabis, methamphetamine, and Quaaludes, the brand name for methaqualone. After 1975, he regularly drank whiskey and used cocaine, particularly mixing the two substances together. According to Hopkins, by the time of Double Trouble's European tour in September 1986, "his lifestyle of substance abuse had reached a peak, probably better characterized as the bottom of a deep chasm."
At the height of Vaughan's substance abuse, he drank of whiskey and used of cocaine each day. Personal assistant Tim Duckworth explained: "I would make sure he would eat breakfast instead of waking up drinking every morning, which was probably the worst thing he was doing." According to Vaughan: "it got to the point where if I'd try to say "hi" to somebody, I would just fall apart crying. It was like solid doom."
In September 1986, Double Trouble traveled to Denmark for a one-month tour of Europe. During the late night hours of September 28, Vaughan became ill after a performance in Ludwigshafen, Germany, suffering from near-death dehydration, for which he received medical treatment. The incident resulted in his checking into The London Clinic under the care of Dr. Victor Bloom, who warned him that he was a month away from death. After staying in London for more than a week, he returned to the United States and entered Peachford Hospital in Atlanta, where he spent four weeks in rehabilitation, and then checked into rehab in Austin.
Live Alive tour
In November 1986, following his departure from rehab, Vaughan moved back into his mother's Glenfield Avenue house in Dallas, which is where he had spent much of his childhood. During this time, Double Trouble began rehearsals for the Live Alive tour. Although Vaughan was nervous about performing after achieving sobriety, he received positive reassurance. Wynans later recalled: "Stevie was real worried about playing after he'd gotten sober...he didn't know if he had anything left to offer. Once we got back out on the road, he was very inspired and motivated." The tour began on November 23 at Towson State University, which was Vaughan's first performance with Double Trouble after rehab. On December 31, 1986, they played a concert at Atlanta's Fox Theatre, which featured encore performances with Lonnie Mack.
As the tour progressed, Vaughan was longing to work on material for his next LP, but in January 1987, he filed for a divorce from Lenny, which restricted him from any projects until the proceedings were finalized. This prevented him from writing and recording songs for almost two years, but Double Trouble wrote the song "Crossfire" with Bill Carter and Ruth Ellsworth. Layton recalled: "we wrote the music, and they had to write the lyrics. We had just gotten together; Stevie was unable to be there at that time. He was in Dallas doing some things, and we just got together and started writing some songs. That was the first one we wrote." On August 6, 1987, Double Trouble appeared at the Austin Aqua Festival, where they played to one of the largest audiences of their career. According to biographer Craig Hopkins, as many as 20,000 people attended the concert. Following a month-long tour as the opening act for Robert Plant in May 1988, which included a concert at Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens, the band was booked for a European leg, which included 22 performances, and ended in Oulu, Finland on July 17. This would be Vaughan's last concert appearance in Europe.
In Step
After Vaughan's divorce from Lenora "Lenny" Darlene Bailey became final, recording for Double Trouble's fourth and final studio album, In Step, began at Kiva Studios in Memphis, Tennessee, working with producer Jim Gaines and co-songwriter Doyle Bramhall. Initially, he had doubts about his musical and creative abilities after achieving sobriety, but he gained confidence as the sessions progressed. Shannon later recalled: "In Step was, for him, a big growing experience. In my opinion, it's our best studio album, and I think he felt that way, too." Bramhall, who had also entered rehab, wrote songs with Vaughan about addiction and redemption. According to Vaughan, the album was titled In Step because "I'm finally in step with life, in step with myself, in step with my music." The album's liner notes include the quote; "'thank God the elevator's broken," a reference to the twelve-step program proposed by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA).
After the In Step recording sessions moved to Los Angeles, Vaughan added horn players Joe Sublett and Darrell Leonard, who played saxophone and trumpet respectively on both "Crossfire" and "Love Me Darlin". Shortly before the album's production was complete, Vaughan and Double Trouble appeared at a presidential inaugural party in Washington, D.C. for George H. W. Bush. In Step was released on June 13, 1989, and eight months later, it was certified gold. The album was Vaughan's most commercially successful release and his first one to win a Grammy Award. It peaked at number 33 on the Billboard 200, spending 47 weeks on the chart. In Step included the song, "Crossfire", which was written by Double Trouble, Bill Carter, and Ruth Ellsworth; it became his only number one hit. The album also included one of his first recordings to feature the use of a Fuzz Face on Vaughan's cover of the Howlin' Wolf song, "Love Me Darlin.
In July 1989, Neil Perry, a writer for Sounds magazine, wrote: "the album closes with the brow-soothing swoon of 'Riviera Paradise,' a slow, lengthy guitar and piano workout that proves just why Vaughan is to the guitar what Nureyev is to ballet." According to music journalist Robert Christgau, Vaughan was "writing blues for AA...he escapes the blues undamaged for the first time in his career." In October 1989, the Boca Raton News described Vaughan's guitar solos as "determined, clear-headed and downright stinging" and his lyrics as "tension-filled allegories".
Death
On Monday, August 27, 1990, at 12:50 a.m. (CDT), Vaughan and members of Eric Clapton's touring entourage played an all-star encore jam session at Alpine Valley Music Theatre in Alpine Valley Resort in East Troy, Wisconsin. They then left for Midway International Airport in Chicago in a Bell 206B helicopter, the most common way for acts to enter and exit the venue, as there is only one road in and out, heavily used by fans. The helicopter crashed into a nearby ski hill shortly after takeoff. Vaughan and the four others on board—pilot Jeff Brown, agent Bobby Brooks, bodyguard Nigel Browne, and tour manager Colin Smythe—died. The helicopter was identified as being owned by Chicago-based company Omniflight Helicopters. Initial reports of the crash erroneously claimed that Clapton had also been killed. According to findings from an inquest conducted by the coroner's office in Elkhorn, all five victims were killed instantly.
The investigation determined the aircraft departed in foggy conditions with visibility reportedly under two miles, according to a local forecast. The National Transportation Safety Board report stated: "As the third helicopter was departing, it remained at a lower altitude than the others, and the pilot turned southeasterly toward rising terrain. Subsequently, the helicopter crashed on hilly terrain about three fifths of a mile from the takeoff point." Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) records showed that Brown was qualified to fly by instruments in a fixed-wing aircraft, but not in a helicopter. Toxicology tests performed on the victims revealed no traces of drugs or alcohol in their systems. Vaughan's funeral service was held on August 31, 1990, at Laurel Land Cemetery in Dallas, Texas. His wooden casket quickly became adorned with bouquets of flowers. An estimated 3,000 mourners joined a procession led by a white hearse. Among those at the public ceremony were Jeff Healey, Charlie Sexton, ZZ Top, Colin James, Stevie Wonder, Bonnie Raitt and Buddy Guy. Vaughan's grave marker reads: "Thank you ... for all the love you passed our way."
Musical style
Vaughan's music was rooted in blues, rock, and jazz. He was influenced by Jimi Hendrix, Albert King, Lonnie Mack, B.B. King, Freddie King, Albert Collins, Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Otis Rush, Guitar Slim, Chuck Berry, and Muddy Waters. According to nightclub owner Clifford Antone, who opened Antone's in 1975, Vaughan jammed with Albert King at Antone's in July 1977 and it almost "scared him to death", saying that "it was the best I've ever saw Albert or the best I ever saw Stevie". While Albert King had a substantial influence on Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix was Vaughan's greatest inspiration. Vaughan declared: "I love Hendrix for so many reasons. He was so much more than just a blues guitarist—he played damn well any kind of guitar he wanted. In fact I'm not sure if he even played the guitar—he played music." He was also influenced by such jazz guitarists as Django Reinhardt, Wes Montgomery, Kenny Burrell, and George Benson.
In 1987, Vaughan listed Lonnie Mack first among the guitarists he had listened to, both as a youngster and as an adult. Vaughan observed that Mack was "ahead of his time" and said, "I got a lot of my fast stuff from Lonnie". On another occasion, Vaughan said that he had learned tremolo picking and vibrato from Mack and that Mack had taught him to "play guitar from the heart." Mack recalled his first meeting with Vaughan in 1978:
Vaughan's relationship with another Texas blues legend, Johnny Winter, was a little more complex. Although they met several times, and often played sessions with the same musicians or even performed the same material, as in the case of Boot Hill, Vaughan always refrained from acknowledging Winter in any form. In his biography, "Raisin' Cain", Winter says that he was unnerved after reading Vaughan stating in an interview that he never met or knew Johnny Winter. "We even played together over at Tommy Shannon's house one time." Vaughan settled the issue in 1988 on the occasion of a blues festival in Europe where both he and Winter were on the bill, explaining that he has been misquoted and that "Every musician in Texas knows Johnny and has learned something from him". Asked to compare their playing styles in an interview in 2010, Winter admitted that "mine's a little bit rawer, I think."
Equipment
Guitars
Vaughan owned and used a variety of guitars during his career. His guitar of choice, and the instrument that he became most associated with, was the Fender Stratocaster, his favorite being a 1963 body with a 1962 neck and pickups dated from 1959. This is why Vaughan usually referred to his Stratocaster as a "1959 Strat". He explained why he favored this guitar in a 1983 interview: "I like the strength of its sound. Any guitar I play has got to be pretty versatile. It's got a big, strong tone and it'll take anything I do to it." Vaughan also referred to this instrument as his "first wife", or "Number One". Another favourite guitar was a slightly later Strat he named 'Lenny' after his wife, Lenora. While at a local pawn shop in 1980, Vaughan had noticed this particular guitar, a 1965 Stratocaster that had been refinished in red, with the original sunburst finish peeking through. It also had a 1910 Mandolin inlay just below the bridge. The pawn shop was asking $300 for it, which was way more than Vaughan had at the time. Lenny saw how badly he wanted this guitar, so she got six of their friends to chip in $50 each, and bought it for him. The guitar was presented to him on his birthday in 1980, and that night, after bringing "Lenny" (the guitar, and wife) home with him, he wrote the song, "Lenny". He started using a borrowed Stratocaster during high school and used Stratocasters predominantly in his live performances and recordings, although he did play other guitars, including custom guitars.
One of the custom guitars—nicknamed "Main"—was built by James Hamilton of Hamiltone Guitars in Buffalo, New York. It was a gift from Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top. Gibbons had commissioned Hamilton to build the guitar in 1979. There were some delays, including having to re-do the mother of pearl inlay of Vaughan's name on the fretboard when he changed his stage name from Stevie Vaughan to Stevie Ray Vaughan. The guitar was presented to him by Jim Hamilton on April 29, 1984. Hamilton recalls that Stevie Ray Vaughan was so happy with the guitar that he played it that night at Springfest on the University of Buffalo campus. It remained one of the main guitars he used on stage and in studio. Vaughan made some alterations to the guitar, including replacing the bronze color Gibson knobs with white Fender knobs, as he preferred the ribbing on the Fender knobs. The pickups had to be changed after the guitar was used in the "Couldn't Stand the Weather" video, in which Stevie and "Main" were drenched with water, and the pickups were ruined. Vaughan preferred guitar has been summarized as his,
Number One Strat, which Stevie claimed to be a ’59, since that was the date stamped on the back of the pickups… this was incorrect, however, as guitar tech Rene Martinez (who oversaw SRV’s guitars since 1980) found the stamp of 1963 on the body and 1962 on the original neck (the neck was replaced in 1989 after it could no longer be refretted properly; Rene used the neck from another SRV favorite, “Red”, as it was also a 1962 model). The pickups are also relatively low output, not the hot overwound myth that gained legs during the 80s… all 3 pickups are rumored to be under 6k ohms output impedance, which would be typical of a 1959 set (the neck pickups tended to be hottest, but not by much). Although the Fender SRV signature model uses Texas Special pickups, which Stevie was heavily involved in the making of, they do not accurately represent the sound of his original Number One.
Vaughan bought many Stratocasters and gave some away as gifts. A sunburst Diplomat Strat-style guitar was purchased by Vaughan and given to his girlfriend Janna Lapidus to learn to play on. Vaughan used a custom set of uncommonly heavy strings, gauges .013, .015, .019, .028, .038, .058, and tuned a half-step below standard tuning. He played with so much tension that it was not uncommon for him to separate his fingernail from the quick movement along the strings. The owner of an Austin club recalled Vaughan coming into the office between sets to borrow super glue, which he used to keep fingernail split from widening while he continued to play. The super glue was suggested by Rene Martinez, who was Stevie's guitar technician. Martinez eventually convinced Stevie to change to slightly lighter strings. He preferred a guitar neck with an asymmetrical profile (thicker at the top) which was more comfortable for his thumb-over style of playing. Heavy use of the vibrato bar necessitated frequent replacements; Vaughan often had his roadie, Byron Barr, obtain custom stainless steel bars made by Barr's father.
Vaughan was also photographed playing a Rickenbacker Capri, a National Duolian, Epiphone Riviera, Gibson Flying V, as well as several other models. Vaughan used a Gibson Johnny Smith to record "Stang's Swang", and a Guild 12-string acoustic for his performance on MTV Unplugged in January 1990. On June 24, 2004, one of Vaughan's Stratocasters, the aforementioned "Lenny" strat, was sold at an auction to benefit Eric Clapton's Crossroads Centre in Antigua; the instrument was bought by Guitar Center for $623,500.
Amplifiers and effects
Vaughan was a catalyst in the revival of vintage amplifiers and effects during the 1980s. His loud volume and use of heavy strings required powerful and robust amplifiers. Vaughan used two black-face Fender Super Reverbs, which were crucial in shaping his clear overdriven sound. He would often blend other amps with the Super Reverbs, including black-face Fender Vibroverbs, and brands such as Dumble, and Marshall, which he used for his clean sound.
While his mainstay effects were the Ibanez Tube Screamer and a Vox wah-wah pedal, Vaughan experimented with a range of effects. He used a Fender Vibratone, designed as a Leslie speaker for electric guitars, and provided a warbling chorus effect, which can be heard on the track "Cold Shot". He used a vintage Dallas Arbiter Fuzz Face that can be heard on In Step, as well as an Octavia. The Guitar Geek website provides a detailed illustration of Vaughan's 1985 equipment set up based on interviews with his guitar tech and effects builder, Cesar Diaz.
Legacy
Vaughan throughout his career revived blues rock and paved the way for many other artists. Vaughan's work continues to influence numerous blues, rock and alternative artists, including John Mayer, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Mike McCready, Albert Cummings, Los Lonely Boys and Chris Duarte, among others. AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine described Vaughan as "the leading light in American blues" and developed "a uniquely eclectic and fiery style that sounded like no other guitarist, regardless of genre". In 1983, Variety magazine called Vaughan the "guitar hero of the present era".
In the months that followed his death, Vaughan sold over 5.5 million albums in the United States. On September 25, 1990, Epic released Family Style, an LP the Vaughan brothers cut at Ardent Studios in Memphis, Tennessee. The label released several promotional singles and videos for the collaborative effort. In November 1990, CMV Enterprises released Pride and Joy, a collection of eight Double Trouble music videos. Sony signed a deal with the Vaughan estate to obtain control of his back catalog, as well as permission to release albums with previously unreleased material and new collections of released work. On October 29, 1991, The Sky Is Crying was released as Vaughan's first posthumous album with Double Trouble, and featured studio recordings from 1984 to 1985. Other compilations, live albums, and films have also been released since his death.
On October 3, 1991, Texas governor Ann Richards proclaimed "Stevie Ray Vaughan Commemoration Day", during which a memorial concert was held at the Texas Theatre. In 1993, a memorial statue of Vaughan was unveiled on Auditorium Shores and is the first public monument of a musician in Austin. In September 1994, a Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Run for Recovery was held in Dallas; the event was a benefit for the Ethel Daniels Foundation, established to help those in recovery from alcoholism and drug addiction who cannot afford treatment. In 1999, the Musicians' Assistance Program (later renamed MusiCares MAP Fund) created the "Stevie Ray Vaughan Award" to honor the memory of Vaughan and to recognize musicians for their devotion to helping other addicts struggling with the recovery process. The recipients include Eric Clapton, David Crosby, Steven Tyler, Alice Cooper, Ozzy Osbourne, Pete Townshend, Chris Cornell, Jerry Cantrell, Mike McCready, among others. In 1993, Martha Vaughan established the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Scholarship Fund, awarded to students at W.E. Greiner Middle School in Oakcliff who intend to attend college and pursue the arts as a profession.
Awards and honors
Vaughan won five W. C. Handy Awards and was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2000. In 1985, he was named an honorary admiral in the Texas Navy. Vaughan had a single number-one hit on the Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart for the song "Crossfire". His album sales in the U.S. stand at over 15 million units. Family Style, released shortly after his death, won the 1991 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album and became his best-selling, non-Double Trouble studio album with over a million shipments in the U.S. In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked him seventh among the "100 Greatest Guitar Players of All Time". He also became eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008, but did not appear on a nominations roster until 2014. He was inducted in the RRHOF alongside Double Trouble in 2015. Guitar World magazine ranked him as Number One in its list of the greatest blues guitarists.
In 1994 the city of Austin, Texas, erected the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial on the hiking trail beside Lady Bird Lake.
Discography
Texas Flood (1983)
Couldn't Stand the Weather (1984)
Soul to Soul (1985)
In Step (1989)
Family Style (1990)
The Sky is Crying (1991)
See also
1980s in music
List of blues rock musicians
List of electric blues musicians
List of guitarists
List of Texas blues musicians
Music of Austin, Texas
Music of Texas
Notes
Footnotes
Citations
Sources
Further reading
External links
The Stevie Ray Vaughan Archive
1954 births
1990 deaths
Accidental deaths in Wisconsin
American blues guitarists
American male guitarists
American blues singers
American blues singer-songwriters
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
Blues rock musicians
Double Trouble (band) members
Electric blues musicians
Epic Records artists
Sony Music artists
Grammy Award winners
Lead guitarists
Musicians from Dallas
Texas blues musicians
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1990
Victims of helicopter accidents or incidents in the United States
20th-century American singers
Slide guitarists
Resonator guitarists
Guitarists from Texas
20th-century American guitarists
People from Oak Cliff, Texas
20th-century American male singers
Musicians killed in aviation accidents or incidents
Singer-songwriters from Texas
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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",
"Howard Stelzer is a composer of electronic music, whose work is made primarily from sounds generated by cassette tapes and tape players. From 1997 until 2012, he ran the independent record label Intransitive Recordings.\n\nEarly years\n\nStelzer began making music using cassette tapes and metal percussion while he was a teenager, living in Boca Raton, Florida. After attempting unsuccessfully to learn how to play conventional instruments, he decided instead to use cassette tapes as the source of his music. Beginning in 1996, all of Stelzer's music would be made with manipulated cassette tapes. I think tapes are simply the language that I speak. When I think about music ideas, I only and always think of them in terms of how they’d be articulated via cassette tapes. – 2016 interview with Tabs Out Podcast Stelzer explained how he first became \"fascinated with (cassette tapes) as sound-producing objects: \"When I was in high school (1989–1992) and banging on trash cans in my parents' garage with a boom box recording in the corner, I discovered how the sound captured on the cassette was different from the acoustic sound in the room while I was making the music. From then on, I experimented with making collages on tape-copying decks, furiously pressing the pause button on the record side while changing the source tape on the other.\"\n\nHis first widely-available album, \"Stone Blind\", was a CD self-released on Stelzer's own Intransitive Recordings label in 1997. The album consisted of three related pieces, each roughly 20 minutes long and made out of crudely spliced cassette tapes assembled with a two-cassette stereo component. Each track was recorded in a single take to one side of a 40-minute tape; a piece ended when the tape ran out.\n\nFirst performances and recordings \n\nIn 1998, Stelzer moved to Boston, Massachusetts. His performances over the next several years were mainly improvised, either solo or with duos or groups. His most frequent collaborator from 1999 until 2003 was Jason Talbot, who played a turntable in a manner similar to that in which Stelzer played cassette tapes. Stelzer credits these years as having a lasting impact on his thinking: \"Everything I thought about music for a long time was based on playing with Jason Talbot. The way I played before I started playing with him was pretty ignorant. I just had a whole lot of tape decks and would put tapes in and hit play, and hope that it would sound all right. But Jason got me thinking more about physicality and improvisation, and I started to think of myself more as a player. That really fundamentally changed what I did with the tape decks, and how my sounds fit in the space, and how they worked compositionally and as live performance.\"\n\nCritics noted the energy of the duo's live performances, but reception to their recordings was mixed: For Stelzer and Talbot, on the other hand, pause is a weapon, and subversion is the norm, not a change from it. The goal of Songs is disorientation; play it while you're doing something else, and you might think the volume's too low, until an eardrum-bursting noise comes out of nowhere. Listening to it loud in headphones can almost be painful. – Dusted Magazine review of SongsStelzer himself seemed to agree. He steadily began moving away from live improvisation and venturing more into studio-based composition. \"At first, my published works were simply unvarnished recordings of live improvisations using tape players, but I was never 100% happy with those. As I listened to them, I'd notice that I was mentally filling in the gaps of what should have been fuller sound, more stereo separation, clearer dynamic range, tighter construction... By the time I made the \"Mincing Perfect Words\" 3\"CDR for Chondritic Sound, I felt like I finally produced music that worked as a home listening experience, and not a performance document. Thus emboldened, I diced up my failed earlier recordings and transformed them into “Bond Inlets”, which I consider my first artistically successful proper album after numerous false starts.\n\nCompositions \nBond Inlets was released by Intransitive Recordings as a CD in 2008, and was the first to receive generally favorable notice from critics. It would be unforgivable to overlook 1998's Bond Inlets, Stelzer’s crowning achievement; an album where he was able to pick the inherent limitations of consumer-grade tapes apart, laying out a foreboding work of rare emotional power. – Tiny Mix Tapes\n\nSubsequent albums included Brayton Point, released in 2014 by Dokuro, which was built out of recordings of the Brayton Point Power Station, the largest coal-fired power generation plant in Massachusetts. The album received the unusual distinction of being recognized in the Boston Globe's year-end business section as one of Massachusetts' \"Most Offbeat Business Stories of 2014\": Strangest Use for a Giant Power Plant: When you think power plant, the first thing that comes to mind is a musical melody, right? Oh, wait... electronic music composer Howard Stelzer turned the still-operational Brayton Point coal plant into a giant musical instrument by recording ambient sounds at the site and turning it into a 49-minute album. – Boston Globe Critical response to Brayton Point was generally positive: For his first solo album since 2008's Bond Inlets, Howard Stelzer captured sound at the Brayton Point power plant in Somerset, Massachusetts. That’s intriguing on its own, but it seems an inaccurate way to characterize the resulting album. The single, 50-minute piece Stelzer concocted is so much more dense and evocative than the term \"field recording\" could ever suggest. It’s like calling something a guitar album – it may narrow the context, but it says almost nothing about the listening experience. – The Out Door \n\nThere's development, at least in terms of sounds transforming from a beginning of identifiable clankings and machine-hums to full-on space gales into moments of tinnitus-shrouded pig screams, to its furnace-blast endpoint... As a hymn to power and a memorial to decrepit industrialisation, Brayton Point is remarkable. – Cyclic Defrost\n\nPartial discography\n\n Songs CD (Intransitive Recordings, US) with Jason Talbot\n Night Life CD (Korm Plastics, NL) with Giuseppe Ielasi \n Mincing Perfect Words 3\"CDr (Chondritic Sound, US)\n Tomorrow No One Will Be Safe CD (Troniks, US) with Jazzkammer\n Bond Inlets CD (Intransitive Recordings, US)\n The Impossible Astronaut c40 (NNA, US)\n Pink Pearl CD (Bocian, PO) with Frans de Waard \n How To CD (Phage Tapes, US)\n The Case Against CD (Monotype Rec., PO)\n Brayton Point CD (Dokuro, IT)\n Dawn Songs c40 (No Rent Records, US)\n Sun Pass c40 (Moss Archive, US)\n A Strange Object Covered With Fur Which Breaks Your Heart c40 (No Rent Records, US) \n Across the Blazer CD (Marginal Frequency, US)\n Nests digital-only (self-released, US) with Nerve Net Noise\n Anathematization of the World is Not an Adequate Response to the World 2CDr (Chocolate Monk, UK)\n Their Crowning Achievement CDr (Chocolate Monk, UK) with Neil Campbell\n Invariably Falling Forward, Into the Thickets of Closure 3CD (No Rent Records, US)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nHoward Stelzer, Official site \nHoward Stelzer at Bandcamp\nIntransitive Recordings at Bandcamp\n\nAmerican male classical composers\nAmerican classical composers\nPeople from Long Island\nUniversity of Florida alumni\nAmerican experimental musicians\nExperimental composers\nAmerican contemporary artists\nElectroacoustic music composers\n1974 births\nLiving people\n20th-century American composers\n20th-century American male musicians"
] |
[
"Stevie Ray Vaughan",
"First recordings",
"In what year did Stevie Ray Vaughan start recording?",
"In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands,",
"What songs were on his first album?",
"They recorded two songs, \"Red, White and Blue\" and \"I Heard a Voice Last Night\",",
"What other musicians did SRV play with on his first recordings?",
"feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird.",
"How did critics receive his first recordings?",
"the album was rejected by A&M,"
] | C_156015fd0dc74c469a47cbc6a542733a_0 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | 5 | Besides what year Stevie Ray Vaughan started recording, what songs were on Stevie Ray Vaughan's first album, what musicians other than Cast of Thousands SRV played with on his first recordings, and how critics received Stevie Ray Vaughan's first recordings, are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | Stevie Ray Vaughan | In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Country Club, a venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined a rock band named Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months. In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were disastrous. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed. In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras that included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King. Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde Pharaoh. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band. CANNOTANSWER | In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, | Stephen Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954August 27, 1990) was an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer, best known as the guitarist and frontman of the blues rock trio Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble. Although his mainstream career only spanned seven years, he is considered an icon and one of the most influential musicians in the history of blues music, and one of the greatest guitarists of all time.
Born and raised in Dallas, Texas, Vaughan began playing guitar at age seven, initially inspired by his elder brother, Jimmie Vaughan. In 1972, he dropped out of high school and moved to Austin, where he began to gain a following after playing gigs on the local club circuit. Vaughan joined forces with Tommy Shannon on bass and Chris Layton on drums as Double Trouble in 1978 and established it as part of the Austin music scene; it soon became one of the most popular acts in Texas. He performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1982, where David Bowie saw him play and contacted him for a studio gig, resulting in Stevie playing his blues guitar on the album Let's Dance (1983), before being discovered by John Hammond, who interested major label Epic Records in signing Vaughan and his band to a record deal. Within months, they achieved mainstream success for the critically acclaimed debut album Texas Flood. With a series of successful network television appearances and extensive concert tours, Vaughan became the leading figure in the blues revival of the 1980s.
Playing his guitar behind his back or plucking the strings with his teeth as Jimi Hendrix did, he earned unprecedented stardom in Europe, which later resulted in breakthroughs for guitar players like Robert Cray, Jeff Healey, Robben Ford and Walter Trout, amongst others.
During the majority of his life, Vaughan struggled with drug and alcohol addiction. He also struggled with the personal and professional pressures of fame and his marriage to Lenora "Lenny" Bailey. He successfully completed rehabilitation and began touring again with Double Trouble in November 1986. His fourth and final studio album In Step reached number 33 in the United States in 1989; it was one of Vaughan's most critically and commercially successful releases and included his only number-one hit, "Crossfire". He became one of the world's most highly demanded blues performers, and he headlined Madison Square Garden in 1989 and the Beale Street Music Festival in 1990.
On August 27, 1990, Vaughan and four others were killed in a helicopter crash in East Troy, Wisconsin, after performing with Double Trouble at Alpine Valley Music Theatre. An investigation concluded that the cause was pilot error and Vaughan's family later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Omniflight Helicopters that was settled out of court. Vaughan's music continued to achieve commercial success with several posthumous releases and has sold over 15 million albums in the United States alone. In 2003, David Fricke of Rolling Stone ranked him the seventh greatest guitarist of all time. Vaughan was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015, along with Double Trouble bandmates Chris Layton, Tommy Shannon, and Reese Wynans.
Family and early life
Stevie's grandfather, Thomas Lee Vaughan, married Laura Belle LaRue and moved to Rockwall County, Texas, where they lived by sharecropping.
Stevie's father, Jimmie Lee Vaughan, was born on September 6, 1921. Jimmie, also known as Jim and Big Jim, dropped out of school at age sixteen and enlisted in the U.S. Navy during World War II. After his discharge, he married Martha Jean (née Cook; 1928–2009) on January 13, 1950. They had a son, Jimmie, in 1951. Stephen was born at Methodist Hospital on October 3, 1954, in Dallas, Texas. Big Jim secured a job as an asbestos worker. The family moved frequently, living in other states such as Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Oklahoma before ultimately moving to the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. A shy and insecure boy, Vaughan was deeply affected by his childhood experiences. His father struggled with alcohol abuse and often terrorized his family and friends with his bad temper. In later years, Vaughan recalled that he had been a victim of his father's violence. His father died on August 27, 1986, exactly four years before Vaughan himself.
First instruments
In the early 1960s, Vaughan's admiration for his brother Jimmie resulted in his trying different instruments such as the drums and saxophone. In 1961, for his seventh birthday, Vaughan received his first guitar, a toy from Sears with Western motif. Learning by ear, he diligently committed himself, following along to songs by the Nightcaps, particularly "Wine, Wine, Wine" and "Thunderbird". He listened to blues artists such as Albert King, Otis Rush, and Muddy Waters, and rock guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix and Lonnie Mack, as well as jazz guitarists including Kenny Burrell. In 1963, he acquired his first electric guitar, a Gibson ES-125T, as a hand-me-down from Jimmie.
Soon after he acquired the electric guitar, Vaughan joined his first band, the Chantones, in 1965. Their first show was at a talent contest held in Dallas' Hill Theatre, but after realizing that they could not perform a Jimmy Reed song in its entirety, Vaughan left the band and joined the Brooklyn Underground, playing professionally at local bars and clubs. He received Jimmie's Fender Broadcaster, which he later traded for an Epiphone Riviera. When Jimmie left home at age sixteen, Vaughan's apparent obsession with the instrument caused a lack of support from his parents. Miserable at home, he took a job at a local hamburger stand, where he washed dishes and dumped trash for seventy cents an hour. After falling into a barrel of grease, he grew tired of the job and quit to devote his life to a music career.
Music career
Early years
In May 1969, after leaving the Brooklyn Underground, Vaughan joined a band called the Southern Distributor. He had learned the Yardbirds' "Jeff's Boogie" and played the song at the audition. Mike Steinbach, the group's drummer, commented: "The kid was fourteen. We auditioned him on 'Jeff's Boogie,' really fast instrumental guitar, and he played it note for note." Although they played pop rock covers, Vaughan conveyed his interest in the addition of blues songs to the group's repertoire; he was told that he wouldn't earn a living playing blues music and he and the band parted ways. Later that year, bassist Tommy Shannon walked into a Dallas club and heard Vaughan playing guitar. Fascinated by the skillful playing, which he described as "incredible even then", Shannon borrowed a bass guitar and the two jammed. Within a few years, they began performing together in a band called Krackerjack.
In February 1970, Vaughan joined a band called Liberation, which was a nine-piece group with a horn section. Having spent the past month briefly playing bass with Jimmie in Texas Storm, he had originally auditioned as bassist. Impressed by Vaughan's guitar playing, Scott Phares, the group's original guitarist, modestly became the bassist. In mid-1970, they performed at the Adolphus Hotel in downtown Dallas, where ZZ Top asked them to perform. During Liberation's break, Vaughan jammed with ZZ Top on the Nightcaps song "Thunderbird". Phares later described the performance: "they tore the house down. It was awesome. It was one of those magical evenings. Stevie fit in like a glove on a hand."
Attending Justin F. Kimball High School during the early 1970s, Vaughan's late-night shows contributed to his neglect in his studies, including music theory; he would often sleep during class. His pursuit of a musical career was disapproved of by many of the school's administrators but he was also encouraged by many people, including his art teacher, to strive for a career in art. In his sophomore year, he attended an evening class for experimental art at Southern Methodist University, but left when it conflicted with rehearsal. Vaughan later spoke of his dislike of the school and recalled having received daily notes from the principal about his grooming.
First recordings
In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Club, a local blues venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months.
In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were unsuccessful. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed.
In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras which included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King.
Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde "Pharaoh" Walden. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band.
Double Trouble
In mid-May 1978, Clark left to form his own group and Vaughan renamed the band Double Trouble, taken from the title of an Otis Rush song. Following the recruitment of bassist Jackie Newhouse, Walden quit in July, and was briefly replaced by Jack Moore, who had moved to Texas from Boston; he performed with the band for about two months. Vaughan then began looking for a drummer and soon after, he met Chris Layton through Sublett, who was his roommate. Layton, who had recently parted ways with Greezy Wheels, was taught by Vaughan to play a shuffle rhythm. When Vaughan offered Layton the position, he agreed. In early July, Vaughan befriended Lenora Bailey, known as "Lenny", who became his girlfriend, and ultimately his wife. The marriage was to last for six and a half years.
In early October 1978, Vaughan and Double Trouble earned a frequent residency performing at one of Austin's most popular nightspots, the Rome Inn. During a performance, Edi Johnson, an accountant at Manor Downs, noticed Vaughan. She remembered: "I'm not an authority on music—it's whatever turned me on—but this did." She recommended him to Manor Downs owner Frances Carr and general manager Chesley Millikin, who was interested in managing artists and saw Vaughan's musical potential. After Barton quit Double Trouble in mid-November 1979, Millikin signed Vaughan to a management contract. Vaughan also hired Robert "Cutter" Brandenburg as road manager, whom he had met in 1969. Addressing him as "Stevie Ray", Brandenburg convinced Vaughan to use his middle name on stage.
In October 1980, bassist Tommy Shannon attended a Double Trouble performance at Rockefeller's in Houston. Shannon, who was playing with Alan Haynes at the time, participated in a jam session with Vaughan and Layton halfway through their set. Shannon later commented: "I went down there that night, and I'll never forget this: it was like, when I walked in the door and I heard them playing, it was like a revelation. 'That's where I want to be; that's where I belong, right there.' During the break, I went up to Stevie and told him that. I didn't try to sneak around and hide it from the bass player [Jackie Newhouse]—I didn't know if he was listening or not. I just really wanted to be in that band. I sat in that night and it sounded great." Almost three months later, when Vaughan offered Shannon the position, he readily accepted.
Drug charge and trial
On December 5, 1979, while Vaughan was in a dressing room before a performance in Houston, an off-duty police officer arrested him after witnessing his usage of cocaine near an open window. He was formally charged with cocaine possession and subsequently released on $1,000 bail. Double Trouble was the opening act for Muddy Waters, who said about Vaughan's substance abuse: "Stevie could perhaps be the greatest guitar player that ever lived, but he won't live to get 40 years old if he doesn't leave that white powder alone." The following year, he was required to return on January 16 and February 29 for court appearances.
During the final court date, on April 17, 1980, Vaughan was sentenced with two years' probation and was prohibited from leaving Texas. Along with a stipulation of entering treatment for drug abuse, he was required to "avoid persons or places of known disreputable or harmful character"; he refused to comply with both of these orders. After a lawyer was hired, his probation officer had the sentence revised to allow him to work outside of the state. The incident later caused him to refuse maid service while staying in hotels during concert tours.
Montreux Jazz Festival
Although popular in Texas at the time, Double Trouble failed to gain national attention. The group's visibility improved when record producer Jerry Wexler recommended them to Claude Nobs, organizer of the Montreux Jazz Festival. He insisted the festival's blues night would be great with Vaughan, whom he called "a jewel, one of those rarities who comes along once in a lifetime", and Nobs agreed to book Double Trouble on July 17.
Vaughan opened with a medley arrangement of Freddie King's song "Hide Away" and his own fast instrumental composition, "Rude Mood". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", Hound Dog Taylor's "Give Me Back My Wig", and Albert Collins' "Collins Shuffle", as well as three original compositions: "Pride and Joy", "Love Struck Baby", and "Dirty Pool". The set ended with boos from the audience. People's James McBride wrote:
According to road manager Don Opperman: "the way I remember it, the 'ooos' and the 'boos' were mixed together, but Stevie was pretty disappointed. Stevie [had] just handed me his guitar and walked off stage, and I'm like, 'are you coming back?' There was a doorway back there; the audience couldn't see the guys, but I could. He went back to the dressing room with his head in his hands. I went back there finally, and that was the end of the show." According to Vaughan: "it wasn't the whole crowd [that booed]. It was just a few people sitting right up front. The room there was built for acoustic jazz. When five or six people boo, wow, it sounds like the whole world hates you. They thought we were too loud, but shoot, I had four army blankets folded over my amp, and the volume level was on 2. I'm used to playin' on 10!" The performance was filmed and later released on DVD in September 2004.
On the following night, Double Trouble was booked in the lounge of the Montreux Casino, with Jackson Browne in attendance. Browne jammed with Double Trouble until the early morning hours and offered them free use of his personal recording studio in downtown Los Angeles. In late November the band accepted his offer and recorded ten songs in two days. While they were in the studio, Vaughan received a telephone call from David Bowie, who met him after the Montreux performance, and he invited him to participate in a recording session for his next studio album, Let's Dance. In January 1983, Vaughan recorded guitar on six of the album's eight songs, including the title track and "China Girl". The album was released on April 14, 1983, and sold over three times as many copies as Bowie's previous album.
National success
In mid-March 1983, Gregg Geller, vice president of A&R at Epic Records, signed Double Trouble to the label at the recommendation of record producer John Hammond. Soon afterward, Epic financed a music video for "Love Struck Baby", which was filmed at the Cherry Tavern in New York City. Vaughan recalled: "we changed the name of the place in the video. Four years ago I got married in a club where we used to play all the time called the Rome Inn. When they closed it down, the owner gave me the sign, so in the video we put that up behind me on the stage."
With the success of Let's Dance, Bowie requested Vaughan as the featured instrumentalist for the upcoming Serious Moonlight Tour, realizing that he was an essential aspect of the album's groundbreaking success. In late April, Vaughan began rehearsals for the tour in Las Colinas, Texas. When contract renegotiations for his performance fee failed, Vaughan abandoned the tour days before its opening date, and he was replaced by Earl Slick. Vaughan commented: "I couldn't gear everything on something I didn't really care a whole lot about. It was kind of risky, but I really didn't need all the headaches." Although contributing factors were widely disputed, Vaughan soon gained major publicity for quitting the tour.
On May 9, the band performed at The Bottom Line in New York City, where they opened for Bryan Adams, with Hammond, Mick Jagger, John McEnroe, Rick Nielsen, Billy Gibbons, and Johnny Winter in attendance. Brandenburg described the performance as "ungodly": "I think Stevie played every lick as loud and as hard and with as much intensity as I've ever heard him." The performance earned Vaughan a positive review published in the New York Post, asserting that Double Trouble outperformed Adams. "Fortunately, Bryan Adams, the Canadian rocker who is opening arena dates for Journey, doesn't headline too often", wrote Martin Porter, who claimed that after the band's performance, the stage had been "rendered to cinders by the most explosively original showmanship to grace the New York stage in some time."
Texas Flood
After acquiring the recordings from Browne's studio, Double Trouble began assembling the material for a full-length LP. The album, Texas Flood, opens with the track "Love Struck Baby", which was written for Lenny on their "love-struck day". He composed "Pride and Joy" and "I'm Cryin'" for one of his former girlfriends, Lindi Bethel. Although both are musically similar, their lyrics are two different perspectives of the relationship. Along with covers of Howlin' Wolf, the Isley Brothers, and Buddy Guy, the album included Vaughan's cover of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", a song which he became strongly associated with. "Lenny" served as a tribute to his wife, which he composed at the end of their bed.
Texas Flood featured cover art by illustrator Brad Holland, who is known for his artwork for Playboy and The New York Times. Originally envisioned with Vaughan sitting on a horse depicting a promotable resemblance, Holland painted an image of him leaning against a wall with a guitar, using a photograph as a reference. Released on June 13, 1983, Texas Flood peaked at number 38 and ultimately sold half a million copies. While Rolling Stone editor Kurt Loder asserted that Vaughan did not possess a distinctive voice, according to AllMusic senior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the release was a "monumental impact". Billboard described it as "a guitar boogie lovers delight". Agent Alex Hodges commented: "No one knew how big that record would be, because guitar players weren't necessarily in vogue, except for some that were so established they were undeniable ... he was one of the few artists that was recouped on every record in a short period of time."
On June 16, Vaughan gave a performance at Tango nightclub in Dallas, which celebrated the album's release. Assorted VIPs attended the performance, including Ted Nugent, Sammy Hagar, and members of The Kinks and Uriah Heep. Jack Chase, vice president of marketing for Epic, recalled: "the coming-out party at Tango was very important; it was absolutely huge. All the radio station personalities, DJs, program directors, all the retail record store owners and the important managers, press, all the executives from New York came down—about seven hundred people. We attacked in Dallas first with Q102-FM and [DJ] Redbeard. We had the Tango party—it was hot. It was the ticket." The Dallas Morning News reviewed the performance, starting with the rhetorical question; "what if Stevie Ray Vaughan had an album release party and everybody came? It happened Thursday night at Tango. ... The adrenalin must have been gushing through the musicians' veins as they performed with rare finesse and skill."
Following a brief tour in Europe, Hodges arranged an engagement for Double Trouble as The Moody Blues' opening act during a two-month tour of North America. Hodges stated that many people disliked the idea of Double Trouble opening for The Moody Blues, but asserted that a common thread which both bands shared was "album-oriented rock". Shannon described the tour as "glorious": "Our record hadn't become that successful yet, but we were playing in front of coliseums full of people. We just went out and played, and it fit like a glove. The sound rang through those big coliseums like a monster. People were going crazy, and they had no idea who we were!" After appearing on the television series Austin City Limits, the band played a sold-out concert at New York City's Beacon Theatre. Variety wrote that their ninety-minute set at the Beacon "left no doubt that this young Texas musician is indeed the 'guitar hero of the present era.'"
Couldn't Stand the Weather
In January 1984, Double Trouble began recording their second studio album, Couldn't Stand the Weather, at the Power Station, with John Hammond as executive producer and engineer Richard Mullen. Layton later recalled working with Hammond: "he was kind of like a nice hand on your shoulder, as opposed to someone that jumped in and said, 'let's redo this, let's do that more.' He didn't get involved in that way at all. He was a feedback person." As the sessions began, Vaughan's cover of Bob Geddins' "Tin Pan Alley" was recorded while audio levels were being checked. Layton remembers the performance: "... we did probably the quietest version we ever did up 'til that point. We ended it and [Hammond] said; 'that's the best that song will ever sound,' and we went; 'we haven't even got sounds, have we?' He goes, 'that doesn't matter. That's the best you'll ever do that song.' We tried it again five, six, seven times- I can't even remember. But it never quite sounded like it did that first time."
During recording sessions, Vaughan began experimenting with other combinations of musicians, including Fran Christina and Stan Harrison, who played drums and saxophone respectively on the jazz instrumental, "Stang's Swang". Jimmie Vaughan played rhythm guitar on his cover of Guitar Slim's "The Things That I Used to Do" and the title track, the latter of which Vaughan carries a worldly message in his lyrics. According to musicologist Andy Aledort, Vaughan's guitar playing throughout the song is marked by steady rhythmic strumming patterns and improvised lead lines, with a distinctive R&B and soul single-note riff, doubled in octaves by guitar and bass.
Couldn't Stand the Weather was released on May 15, 1984, and two weeks later it had rapidly outpaced the sales of Texas Flood. It peaked at number 31 and spent 38 weeks on the charts. The album includes Vaughan's cover of Jimi Hendrix's song, "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", which provoked inevitable comparisons to Hendrix. According to AllMusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Couldn't Stand the Weather "confirmed that the acclaimed debut was no fluke, while matching, if not bettering, the sales of its predecessor, thereby cementing Vaughan's status as a giant of modern blues." According to authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford, the album "was a major turning point in Stevie Ray Vaughan's development" and Vaughan's singing improved.
Carnegie Hall
On October 4, 1984, Vaughan headlined a performance at Carnegie Hall that included many guest musicians. For the second half of the concert, he added Jimmie as rhythm guitarist, drummer George Rains, keyboardist Dr. John, Roomful of Blues horn section, and featured vocalist Angela Strehli. The ensemble rehearsed for less than two weeks before the performance, and despite the solid dynamics of Double Trouble for the first half of the performance, according to Patoski and Crawford, the big band concept never entirely took form. Before arriving at the engagement, the venue sold out, which made Vaughan overexcited and nervous as he did not calm down until halfway through the third song. A benefit for the T.J. Martell Foundation's work in leukemia and cancer research, he was an important draw for the event. As his scheduled time slot drew closer, he indicated that he preferred traveling to the venue by limousine to avoid being swarmed by fans on the street; the band took the stage around 8:00 p.m. The audience of 2,200 people, which included Vaughan's wife, family and friends, transformed the venue into what Stephen Holden of The New York Times described as "a whistling, stomping roadhouse".
Introduced by Hammond as "one of the greatest guitar players of all time", Vaughan opened with "Scuttle Buttin'", wearing a custom-made mariachi suit he described as a "Mexican tuxedo". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of the Isley Brothers' "Testify", The Jimi Hendrix Experience's "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", "Tin Pan Alley", Elmore James' "The Sky Is Crying", and W. C. Clark's "Cold Shot", along with four original compositions including "Love Struck Baby", "Honey Bee", "Couldn't Stand the Weather", and "Rude Mood". During the second half of the performance, Vaughan performed covers by Larry Davis, Buddy Guy, Guitar Slim, Albert King, Jackie Wilson, and Albert Collins. The set ended with Vaughan performing solo renditions of "Lenny" and "Rude Mood".
The Dallas Times-Herald wrote of the performance at Carnegie Hall as; "was full of stomping feet and swaying bodies, kids in blue jeans hanging off the balconies, dancing bodies that clogged the aisles." The New York Times asserted that, despite the venue's "muddy" acoustics, their performance was "filled with verve", and Vaughan's playing was "handsomely displayed". Jimmie Vaughan later commented: "I was worried the crowd might be a little stiff. Turned out they're just like any other beer joint." Vaughan commented: "We won't be limited to just the trio, although that doesn't mean we'll stop doing the trio. I'm planning on doing that too. I ain't gonna stay in one place. If I do, I'm stupid." The performance was recorded and later released as an official live LP. The album was released posthumously on July 29, 1997, by Epic Records; it was ultimately certified gold.
Immediately after the concert, Vaughan attended a private party at a downtown club in New York, which was sponsored by MTV, where he was greeted by an hour's worth of supporters. On the following day, Double Trouble made an appearance at a record store in Greenwich Village, where they signed autographs for fans. In late October 1984, the band toured Australia and New Zealand, which included one of their first appearances on Australian television—on Hey Hey It's Saturday—where they performed "Texas Flood", and an interview on Sounds. On November 5 and 9, they played sold-out concerts at the Sydney Opera House. Upon returning to the U.S., Double Trouble went on a brief tour in California. Soon afterward, Vaughan and Lenny went to the island of Saint Croix, on the U.S. Virgin Islands in the Caribbean Sea, where they had spent some time vacationing in December. The next month, Double Trouble flew to Japan, where they appeared for five performances, including at Kōsei Nenkin Kaikan in Osaka.
Soul to Soul
In March 1985, recording for Double Trouble's third studio album, Soul to Soul, began at the Dallas Sound Lab. As the sessions progressed, Vaughan became increasingly frustrated with his own lack of inspiration. He was also allowed a relaxed pace of recording the album, which contributed to a lack of focus due to excesses in alcohol and other drugs. Roadie Byron Barr later recalled: "the routine was to go to the studio, do dope, and play ping-pong." Vaughan, who found it increasingly difficult to be able to play rhythm guitar parts and sing at the same time, wanted to add another dimension to the band, so he hired keyboardist Reese Wynans to record on the album; he joined the band soon thereafter.
During the album's production, Vaughan appeared at the Houston Astrodome on April 10, 1985, where he performed a slide guitar rendition of the U.S. national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner"; his performance was met with booing. Upon leaving the stage, Vaughan acquired an autograph from former player for the New York Yankees, Mickey Mantle. Astrodome publicist Molly Glentzer wrote in the Houston Press: "as Vaughan shuffled back behind home plate, he was only lucid enough to know that he wanted Mickey Mantle's autograph. Mantle obliged. 'I never signed a guitar before.' Nobody asked Vaughan for his autograph. I was sure he'd be dead before he hit 30." Critics associated his performance with Jimi Hendrix's rendition at Woodstock in 1969, yet Vaughan disliked this comparison: "I heard they even wrote about it in one of the music magazines and they tried to put the two versions side by side. I hate that stuff. His version was great."
Released on September 30, 1985, Soul to Soul peaked at number 34 and remained on the Billboard 200 through mid-1986, eventually certified gold. Critic Jimmy Guterman of Rolling Stone wrote: "there's some life left in their blues rock pastiche; it's also possible that they've run out of gas." According to Patoski and Crawford, sales of the album "did not match Couldn't Stand the Weather, suggesting Stevie Ray and Double Trouble were plateauing". Vaughan commented: "as far as what's on there song-wise, I like the album a lot. It meant a lot to us what we went through to get this record. There were a lot of odds and we still stayed strong. We grew a lot with the people in the band and immediate friends around us; we learned a lot and grew a lot closer. That has a lot to do with why it's called [Soul to Soul]."
Live Alive
After touring for nine and a half months, Epic requested a fourth album from Double Trouble as part of their contractual obligation. In July 1986, Vaughan decided that they would record the LP, Live Alive, during three live appearances in Austin and Dallas. On July 17 and 18, the band performed sold-out concerts at the Austin Opera House, and July 19 at the Dallas Starfest. They used recordings of these concerts to assemble the LP, which was produced by Vaughan. Shannon was backstage before the Austin concert and predicted to new manager Alex Hodges that both Vaughan and himself were "headed for a brick wall". Guitarist Denny Freeman attended the Austin performances; he called the shows a "musical mess, because they would go into these chaotic jams with no control. I didn't know what exactly was going on, but I was concerned." Both Layton and Shannon remarked that their work schedule and drugs were causing the band to lose focus. According to Wynans: "Things were getting illogical and crazy."
The Live Alive album was released on November 17, 1986, and the only official live Double Trouble LP made commercially available during Vaughan's lifetime, though it never appeared on the Billboard 200 chart. Though many critics claimed that most of the album was overdubbed, engineer Gary Olazabal, who mixed the album, asserted that most of the material was recorded poorly. Vaughan later admitted that it was not one of his better efforts; he recalled: "I wasn't in very good shape when we recorded Live Alive. At the time, I didn't realize how bad a shape I was in. There were more fix-it jobs done on the album than I would have liked. Some of the work sounds like [it was] the work of half-dead people. There were some great notes that came out, but I just wasn't in control; nobody was."
Drugs and alcohol
In 1960, when Vaughan was six years old, he began stealing his father's drinks. Drawn in by its effects, he started making his own drinks and this resulted in alcohol dependence. He explained: "that's when I first started stealing daddy's drinks. Or when my parents were gone, I'd find the bottle and make myself one. I thought it was cool ... thought the kids down the street would think it was cool. That's where it began, and I had been depending on it ever since." According to the authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford: "In the ensuing twenty-five years, he had worked his way through the Physicians' Desk Reference before finding his poisons of preference—alcohol and cocaine."
While Vaughan asserted that he first experienced the effects of cocaine when a doctor prescribed him a liquid solution of the stimulant as a nasal spray, according to Patoski and Crawford, the earliest that Vaughan is known to have ingested the drug is in 1975, while performing with the Cobras. Before that, Vaughan had briefly used other drugs such as cannabis, methamphetamine, and Quaaludes, the brand name for methaqualone. After 1975, he regularly drank whiskey and used cocaine, particularly mixing the two substances together. According to Hopkins, by the time of Double Trouble's European tour in September 1986, "his lifestyle of substance abuse had reached a peak, probably better characterized as the bottom of a deep chasm."
At the height of Vaughan's substance abuse, he drank of whiskey and used of cocaine each day. Personal assistant Tim Duckworth explained: "I would make sure he would eat breakfast instead of waking up drinking every morning, which was probably the worst thing he was doing." According to Vaughan: "it got to the point where if I'd try to say "hi" to somebody, I would just fall apart crying. It was like solid doom."
In September 1986, Double Trouble traveled to Denmark for a one-month tour of Europe. During the late night hours of September 28, Vaughan became ill after a performance in Ludwigshafen, Germany, suffering from near-death dehydration, for which he received medical treatment. The incident resulted in his checking into The London Clinic under the care of Dr. Victor Bloom, who warned him that he was a month away from death. After staying in London for more than a week, he returned to the United States and entered Peachford Hospital in Atlanta, where he spent four weeks in rehabilitation, and then checked into rehab in Austin.
Live Alive tour
In November 1986, following his departure from rehab, Vaughan moved back into his mother's Glenfield Avenue house in Dallas, which is where he had spent much of his childhood. During this time, Double Trouble began rehearsals for the Live Alive tour. Although Vaughan was nervous about performing after achieving sobriety, he received positive reassurance. Wynans later recalled: "Stevie was real worried about playing after he'd gotten sober...he didn't know if he had anything left to offer. Once we got back out on the road, he was very inspired and motivated." The tour began on November 23 at Towson State University, which was Vaughan's first performance with Double Trouble after rehab. On December 31, 1986, they played a concert at Atlanta's Fox Theatre, which featured encore performances with Lonnie Mack.
As the tour progressed, Vaughan was longing to work on material for his next LP, but in January 1987, he filed for a divorce from Lenny, which restricted him from any projects until the proceedings were finalized. This prevented him from writing and recording songs for almost two years, but Double Trouble wrote the song "Crossfire" with Bill Carter and Ruth Ellsworth. Layton recalled: "we wrote the music, and they had to write the lyrics. We had just gotten together; Stevie was unable to be there at that time. He was in Dallas doing some things, and we just got together and started writing some songs. That was the first one we wrote." On August 6, 1987, Double Trouble appeared at the Austin Aqua Festival, where they played to one of the largest audiences of their career. According to biographer Craig Hopkins, as many as 20,000 people attended the concert. Following a month-long tour as the opening act for Robert Plant in May 1988, which included a concert at Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens, the band was booked for a European leg, which included 22 performances, and ended in Oulu, Finland on July 17. This would be Vaughan's last concert appearance in Europe.
In Step
After Vaughan's divorce from Lenora "Lenny" Darlene Bailey became final, recording for Double Trouble's fourth and final studio album, In Step, began at Kiva Studios in Memphis, Tennessee, working with producer Jim Gaines and co-songwriter Doyle Bramhall. Initially, he had doubts about his musical and creative abilities after achieving sobriety, but he gained confidence as the sessions progressed. Shannon later recalled: "In Step was, for him, a big growing experience. In my opinion, it's our best studio album, and I think he felt that way, too." Bramhall, who had also entered rehab, wrote songs with Vaughan about addiction and redemption. According to Vaughan, the album was titled In Step because "I'm finally in step with life, in step with myself, in step with my music." The album's liner notes include the quote; "'thank God the elevator's broken," a reference to the twelve-step program proposed by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA).
After the In Step recording sessions moved to Los Angeles, Vaughan added horn players Joe Sublett and Darrell Leonard, who played saxophone and trumpet respectively on both "Crossfire" and "Love Me Darlin". Shortly before the album's production was complete, Vaughan and Double Trouble appeared at a presidential inaugural party in Washington, D.C. for George H. W. Bush. In Step was released on June 13, 1989, and eight months later, it was certified gold. The album was Vaughan's most commercially successful release and his first one to win a Grammy Award. It peaked at number 33 on the Billboard 200, spending 47 weeks on the chart. In Step included the song, "Crossfire", which was written by Double Trouble, Bill Carter, and Ruth Ellsworth; it became his only number one hit. The album also included one of his first recordings to feature the use of a Fuzz Face on Vaughan's cover of the Howlin' Wolf song, "Love Me Darlin.
In July 1989, Neil Perry, a writer for Sounds magazine, wrote: "the album closes with the brow-soothing swoon of 'Riviera Paradise,' a slow, lengthy guitar and piano workout that proves just why Vaughan is to the guitar what Nureyev is to ballet." According to music journalist Robert Christgau, Vaughan was "writing blues for AA...he escapes the blues undamaged for the first time in his career." In October 1989, the Boca Raton News described Vaughan's guitar solos as "determined, clear-headed and downright stinging" and his lyrics as "tension-filled allegories".
Death
On Monday, August 27, 1990, at 12:50 a.m. (CDT), Vaughan and members of Eric Clapton's touring entourage played an all-star encore jam session at Alpine Valley Music Theatre in Alpine Valley Resort in East Troy, Wisconsin. They then left for Midway International Airport in Chicago in a Bell 206B helicopter, the most common way for acts to enter and exit the venue, as there is only one road in and out, heavily used by fans. The helicopter crashed into a nearby ski hill shortly after takeoff. Vaughan and the four others on board—pilot Jeff Brown, agent Bobby Brooks, bodyguard Nigel Browne, and tour manager Colin Smythe—died. The helicopter was identified as being owned by Chicago-based company Omniflight Helicopters. Initial reports of the crash erroneously claimed that Clapton had also been killed. According to findings from an inquest conducted by the coroner's office in Elkhorn, all five victims were killed instantly.
The investigation determined the aircraft departed in foggy conditions with visibility reportedly under two miles, according to a local forecast. The National Transportation Safety Board report stated: "As the third helicopter was departing, it remained at a lower altitude than the others, and the pilot turned southeasterly toward rising terrain. Subsequently, the helicopter crashed on hilly terrain about three fifths of a mile from the takeoff point." Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) records showed that Brown was qualified to fly by instruments in a fixed-wing aircraft, but not in a helicopter. Toxicology tests performed on the victims revealed no traces of drugs or alcohol in their systems. Vaughan's funeral service was held on August 31, 1990, at Laurel Land Cemetery in Dallas, Texas. His wooden casket quickly became adorned with bouquets of flowers. An estimated 3,000 mourners joined a procession led by a white hearse. Among those at the public ceremony were Jeff Healey, Charlie Sexton, ZZ Top, Colin James, Stevie Wonder, Bonnie Raitt and Buddy Guy. Vaughan's grave marker reads: "Thank you ... for all the love you passed our way."
Musical style
Vaughan's music was rooted in blues, rock, and jazz. He was influenced by Jimi Hendrix, Albert King, Lonnie Mack, B.B. King, Freddie King, Albert Collins, Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Otis Rush, Guitar Slim, Chuck Berry, and Muddy Waters. According to nightclub owner Clifford Antone, who opened Antone's in 1975, Vaughan jammed with Albert King at Antone's in July 1977 and it almost "scared him to death", saying that "it was the best I've ever saw Albert or the best I ever saw Stevie". While Albert King had a substantial influence on Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix was Vaughan's greatest inspiration. Vaughan declared: "I love Hendrix for so many reasons. He was so much more than just a blues guitarist—he played damn well any kind of guitar he wanted. In fact I'm not sure if he even played the guitar—he played music." He was also influenced by such jazz guitarists as Django Reinhardt, Wes Montgomery, Kenny Burrell, and George Benson.
In 1987, Vaughan listed Lonnie Mack first among the guitarists he had listened to, both as a youngster and as an adult. Vaughan observed that Mack was "ahead of his time" and said, "I got a lot of my fast stuff from Lonnie". On another occasion, Vaughan said that he had learned tremolo picking and vibrato from Mack and that Mack had taught him to "play guitar from the heart." Mack recalled his first meeting with Vaughan in 1978:
Vaughan's relationship with another Texas blues legend, Johnny Winter, was a little more complex. Although they met several times, and often played sessions with the same musicians or even performed the same material, as in the case of Boot Hill, Vaughan always refrained from acknowledging Winter in any form. In his biography, "Raisin' Cain", Winter says that he was unnerved after reading Vaughan stating in an interview that he never met or knew Johnny Winter. "We even played together over at Tommy Shannon's house one time." Vaughan settled the issue in 1988 on the occasion of a blues festival in Europe where both he and Winter were on the bill, explaining that he has been misquoted and that "Every musician in Texas knows Johnny and has learned something from him". Asked to compare their playing styles in an interview in 2010, Winter admitted that "mine's a little bit rawer, I think."
Equipment
Guitars
Vaughan owned and used a variety of guitars during his career. His guitar of choice, and the instrument that he became most associated with, was the Fender Stratocaster, his favorite being a 1963 body with a 1962 neck and pickups dated from 1959. This is why Vaughan usually referred to his Stratocaster as a "1959 Strat". He explained why he favored this guitar in a 1983 interview: "I like the strength of its sound. Any guitar I play has got to be pretty versatile. It's got a big, strong tone and it'll take anything I do to it." Vaughan also referred to this instrument as his "first wife", or "Number One". Another favourite guitar was a slightly later Strat he named 'Lenny' after his wife, Lenora. While at a local pawn shop in 1980, Vaughan had noticed this particular guitar, a 1965 Stratocaster that had been refinished in red, with the original sunburst finish peeking through. It also had a 1910 Mandolin inlay just below the bridge. The pawn shop was asking $300 for it, which was way more than Vaughan had at the time. Lenny saw how badly he wanted this guitar, so she got six of their friends to chip in $50 each, and bought it for him. The guitar was presented to him on his birthday in 1980, and that night, after bringing "Lenny" (the guitar, and wife) home with him, he wrote the song, "Lenny". He started using a borrowed Stratocaster during high school and used Stratocasters predominantly in his live performances and recordings, although he did play other guitars, including custom guitars.
One of the custom guitars—nicknamed "Main"—was built by James Hamilton of Hamiltone Guitars in Buffalo, New York. It was a gift from Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top. Gibbons had commissioned Hamilton to build the guitar in 1979. There were some delays, including having to re-do the mother of pearl inlay of Vaughan's name on the fretboard when he changed his stage name from Stevie Vaughan to Stevie Ray Vaughan. The guitar was presented to him by Jim Hamilton on April 29, 1984. Hamilton recalls that Stevie Ray Vaughan was so happy with the guitar that he played it that night at Springfest on the University of Buffalo campus. It remained one of the main guitars he used on stage and in studio. Vaughan made some alterations to the guitar, including replacing the bronze color Gibson knobs with white Fender knobs, as he preferred the ribbing on the Fender knobs. The pickups had to be changed after the guitar was used in the "Couldn't Stand the Weather" video, in which Stevie and "Main" were drenched with water, and the pickups were ruined. Vaughan preferred guitar has been summarized as his,
Number One Strat, which Stevie claimed to be a ’59, since that was the date stamped on the back of the pickups… this was incorrect, however, as guitar tech Rene Martinez (who oversaw SRV’s guitars since 1980) found the stamp of 1963 on the body and 1962 on the original neck (the neck was replaced in 1989 after it could no longer be refretted properly; Rene used the neck from another SRV favorite, “Red”, as it was also a 1962 model). The pickups are also relatively low output, not the hot overwound myth that gained legs during the 80s… all 3 pickups are rumored to be under 6k ohms output impedance, which would be typical of a 1959 set (the neck pickups tended to be hottest, but not by much). Although the Fender SRV signature model uses Texas Special pickups, which Stevie was heavily involved in the making of, they do not accurately represent the sound of his original Number One.
Vaughan bought many Stratocasters and gave some away as gifts. A sunburst Diplomat Strat-style guitar was purchased by Vaughan and given to his girlfriend Janna Lapidus to learn to play on. Vaughan used a custom set of uncommonly heavy strings, gauges .013, .015, .019, .028, .038, .058, and tuned a half-step below standard tuning. He played with so much tension that it was not uncommon for him to separate his fingernail from the quick movement along the strings. The owner of an Austin club recalled Vaughan coming into the office between sets to borrow super glue, which he used to keep fingernail split from widening while he continued to play. The super glue was suggested by Rene Martinez, who was Stevie's guitar technician. Martinez eventually convinced Stevie to change to slightly lighter strings. He preferred a guitar neck with an asymmetrical profile (thicker at the top) which was more comfortable for his thumb-over style of playing. Heavy use of the vibrato bar necessitated frequent replacements; Vaughan often had his roadie, Byron Barr, obtain custom stainless steel bars made by Barr's father.
Vaughan was also photographed playing a Rickenbacker Capri, a National Duolian, Epiphone Riviera, Gibson Flying V, as well as several other models. Vaughan used a Gibson Johnny Smith to record "Stang's Swang", and a Guild 12-string acoustic for his performance on MTV Unplugged in January 1990. On June 24, 2004, one of Vaughan's Stratocasters, the aforementioned "Lenny" strat, was sold at an auction to benefit Eric Clapton's Crossroads Centre in Antigua; the instrument was bought by Guitar Center for $623,500.
Amplifiers and effects
Vaughan was a catalyst in the revival of vintage amplifiers and effects during the 1980s. His loud volume and use of heavy strings required powerful and robust amplifiers. Vaughan used two black-face Fender Super Reverbs, which were crucial in shaping his clear overdriven sound. He would often blend other amps with the Super Reverbs, including black-face Fender Vibroverbs, and brands such as Dumble, and Marshall, which he used for his clean sound.
While his mainstay effects were the Ibanez Tube Screamer and a Vox wah-wah pedal, Vaughan experimented with a range of effects. He used a Fender Vibratone, designed as a Leslie speaker for electric guitars, and provided a warbling chorus effect, which can be heard on the track "Cold Shot". He used a vintage Dallas Arbiter Fuzz Face that can be heard on In Step, as well as an Octavia. The Guitar Geek website provides a detailed illustration of Vaughan's 1985 equipment set up based on interviews with his guitar tech and effects builder, Cesar Diaz.
Legacy
Vaughan throughout his career revived blues rock and paved the way for many other artists. Vaughan's work continues to influence numerous blues, rock and alternative artists, including John Mayer, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Mike McCready, Albert Cummings, Los Lonely Boys and Chris Duarte, among others. AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine described Vaughan as "the leading light in American blues" and developed "a uniquely eclectic and fiery style that sounded like no other guitarist, regardless of genre". In 1983, Variety magazine called Vaughan the "guitar hero of the present era".
In the months that followed his death, Vaughan sold over 5.5 million albums in the United States. On September 25, 1990, Epic released Family Style, an LP the Vaughan brothers cut at Ardent Studios in Memphis, Tennessee. The label released several promotional singles and videos for the collaborative effort. In November 1990, CMV Enterprises released Pride and Joy, a collection of eight Double Trouble music videos. Sony signed a deal with the Vaughan estate to obtain control of his back catalog, as well as permission to release albums with previously unreleased material and new collections of released work. On October 29, 1991, The Sky Is Crying was released as Vaughan's first posthumous album with Double Trouble, and featured studio recordings from 1984 to 1985. Other compilations, live albums, and films have also been released since his death.
On October 3, 1991, Texas governor Ann Richards proclaimed "Stevie Ray Vaughan Commemoration Day", during which a memorial concert was held at the Texas Theatre. In 1993, a memorial statue of Vaughan was unveiled on Auditorium Shores and is the first public monument of a musician in Austin. In September 1994, a Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Run for Recovery was held in Dallas; the event was a benefit for the Ethel Daniels Foundation, established to help those in recovery from alcoholism and drug addiction who cannot afford treatment. In 1999, the Musicians' Assistance Program (later renamed MusiCares MAP Fund) created the "Stevie Ray Vaughan Award" to honor the memory of Vaughan and to recognize musicians for their devotion to helping other addicts struggling with the recovery process. The recipients include Eric Clapton, David Crosby, Steven Tyler, Alice Cooper, Ozzy Osbourne, Pete Townshend, Chris Cornell, Jerry Cantrell, Mike McCready, among others. In 1993, Martha Vaughan established the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Scholarship Fund, awarded to students at W.E. Greiner Middle School in Oakcliff who intend to attend college and pursue the arts as a profession.
Awards and honors
Vaughan won five W. C. Handy Awards and was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2000. In 1985, he was named an honorary admiral in the Texas Navy. Vaughan had a single number-one hit on the Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart for the song "Crossfire". His album sales in the U.S. stand at over 15 million units. Family Style, released shortly after his death, won the 1991 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album and became his best-selling, non-Double Trouble studio album with over a million shipments in the U.S. In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked him seventh among the "100 Greatest Guitar Players of All Time". He also became eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008, but did not appear on a nominations roster until 2014. He was inducted in the RRHOF alongside Double Trouble in 2015. Guitar World magazine ranked him as Number One in its list of the greatest blues guitarists.
In 1994 the city of Austin, Texas, erected the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial on the hiking trail beside Lady Bird Lake.
Discography
Texas Flood (1983)
Couldn't Stand the Weather (1984)
Soul to Soul (1985)
In Step (1989)
Family Style (1990)
The Sky is Crying (1991)
See also
1980s in music
List of blues rock musicians
List of electric blues musicians
List of guitarists
List of Texas blues musicians
Music of Austin, Texas
Music of Texas
Notes
Footnotes
Citations
Sources
Further reading
External links
The Stevie Ray Vaughan Archive
1954 births
1990 deaths
Accidental deaths in Wisconsin
American blues guitarists
American male guitarists
American blues singers
American blues singer-songwriters
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
Blues rock musicians
Double Trouble (band) members
Electric blues musicians
Epic Records artists
Sony Music artists
Grammy Award winners
Lead guitarists
Musicians from Dallas
Texas blues musicians
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1990
Victims of helicopter accidents or incidents in the United States
20th-century American singers
Slide guitarists
Resonator guitarists
Guitarists from Texas
20th-century American guitarists
People from Oak Cliff, Texas
20th-century American male singers
Musicians killed in aviation accidents or incidents
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Pipe smokers | 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"
] |
[
"Stevie Ray Vaughan",
"First recordings",
"In what year did Stevie Ray Vaughan start recording?",
"In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands,",
"What songs were on his first album?",
"They recorded two songs, \"Red, White and Blue\" and \"I Heard a Voice Last Night\",",
"What other musicians did SRV play with on his first recordings?",
"feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird.",
"How did critics receive his first recordings?",
"the album was rejected by A&M,",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top,"
] | C_156015fd0dc74c469a47cbc6a542733a_0 | Did SRV tour with ZZ Top? | 6 | Did SRV tour with ZZ Top? | Stevie Ray Vaughan | In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Country Club, a venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined a rock band named Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months. In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were disastrous. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed. In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras that included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King. Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde Pharaoh. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band. CANNOTANSWER | played various gigs across the South, | Stephen Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954August 27, 1990) was an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer, best known as the guitarist and frontman of the blues rock trio Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble. Although his mainstream career only spanned seven years, he is considered an icon and one of the most influential musicians in the history of blues music, and one of the greatest guitarists of all time.
Born and raised in Dallas, Texas, Vaughan began playing guitar at age seven, initially inspired by his elder brother, Jimmie Vaughan. In 1972, he dropped out of high school and moved to Austin, where he began to gain a following after playing gigs on the local club circuit. Vaughan joined forces with Tommy Shannon on bass and Chris Layton on drums as Double Trouble in 1978 and established it as part of the Austin music scene; it soon became one of the most popular acts in Texas. He performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1982, where David Bowie saw him play and contacted him for a studio gig, resulting in Stevie playing his blues guitar on the album Let's Dance (1983), before being discovered by John Hammond, who interested major label Epic Records in signing Vaughan and his band to a record deal. Within months, they achieved mainstream success for the critically acclaimed debut album Texas Flood. With a series of successful network television appearances and extensive concert tours, Vaughan became the leading figure in the blues revival of the 1980s.
Playing his guitar behind his back or plucking the strings with his teeth as Jimi Hendrix did, he earned unprecedented stardom in Europe, which later resulted in breakthroughs for guitar players like Robert Cray, Jeff Healey, Robben Ford and Walter Trout, amongst others.
During the majority of his life, Vaughan struggled with drug and alcohol addiction. He also struggled with the personal and professional pressures of fame and his marriage to Lenora "Lenny" Bailey. He successfully completed rehabilitation and began touring again with Double Trouble in November 1986. His fourth and final studio album In Step reached number 33 in the United States in 1989; it was one of Vaughan's most critically and commercially successful releases and included his only number-one hit, "Crossfire". He became one of the world's most highly demanded blues performers, and he headlined Madison Square Garden in 1989 and the Beale Street Music Festival in 1990.
On August 27, 1990, Vaughan and four others were killed in a helicopter crash in East Troy, Wisconsin, after performing with Double Trouble at Alpine Valley Music Theatre. An investigation concluded that the cause was pilot error and Vaughan's family later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Omniflight Helicopters that was settled out of court. Vaughan's music continued to achieve commercial success with several posthumous releases and has sold over 15 million albums in the United States alone. In 2003, David Fricke of Rolling Stone ranked him the seventh greatest guitarist of all time. Vaughan was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015, along with Double Trouble bandmates Chris Layton, Tommy Shannon, and Reese Wynans.
Family and early life
Stevie's grandfather, Thomas Lee Vaughan, married Laura Belle LaRue and moved to Rockwall County, Texas, where they lived by sharecropping.
Stevie's father, Jimmie Lee Vaughan, was born on September 6, 1921. Jimmie, also known as Jim and Big Jim, dropped out of school at age sixteen and enlisted in the U.S. Navy during World War II. After his discharge, he married Martha Jean (née Cook; 1928–2009) on January 13, 1950. They had a son, Jimmie, in 1951. Stephen was born at Methodist Hospital on October 3, 1954, in Dallas, Texas. Big Jim secured a job as an asbestos worker. The family moved frequently, living in other states such as Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Oklahoma before ultimately moving to the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. A shy and insecure boy, Vaughan was deeply affected by his childhood experiences. His father struggled with alcohol abuse and often terrorized his family and friends with his bad temper. In later years, Vaughan recalled that he had been a victim of his father's violence. His father died on August 27, 1986, exactly four years before Vaughan himself.
First instruments
In the early 1960s, Vaughan's admiration for his brother Jimmie resulted in his trying different instruments such as the drums and saxophone. In 1961, for his seventh birthday, Vaughan received his first guitar, a toy from Sears with Western motif. Learning by ear, he diligently committed himself, following along to songs by the Nightcaps, particularly "Wine, Wine, Wine" and "Thunderbird". He listened to blues artists such as Albert King, Otis Rush, and Muddy Waters, and rock guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix and Lonnie Mack, as well as jazz guitarists including Kenny Burrell. In 1963, he acquired his first electric guitar, a Gibson ES-125T, as a hand-me-down from Jimmie.
Soon after he acquired the electric guitar, Vaughan joined his first band, the Chantones, in 1965. Their first show was at a talent contest held in Dallas' Hill Theatre, but after realizing that they could not perform a Jimmy Reed song in its entirety, Vaughan left the band and joined the Brooklyn Underground, playing professionally at local bars and clubs. He received Jimmie's Fender Broadcaster, which he later traded for an Epiphone Riviera. When Jimmie left home at age sixteen, Vaughan's apparent obsession with the instrument caused a lack of support from his parents. Miserable at home, he took a job at a local hamburger stand, where he washed dishes and dumped trash for seventy cents an hour. After falling into a barrel of grease, he grew tired of the job and quit to devote his life to a music career.
Music career
Early years
In May 1969, after leaving the Brooklyn Underground, Vaughan joined a band called the Southern Distributor. He had learned the Yardbirds' "Jeff's Boogie" and played the song at the audition. Mike Steinbach, the group's drummer, commented: "The kid was fourteen. We auditioned him on 'Jeff's Boogie,' really fast instrumental guitar, and he played it note for note." Although they played pop rock covers, Vaughan conveyed his interest in the addition of blues songs to the group's repertoire; he was told that he wouldn't earn a living playing blues music and he and the band parted ways. Later that year, bassist Tommy Shannon walked into a Dallas club and heard Vaughan playing guitar. Fascinated by the skillful playing, which he described as "incredible even then", Shannon borrowed a bass guitar and the two jammed. Within a few years, they began performing together in a band called Krackerjack.
In February 1970, Vaughan joined a band called Liberation, which was a nine-piece group with a horn section. Having spent the past month briefly playing bass with Jimmie in Texas Storm, he had originally auditioned as bassist. Impressed by Vaughan's guitar playing, Scott Phares, the group's original guitarist, modestly became the bassist. In mid-1970, they performed at the Adolphus Hotel in downtown Dallas, where ZZ Top asked them to perform. During Liberation's break, Vaughan jammed with ZZ Top on the Nightcaps song "Thunderbird". Phares later described the performance: "they tore the house down. It was awesome. It was one of those magical evenings. Stevie fit in like a glove on a hand."
Attending Justin F. Kimball High School during the early 1970s, Vaughan's late-night shows contributed to his neglect in his studies, including music theory; he would often sleep during class. His pursuit of a musical career was disapproved of by many of the school's administrators but he was also encouraged by many people, including his art teacher, to strive for a career in art. In his sophomore year, he attended an evening class for experimental art at Southern Methodist University, but left when it conflicted with rehearsal. Vaughan later spoke of his dislike of the school and recalled having received daily notes from the principal about his grooming.
First recordings
In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Club, a local blues venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months.
In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were unsuccessful. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed.
In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras which included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King.
Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde "Pharaoh" Walden. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band.
Double Trouble
In mid-May 1978, Clark left to form his own group and Vaughan renamed the band Double Trouble, taken from the title of an Otis Rush song. Following the recruitment of bassist Jackie Newhouse, Walden quit in July, and was briefly replaced by Jack Moore, who had moved to Texas from Boston; he performed with the band for about two months. Vaughan then began looking for a drummer and soon after, he met Chris Layton through Sublett, who was his roommate. Layton, who had recently parted ways with Greezy Wheels, was taught by Vaughan to play a shuffle rhythm. When Vaughan offered Layton the position, he agreed. In early July, Vaughan befriended Lenora Bailey, known as "Lenny", who became his girlfriend, and ultimately his wife. The marriage was to last for six and a half years.
In early October 1978, Vaughan and Double Trouble earned a frequent residency performing at one of Austin's most popular nightspots, the Rome Inn. During a performance, Edi Johnson, an accountant at Manor Downs, noticed Vaughan. She remembered: "I'm not an authority on music—it's whatever turned me on—but this did." She recommended him to Manor Downs owner Frances Carr and general manager Chesley Millikin, who was interested in managing artists and saw Vaughan's musical potential. After Barton quit Double Trouble in mid-November 1979, Millikin signed Vaughan to a management contract. Vaughan also hired Robert "Cutter" Brandenburg as road manager, whom he had met in 1969. Addressing him as "Stevie Ray", Brandenburg convinced Vaughan to use his middle name on stage.
In October 1980, bassist Tommy Shannon attended a Double Trouble performance at Rockefeller's in Houston. Shannon, who was playing with Alan Haynes at the time, participated in a jam session with Vaughan and Layton halfway through their set. Shannon later commented: "I went down there that night, and I'll never forget this: it was like, when I walked in the door and I heard them playing, it was like a revelation. 'That's where I want to be; that's where I belong, right there.' During the break, I went up to Stevie and told him that. I didn't try to sneak around and hide it from the bass player [Jackie Newhouse]—I didn't know if he was listening or not. I just really wanted to be in that band. I sat in that night and it sounded great." Almost three months later, when Vaughan offered Shannon the position, he readily accepted.
Drug charge and trial
On December 5, 1979, while Vaughan was in a dressing room before a performance in Houston, an off-duty police officer arrested him after witnessing his usage of cocaine near an open window. He was formally charged with cocaine possession and subsequently released on $1,000 bail. Double Trouble was the opening act for Muddy Waters, who said about Vaughan's substance abuse: "Stevie could perhaps be the greatest guitar player that ever lived, but he won't live to get 40 years old if he doesn't leave that white powder alone." The following year, he was required to return on January 16 and February 29 for court appearances.
During the final court date, on April 17, 1980, Vaughan was sentenced with two years' probation and was prohibited from leaving Texas. Along with a stipulation of entering treatment for drug abuse, he was required to "avoid persons or places of known disreputable or harmful character"; he refused to comply with both of these orders. After a lawyer was hired, his probation officer had the sentence revised to allow him to work outside of the state. The incident later caused him to refuse maid service while staying in hotels during concert tours.
Montreux Jazz Festival
Although popular in Texas at the time, Double Trouble failed to gain national attention. The group's visibility improved when record producer Jerry Wexler recommended them to Claude Nobs, organizer of the Montreux Jazz Festival. He insisted the festival's blues night would be great with Vaughan, whom he called "a jewel, one of those rarities who comes along once in a lifetime", and Nobs agreed to book Double Trouble on July 17.
Vaughan opened with a medley arrangement of Freddie King's song "Hide Away" and his own fast instrumental composition, "Rude Mood". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", Hound Dog Taylor's "Give Me Back My Wig", and Albert Collins' "Collins Shuffle", as well as three original compositions: "Pride and Joy", "Love Struck Baby", and "Dirty Pool". The set ended with boos from the audience. People's James McBride wrote:
According to road manager Don Opperman: "the way I remember it, the 'ooos' and the 'boos' were mixed together, but Stevie was pretty disappointed. Stevie [had] just handed me his guitar and walked off stage, and I'm like, 'are you coming back?' There was a doorway back there; the audience couldn't see the guys, but I could. He went back to the dressing room with his head in his hands. I went back there finally, and that was the end of the show." According to Vaughan: "it wasn't the whole crowd [that booed]. It was just a few people sitting right up front. The room there was built for acoustic jazz. When five or six people boo, wow, it sounds like the whole world hates you. They thought we were too loud, but shoot, I had four army blankets folded over my amp, and the volume level was on 2. I'm used to playin' on 10!" The performance was filmed and later released on DVD in September 2004.
On the following night, Double Trouble was booked in the lounge of the Montreux Casino, with Jackson Browne in attendance. Browne jammed with Double Trouble until the early morning hours and offered them free use of his personal recording studio in downtown Los Angeles. In late November the band accepted his offer and recorded ten songs in two days. While they were in the studio, Vaughan received a telephone call from David Bowie, who met him after the Montreux performance, and he invited him to participate in a recording session for his next studio album, Let's Dance. In January 1983, Vaughan recorded guitar on six of the album's eight songs, including the title track and "China Girl". The album was released on April 14, 1983, and sold over three times as many copies as Bowie's previous album.
National success
In mid-March 1983, Gregg Geller, vice president of A&R at Epic Records, signed Double Trouble to the label at the recommendation of record producer John Hammond. Soon afterward, Epic financed a music video for "Love Struck Baby", which was filmed at the Cherry Tavern in New York City. Vaughan recalled: "we changed the name of the place in the video. Four years ago I got married in a club where we used to play all the time called the Rome Inn. When they closed it down, the owner gave me the sign, so in the video we put that up behind me on the stage."
With the success of Let's Dance, Bowie requested Vaughan as the featured instrumentalist for the upcoming Serious Moonlight Tour, realizing that he was an essential aspect of the album's groundbreaking success. In late April, Vaughan began rehearsals for the tour in Las Colinas, Texas. When contract renegotiations for his performance fee failed, Vaughan abandoned the tour days before its opening date, and he was replaced by Earl Slick. Vaughan commented: "I couldn't gear everything on something I didn't really care a whole lot about. It was kind of risky, but I really didn't need all the headaches." Although contributing factors were widely disputed, Vaughan soon gained major publicity for quitting the tour.
On May 9, the band performed at The Bottom Line in New York City, where they opened for Bryan Adams, with Hammond, Mick Jagger, John McEnroe, Rick Nielsen, Billy Gibbons, and Johnny Winter in attendance. Brandenburg described the performance as "ungodly": "I think Stevie played every lick as loud and as hard and with as much intensity as I've ever heard him." The performance earned Vaughan a positive review published in the New York Post, asserting that Double Trouble outperformed Adams. "Fortunately, Bryan Adams, the Canadian rocker who is opening arena dates for Journey, doesn't headline too often", wrote Martin Porter, who claimed that after the band's performance, the stage had been "rendered to cinders by the most explosively original showmanship to grace the New York stage in some time."
Texas Flood
After acquiring the recordings from Browne's studio, Double Trouble began assembling the material for a full-length LP. The album, Texas Flood, opens with the track "Love Struck Baby", which was written for Lenny on their "love-struck day". He composed "Pride and Joy" and "I'm Cryin'" for one of his former girlfriends, Lindi Bethel. Although both are musically similar, their lyrics are two different perspectives of the relationship. Along with covers of Howlin' Wolf, the Isley Brothers, and Buddy Guy, the album included Vaughan's cover of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", a song which he became strongly associated with. "Lenny" served as a tribute to his wife, which he composed at the end of their bed.
Texas Flood featured cover art by illustrator Brad Holland, who is known for his artwork for Playboy and The New York Times. Originally envisioned with Vaughan sitting on a horse depicting a promotable resemblance, Holland painted an image of him leaning against a wall with a guitar, using a photograph as a reference. Released on June 13, 1983, Texas Flood peaked at number 38 and ultimately sold half a million copies. While Rolling Stone editor Kurt Loder asserted that Vaughan did not possess a distinctive voice, according to AllMusic senior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the release was a "monumental impact". Billboard described it as "a guitar boogie lovers delight". Agent Alex Hodges commented: "No one knew how big that record would be, because guitar players weren't necessarily in vogue, except for some that were so established they were undeniable ... he was one of the few artists that was recouped on every record in a short period of time."
On June 16, Vaughan gave a performance at Tango nightclub in Dallas, which celebrated the album's release. Assorted VIPs attended the performance, including Ted Nugent, Sammy Hagar, and members of The Kinks and Uriah Heep. Jack Chase, vice president of marketing for Epic, recalled: "the coming-out party at Tango was very important; it was absolutely huge. All the radio station personalities, DJs, program directors, all the retail record store owners and the important managers, press, all the executives from New York came down—about seven hundred people. We attacked in Dallas first with Q102-FM and [DJ] Redbeard. We had the Tango party—it was hot. It was the ticket." The Dallas Morning News reviewed the performance, starting with the rhetorical question; "what if Stevie Ray Vaughan had an album release party and everybody came? It happened Thursday night at Tango. ... The adrenalin must have been gushing through the musicians' veins as they performed with rare finesse and skill."
Following a brief tour in Europe, Hodges arranged an engagement for Double Trouble as The Moody Blues' opening act during a two-month tour of North America. Hodges stated that many people disliked the idea of Double Trouble opening for The Moody Blues, but asserted that a common thread which both bands shared was "album-oriented rock". Shannon described the tour as "glorious": "Our record hadn't become that successful yet, but we were playing in front of coliseums full of people. We just went out and played, and it fit like a glove. The sound rang through those big coliseums like a monster. People were going crazy, and they had no idea who we were!" After appearing on the television series Austin City Limits, the band played a sold-out concert at New York City's Beacon Theatre. Variety wrote that their ninety-minute set at the Beacon "left no doubt that this young Texas musician is indeed the 'guitar hero of the present era.'"
Couldn't Stand the Weather
In January 1984, Double Trouble began recording their second studio album, Couldn't Stand the Weather, at the Power Station, with John Hammond as executive producer and engineer Richard Mullen. Layton later recalled working with Hammond: "he was kind of like a nice hand on your shoulder, as opposed to someone that jumped in and said, 'let's redo this, let's do that more.' He didn't get involved in that way at all. He was a feedback person." As the sessions began, Vaughan's cover of Bob Geddins' "Tin Pan Alley" was recorded while audio levels were being checked. Layton remembers the performance: "... we did probably the quietest version we ever did up 'til that point. We ended it and [Hammond] said; 'that's the best that song will ever sound,' and we went; 'we haven't even got sounds, have we?' He goes, 'that doesn't matter. That's the best you'll ever do that song.' We tried it again five, six, seven times- I can't even remember. But it never quite sounded like it did that first time."
During recording sessions, Vaughan began experimenting with other combinations of musicians, including Fran Christina and Stan Harrison, who played drums and saxophone respectively on the jazz instrumental, "Stang's Swang". Jimmie Vaughan played rhythm guitar on his cover of Guitar Slim's "The Things That I Used to Do" and the title track, the latter of which Vaughan carries a worldly message in his lyrics. According to musicologist Andy Aledort, Vaughan's guitar playing throughout the song is marked by steady rhythmic strumming patterns and improvised lead lines, with a distinctive R&B and soul single-note riff, doubled in octaves by guitar and bass.
Couldn't Stand the Weather was released on May 15, 1984, and two weeks later it had rapidly outpaced the sales of Texas Flood. It peaked at number 31 and spent 38 weeks on the charts. The album includes Vaughan's cover of Jimi Hendrix's song, "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", which provoked inevitable comparisons to Hendrix. According to AllMusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Couldn't Stand the Weather "confirmed that the acclaimed debut was no fluke, while matching, if not bettering, the sales of its predecessor, thereby cementing Vaughan's status as a giant of modern blues." According to authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford, the album "was a major turning point in Stevie Ray Vaughan's development" and Vaughan's singing improved.
Carnegie Hall
On October 4, 1984, Vaughan headlined a performance at Carnegie Hall that included many guest musicians. For the second half of the concert, he added Jimmie as rhythm guitarist, drummer George Rains, keyboardist Dr. John, Roomful of Blues horn section, and featured vocalist Angela Strehli. The ensemble rehearsed for less than two weeks before the performance, and despite the solid dynamics of Double Trouble for the first half of the performance, according to Patoski and Crawford, the big band concept never entirely took form. Before arriving at the engagement, the venue sold out, which made Vaughan overexcited and nervous as he did not calm down until halfway through the third song. A benefit for the T.J. Martell Foundation's work in leukemia and cancer research, he was an important draw for the event. As his scheduled time slot drew closer, he indicated that he preferred traveling to the venue by limousine to avoid being swarmed by fans on the street; the band took the stage around 8:00 p.m. The audience of 2,200 people, which included Vaughan's wife, family and friends, transformed the venue into what Stephen Holden of The New York Times described as "a whistling, stomping roadhouse".
Introduced by Hammond as "one of the greatest guitar players of all time", Vaughan opened with "Scuttle Buttin'", wearing a custom-made mariachi suit he described as a "Mexican tuxedo". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of the Isley Brothers' "Testify", The Jimi Hendrix Experience's "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", "Tin Pan Alley", Elmore James' "The Sky Is Crying", and W. C. Clark's "Cold Shot", along with four original compositions including "Love Struck Baby", "Honey Bee", "Couldn't Stand the Weather", and "Rude Mood". During the second half of the performance, Vaughan performed covers by Larry Davis, Buddy Guy, Guitar Slim, Albert King, Jackie Wilson, and Albert Collins. The set ended with Vaughan performing solo renditions of "Lenny" and "Rude Mood".
The Dallas Times-Herald wrote of the performance at Carnegie Hall as; "was full of stomping feet and swaying bodies, kids in blue jeans hanging off the balconies, dancing bodies that clogged the aisles." The New York Times asserted that, despite the venue's "muddy" acoustics, their performance was "filled with verve", and Vaughan's playing was "handsomely displayed". Jimmie Vaughan later commented: "I was worried the crowd might be a little stiff. Turned out they're just like any other beer joint." Vaughan commented: "We won't be limited to just the trio, although that doesn't mean we'll stop doing the trio. I'm planning on doing that too. I ain't gonna stay in one place. If I do, I'm stupid." The performance was recorded and later released as an official live LP. The album was released posthumously on July 29, 1997, by Epic Records; it was ultimately certified gold.
Immediately after the concert, Vaughan attended a private party at a downtown club in New York, which was sponsored by MTV, where he was greeted by an hour's worth of supporters. On the following day, Double Trouble made an appearance at a record store in Greenwich Village, where they signed autographs for fans. In late October 1984, the band toured Australia and New Zealand, which included one of their first appearances on Australian television—on Hey Hey It's Saturday—where they performed "Texas Flood", and an interview on Sounds. On November 5 and 9, they played sold-out concerts at the Sydney Opera House. Upon returning to the U.S., Double Trouble went on a brief tour in California. Soon afterward, Vaughan and Lenny went to the island of Saint Croix, on the U.S. Virgin Islands in the Caribbean Sea, where they had spent some time vacationing in December. The next month, Double Trouble flew to Japan, where they appeared for five performances, including at Kōsei Nenkin Kaikan in Osaka.
Soul to Soul
In March 1985, recording for Double Trouble's third studio album, Soul to Soul, began at the Dallas Sound Lab. As the sessions progressed, Vaughan became increasingly frustrated with his own lack of inspiration. He was also allowed a relaxed pace of recording the album, which contributed to a lack of focus due to excesses in alcohol and other drugs. Roadie Byron Barr later recalled: "the routine was to go to the studio, do dope, and play ping-pong." Vaughan, who found it increasingly difficult to be able to play rhythm guitar parts and sing at the same time, wanted to add another dimension to the band, so he hired keyboardist Reese Wynans to record on the album; he joined the band soon thereafter.
During the album's production, Vaughan appeared at the Houston Astrodome on April 10, 1985, where he performed a slide guitar rendition of the U.S. national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner"; his performance was met with booing. Upon leaving the stage, Vaughan acquired an autograph from former player for the New York Yankees, Mickey Mantle. Astrodome publicist Molly Glentzer wrote in the Houston Press: "as Vaughan shuffled back behind home plate, he was only lucid enough to know that he wanted Mickey Mantle's autograph. Mantle obliged. 'I never signed a guitar before.' Nobody asked Vaughan for his autograph. I was sure he'd be dead before he hit 30." Critics associated his performance with Jimi Hendrix's rendition at Woodstock in 1969, yet Vaughan disliked this comparison: "I heard they even wrote about it in one of the music magazines and they tried to put the two versions side by side. I hate that stuff. His version was great."
Released on September 30, 1985, Soul to Soul peaked at number 34 and remained on the Billboard 200 through mid-1986, eventually certified gold. Critic Jimmy Guterman of Rolling Stone wrote: "there's some life left in their blues rock pastiche; it's also possible that they've run out of gas." According to Patoski and Crawford, sales of the album "did not match Couldn't Stand the Weather, suggesting Stevie Ray and Double Trouble were plateauing". Vaughan commented: "as far as what's on there song-wise, I like the album a lot. It meant a lot to us what we went through to get this record. There were a lot of odds and we still stayed strong. We grew a lot with the people in the band and immediate friends around us; we learned a lot and grew a lot closer. That has a lot to do with why it's called [Soul to Soul]."
Live Alive
After touring for nine and a half months, Epic requested a fourth album from Double Trouble as part of their contractual obligation. In July 1986, Vaughan decided that they would record the LP, Live Alive, during three live appearances in Austin and Dallas. On July 17 and 18, the band performed sold-out concerts at the Austin Opera House, and July 19 at the Dallas Starfest. They used recordings of these concerts to assemble the LP, which was produced by Vaughan. Shannon was backstage before the Austin concert and predicted to new manager Alex Hodges that both Vaughan and himself were "headed for a brick wall". Guitarist Denny Freeman attended the Austin performances; he called the shows a "musical mess, because they would go into these chaotic jams with no control. I didn't know what exactly was going on, but I was concerned." Both Layton and Shannon remarked that their work schedule and drugs were causing the band to lose focus. According to Wynans: "Things were getting illogical and crazy."
The Live Alive album was released on November 17, 1986, and the only official live Double Trouble LP made commercially available during Vaughan's lifetime, though it never appeared on the Billboard 200 chart. Though many critics claimed that most of the album was overdubbed, engineer Gary Olazabal, who mixed the album, asserted that most of the material was recorded poorly. Vaughan later admitted that it was not one of his better efforts; he recalled: "I wasn't in very good shape when we recorded Live Alive. At the time, I didn't realize how bad a shape I was in. There were more fix-it jobs done on the album than I would have liked. Some of the work sounds like [it was] the work of half-dead people. There were some great notes that came out, but I just wasn't in control; nobody was."
Drugs and alcohol
In 1960, when Vaughan was six years old, he began stealing his father's drinks. Drawn in by its effects, he started making his own drinks and this resulted in alcohol dependence. He explained: "that's when I first started stealing daddy's drinks. Or when my parents were gone, I'd find the bottle and make myself one. I thought it was cool ... thought the kids down the street would think it was cool. That's where it began, and I had been depending on it ever since." According to the authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford: "In the ensuing twenty-five years, he had worked his way through the Physicians' Desk Reference before finding his poisons of preference—alcohol and cocaine."
While Vaughan asserted that he first experienced the effects of cocaine when a doctor prescribed him a liquid solution of the stimulant as a nasal spray, according to Patoski and Crawford, the earliest that Vaughan is known to have ingested the drug is in 1975, while performing with the Cobras. Before that, Vaughan had briefly used other drugs such as cannabis, methamphetamine, and Quaaludes, the brand name for methaqualone. After 1975, he regularly drank whiskey and used cocaine, particularly mixing the two substances together. According to Hopkins, by the time of Double Trouble's European tour in September 1986, "his lifestyle of substance abuse had reached a peak, probably better characterized as the bottom of a deep chasm."
At the height of Vaughan's substance abuse, he drank of whiskey and used of cocaine each day. Personal assistant Tim Duckworth explained: "I would make sure he would eat breakfast instead of waking up drinking every morning, which was probably the worst thing he was doing." According to Vaughan: "it got to the point where if I'd try to say "hi" to somebody, I would just fall apart crying. It was like solid doom."
In September 1986, Double Trouble traveled to Denmark for a one-month tour of Europe. During the late night hours of September 28, Vaughan became ill after a performance in Ludwigshafen, Germany, suffering from near-death dehydration, for which he received medical treatment. The incident resulted in his checking into The London Clinic under the care of Dr. Victor Bloom, who warned him that he was a month away from death. After staying in London for more than a week, he returned to the United States and entered Peachford Hospital in Atlanta, where he spent four weeks in rehabilitation, and then checked into rehab in Austin.
Live Alive tour
In November 1986, following his departure from rehab, Vaughan moved back into his mother's Glenfield Avenue house in Dallas, which is where he had spent much of his childhood. During this time, Double Trouble began rehearsals for the Live Alive tour. Although Vaughan was nervous about performing after achieving sobriety, he received positive reassurance. Wynans later recalled: "Stevie was real worried about playing after he'd gotten sober...he didn't know if he had anything left to offer. Once we got back out on the road, he was very inspired and motivated." The tour began on November 23 at Towson State University, which was Vaughan's first performance with Double Trouble after rehab. On December 31, 1986, they played a concert at Atlanta's Fox Theatre, which featured encore performances with Lonnie Mack.
As the tour progressed, Vaughan was longing to work on material for his next LP, but in January 1987, he filed for a divorce from Lenny, which restricted him from any projects until the proceedings were finalized. This prevented him from writing and recording songs for almost two years, but Double Trouble wrote the song "Crossfire" with Bill Carter and Ruth Ellsworth. Layton recalled: "we wrote the music, and they had to write the lyrics. We had just gotten together; Stevie was unable to be there at that time. He was in Dallas doing some things, and we just got together and started writing some songs. That was the first one we wrote." On August 6, 1987, Double Trouble appeared at the Austin Aqua Festival, where they played to one of the largest audiences of their career. According to biographer Craig Hopkins, as many as 20,000 people attended the concert. Following a month-long tour as the opening act for Robert Plant in May 1988, which included a concert at Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens, the band was booked for a European leg, which included 22 performances, and ended in Oulu, Finland on July 17. This would be Vaughan's last concert appearance in Europe.
In Step
After Vaughan's divorce from Lenora "Lenny" Darlene Bailey became final, recording for Double Trouble's fourth and final studio album, In Step, began at Kiva Studios in Memphis, Tennessee, working with producer Jim Gaines and co-songwriter Doyle Bramhall. Initially, he had doubts about his musical and creative abilities after achieving sobriety, but he gained confidence as the sessions progressed. Shannon later recalled: "In Step was, for him, a big growing experience. In my opinion, it's our best studio album, and I think he felt that way, too." Bramhall, who had also entered rehab, wrote songs with Vaughan about addiction and redemption. According to Vaughan, the album was titled In Step because "I'm finally in step with life, in step with myself, in step with my music." The album's liner notes include the quote; "'thank God the elevator's broken," a reference to the twelve-step program proposed by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA).
After the In Step recording sessions moved to Los Angeles, Vaughan added horn players Joe Sublett and Darrell Leonard, who played saxophone and trumpet respectively on both "Crossfire" and "Love Me Darlin". Shortly before the album's production was complete, Vaughan and Double Trouble appeared at a presidential inaugural party in Washington, D.C. for George H. W. Bush. In Step was released on June 13, 1989, and eight months later, it was certified gold. The album was Vaughan's most commercially successful release and his first one to win a Grammy Award. It peaked at number 33 on the Billboard 200, spending 47 weeks on the chart. In Step included the song, "Crossfire", which was written by Double Trouble, Bill Carter, and Ruth Ellsworth; it became his only number one hit. The album also included one of his first recordings to feature the use of a Fuzz Face on Vaughan's cover of the Howlin' Wolf song, "Love Me Darlin.
In July 1989, Neil Perry, a writer for Sounds magazine, wrote: "the album closes with the brow-soothing swoon of 'Riviera Paradise,' a slow, lengthy guitar and piano workout that proves just why Vaughan is to the guitar what Nureyev is to ballet." According to music journalist Robert Christgau, Vaughan was "writing blues for AA...he escapes the blues undamaged for the first time in his career." In October 1989, the Boca Raton News described Vaughan's guitar solos as "determined, clear-headed and downright stinging" and his lyrics as "tension-filled allegories".
Death
On Monday, August 27, 1990, at 12:50 a.m. (CDT), Vaughan and members of Eric Clapton's touring entourage played an all-star encore jam session at Alpine Valley Music Theatre in Alpine Valley Resort in East Troy, Wisconsin. They then left for Midway International Airport in Chicago in a Bell 206B helicopter, the most common way for acts to enter and exit the venue, as there is only one road in and out, heavily used by fans. The helicopter crashed into a nearby ski hill shortly after takeoff. Vaughan and the four others on board—pilot Jeff Brown, agent Bobby Brooks, bodyguard Nigel Browne, and tour manager Colin Smythe—died. The helicopter was identified as being owned by Chicago-based company Omniflight Helicopters. Initial reports of the crash erroneously claimed that Clapton had also been killed. According to findings from an inquest conducted by the coroner's office in Elkhorn, all five victims were killed instantly.
The investigation determined the aircraft departed in foggy conditions with visibility reportedly under two miles, according to a local forecast. The National Transportation Safety Board report stated: "As the third helicopter was departing, it remained at a lower altitude than the others, and the pilot turned southeasterly toward rising terrain. Subsequently, the helicopter crashed on hilly terrain about three fifths of a mile from the takeoff point." Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) records showed that Brown was qualified to fly by instruments in a fixed-wing aircraft, but not in a helicopter. Toxicology tests performed on the victims revealed no traces of drugs or alcohol in their systems. Vaughan's funeral service was held on August 31, 1990, at Laurel Land Cemetery in Dallas, Texas. His wooden casket quickly became adorned with bouquets of flowers. An estimated 3,000 mourners joined a procession led by a white hearse. Among those at the public ceremony were Jeff Healey, Charlie Sexton, ZZ Top, Colin James, Stevie Wonder, Bonnie Raitt and Buddy Guy. Vaughan's grave marker reads: "Thank you ... for all the love you passed our way."
Musical style
Vaughan's music was rooted in blues, rock, and jazz. He was influenced by Jimi Hendrix, Albert King, Lonnie Mack, B.B. King, Freddie King, Albert Collins, Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Otis Rush, Guitar Slim, Chuck Berry, and Muddy Waters. According to nightclub owner Clifford Antone, who opened Antone's in 1975, Vaughan jammed with Albert King at Antone's in July 1977 and it almost "scared him to death", saying that "it was the best I've ever saw Albert or the best I ever saw Stevie". While Albert King had a substantial influence on Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix was Vaughan's greatest inspiration. Vaughan declared: "I love Hendrix for so many reasons. He was so much more than just a blues guitarist—he played damn well any kind of guitar he wanted. In fact I'm not sure if he even played the guitar—he played music." He was also influenced by such jazz guitarists as Django Reinhardt, Wes Montgomery, Kenny Burrell, and George Benson.
In 1987, Vaughan listed Lonnie Mack first among the guitarists he had listened to, both as a youngster and as an adult. Vaughan observed that Mack was "ahead of his time" and said, "I got a lot of my fast stuff from Lonnie". On another occasion, Vaughan said that he had learned tremolo picking and vibrato from Mack and that Mack had taught him to "play guitar from the heart." Mack recalled his first meeting with Vaughan in 1978:
Vaughan's relationship with another Texas blues legend, Johnny Winter, was a little more complex. Although they met several times, and often played sessions with the same musicians or even performed the same material, as in the case of Boot Hill, Vaughan always refrained from acknowledging Winter in any form. In his biography, "Raisin' Cain", Winter says that he was unnerved after reading Vaughan stating in an interview that he never met or knew Johnny Winter. "We even played together over at Tommy Shannon's house one time." Vaughan settled the issue in 1988 on the occasion of a blues festival in Europe where both he and Winter were on the bill, explaining that he has been misquoted and that "Every musician in Texas knows Johnny and has learned something from him". Asked to compare their playing styles in an interview in 2010, Winter admitted that "mine's a little bit rawer, I think."
Equipment
Guitars
Vaughan owned and used a variety of guitars during his career. His guitar of choice, and the instrument that he became most associated with, was the Fender Stratocaster, his favorite being a 1963 body with a 1962 neck and pickups dated from 1959. This is why Vaughan usually referred to his Stratocaster as a "1959 Strat". He explained why he favored this guitar in a 1983 interview: "I like the strength of its sound. Any guitar I play has got to be pretty versatile. It's got a big, strong tone and it'll take anything I do to it." Vaughan also referred to this instrument as his "first wife", or "Number One". Another favourite guitar was a slightly later Strat he named 'Lenny' after his wife, Lenora. While at a local pawn shop in 1980, Vaughan had noticed this particular guitar, a 1965 Stratocaster that had been refinished in red, with the original sunburst finish peeking through. It also had a 1910 Mandolin inlay just below the bridge. The pawn shop was asking $300 for it, which was way more than Vaughan had at the time. Lenny saw how badly he wanted this guitar, so she got six of their friends to chip in $50 each, and bought it for him. The guitar was presented to him on his birthday in 1980, and that night, after bringing "Lenny" (the guitar, and wife) home with him, he wrote the song, "Lenny". He started using a borrowed Stratocaster during high school and used Stratocasters predominantly in his live performances and recordings, although he did play other guitars, including custom guitars.
One of the custom guitars—nicknamed "Main"—was built by James Hamilton of Hamiltone Guitars in Buffalo, New York. It was a gift from Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top. Gibbons had commissioned Hamilton to build the guitar in 1979. There were some delays, including having to re-do the mother of pearl inlay of Vaughan's name on the fretboard when he changed his stage name from Stevie Vaughan to Stevie Ray Vaughan. The guitar was presented to him by Jim Hamilton on April 29, 1984. Hamilton recalls that Stevie Ray Vaughan was so happy with the guitar that he played it that night at Springfest on the University of Buffalo campus. It remained one of the main guitars he used on stage and in studio. Vaughan made some alterations to the guitar, including replacing the bronze color Gibson knobs with white Fender knobs, as he preferred the ribbing on the Fender knobs. The pickups had to be changed after the guitar was used in the "Couldn't Stand the Weather" video, in which Stevie and "Main" were drenched with water, and the pickups were ruined. Vaughan preferred guitar has been summarized as his,
Number One Strat, which Stevie claimed to be a ’59, since that was the date stamped on the back of the pickups… this was incorrect, however, as guitar tech Rene Martinez (who oversaw SRV’s guitars since 1980) found the stamp of 1963 on the body and 1962 on the original neck (the neck was replaced in 1989 after it could no longer be refretted properly; Rene used the neck from another SRV favorite, “Red”, as it was also a 1962 model). The pickups are also relatively low output, not the hot overwound myth that gained legs during the 80s… all 3 pickups are rumored to be under 6k ohms output impedance, which would be typical of a 1959 set (the neck pickups tended to be hottest, but not by much). Although the Fender SRV signature model uses Texas Special pickups, which Stevie was heavily involved in the making of, they do not accurately represent the sound of his original Number One.
Vaughan bought many Stratocasters and gave some away as gifts. A sunburst Diplomat Strat-style guitar was purchased by Vaughan and given to his girlfriend Janna Lapidus to learn to play on. Vaughan used a custom set of uncommonly heavy strings, gauges .013, .015, .019, .028, .038, .058, and tuned a half-step below standard tuning. He played with so much tension that it was not uncommon for him to separate his fingernail from the quick movement along the strings. The owner of an Austin club recalled Vaughan coming into the office between sets to borrow super glue, which he used to keep fingernail split from widening while he continued to play. The super glue was suggested by Rene Martinez, who was Stevie's guitar technician. Martinez eventually convinced Stevie to change to slightly lighter strings. He preferred a guitar neck with an asymmetrical profile (thicker at the top) which was more comfortable for his thumb-over style of playing. Heavy use of the vibrato bar necessitated frequent replacements; Vaughan often had his roadie, Byron Barr, obtain custom stainless steel bars made by Barr's father.
Vaughan was also photographed playing a Rickenbacker Capri, a National Duolian, Epiphone Riviera, Gibson Flying V, as well as several other models. Vaughan used a Gibson Johnny Smith to record "Stang's Swang", and a Guild 12-string acoustic for his performance on MTV Unplugged in January 1990. On June 24, 2004, one of Vaughan's Stratocasters, the aforementioned "Lenny" strat, was sold at an auction to benefit Eric Clapton's Crossroads Centre in Antigua; the instrument was bought by Guitar Center for $623,500.
Amplifiers and effects
Vaughan was a catalyst in the revival of vintage amplifiers and effects during the 1980s. His loud volume and use of heavy strings required powerful and robust amplifiers. Vaughan used two black-face Fender Super Reverbs, which were crucial in shaping his clear overdriven sound. He would often blend other amps with the Super Reverbs, including black-face Fender Vibroverbs, and brands such as Dumble, and Marshall, which he used for his clean sound.
While his mainstay effects were the Ibanez Tube Screamer and a Vox wah-wah pedal, Vaughan experimented with a range of effects. He used a Fender Vibratone, designed as a Leslie speaker for electric guitars, and provided a warbling chorus effect, which can be heard on the track "Cold Shot". He used a vintage Dallas Arbiter Fuzz Face that can be heard on In Step, as well as an Octavia. The Guitar Geek website provides a detailed illustration of Vaughan's 1985 equipment set up based on interviews with his guitar tech and effects builder, Cesar Diaz.
Legacy
Vaughan throughout his career revived blues rock and paved the way for many other artists. Vaughan's work continues to influence numerous blues, rock and alternative artists, including John Mayer, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Mike McCready, Albert Cummings, Los Lonely Boys and Chris Duarte, among others. AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine described Vaughan as "the leading light in American blues" and developed "a uniquely eclectic and fiery style that sounded like no other guitarist, regardless of genre". In 1983, Variety magazine called Vaughan the "guitar hero of the present era".
In the months that followed his death, Vaughan sold over 5.5 million albums in the United States. On September 25, 1990, Epic released Family Style, an LP the Vaughan brothers cut at Ardent Studios in Memphis, Tennessee. The label released several promotional singles and videos for the collaborative effort. In November 1990, CMV Enterprises released Pride and Joy, a collection of eight Double Trouble music videos. Sony signed a deal with the Vaughan estate to obtain control of his back catalog, as well as permission to release albums with previously unreleased material and new collections of released work. On October 29, 1991, The Sky Is Crying was released as Vaughan's first posthumous album with Double Trouble, and featured studio recordings from 1984 to 1985. Other compilations, live albums, and films have also been released since his death.
On October 3, 1991, Texas governor Ann Richards proclaimed "Stevie Ray Vaughan Commemoration Day", during which a memorial concert was held at the Texas Theatre. In 1993, a memorial statue of Vaughan was unveiled on Auditorium Shores and is the first public monument of a musician in Austin. In September 1994, a Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Run for Recovery was held in Dallas; the event was a benefit for the Ethel Daniels Foundation, established to help those in recovery from alcoholism and drug addiction who cannot afford treatment. In 1999, the Musicians' Assistance Program (later renamed MusiCares MAP Fund) created the "Stevie Ray Vaughan Award" to honor the memory of Vaughan and to recognize musicians for their devotion to helping other addicts struggling with the recovery process. The recipients include Eric Clapton, David Crosby, Steven Tyler, Alice Cooper, Ozzy Osbourne, Pete Townshend, Chris Cornell, Jerry Cantrell, Mike McCready, among others. In 1993, Martha Vaughan established the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Scholarship Fund, awarded to students at W.E. Greiner Middle School in Oakcliff who intend to attend college and pursue the arts as a profession.
Awards and honors
Vaughan won five W. C. Handy Awards and was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2000. In 1985, he was named an honorary admiral in the Texas Navy. Vaughan had a single number-one hit on the Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart for the song "Crossfire". His album sales in the U.S. stand at over 15 million units. Family Style, released shortly after his death, won the 1991 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album and became his best-selling, non-Double Trouble studio album with over a million shipments in the U.S. In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked him seventh among the "100 Greatest Guitar Players of All Time". He also became eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008, but did not appear on a nominations roster until 2014. He was inducted in the RRHOF alongside Double Trouble in 2015. Guitar World magazine ranked him as Number One in its list of the greatest blues guitarists.
In 1994 the city of Austin, Texas, erected the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial on the hiking trail beside Lady Bird Lake.
Discography
Texas Flood (1983)
Couldn't Stand the Weather (1984)
Soul to Soul (1985)
In Step (1989)
Family Style (1990)
The Sky is Crying (1991)
See also
1980s in music
List of blues rock musicians
List of electric blues musicians
List of guitarists
List of Texas blues musicians
Music of Austin, Texas
Music of Texas
Notes
Footnotes
Citations
Sources
Further reading
External links
The Stevie Ray Vaughan Archive
1954 births
1990 deaths
Accidental deaths in Wisconsin
American blues guitarists
American male guitarists
American blues singers
American blues singer-songwriters
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
Blues rock musicians
Double Trouble (band) members
Electric blues musicians
Epic Records artists
Sony Music artists
Grammy Award winners
Lead guitarists
Musicians from Dallas
Texas blues musicians
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1990
Victims of helicopter accidents or incidents in the United States
20th-century American singers
Slide guitarists
Resonator guitarists
Guitarists from Texas
20th-century American guitarists
People from Oak Cliff, Texas
20th-century American male singers
Musicians killed in aviation accidents or incidents
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Pipe smokers | true | [
"The XXX Tour was a worldwide concert tour by American rock band ZZ Top. Staged in support of their 1999 album XXX, the tour visited arenas and stadiums from 1999 to 2002. With five legs and 134 shows, the tour began in Denver, Colorado on September 12, 1999 and ended on November 1, 2002 in London, England. The first two legs took place in the United States before the next leg visited Australasia. After three legs, the band was initially expected to tour Europe, but the European leg was postponed until over two years later, which was branded as \"Euro-Afrique\". Although the tour provoked a range of reactions from critics, it was generally well received.\n\nBackground\nZZ Top's 1996 album Rhythmeen and the supporting Continental Safari Tour brought them to new audiences, particularly in South Africa. Unlike their previous tours, Continental Safari was a minimalistic, sparse production. According to a press release, guitarist and vocalist Billy Gibbons described the tour's production as a \"no-frills, full-thrill presentation—streamlined and down and gritty\", further acknowledging, \"ZZ Top drives it home with a meaner rhythm than ever before.\" Although their 1997 Mean Rhythm Global Tour did not visit Europe, they performed over 170 shows in support of Rhythmeen.\n\nStage design and production\nThe XXX Tour stage was designed by Chris Stuba, ZZ Top's lighting director To design the set, Stuba collaborated with longtime production manager Donny Stuart stage set. In place of ZZ Top's elaborate productions of the past, the XXX Tour stage was a simple setup, designed to be intimate. The set included a 48-by-30 foot (15 by 9 m) stage, and was supplemented by giant stretch fabric fixtures, known as Transformits, and were made into geometric shapes, which showed various visuals, including the \"XXX\" logo behind the stage; for any in-the-round venues, the Transformits were not used. Stuba faced the challenge of designing a lighting system to suit both ZZ Top and Lynyrd Skynyrd, the opening act for most of the tour; both bands used the same wash lights. The set used 87 automated luminaries and 180 PAR lamps, emitting much heat in which the band favored. Stuba explained:\n\nTour dates\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nZZ Top concert tours\n1999 concert tours\n2000 concert tours\n2002 concert tours",
"The Hollywood Blues Tour was a concert tour through the United States and Canada, undertaken by American rock band ZZ Top. Named after a warm-up show at the House of Blues in West Hollywood, California, the tour was their second of which to be staged without a supporting album. As a result, they did not perform any newer material. Although this was a criticism for the tour, it was generally well-received—a critic from The Florida Times-Union regarded the band as \"one of rock's most reliable acts; you just know they're going to put on a good show\". In contrast to ZZ Top's elaborately-staged productions from previous tours, the Hollywood Blues Tour utilized an austere stage setup. To embrace the group's renowned concept of visual imagery, the stage featured an LED drape for a backdrop video screen that showed visual effects, video clips and flashing text phrases, along with amplifiers stacks and a Van de Graaff generator.\n\nConsisting of four legs and 97 shows, the tour began in Biloxi, Mississippi on March 6, 2007 and ended in Aspen, Colorado on December 31, 2007. After the first leg, the tour was expanded for a summer tour with the Stray Cats and The Pretenders, which was branded as \"Summer Scorcher\". With a total gross of $17.8 million, Hollywood Blues sold over 380,000 tickets at its conclusion. The band's 2008 live album and DVD Live from Texas was filmed and recorded during a show in Grand Prairie, Texas. A portion of the tour is shown in the Eagle Rock 2009 concert film Double Down Live.\n\nTour dates\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nPeter Zurich's ZZ Top Gallery\n\nZZ Top concert tours\n2007 concert tours"
] |
[
"Stevie Ray Vaughan",
"First recordings",
"In what year did Stevie Ray Vaughan start recording?",
"In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands,",
"What songs were on his first album?",
"They recorded two songs, \"Red, White and Blue\" and \"I Heard a Voice Last Night\",",
"What other musicians did SRV play with on his first recordings?",
"feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird.",
"How did critics receive his first recordings?",
"the album was rejected by A&M,",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top,",
"Did SRV tour with ZZ Top?",
"played various gigs across the South,"
] | C_156015fd0dc74c469a47cbc6a542733a_0 | What happened on the tour across the South? | 7 | What happened on ZZ Top's tour across the South? | Stevie Ray Vaughan | In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Country Club, a venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined a rock band named Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months. In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were disastrous. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed. In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras that included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King. Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde Pharaoh. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band. CANNOTANSWER | Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home | Stephen Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954August 27, 1990) was an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer, best known as the guitarist and frontman of the blues rock trio Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble. Although his mainstream career only spanned seven years, he is considered an icon and one of the most influential musicians in the history of blues music, and one of the greatest guitarists of all time.
Born and raised in Dallas, Texas, Vaughan began playing guitar at age seven, initially inspired by his elder brother, Jimmie Vaughan. In 1972, he dropped out of high school and moved to Austin, where he began to gain a following after playing gigs on the local club circuit. Vaughan joined forces with Tommy Shannon on bass and Chris Layton on drums as Double Trouble in 1978 and established it as part of the Austin music scene; it soon became one of the most popular acts in Texas. He performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1982, where David Bowie saw him play and contacted him for a studio gig, resulting in Stevie playing his blues guitar on the album Let's Dance (1983), before being discovered by John Hammond, who interested major label Epic Records in signing Vaughan and his band to a record deal. Within months, they achieved mainstream success for the critically acclaimed debut album Texas Flood. With a series of successful network television appearances and extensive concert tours, Vaughan became the leading figure in the blues revival of the 1980s.
Playing his guitar behind his back or plucking the strings with his teeth as Jimi Hendrix did, he earned unprecedented stardom in Europe, which later resulted in breakthroughs for guitar players like Robert Cray, Jeff Healey, Robben Ford and Walter Trout, amongst others.
During the majority of his life, Vaughan struggled with drug and alcohol addiction. He also struggled with the personal and professional pressures of fame and his marriage to Lenora "Lenny" Bailey. He successfully completed rehabilitation and began touring again with Double Trouble in November 1986. His fourth and final studio album In Step reached number 33 in the United States in 1989; it was one of Vaughan's most critically and commercially successful releases and included his only number-one hit, "Crossfire". He became one of the world's most highly demanded blues performers, and he headlined Madison Square Garden in 1989 and the Beale Street Music Festival in 1990.
On August 27, 1990, Vaughan and four others were killed in a helicopter crash in East Troy, Wisconsin, after performing with Double Trouble at Alpine Valley Music Theatre. An investigation concluded that the cause was pilot error and Vaughan's family later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Omniflight Helicopters that was settled out of court. Vaughan's music continued to achieve commercial success with several posthumous releases and has sold over 15 million albums in the United States alone. In 2003, David Fricke of Rolling Stone ranked him the seventh greatest guitarist of all time. Vaughan was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015, along with Double Trouble bandmates Chris Layton, Tommy Shannon, and Reese Wynans.
Family and early life
Stevie's grandfather, Thomas Lee Vaughan, married Laura Belle LaRue and moved to Rockwall County, Texas, where they lived by sharecropping.
Stevie's father, Jimmie Lee Vaughan, was born on September 6, 1921. Jimmie, also known as Jim and Big Jim, dropped out of school at age sixteen and enlisted in the U.S. Navy during World War II. After his discharge, he married Martha Jean (née Cook; 1928–2009) on January 13, 1950. They had a son, Jimmie, in 1951. Stephen was born at Methodist Hospital on October 3, 1954, in Dallas, Texas. Big Jim secured a job as an asbestos worker. The family moved frequently, living in other states such as Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Oklahoma before ultimately moving to the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. A shy and insecure boy, Vaughan was deeply affected by his childhood experiences. His father struggled with alcohol abuse and often terrorized his family and friends with his bad temper. In later years, Vaughan recalled that he had been a victim of his father's violence. His father died on August 27, 1986, exactly four years before Vaughan himself.
First instruments
In the early 1960s, Vaughan's admiration for his brother Jimmie resulted in his trying different instruments such as the drums and saxophone. In 1961, for his seventh birthday, Vaughan received his first guitar, a toy from Sears with Western motif. Learning by ear, he diligently committed himself, following along to songs by the Nightcaps, particularly "Wine, Wine, Wine" and "Thunderbird". He listened to blues artists such as Albert King, Otis Rush, and Muddy Waters, and rock guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix and Lonnie Mack, as well as jazz guitarists including Kenny Burrell. In 1963, he acquired his first electric guitar, a Gibson ES-125T, as a hand-me-down from Jimmie.
Soon after he acquired the electric guitar, Vaughan joined his first band, the Chantones, in 1965. Their first show was at a talent contest held in Dallas' Hill Theatre, but after realizing that they could not perform a Jimmy Reed song in its entirety, Vaughan left the band and joined the Brooklyn Underground, playing professionally at local bars and clubs. He received Jimmie's Fender Broadcaster, which he later traded for an Epiphone Riviera. When Jimmie left home at age sixteen, Vaughan's apparent obsession with the instrument caused a lack of support from his parents. Miserable at home, he took a job at a local hamburger stand, where he washed dishes and dumped trash for seventy cents an hour. After falling into a barrel of grease, he grew tired of the job and quit to devote his life to a music career.
Music career
Early years
In May 1969, after leaving the Brooklyn Underground, Vaughan joined a band called the Southern Distributor. He had learned the Yardbirds' "Jeff's Boogie" and played the song at the audition. Mike Steinbach, the group's drummer, commented: "The kid was fourteen. We auditioned him on 'Jeff's Boogie,' really fast instrumental guitar, and he played it note for note." Although they played pop rock covers, Vaughan conveyed his interest in the addition of blues songs to the group's repertoire; he was told that he wouldn't earn a living playing blues music and he and the band parted ways. Later that year, bassist Tommy Shannon walked into a Dallas club and heard Vaughan playing guitar. Fascinated by the skillful playing, which he described as "incredible even then", Shannon borrowed a bass guitar and the two jammed. Within a few years, they began performing together in a band called Krackerjack.
In February 1970, Vaughan joined a band called Liberation, which was a nine-piece group with a horn section. Having spent the past month briefly playing bass with Jimmie in Texas Storm, he had originally auditioned as bassist. Impressed by Vaughan's guitar playing, Scott Phares, the group's original guitarist, modestly became the bassist. In mid-1970, they performed at the Adolphus Hotel in downtown Dallas, where ZZ Top asked them to perform. During Liberation's break, Vaughan jammed with ZZ Top on the Nightcaps song "Thunderbird". Phares later described the performance: "they tore the house down. It was awesome. It was one of those magical evenings. Stevie fit in like a glove on a hand."
Attending Justin F. Kimball High School during the early 1970s, Vaughan's late-night shows contributed to his neglect in his studies, including music theory; he would often sleep during class. His pursuit of a musical career was disapproved of by many of the school's administrators but he was also encouraged by many people, including his art teacher, to strive for a career in art. In his sophomore year, he attended an evening class for experimental art at Southern Methodist University, but left when it conflicted with rehearsal. Vaughan later spoke of his dislike of the school and recalled having received daily notes from the principal about his grooming.
First recordings
In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Club, a local blues venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months.
In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were unsuccessful. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed.
In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras which included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King.
Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde "Pharaoh" Walden. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band.
Double Trouble
In mid-May 1978, Clark left to form his own group and Vaughan renamed the band Double Trouble, taken from the title of an Otis Rush song. Following the recruitment of bassist Jackie Newhouse, Walden quit in July, and was briefly replaced by Jack Moore, who had moved to Texas from Boston; he performed with the band for about two months. Vaughan then began looking for a drummer and soon after, he met Chris Layton through Sublett, who was his roommate. Layton, who had recently parted ways with Greezy Wheels, was taught by Vaughan to play a shuffle rhythm. When Vaughan offered Layton the position, he agreed. In early July, Vaughan befriended Lenora Bailey, known as "Lenny", who became his girlfriend, and ultimately his wife. The marriage was to last for six and a half years.
In early October 1978, Vaughan and Double Trouble earned a frequent residency performing at one of Austin's most popular nightspots, the Rome Inn. During a performance, Edi Johnson, an accountant at Manor Downs, noticed Vaughan. She remembered: "I'm not an authority on music—it's whatever turned me on—but this did." She recommended him to Manor Downs owner Frances Carr and general manager Chesley Millikin, who was interested in managing artists and saw Vaughan's musical potential. After Barton quit Double Trouble in mid-November 1979, Millikin signed Vaughan to a management contract. Vaughan also hired Robert "Cutter" Brandenburg as road manager, whom he had met in 1969. Addressing him as "Stevie Ray", Brandenburg convinced Vaughan to use his middle name on stage.
In October 1980, bassist Tommy Shannon attended a Double Trouble performance at Rockefeller's in Houston. Shannon, who was playing with Alan Haynes at the time, participated in a jam session with Vaughan and Layton halfway through their set. Shannon later commented: "I went down there that night, and I'll never forget this: it was like, when I walked in the door and I heard them playing, it was like a revelation. 'That's where I want to be; that's where I belong, right there.' During the break, I went up to Stevie and told him that. I didn't try to sneak around and hide it from the bass player [Jackie Newhouse]—I didn't know if he was listening or not. I just really wanted to be in that band. I sat in that night and it sounded great." Almost three months later, when Vaughan offered Shannon the position, he readily accepted.
Drug charge and trial
On December 5, 1979, while Vaughan was in a dressing room before a performance in Houston, an off-duty police officer arrested him after witnessing his usage of cocaine near an open window. He was formally charged with cocaine possession and subsequently released on $1,000 bail. Double Trouble was the opening act for Muddy Waters, who said about Vaughan's substance abuse: "Stevie could perhaps be the greatest guitar player that ever lived, but he won't live to get 40 years old if he doesn't leave that white powder alone." The following year, he was required to return on January 16 and February 29 for court appearances.
During the final court date, on April 17, 1980, Vaughan was sentenced with two years' probation and was prohibited from leaving Texas. Along with a stipulation of entering treatment for drug abuse, he was required to "avoid persons or places of known disreputable or harmful character"; he refused to comply with both of these orders. After a lawyer was hired, his probation officer had the sentence revised to allow him to work outside of the state. The incident later caused him to refuse maid service while staying in hotels during concert tours.
Montreux Jazz Festival
Although popular in Texas at the time, Double Trouble failed to gain national attention. The group's visibility improved when record producer Jerry Wexler recommended them to Claude Nobs, organizer of the Montreux Jazz Festival. He insisted the festival's blues night would be great with Vaughan, whom he called "a jewel, one of those rarities who comes along once in a lifetime", and Nobs agreed to book Double Trouble on July 17.
Vaughan opened with a medley arrangement of Freddie King's song "Hide Away" and his own fast instrumental composition, "Rude Mood". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", Hound Dog Taylor's "Give Me Back My Wig", and Albert Collins' "Collins Shuffle", as well as three original compositions: "Pride and Joy", "Love Struck Baby", and "Dirty Pool". The set ended with boos from the audience. People's James McBride wrote:
According to road manager Don Opperman: "the way I remember it, the 'ooos' and the 'boos' were mixed together, but Stevie was pretty disappointed. Stevie [had] just handed me his guitar and walked off stage, and I'm like, 'are you coming back?' There was a doorway back there; the audience couldn't see the guys, but I could. He went back to the dressing room with his head in his hands. I went back there finally, and that was the end of the show." According to Vaughan: "it wasn't the whole crowd [that booed]. It was just a few people sitting right up front. The room there was built for acoustic jazz. When five or six people boo, wow, it sounds like the whole world hates you. They thought we were too loud, but shoot, I had four army blankets folded over my amp, and the volume level was on 2. I'm used to playin' on 10!" The performance was filmed and later released on DVD in September 2004.
On the following night, Double Trouble was booked in the lounge of the Montreux Casino, with Jackson Browne in attendance. Browne jammed with Double Trouble until the early morning hours and offered them free use of his personal recording studio in downtown Los Angeles. In late November the band accepted his offer and recorded ten songs in two days. While they were in the studio, Vaughan received a telephone call from David Bowie, who met him after the Montreux performance, and he invited him to participate in a recording session for his next studio album, Let's Dance. In January 1983, Vaughan recorded guitar on six of the album's eight songs, including the title track and "China Girl". The album was released on April 14, 1983, and sold over three times as many copies as Bowie's previous album.
National success
In mid-March 1983, Gregg Geller, vice president of A&R at Epic Records, signed Double Trouble to the label at the recommendation of record producer John Hammond. Soon afterward, Epic financed a music video for "Love Struck Baby", which was filmed at the Cherry Tavern in New York City. Vaughan recalled: "we changed the name of the place in the video. Four years ago I got married in a club where we used to play all the time called the Rome Inn. When they closed it down, the owner gave me the sign, so in the video we put that up behind me on the stage."
With the success of Let's Dance, Bowie requested Vaughan as the featured instrumentalist for the upcoming Serious Moonlight Tour, realizing that he was an essential aspect of the album's groundbreaking success. In late April, Vaughan began rehearsals for the tour in Las Colinas, Texas. When contract renegotiations for his performance fee failed, Vaughan abandoned the tour days before its opening date, and he was replaced by Earl Slick. Vaughan commented: "I couldn't gear everything on something I didn't really care a whole lot about. It was kind of risky, but I really didn't need all the headaches." Although contributing factors were widely disputed, Vaughan soon gained major publicity for quitting the tour.
On May 9, the band performed at The Bottom Line in New York City, where they opened for Bryan Adams, with Hammond, Mick Jagger, John McEnroe, Rick Nielsen, Billy Gibbons, and Johnny Winter in attendance. Brandenburg described the performance as "ungodly": "I think Stevie played every lick as loud and as hard and with as much intensity as I've ever heard him." The performance earned Vaughan a positive review published in the New York Post, asserting that Double Trouble outperformed Adams. "Fortunately, Bryan Adams, the Canadian rocker who is opening arena dates for Journey, doesn't headline too often", wrote Martin Porter, who claimed that after the band's performance, the stage had been "rendered to cinders by the most explosively original showmanship to grace the New York stage in some time."
Texas Flood
After acquiring the recordings from Browne's studio, Double Trouble began assembling the material for a full-length LP. The album, Texas Flood, opens with the track "Love Struck Baby", which was written for Lenny on their "love-struck day". He composed "Pride and Joy" and "I'm Cryin'" for one of his former girlfriends, Lindi Bethel. Although both are musically similar, their lyrics are two different perspectives of the relationship. Along with covers of Howlin' Wolf, the Isley Brothers, and Buddy Guy, the album included Vaughan's cover of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", a song which he became strongly associated with. "Lenny" served as a tribute to his wife, which he composed at the end of their bed.
Texas Flood featured cover art by illustrator Brad Holland, who is known for his artwork for Playboy and The New York Times. Originally envisioned with Vaughan sitting on a horse depicting a promotable resemblance, Holland painted an image of him leaning against a wall with a guitar, using a photograph as a reference. Released on June 13, 1983, Texas Flood peaked at number 38 and ultimately sold half a million copies. While Rolling Stone editor Kurt Loder asserted that Vaughan did not possess a distinctive voice, according to AllMusic senior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the release was a "monumental impact". Billboard described it as "a guitar boogie lovers delight". Agent Alex Hodges commented: "No one knew how big that record would be, because guitar players weren't necessarily in vogue, except for some that were so established they were undeniable ... he was one of the few artists that was recouped on every record in a short period of time."
On June 16, Vaughan gave a performance at Tango nightclub in Dallas, which celebrated the album's release. Assorted VIPs attended the performance, including Ted Nugent, Sammy Hagar, and members of The Kinks and Uriah Heep. Jack Chase, vice president of marketing for Epic, recalled: "the coming-out party at Tango was very important; it was absolutely huge. All the radio station personalities, DJs, program directors, all the retail record store owners and the important managers, press, all the executives from New York came down—about seven hundred people. We attacked in Dallas first with Q102-FM and [DJ] Redbeard. We had the Tango party—it was hot. It was the ticket." The Dallas Morning News reviewed the performance, starting with the rhetorical question; "what if Stevie Ray Vaughan had an album release party and everybody came? It happened Thursday night at Tango. ... The adrenalin must have been gushing through the musicians' veins as they performed with rare finesse and skill."
Following a brief tour in Europe, Hodges arranged an engagement for Double Trouble as The Moody Blues' opening act during a two-month tour of North America. Hodges stated that many people disliked the idea of Double Trouble opening for The Moody Blues, but asserted that a common thread which both bands shared was "album-oriented rock". Shannon described the tour as "glorious": "Our record hadn't become that successful yet, but we were playing in front of coliseums full of people. We just went out and played, and it fit like a glove. The sound rang through those big coliseums like a monster. People were going crazy, and they had no idea who we were!" After appearing on the television series Austin City Limits, the band played a sold-out concert at New York City's Beacon Theatre. Variety wrote that their ninety-minute set at the Beacon "left no doubt that this young Texas musician is indeed the 'guitar hero of the present era.'"
Couldn't Stand the Weather
In January 1984, Double Trouble began recording their second studio album, Couldn't Stand the Weather, at the Power Station, with John Hammond as executive producer and engineer Richard Mullen. Layton later recalled working with Hammond: "he was kind of like a nice hand on your shoulder, as opposed to someone that jumped in and said, 'let's redo this, let's do that more.' He didn't get involved in that way at all. He was a feedback person." As the sessions began, Vaughan's cover of Bob Geddins' "Tin Pan Alley" was recorded while audio levels were being checked. Layton remembers the performance: "... we did probably the quietest version we ever did up 'til that point. We ended it and [Hammond] said; 'that's the best that song will ever sound,' and we went; 'we haven't even got sounds, have we?' He goes, 'that doesn't matter. That's the best you'll ever do that song.' We tried it again five, six, seven times- I can't even remember. But it never quite sounded like it did that first time."
During recording sessions, Vaughan began experimenting with other combinations of musicians, including Fran Christina and Stan Harrison, who played drums and saxophone respectively on the jazz instrumental, "Stang's Swang". Jimmie Vaughan played rhythm guitar on his cover of Guitar Slim's "The Things That I Used to Do" and the title track, the latter of which Vaughan carries a worldly message in his lyrics. According to musicologist Andy Aledort, Vaughan's guitar playing throughout the song is marked by steady rhythmic strumming patterns and improvised lead lines, with a distinctive R&B and soul single-note riff, doubled in octaves by guitar and bass.
Couldn't Stand the Weather was released on May 15, 1984, and two weeks later it had rapidly outpaced the sales of Texas Flood. It peaked at number 31 and spent 38 weeks on the charts. The album includes Vaughan's cover of Jimi Hendrix's song, "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", which provoked inevitable comparisons to Hendrix. According to AllMusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Couldn't Stand the Weather "confirmed that the acclaimed debut was no fluke, while matching, if not bettering, the sales of its predecessor, thereby cementing Vaughan's status as a giant of modern blues." According to authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford, the album "was a major turning point in Stevie Ray Vaughan's development" and Vaughan's singing improved.
Carnegie Hall
On October 4, 1984, Vaughan headlined a performance at Carnegie Hall that included many guest musicians. For the second half of the concert, he added Jimmie as rhythm guitarist, drummer George Rains, keyboardist Dr. John, Roomful of Blues horn section, and featured vocalist Angela Strehli. The ensemble rehearsed for less than two weeks before the performance, and despite the solid dynamics of Double Trouble for the first half of the performance, according to Patoski and Crawford, the big band concept never entirely took form. Before arriving at the engagement, the venue sold out, which made Vaughan overexcited and nervous as he did not calm down until halfway through the third song. A benefit for the T.J. Martell Foundation's work in leukemia and cancer research, he was an important draw for the event. As his scheduled time slot drew closer, he indicated that he preferred traveling to the venue by limousine to avoid being swarmed by fans on the street; the band took the stage around 8:00 p.m. The audience of 2,200 people, which included Vaughan's wife, family and friends, transformed the venue into what Stephen Holden of The New York Times described as "a whistling, stomping roadhouse".
Introduced by Hammond as "one of the greatest guitar players of all time", Vaughan opened with "Scuttle Buttin'", wearing a custom-made mariachi suit he described as a "Mexican tuxedo". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of the Isley Brothers' "Testify", The Jimi Hendrix Experience's "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", "Tin Pan Alley", Elmore James' "The Sky Is Crying", and W. C. Clark's "Cold Shot", along with four original compositions including "Love Struck Baby", "Honey Bee", "Couldn't Stand the Weather", and "Rude Mood". During the second half of the performance, Vaughan performed covers by Larry Davis, Buddy Guy, Guitar Slim, Albert King, Jackie Wilson, and Albert Collins. The set ended with Vaughan performing solo renditions of "Lenny" and "Rude Mood".
The Dallas Times-Herald wrote of the performance at Carnegie Hall as; "was full of stomping feet and swaying bodies, kids in blue jeans hanging off the balconies, dancing bodies that clogged the aisles." The New York Times asserted that, despite the venue's "muddy" acoustics, their performance was "filled with verve", and Vaughan's playing was "handsomely displayed". Jimmie Vaughan later commented: "I was worried the crowd might be a little stiff. Turned out they're just like any other beer joint." Vaughan commented: "We won't be limited to just the trio, although that doesn't mean we'll stop doing the trio. I'm planning on doing that too. I ain't gonna stay in one place. If I do, I'm stupid." The performance was recorded and later released as an official live LP. The album was released posthumously on July 29, 1997, by Epic Records; it was ultimately certified gold.
Immediately after the concert, Vaughan attended a private party at a downtown club in New York, which was sponsored by MTV, where he was greeted by an hour's worth of supporters. On the following day, Double Trouble made an appearance at a record store in Greenwich Village, where they signed autographs for fans. In late October 1984, the band toured Australia and New Zealand, which included one of their first appearances on Australian television—on Hey Hey It's Saturday—where they performed "Texas Flood", and an interview on Sounds. On November 5 and 9, they played sold-out concerts at the Sydney Opera House. Upon returning to the U.S., Double Trouble went on a brief tour in California. Soon afterward, Vaughan and Lenny went to the island of Saint Croix, on the U.S. Virgin Islands in the Caribbean Sea, where they had spent some time vacationing in December. The next month, Double Trouble flew to Japan, where they appeared for five performances, including at Kōsei Nenkin Kaikan in Osaka.
Soul to Soul
In March 1985, recording for Double Trouble's third studio album, Soul to Soul, began at the Dallas Sound Lab. As the sessions progressed, Vaughan became increasingly frustrated with his own lack of inspiration. He was also allowed a relaxed pace of recording the album, which contributed to a lack of focus due to excesses in alcohol and other drugs. Roadie Byron Barr later recalled: "the routine was to go to the studio, do dope, and play ping-pong." Vaughan, who found it increasingly difficult to be able to play rhythm guitar parts and sing at the same time, wanted to add another dimension to the band, so he hired keyboardist Reese Wynans to record on the album; he joined the band soon thereafter.
During the album's production, Vaughan appeared at the Houston Astrodome on April 10, 1985, where he performed a slide guitar rendition of the U.S. national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner"; his performance was met with booing. Upon leaving the stage, Vaughan acquired an autograph from former player for the New York Yankees, Mickey Mantle. Astrodome publicist Molly Glentzer wrote in the Houston Press: "as Vaughan shuffled back behind home plate, he was only lucid enough to know that he wanted Mickey Mantle's autograph. Mantle obliged. 'I never signed a guitar before.' Nobody asked Vaughan for his autograph. I was sure he'd be dead before he hit 30." Critics associated his performance with Jimi Hendrix's rendition at Woodstock in 1969, yet Vaughan disliked this comparison: "I heard they even wrote about it in one of the music magazines and they tried to put the two versions side by side. I hate that stuff. His version was great."
Released on September 30, 1985, Soul to Soul peaked at number 34 and remained on the Billboard 200 through mid-1986, eventually certified gold. Critic Jimmy Guterman of Rolling Stone wrote: "there's some life left in their blues rock pastiche; it's also possible that they've run out of gas." According to Patoski and Crawford, sales of the album "did not match Couldn't Stand the Weather, suggesting Stevie Ray and Double Trouble were plateauing". Vaughan commented: "as far as what's on there song-wise, I like the album a lot. It meant a lot to us what we went through to get this record. There were a lot of odds and we still stayed strong. We grew a lot with the people in the band and immediate friends around us; we learned a lot and grew a lot closer. That has a lot to do with why it's called [Soul to Soul]."
Live Alive
After touring for nine and a half months, Epic requested a fourth album from Double Trouble as part of their contractual obligation. In July 1986, Vaughan decided that they would record the LP, Live Alive, during three live appearances in Austin and Dallas. On July 17 and 18, the band performed sold-out concerts at the Austin Opera House, and July 19 at the Dallas Starfest. They used recordings of these concerts to assemble the LP, which was produced by Vaughan. Shannon was backstage before the Austin concert and predicted to new manager Alex Hodges that both Vaughan and himself were "headed for a brick wall". Guitarist Denny Freeman attended the Austin performances; he called the shows a "musical mess, because they would go into these chaotic jams with no control. I didn't know what exactly was going on, but I was concerned." Both Layton and Shannon remarked that their work schedule and drugs were causing the band to lose focus. According to Wynans: "Things were getting illogical and crazy."
The Live Alive album was released on November 17, 1986, and the only official live Double Trouble LP made commercially available during Vaughan's lifetime, though it never appeared on the Billboard 200 chart. Though many critics claimed that most of the album was overdubbed, engineer Gary Olazabal, who mixed the album, asserted that most of the material was recorded poorly. Vaughan later admitted that it was not one of his better efforts; he recalled: "I wasn't in very good shape when we recorded Live Alive. At the time, I didn't realize how bad a shape I was in. There were more fix-it jobs done on the album than I would have liked. Some of the work sounds like [it was] the work of half-dead people. There were some great notes that came out, but I just wasn't in control; nobody was."
Drugs and alcohol
In 1960, when Vaughan was six years old, he began stealing his father's drinks. Drawn in by its effects, he started making his own drinks and this resulted in alcohol dependence. He explained: "that's when I first started stealing daddy's drinks. Or when my parents were gone, I'd find the bottle and make myself one. I thought it was cool ... thought the kids down the street would think it was cool. That's where it began, and I had been depending on it ever since." According to the authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford: "In the ensuing twenty-five years, he had worked his way through the Physicians' Desk Reference before finding his poisons of preference—alcohol and cocaine."
While Vaughan asserted that he first experienced the effects of cocaine when a doctor prescribed him a liquid solution of the stimulant as a nasal spray, according to Patoski and Crawford, the earliest that Vaughan is known to have ingested the drug is in 1975, while performing with the Cobras. Before that, Vaughan had briefly used other drugs such as cannabis, methamphetamine, and Quaaludes, the brand name for methaqualone. After 1975, he regularly drank whiskey and used cocaine, particularly mixing the two substances together. According to Hopkins, by the time of Double Trouble's European tour in September 1986, "his lifestyle of substance abuse had reached a peak, probably better characterized as the bottom of a deep chasm."
At the height of Vaughan's substance abuse, he drank of whiskey and used of cocaine each day. Personal assistant Tim Duckworth explained: "I would make sure he would eat breakfast instead of waking up drinking every morning, which was probably the worst thing he was doing." According to Vaughan: "it got to the point where if I'd try to say "hi" to somebody, I would just fall apart crying. It was like solid doom."
In September 1986, Double Trouble traveled to Denmark for a one-month tour of Europe. During the late night hours of September 28, Vaughan became ill after a performance in Ludwigshafen, Germany, suffering from near-death dehydration, for which he received medical treatment. The incident resulted in his checking into The London Clinic under the care of Dr. Victor Bloom, who warned him that he was a month away from death. After staying in London for more than a week, he returned to the United States and entered Peachford Hospital in Atlanta, where he spent four weeks in rehabilitation, and then checked into rehab in Austin.
Live Alive tour
In November 1986, following his departure from rehab, Vaughan moved back into his mother's Glenfield Avenue house in Dallas, which is where he had spent much of his childhood. During this time, Double Trouble began rehearsals for the Live Alive tour. Although Vaughan was nervous about performing after achieving sobriety, he received positive reassurance. Wynans later recalled: "Stevie was real worried about playing after he'd gotten sober...he didn't know if he had anything left to offer. Once we got back out on the road, he was very inspired and motivated." The tour began on November 23 at Towson State University, which was Vaughan's first performance with Double Trouble after rehab. On December 31, 1986, they played a concert at Atlanta's Fox Theatre, which featured encore performances with Lonnie Mack.
As the tour progressed, Vaughan was longing to work on material for his next LP, but in January 1987, he filed for a divorce from Lenny, which restricted him from any projects until the proceedings were finalized. This prevented him from writing and recording songs for almost two years, but Double Trouble wrote the song "Crossfire" with Bill Carter and Ruth Ellsworth. Layton recalled: "we wrote the music, and they had to write the lyrics. We had just gotten together; Stevie was unable to be there at that time. He was in Dallas doing some things, and we just got together and started writing some songs. That was the first one we wrote." On August 6, 1987, Double Trouble appeared at the Austin Aqua Festival, where they played to one of the largest audiences of their career. According to biographer Craig Hopkins, as many as 20,000 people attended the concert. Following a month-long tour as the opening act for Robert Plant in May 1988, which included a concert at Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens, the band was booked for a European leg, which included 22 performances, and ended in Oulu, Finland on July 17. This would be Vaughan's last concert appearance in Europe.
In Step
After Vaughan's divorce from Lenora "Lenny" Darlene Bailey became final, recording for Double Trouble's fourth and final studio album, In Step, began at Kiva Studios in Memphis, Tennessee, working with producer Jim Gaines and co-songwriter Doyle Bramhall. Initially, he had doubts about his musical and creative abilities after achieving sobriety, but he gained confidence as the sessions progressed. Shannon later recalled: "In Step was, for him, a big growing experience. In my opinion, it's our best studio album, and I think he felt that way, too." Bramhall, who had also entered rehab, wrote songs with Vaughan about addiction and redemption. According to Vaughan, the album was titled In Step because "I'm finally in step with life, in step with myself, in step with my music." The album's liner notes include the quote; "'thank God the elevator's broken," a reference to the twelve-step program proposed by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA).
After the In Step recording sessions moved to Los Angeles, Vaughan added horn players Joe Sublett and Darrell Leonard, who played saxophone and trumpet respectively on both "Crossfire" and "Love Me Darlin". Shortly before the album's production was complete, Vaughan and Double Trouble appeared at a presidential inaugural party in Washington, D.C. for George H. W. Bush. In Step was released on June 13, 1989, and eight months later, it was certified gold. The album was Vaughan's most commercially successful release and his first one to win a Grammy Award. It peaked at number 33 on the Billboard 200, spending 47 weeks on the chart. In Step included the song, "Crossfire", which was written by Double Trouble, Bill Carter, and Ruth Ellsworth; it became his only number one hit. The album also included one of his first recordings to feature the use of a Fuzz Face on Vaughan's cover of the Howlin' Wolf song, "Love Me Darlin.
In July 1989, Neil Perry, a writer for Sounds magazine, wrote: "the album closes with the brow-soothing swoon of 'Riviera Paradise,' a slow, lengthy guitar and piano workout that proves just why Vaughan is to the guitar what Nureyev is to ballet." According to music journalist Robert Christgau, Vaughan was "writing blues for AA...he escapes the blues undamaged for the first time in his career." In October 1989, the Boca Raton News described Vaughan's guitar solos as "determined, clear-headed and downright stinging" and his lyrics as "tension-filled allegories".
Death
On Monday, August 27, 1990, at 12:50 a.m. (CDT), Vaughan and members of Eric Clapton's touring entourage played an all-star encore jam session at Alpine Valley Music Theatre in Alpine Valley Resort in East Troy, Wisconsin. They then left for Midway International Airport in Chicago in a Bell 206B helicopter, the most common way for acts to enter and exit the venue, as there is only one road in and out, heavily used by fans. The helicopter crashed into a nearby ski hill shortly after takeoff. Vaughan and the four others on board—pilot Jeff Brown, agent Bobby Brooks, bodyguard Nigel Browne, and tour manager Colin Smythe—died. The helicopter was identified as being owned by Chicago-based company Omniflight Helicopters. Initial reports of the crash erroneously claimed that Clapton had also been killed. According to findings from an inquest conducted by the coroner's office in Elkhorn, all five victims were killed instantly.
The investigation determined the aircraft departed in foggy conditions with visibility reportedly under two miles, according to a local forecast. The National Transportation Safety Board report stated: "As the third helicopter was departing, it remained at a lower altitude than the others, and the pilot turned southeasterly toward rising terrain. Subsequently, the helicopter crashed on hilly terrain about three fifths of a mile from the takeoff point." Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) records showed that Brown was qualified to fly by instruments in a fixed-wing aircraft, but not in a helicopter. Toxicology tests performed on the victims revealed no traces of drugs or alcohol in their systems. Vaughan's funeral service was held on August 31, 1990, at Laurel Land Cemetery in Dallas, Texas. His wooden casket quickly became adorned with bouquets of flowers. An estimated 3,000 mourners joined a procession led by a white hearse. Among those at the public ceremony were Jeff Healey, Charlie Sexton, ZZ Top, Colin James, Stevie Wonder, Bonnie Raitt and Buddy Guy. Vaughan's grave marker reads: "Thank you ... for all the love you passed our way."
Musical style
Vaughan's music was rooted in blues, rock, and jazz. He was influenced by Jimi Hendrix, Albert King, Lonnie Mack, B.B. King, Freddie King, Albert Collins, Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Otis Rush, Guitar Slim, Chuck Berry, and Muddy Waters. According to nightclub owner Clifford Antone, who opened Antone's in 1975, Vaughan jammed with Albert King at Antone's in July 1977 and it almost "scared him to death", saying that "it was the best I've ever saw Albert or the best I ever saw Stevie". While Albert King had a substantial influence on Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix was Vaughan's greatest inspiration. Vaughan declared: "I love Hendrix for so many reasons. He was so much more than just a blues guitarist—he played damn well any kind of guitar he wanted. In fact I'm not sure if he even played the guitar—he played music." He was also influenced by such jazz guitarists as Django Reinhardt, Wes Montgomery, Kenny Burrell, and George Benson.
In 1987, Vaughan listed Lonnie Mack first among the guitarists he had listened to, both as a youngster and as an adult. Vaughan observed that Mack was "ahead of his time" and said, "I got a lot of my fast stuff from Lonnie". On another occasion, Vaughan said that he had learned tremolo picking and vibrato from Mack and that Mack had taught him to "play guitar from the heart." Mack recalled his first meeting with Vaughan in 1978:
Vaughan's relationship with another Texas blues legend, Johnny Winter, was a little more complex. Although they met several times, and often played sessions with the same musicians or even performed the same material, as in the case of Boot Hill, Vaughan always refrained from acknowledging Winter in any form. In his biography, "Raisin' Cain", Winter says that he was unnerved after reading Vaughan stating in an interview that he never met or knew Johnny Winter. "We even played together over at Tommy Shannon's house one time." Vaughan settled the issue in 1988 on the occasion of a blues festival in Europe where both he and Winter were on the bill, explaining that he has been misquoted and that "Every musician in Texas knows Johnny and has learned something from him". Asked to compare their playing styles in an interview in 2010, Winter admitted that "mine's a little bit rawer, I think."
Equipment
Guitars
Vaughan owned and used a variety of guitars during his career. His guitar of choice, and the instrument that he became most associated with, was the Fender Stratocaster, his favorite being a 1963 body with a 1962 neck and pickups dated from 1959. This is why Vaughan usually referred to his Stratocaster as a "1959 Strat". He explained why he favored this guitar in a 1983 interview: "I like the strength of its sound. Any guitar I play has got to be pretty versatile. It's got a big, strong tone and it'll take anything I do to it." Vaughan also referred to this instrument as his "first wife", or "Number One". Another favourite guitar was a slightly later Strat he named 'Lenny' after his wife, Lenora. While at a local pawn shop in 1980, Vaughan had noticed this particular guitar, a 1965 Stratocaster that had been refinished in red, with the original sunburst finish peeking through. It also had a 1910 Mandolin inlay just below the bridge. The pawn shop was asking $300 for it, which was way more than Vaughan had at the time. Lenny saw how badly he wanted this guitar, so she got six of their friends to chip in $50 each, and bought it for him. The guitar was presented to him on his birthday in 1980, and that night, after bringing "Lenny" (the guitar, and wife) home with him, he wrote the song, "Lenny". He started using a borrowed Stratocaster during high school and used Stratocasters predominantly in his live performances and recordings, although he did play other guitars, including custom guitars.
One of the custom guitars—nicknamed "Main"—was built by James Hamilton of Hamiltone Guitars in Buffalo, New York. It was a gift from Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top. Gibbons had commissioned Hamilton to build the guitar in 1979. There were some delays, including having to re-do the mother of pearl inlay of Vaughan's name on the fretboard when he changed his stage name from Stevie Vaughan to Stevie Ray Vaughan. The guitar was presented to him by Jim Hamilton on April 29, 1984. Hamilton recalls that Stevie Ray Vaughan was so happy with the guitar that he played it that night at Springfest on the University of Buffalo campus. It remained one of the main guitars he used on stage and in studio. Vaughan made some alterations to the guitar, including replacing the bronze color Gibson knobs with white Fender knobs, as he preferred the ribbing on the Fender knobs. The pickups had to be changed after the guitar was used in the "Couldn't Stand the Weather" video, in which Stevie and "Main" were drenched with water, and the pickups were ruined. Vaughan preferred guitar has been summarized as his,
Number One Strat, which Stevie claimed to be a ’59, since that was the date stamped on the back of the pickups… this was incorrect, however, as guitar tech Rene Martinez (who oversaw SRV’s guitars since 1980) found the stamp of 1963 on the body and 1962 on the original neck (the neck was replaced in 1989 after it could no longer be refretted properly; Rene used the neck from another SRV favorite, “Red”, as it was also a 1962 model). The pickups are also relatively low output, not the hot overwound myth that gained legs during the 80s… all 3 pickups are rumored to be under 6k ohms output impedance, which would be typical of a 1959 set (the neck pickups tended to be hottest, but not by much). Although the Fender SRV signature model uses Texas Special pickups, which Stevie was heavily involved in the making of, they do not accurately represent the sound of his original Number One.
Vaughan bought many Stratocasters and gave some away as gifts. A sunburst Diplomat Strat-style guitar was purchased by Vaughan and given to his girlfriend Janna Lapidus to learn to play on. Vaughan used a custom set of uncommonly heavy strings, gauges .013, .015, .019, .028, .038, .058, and tuned a half-step below standard tuning. He played with so much tension that it was not uncommon for him to separate his fingernail from the quick movement along the strings. The owner of an Austin club recalled Vaughan coming into the office between sets to borrow super glue, which he used to keep fingernail split from widening while he continued to play. The super glue was suggested by Rene Martinez, who was Stevie's guitar technician. Martinez eventually convinced Stevie to change to slightly lighter strings. He preferred a guitar neck with an asymmetrical profile (thicker at the top) which was more comfortable for his thumb-over style of playing. Heavy use of the vibrato bar necessitated frequent replacements; Vaughan often had his roadie, Byron Barr, obtain custom stainless steel bars made by Barr's father.
Vaughan was also photographed playing a Rickenbacker Capri, a National Duolian, Epiphone Riviera, Gibson Flying V, as well as several other models. Vaughan used a Gibson Johnny Smith to record "Stang's Swang", and a Guild 12-string acoustic for his performance on MTV Unplugged in January 1990. On June 24, 2004, one of Vaughan's Stratocasters, the aforementioned "Lenny" strat, was sold at an auction to benefit Eric Clapton's Crossroads Centre in Antigua; the instrument was bought by Guitar Center for $623,500.
Amplifiers and effects
Vaughan was a catalyst in the revival of vintage amplifiers and effects during the 1980s. His loud volume and use of heavy strings required powerful and robust amplifiers. Vaughan used two black-face Fender Super Reverbs, which were crucial in shaping his clear overdriven sound. He would often blend other amps with the Super Reverbs, including black-face Fender Vibroverbs, and brands such as Dumble, and Marshall, which he used for his clean sound.
While his mainstay effects were the Ibanez Tube Screamer and a Vox wah-wah pedal, Vaughan experimented with a range of effects. He used a Fender Vibratone, designed as a Leslie speaker for electric guitars, and provided a warbling chorus effect, which can be heard on the track "Cold Shot". He used a vintage Dallas Arbiter Fuzz Face that can be heard on In Step, as well as an Octavia. The Guitar Geek website provides a detailed illustration of Vaughan's 1985 equipment set up based on interviews with his guitar tech and effects builder, Cesar Diaz.
Legacy
Vaughan throughout his career revived blues rock and paved the way for many other artists. Vaughan's work continues to influence numerous blues, rock and alternative artists, including John Mayer, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Mike McCready, Albert Cummings, Los Lonely Boys and Chris Duarte, among others. AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine described Vaughan as "the leading light in American blues" and developed "a uniquely eclectic and fiery style that sounded like no other guitarist, regardless of genre". In 1983, Variety magazine called Vaughan the "guitar hero of the present era".
In the months that followed his death, Vaughan sold over 5.5 million albums in the United States. On September 25, 1990, Epic released Family Style, an LP the Vaughan brothers cut at Ardent Studios in Memphis, Tennessee. The label released several promotional singles and videos for the collaborative effort. In November 1990, CMV Enterprises released Pride and Joy, a collection of eight Double Trouble music videos. Sony signed a deal with the Vaughan estate to obtain control of his back catalog, as well as permission to release albums with previously unreleased material and new collections of released work. On October 29, 1991, The Sky Is Crying was released as Vaughan's first posthumous album with Double Trouble, and featured studio recordings from 1984 to 1985. Other compilations, live albums, and films have also been released since his death.
On October 3, 1991, Texas governor Ann Richards proclaimed "Stevie Ray Vaughan Commemoration Day", during which a memorial concert was held at the Texas Theatre. In 1993, a memorial statue of Vaughan was unveiled on Auditorium Shores and is the first public monument of a musician in Austin. In September 1994, a Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Run for Recovery was held in Dallas; the event was a benefit for the Ethel Daniels Foundation, established to help those in recovery from alcoholism and drug addiction who cannot afford treatment. In 1999, the Musicians' Assistance Program (later renamed MusiCares MAP Fund) created the "Stevie Ray Vaughan Award" to honor the memory of Vaughan and to recognize musicians for their devotion to helping other addicts struggling with the recovery process. The recipients include Eric Clapton, David Crosby, Steven Tyler, Alice Cooper, Ozzy Osbourne, Pete Townshend, Chris Cornell, Jerry Cantrell, Mike McCready, among others. In 1993, Martha Vaughan established the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Scholarship Fund, awarded to students at W.E. Greiner Middle School in Oakcliff who intend to attend college and pursue the arts as a profession.
Awards and honors
Vaughan won five W. C. Handy Awards and was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2000. In 1985, he was named an honorary admiral in the Texas Navy. Vaughan had a single number-one hit on the Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart for the song "Crossfire". His album sales in the U.S. stand at over 15 million units. Family Style, released shortly after his death, won the 1991 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album and became his best-selling, non-Double Trouble studio album with over a million shipments in the U.S. In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked him seventh among the "100 Greatest Guitar Players of All Time". He also became eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008, but did not appear on a nominations roster until 2014. He was inducted in the RRHOF alongside Double Trouble in 2015. Guitar World magazine ranked him as Number One in its list of the greatest blues guitarists.
In 1994 the city of Austin, Texas, erected the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial on the hiking trail beside Lady Bird Lake.
Discography
Texas Flood (1983)
Couldn't Stand the Weather (1984)
Soul to Soul (1985)
In Step (1989)
Family Style (1990)
The Sky is Crying (1991)
See also
1980s in music
List of blues rock musicians
List of electric blues musicians
List of guitarists
List of Texas blues musicians
Music of Austin, Texas
Music of Texas
Notes
Footnotes
Citations
Sources
Further reading
External links
The Stevie Ray Vaughan Archive
1954 births
1990 deaths
Accidental deaths in Wisconsin
American blues guitarists
American male guitarists
American blues singers
American blues singer-songwriters
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
Blues rock musicians
Double Trouble (band) members
Electric blues musicians
Epic Records artists
Sony Music artists
Grammy Award winners
Lead guitarists
Musicians from Dallas
Texas blues musicians
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1990
Victims of helicopter accidents or incidents in the United States
20th-century American singers
Slide guitarists
Resonator guitarists
Guitarists from Texas
20th-century American guitarists
People from Oak Cliff, Texas
20th-century American male singers
Musicians killed in aviation accidents or incidents
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Pipe smokers | true | [
"\"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",
"Paul Murray Live is an Australian television current affairs and commentary program, shown on Sky News Australia and hosted by broadcaster Paul Murray. It airs weeknights.\n\nThe show revolves around public Twitter discussions and the slogan \"this is a show where we tell you what happened today and hopefully by the end of it you'll know what really happened today\".\n\nNews updates are presented by Sharon McKenzie.\n\nHistory\nOriginally a spin-off from Murray's previous Sky News program 180: The Other Side of the News, Paul Murray Live debuted in 2010 and presents the days news, offering commentary and a panel discussion on what has happened in the last 24 hours.\n\nFrom 2015, Paul Murray Live will air weeknights, rather than its previous timeslots of Sunday to Thursday evenings throughout 2014, to make way for Hinch Live, which will air Saturday and Sundays as a continuation of the Paul Murray Live brand. From July 2016, the program airs a highlights edition on Friday evenings to allow Murray to host new format Saturday Edition on Saturdays.\n\nThe program has expanded to 2 hours in 2017, following the ending of SportsNight with James Bracey in 2016. Also in 2017, Paul Murray Live held programs from locations outside the studio with a live audience.\n\nIn the first half of 2018, Paul Murray Live was the most watched program in its timeslot across all subscription television channels.\n\nIn 2019, Paul Murray made international headlines for his interview with U.S. President Donald Trump. In 2019, Paul Murray Live Our Town tour travelled across the nation celebrating, supporting and showcasing local communities. The tour kicked off in February and raised a total of $400,000 for Australian regional communities in Launceston, Townsville, Toowoomba, Tamworth, Whyalla, Thredbo, Broome, Alice Springs and Newcastle.\n\nSee also\n List of Australian television series\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nSky News Official site\n\nSky News Australia\nAustralian non-fiction television series\n2010 Australian television series debuts"
] |
[
"Stevie Ray Vaughan",
"First recordings",
"In what year did Stevie Ray Vaughan start recording?",
"In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands,",
"What songs were on his first album?",
"They recorded two songs, \"Red, White and Blue\" and \"I Heard a Voice Last Night\",",
"What other musicians did SRV play with on his first recordings?",
"feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird.",
"How did critics receive his first recordings?",
"the album was rejected by A&M,",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top,",
"Did SRV tour with ZZ Top?",
"played various gigs across the South,",
"What happened on the tour across the South?",
"Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home"
] | C_156015fd0dc74c469a47cbc6a542733a_0 | Who is Ham? | 8 | Who is Ham? | Stevie Ray Vaughan | In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Country Club, a venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined a rock band named Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months. In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were disastrous. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed. In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras that included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King. Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde Pharaoh. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band. CANNOTANSWER | Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, | Stephen Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954August 27, 1990) was an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer, best known as the guitarist and frontman of the blues rock trio Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble. Although his mainstream career only spanned seven years, he is considered an icon and one of the most influential musicians in the history of blues music, and one of the greatest guitarists of all time.
Born and raised in Dallas, Texas, Vaughan began playing guitar at age seven, initially inspired by his elder brother, Jimmie Vaughan. In 1972, he dropped out of high school and moved to Austin, where he began to gain a following after playing gigs on the local club circuit. Vaughan joined forces with Tommy Shannon on bass and Chris Layton on drums as Double Trouble in 1978 and established it as part of the Austin music scene; it soon became one of the most popular acts in Texas. He performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1982, where David Bowie saw him play and contacted him for a studio gig, resulting in Stevie playing his blues guitar on the album Let's Dance (1983), before being discovered by John Hammond, who interested major label Epic Records in signing Vaughan and his band to a record deal. Within months, they achieved mainstream success for the critically acclaimed debut album Texas Flood. With a series of successful network television appearances and extensive concert tours, Vaughan became the leading figure in the blues revival of the 1980s.
Playing his guitar behind his back or plucking the strings with his teeth as Jimi Hendrix did, he earned unprecedented stardom in Europe, which later resulted in breakthroughs for guitar players like Robert Cray, Jeff Healey, Robben Ford and Walter Trout, amongst others.
During the majority of his life, Vaughan struggled with drug and alcohol addiction. He also struggled with the personal and professional pressures of fame and his marriage to Lenora "Lenny" Bailey. He successfully completed rehabilitation and began touring again with Double Trouble in November 1986. His fourth and final studio album In Step reached number 33 in the United States in 1989; it was one of Vaughan's most critically and commercially successful releases and included his only number-one hit, "Crossfire". He became one of the world's most highly demanded blues performers, and he headlined Madison Square Garden in 1989 and the Beale Street Music Festival in 1990.
On August 27, 1990, Vaughan and four others were killed in a helicopter crash in East Troy, Wisconsin, after performing with Double Trouble at Alpine Valley Music Theatre. An investigation concluded that the cause was pilot error and Vaughan's family later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Omniflight Helicopters that was settled out of court. Vaughan's music continued to achieve commercial success with several posthumous releases and has sold over 15 million albums in the United States alone. In 2003, David Fricke of Rolling Stone ranked him the seventh greatest guitarist of all time. Vaughan was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015, along with Double Trouble bandmates Chris Layton, Tommy Shannon, and Reese Wynans.
Family and early life
Stevie's grandfather, Thomas Lee Vaughan, married Laura Belle LaRue and moved to Rockwall County, Texas, where they lived by sharecropping.
Stevie's father, Jimmie Lee Vaughan, was born on September 6, 1921. Jimmie, also known as Jim and Big Jim, dropped out of school at age sixteen and enlisted in the U.S. Navy during World War II. After his discharge, he married Martha Jean (née Cook; 1928–2009) on January 13, 1950. They had a son, Jimmie, in 1951. Stephen was born at Methodist Hospital on October 3, 1954, in Dallas, Texas. Big Jim secured a job as an asbestos worker. The family moved frequently, living in other states such as Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Oklahoma before ultimately moving to the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. A shy and insecure boy, Vaughan was deeply affected by his childhood experiences. His father struggled with alcohol abuse and often terrorized his family and friends with his bad temper. In later years, Vaughan recalled that he had been a victim of his father's violence. His father died on August 27, 1986, exactly four years before Vaughan himself.
First instruments
In the early 1960s, Vaughan's admiration for his brother Jimmie resulted in his trying different instruments such as the drums and saxophone. In 1961, for his seventh birthday, Vaughan received his first guitar, a toy from Sears with Western motif. Learning by ear, he diligently committed himself, following along to songs by the Nightcaps, particularly "Wine, Wine, Wine" and "Thunderbird". He listened to blues artists such as Albert King, Otis Rush, and Muddy Waters, and rock guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix and Lonnie Mack, as well as jazz guitarists including Kenny Burrell. In 1963, he acquired his first electric guitar, a Gibson ES-125T, as a hand-me-down from Jimmie.
Soon after he acquired the electric guitar, Vaughan joined his first band, the Chantones, in 1965. Their first show was at a talent contest held in Dallas' Hill Theatre, but after realizing that they could not perform a Jimmy Reed song in its entirety, Vaughan left the band and joined the Brooklyn Underground, playing professionally at local bars and clubs. He received Jimmie's Fender Broadcaster, which he later traded for an Epiphone Riviera. When Jimmie left home at age sixteen, Vaughan's apparent obsession with the instrument caused a lack of support from his parents. Miserable at home, he took a job at a local hamburger stand, where he washed dishes and dumped trash for seventy cents an hour. After falling into a barrel of grease, he grew tired of the job and quit to devote his life to a music career.
Music career
Early years
In May 1969, after leaving the Brooklyn Underground, Vaughan joined a band called the Southern Distributor. He had learned the Yardbirds' "Jeff's Boogie" and played the song at the audition. Mike Steinbach, the group's drummer, commented: "The kid was fourteen. We auditioned him on 'Jeff's Boogie,' really fast instrumental guitar, and he played it note for note." Although they played pop rock covers, Vaughan conveyed his interest in the addition of blues songs to the group's repertoire; he was told that he wouldn't earn a living playing blues music and he and the band parted ways. Later that year, bassist Tommy Shannon walked into a Dallas club and heard Vaughan playing guitar. Fascinated by the skillful playing, which he described as "incredible even then", Shannon borrowed a bass guitar and the two jammed. Within a few years, they began performing together in a band called Krackerjack.
In February 1970, Vaughan joined a band called Liberation, which was a nine-piece group with a horn section. Having spent the past month briefly playing bass with Jimmie in Texas Storm, he had originally auditioned as bassist. Impressed by Vaughan's guitar playing, Scott Phares, the group's original guitarist, modestly became the bassist. In mid-1970, they performed at the Adolphus Hotel in downtown Dallas, where ZZ Top asked them to perform. During Liberation's break, Vaughan jammed with ZZ Top on the Nightcaps song "Thunderbird". Phares later described the performance: "they tore the house down. It was awesome. It was one of those magical evenings. Stevie fit in like a glove on a hand."
Attending Justin F. Kimball High School during the early 1970s, Vaughan's late-night shows contributed to his neglect in his studies, including music theory; he would often sleep during class. His pursuit of a musical career was disapproved of by many of the school's administrators but he was also encouraged by many people, including his art teacher, to strive for a career in art. In his sophomore year, he attended an evening class for experimental art at Southern Methodist University, but left when it conflicted with rehearsal. Vaughan later spoke of his dislike of the school and recalled having received daily notes from the principal about his grooming.
First recordings
In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Club, a local blues venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months.
In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were unsuccessful. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed.
In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras which included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King.
Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde "Pharaoh" Walden. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band.
Double Trouble
In mid-May 1978, Clark left to form his own group and Vaughan renamed the band Double Trouble, taken from the title of an Otis Rush song. Following the recruitment of bassist Jackie Newhouse, Walden quit in July, and was briefly replaced by Jack Moore, who had moved to Texas from Boston; he performed with the band for about two months. Vaughan then began looking for a drummer and soon after, he met Chris Layton through Sublett, who was his roommate. Layton, who had recently parted ways with Greezy Wheels, was taught by Vaughan to play a shuffle rhythm. When Vaughan offered Layton the position, he agreed. In early July, Vaughan befriended Lenora Bailey, known as "Lenny", who became his girlfriend, and ultimately his wife. The marriage was to last for six and a half years.
In early October 1978, Vaughan and Double Trouble earned a frequent residency performing at one of Austin's most popular nightspots, the Rome Inn. During a performance, Edi Johnson, an accountant at Manor Downs, noticed Vaughan. She remembered: "I'm not an authority on music—it's whatever turned me on—but this did." She recommended him to Manor Downs owner Frances Carr and general manager Chesley Millikin, who was interested in managing artists and saw Vaughan's musical potential. After Barton quit Double Trouble in mid-November 1979, Millikin signed Vaughan to a management contract. Vaughan also hired Robert "Cutter" Brandenburg as road manager, whom he had met in 1969. Addressing him as "Stevie Ray", Brandenburg convinced Vaughan to use his middle name on stage.
In October 1980, bassist Tommy Shannon attended a Double Trouble performance at Rockefeller's in Houston. Shannon, who was playing with Alan Haynes at the time, participated in a jam session with Vaughan and Layton halfway through their set. Shannon later commented: "I went down there that night, and I'll never forget this: it was like, when I walked in the door and I heard them playing, it was like a revelation. 'That's where I want to be; that's where I belong, right there.' During the break, I went up to Stevie and told him that. I didn't try to sneak around and hide it from the bass player [Jackie Newhouse]—I didn't know if he was listening or not. I just really wanted to be in that band. I sat in that night and it sounded great." Almost three months later, when Vaughan offered Shannon the position, he readily accepted.
Drug charge and trial
On December 5, 1979, while Vaughan was in a dressing room before a performance in Houston, an off-duty police officer arrested him after witnessing his usage of cocaine near an open window. He was formally charged with cocaine possession and subsequently released on $1,000 bail. Double Trouble was the opening act for Muddy Waters, who said about Vaughan's substance abuse: "Stevie could perhaps be the greatest guitar player that ever lived, but he won't live to get 40 years old if he doesn't leave that white powder alone." The following year, he was required to return on January 16 and February 29 for court appearances.
During the final court date, on April 17, 1980, Vaughan was sentenced with two years' probation and was prohibited from leaving Texas. Along with a stipulation of entering treatment for drug abuse, he was required to "avoid persons or places of known disreputable or harmful character"; he refused to comply with both of these orders. After a lawyer was hired, his probation officer had the sentence revised to allow him to work outside of the state. The incident later caused him to refuse maid service while staying in hotels during concert tours.
Montreux Jazz Festival
Although popular in Texas at the time, Double Trouble failed to gain national attention. The group's visibility improved when record producer Jerry Wexler recommended them to Claude Nobs, organizer of the Montreux Jazz Festival. He insisted the festival's blues night would be great with Vaughan, whom he called "a jewel, one of those rarities who comes along once in a lifetime", and Nobs agreed to book Double Trouble on July 17.
Vaughan opened with a medley arrangement of Freddie King's song "Hide Away" and his own fast instrumental composition, "Rude Mood". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", Hound Dog Taylor's "Give Me Back My Wig", and Albert Collins' "Collins Shuffle", as well as three original compositions: "Pride and Joy", "Love Struck Baby", and "Dirty Pool". The set ended with boos from the audience. People's James McBride wrote:
According to road manager Don Opperman: "the way I remember it, the 'ooos' and the 'boos' were mixed together, but Stevie was pretty disappointed. Stevie [had] just handed me his guitar and walked off stage, and I'm like, 'are you coming back?' There was a doorway back there; the audience couldn't see the guys, but I could. He went back to the dressing room with his head in his hands. I went back there finally, and that was the end of the show." According to Vaughan: "it wasn't the whole crowd [that booed]. It was just a few people sitting right up front. The room there was built for acoustic jazz. When five or six people boo, wow, it sounds like the whole world hates you. They thought we were too loud, but shoot, I had four army blankets folded over my amp, and the volume level was on 2. I'm used to playin' on 10!" The performance was filmed and later released on DVD in September 2004.
On the following night, Double Trouble was booked in the lounge of the Montreux Casino, with Jackson Browne in attendance. Browne jammed with Double Trouble until the early morning hours and offered them free use of his personal recording studio in downtown Los Angeles. In late November the band accepted his offer and recorded ten songs in two days. While they were in the studio, Vaughan received a telephone call from David Bowie, who met him after the Montreux performance, and he invited him to participate in a recording session for his next studio album, Let's Dance. In January 1983, Vaughan recorded guitar on six of the album's eight songs, including the title track and "China Girl". The album was released on April 14, 1983, and sold over three times as many copies as Bowie's previous album.
National success
In mid-March 1983, Gregg Geller, vice president of A&R at Epic Records, signed Double Trouble to the label at the recommendation of record producer John Hammond. Soon afterward, Epic financed a music video for "Love Struck Baby", which was filmed at the Cherry Tavern in New York City. Vaughan recalled: "we changed the name of the place in the video. Four years ago I got married in a club where we used to play all the time called the Rome Inn. When they closed it down, the owner gave me the sign, so in the video we put that up behind me on the stage."
With the success of Let's Dance, Bowie requested Vaughan as the featured instrumentalist for the upcoming Serious Moonlight Tour, realizing that he was an essential aspect of the album's groundbreaking success. In late April, Vaughan began rehearsals for the tour in Las Colinas, Texas. When contract renegotiations for his performance fee failed, Vaughan abandoned the tour days before its opening date, and he was replaced by Earl Slick. Vaughan commented: "I couldn't gear everything on something I didn't really care a whole lot about. It was kind of risky, but I really didn't need all the headaches." Although contributing factors were widely disputed, Vaughan soon gained major publicity for quitting the tour.
On May 9, the band performed at The Bottom Line in New York City, where they opened for Bryan Adams, with Hammond, Mick Jagger, John McEnroe, Rick Nielsen, Billy Gibbons, and Johnny Winter in attendance. Brandenburg described the performance as "ungodly": "I think Stevie played every lick as loud and as hard and with as much intensity as I've ever heard him." The performance earned Vaughan a positive review published in the New York Post, asserting that Double Trouble outperformed Adams. "Fortunately, Bryan Adams, the Canadian rocker who is opening arena dates for Journey, doesn't headline too often", wrote Martin Porter, who claimed that after the band's performance, the stage had been "rendered to cinders by the most explosively original showmanship to grace the New York stage in some time."
Texas Flood
After acquiring the recordings from Browne's studio, Double Trouble began assembling the material for a full-length LP. The album, Texas Flood, opens with the track "Love Struck Baby", which was written for Lenny on their "love-struck day". He composed "Pride and Joy" and "I'm Cryin'" for one of his former girlfriends, Lindi Bethel. Although both are musically similar, their lyrics are two different perspectives of the relationship. Along with covers of Howlin' Wolf, the Isley Brothers, and Buddy Guy, the album included Vaughan's cover of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", a song which he became strongly associated with. "Lenny" served as a tribute to his wife, which he composed at the end of their bed.
Texas Flood featured cover art by illustrator Brad Holland, who is known for his artwork for Playboy and The New York Times. Originally envisioned with Vaughan sitting on a horse depicting a promotable resemblance, Holland painted an image of him leaning against a wall with a guitar, using a photograph as a reference. Released on June 13, 1983, Texas Flood peaked at number 38 and ultimately sold half a million copies. While Rolling Stone editor Kurt Loder asserted that Vaughan did not possess a distinctive voice, according to AllMusic senior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the release was a "monumental impact". Billboard described it as "a guitar boogie lovers delight". Agent Alex Hodges commented: "No one knew how big that record would be, because guitar players weren't necessarily in vogue, except for some that were so established they were undeniable ... he was one of the few artists that was recouped on every record in a short period of time."
On June 16, Vaughan gave a performance at Tango nightclub in Dallas, which celebrated the album's release. Assorted VIPs attended the performance, including Ted Nugent, Sammy Hagar, and members of The Kinks and Uriah Heep. Jack Chase, vice president of marketing for Epic, recalled: "the coming-out party at Tango was very important; it was absolutely huge. All the radio station personalities, DJs, program directors, all the retail record store owners and the important managers, press, all the executives from New York came down—about seven hundred people. We attacked in Dallas first with Q102-FM and [DJ] Redbeard. We had the Tango party—it was hot. It was the ticket." The Dallas Morning News reviewed the performance, starting with the rhetorical question; "what if Stevie Ray Vaughan had an album release party and everybody came? It happened Thursday night at Tango. ... The adrenalin must have been gushing through the musicians' veins as they performed with rare finesse and skill."
Following a brief tour in Europe, Hodges arranged an engagement for Double Trouble as The Moody Blues' opening act during a two-month tour of North America. Hodges stated that many people disliked the idea of Double Trouble opening for The Moody Blues, but asserted that a common thread which both bands shared was "album-oriented rock". Shannon described the tour as "glorious": "Our record hadn't become that successful yet, but we were playing in front of coliseums full of people. We just went out and played, and it fit like a glove. The sound rang through those big coliseums like a monster. People were going crazy, and they had no idea who we were!" After appearing on the television series Austin City Limits, the band played a sold-out concert at New York City's Beacon Theatre. Variety wrote that their ninety-minute set at the Beacon "left no doubt that this young Texas musician is indeed the 'guitar hero of the present era.'"
Couldn't Stand the Weather
In January 1984, Double Trouble began recording their second studio album, Couldn't Stand the Weather, at the Power Station, with John Hammond as executive producer and engineer Richard Mullen. Layton later recalled working with Hammond: "he was kind of like a nice hand on your shoulder, as opposed to someone that jumped in and said, 'let's redo this, let's do that more.' He didn't get involved in that way at all. He was a feedback person." As the sessions began, Vaughan's cover of Bob Geddins' "Tin Pan Alley" was recorded while audio levels were being checked. Layton remembers the performance: "... we did probably the quietest version we ever did up 'til that point. We ended it and [Hammond] said; 'that's the best that song will ever sound,' and we went; 'we haven't even got sounds, have we?' He goes, 'that doesn't matter. That's the best you'll ever do that song.' We tried it again five, six, seven times- I can't even remember. But it never quite sounded like it did that first time."
During recording sessions, Vaughan began experimenting with other combinations of musicians, including Fran Christina and Stan Harrison, who played drums and saxophone respectively on the jazz instrumental, "Stang's Swang". Jimmie Vaughan played rhythm guitar on his cover of Guitar Slim's "The Things That I Used to Do" and the title track, the latter of which Vaughan carries a worldly message in his lyrics. According to musicologist Andy Aledort, Vaughan's guitar playing throughout the song is marked by steady rhythmic strumming patterns and improvised lead lines, with a distinctive R&B and soul single-note riff, doubled in octaves by guitar and bass.
Couldn't Stand the Weather was released on May 15, 1984, and two weeks later it had rapidly outpaced the sales of Texas Flood. It peaked at number 31 and spent 38 weeks on the charts. The album includes Vaughan's cover of Jimi Hendrix's song, "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", which provoked inevitable comparisons to Hendrix. According to AllMusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Couldn't Stand the Weather "confirmed that the acclaimed debut was no fluke, while matching, if not bettering, the sales of its predecessor, thereby cementing Vaughan's status as a giant of modern blues." According to authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford, the album "was a major turning point in Stevie Ray Vaughan's development" and Vaughan's singing improved.
Carnegie Hall
On October 4, 1984, Vaughan headlined a performance at Carnegie Hall that included many guest musicians. For the second half of the concert, he added Jimmie as rhythm guitarist, drummer George Rains, keyboardist Dr. John, Roomful of Blues horn section, and featured vocalist Angela Strehli. The ensemble rehearsed for less than two weeks before the performance, and despite the solid dynamics of Double Trouble for the first half of the performance, according to Patoski and Crawford, the big band concept never entirely took form. Before arriving at the engagement, the venue sold out, which made Vaughan overexcited and nervous as he did not calm down until halfway through the third song. A benefit for the T.J. Martell Foundation's work in leukemia and cancer research, he was an important draw for the event. As his scheduled time slot drew closer, he indicated that he preferred traveling to the venue by limousine to avoid being swarmed by fans on the street; the band took the stage around 8:00 p.m. The audience of 2,200 people, which included Vaughan's wife, family and friends, transformed the venue into what Stephen Holden of The New York Times described as "a whistling, stomping roadhouse".
Introduced by Hammond as "one of the greatest guitar players of all time", Vaughan opened with "Scuttle Buttin'", wearing a custom-made mariachi suit he described as a "Mexican tuxedo". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of the Isley Brothers' "Testify", The Jimi Hendrix Experience's "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", "Tin Pan Alley", Elmore James' "The Sky Is Crying", and W. C. Clark's "Cold Shot", along with four original compositions including "Love Struck Baby", "Honey Bee", "Couldn't Stand the Weather", and "Rude Mood". During the second half of the performance, Vaughan performed covers by Larry Davis, Buddy Guy, Guitar Slim, Albert King, Jackie Wilson, and Albert Collins. The set ended with Vaughan performing solo renditions of "Lenny" and "Rude Mood".
The Dallas Times-Herald wrote of the performance at Carnegie Hall as; "was full of stomping feet and swaying bodies, kids in blue jeans hanging off the balconies, dancing bodies that clogged the aisles." The New York Times asserted that, despite the venue's "muddy" acoustics, their performance was "filled with verve", and Vaughan's playing was "handsomely displayed". Jimmie Vaughan later commented: "I was worried the crowd might be a little stiff. Turned out they're just like any other beer joint." Vaughan commented: "We won't be limited to just the trio, although that doesn't mean we'll stop doing the trio. I'm planning on doing that too. I ain't gonna stay in one place. If I do, I'm stupid." The performance was recorded and later released as an official live LP. The album was released posthumously on July 29, 1997, by Epic Records; it was ultimately certified gold.
Immediately after the concert, Vaughan attended a private party at a downtown club in New York, which was sponsored by MTV, where he was greeted by an hour's worth of supporters. On the following day, Double Trouble made an appearance at a record store in Greenwich Village, where they signed autographs for fans. In late October 1984, the band toured Australia and New Zealand, which included one of their first appearances on Australian television—on Hey Hey It's Saturday—where they performed "Texas Flood", and an interview on Sounds. On November 5 and 9, they played sold-out concerts at the Sydney Opera House. Upon returning to the U.S., Double Trouble went on a brief tour in California. Soon afterward, Vaughan and Lenny went to the island of Saint Croix, on the U.S. Virgin Islands in the Caribbean Sea, where they had spent some time vacationing in December. The next month, Double Trouble flew to Japan, where they appeared for five performances, including at Kōsei Nenkin Kaikan in Osaka.
Soul to Soul
In March 1985, recording for Double Trouble's third studio album, Soul to Soul, began at the Dallas Sound Lab. As the sessions progressed, Vaughan became increasingly frustrated with his own lack of inspiration. He was also allowed a relaxed pace of recording the album, which contributed to a lack of focus due to excesses in alcohol and other drugs. Roadie Byron Barr later recalled: "the routine was to go to the studio, do dope, and play ping-pong." Vaughan, who found it increasingly difficult to be able to play rhythm guitar parts and sing at the same time, wanted to add another dimension to the band, so he hired keyboardist Reese Wynans to record on the album; he joined the band soon thereafter.
During the album's production, Vaughan appeared at the Houston Astrodome on April 10, 1985, where he performed a slide guitar rendition of the U.S. national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner"; his performance was met with booing. Upon leaving the stage, Vaughan acquired an autograph from former player for the New York Yankees, Mickey Mantle. Astrodome publicist Molly Glentzer wrote in the Houston Press: "as Vaughan shuffled back behind home plate, he was only lucid enough to know that he wanted Mickey Mantle's autograph. Mantle obliged. 'I never signed a guitar before.' Nobody asked Vaughan for his autograph. I was sure he'd be dead before he hit 30." Critics associated his performance with Jimi Hendrix's rendition at Woodstock in 1969, yet Vaughan disliked this comparison: "I heard they even wrote about it in one of the music magazines and they tried to put the two versions side by side. I hate that stuff. His version was great."
Released on September 30, 1985, Soul to Soul peaked at number 34 and remained on the Billboard 200 through mid-1986, eventually certified gold. Critic Jimmy Guterman of Rolling Stone wrote: "there's some life left in their blues rock pastiche; it's also possible that they've run out of gas." According to Patoski and Crawford, sales of the album "did not match Couldn't Stand the Weather, suggesting Stevie Ray and Double Trouble were plateauing". Vaughan commented: "as far as what's on there song-wise, I like the album a lot. It meant a lot to us what we went through to get this record. There were a lot of odds and we still stayed strong. We grew a lot with the people in the band and immediate friends around us; we learned a lot and grew a lot closer. That has a lot to do with why it's called [Soul to Soul]."
Live Alive
After touring for nine and a half months, Epic requested a fourth album from Double Trouble as part of their contractual obligation. In July 1986, Vaughan decided that they would record the LP, Live Alive, during three live appearances in Austin and Dallas. On July 17 and 18, the band performed sold-out concerts at the Austin Opera House, and July 19 at the Dallas Starfest. They used recordings of these concerts to assemble the LP, which was produced by Vaughan. Shannon was backstage before the Austin concert and predicted to new manager Alex Hodges that both Vaughan and himself were "headed for a brick wall". Guitarist Denny Freeman attended the Austin performances; he called the shows a "musical mess, because they would go into these chaotic jams with no control. I didn't know what exactly was going on, but I was concerned." Both Layton and Shannon remarked that their work schedule and drugs were causing the band to lose focus. According to Wynans: "Things were getting illogical and crazy."
The Live Alive album was released on November 17, 1986, and the only official live Double Trouble LP made commercially available during Vaughan's lifetime, though it never appeared on the Billboard 200 chart. Though many critics claimed that most of the album was overdubbed, engineer Gary Olazabal, who mixed the album, asserted that most of the material was recorded poorly. Vaughan later admitted that it was not one of his better efforts; he recalled: "I wasn't in very good shape when we recorded Live Alive. At the time, I didn't realize how bad a shape I was in. There were more fix-it jobs done on the album than I would have liked. Some of the work sounds like [it was] the work of half-dead people. There were some great notes that came out, but I just wasn't in control; nobody was."
Drugs and alcohol
In 1960, when Vaughan was six years old, he began stealing his father's drinks. Drawn in by its effects, he started making his own drinks and this resulted in alcohol dependence. He explained: "that's when I first started stealing daddy's drinks. Or when my parents were gone, I'd find the bottle and make myself one. I thought it was cool ... thought the kids down the street would think it was cool. That's where it began, and I had been depending on it ever since." According to the authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford: "In the ensuing twenty-five years, he had worked his way through the Physicians' Desk Reference before finding his poisons of preference—alcohol and cocaine."
While Vaughan asserted that he first experienced the effects of cocaine when a doctor prescribed him a liquid solution of the stimulant as a nasal spray, according to Patoski and Crawford, the earliest that Vaughan is known to have ingested the drug is in 1975, while performing with the Cobras. Before that, Vaughan had briefly used other drugs such as cannabis, methamphetamine, and Quaaludes, the brand name for methaqualone. After 1975, he regularly drank whiskey and used cocaine, particularly mixing the two substances together. According to Hopkins, by the time of Double Trouble's European tour in September 1986, "his lifestyle of substance abuse had reached a peak, probably better characterized as the bottom of a deep chasm."
At the height of Vaughan's substance abuse, he drank of whiskey and used of cocaine each day. Personal assistant Tim Duckworth explained: "I would make sure he would eat breakfast instead of waking up drinking every morning, which was probably the worst thing he was doing." According to Vaughan: "it got to the point where if I'd try to say "hi" to somebody, I would just fall apart crying. It was like solid doom."
In September 1986, Double Trouble traveled to Denmark for a one-month tour of Europe. During the late night hours of September 28, Vaughan became ill after a performance in Ludwigshafen, Germany, suffering from near-death dehydration, for which he received medical treatment. The incident resulted in his checking into The London Clinic under the care of Dr. Victor Bloom, who warned him that he was a month away from death. After staying in London for more than a week, he returned to the United States and entered Peachford Hospital in Atlanta, where he spent four weeks in rehabilitation, and then checked into rehab in Austin.
Live Alive tour
In November 1986, following his departure from rehab, Vaughan moved back into his mother's Glenfield Avenue house in Dallas, which is where he had spent much of his childhood. During this time, Double Trouble began rehearsals for the Live Alive tour. Although Vaughan was nervous about performing after achieving sobriety, he received positive reassurance. Wynans later recalled: "Stevie was real worried about playing after he'd gotten sober...he didn't know if he had anything left to offer. Once we got back out on the road, he was very inspired and motivated." The tour began on November 23 at Towson State University, which was Vaughan's first performance with Double Trouble after rehab. On December 31, 1986, they played a concert at Atlanta's Fox Theatre, which featured encore performances with Lonnie Mack.
As the tour progressed, Vaughan was longing to work on material for his next LP, but in January 1987, he filed for a divorce from Lenny, which restricted him from any projects until the proceedings were finalized. This prevented him from writing and recording songs for almost two years, but Double Trouble wrote the song "Crossfire" with Bill Carter and Ruth Ellsworth. Layton recalled: "we wrote the music, and they had to write the lyrics. We had just gotten together; Stevie was unable to be there at that time. He was in Dallas doing some things, and we just got together and started writing some songs. That was the first one we wrote." On August 6, 1987, Double Trouble appeared at the Austin Aqua Festival, where they played to one of the largest audiences of their career. According to biographer Craig Hopkins, as many as 20,000 people attended the concert. Following a month-long tour as the opening act for Robert Plant in May 1988, which included a concert at Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens, the band was booked for a European leg, which included 22 performances, and ended in Oulu, Finland on July 17. This would be Vaughan's last concert appearance in Europe.
In Step
After Vaughan's divorce from Lenora "Lenny" Darlene Bailey became final, recording for Double Trouble's fourth and final studio album, In Step, began at Kiva Studios in Memphis, Tennessee, working with producer Jim Gaines and co-songwriter Doyle Bramhall. Initially, he had doubts about his musical and creative abilities after achieving sobriety, but he gained confidence as the sessions progressed. Shannon later recalled: "In Step was, for him, a big growing experience. In my opinion, it's our best studio album, and I think he felt that way, too." Bramhall, who had also entered rehab, wrote songs with Vaughan about addiction and redemption. According to Vaughan, the album was titled In Step because "I'm finally in step with life, in step with myself, in step with my music." The album's liner notes include the quote; "'thank God the elevator's broken," a reference to the twelve-step program proposed by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA).
After the In Step recording sessions moved to Los Angeles, Vaughan added horn players Joe Sublett and Darrell Leonard, who played saxophone and trumpet respectively on both "Crossfire" and "Love Me Darlin". Shortly before the album's production was complete, Vaughan and Double Trouble appeared at a presidential inaugural party in Washington, D.C. for George H. W. Bush. In Step was released on June 13, 1989, and eight months later, it was certified gold. The album was Vaughan's most commercially successful release and his first one to win a Grammy Award. It peaked at number 33 on the Billboard 200, spending 47 weeks on the chart. In Step included the song, "Crossfire", which was written by Double Trouble, Bill Carter, and Ruth Ellsworth; it became his only number one hit. The album also included one of his first recordings to feature the use of a Fuzz Face on Vaughan's cover of the Howlin' Wolf song, "Love Me Darlin.
In July 1989, Neil Perry, a writer for Sounds magazine, wrote: "the album closes with the brow-soothing swoon of 'Riviera Paradise,' a slow, lengthy guitar and piano workout that proves just why Vaughan is to the guitar what Nureyev is to ballet." According to music journalist Robert Christgau, Vaughan was "writing blues for AA...he escapes the blues undamaged for the first time in his career." In October 1989, the Boca Raton News described Vaughan's guitar solos as "determined, clear-headed and downright stinging" and his lyrics as "tension-filled allegories".
Death
On Monday, August 27, 1990, at 12:50 a.m. (CDT), Vaughan and members of Eric Clapton's touring entourage played an all-star encore jam session at Alpine Valley Music Theatre in Alpine Valley Resort in East Troy, Wisconsin. They then left for Midway International Airport in Chicago in a Bell 206B helicopter, the most common way for acts to enter and exit the venue, as there is only one road in and out, heavily used by fans. The helicopter crashed into a nearby ski hill shortly after takeoff. Vaughan and the four others on board—pilot Jeff Brown, agent Bobby Brooks, bodyguard Nigel Browne, and tour manager Colin Smythe—died. The helicopter was identified as being owned by Chicago-based company Omniflight Helicopters. Initial reports of the crash erroneously claimed that Clapton had also been killed. According to findings from an inquest conducted by the coroner's office in Elkhorn, all five victims were killed instantly.
The investigation determined the aircraft departed in foggy conditions with visibility reportedly under two miles, according to a local forecast. The National Transportation Safety Board report stated: "As the third helicopter was departing, it remained at a lower altitude than the others, and the pilot turned southeasterly toward rising terrain. Subsequently, the helicopter crashed on hilly terrain about three fifths of a mile from the takeoff point." Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) records showed that Brown was qualified to fly by instruments in a fixed-wing aircraft, but not in a helicopter. Toxicology tests performed on the victims revealed no traces of drugs or alcohol in their systems. Vaughan's funeral service was held on August 31, 1990, at Laurel Land Cemetery in Dallas, Texas. His wooden casket quickly became adorned with bouquets of flowers. An estimated 3,000 mourners joined a procession led by a white hearse. Among those at the public ceremony were Jeff Healey, Charlie Sexton, ZZ Top, Colin James, Stevie Wonder, Bonnie Raitt and Buddy Guy. Vaughan's grave marker reads: "Thank you ... for all the love you passed our way."
Musical style
Vaughan's music was rooted in blues, rock, and jazz. He was influenced by Jimi Hendrix, Albert King, Lonnie Mack, B.B. King, Freddie King, Albert Collins, Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Otis Rush, Guitar Slim, Chuck Berry, and Muddy Waters. According to nightclub owner Clifford Antone, who opened Antone's in 1975, Vaughan jammed with Albert King at Antone's in July 1977 and it almost "scared him to death", saying that "it was the best I've ever saw Albert or the best I ever saw Stevie". While Albert King had a substantial influence on Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix was Vaughan's greatest inspiration. Vaughan declared: "I love Hendrix for so many reasons. He was so much more than just a blues guitarist—he played damn well any kind of guitar he wanted. In fact I'm not sure if he even played the guitar—he played music." He was also influenced by such jazz guitarists as Django Reinhardt, Wes Montgomery, Kenny Burrell, and George Benson.
In 1987, Vaughan listed Lonnie Mack first among the guitarists he had listened to, both as a youngster and as an adult. Vaughan observed that Mack was "ahead of his time" and said, "I got a lot of my fast stuff from Lonnie". On another occasion, Vaughan said that he had learned tremolo picking and vibrato from Mack and that Mack had taught him to "play guitar from the heart." Mack recalled his first meeting with Vaughan in 1978:
Vaughan's relationship with another Texas blues legend, Johnny Winter, was a little more complex. Although they met several times, and often played sessions with the same musicians or even performed the same material, as in the case of Boot Hill, Vaughan always refrained from acknowledging Winter in any form. In his biography, "Raisin' Cain", Winter says that he was unnerved after reading Vaughan stating in an interview that he never met or knew Johnny Winter. "We even played together over at Tommy Shannon's house one time." Vaughan settled the issue in 1988 on the occasion of a blues festival in Europe where both he and Winter were on the bill, explaining that he has been misquoted and that "Every musician in Texas knows Johnny and has learned something from him". Asked to compare their playing styles in an interview in 2010, Winter admitted that "mine's a little bit rawer, I think."
Equipment
Guitars
Vaughan owned and used a variety of guitars during his career. His guitar of choice, and the instrument that he became most associated with, was the Fender Stratocaster, his favorite being a 1963 body with a 1962 neck and pickups dated from 1959. This is why Vaughan usually referred to his Stratocaster as a "1959 Strat". He explained why he favored this guitar in a 1983 interview: "I like the strength of its sound. Any guitar I play has got to be pretty versatile. It's got a big, strong tone and it'll take anything I do to it." Vaughan also referred to this instrument as his "first wife", or "Number One". Another favourite guitar was a slightly later Strat he named 'Lenny' after his wife, Lenora. While at a local pawn shop in 1980, Vaughan had noticed this particular guitar, a 1965 Stratocaster that had been refinished in red, with the original sunburst finish peeking through. It also had a 1910 Mandolin inlay just below the bridge. The pawn shop was asking $300 for it, which was way more than Vaughan had at the time. Lenny saw how badly he wanted this guitar, so she got six of their friends to chip in $50 each, and bought it for him. The guitar was presented to him on his birthday in 1980, and that night, after bringing "Lenny" (the guitar, and wife) home with him, he wrote the song, "Lenny". He started using a borrowed Stratocaster during high school and used Stratocasters predominantly in his live performances and recordings, although he did play other guitars, including custom guitars.
One of the custom guitars—nicknamed "Main"—was built by James Hamilton of Hamiltone Guitars in Buffalo, New York. It was a gift from Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top. Gibbons had commissioned Hamilton to build the guitar in 1979. There were some delays, including having to re-do the mother of pearl inlay of Vaughan's name on the fretboard when he changed his stage name from Stevie Vaughan to Stevie Ray Vaughan. The guitar was presented to him by Jim Hamilton on April 29, 1984. Hamilton recalls that Stevie Ray Vaughan was so happy with the guitar that he played it that night at Springfest on the University of Buffalo campus. It remained one of the main guitars he used on stage and in studio. Vaughan made some alterations to the guitar, including replacing the bronze color Gibson knobs with white Fender knobs, as he preferred the ribbing on the Fender knobs. The pickups had to be changed after the guitar was used in the "Couldn't Stand the Weather" video, in which Stevie and "Main" were drenched with water, and the pickups were ruined. Vaughan preferred guitar has been summarized as his,
Number One Strat, which Stevie claimed to be a ’59, since that was the date stamped on the back of the pickups… this was incorrect, however, as guitar tech Rene Martinez (who oversaw SRV’s guitars since 1980) found the stamp of 1963 on the body and 1962 on the original neck (the neck was replaced in 1989 after it could no longer be refretted properly; Rene used the neck from another SRV favorite, “Red”, as it was also a 1962 model). The pickups are also relatively low output, not the hot overwound myth that gained legs during the 80s… all 3 pickups are rumored to be under 6k ohms output impedance, which would be typical of a 1959 set (the neck pickups tended to be hottest, but not by much). Although the Fender SRV signature model uses Texas Special pickups, which Stevie was heavily involved in the making of, they do not accurately represent the sound of his original Number One.
Vaughan bought many Stratocasters and gave some away as gifts. A sunburst Diplomat Strat-style guitar was purchased by Vaughan and given to his girlfriend Janna Lapidus to learn to play on. Vaughan used a custom set of uncommonly heavy strings, gauges .013, .015, .019, .028, .038, .058, and tuned a half-step below standard tuning. He played with so much tension that it was not uncommon for him to separate his fingernail from the quick movement along the strings. The owner of an Austin club recalled Vaughan coming into the office between sets to borrow super glue, which he used to keep fingernail split from widening while he continued to play. The super glue was suggested by Rene Martinez, who was Stevie's guitar technician. Martinez eventually convinced Stevie to change to slightly lighter strings. He preferred a guitar neck with an asymmetrical profile (thicker at the top) which was more comfortable for his thumb-over style of playing. Heavy use of the vibrato bar necessitated frequent replacements; Vaughan often had his roadie, Byron Barr, obtain custom stainless steel bars made by Barr's father.
Vaughan was also photographed playing a Rickenbacker Capri, a National Duolian, Epiphone Riviera, Gibson Flying V, as well as several other models. Vaughan used a Gibson Johnny Smith to record "Stang's Swang", and a Guild 12-string acoustic for his performance on MTV Unplugged in January 1990. On June 24, 2004, one of Vaughan's Stratocasters, the aforementioned "Lenny" strat, was sold at an auction to benefit Eric Clapton's Crossroads Centre in Antigua; the instrument was bought by Guitar Center for $623,500.
Amplifiers and effects
Vaughan was a catalyst in the revival of vintage amplifiers and effects during the 1980s. His loud volume and use of heavy strings required powerful and robust amplifiers. Vaughan used two black-face Fender Super Reverbs, which were crucial in shaping his clear overdriven sound. He would often blend other amps with the Super Reverbs, including black-face Fender Vibroverbs, and brands such as Dumble, and Marshall, which he used for his clean sound.
While his mainstay effects were the Ibanez Tube Screamer and a Vox wah-wah pedal, Vaughan experimented with a range of effects. He used a Fender Vibratone, designed as a Leslie speaker for electric guitars, and provided a warbling chorus effect, which can be heard on the track "Cold Shot". He used a vintage Dallas Arbiter Fuzz Face that can be heard on In Step, as well as an Octavia. The Guitar Geek website provides a detailed illustration of Vaughan's 1985 equipment set up based on interviews with his guitar tech and effects builder, Cesar Diaz.
Legacy
Vaughan throughout his career revived blues rock and paved the way for many other artists. Vaughan's work continues to influence numerous blues, rock and alternative artists, including John Mayer, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Mike McCready, Albert Cummings, Los Lonely Boys and Chris Duarte, among others. AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine described Vaughan as "the leading light in American blues" and developed "a uniquely eclectic and fiery style that sounded like no other guitarist, regardless of genre". In 1983, Variety magazine called Vaughan the "guitar hero of the present era".
In the months that followed his death, Vaughan sold over 5.5 million albums in the United States. On September 25, 1990, Epic released Family Style, an LP the Vaughan brothers cut at Ardent Studios in Memphis, Tennessee. The label released several promotional singles and videos for the collaborative effort. In November 1990, CMV Enterprises released Pride and Joy, a collection of eight Double Trouble music videos. Sony signed a deal with the Vaughan estate to obtain control of his back catalog, as well as permission to release albums with previously unreleased material and new collections of released work. On October 29, 1991, The Sky Is Crying was released as Vaughan's first posthumous album with Double Trouble, and featured studio recordings from 1984 to 1985. Other compilations, live albums, and films have also been released since his death.
On October 3, 1991, Texas governor Ann Richards proclaimed "Stevie Ray Vaughan Commemoration Day", during which a memorial concert was held at the Texas Theatre. In 1993, a memorial statue of Vaughan was unveiled on Auditorium Shores and is the first public monument of a musician in Austin. In September 1994, a Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Run for Recovery was held in Dallas; the event was a benefit for the Ethel Daniels Foundation, established to help those in recovery from alcoholism and drug addiction who cannot afford treatment. In 1999, the Musicians' Assistance Program (later renamed MusiCares MAP Fund) created the "Stevie Ray Vaughan Award" to honor the memory of Vaughan and to recognize musicians for their devotion to helping other addicts struggling with the recovery process. The recipients include Eric Clapton, David Crosby, Steven Tyler, Alice Cooper, Ozzy Osbourne, Pete Townshend, Chris Cornell, Jerry Cantrell, Mike McCready, among others. In 1993, Martha Vaughan established the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Scholarship Fund, awarded to students at W.E. Greiner Middle School in Oakcliff who intend to attend college and pursue the arts as a profession.
Awards and honors
Vaughan won five W. C. Handy Awards and was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2000. In 1985, he was named an honorary admiral in the Texas Navy. Vaughan had a single number-one hit on the Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart for the song "Crossfire". His album sales in the U.S. stand at over 15 million units. Family Style, released shortly after his death, won the 1991 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album and became his best-selling, non-Double Trouble studio album with over a million shipments in the U.S. In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked him seventh among the "100 Greatest Guitar Players of All Time". He also became eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008, but did not appear on a nominations roster until 2014. He was inducted in the RRHOF alongside Double Trouble in 2015. Guitar World magazine ranked him as Number One in its list of the greatest blues guitarists.
In 1994 the city of Austin, Texas, erected the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial on the hiking trail beside Lady Bird Lake.
Discography
Texas Flood (1983)
Couldn't Stand the Weather (1984)
Soul to Soul (1985)
In Step (1989)
Family Style (1990)
The Sky is Crying (1991)
See also
1980s in music
List of blues rock musicians
List of electric blues musicians
List of guitarists
List of Texas blues musicians
Music of Austin, Texas
Music of Texas
Notes
Footnotes
Citations
Sources
Further reading
External links
The Stevie Ray Vaughan Archive
1954 births
1990 deaths
Accidental deaths in Wisconsin
American blues guitarists
American male guitarists
American blues singers
American blues singer-songwriters
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
Blues rock musicians
Double Trouble (band) members
Electric blues musicians
Epic Records artists
Sony Music artists
Grammy Award winners
Lead guitarists
Musicians from Dallas
Texas blues musicians
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1990
Victims of helicopter accidents or incidents in the United States
20th-century American singers
Slide guitarists
Resonator guitarists
Guitarists from Texas
20th-century American guitarists
People from Oak Cliff, Texas
20th-century American male singers
Musicians killed in aviation accidents or incidents
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Pipe smokers | true | [
"Ham sausage is a sausage prepared using ham and other ingredients, the latter varying by location. It is a part of the cuisines of China, Germany, Poland and the United States. Ham sausage is a mass-produced food product.\n\nBy country\n\nChina\n\nAutoclaved ham sausage is branded as \"Ham Sausage\" in China. Ham sausage is mass-produced and consumed in China, and several varieties of the product exist in the country. The Chinese ham sausage is a mixture of meat and starch, as well as low concentrations of water, vegetable oil, salt, monosodium glutamate and other food additives. A very small amount of ham sausage produced in China is exported to Japan (around .02% in 2004). The Chundu Group is an example of a Chinese company that produces ham sausage.\n\nGermany\n\nIn German cuisine, ham sausage (Schinkenwurst) is made from ham mixed with varying amounts of bacon, ground pork, beef, meat trimmings, garlic, and spices. The mixture is stuffed into casings, can be smoked, and is cooked in scalding or boiling water. Ham sausage can be cured using a curing solution that is rubbed into the ham, and machines can perform this process. Ham sausage has a marbled appearance due to the ham and bacon pieces in it, which can be observed when the product is sliced. German ham sausage can be sliced and then grilled or fried, and is also used as an ingredient in soups and stews.\n\nItaly\nSoppressata is an Italian dry-cured salami that is sometimes prepared using ham.\n\nPoland\nKielbasa szynkowa is a Polish ham sausage prepared using ham, pork shoulder, beef and spices. It can be prepared by hot smoking.\n\nUnited States\nThe Christian Klinck Packing Company, established around 1868 in Buffalo, New York, by German immigrants, sold a ham sausage and other sausage products by 1905. During the 1910s the Edelweiss brand included ham sausage in its product line. In the late 1800s in the U.S., Parisian ham sausage was prepared using pork ham or shoulder, beef and spices. Parisian ham sausage at this time was smoked and then boiled.\n\nSmithfield Foods, an American meat processing company, introduced ham sausage as part of its product line in the late 1970s. Sales projections for Smithfield Foods ham sausage were estimated to be per month when the sausage was introduced, and average sales thereafter of per month exceeded the initial estimate.\n\nNew England ham sausage, also referred to as pressed ham, is prepared using ham or pork shoulder trimmings, and lean pork that is ground, smoked and then boiled.\n\nMass production\nHam sausage is a mass-produced food. The Tai Foong Canned Goods Co. in Shanghai, China, produced and purveyed canned corned ham sausage and canned smoked ham sausage as early as 1915. The Tianjin Meat United Processing Factory in Tianjin, China, produces Yingbin brand ham sausage in contemporary times. G.A. Müller and Könecke are German companies that produce a ham sausage called Schinken Bockwurst (English: ham bockwurst) and other sausage products in contemporary times. Smithfield Foods of the U.S. has mass-produced ham sausage.\n\nSee also\n\n List of sausages\n Teewurst – a German sausage prepared using pork, bacon and sometimes beef\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nFurther reading\n \n \n \n \n \n\nChinese cuisine\nGerman cuisine\nHam dishes\nPolish cuisine\nSausages\nAmerican sausages\nAmerican pork dishes",
"This is a list of notable hams and ham products. Ham is pork that has been preserved through salting, smoking, or wet curing. It was traditionally made only from the hind leg of swine, and referred to that specific cut of pork. Ham is made around the world, including a number of highly coveted regional specialties, such as Westphalian ham and jamón serrano.\n\nTechnically a processed meat, \"ham\" may refer to a product which has been through mechanical reforming. The precise nature of meat termed \"ham\" is controlled by statute in a number of areas, including the United States and European Union. In addition, numerous ham products have specific geographical indication protection, such as Prosciutto di Parma and Prosciutto Toscano PDO in Europe, and Smithfield ham in the United States.\n\nHams and ham products\n\nBulgaria\n Elenski but is a dry-cured ham from the town of Elena in northern Bulgaria and a popular delicacy throughout the country. The meat has a specific taste and can be preserved for several years, owing much to the special process of making and the climatic conditions of the part of Stara Planina where Elena is located.\n\nChina\n\n Anfu ham is a dry-cured ham from Anfu, Jiangxi, China, documented starting in the Qin Dynasty. It is eaten alone and also used as an ingredient to add flavor to various dishes.\n Jinhua ham is a type of dry-cured ham named after the city of Jinhua, where it is produced, in the Zhejiang province of eastern China. The ham is used in Chinese cuisine to flavor stewed and braised foods, as well as for making the stocks and broths of many Chinese soups. It is prepared using the Tongcheng pig and has been described as \"the most prized ham in all of China\".\n Rugao ham is a dry-cured ham that originated in Jiangsu province, China, and was first prepared in 1851. Rugao ham is named after Rugao in Jiangsu province and is produced in a diverse variety of flavors, colors, and weights.\n Xuanwei ham – a local dish in the Qujing prefecture in Yunnan province, China. Xuanwei ham has a 250-year history dating back to 1766. In 1909 it was first mass-produced and gained popularity. It is also used as an ingredient in various dishes.\n\nCzech Republic\n\n Prague ham is a brine-cured, stewed, and mildly beechwood-smoked boneless ham originally from Prague in Bohemia (Czech Republic).\n\nEngland\n York ham is a historical ham from Yorkshire, England; it is a mild-flavoured ham with delicate pink coloring. York ham is traditionally served with Madeira sauce. A lightly smoked, dry-cured ham, York ham is saltier but milder in flavour than other European dry-cured hams. Folklore has it that the oak construction for York Minster provided the sawdust for smoking the ham. Robert Burrow Atkinson's butchery shop, in Blossom Street, is the birthplace of the original \"York ham\" and the reason why the premises became famous.\n\n Wiltshire cure ham is a historical ham from Wiltshire, England\n\n Shropshire Black Ham or Bradenham ham\n\nFrance\n Bayonne ham is a cured ham that takes its name from the ancient port city of Bayonne in the far south-west of France, a city located in both the cultural regions of Basque Country and Gascony. Jambon de Bayonne has protected geographical indication (PGI) status.\n\nGermany\n\n Ammerländer Schinken is a dry-cured (and normally smoked) ham produced in the Ammerland area of northern Germany. It has PGI status under European Union law.\n Black Forest ham is a variety of dry-cured, smoked ham produced in the Black Forest region of Germany.\n Westphalian ham is produced from acorn-fed pigs raised in the forests of Westphalia, Germany, and the resulting meat is dry-cured and then smoked over a mixture of beechwood and juniper branches.\n\nIreland\n Limerick ham is a method of preparing a joint of ham in the cuisine of Ireland. The method was originally developed in County Limerick, Ireland.\n\nItaly\n\n Culatello is similar to prosciutto, but is made from the filet or loin of the hind leg; it originated in Parma, Italy.\n Prosciutto is an Italian dry-cured ham that is usually thinly sliced and served uncooked; this style is called prosciutto crudo in Italian (or simply crudo).\nCrudo di Cuneo PDO (Piedmont)\nProsciutto di Carpegna PDO (Marche)\nProsciutto di Modena PDO (Emilia-Romagna)\nProsciutto di Parma PDO (Emilia-Romagna)\nProsciutto di San Daniele PDO (Friuli-Venezia Giulia)\nProsciutto toscano PDO (Tuscany)\nProsciutto Veneto Berico-Euganeo PDO (Veneto)\nProsciutto amatriciano PGI (Lazio)\nProsciutto di Norcia PGI (Umbria)\nProsciutto di Sauris PGI (Friuli-Venezia Giulia)\n Speck Alto Adige PGI is a dry-cured, lightly smoked ham (prosciutto in Italian), produced in South Tyrol, northern Italy. Parts of its production are regulated by the European Union under the PGI status. In Italy and Turkey parts of the English-speaking culinary world, the term \"speck\" refers to Italian Speck Alto Adige PGI, a type of prosciutto.\n Tyrolean Speck – a distinctively juniper-flavored, boneless ham originally from Tyrol, an historical region that since 1918 partially lies in Italy. The first historical mention of Tyrolean Speck' was in the early 13th century, when some of the current production techniques were already in use.\n Vallée d’Aoste Jambon de Bosses is a spicy, cured ham product from Saint-Rhémy-en-Bosses in the Aosta Valley in Italy, one of the region's specialties. It was awarded protected designation of origin (PDO) status by the European Union.\n\nLuxembourg\n Éisleker ham, literally \"Oesling ham\", is a speciality from the Oesling region in the north of Luxembourg, which is produced from the hind legs of pigs. Traditionally, it was prepared by marinating the hams in herbs and vinegar for several days, then hanging them in a chimney for long periods of cold smoking. Today, the meat is cured in brine for two weeks and placed in a smoker fed from beech and oak chips for about a week.\n\nMontenegro\n\n Njeguški pršut is a dry-cured ham served uncooked, similar to Italian prosciutto; it is a specialty of Njeguši, a village in Montenegro\n\nPortugal\n Jamón ibérico is produced in Spain and Portugal, from the local breed of acorn-fed pigs.\n Presunto is a dry-cured ham from Portugal, similar to Spanish jamón or Italian prosciutto crudo.\n\nSpain\n\n Jamón serrano or simply Jamón - A dry-cured ham and one of the most well known foods of Spanish cuisine. It has traditional specialities guaranteed (TSG) status.\n Jamón ibérico – A variety of Jamón produced in Spain and Portugal, made from black Iberian pigs instead of white breeds. It includes the world's most expensive hams.\n Lacón Gallego is a dried ham product from Galicia, with PGI status under European law\n\nUnited States\n\n Chipped chopped ham is a processed ham luncheon meat made from chopped ham. Chopped ham is a mixture of ham chunks and trimmings and seasonings, ground together and then packaged into loaves.\n City ham is the name for a variety of brine-cured hams that are not dry-cured or dried, so must be refrigerated for safe storage. It is known simply as \"ham\" in regions of the U.S. where country ham is unknown.\n Country ham is a variety of dry-cured ham, referring to a method of curing and smoking done in the parts of the Southeast U.S. states of North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Georgia, Kentucky, Missouri, and other nearby states.\n Glazed ham in the U.S. is coated with a flavored or spiced sugar solution (glazed) ham before cooking. \n Smithfield ham is a specific form of country ham finish-cured in the town of Smithfield in Isle of Wight County in the Hampton Roads region of Virginia, United States.\n\nSee also\n\n Ham hock \n Ham sausage\n List of dried foods\n List of ham dishes\n List of pork dishes\n List of smoked foods\n Turkey ham – a processed food made primarily from cooked or cured turkey meat and water, formed into the shape of a ham and often sold pre-sliced.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\nHams"
] |
[
"Stevie Ray Vaughan",
"First recordings",
"In what year did Stevie Ray Vaughan start recording?",
"In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands,",
"What songs were on his first album?",
"They recorded two songs, \"Red, White and Blue\" and \"I Heard a Voice Last Night\",",
"What other musicians did SRV play with on his first recordings?",
"feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird.",
"How did critics receive his first recordings?",
"the album was rejected by A&M,",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top,",
"Did SRV tour with ZZ Top?",
"played various gigs across the South,",
"What happened on the tour across the South?",
"Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home",
"Who is Ham?",
"Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top,"
] | C_156015fd0dc74c469a47cbc6a542733a_0 | What happened after they were stranded? | 9 | What happened after ZZ Top were stranded in Mississippi? | Stevie Ray Vaughan | In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Country Club, a venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined a rock band named Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months. In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were disastrous. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed. In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras that included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King. Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde Pharaoh. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band. CANNOTANSWER | demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed. | Stephen Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954August 27, 1990) was an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer, best known as the guitarist and frontman of the blues rock trio Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble. Although his mainstream career only spanned seven years, he is considered an icon and one of the most influential musicians in the history of blues music, and one of the greatest guitarists of all time.
Born and raised in Dallas, Texas, Vaughan began playing guitar at age seven, initially inspired by his elder brother, Jimmie Vaughan. In 1972, he dropped out of high school and moved to Austin, where he began to gain a following after playing gigs on the local club circuit. Vaughan joined forces with Tommy Shannon on bass and Chris Layton on drums as Double Trouble in 1978 and established it as part of the Austin music scene; it soon became one of the most popular acts in Texas. He performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1982, where David Bowie saw him play and contacted him for a studio gig, resulting in Stevie playing his blues guitar on the album Let's Dance (1983), before being discovered by John Hammond, who interested major label Epic Records in signing Vaughan and his band to a record deal. Within months, they achieved mainstream success for the critically acclaimed debut album Texas Flood. With a series of successful network television appearances and extensive concert tours, Vaughan became the leading figure in the blues revival of the 1980s.
Playing his guitar behind his back or plucking the strings with his teeth as Jimi Hendrix did, he earned unprecedented stardom in Europe, which later resulted in breakthroughs for guitar players like Robert Cray, Jeff Healey, Robben Ford and Walter Trout, amongst others.
During the majority of his life, Vaughan struggled with drug and alcohol addiction. He also struggled with the personal and professional pressures of fame and his marriage to Lenora "Lenny" Bailey. He successfully completed rehabilitation and began touring again with Double Trouble in November 1986. His fourth and final studio album In Step reached number 33 in the United States in 1989; it was one of Vaughan's most critically and commercially successful releases and included his only number-one hit, "Crossfire". He became one of the world's most highly demanded blues performers, and he headlined Madison Square Garden in 1989 and the Beale Street Music Festival in 1990.
On August 27, 1990, Vaughan and four others were killed in a helicopter crash in East Troy, Wisconsin, after performing with Double Trouble at Alpine Valley Music Theatre. An investigation concluded that the cause was pilot error and Vaughan's family later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Omniflight Helicopters that was settled out of court. Vaughan's music continued to achieve commercial success with several posthumous releases and has sold over 15 million albums in the United States alone. In 2003, David Fricke of Rolling Stone ranked him the seventh greatest guitarist of all time. Vaughan was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015, along with Double Trouble bandmates Chris Layton, Tommy Shannon, and Reese Wynans.
Family and early life
Stevie's grandfather, Thomas Lee Vaughan, married Laura Belle LaRue and moved to Rockwall County, Texas, where they lived by sharecropping.
Stevie's father, Jimmie Lee Vaughan, was born on September 6, 1921. Jimmie, also known as Jim and Big Jim, dropped out of school at age sixteen and enlisted in the U.S. Navy during World War II. After his discharge, he married Martha Jean (née Cook; 1928–2009) on January 13, 1950. They had a son, Jimmie, in 1951. Stephen was born at Methodist Hospital on October 3, 1954, in Dallas, Texas. Big Jim secured a job as an asbestos worker. The family moved frequently, living in other states such as Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Oklahoma before ultimately moving to the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. A shy and insecure boy, Vaughan was deeply affected by his childhood experiences. His father struggled with alcohol abuse and often terrorized his family and friends with his bad temper. In later years, Vaughan recalled that he had been a victim of his father's violence. His father died on August 27, 1986, exactly four years before Vaughan himself.
First instruments
In the early 1960s, Vaughan's admiration for his brother Jimmie resulted in his trying different instruments such as the drums and saxophone. In 1961, for his seventh birthday, Vaughan received his first guitar, a toy from Sears with Western motif. Learning by ear, he diligently committed himself, following along to songs by the Nightcaps, particularly "Wine, Wine, Wine" and "Thunderbird". He listened to blues artists such as Albert King, Otis Rush, and Muddy Waters, and rock guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix and Lonnie Mack, as well as jazz guitarists including Kenny Burrell. In 1963, he acquired his first electric guitar, a Gibson ES-125T, as a hand-me-down from Jimmie.
Soon after he acquired the electric guitar, Vaughan joined his first band, the Chantones, in 1965. Their first show was at a talent contest held in Dallas' Hill Theatre, but after realizing that they could not perform a Jimmy Reed song in its entirety, Vaughan left the band and joined the Brooklyn Underground, playing professionally at local bars and clubs. He received Jimmie's Fender Broadcaster, which he later traded for an Epiphone Riviera. When Jimmie left home at age sixteen, Vaughan's apparent obsession with the instrument caused a lack of support from his parents. Miserable at home, he took a job at a local hamburger stand, where he washed dishes and dumped trash for seventy cents an hour. After falling into a barrel of grease, he grew tired of the job and quit to devote his life to a music career.
Music career
Early years
In May 1969, after leaving the Brooklyn Underground, Vaughan joined a band called the Southern Distributor. He had learned the Yardbirds' "Jeff's Boogie" and played the song at the audition. Mike Steinbach, the group's drummer, commented: "The kid was fourteen. We auditioned him on 'Jeff's Boogie,' really fast instrumental guitar, and he played it note for note." Although they played pop rock covers, Vaughan conveyed his interest in the addition of blues songs to the group's repertoire; he was told that he wouldn't earn a living playing blues music and he and the band parted ways. Later that year, bassist Tommy Shannon walked into a Dallas club and heard Vaughan playing guitar. Fascinated by the skillful playing, which he described as "incredible even then", Shannon borrowed a bass guitar and the two jammed. Within a few years, they began performing together in a band called Krackerjack.
In February 1970, Vaughan joined a band called Liberation, which was a nine-piece group with a horn section. Having spent the past month briefly playing bass with Jimmie in Texas Storm, he had originally auditioned as bassist. Impressed by Vaughan's guitar playing, Scott Phares, the group's original guitarist, modestly became the bassist. In mid-1970, they performed at the Adolphus Hotel in downtown Dallas, where ZZ Top asked them to perform. During Liberation's break, Vaughan jammed with ZZ Top on the Nightcaps song "Thunderbird". Phares later described the performance: "they tore the house down. It was awesome. It was one of those magical evenings. Stevie fit in like a glove on a hand."
Attending Justin F. Kimball High School during the early 1970s, Vaughan's late-night shows contributed to his neglect in his studies, including music theory; he would often sleep during class. His pursuit of a musical career was disapproved of by many of the school's administrators but he was also encouraged by many people, including his art teacher, to strive for a career in art. In his sophomore year, he attended an evening class for experimental art at Southern Methodist University, but left when it conflicted with rehearsal. Vaughan later spoke of his dislike of the school and recalled having received daily notes from the principal about his grooming.
First recordings
In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Club, a local blues venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months.
In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were unsuccessful. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed.
In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras which included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King.
Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde "Pharaoh" Walden. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band.
Double Trouble
In mid-May 1978, Clark left to form his own group and Vaughan renamed the band Double Trouble, taken from the title of an Otis Rush song. Following the recruitment of bassist Jackie Newhouse, Walden quit in July, and was briefly replaced by Jack Moore, who had moved to Texas from Boston; he performed with the band for about two months. Vaughan then began looking for a drummer and soon after, he met Chris Layton through Sublett, who was his roommate. Layton, who had recently parted ways with Greezy Wheels, was taught by Vaughan to play a shuffle rhythm. When Vaughan offered Layton the position, he agreed. In early July, Vaughan befriended Lenora Bailey, known as "Lenny", who became his girlfriend, and ultimately his wife. The marriage was to last for six and a half years.
In early October 1978, Vaughan and Double Trouble earned a frequent residency performing at one of Austin's most popular nightspots, the Rome Inn. During a performance, Edi Johnson, an accountant at Manor Downs, noticed Vaughan. She remembered: "I'm not an authority on music—it's whatever turned me on—but this did." She recommended him to Manor Downs owner Frances Carr and general manager Chesley Millikin, who was interested in managing artists and saw Vaughan's musical potential. After Barton quit Double Trouble in mid-November 1979, Millikin signed Vaughan to a management contract. Vaughan also hired Robert "Cutter" Brandenburg as road manager, whom he had met in 1969. Addressing him as "Stevie Ray", Brandenburg convinced Vaughan to use his middle name on stage.
In October 1980, bassist Tommy Shannon attended a Double Trouble performance at Rockefeller's in Houston. Shannon, who was playing with Alan Haynes at the time, participated in a jam session with Vaughan and Layton halfway through their set. Shannon later commented: "I went down there that night, and I'll never forget this: it was like, when I walked in the door and I heard them playing, it was like a revelation. 'That's where I want to be; that's where I belong, right there.' During the break, I went up to Stevie and told him that. I didn't try to sneak around and hide it from the bass player [Jackie Newhouse]—I didn't know if he was listening or not. I just really wanted to be in that band. I sat in that night and it sounded great." Almost three months later, when Vaughan offered Shannon the position, he readily accepted.
Drug charge and trial
On December 5, 1979, while Vaughan was in a dressing room before a performance in Houston, an off-duty police officer arrested him after witnessing his usage of cocaine near an open window. He was formally charged with cocaine possession and subsequently released on $1,000 bail. Double Trouble was the opening act for Muddy Waters, who said about Vaughan's substance abuse: "Stevie could perhaps be the greatest guitar player that ever lived, but he won't live to get 40 years old if he doesn't leave that white powder alone." The following year, he was required to return on January 16 and February 29 for court appearances.
During the final court date, on April 17, 1980, Vaughan was sentenced with two years' probation and was prohibited from leaving Texas. Along with a stipulation of entering treatment for drug abuse, he was required to "avoid persons or places of known disreputable or harmful character"; he refused to comply with both of these orders. After a lawyer was hired, his probation officer had the sentence revised to allow him to work outside of the state. The incident later caused him to refuse maid service while staying in hotels during concert tours.
Montreux Jazz Festival
Although popular in Texas at the time, Double Trouble failed to gain national attention. The group's visibility improved when record producer Jerry Wexler recommended them to Claude Nobs, organizer of the Montreux Jazz Festival. He insisted the festival's blues night would be great with Vaughan, whom he called "a jewel, one of those rarities who comes along once in a lifetime", and Nobs agreed to book Double Trouble on July 17.
Vaughan opened with a medley arrangement of Freddie King's song "Hide Away" and his own fast instrumental composition, "Rude Mood". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", Hound Dog Taylor's "Give Me Back My Wig", and Albert Collins' "Collins Shuffle", as well as three original compositions: "Pride and Joy", "Love Struck Baby", and "Dirty Pool". The set ended with boos from the audience. People's James McBride wrote:
According to road manager Don Opperman: "the way I remember it, the 'ooos' and the 'boos' were mixed together, but Stevie was pretty disappointed. Stevie [had] just handed me his guitar and walked off stage, and I'm like, 'are you coming back?' There was a doorway back there; the audience couldn't see the guys, but I could. He went back to the dressing room with his head in his hands. I went back there finally, and that was the end of the show." According to Vaughan: "it wasn't the whole crowd [that booed]. It was just a few people sitting right up front. The room there was built for acoustic jazz. When five or six people boo, wow, it sounds like the whole world hates you. They thought we were too loud, but shoot, I had four army blankets folded over my amp, and the volume level was on 2. I'm used to playin' on 10!" The performance was filmed and later released on DVD in September 2004.
On the following night, Double Trouble was booked in the lounge of the Montreux Casino, with Jackson Browne in attendance. Browne jammed with Double Trouble until the early morning hours and offered them free use of his personal recording studio in downtown Los Angeles. In late November the band accepted his offer and recorded ten songs in two days. While they were in the studio, Vaughan received a telephone call from David Bowie, who met him after the Montreux performance, and he invited him to participate in a recording session for his next studio album, Let's Dance. In January 1983, Vaughan recorded guitar on six of the album's eight songs, including the title track and "China Girl". The album was released on April 14, 1983, and sold over three times as many copies as Bowie's previous album.
National success
In mid-March 1983, Gregg Geller, vice president of A&R at Epic Records, signed Double Trouble to the label at the recommendation of record producer John Hammond. Soon afterward, Epic financed a music video for "Love Struck Baby", which was filmed at the Cherry Tavern in New York City. Vaughan recalled: "we changed the name of the place in the video. Four years ago I got married in a club where we used to play all the time called the Rome Inn. When they closed it down, the owner gave me the sign, so in the video we put that up behind me on the stage."
With the success of Let's Dance, Bowie requested Vaughan as the featured instrumentalist for the upcoming Serious Moonlight Tour, realizing that he was an essential aspect of the album's groundbreaking success. In late April, Vaughan began rehearsals for the tour in Las Colinas, Texas. When contract renegotiations for his performance fee failed, Vaughan abandoned the tour days before its opening date, and he was replaced by Earl Slick. Vaughan commented: "I couldn't gear everything on something I didn't really care a whole lot about. It was kind of risky, but I really didn't need all the headaches." Although contributing factors were widely disputed, Vaughan soon gained major publicity for quitting the tour.
On May 9, the band performed at The Bottom Line in New York City, where they opened for Bryan Adams, with Hammond, Mick Jagger, John McEnroe, Rick Nielsen, Billy Gibbons, and Johnny Winter in attendance. Brandenburg described the performance as "ungodly": "I think Stevie played every lick as loud and as hard and with as much intensity as I've ever heard him." The performance earned Vaughan a positive review published in the New York Post, asserting that Double Trouble outperformed Adams. "Fortunately, Bryan Adams, the Canadian rocker who is opening arena dates for Journey, doesn't headline too often", wrote Martin Porter, who claimed that after the band's performance, the stage had been "rendered to cinders by the most explosively original showmanship to grace the New York stage in some time."
Texas Flood
After acquiring the recordings from Browne's studio, Double Trouble began assembling the material for a full-length LP. The album, Texas Flood, opens with the track "Love Struck Baby", which was written for Lenny on their "love-struck day". He composed "Pride and Joy" and "I'm Cryin'" for one of his former girlfriends, Lindi Bethel. Although both are musically similar, their lyrics are two different perspectives of the relationship. Along with covers of Howlin' Wolf, the Isley Brothers, and Buddy Guy, the album included Vaughan's cover of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", a song which he became strongly associated with. "Lenny" served as a tribute to his wife, which he composed at the end of their bed.
Texas Flood featured cover art by illustrator Brad Holland, who is known for his artwork for Playboy and The New York Times. Originally envisioned with Vaughan sitting on a horse depicting a promotable resemblance, Holland painted an image of him leaning against a wall with a guitar, using a photograph as a reference. Released on June 13, 1983, Texas Flood peaked at number 38 and ultimately sold half a million copies. While Rolling Stone editor Kurt Loder asserted that Vaughan did not possess a distinctive voice, according to AllMusic senior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the release was a "monumental impact". Billboard described it as "a guitar boogie lovers delight". Agent Alex Hodges commented: "No one knew how big that record would be, because guitar players weren't necessarily in vogue, except for some that were so established they were undeniable ... he was one of the few artists that was recouped on every record in a short period of time."
On June 16, Vaughan gave a performance at Tango nightclub in Dallas, which celebrated the album's release. Assorted VIPs attended the performance, including Ted Nugent, Sammy Hagar, and members of The Kinks and Uriah Heep. Jack Chase, vice president of marketing for Epic, recalled: "the coming-out party at Tango was very important; it was absolutely huge. All the radio station personalities, DJs, program directors, all the retail record store owners and the important managers, press, all the executives from New York came down—about seven hundred people. We attacked in Dallas first with Q102-FM and [DJ] Redbeard. We had the Tango party—it was hot. It was the ticket." The Dallas Morning News reviewed the performance, starting with the rhetorical question; "what if Stevie Ray Vaughan had an album release party and everybody came? It happened Thursday night at Tango. ... The adrenalin must have been gushing through the musicians' veins as they performed with rare finesse and skill."
Following a brief tour in Europe, Hodges arranged an engagement for Double Trouble as The Moody Blues' opening act during a two-month tour of North America. Hodges stated that many people disliked the idea of Double Trouble opening for The Moody Blues, but asserted that a common thread which both bands shared was "album-oriented rock". Shannon described the tour as "glorious": "Our record hadn't become that successful yet, but we were playing in front of coliseums full of people. We just went out and played, and it fit like a glove. The sound rang through those big coliseums like a monster. People were going crazy, and they had no idea who we were!" After appearing on the television series Austin City Limits, the band played a sold-out concert at New York City's Beacon Theatre. Variety wrote that their ninety-minute set at the Beacon "left no doubt that this young Texas musician is indeed the 'guitar hero of the present era.'"
Couldn't Stand the Weather
In January 1984, Double Trouble began recording their second studio album, Couldn't Stand the Weather, at the Power Station, with John Hammond as executive producer and engineer Richard Mullen. Layton later recalled working with Hammond: "he was kind of like a nice hand on your shoulder, as opposed to someone that jumped in and said, 'let's redo this, let's do that more.' He didn't get involved in that way at all. He was a feedback person." As the sessions began, Vaughan's cover of Bob Geddins' "Tin Pan Alley" was recorded while audio levels were being checked. Layton remembers the performance: "... we did probably the quietest version we ever did up 'til that point. We ended it and [Hammond] said; 'that's the best that song will ever sound,' and we went; 'we haven't even got sounds, have we?' He goes, 'that doesn't matter. That's the best you'll ever do that song.' We tried it again five, six, seven times- I can't even remember. But it never quite sounded like it did that first time."
During recording sessions, Vaughan began experimenting with other combinations of musicians, including Fran Christina and Stan Harrison, who played drums and saxophone respectively on the jazz instrumental, "Stang's Swang". Jimmie Vaughan played rhythm guitar on his cover of Guitar Slim's "The Things That I Used to Do" and the title track, the latter of which Vaughan carries a worldly message in his lyrics. According to musicologist Andy Aledort, Vaughan's guitar playing throughout the song is marked by steady rhythmic strumming patterns and improvised lead lines, with a distinctive R&B and soul single-note riff, doubled in octaves by guitar and bass.
Couldn't Stand the Weather was released on May 15, 1984, and two weeks later it had rapidly outpaced the sales of Texas Flood. It peaked at number 31 and spent 38 weeks on the charts. The album includes Vaughan's cover of Jimi Hendrix's song, "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", which provoked inevitable comparisons to Hendrix. According to AllMusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Couldn't Stand the Weather "confirmed that the acclaimed debut was no fluke, while matching, if not bettering, the sales of its predecessor, thereby cementing Vaughan's status as a giant of modern blues." According to authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford, the album "was a major turning point in Stevie Ray Vaughan's development" and Vaughan's singing improved.
Carnegie Hall
On October 4, 1984, Vaughan headlined a performance at Carnegie Hall that included many guest musicians. For the second half of the concert, he added Jimmie as rhythm guitarist, drummer George Rains, keyboardist Dr. John, Roomful of Blues horn section, and featured vocalist Angela Strehli. The ensemble rehearsed for less than two weeks before the performance, and despite the solid dynamics of Double Trouble for the first half of the performance, according to Patoski and Crawford, the big band concept never entirely took form. Before arriving at the engagement, the venue sold out, which made Vaughan overexcited and nervous as he did not calm down until halfway through the third song. A benefit for the T.J. Martell Foundation's work in leukemia and cancer research, he was an important draw for the event. As his scheduled time slot drew closer, he indicated that he preferred traveling to the venue by limousine to avoid being swarmed by fans on the street; the band took the stage around 8:00 p.m. The audience of 2,200 people, which included Vaughan's wife, family and friends, transformed the venue into what Stephen Holden of The New York Times described as "a whistling, stomping roadhouse".
Introduced by Hammond as "one of the greatest guitar players of all time", Vaughan opened with "Scuttle Buttin'", wearing a custom-made mariachi suit he described as a "Mexican tuxedo". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of the Isley Brothers' "Testify", The Jimi Hendrix Experience's "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", "Tin Pan Alley", Elmore James' "The Sky Is Crying", and W. C. Clark's "Cold Shot", along with four original compositions including "Love Struck Baby", "Honey Bee", "Couldn't Stand the Weather", and "Rude Mood". During the second half of the performance, Vaughan performed covers by Larry Davis, Buddy Guy, Guitar Slim, Albert King, Jackie Wilson, and Albert Collins. The set ended with Vaughan performing solo renditions of "Lenny" and "Rude Mood".
The Dallas Times-Herald wrote of the performance at Carnegie Hall as; "was full of stomping feet and swaying bodies, kids in blue jeans hanging off the balconies, dancing bodies that clogged the aisles." The New York Times asserted that, despite the venue's "muddy" acoustics, their performance was "filled with verve", and Vaughan's playing was "handsomely displayed". Jimmie Vaughan later commented: "I was worried the crowd might be a little stiff. Turned out they're just like any other beer joint." Vaughan commented: "We won't be limited to just the trio, although that doesn't mean we'll stop doing the trio. I'm planning on doing that too. I ain't gonna stay in one place. If I do, I'm stupid." The performance was recorded and later released as an official live LP. The album was released posthumously on July 29, 1997, by Epic Records; it was ultimately certified gold.
Immediately after the concert, Vaughan attended a private party at a downtown club in New York, which was sponsored by MTV, where he was greeted by an hour's worth of supporters. On the following day, Double Trouble made an appearance at a record store in Greenwich Village, where they signed autographs for fans. In late October 1984, the band toured Australia and New Zealand, which included one of their first appearances on Australian television—on Hey Hey It's Saturday—where they performed "Texas Flood", and an interview on Sounds. On November 5 and 9, they played sold-out concerts at the Sydney Opera House. Upon returning to the U.S., Double Trouble went on a brief tour in California. Soon afterward, Vaughan and Lenny went to the island of Saint Croix, on the U.S. Virgin Islands in the Caribbean Sea, where they had spent some time vacationing in December. The next month, Double Trouble flew to Japan, where they appeared for five performances, including at Kōsei Nenkin Kaikan in Osaka.
Soul to Soul
In March 1985, recording for Double Trouble's third studio album, Soul to Soul, began at the Dallas Sound Lab. As the sessions progressed, Vaughan became increasingly frustrated with his own lack of inspiration. He was also allowed a relaxed pace of recording the album, which contributed to a lack of focus due to excesses in alcohol and other drugs. Roadie Byron Barr later recalled: "the routine was to go to the studio, do dope, and play ping-pong." Vaughan, who found it increasingly difficult to be able to play rhythm guitar parts and sing at the same time, wanted to add another dimension to the band, so he hired keyboardist Reese Wynans to record on the album; he joined the band soon thereafter.
During the album's production, Vaughan appeared at the Houston Astrodome on April 10, 1985, where he performed a slide guitar rendition of the U.S. national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner"; his performance was met with booing. Upon leaving the stage, Vaughan acquired an autograph from former player for the New York Yankees, Mickey Mantle. Astrodome publicist Molly Glentzer wrote in the Houston Press: "as Vaughan shuffled back behind home plate, he was only lucid enough to know that he wanted Mickey Mantle's autograph. Mantle obliged. 'I never signed a guitar before.' Nobody asked Vaughan for his autograph. I was sure he'd be dead before he hit 30." Critics associated his performance with Jimi Hendrix's rendition at Woodstock in 1969, yet Vaughan disliked this comparison: "I heard they even wrote about it in one of the music magazines and they tried to put the two versions side by side. I hate that stuff. His version was great."
Released on September 30, 1985, Soul to Soul peaked at number 34 and remained on the Billboard 200 through mid-1986, eventually certified gold. Critic Jimmy Guterman of Rolling Stone wrote: "there's some life left in their blues rock pastiche; it's also possible that they've run out of gas." According to Patoski and Crawford, sales of the album "did not match Couldn't Stand the Weather, suggesting Stevie Ray and Double Trouble were plateauing". Vaughan commented: "as far as what's on there song-wise, I like the album a lot. It meant a lot to us what we went through to get this record. There were a lot of odds and we still stayed strong. We grew a lot with the people in the band and immediate friends around us; we learned a lot and grew a lot closer. That has a lot to do with why it's called [Soul to Soul]."
Live Alive
After touring for nine and a half months, Epic requested a fourth album from Double Trouble as part of their contractual obligation. In July 1986, Vaughan decided that they would record the LP, Live Alive, during three live appearances in Austin and Dallas. On July 17 and 18, the band performed sold-out concerts at the Austin Opera House, and July 19 at the Dallas Starfest. They used recordings of these concerts to assemble the LP, which was produced by Vaughan. Shannon was backstage before the Austin concert and predicted to new manager Alex Hodges that both Vaughan and himself were "headed for a brick wall". Guitarist Denny Freeman attended the Austin performances; he called the shows a "musical mess, because they would go into these chaotic jams with no control. I didn't know what exactly was going on, but I was concerned." Both Layton and Shannon remarked that their work schedule and drugs were causing the band to lose focus. According to Wynans: "Things were getting illogical and crazy."
The Live Alive album was released on November 17, 1986, and the only official live Double Trouble LP made commercially available during Vaughan's lifetime, though it never appeared on the Billboard 200 chart. Though many critics claimed that most of the album was overdubbed, engineer Gary Olazabal, who mixed the album, asserted that most of the material was recorded poorly. Vaughan later admitted that it was not one of his better efforts; he recalled: "I wasn't in very good shape when we recorded Live Alive. At the time, I didn't realize how bad a shape I was in. There were more fix-it jobs done on the album than I would have liked. Some of the work sounds like [it was] the work of half-dead people. There were some great notes that came out, but I just wasn't in control; nobody was."
Drugs and alcohol
In 1960, when Vaughan was six years old, he began stealing his father's drinks. Drawn in by its effects, he started making his own drinks and this resulted in alcohol dependence. He explained: "that's when I first started stealing daddy's drinks. Or when my parents were gone, I'd find the bottle and make myself one. I thought it was cool ... thought the kids down the street would think it was cool. That's where it began, and I had been depending on it ever since." According to the authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford: "In the ensuing twenty-five years, he had worked his way through the Physicians' Desk Reference before finding his poisons of preference—alcohol and cocaine."
While Vaughan asserted that he first experienced the effects of cocaine when a doctor prescribed him a liquid solution of the stimulant as a nasal spray, according to Patoski and Crawford, the earliest that Vaughan is known to have ingested the drug is in 1975, while performing with the Cobras. Before that, Vaughan had briefly used other drugs such as cannabis, methamphetamine, and Quaaludes, the brand name for methaqualone. After 1975, he regularly drank whiskey and used cocaine, particularly mixing the two substances together. According to Hopkins, by the time of Double Trouble's European tour in September 1986, "his lifestyle of substance abuse had reached a peak, probably better characterized as the bottom of a deep chasm."
At the height of Vaughan's substance abuse, he drank of whiskey and used of cocaine each day. Personal assistant Tim Duckworth explained: "I would make sure he would eat breakfast instead of waking up drinking every morning, which was probably the worst thing he was doing." According to Vaughan: "it got to the point where if I'd try to say "hi" to somebody, I would just fall apart crying. It was like solid doom."
In September 1986, Double Trouble traveled to Denmark for a one-month tour of Europe. During the late night hours of September 28, Vaughan became ill after a performance in Ludwigshafen, Germany, suffering from near-death dehydration, for which he received medical treatment. The incident resulted in his checking into The London Clinic under the care of Dr. Victor Bloom, who warned him that he was a month away from death. After staying in London for more than a week, he returned to the United States and entered Peachford Hospital in Atlanta, where he spent four weeks in rehabilitation, and then checked into rehab in Austin.
Live Alive tour
In November 1986, following his departure from rehab, Vaughan moved back into his mother's Glenfield Avenue house in Dallas, which is where he had spent much of his childhood. During this time, Double Trouble began rehearsals for the Live Alive tour. Although Vaughan was nervous about performing after achieving sobriety, he received positive reassurance. Wynans later recalled: "Stevie was real worried about playing after he'd gotten sober...he didn't know if he had anything left to offer. Once we got back out on the road, he was very inspired and motivated." The tour began on November 23 at Towson State University, which was Vaughan's first performance with Double Trouble after rehab. On December 31, 1986, they played a concert at Atlanta's Fox Theatre, which featured encore performances with Lonnie Mack.
As the tour progressed, Vaughan was longing to work on material for his next LP, but in January 1987, he filed for a divorce from Lenny, which restricted him from any projects until the proceedings were finalized. This prevented him from writing and recording songs for almost two years, but Double Trouble wrote the song "Crossfire" with Bill Carter and Ruth Ellsworth. Layton recalled: "we wrote the music, and they had to write the lyrics. We had just gotten together; Stevie was unable to be there at that time. He was in Dallas doing some things, and we just got together and started writing some songs. That was the first one we wrote." On August 6, 1987, Double Trouble appeared at the Austin Aqua Festival, where they played to one of the largest audiences of their career. According to biographer Craig Hopkins, as many as 20,000 people attended the concert. Following a month-long tour as the opening act for Robert Plant in May 1988, which included a concert at Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens, the band was booked for a European leg, which included 22 performances, and ended in Oulu, Finland on July 17. This would be Vaughan's last concert appearance in Europe.
In Step
After Vaughan's divorce from Lenora "Lenny" Darlene Bailey became final, recording for Double Trouble's fourth and final studio album, In Step, began at Kiva Studios in Memphis, Tennessee, working with producer Jim Gaines and co-songwriter Doyle Bramhall. Initially, he had doubts about his musical and creative abilities after achieving sobriety, but he gained confidence as the sessions progressed. Shannon later recalled: "In Step was, for him, a big growing experience. In my opinion, it's our best studio album, and I think he felt that way, too." Bramhall, who had also entered rehab, wrote songs with Vaughan about addiction and redemption. According to Vaughan, the album was titled In Step because "I'm finally in step with life, in step with myself, in step with my music." The album's liner notes include the quote; "'thank God the elevator's broken," a reference to the twelve-step program proposed by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA).
After the In Step recording sessions moved to Los Angeles, Vaughan added horn players Joe Sublett and Darrell Leonard, who played saxophone and trumpet respectively on both "Crossfire" and "Love Me Darlin". Shortly before the album's production was complete, Vaughan and Double Trouble appeared at a presidential inaugural party in Washington, D.C. for George H. W. Bush. In Step was released on June 13, 1989, and eight months later, it was certified gold. The album was Vaughan's most commercially successful release and his first one to win a Grammy Award. It peaked at number 33 on the Billboard 200, spending 47 weeks on the chart. In Step included the song, "Crossfire", which was written by Double Trouble, Bill Carter, and Ruth Ellsworth; it became his only number one hit. The album also included one of his first recordings to feature the use of a Fuzz Face on Vaughan's cover of the Howlin' Wolf song, "Love Me Darlin.
In July 1989, Neil Perry, a writer for Sounds magazine, wrote: "the album closes with the brow-soothing swoon of 'Riviera Paradise,' a slow, lengthy guitar and piano workout that proves just why Vaughan is to the guitar what Nureyev is to ballet." According to music journalist Robert Christgau, Vaughan was "writing blues for AA...he escapes the blues undamaged for the first time in his career." In October 1989, the Boca Raton News described Vaughan's guitar solos as "determined, clear-headed and downright stinging" and his lyrics as "tension-filled allegories".
Death
On Monday, August 27, 1990, at 12:50 a.m. (CDT), Vaughan and members of Eric Clapton's touring entourage played an all-star encore jam session at Alpine Valley Music Theatre in Alpine Valley Resort in East Troy, Wisconsin. They then left for Midway International Airport in Chicago in a Bell 206B helicopter, the most common way for acts to enter and exit the venue, as there is only one road in and out, heavily used by fans. The helicopter crashed into a nearby ski hill shortly after takeoff. Vaughan and the four others on board—pilot Jeff Brown, agent Bobby Brooks, bodyguard Nigel Browne, and tour manager Colin Smythe—died. The helicopter was identified as being owned by Chicago-based company Omniflight Helicopters. Initial reports of the crash erroneously claimed that Clapton had also been killed. According to findings from an inquest conducted by the coroner's office in Elkhorn, all five victims were killed instantly.
The investigation determined the aircraft departed in foggy conditions with visibility reportedly under two miles, according to a local forecast. The National Transportation Safety Board report stated: "As the third helicopter was departing, it remained at a lower altitude than the others, and the pilot turned southeasterly toward rising terrain. Subsequently, the helicopter crashed on hilly terrain about three fifths of a mile from the takeoff point." Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) records showed that Brown was qualified to fly by instruments in a fixed-wing aircraft, but not in a helicopter. Toxicology tests performed on the victims revealed no traces of drugs or alcohol in their systems. Vaughan's funeral service was held on August 31, 1990, at Laurel Land Cemetery in Dallas, Texas. His wooden casket quickly became adorned with bouquets of flowers. An estimated 3,000 mourners joined a procession led by a white hearse. Among those at the public ceremony were Jeff Healey, Charlie Sexton, ZZ Top, Colin James, Stevie Wonder, Bonnie Raitt and Buddy Guy. Vaughan's grave marker reads: "Thank you ... for all the love you passed our way."
Musical style
Vaughan's music was rooted in blues, rock, and jazz. He was influenced by Jimi Hendrix, Albert King, Lonnie Mack, B.B. King, Freddie King, Albert Collins, Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Otis Rush, Guitar Slim, Chuck Berry, and Muddy Waters. According to nightclub owner Clifford Antone, who opened Antone's in 1975, Vaughan jammed with Albert King at Antone's in July 1977 and it almost "scared him to death", saying that "it was the best I've ever saw Albert or the best I ever saw Stevie". While Albert King had a substantial influence on Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix was Vaughan's greatest inspiration. Vaughan declared: "I love Hendrix for so many reasons. He was so much more than just a blues guitarist—he played damn well any kind of guitar he wanted. In fact I'm not sure if he even played the guitar—he played music." He was also influenced by such jazz guitarists as Django Reinhardt, Wes Montgomery, Kenny Burrell, and George Benson.
In 1987, Vaughan listed Lonnie Mack first among the guitarists he had listened to, both as a youngster and as an adult. Vaughan observed that Mack was "ahead of his time" and said, "I got a lot of my fast stuff from Lonnie". On another occasion, Vaughan said that he had learned tremolo picking and vibrato from Mack and that Mack had taught him to "play guitar from the heart." Mack recalled his first meeting with Vaughan in 1978:
Vaughan's relationship with another Texas blues legend, Johnny Winter, was a little more complex. Although they met several times, and often played sessions with the same musicians or even performed the same material, as in the case of Boot Hill, Vaughan always refrained from acknowledging Winter in any form. In his biography, "Raisin' Cain", Winter says that he was unnerved after reading Vaughan stating in an interview that he never met or knew Johnny Winter. "We even played together over at Tommy Shannon's house one time." Vaughan settled the issue in 1988 on the occasion of a blues festival in Europe where both he and Winter were on the bill, explaining that he has been misquoted and that "Every musician in Texas knows Johnny and has learned something from him". Asked to compare their playing styles in an interview in 2010, Winter admitted that "mine's a little bit rawer, I think."
Equipment
Guitars
Vaughan owned and used a variety of guitars during his career. His guitar of choice, and the instrument that he became most associated with, was the Fender Stratocaster, his favorite being a 1963 body with a 1962 neck and pickups dated from 1959. This is why Vaughan usually referred to his Stratocaster as a "1959 Strat". He explained why he favored this guitar in a 1983 interview: "I like the strength of its sound. Any guitar I play has got to be pretty versatile. It's got a big, strong tone and it'll take anything I do to it." Vaughan also referred to this instrument as his "first wife", or "Number One". Another favourite guitar was a slightly later Strat he named 'Lenny' after his wife, Lenora. While at a local pawn shop in 1980, Vaughan had noticed this particular guitar, a 1965 Stratocaster that had been refinished in red, with the original sunburst finish peeking through. It also had a 1910 Mandolin inlay just below the bridge. The pawn shop was asking $300 for it, which was way more than Vaughan had at the time. Lenny saw how badly he wanted this guitar, so she got six of their friends to chip in $50 each, and bought it for him. The guitar was presented to him on his birthday in 1980, and that night, after bringing "Lenny" (the guitar, and wife) home with him, he wrote the song, "Lenny". He started using a borrowed Stratocaster during high school and used Stratocasters predominantly in his live performances and recordings, although he did play other guitars, including custom guitars.
One of the custom guitars—nicknamed "Main"—was built by James Hamilton of Hamiltone Guitars in Buffalo, New York. It was a gift from Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top. Gibbons had commissioned Hamilton to build the guitar in 1979. There were some delays, including having to re-do the mother of pearl inlay of Vaughan's name on the fretboard when he changed his stage name from Stevie Vaughan to Stevie Ray Vaughan. The guitar was presented to him by Jim Hamilton on April 29, 1984. Hamilton recalls that Stevie Ray Vaughan was so happy with the guitar that he played it that night at Springfest on the University of Buffalo campus. It remained one of the main guitars he used on stage and in studio. Vaughan made some alterations to the guitar, including replacing the bronze color Gibson knobs with white Fender knobs, as he preferred the ribbing on the Fender knobs. The pickups had to be changed after the guitar was used in the "Couldn't Stand the Weather" video, in which Stevie and "Main" were drenched with water, and the pickups were ruined. Vaughan preferred guitar has been summarized as his,
Number One Strat, which Stevie claimed to be a ’59, since that was the date stamped on the back of the pickups… this was incorrect, however, as guitar tech Rene Martinez (who oversaw SRV’s guitars since 1980) found the stamp of 1963 on the body and 1962 on the original neck (the neck was replaced in 1989 after it could no longer be refretted properly; Rene used the neck from another SRV favorite, “Red”, as it was also a 1962 model). The pickups are also relatively low output, not the hot overwound myth that gained legs during the 80s… all 3 pickups are rumored to be under 6k ohms output impedance, which would be typical of a 1959 set (the neck pickups tended to be hottest, but not by much). Although the Fender SRV signature model uses Texas Special pickups, which Stevie was heavily involved in the making of, they do not accurately represent the sound of his original Number One.
Vaughan bought many Stratocasters and gave some away as gifts. A sunburst Diplomat Strat-style guitar was purchased by Vaughan and given to his girlfriend Janna Lapidus to learn to play on. Vaughan used a custom set of uncommonly heavy strings, gauges .013, .015, .019, .028, .038, .058, and tuned a half-step below standard tuning. He played with so much tension that it was not uncommon for him to separate his fingernail from the quick movement along the strings. The owner of an Austin club recalled Vaughan coming into the office between sets to borrow super glue, which he used to keep fingernail split from widening while he continued to play. The super glue was suggested by Rene Martinez, who was Stevie's guitar technician. Martinez eventually convinced Stevie to change to slightly lighter strings. He preferred a guitar neck with an asymmetrical profile (thicker at the top) which was more comfortable for his thumb-over style of playing. Heavy use of the vibrato bar necessitated frequent replacements; Vaughan often had his roadie, Byron Barr, obtain custom stainless steel bars made by Barr's father.
Vaughan was also photographed playing a Rickenbacker Capri, a National Duolian, Epiphone Riviera, Gibson Flying V, as well as several other models. Vaughan used a Gibson Johnny Smith to record "Stang's Swang", and a Guild 12-string acoustic for his performance on MTV Unplugged in January 1990. On June 24, 2004, one of Vaughan's Stratocasters, the aforementioned "Lenny" strat, was sold at an auction to benefit Eric Clapton's Crossroads Centre in Antigua; the instrument was bought by Guitar Center for $623,500.
Amplifiers and effects
Vaughan was a catalyst in the revival of vintage amplifiers and effects during the 1980s. His loud volume and use of heavy strings required powerful and robust amplifiers. Vaughan used two black-face Fender Super Reverbs, which were crucial in shaping his clear overdriven sound. He would often blend other amps with the Super Reverbs, including black-face Fender Vibroverbs, and brands such as Dumble, and Marshall, which he used for his clean sound.
While his mainstay effects were the Ibanez Tube Screamer and a Vox wah-wah pedal, Vaughan experimented with a range of effects. He used a Fender Vibratone, designed as a Leslie speaker for electric guitars, and provided a warbling chorus effect, which can be heard on the track "Cold Shot". He used a vintage Dallas Arbiter Fuzz Face that can be heard on In Step, as well as an Octavia. The Guitar Geek website provides a detailed illustration of Vaughan's 1985 equipment set up based on interviews with his guitar tech and effects builder, Cesar Diaz.
Legacy
Vaughan throughout his career revived blues rock and paved the way for many other artists. Vaughan's work continues to influence numerous blues, rock and alternative artists, including John Mayer, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Mike McCready, Albert Cummings, Los Lonely Boys and Chris Duarte, among others. AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine described Vaughan as "the leading light in American blues" and developed "a uniquely eclectic and fiery style that sounded like no other guitarist, regardless of genre". In 1983, Variety magazine called Vaughan the "guitar hero of the present era".
In the months that followed his death, Vaughan sold over 5.5 million albums in the United States. On September 25, 1990, Epic released Family Style, an LP the Vaughan brothers cut at Ardent Studios in Memphis, Tennessee. The label released several promotional singles and videos for the collaborative effort. In November 1990, CMV Enterprises released Pride and Joy, a collection of eight Double Trouble music videos. Sony signed a deal with the Vaughan estate to obtain control of his back catalog, as well as permission to release albums with previously unreleased material and new collections of released work. On October 29, 1991, The Sky Is Crying was released as Vaughan's first posthumous album with Double Trouble, and featured studio recordings from 1984 to 1985. Other compilations, live albums, and films have also been released since his death.
On October 3, 1991, Texas governor Ann Richards proclaimed "Stevie Ray Vaughan Commemoration Day", during which a memorial concert was held at the Texas Theatre. In 1993, a memorial statue of Vaughan was unveiled on Auditorium Shores and is the first public monument of a musician in Austin. In September 1994, a Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Run for Recovery was held in Dallas; the event was a benefit for the Ethel Daniels Foundation, established to help those in recovery from alcoholism and drug addiction who cannot afford treatment. In 1999, the Musicians' Assistance Program (later renamed MusiCares MAP Fund) created the "Stevie Ray Vaughan Award" to honor the memory of Vaughan and to recognize musicians for their devotion to helping other addicts struggling with the recovery process. The recipients include Eric Clapton, David Crosby, Steven Tyler, Alice Cooper, Ozzy Osbourne, Pete Townshend, Chris Cornell, Jerry Cantrell, Mike McCready, among others. In 1993, Martha Vaughan established the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Scholarship Fund, awarded to students at W.E. Greiner Middle School in Oakcliff who intend to attend college and pursue the arts as a profession.
Awards and honors
Vaughan won five W. C. Handy Awards and was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2000. In 1985, he was named an honorary admiral in the Texas Navy. Vaughan had a single number-one hit on the Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart for the song "Crossfire". His album sales in the U.S. stand at over 15 million units. Family Style, released shortly after his death, won the 1991 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album and became his best-selling, non-Double Trouble studio album with over a million shipments in the U.S. In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked him seventh among the "100 Greatest Guitar Players of All Time". He also became eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008, but did not appear on a nominations roster until 2014. He was inducted in the RRHOF alongside Double Trouble in 2015. Guitar World magazine ranked him as Number One in its list of the greatest blues guitarists.
In 1994 the city of Austin, Texas, erected the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial on the hiking trail beside Lady Bird Lake.
Discography
Texas Flood (1983)
Couldn't Stand the Weather (1984)
Soul to Soul (1985)
In Step (1989)
Family Style (1990)
The Sky is Crying (1991)
See also
1980s in music
List of blues rock musicians
List of electric blues musicians
List of guitarists
List of Texas blues musicians
Music of Austin, Texas
Music of Texas
Notes
Footnotes
Citations
Sources
Further reading
External links
The Stevie Ray Vaughan Archive
1954 births
1990 deaths
Accidental deaths in Wisconsin
American blues guitarists
American male guitarists
American blues singers
American blues singer-songwriters
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
Blues rock musicians
Double Trouble (band) members
Electric blues musicians
Epic Records artists
Sony Music artists
Grammy Award winners
Lead guitarists
Musicians from Dallas
Texas blues musicians
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1990
Victims of helicopter accidents or incidents in the United States
20th-century American singers
Slide guitarists
Resonator guitarists
Guitarists from Texas
20th-century American guitarists
People from Oak Cliff, Texas
20th-century American male singers
Musicians killed in aviation accidents or incidents
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Pipe smokers | true | [
"Time Reef is a Big Finish Productions audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It is a three part adventure, released with the single episode story that follows it, A Perfect World.\n\nPlot\nThe Doctor and Nyssa have returned to the TARDIS to find it missing various pieces of equipment and its dimensions unstable. Thomas Brewster refuses to explain where he has been since he \"borrowed\" the TARDIS and what has happened to it. Drawn by a distress beacon, the TARDIS crash lands on a time reef where the interior subsequently implodes, leaving the companions stranded. They need to find their way back to normal space.\n\nBrewster originally stole the TARDIS in The Haunting of Thomas Brewster, leaving the Doctor and Nyssa stranded in Victorian London. They regain the TARDIS in the following story, The Boy That Time Forgot.\n\nCast\nThe Doctor — Peter Davison\nNyssa — Sarah Sutton\nThomas Brewster – John Pickard\nCommander Gammades – Nicholas Farrell\nLady Vuyoki – Beth Chalmers\nThe Ruhk – Sean Biggerstaff\nLucor – Sean Connolly\n\nExternal links\nTime Reef – Big Finish\n \n\n2008 audio plays\nFifth Doctor audio plays",
"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"
] |
[
"Stevie Ray Vaughan",
"First recordings",
"In what year did Stevie Ray Vaughan start recording?",
"In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands,",
"What songs were on his first album?",
"They recorded two songs, \"Red, White and Blue\" and \"I Heard a Voice Last Night\",",
"What other musicians did SRV play with on his first recordings?",
"feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird.",
"How did critics receive his first recordings?",
"the album was rejected by A&M,",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top,",
"Did SRV tour with ZZ Top?",
"played various gigs across the South,",
"What happened on the tour across the South?",
"Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home",
"Who is Ham?",
"Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top,",
"What happened after they were stranded?",
"demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed."
] | C_156015fd0dc74c469a47cbc6a542733a_0 | Where did they tour next? | 10 | Where did ZZ Top tour next? | Stevie Ray Vaughan | In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Country Club, a venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined a rock band named Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months. In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were disastrous. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed. In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras that included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King. Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde Pharaoh. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band. CANNOTANSWER | For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, | Stephen Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954August 27, 1990) was an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer, best known as the guitarist and frontman of the blues rock trio Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble. Although his mainstream career only spanned seven years, he is considered an icon and one of the most influential musicians in the history of blues music, and one of the greatest guitarists of all time.
Born and raised in Dallas, Texas, Vaughan began playing guitar at age seven, initially inspired by his elder brother, Jimmie Vaughan. In 1972, he dropped out of high school and moved to Austin, where he began to gain a following after playing gigs on the local club circuit. Vaughan joined forces with Tommy Shannon on bass and Chris Layton on drums as Double Trouble in 1978 and established it as part of the Austin music scene; it soon became one of the most popular acts in Texas. He performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1982, where David Bowie saw him play and contacted him for a studio gig, resulting in Stevie playing his blues guitar on the album Let's Dance (1983), before being discovered by John Hammond, who interested major label Epic Records in signing Vaughan and his band to a record deal. Within months, they achieved mainstream success for the critically acclaimed debut album Texas Flood. With a series of successful network television appearances and extensive concert tours, Vaughan became the leading figure in the blues revival of the 1980s.
Playing his guitar behind his back or plucking the strings with his teeth as Jimi Hendrix did, he earned unprecedented stardom in Europe, which later resulted in breakthroughs for guitar players like Robert Cray, Jeff Healey, Robben Ford and Walter Trout, amongst others.
During the majority of his life, Vaughan struggled with drug and alcohol addiction. He also struggled with the personal and professional pressures of fame and his marriage to Lenora "Lenny" Bailey. He successfully completed rehabilitation and began touring again with Double Trouble in November 1986. His fourth and final studio album In Step reached number 33 in the United States in 1989; it was one of Vaughan's most critically and commercially successful releases and included his only number-one hit, "Crossfire". He became one of the world's most highly demanded blues performers, and he headlined Madison Square Garden in 1989 and the Beale Street Music Festival in 1990.
On August 27, 1990, Vaughan and four others were killed in a helicopter crash in East Troy, Wisconsin, after performing with Double Trouble at Alpine Valley Music Theatre. An investigation concluded that the cause was pilot error and Vaughan's family later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Omniflight Helicopters that was settled out of court. Vaughan's music continued to achieve commercial success with several posthumous releases and has sold over 15 million albums in the United States alone. In 2003, David Fricke of Rolling Stone ranked him the seventh greatest guitarist of all time. Vaughan was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015, along with Double Trouble bandmates Chris Layton, Tommy Shannon, and Reese Wynans.
Family and early life
Stevie's grandfather, Thomas Lee Vaughan, married Laura Belle LaRue and moved to Rockwall County, Texas, where they lived by sharecropping.
Stevie's father, Jimmie Lee Vaughan, was born on September 6, 1921. Jimmie, also known as Jim and Big Jim, dropped out of school at age sixteen and enlisted in the U.S. Navy during World War II. After his discharge, he married Martha Jean (née Cook; 1928–2009) on January 13, 1950. They had a son, Jimmie, in 1951. Stephen was born at Methodist Hospital on October 3, 1954, in Dallas, Texas. Big Jim secured a job as an asbestos worker. The family moved frequently, living in other states such as Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Oklahoma before ultimately moving to the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. A shy and insecure boy, Vaughan was deeply affected by his childhood experiences. His father struggled with alcohol abuse and often terrorized his family and friends with his bad temper. In later years, Vaughan recalled that he had been a victim of his father's violence. His father died on August 27, 1986, exactly four years before Vaughan himself.
First instruments
In the early 1960s, Vaughan's admiration for his brother Jimmie resulted in his trying different instruments such as the drums and saxophone. In 1961, for his seventh birthday, Vaughan received his first guitar, a toy from Sears with Western motif. Learning by ear, he diligently committed himself, following along to songs by the Nightcaps, particularly "Wine, Wine, Wine" and "Thunderbird". He listened to blues artists such as Albert King, Otis Rush, and Muddy Waters, and rock guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix and Lonnie Mack, as well as jazz guitarists including Kenny Burrell. In 1963, he acquired his first electric guitar, a Gibson ES-125T, as a hand-me-down from Jimmie.
Soon after he acquired the electric guitar, Vaughan joined his first band, the Chantones, in 1965. Their first show was at a talent contest held in Dallas' Hill Theatre, but after realizing that they could not perform a Jimmy Reed song in its entirety, Vaughan left the band and joined the Brooklyn Underground, playing professionally at local bars and clubs. He received Jimmie's Fender Broadcaster, which he later traded for an Epiphone Riviera. When Jimmie left home at age sixteen, Vaughan's apparent obsession with the instrument caused a lack of support from his parents. Miserable at home, he took a job at a local hamburger stand, where he washed dishes and dumped trash for seventy cents an hour. After falling into a barrel of grease, he grew tired of the job and quit to devote his life to a music career.
Music career
Early years
In May 1969, after leaving the Brooklyn Underground, Vaughan joined a band called the Southern Distributor. He had learned the Yardbirds' "Jeff's Boogie" and played the song at the audition. Mike Steinbach, the group's drummer, commented: "The kid was fourteen. We auditioned him on 'Jeff's Boogie,' really fast instrumental guitar, and he played it note for note." Although they played pop rock covers, Vaughan conveyed his interest in the addition of blues songs to the group's repertoire; he was told that he wouldn't earn a living playing blues music and he and the band parted ways. Later that year, bassist Tommy Shannon walked into a Dallas club and heard Vaughan playing guitar. Fascinated by the skillful playing, which he described as "incredible even then", Shannon borrowed a bass guitar and the two jammed. Within a few years, they began performing together in a band called Krackerjack.
In February 1970, Vaughan joined a band called Liberation, which was a nine-piece group with a horn section. Having spent the past month briefly playing bass with Jimmie in Texas Storm, he had originally auditioned as bassist. Impressed by Vaughan's guitar playing, Scott Phares, the group's original guitarist, modestly became the bassist. In mid-1970, they performed at the Adolphus Hotel in downtown Dallas, where ZZ Top asked them to perform. During Liberation's break, Vaughan jammed with ZZ Top on the Nightcaps song "Thunderbird". Phares later described the performance: "they tore the house down. It was awesome. It was one of those magical evenings. Stevie fit in like a glove on a hand."
Attending Justin F. Kimball High School during the early 1970s, Vaughan's late-night shows contributed to his neglect in his studies, including music theory; he would often sleep during class. His pursuit of a musical career was disapproved of by many of the school's administrators but he was also encouraged by many people, including his art teacher, to strive for a career in art. In his sophomore year, he attended an evening class for experimental art at Southern Methodist University, but left when it conflicted with rehearsal. Vaughan later spoke of his dislike of the school and recalled having received daily notes from the principal about his grooming.
First recordings
In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Club, a local blues venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months.
In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were unsuccessful. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed.
In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras which included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King.
Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde "Pharaoh" Walden. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band.
Double Trouble
In mid-May 1978, Clark left to form his own group and Vaughan renamed the band Double Trouble, taken from the title of an Otis Rush song. Following the recruitment of bassist Jackie Newhouse, Walden quit in July, and was briefly replaced by Jack Moore, who had moved to Texas from Boston; he performed with the band for about two months. Vaughan then began looking for a drummer and soon after, he met Chris Layton through Sublett, who was his roommate. Layton, who had recently parted ways with Greezy Wheels, was taught by Vaughan to play a shuffle rhythm. When Vaughan offered Layton the position, he agreed. In early July, Vaughan befriended Lenora Bailey, known as "Lenny", who became his girlfriend, and ultimately his wife. The marriage was to last for six and a half years.
In early October 1978, Vaughan and Double Trouble earned a frequent residency performing at one of Austin's most popular nightspots, the Rome Inn. During a performance, Edi Johnson, an accountant at Manor Downs, noticed Vaughan. She remembered: "I'm not an authority on music—it's whatever turned me on—but this did." She recommended him to Manor Downs owner Frances Carr and general manager Chesley Millikin, who was interested in managing artists and saw Vaughan's musical potential. After Barton quit Double Trouble in mid-November 1979, Millikin signed Vaughan to a management contract. Vaughan also hired Robert "Cutter" Brandenburg as road manager, whom he had met in 1969. Addressing him as "Stevie Ray", Brandenburg convinced Vaughan to use his middle name on stage.
In October 1980, bassist Tommy Shannon attended a Double Trouble performance at Rockefeller's in Houston. Shannon, who was playing with Alan Haynes at the time, participated in a jam session with Vaughan and Layton halfway through their set. Shannon later commented: "I went down there that night, and I'll never forget this: it was like, when I walked in the door and I heard them playing, it was like a revelation. 'That's where I want to be; that's where I belong, right there.' During the break, I went up to Stevie and told him that. I didn't try to sneak around and hide it from the bass player [Jackie Newhouse]—I didn't know if he was listening or not. I just really wanted to be in that band. I sat in that night and it sounded great." Almost three months later, when Vaughan offered Shannon the position, he readily accepted.
Drug charge and trial
On December 5, 1979, while Vaughan was in a dressing room before a performance in Houston, an off-duty police officer arrested him after witnessing his usage of cocaine near an open window. He was formally charged with cocaine possession and subsequently released on $1,000 bail. Double Trouble was the opening act for Muddy Waters, who said about Vaughan's substance abuse: "Stevie could perhaps be the greatest guitar player that ever lived, but he won't live to get 40 years old if he doesn't leave that white powder alone." The following year, he was required to return on January 16 and February 29 for court appearances.
During the final court date, on April 17, 1980, Vaughan was sentenced with two years' probation and was prohibited from leaving Texas. Along with a stipulation of entering treatment for drug abuse, he was required to "avoid persons or places of known disreputable or harmful character"; he refused to comply with both of these orders. After a lawyer was hired, his probation officer had the sentence revised to allow him to work outside of the state. The incident later caused him to refuse maid service while staying in hotels during concert tours.
Montreux Jazz Festival
Although popular in Texas at the time, Double Trouble failed to gain national attention. The group's visibility improved when record producer Jerry Wexler recommended them to Claude Nobs, organizer of the Montreux Jazz Festival. He insisted the festival's blues night would be great with Vaughan, whom he called "a jewel, one of those rarities who comes along once in a lifetime", and Nobs agreed to book Double Trouble on July 17.
Vaughan opened with a medley arrangement of Freddie King's song "Hide Away" and his own fast instrumental composition, "Rude Mood". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", Hound Dog Taylor's "Give Me Back My Wig", and Albert Collins' "Collins Shuffle", as well as three original compositions: "Pride and Joy", "Love Struck Baby", and "Dirty Pool". The set ended with boos from the audience. People's James McBride wrote:
According to road manager Don Opperman: "the way I remember it, the 'ooos' and the 'boos' were mixed together, but Stevie was pretty disappointed. Stevie [had] just handed me his guitar and walked off stage, and I'm like, 'are you coming back?' There was a doorway back there; the audience couldn't see the guys, but I could. He went back to the dressing room with his head in his hands. I went back there finally, and that was the end of the show." According to Vaughan: "it wasn't the whole crowd [that booed]. It was just a few people sitting right up front. The room there was built for acoustic jazz. When five or six people boo, wow, it sounds like the whole world hates you. They thought we were too loud, but shoot, I had four army blankets folded over my amp, and the volume level was on 2. I'm used to playin' on 10!" The performance was filmed and later released on DVD in September 2004.
On the following night, Double Trouble was booked in the lounge of the Montreux Casino, with Jackson Browne in attendance. Browne jammed with Double Trouble until the early morning hours and offered them free use of his personal recording studio in downtown Los Angeles. In late November the band accepted his offer and recorded ten songs in two days. While they were in the studio, Vaughan received a telephone call from David Bowie, who met him after the Montreux performance, and he invited him to participate in a recording session for his next studio album, Let's Dance. In January 1983, Vaughan recorded guitar on six of the album's eight songs, including the title track and "China Girl". The album was released on April 14, 1983, and sold over three times as many copies as Bowie's previous album.
National success
In mid-March 1983, Gregg Geller, vice president of A&R at Epic Records, signed Double Trouble to the label at the recommendation of record producer John Hammond. Soon afterward, Epic financed a music video for "Love Struck Baby", which was filmed at the Cherry Tavern in New York City. Vaughan recalled: "we changed the name of the place in the video. Four years ago I got married in a club where we used to play all the time called the Rome Inn. When they closed it down, the owner gave me the sign, so in the video we put that up behind me on the stage."
With the success of Let's Dance, Bowie requested Vaughan as the featured instrumentalist for the upcoming Serious Moonlight Tour, realizing that he was an essential aspect of the album's groundbreaking success. In late April, Vaughan began rehearsals for the tour in Las Colinas, Texas. When contract renegotiations for his performance fee failed, Vaughan abandoned the tour days before its opening date, and he was replaced by Earl Slick. Vaughan commented: "I couldn't gear everything on something I didn't really care a whole lot about. It was kind of risky, but I really didn't need all the headaches." Although contributing factors were widely disputed, Vaughan soon gained major publicity for quitting the tour.
On May 9, the band performed at The Bottom Line in New York City, where they opened for Bryan Adams, with Hammond, Mick Jagger, John McEnroe, Rick Nielsen, Billy Gibbons, and Johnny Winter in attendance. Brandenburg described the performance as "ungodly": "I think Stevie played every lick as loud and as hard and with as much intensity as I've ever heard him." The performance earned Vaughan a positive review published in the New York Post, asserting that Double Trouble outperformed Adams. "Fortunately, Bryan Adams, the Canadian rocker who is opening arena dates for Journey, doesn't headline too often", wrote Martin Porter, who claimed that after the band's performance, the stage had been "rendered to cinders by the most explosively original showmanship to grace the New York stage in some time."
Texas Flood
After acquiring the recordings from Browne's studio, Double Trouble began assembling the material for a full-length LP. The album, Texas Flood, opens with the track "Love Struck Baby", which was written for Lenny on their "love-struck day". He composed "Pride and Joy" and "I'm Cryin'" for one of his former girlfriends, Lindi Bethel. Although both are musically similar, their lyrics are two different perspectives of the relationship. Along with covers of Howlin' Wolf, the Isley Brothers, and Buddy Guy, the album included Vaughan's cover of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", a song which he became strongly associated with. "Lenny" served as a tribute to his wife, which he composed at the end of their bed.
Texas Flood featured cover art by illustrator Brad Holland, who is known for his artwork for Playboy and The New York Times. Originally envisioned with Vaughan sitting on a horse depicting a promotable resemblance, Holland painted an image of him leaning against a wall with a guitar, using a photograph as a reference. Released on June 13, 1983, Texas Flood peaked at number 38 and ultimately sold half a million copies. While Rolling Stone editor Kurt Loder asserted that Vaughan did not possess a distinctive voice, according to AllMusic senior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the release was a "monumental impact". Billboard described it as "a guitar boogie lovers delight". Agent Alex Hodges commented: "No one knew how big that record would be, because guitar players weren't necessarily in vogue, except for some that were so established they were undeniable ... he was one of the few artists that was recouped on every record in a short period of time."
On June 16, Vaughan gave a performance at Tango nightclub in Dallas, which celebrated the album's release. Assorted VIPs attended the performance, including Ted Nugent, Sammy Hagar, and members of The Kinks and Uriah Heep. Jack Chase, vice president of marketing for Epic, recalled: "the coming-out party at Tango was very important; it was absolutely huge. All the radio station personalities, DJs, program directors, all the retail record store owners and the important managers, press, all the executives from New York came down—about seven hundred people. We attacked in Dallas first with Q102-FM and [DJ] Redbeard. We had the Tango party—it was hot. It was the ticket." The Dallas Morning News reviewed the performance, starting with the rhetorical question; "what if Stevie Ray Vaughan had an album release party and everybody came? It happened Thursday night at Tango. ... The adrenalin must have been gushing through the musicians' veins as they performed with rare finesse and skill."
Following a brief tour in Europe, Hodges arranged an engagement for Double Trouble as The Moody Blues' opening act during a two-month tour of North America. Hodges stated that many people disliked the idea of Double Trouble opening for The Moody Blues, but asserted that a common thread which both bands shared was "album-oriented rock". Shannon described the tour as "glorious": "Our record hadn't become that successful yet, but we were playing in front of coliseums full of people. We just went out and played, and it fit like a glove. The sound rang through those big coliseums like a monster. People were going crazy, and they had no idea who we were!" After appearing on the television series Austin City Limits, the band played a sold-out concert at New York City's Beacon Theatre. Variety wrote that their ninety-minute set at the Beacon "left no doubt that this young Texas musician is indeed the 'guitar hero of the present era.'"
Couldn't Stand the Weather
In January 1984, Double Trouble began recording their second studio album, Couldn't Stand the Weather, at the Power Station, with John Hammond as executive producer and engineer Richard Mullen. Layton later recalled working with Hammond: "he was kind of like a nice hand on your shoulder, as opposed to someone that jumped in and said, 'let's redo this, let's do that more.' He didn't get involved in that way at all. He was a feedback person." As the sessions began, Vaughan's cover of Bob Geddins' "Tin Pan Alley" was recorded while audio levels were being checked. Layton remembers the performance: "... we did probably the quietest version we ever did up 'til that point. We ended it and [Hammond] said; 'that's the best that song will ever sound,' and we went; 'we haven't even got sounds, have we?' He goes, 'that doesn't matter. That's the best you'll ever do that song.' We tried it again five, six, seven times- I can't even remember. But it never quite sounded like it did that first time."
During recording sessions, Vaughan began experimenting with other combinations of musicians, including Fran Christina and Stan Harrison, who played drums and saxophone respectively on the jazz instrumental, "Stang's Swang". Jimmie Vaughan played rhythm guitar on his cover of Guitar Slim's "The Things That I Used to Do" and the title track, the latter of which Vaughan carries a worldly message in his lyrics. According to musicologist Andy Aledort, Vaughan's guitar playing throughout the song is marked by steady rhythmic strumming patterns and improvised lead lines, with a distinctive R&B and soul single-note riff, doubled in octaves by guitar and bass.
Couldn't Stand the Weather was released on May 15, 1984, and two weeks later it had rapidly outpaced the sales of Texas Flood. It peaked at number 31 and spent 38 weeks on the charts. The album includes Vaughan's cover of Jimi Hendrix's song, "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", which provoked inevitable comparisons to Hendrix. According to AllMusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Couldn't Stand the Weather "confirmed that the acclaimed debut was no fluke, while matching, if not bettering, the sales of its predecessor, thereby cementing Vaughan's status as a giant of modern blues." According to authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford, the album "was a major turning point in Stevie Ray Vaughan's development" and Vaughan's singing improved.
Carnegie Hall
On October 4, 1984, Vaughan headlined a performance at Carnegie Hall that included many guest musicians. For the second half of the concert, he added Jimmie as rhythm guitarist, drummer George Rains, keyboardist Dr. John, Roomful of Blues horn section, and featured vocalist Angela Strehli. The ensemble rehearsed for less than two weeks before the performance, and despite the solid dynamics of Double Trouble for the first half of the performance, according to Patoski and Crawford, the big band concept never entirely took form. Before arriving at the engagement, the venue sold out, which made Vaughan overexcited and nervous as he did not calm down until halfway through the third song. A benefit for the T.J. Martell Foundation's work in leukemia and cancer research, he was an important draw for the event. As his scheduled time slot drew closer, he indicated that he preferred traveling to the venue by limousine to avoid being swarmed by fans on the street; the band took the stage around 8:00 p.m. The audience of 2,200 people, which included Vaughan's wife, family and friends, transformed the venue into what Stephen Holden of The New York Times described as "a whistling, stomping roadhouse".
Introduced by Hammond as "one of the greatest guitar players of all time", Vaughan opened with "Scuttle Buttin'", wearing a custom-made mariachi suit he described as a "Mexican tuxedo". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of the Isley Brothers' "Testify", The Jimi Hendrix Experience's "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", "Tin Pan Alley", Elmore James' "The Sky Is Crying", and W. C. Clark's "Cold Shot", along with four original compositions including "Love Struck Baby", "Honey Bee", "Couldn't Stand the Weather", and "Rude Mood". During the second half of the performance, Vaughan performed covers by Larry Davis, Buddy Guy, Guitar Slim, Albert King, Jackie Wilson, and Albert Collins. The set ended with Vaughan performing solo renditions of "Lenny" and "Rude Mood".
The Dallas Times-Herald wrote of the performance at Carnegie Hall as; "was full of stomping feet and swaying bodies, kids in blue jeans hanging off the balconies, dancing bodies that clogged the aisles." The New York Times asserted that, despite the venue's "muddy" acoustics, their performance was "filled with verve", and Vaughan's playing was "handsomely displayed". Jimmie Vaughan later commented: "I was worried the crowd might be a little stiff. Turned out they're just like any other beer joint." Vaughan commented: "We won't be limited to just the trio, although that doesn't mean we'll stop doing the trio. I'm planning on doing that too. I ain't gonna stay in one place. If I do, I'm stupid." The performance was recorded and later released as an official live LP. The album was released posthumously on July 29, 1997, by Epic Records; it was ultimately certified gold.
Immediately after the concert, Vaughan attended a private party at a downtown club in New York, which was sponsored by MTV, where he was greeted by an hour's worth of supporters. On the following day, Double Trouble made an appearance at a record store in Greenwich Village, where they signed autographs for fans. In late October 1984, the band toured Australia and New Zealand, which included one of their first appearances on Australian television—on Hey Hey It's Saturday—where they performed "Texas Flood", and an interview on Sounds. On November 5 and 9, they played sold-out concerts at the Sydney Opera House. Upon returning to the U.S., Double Trouble went on a brief tour in California. Soon afterward, Vaughan and Lenny went to the island of Saint Croix, on the U.S. Virgin Islands in the Caribbean Sea, where they had spent some time vacationing in December. The next month, Double Trouble flew to Japan, where they appeared for five performances, including at Kōsei Nenkin Kaikan in Osaka.
Soul to Soul
In March 1985, recording for Double Trouble's third studio album, Soul to Soul, began at the Dallas Sound Lab. As the sessions progressed, Vaughan became increasingly frustrated with his own lack of inspiration. He was also allowed a relaxed pace of recording the album, which contributed to a lack of focus due to excesses in alcohol and other drugs. Roadie Byron Barr later recalled: "the routine was to go to the studio, do dope, and play ping-pong." Vaughan, who found it increasingly difficult to be able to play rhythm guitar parts and sing at the same time, wanted to add another dimension to the band, so he hired keyboardist Reese Wynans to record on the album; he joined the band soon thereafter.
During the album's production, Vaughan appeared at the Houston Astrodome on April 10, 1985, where he performed a slide guitar rendition of the U.S. national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner"; his performance was met with booing. Upon leaving the stage, Vaughan acquired an autograph from former player for the New York Yankees, Mickey Mantle. Astrodome publicist Molly Glentzer wrote in the Houston Press: "as Vaughan shuffled back behind home plate, he was only lucid enough to know that he wanted Mickey Mantle's autograph. Mantle obliged. 'I never signed a guitar before.' Nobody asked Vaughan for his autograph. I was sure he'd be dead before he hit 30." Critics associated his performance with Jimi Hendrix's rendition at Woodstock in 1969, yet Vaughan disliked this comparison: "I heard they even wrote about it in one of the music magazines and they tried to put the two versions side by side. I hate that stuff. His version was great."
Released on September 30, 1985, Soul to Soul peaked at number 34 and remained on the Billboard 200 through mid-1986, eventually certified gold. Critic Jimmy Guterman of Rolling Stone wrote: "there's some life left in their blues rock pastiche; it's also possible that they've run out of gas." According to Patoski and Crawford, sales of the album "did not match Couldn't Stand the Weather, suggesting Stevie Ray and Double Trouble were plateauing". Vaughan commented: "as far as what's on there song-wise, I like the album a lot. It meant a lot to us what we went through to get this record. There were a lot of odds and we still stayed strong. We grew a lot with the people in the band and immediate friends around us; we learned a lot and grew a lot closer. That has a lot to do with why it's called [Soul to Soul]."
Live Alive
After touring for nine and a half months, Epic requested a fourth album from Double Trouble as part of their contractual obligation. In July 1986, Vaughan decided that they would record the LP, Live Alive, during three live appearances in Austin and Dallas. On July 17 and 18, the band performed sold-out concerts at the Austin Opera House, and July 19 at the Dallas Starfest. They used recordings of these concerts to assemble the LP, which was produced by Vaughan. Shannon was backstage before the Austin concert and predicted to new manager Alex Hodges that both Vaughan and himself were "headed for a brick wall". Guitarist Denny Freeman attended the Austin performances; he called the shows a "musical mess, because they would go into these chaotic jams with no control. I didn't know what exactly was going on, but I was concerned." Both Layton and Shannon remarked that their work schedule and drugs were causing the band to lose focus. According to Wynans: "Things were getting illogical and crazy."
The Live Alive album was released on November 17, 1986, and the only official live Double Trouble LP made commercially available during Vaughan's lifetime, though it never appeared on the Billboard 200 chart. Though many critics claimed that most of the album was overdubbed, engineer Gary Olazabal, who mixed the album, asserted that most of the material was recorded poorly. Vaughan later admitted that it was not one of his better efforts; he recalled: "I wasn't in very good shape when we recorded Live Alive. At the time, I didn't realize how bad a shape I was in. There were more fix-it jobs done on the album than I would have liked. Some of the work sounds like [it was] the work of half-dead people. There were some great notes that came out, but I just wasn't in control; nobody was."
Drugs and alcohol
In 1960, when Vaughan was six years old, he began stealing his father's drinks. Drawn in by its effects, he started making his own drinks and this resulted in alcohol dependence. He explained: "that's when I first started stealing daddy's drinks. Or when my parents were gone, I'd find the bottle and make myself one. I thought it was cool ... thought the kids down the street would think it was cool. That's where it began, and I had been depending on it ever since." According to the authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford: "In the ensuing twenty-five years, he had worked his way through the Physicians' Desk Reference before finding his poisons of preference—alcohol and cocaine."
While Vaughan asserted that he first experienced the effects of cocaine when a doctor prescribed him a liquid solution of the stimulant as a nasal spray, according to Patoski and Crawford, the earliest that Vaughan is known to have ingested the drug is in 1975, while performing with the Cobras. Before that, Vaughan had briefly used other drugs such as cannabis, methamphetamine, and Quaaludes, the brand name for methaqualone. After 1975, he regularly drank whiskey and used cocaine, particularly mixing the two substances together. According to Hopkins, by the time of Double Trouble's European tour in September 1986, "his lifestyle of substance abuse had reached a peak, probably better characterized as the bottom of a deep chasm."
At the height of Vaughan's substance abuse, he drank of whiskey and used of cocaine each day. Personal assistant Tim Duckworth explained: "I would make sure he would eat breakfast instead of waking up drinking every morning, which was probably the worst thing he was doing." According to Vaughan: "it got to the point where if I'd try to say "hi" to somebody, I would just fall apart crying. It was like solid doom."
In September 1986, Double Trouble traveled to Denmark for a one-month tour of Europe. During the late night hours of September 28, Vaughan became ill after a performance in Ludwigshafen, Germany, suffering from near-death dehydration, for which he received medical treatment. The incident resulted in his checking into The London Clinic under the care of Dr. Victor Bloom, who warned him that he was a month away from death. After staying in London for more than a week, he returned to the United States and entered Peachford Hospital in Atlanta, where he spent four weeks in rehabilitation, and then checked into rehab in Austin.
Live Alive tour
In November 1986, following his departure from rehab, Vaughan moved back into his mother's Glenfield Avenue house in Dallas, which is where he had spent much of his childhood. During this time, Double Trouble began rehearsals for the Live Alive tour. Although Vaughan was nervous about performing after achieving sobriety, he received positive reassurance. Wynans later recalled: "Stevie was real worried about playing after he'd gotten sober...he didn't know if he had anything left to offer. Once we got back out on the road, he was very inspired and motivated." The tour began on November 23 at Towson State University, which was Vaughan's first performance with Double Trouble after rehab. On December 31, 1986, they played a concert at Atlanta's Fox Theatre, which featured encore performances with Lonnie Mack.
As the tour progressed, Vaughan was longing to work on material for his next LP, but in January 1987, he filed for a divorce from Lenny, which restricted him from any projects until the proceedings were finalized. This prevented him from writing and recording songs for almost two years, but Double Trouble wrote the song "Crossfire" with Bill Carter and Ruth Ellsworth. Layton recalled: "we wrote the music, and they had to write the lyrics. We had just gotten together; Stevie was unable to be there at that time. He was in Dallas doing some things, and we just got together and started writing some songs. That was the first one we wrote." On August 6, 1987, Double Trouble appeared at the Austin Aqua Festival, where they played to one of the largest audiences of their career. According to biographer Craig Hopkins, as many as 20,000 people attended the concert. Following a month-long tour as the opening act for Robert Plant in May 1988, which included a concert at Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens, the band was booked for a European leg, which included 22 performances, and ended in Oulu, Finland on July 17. This would be Vaughan's last concert appearance in Europe.
In Step
After Vaughan's divorce from Lenora "Lenny" Darlene Bailey became final, recording for Double Trouble's fourth and final studio album, In Step, began at Kiva Studios in Memphis, Tennessee, working with producer Jim Gaines and co-songwriter Doyle Bramhall. Initially, he had doubts about his musical and creative abilities after achieving sobriety, but he gained confidence as the sessions progressed. Shannon later recalled: "In Step was, for him, a big growing experience. In my opinion, it's our best studio album, and I think he felt that way, too." Bramhall, who had also entered rehab, wrote songs with Vaughan about addiction and redemption. According to Vaughan, the album was titled In Step because "I'm finally in step with life, in step with myself, in step with my music." The album's liner notes include the quote; "'thank God the elevator's broken," a reference to the twelve-step program proposed by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA).
After the In Step recording sessions moved to Los Angeles, Vaughan added horn players Joe Sublett and Darrell Leonard, who played saxophone and trumpet respectively on both "Crossfire" and "Love Me Darlin". Shortly before the album's production was complete, Vaughan and Double Trouble appeared at a presidential inaugural party in Washington, D.C. for George H. W. Bush. In Step was released on June 13, 1989, and eight months later, it was certified gold. The album was Vaughan's most commercially successful release and his first one to win a Grammy Award. It peaked at number 33 on the Billboard 200, spending 47 weeks on the chart. In Step included the song, "Crossfire", which was written by Double Trouble, Bill Carter, and Ruth Ellsworth; it became his only number one hit. The album also included one of his first recordings to feature the use of a Fuzz Face on Vaughan's cover of the Howlin' Wolf song, "Love Me Darlin.
In July 1989, Neil Perry, a writer for Sounds magazine, wrote: "the album closes with the brow-soothing swoon of 'Riviera Paradise,' a slow, lengthy guitar and piano workout that proves just why Vaughan is to the guitar what Nureyev is to ballet." According to music journalist Robert Christgau, Vaughan was "writing blues for AA...he escapes the blues undamaged for the first time in his career." In October 1989, the Boca Raton News described Vaughan's guitar solos as "determined, clear-headed and downright stinging" and his lyrics as "tension-filled allegories".
Death
On Monday, August 27, 1990, at 12:50 a.m. (CDT), Vaughan and members of Eric Clapton's touring entourage played an all-star encore jam session at Alpine Valley Music Theatre in Alpine Valley Resort in East Troy, Wisconsin. They then left for Midway International Airport in Chicago in a Bell 206B helicopter, the most common way for acts to enter and exit the venue, as there is only one road in and out, heavily used by fans. The helicopter crashed into a nearby ski hill shortly after takeoff. Vaughan and the four others on board—pilot Jeff Brown, agent Bobby Brooks, bodyguard Nigel Browne, and tour manager Colin Smythe—died. The helicopter was identified as being owned by Chicago-based company Omniflight Helicopters. Initial reports of the crash erroneously claimed that Clapton had also been killed. According to findings from an inquest conducted by the coroner's office in Elkhorn, all five victims were killed instantly.
The investigation determined the aircraft departed in foggy conditions with visibility reportedly under two miles, according to a local forecast. The National Transportation Safety Board report stated: "As the third helicopter was departing, it remained at a lower altitude than the others, and the pilot turned southeasterly toward rising terrain. Subsequently, the helicopter crashed on hilly terrain about three fifths of a mile from the takeoff point." Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) records showed that Brown was qualified to fly by instruments in a fixed-wing aircraft, but not in a helicopter. Toxicology tests performed on the victims revealed no traces of drugs or alcohol in their systems. Vaughan's funeral service was held on August 31, 1990, at Laurel Land Cemetery in Dallas, Texas. His wooden casket quickly became adorned with bouquets of flowers. An estimated 3,000 mourners joined a procession led by a white hearse. Among those at the public ceremony were Jeff Healey, Charlie Sexton, ZZ Top, Colin James, Stevie Wonder, Bonnie Raitt and Buddy Guy. Vaughan's grave marker reads: "Thank you ... for all the love you passed our way."
Musical style
Vaughan's music was rooted in blues, rock, and jazz. He was influenced by Jimi Hendrix, Albert King, Lonnie Mack, B.B. King, Freddie King, Albert Collins, Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Otis Rush, Guitar Slim, Chuck Berry, and Muddy Waters. According to nightclub owner Clifford Antone, who opened Antone's in 1975, Vaughan jammed with Albert King at Antone's in July 1977 and it almost "scared him to death", saying that "it was the best I've ever saw Albert or the best I ever saw Stevie". While Albert King had a substantial influence on Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix was Vaughan's greatest inspiration. Vaughan declared: "I love Hendrix for so many reasons. He was so much more than just a blues guitarist—he played damn well any kind of guitar he wanted. In fact I'm not sure if he even played the guitar—he played music." He was also influenced by such jazz guitarists as Django Reinhardt, Wes Montgomery, Kenny Burrell, and George Benson.
In 1987, Vaughan listed Lonnie Mack first among the guitarists he had listened to, both as a youngster and as an adult. Vaughan observed that Mack was "ahead of his time" and said, "I got a lot of my fast stuff from Lonnie". On another occasion, Vaughan said that he had learned tremolo picking and vibrato from Mack and that Mack had taught him to "play guitar from the heart." Mack recalled his first meeting with Vaughan in 1978:
Vaughan's relationship with another Texas blues legend, Johnny Winter, was a little more complex. Although they met several times, and often played sessions with the same musicians or even performed the same material, as in the case of Boot Hill, Vaughan always refrained from acknowledging Winter in any form. In his biography, "Raisin' Cain", Winter says that he was unnerved after reading Vaughan stating in an interview that he never met or knew Johnny Winter. "We even played together over at Tommy Shannon's house one time." Vaughan settled the issue in 1988 on the occasion of a blues festival in Europe where both he and Winter were on the bill, explaining that he has been misquoted and that "Every musician in Texas knows Johnny and has learned something from him". Asked to compare their playing styles in an interview in 2010, Winter admitted that "mine's a little bit rawer, I think."
Equipment
Guitars
Vaughan owned and used a variety of guitars during his career. His guitar of choice, and the instrument that he became most associated with, was the Fender Stratocaster, his favorite being a 1963 body with a 1962 neck and pickups dated from 1959. This is why Vaughan usually referred to his Stratocaster as a "1959 Strat". He explained why he favored this guitar in a 1983 interview: "I like the strength of its sound. Any guitar I play has got to be pretty versatile. It's got a big, strong tone and it'll take anything I do to it." Vaughan also referred to this instrument as his "first wife", or "Number One". Another favourite guitar was a slightly later Strat he named 'Lenny' after his wife, Lenora. While at a local pawn shop in 1980, Vaughan had noticed this particular guitar, a 1965 Stratocaster that had been refinished in red, with the original sunburst finish peeking through. It also had a 1910 Mandolin inlay just below the bridge. The pawn shop was asking $300 for it, which was way more than Vaughan had at the time. Lenny saw how badly he wanted this guitar, so she got six of their friends to chip in $50 each, and bought it for him. The guitar was presented to him on his birthday in 1980, and that night, after bringing "Lenny" (the guitar, and wife) home with him, he wrote the song, "Lenny". He started using a borrowed Stratocaster during high school and used Stratocasters predominantly in his live performances and recordings, although he did play other guitars, including custom guitars.
One of the custom guitars—nicknamed "Main"—was built by James Hamilton of Hamiltone Guitars in Buffalo, New York. It was a gift from Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top. Gibbons had commissioned Hamilton to build the guitar in 1979. There were some delays, including having to re-do the mother of pearl inlay of Vaughan's name on the fretboard when he changed his stage name from Stevie Vaughan to Stevie Ray Vaughan. The guitar was presented to him by Jim Hamilton on April 29, 1984. Hamilton recalls that Stevie Ray Vaughan was so happy with the guitar that he played it that night at Springfest on the University of Buffalo campus. It remained one of the main guitars he used on stage and in studio. Vaughan made some alterations to the guitar, including replacing the bronze color Gibson knobs with white Fender knobs, as he preferred the ribbing on the Fender knobs. The pickups had to be changed after the guitar was used in the "Couldn't Stand the Weather" video, in which Stevie and "Main" were drenched with water, and the pickups were ruined. Vaughan preferred guitar has been summarized as his,
Number One Strat, which Stevie claimed to be a ’59, since that was the date stamped on the back of the pickups… this was incorrect, however, as guitar tech Rene Martinez (who oversaw SRV’s guitars since 1980) found the stamp of 1963 on the body and 1962 on the original neck (the neck was replaced in 1989 after it could no longer be refretted properly; Rene used the neck from another SRV favorite, “Red”, as it was also a 1962 model). The pickups are also relatively low output, not the hot overwound myth that gained legs during the 80s… all 3 pickups are rumored to be under 6k ohms output impedance, which would be typical of a 1959 set (the neck pickups tended to be hottest, but not by much). Although the Fender SRV signature model uses Texas Special pickups, which Stevie was heavily involved in the making of, they do not accurately represent the sound of his original Number One.
Vaughan bought many Stratocasters and gave some away as gifts. A sunburst Diplomat Strat-style guitar was purchased by Vaughan and given to his girlfriend Janna Lapidus to learn to play on. Vaughan used a custom set of uncommonly heavy strings, gauges .013, .015, .019, .028, .038, .058, and tuned a half-step below standard tuning. He played with so much tension that it was not uncommon for him to separate his fingernail from the quick movement along the strings. The owner of an Austin club recalled Vaughan coming into the office between sets to borrow super glue, which he used to keep fingernail split from widening while he continued to play. The super glue was suggested by Rene Martinez, who was Stevie's guitar technician. Martinez eventually convinced Stevie to change to slightly lighter strings. He preferred a guitar neck with an asymmetrical profile (thicker at the top) which was more comfortable for his thumb-over style of playing. Heavy use of the vibrato bar necessitated frequent replacements; Vaughan often had his roadie, Byron Barr, obtain custom stainless steel bars made by Barr's father.
Vaughan was also photographed playing a Rickenbacker Capri, a National Duolian, Epiphone Riviera, Gibson Flying V, as well as several other models. Vaughan used a Gibson Johnny Smith to record "Stang's Swang", and a Guild 12-string acoustic for his performance on MTV Unplugged in January 1990. On June 24, 2004, one of Vaughan's Stratocasters, the aforementioned "Lenny" strat, was sold at an auction to benefit Eric Clapton's Crossroads Centre in Antigua; the instrument was bought by Guitar Center for $623,500.
Amplifiers and effects
Vaughan was a catalyst in the revival of vintage amplifiers and effects during the 1980s. His loud volume and use of heavy strings required powerful and robust amplifiers. Vaughan used two black-face Fender Super Reverbs, which were crucial in shaping his clear overdriven sound. He would often blend other amps with the Super Reverbs, including black-face Fender Vibroverbs, and brands such as Dumble, and Marshall, which he used for his clean sound.
While his mainstay effects were the Ibanez Tube Screamer and a Vox wah-wah pedal, Vaughan experimented with a range of effects. He used a Fender Vibratone, designed as a Leslie speaker for electric guitars, and provided a warbling chorus effect, which can be heard on the track "Cold Shot". He used a vintage Dallas Arbiter Fuzz Face that can be heard on In Step, as well as an Octavia. The Guitar Geek website provides a detailed illustration of Vaughan's 1985 equipment set up based on interviews with his guitar tech and effects builder, Cesar Diaz.
Legacy
Vaughan throughout his career revived blues rock and paved the way for many other artists. Vaughan's work continues to influence numerous blues, rock and alternative artists, including John Mayer, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Mike McCready, Albert Cummings, Los Lonely Boys and Chris Duarte, among others. AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine described Vaughan as "the leading light in American blues" and developed "a uniquely eclectic and fiery style that sounded like no other guitarist, regardless of genre". In 1983, Variety magazine called Vaughan the "guitar hero of the present era".
In the months that followed his death, Vaughan sold over 5.5 million albums in the United States. On September 25, 1990, Epic released Family Style, an LP the Vaughan brothers cut at Ardent Studios in Memphis, Tennessee. The label released several promotional singles and videos for the collaborative effort. In November 1990, CMV Enterprises released Pride and Joy, a collection of eight Double Trouble music videos. Sony signed a deal with the Vaughan estate to obtain control of his back catalog, as well as permission to release albums with previously unreleased material and new collections of released work. On October 29, 1991, The Sky Is Crying was released as Vaughan's first posthumous album with Double Trouble, and featured studio recordings from 1984 to 1985. Other compilations, live albums, and films have also been released since his death.
On October 3, 1991, Texas governor Ann Richards proclaimed "Stevie Ray Vaughan Commemoration Day", during which a memorial concert was held at the Texas Theatre. In 1993, a memorial statue of Vaughan was unveiled on Auditorium Shores and is the first public monument of a musician in Austin. In September 1994, a Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Run for Recovery was held in Dallas; the event was a benefit for the Ethel Daniels Foundation, established to help those in recovery from alcoholism and drug addiction who cannot afford treatment. In 1999, the Musicians' Assistance Program (later renamed MusiCares MAP Fund) created the "Stevie Ray Vaughan Award" to honor the memory of Vaughan and to recognize musicians for their devotion to helping other addicts struggling with the recovery process. The recipients include Eric Clapton, David Crosby, Steven Tyler, Alice Cooper, Ozzy Osbourne, Pete Townshend, Chris Cornell, Jerry Cantrell, Mike McCready, among others. In 1993, Martha Vaughan established the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Scholarship Fund, awarded to students at W.E. Greiner Middle School in Oakcliff who intend to attend college and pursue the arts as a profession.
Awards and honors
Vaughan won five W. C. Handy Awards and was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2000. In 1985, he was named an honorary admiral in the Texas Navy. Vaughan had a single number-one hit on the Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart for the song "Crossfire". His album sales in the U.S. stand at over 15 million units. Family Style, released shortly after his death, won the 1991 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album and became his best-selling, non-Double Trouble studio album with over a million shipments in the U.S. In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked him seventh among the "100 Greatest Guitar Players of All Time". He also became eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008, but did not appear on a nominations roster until 2014. He was inducted in the RRHOF alongside Double Trouble in 2015. Guitar World magazine ranked him as Number One in its list of the greatest blues guitarists.
In 1994 the city of Austin, Texas, erected the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial on the hiking trail beside Lady Bird Lake.
Discography
Texas Flood (1983)
Couldn't Stand the Weather (1984)
Soul to Soul (1985)
In Step (1989)
Family Style (1990)
The Sky is Crying (1991)
See also
1980s in music
List of blues rock musicians
List of electric blues musicians
List of guitarists
List of Texas blues musicians
Music of Austin, Texas
Music of Texas
Notes
Footnotes
Citations
Sources
Further reading
External links
The Stevie Ray Vaughan Archive
1954 births
1990 deaths
Accidental deaths in Wisconsin
American blues guitarists
American male guitarists
American blues singers
American blues singer-songwriters
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
Blues rock musicians
Double Trouble (band) members
Electric blues musicians
Epic Records artists
Sony Music artists
Grammy Award winners
Lead guitarists
Musicians from Dallas
Texas blues musicians
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1990
Victims of helicopter accidents or incidents in the United States
20th-century American singers
Slide guitarists
Resonator guitarists
Guitarists from Texas
20th-century American guitarists
People from Oak Cliff, Texas
20th-century American male singers
Musicians killed in aviation accidents or incidents
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Pipe smokers | true | [
"Jason Jacobson (born June 8, 1977) is a Canadian curler from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.\n\nCareer\nJacobson won the 2009 Saskatchewan provincial mixed championship playing second on a team skipped by Darrell McKee. The team represented Saskatchewan at the 2009 Canadian Mixed Curling Championship, where they finished third. After finishing 9-2 in the round robin, they would lose in the semi-final to Ontario.\n\nJacobson is a long-time competitor on the World Curling Tour. He played in his first Grand Slam event playing third for the Jeff Sharp rink at the 2003 Players' Championship, where they would lose all of their matches. The next season Jacobson joined the Brad Heidt rink at third. The team played in two Grand Slams in the 2003-04 season. They failed to make the playoffs at the 2003 Canadian Open but did much better at the 2004 Players' Championship, placing in 4th place after losing in a rare 3rd place game. That season, he won two Tour events, the Russell Beef & Barley Classic and the SGI Canada Charity Classic. The next season, the team won the 2004 Whites Drug Store Classic. Jacobson left the team in 2005.\n\nAfter playing third for the Steve Laycock rink for one season, Jacobson joined the Bruce Korte team in 2006, playing second for the team. The team would play in the 2007 Players' Championship, making it to the quarterfinals, where they lost to Randy Ferbey. The team also won the 2006 Whites Drug Store Classic that season. Jacobson left the Korte team after that one season. He then would join the Darrell McKee for two seasons, then the Clint Dieno, for one season, then formed his own team for the 2010-11 season, then joined the McKee rink again in 2011-12 before once again forming his own team in 2012. Jacobson did not win any tour events until winning the 2016 Medicine Hat Charity Classic.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\nLiving people\n1977 births\nCurlers from Saskatoon\nCanadian male curlers",
"The 1998 New Zealand rugby league tour of Great Britain was a tour by the New Zealand national rugby league team. The New Zealand national rugby league team defeated Great Britain 2–0 in the three match test series.\n\nBackground\nNew Zealand arrived in Great Britain for the first time since the 1995 World Cup, having already lost a test series 1–2 with Australia. It was the first full tour of Great Britain by a New Zealand side since 1993.\n\nMany of the squad, including coach Frank Endacott, had been involved in the Auckland Warriors' 1998 season, where they had finished 15th out of 20 clubs. In addition to this the Auckland Rugby League were looking to sell the club during the tour.\n\nSquad\nThe squad included two sets of brothers; the Iros, Kevin and Tony and the Pauls, Robbie and Henry.\n\nCoach: Frank Endacott (Auckland Warriors)\n\nFixtures\nThey won the first two test matches 22–16 and 36–16 before being held to a 23-all draw in the third and final test match. Australian referee Bill Harrigan controlled all three Test matches.\n\nIn the second test match Great Britain were ahead 16–8 at halftime before letting in 28 points in the second half to lose the match and the series.\n\nAftermath\nNew Zealand next competed against Great Britain in the 1999 Tri-Nations but did not tour Great Britain again until the 2000 World Cup. The next full tour was conducted in 2002 which saw a drawn test series 1-all.\n\nThe Auckland Warriors were sold to a consortium that included majority investor the Tainui tribe as well as Graham Lowe and Malcolm Boyle. Kiwi coach Frank Endacott was replaced as Warriors coach and several Kiwis left the club included Stephen Kearney, Quentin Pongia, and Kevin Iro. Endacott's next coaching assignment would be the 1999 ANZAC Test on 23 April.\n\nReferences\n\nNew Zealand national rugby league team tours\nGreat Britain\nNew Zealand rugby league tour of Great Britain\nNew Zealand rugby league tour of Great Britain\nRugby league tours of Great Britain"
] |
[
"Stevie Ray Vaughan",
"First recordings",
"In what year did Stevie Ray Vaughan start recording?",
"In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands,",
"What songs were on his first album?",
"They recorded two songs, \"Red, White and Blue\" and \"I Heard a Voice Last Night\",",
"What other musicians did SRV play with on his first recordings?",
"feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird.",
"How did critics receive his first recordings?",
"the album was rejected by A&M,",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top,",
"Did SRV tour with ZZ Top?",
"played various gigs across the South,",
"What happened on the tour across the South?",
"Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home",
"Who is Ham?",
"Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top,",
"What happened after they were stranded?",
"demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed.",
"Where did they tour next?",
"For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon,"
] | C_156015fd0dc74c469a47cbc6a542733a_0 | Did he make any recordings at that time? | 11 | Did Vaughan make any recordings at the Soap Creek Saloon? | Stevie Ray Vaughan | In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Country Club, a venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined a rock band named Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months. In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were disastrous. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed. In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras that included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King. Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde Pharaoh. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band. CANNOTANSWER | In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. | Stephen Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954August 27, 1990) was an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer, best known as the guitarist and frontman of the blues rock trio Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble. Although his mainstream career only spanned seven years, he is considered an icon and one of the most influential musicians in the history of blues music, and one of the greatest guitarists of all time.
Born and raised in Dallas, Texas, Vaughan began playing guitar at age seven, initially inspired by his elder brother, Jimmie Vaughan. In 1972, he dropped out of high school and moved to Austin, where he began to gain a following after playing gigs on the local club circuit. Vaughan joined forces with Tommy Shannon on bass and Chris Layton on drums as Double Trouble in 1978 and established it as part of the Austin music scene; it soon became one of the most popular acts in Texas. He performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1982, where David Bowie saw him play and contacted him for a studio gig, resulting in Stevie playing his blues guitar on the album Let's Dance (1983), before being discovered by John Hammond, who interested major label Epic Records in signing Vaughan and his band to a record deal. Within months, they achieved mainstream success for the critically acclaimed debut album Texas Flood. With a series of successful network television appearances and extensive concert tours, Vaughan became the leading figure in the blues revival of the 1980s.
Playing his guitar behind his back or plucking the strings with his teeth as Jimi Hendrix did, he earned unprecedented stardom in Europe, which later resulted in breakthroughs for guitar players like Robert Cray, Jeff Healey, Robben Ford and Walter Trout, amongst others.
During the majority of his life, Vaughan struggled with drug and alcohol addiction. He also struggled with the personal and professional pressures of fame and his marriage to Lenora "Lenny" Bailey. He successfully completed rehabilitation and began touring again with Double Trouble in November 1986. His fourth and final studio album In Step reached number 33 in the United States in 1989; it was one of Vaughan's most critically and commercially successful releases and included his only number-one hit, "Crossfire". He became one of the world's most highly demanded blues performers, and he headlined Madison Square Garden in 1989 and the Beale Street Music Festival in 1990.
On August 27, 1990, Vaughan and four others were killed in a helicopter crash in East Troy, Wisconsin, after performing with Double Trouble at Alpine Valley Music Theatre. An investigation concluded that the cause was pilot error and Vaughan's family later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Omniflight Helicopters that was settled out of court. Vaughan's music continued to achieve commercial success with several posthumous releases and has sold over 15 million albums in the United States alone. In 2003, David Fricke of Rolling Stone ranked him the seventh greatest guitarist of all time. Vaughan was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015, along with Double Trouble bandmates Chris Layton, Tommy Shannon, and Reese Wynans.
Family and early life
Stevie's grandfather, Thomas Lee Vaughan, married Laura Belle LaRue and moved to Rockwall County, Texas, where they lived by sharecropping.
Stevie's father, Jimmie Lee Vaughan, was born on September 6, 1921. Jimmie, also known as Jim and Big Jim, dropped out of school at age sixteen and enlisted in the U.S. Navy during World War II. After his discharge, he married Martha Jean (née Cook; 1928–2009) on January 13, 1950. They had a son, Jimmie, in 1951. Stephen was born at Methodist Hospital on October 3, 1954, in Dallas, Texas. Big Jim secured a job as an asbestos worker. The family moved frequently, living in other states such as Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Oklahoma before ultimately moving to the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. A shy and insecure boy, Vaughan was deeply affected by his childhood experiences. His father struggled with alcohol abuse and often terrorized his family and friends with his bad temper. In later years, Vaughan recalled that he had been a victim of his father's violence. His father died on August 27, 1986, exactly four years before Vaughan himself.
First instruments
In the early 1960s, Vaughan's admiration for his brother Jimmie resulted in his trying different instruments such as the drums and saxophone. In 1961, for his seventh birthday, Vaughan received his first guitar, a toy from Sears with Western motif. Learning by ear, he diligently committed himself, following along to songs by the Nightcaps, particularly "Wine, Wine, Wine" and "Thunderbird". He listened to blues artists such as Albert King, Otis Rush, and Muddy Waters, and rock guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix and Lonnie Mack, as well as jazz guitarists including Kenny Burrell. In 1963, he acquired his first electric guitar, a Gibson ES-125T, as a hand-me-down from Jimmie.
Soon after he acquired the electric guitar, Vaughan joined his first band, the Chantones, in 1965. Their first show was at a talent contest held in Dallas' Hill Theatre, but after realizing that they could not perform a Jimmy Reed song in its entirety, Vaughan left the band and joined the Brooklyn Underground, playing professionally at local bars and clubs. He received Jimmie's Fender Broadcaster, which he later traded for an Epiphone Riviera. When Jimmie left home at age sixteen, Vaughan's apparent obsession with the instrument caused a lack of support from his parents. Miserable at home, he took a job at a local hamburger stand, where he washed dishes and dumped trash for seventy cents an hour. After falling into a barrel of grease, he grew tired of the job and quit to devote his life to a music career.
Music career
Early years
In May 1969, after leaving the Brooklyn Underground, Vaughan joined a band called the Southern Distributor. He had learned the Yardbirds' "Jeff's Boogie" and played the song at the audition. Mike Steinbach, the group's drummer, commented: "The kid was fourteen. We auditioned him on 'Jeff's Boogie,' really fast instrumental guitar, and he played it note for note." Although they played pop rock covers, Vaughan conveyed his interest in the addition of blues songs to the group's repertoire; he was told that he wouldn't earn a living playing blues music and he and the band parted ways. Later that year, bassist Tommy Shannon walked into a Dallas club and heard Vaughan playing guitar. Fascinated by the skillful playing, which he described as "incredible even then", Shannon borrowed a bass guitar and the two jammed. Within a few years, they began performing together in a band called Krackerjack.
In February 1970, Vaughan joined a band called Liberation, which was a nine-piece group with a horn section. Having spent the past month briefly playing bass with Jimmie in Texas Storm, he had originally auditioned as bassist. Impressed by Vaughan's guitar playing, Scott Phares, the group's original guitarist, modestly became the bassist. In mid-1970, they performed at the Adolphus Hotel in downtown Dallas, where ZZ Top asked them to perform. During Liberation's break, Vaughan jammed with ZZ Top on the Nightcaps song "Thunderbird". Phares later described the performance: "they tore the house down. It was awesome. It was one of those magical evenings. Stevie fit in like a glove on a hand."
Attending Justin F. Kimball High School during the early 1970s, Vaughan's late-night shows contributed to his neglect in his studies, including music theory; he would often sleep during class. His pursuit of a musical career was disapproved of by many of the school's administrators but he was also encouraged by many people, including his art teacher, to strive for a career in art. In his sophomore year, he attended an evening class for experimental art at Southern Methodist University, but left when it conflicted with rehearsal. Vaughan later spoke of his dislike of the school and recalled having received daily notes from the principal about his grooming.
First recordings
In September 1970, Vaughan made his first studio recordings with the band Cast of Thousands, which included future actor Stephen Tobolowsky. They recorded two songs, "Red, White and Blue" and "I Heard a Voice Last Night", for a compilation album, A New Hi, that featured various teenage bands from Dallas. In late January 1971, feeling confined by playing pop hits with Liberation, Vaughan formed his own band, Blackbird. After growing tired of the Dallas music scene, he dropped out of school and moved with the band to Austin, Texas, which had more liberal and tolerant audiences. There, Vaughan initially took residence at the Rolling Hills Club, a local blues venue that would later become the Soap Creek Saloon. Blackbird played at several clubs in Austin and opened shows for bands such as Sugarloaf, Wishbone Ash, and Zephyr, but could not maintain a consistent lineup. In early December 1972, Vaughan left Blackbird and joined Krackerjack; he performed with them for less than three months.
In March 1973, Vaughan joined Marc Benno's band, the Nightcrawlers, after meeting Benno at a jam session years before. The band featured vocalist Doyle Bramhall, who met Vaughan when he was twelve years old. The next month, the Nightcrawlers recorded an album at Sunset Sound Recorders in Hollywood for A&M Records. While the album was rejected by A&M, it included Vaughan's first songwriting efforts, "Dirty Pool" and "Crawlin'". Soon afterward, he and the Nightcrawlers traveled back to Austin without Benno. In mid-1973, they signed a contract with Bill Ham, manager for ZZ Top, and played various gigs across the South, though many of them were unsuccessful. Ham left the band stranded in Mississippi without any way to make it back home and demanded reimbursement from Vaughan for equipment expenses; Ham was never reimbursed.
In 1975, Vaughan joined a six-piece band called Paul Ray and the Cobras which included guitarist Denny Freeman and saxophonist Joe Sublett. For the next two-and-a-half years, he earned a living performing weekly at a popular venue in town, the Soap Creek Saloon, and ultimately the newly opened Antone's, widely known as Austin's "home of the blues". In late 1976, Vaughan recorded a single with them, "Other Days" as the A-side and "Texas Clover" as the B-side. Playing guitar on both tracks, the single was released on February 7, 1977. In March, readers of the Austin Sun voted them as Band of the Year. In addition to playing with the Cobras, Vaughan jammed with many of his influences at Antone's, including Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, Jimmy Rogers, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Albert King.
Vaughan toured with the Cobras during much of 1977, but near the end of September, after they decided to strive for a mainstream musical direction, he left the band and formed Triple Threat Revue, which included singer Lou Ann Barton, bassist W. C. Clark, and drummer Fredde "Pharaoh" Walden. In January 1978, they recorded four songs in Austin, including Vaughan's composition "I'm Cryin'". The thirty-minute audio recording marks the only known studio recording of the band.
Double Trouble
In mid-May 1978, Clark left to form his own group and Vaughan renamed the band Double Trouble, taken from the title of an Otis Rush song. Following the recruitment of bassist Jackie Newhouse, Walden quit in July, and was briefly replaced by Jack Moore, who had moved to Texas from Boston; he performed with the band for about two months. Vaughan then began looking for a drummer and soon after, he met Chris Layton through Sublett, who was his roommate. Layton, who had recently parted ways with Greezy Wheels, was taught by Vaughan to play a shuffle rhythm. When Vaughan offered Layton the position, he agreed. In early July, Vaughan befriended Lenora Bailey, known as "Lenny", who became his girlfriend, and ultimately his wife. The marriage was to last for six and a half years.
In early October 1978, Vaughan and Double Trouble earned a frequent residency performing at one of Austin's most popular nightspots, the Rome Inn. During a performance, Edi Johnson, an accountant at Manor Downs, noticed Vaughan. She remembered: "I'm not an authority on music—it's whatever turned me on—but this did." She recommended him to Manor Downs owner Frances Carr and general manager Chesley Millikin, who was interested in managing artists and saw Vaughan's musical potential. After Barton quit Double Trouble in mid-November 1979, Millikin signed Vaughan to a management contract. Vaughan also hired Robert "Cutter" Brandenburg as road manager, whom he had met in 1969. Addressing him as "Stevie Ray", Brandenburg convinced Vaughan to use his middle name on stage.
In October 1980, bassist Tommy Shannon attended a Double Trouble performance at Rockefeller's in Houston. Shannon, who was playing with Alan Haynes at the time, participated in a jam session with Vaughan and Layton halfway through their set. Shannon later commented: "I went down there that night, and I'll never forget this: it was like, when I walked in the door and I heard them playing, it was like a revelation. 'That's where I want to be; that's where I belong, right there.' During the break, I went up to Stevie and told him that. I didn't try to sneak around and hide it from the bass player [Jackie Newhouse]—I didn't know if he was listening or not. I just really wanted to be in that band. I sat in that night and it sounded great." Almost three months later, when Vaughan offered Shannon the position, he readily accepted.
Drug charge and trial
On December 5, 1979, while Vaughan was in a dressing room before a performance in Houston, an off-duty police officer arrested him after witnessing his usage of cocaine near an open window. He was formally charged with cocaine possession and subsequently released on $1,000 bail. Double Trouble was the opening act for Muddy Waters, who said about Vaughan's substance abuse: "Stevie could perhaps be the greatest guitar player that ever lived, but he won't live to get 40 years old if he doesn't leave that white powder alone." The following year, he was required to return on January 16 and February 29 for court appearances.
During the final court date, on April 17, 1980, Vaughan was sentenced with two years' probation and was prohibited from leaving Texas. Along with a stipulation of entering treatment for drug abuse, he was required to "avoid persons or places of known disreputable or harmful character"; he refused to comply with both of these orders. After a lawyer was hired, his probation officer had the sentence revised to allow him to work outside of the state. The incident later caused him to refuse maid service while staying in hotels during concert tours.
Montreux Jazz Festival
Although popular in Texas at the time, Double Trouble failed to gain national attention. The group's visibility improved when record producer Jerry Wexler recommended them to Claude Nobs, organizer of the Montreux Jazz Festival. He insisted the festival's blues night would be great with Vaughan, whom he called "a jewel, one of those rarities who comes along once in a lifetime", and Nobs agreed to book Double Trouble on July 17.
Vaughan opened with a medley arrangement of Freddie King's song "Hide Away" and his own fast instrumental composition, "Rude Mood". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", Hound Dog Taylor's "Give Me Back My Wig", and Albert Collins' "Collins Shuffle", as well as three original compositions: "Pride and Joy", "Love Struck Baby", and "Dirty Pool". The set ended with boos from the audience. People's James McBride wrote:
According to road manager Don Opperman: "the way I remember it, the 'ooos' and the 'boos' were mixed together, but Stevie was pretty disappointed. Stevie [had] just handed me his guitar and walked off stage, and I'm like, 'are you coming back?' There was a doorway back there; the audience couldn't see the guys, but I could. He went back to the dressing room with his head in his hands. I went back there finally, and that was the end of the show." According to Vaughan: "it wasn't the whole crowd [that booed]. It was just a few people sitting right up front. The room there was built for acoustic jazz. When five or six people boo, wow, it sounds like the whole world hates you. They thought we were too loud, but shoot, I had four army blankets folded over my amp, and the volume level was on 2. I'm used to playin' on 10!" The performance was filmed and later released on DVD in September 2004.
On the following night, Double Trouble was booked in the lounge of the Montreux Casino, with Jackson Browne in attendance. Browne jammed with Double Trouble until the early morning hours and offered them free use of his personal recording studio in downtown Los Angeles. In late November the band accepted his offer and recorded ten songs in two days. While they were in the studio, Vaughan received a telephone call from David Bowie, who met him after the Montreux performance, and he invited him to participate in a recording session for his next studio album, Let's Dance. In January 1983, Vaughan recorded guitar on six of the album's eight songs, including the title track and "China Girl". The album was released on April 14, 1983, and sold over three times as many copies as Bowie's previous album.
National success
In mid-March 1983, Gregg Geller, vice president of A&R at Epic Records, signed Double Trouble to the label at the recommendation of record producer John Hammond. Soon afterward, Epic financed a music video for "Love Struck Baby", which was filmed at the Cherry Tavern in New York City. Vaughan recalled: "we changed the name of the place in the video. Four years ago I got married in a club where we used to play all the time called the Rome Inn. When they closed it down, the owner gave me the sign, so in the video we put that up behind me on the stage."
With the success of Let's Dance, Bowie requested Vaughan as the featured instrumentalist for the upcoming Serious Moonlight Tour, realizing that he was an essential aspect of the album's groundbreaking success. In late April, Vaughan began rehearsals for the tour in Las Colinas, Texas. When contract renegotiations for his performance fee failed, Vaughan abandoned the tour days before its opening date, and he was replaced by Earl Slick. Vaughan commented: "I couldn't gear everything on something I didn't really care a whole lot about. It was kind of risky, but I really didn't need all the headaches." Although contributing factors were widely disputed, Vaughan soon gained major publicity for quitting the tour.
On May 9, the band performed at The Bottom Line in New York City, where they opened for Bryan Adams, with Hammond, Mick Jagger, John McEnroe, Rick Nielsen, Billy Gibbons, and Johnny Winter in attendance. Brandenburg described the performance as "ungodly": "I think Stevie played every lick as loud and as hard and with as much intensity as I've ever heard him." The performance earned Vaughan a positive review published in the New York Post, asserting that Double Trouble outperformed Adams. "Fortunately, Bryan Adams, the Canadian rocker who is opening arena dates for Journey, doesn't headline too often", wrote Martin Porter, who claimed that after the band's performance, the stage had been "rendered to cinders by the most explosively original showmanship to grace the New York stage in some time."
Texas Flood
After acquiring the recordings from Browne's studio, Double Trouble began assembling the material for a full-length LP. The album, Texas Flood, opens with the track "Love Struck Baby", which was written for Lenny on their "love-struck day". He composed "Pride and Joy" and "I'm Cryin'" for one of his former girlfriends, Lindi Bethel. Although both are musically similar, their lyrics are two different perspectives of the relationship. Along with covers of Howlin' Wolf, the Isley Brothers, and Buddy Guy, the album included Vaughan's cover of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood", a song which he became strongly associated with. "Lenny" served as a tribute to his wife, which he composed at the end of their bed.
Texas Flood featured cover art by illustrator Brad Holland, who is known for his artwork for Playboy and The New York Times. Originally envisioned with Vaughan sitting on a horse depicting a promotable resemblance, Holland painted an image of him leaning against a wall with a guitar, using a photograph as a reference. Released on June 13, 1983, Texas Flood peaked at number 38 and ultimately sold half a million copies. While Rolling Stone editor Kurt Loder asserted that Vaughan did not possess a distinctive voice, according to AllMusic senior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the release was a "monumental impact". Billboard described it as "a guitar boogie lovers delight". Agent Alex Hodges commented: "No one knew how big that record would be, because guitar players weren't necessarily in vogue, except for some that were so established they were undeniable ... he was one of the few artists that was recouped on every record in a short period of time."
On June 16, Vaughan gave a performance at Tango nightclub in Dallas, which celebrated the album's release. Assorted VIPs attended the performance, including Ted Nugent, Sammy Hagar, and members of The Kinks and Uriah Heep. Jack Chase, vice president of marketing for Epic, recalled: "the coming-out party at Tango was very important; it was absolutely huge. All the radio station personalities, DJs, program directors, all the retail record store owners and the important managers, press, all the executives from New York came down—about seven hundred people. We attacked in Dallas first with Q102-FM and [DJ] Redbeard. We had the Tango party—it was hot. It was the ticket." The Dallas Morning News reviewed the performance, starting with the rhetorical question; "what if Stevie Ray Vaughan had an album release party and everybody came? It happened Thursday night at Tango. ... The adrenalin must have been gushing through the musicians' veins as they performed with rare finesse and skill."
Following a brief tour in Europe, Hodges arranged an engagement for Double Trouble as The Moody Blues' opening act during a two-month tour of North America. Hodges stated that many people disliked the idea of Double Trouble opening for The Moody Blues, but asserted that a common thread which both bands shared was "album-oriented rock". Shannon described the tour as "glorious": "Our record hadn't become that successful yet, but we were playing in front of coliseums full of people. We just went out and played, and it fit like a glove. The sound rang through those big coliseums like a monster. People were going crazy, and they had no idea who we were!" After appearing on the television series Austin City Limits, the band played a sold-out concert at New York City's Beacon Theatre. Variety wrote that their ninety-minute set at the Beacon "left no doubt that this young Texas musician is indeed the 'guitar hero of the present era.'"
Couldn't Stand the Weather
In January 1984, Double Trouble began recording their second studio album, Couldn't Stand the Weather, at the Power Station, with John Hammond as executive producer and engineer Richard Mullen. Layton later recalled working with Hammond: "he was kind of like a nice hand on your shoulder, as opposed to someone that jumped in and said, 'let's redo this, let's do that more.' He didn't get involved in that way at all. He was a feedback person." As the sessions began, Vaughan's cover of Bob Geddins' "Tin Pan Alley" was recorded while audio levels were being checked. Layton remembers the performance: "... we did probably the quietest version we ever did up 'til that point. We ended it and [Hammond] said; 'that's the best that song will ever sound,' and we went; 'we haven't even got sounds, have we?' He goes, 'that doesn't matter. That's the best you'll ever do that song.' We tried it again five, six, seven times- I can't even remember. But it never quite sounded like it did that first time."
During recording sessions, Vaughan began experimenting with other combinations of musicians, including Fran Christina and Stan Harrison, who played drums and saxophone respectively on the jazz instrumental, "Stang's Swang". Jimmie Vaughan played rhythm guitar on his cover of Guitar Slim's "The Things That I Used to Do" and the title track, the latter of which Vaughan carries a worldly message in his lyrics. According to musicologist Andy Aledort, Vaughan's guitar playing throughout the song is marked by steady rhythmic strumming patterns and improvised lead lines, with a distinctive R&B and soul single-note riff, doubled in octaves by guitar and bass.
Couldn't Stand the Weather was released on May 15, 1984, and two weeks later it had rapidly outpaced the sales of Texas Flood. It peaked at number 31 and spent 38 weeks on the charts. The album includes Vaughan's cover of Jimi Hendrix's song, "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", which provoked inevitable comparisons to Hendrix. According to AllMusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Couldn't Stand the Weather "confirmed that the acclaimed debut was no fluke, while matching, if not bettering, the sales of its predecessor, thereby cementing Vaughan's status as a giant of modern blues." According to authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford, the album "was a major turning point in Stevie Ray Vaughan's development" and Vaughan's singing improved.
Carnegie Hall
On October 4, 1984, Vaughan headlined a performance at Carnegie Hall that included many guest musicians. For the second half of the concert, he added Jimmie as rhythm guitarist, drummer George Rains, keyboardist Dr. John, Roomful of Blues horn section, and featured vocalist Angela Strehli. The ensemble rehearsed for less than two weeks before the performance, and despite the solid dynamics of Double Trouble for the first half of the performance, according to Patoski and Crawford, the big band concept never entirely took form. Before arriving at the engagement, the venue sold out, which made Vaughan overexcited and nervous as he did not calm down until halfway through the third song. A benefit for the T.J. Martell Foundation's work in leukemia and cancer research, he was an important draw for the event. As his scheduled time slot drew closer, he indicated that he preferred traveling to the venue by limousine to avoid being swarmed by fans on the street; the band took the stage around 8:00 p.m. The audience of 2,200 people, which included Vaughan's wife, family and friends, transformed the venue into what Stephen Holden of The New York Times described as "a whistling, stomping roadhouse".
Introduced by Hammond as "one of the greatest guitar players of all time", Vaughan opened with "Scuttle Buttin'", wearing a custom-made mariachi suit he described as a "Mexican tuxedo". Double Trouble went on to perform renditions of the Isley Brothers' "Testify", The Jimi Hendrix Experience's "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)", "Tin Pan Alley", Elmore James' "The Sky Is Crying", and W. C. Clark's "Cold Shot", along with four original compositions including "Love Struck Baby", "Honey Bee", "Couldn't Stand the Weather", and "Rude Mood". During the second half of the performance, Vaughan performed covers by Larry Davis, Buddy Guy, Guitar Slim, Albert King, Jackie Wilson, and Albert Collins. The set ended with Vaughan performing solo renditions of "Lenny" and "Rude Mood".
The Dallas Times-Herald wrote of the performance at Carnegie Hall as; "was full of stomping feet and swaying bodies, kids in blue jeans hanging off the balconies, dancing bodies that clogged the aisles." The New York Times asserted that, despite the venue's "muddy" acoustics, their performance was "filled with verve", and Vaughan's playing was "handsomely displayed". Jimmie Vaughan later commented: "I was worried the crowd might be a little stiff. Turned out they're just like any other beer joint." Vaughan commented: "We won't be limited to just the trio, although that doesn't mean we'll stop doing the trio. I'm planning on doing that too. I ain't gonna stay in one place. If I do, I'm stupid." The performance was recorded and later released as an official live LP. The album was released posthumously on July 29, 1997, by Epic Records; it was ultimately certified gold.
Immediately after the concert, Vaughan attended a private party at a downtown club in New York, which was sponsored by MTV, where he was greeted by an hour's worth of supporters. On the following day, Double Trouble made an appearance at a record store in Greenwich Village, where they signed autographs for fans. In late October 1984, the band toured Australia and New Zealand, which included one of their first appearances on Australian television—on Hey Hey It's Saturday—where they performed "Texas Flood", and an interview on Sounds. On November 5 and 9, they played sold-out concerts at the Sydney Opera House. Upon returning to the U.S., Double Trouble went on a brief tour in California. Soon afterward, Vaughan and Lenny went to the island of Saint Croix, on the U.S. Virgin Islands in the Caribbean Sea, where they had spent some time vacationing in December. The next month, Double Trouble flew to Japan, where they appeared for five performances, including at Kōsei Nenkin Kaikan in Osaka.
Soul to Soul
In March 1985, recording for Double Trouble's third studio album, Soul to Soul, began at the Dallas Sound Lab. As the sessions progressed, Vaughan became increasingly frustrated with his own lack of inspiration. He was also allowed a relaxed pace of recording the album, which contributed to a lack of focus due to excesses in alcohol and other drugs. Roadie Byron Barr later recalled: "the routine was to go to the studio, do dope, and play ping-pong." Vaughan, who found it increasingly difficult to be able to play rhythm guitar parts and sing at the same time, wanted to add another dimension to the band, so he hired keyboardist Reese Wynans to record on the album; he joined the band soon thereafter.
During the album's production, Vaughan appeared at the Houston Astrodome on April 10, 1985, where he performed a slide guitar rendition of the U.S. national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner"; his performance was met with booing. Upon leaving the stage, Vaughan acquired an autograph from former player for the New York Yankees, Mickey Mantle. Astrodome publicist Molly Glentzer wrote in the Houston Press: "as Vaughan shuffled back behind home plate, he was only lucid enough to know that he wanted Mickey Mantle's autograph. Mantle obliged. 'I never signed a guitar before.' Nobody asked Vaughan for his autograph. I was sure he'd be dead before he hit 30." Critics associated his performance with Jimi Hendrix's rendition at Woodstock in 1969, yet Vaughan disliked this comparison: "I heard they even wrote about it in one of the music magazines and they tried to put the two versions side by side. I hate that stuff. His version was great."
Released on September 30, 1985, Soul to Soul peaked at number 34 and remained on the Billboard 200 through mid-1986, eventually certified gold. Critic Jimmy Guterman of Rolling Stone wrote: "there's some life left in their blues rock pastiche; it's also possible that they've run out of gas." According to Patoski and Crawford, sales of the album "did not match Couldn't Stand the Weather, suggesting Stevie Ray and Double Trouble were plateauing". Vaughan commented: "as far as what's on there song-wise, I like the album a lot. It meant a lot to us what we went through to get this record. There were a lot of odds and we still stayed strong. We grew a lot with the people in the band and immediate friends around us; we learned a lot and grew a lot closer. That has a lot to do with why it's called [Soul to Soul]."
Live Alive
After touring for nine and a half months, Epic requested a fourth album from Double Trouble as part of their contractual obligation. In July 1986, Vaughan decided that they would record the LP, Live Alive, during three live appearances in Austin and Dallas. On July 17 and 18, the band performed sold-out concerts at the Austin Opera House, and July 19 at the Dallas Starfest. They used recordings of these concerts to assemble the LP, which was produced by Vaughan. Shannon was backstage before the Austin concert and predicted to new manager Alex Hodges that both Vaughan and himself were "headed for a brick wall". Guitarist Denny Freeman attended the Austin performances; he called the shows a "musical mess, because they would go into these chaotic jams with no control. I didn't know what exactly was going on, but I was concerned." Both Layton and Shannon remarked that their work schedule and drugs were causing the band to lose focus. According to Wynans: "Things were getting illogical and crazy."
The Live Alive album was released on November 17, 1986, and the only official live Double Trouble LP made commercially available during Vaughan's lifetime, though it never appeared on the Billboard 200 chart. Though many critics claimed that most of the album was overdubbed, engineer Gary Olazabal, who mixed the album, asserted that most of the material was recorded poorly. Vaughan later admitted that it was not one of his better efforts; he recalled: "I wasn't in very good shape when we recorded Live Alive. At the time, I didn't realize how bad a shape I was in. There were more fix-it jobs done on the album than I would have liked. Some of the work sounds like [it was] the work of half-dead people. There were some great notes that came out, but I just wasn't in control; nobody was."
Drugs and alcohol
In 1960, when Vaughan was six years old, he began stealing his father's drinks. Drawn in by its effects, he started making his own drinks and this resulted in alcohol dependence. He explained: "that's when I first started stealing daddy's drinks. Or when my parents were gone, I'd find the bottle and make myself one. I thought it was cool ... thought the kids down the street would think it was cool. That's where it began, and I had been depending on it ever since." According to the authors Joe Nick Patoski and Bill Crawford: "In the ensuing twenty-five years, he had worked his way through the Physicians' Desk Reference before finding his poisons of preference—alcohol and cocaine."
While Vaughan asserted that he first experienced the effects of cocaine when a doctor prescribed him a liquid solution of the stimulant as a nasal spray, according to Patoski and Crawford, the earliest that Vaughan is known to have ingested the drug is in 1975, while performing with the Cobras. Before that, Vaughan had briefly used other drugs such as cannabis, methamphetamine, and Quaaludes, the brand name for methaqualone. After 1975, he regularly drank whiskey and used cocaine, particularly mixing the two substances together. According to Hopkins, by the time of Double Trouble's European tour in September 1986, "his lifestyle of substance abuse had reached a peak, probably better characterized as the bottom of a deep chasm."
At the height of Vaughan's substance abuse, he drank of whiskey and used of cocaine each day. Personal assistant Tim Duckworth explained: "I would make sure he would eat breakfast instead of waking up drinking every morning, which was probably the worst thing he was doing." According to Vaughan: "it got to the point where if I'd try to say "hi" to somebody, I would just fall apart crying. It was like solid doom."
In September 1986, Double Trouble traveled to Denmark for a one-month tour of Europe. During the late night hours of September 28, Vaughan became ill after a performance in Ludwigshafen, Germany, suffering from near-death dehydration, for which he received medical treatment. The incident resulted in his checking into The London Clinic under the care of Dr. Victor Bloom, who warned him that he was a month away from death. After staying in London for more than a week, he returned to the United States and entered Peachford Hospital in Atlanta, where he spent four weeks in rehabilitation, and then checked into rehab in Austin.
Live Alive tour
In November 1986, following his departure from rehab, Vaughan moved back into his mother's Glenfield Avenue house in Dallas, which is where he had spent much of his childhood. During this time, Double Trouble began rehearsals for the Live Alive tour. Although Vaughan was nervous about performing after achieving sobriety, he received positive reassurance. Wynans later recalled: "Stevie was real worried about playing after he'd gotten sober...he didn't know if he had anything left to offer. Once we got back out on the road, he was very inspired and motivated." The tour began on November 23 at Towson State University, which was Vaughan's first performance with Double Trouble after rehab. On December 31, 1986, they played a concert at Atlanta's Fox Theatre, which featured encore performances with Lonnie Mack.
As the tour progressed, Vaughan was longing to work on material for his next LP, but in January 1987, he filed for a divorce from Lenny, which restricted him from any projects until the proceedings were finalized. This prevented him from writing and recording songs for almost two years, but Double Trouble wrote the song "Crossfire" with Bill Carter and Ruth Ellsworth. Layton recalled: "we wrote the music, and they had to write the lyrics. We had just gotten together; Stevie was unable to be there at that time. He was in Dallas doing some things, and we just got together and started writing some songs. That was the first one we wrote." On August 6, 1987, Double Trouble appeared at the Austin Aqua Festival, where they played to one of the largest audiences of their career. According to biographer Craig Hopkins, as many as 20,000 people attended the concert. Following a month-long tour as the opening act for Robert Plant in May 1988, which included a concert at Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens, the band was booked for a European leg, which included 22 performances, and ended in Oulu, Finland on July 17. This would be Vaughan's last concert appearance in Europe.
In Step
After Vaughan's divorce from Lenora "Lenny" Darlene Bailey became final, recording for Double Trouble's fourth and final studio album, In Step, began at Kiva Studios in Memphis, Tennessee, working with producer Jim Gaines and co-songwriter Doyle Bramhall. Initially, he had doubts about his musical and creative abilities after achieving sobriety, but he gained confidence as the sessions progressed. Shannon later recalled: "In Step was, for him, a big growing experience. In my opinion, it's our best studio album, and I think he felt that way, too." Bramhall, who had also entered rehab, wrote songs with Vaughan about addiction and redemption. According to Vaughan, the album was titled In Step because "I'm finally in step with life, in step with myself, in step with my music." The album's liner notes include the quote; "'thank God the elevator's broken," a reference to the twelve-step program proposed by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA).
After the In Step recording sessions moved to Los Angeles, Vaughan added horn players Joe Sublett and Darrell Leonard, who played saxophone and trumpet respectively on both "Crossfire" and "Love Me Darlin". Shortly before the album's production was complete, Vaughan and Double Trouble appeared at a presidential inaugural party in Washington, D.C. for George H. W. Bush. In Step was released on June 13, 1989, and eight months later, it was certified gold. The album was Vaughan's most commercially successful release and his first one to win a Grammy Award. It peaked at number 33 on the Billboard 200, spending 47 weeks on the chart. In Step included the song, "Crossfire", which was written by Double Trouble, Bill Carter, and Ruth Ellsworth; it became his only number one hit. The album also included one of his first recordings to feature the use of a Fuzz Face on Vaughan's cover of the Howlin' Wolf song, "Love Me Darlin.
In July 1989, Neil Perry, a writer for Sounds magazine, wrote: "the album closes with the brow-soothing swoon of 'Riviera Paradise,' a slow, lengthy guitar and piano workout that proves just why Vaughan is to the guitar what Nureyev is to ballet." According to music journalist Robert Christgau, Vaughan was "writing blues for AA...he escapes the blues undamaged for the first time in his career." In October 1989, the Boca Raton News described Vaughan's guitar solos as "determined, clear-headed and downright stinging" and his lyrics as "tension-filled allegories".
Death
On Monday, August 27, 1990, at 12:50 a.m. (CDT), Vaughan and members of Eric Clapton's touring entourage played an all-star encore jam session at Alpine Valley Music Theatre in Alpine Valley Resort in East Troy, Wisconsin. They then left for Midway International Airport in Chicago in a Bell 206B helicopter, the most common way for acts to enter and exit the venue, as there is only one road in and out, heavily used by fans. The helicopter crashed into a nearby ski hill shortly after takeoff. Vaughan and the four others on board—pilot Jeff Brown, agent Bobby Brooks, bodyguard Nigel Browne, and tour manager Colin Smythe—died. The helicopter was identified as being owned by Chicago-based company Omniflight Helicopters. Initial reports of the crash erroneously claimed that Clapton had also been killed. According to findings from an inquest conducted by the coroner's office in Elkhorn, all five victims were killed instantly.
The investigation determined the aircraft departed in foggy conditions with visibility reportedly under two miles, according to a local forecast. The National Transportation Safety Board report stated: "As the third helicopter was departing, it remained at a lower altitude than the others, and the pilot turned southeasterly toward rising terrain. Subsequently, the helicopter crashed on hilly terrain about three fifths of a mile from the takeoff point." Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) records showed that Brown was qualified to fly by instruments in a fixed-wing aircraft, but not in a helicopter. Toxicology tests performed on the victims revealed no traces of drugs or alcohol in their systems. Vaughan's funeral service was held on August 31, 1990, at Laurel Land Cemetery in Dallas, Texas. His wooden casket quickly became adorned with bouquets of flowers. An estimated 3,000 mourners joined a procession led by a white hearse. Among those at the public ceremony were Jeff Healey, Charlie Sexton, ZZ Top, Colin James, Stevie Wonder, Bonnie Raitt and Buddy Guy. Vaughan's grave marker reads: "Thank you ... for all the love you passed our way."
Musical style
Vaughan's music was rooted in blues, rock, and jazz. He was influenced by Jimi Hendrix, Albert King, Lonnie Mack, B.B. King, Freddie King, Albert Collins, Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Otis Rush, Guitar Slim, Chuck Berry, and Muddy Waters. According to nightclub owner Clifford Antone, who opened Antone's in 1975, Vaughan jammed with Albert King at Antone's in July 1977 and it almost "scared him to death", saying that "it was the best I've ever saw Albert or the best I ever saw Stevie". While Albert King had a substantial influence on Vaughan, Jimi Hendrix was Vaughan's greatest inspiration. Vaughan declared: "I love Hendrix for so many reasons. He was so much more than just a blues guitarist—he played damn well any kind of guitar he wanted. In fact I'm not sure if he even played the guitar—he played music." He was also influenced by such jazz guitarists as Django Reinhardt, Wes Montgomery, Kenny Burrell, and George Benson.
In 1987, Vaughan listed Lonnie Mack first among the guitarists he had listened to, both as a youngster and as an adult. Vaughan observed that Mack was "ahead of his time" and said, "I got a lot of my fast stuff from Lonnie". On another occasion, Vaughan said that he had learned tremolo picking and vibrato from Mack and that Mack had taught him to "play guitar from the heart." Mack recalled his first meeting with Vaughan in 1978:
Vaughan's relationship with another Texas blues legend, Johnny Winter, was a little more complex. Although they met several times, and often played sessions with the same musicians or even performed the same material, as in the case of Boot Hill, Vaughan always refrained from acknowledging Winter in any form. In his biography, "Raisin' Cain", Winter says that he was unnerved after reading Vaughan stating in an interview that he never met or knew Johnny Winter. "We even played together over at Tommy Shannon's house one time." Vaughan settled the issue in 1988 on the occasion of a blues festival in Europe where both he and Winter were on the bill, explaining that he has been misquoted and that "Every musician in Texas knows Johnny and has learned something from him". Asked to compare their playing styles in an interview in 2010, Winter admitted that "mine's a little bit rawer, I think."
Equipment
Guitars
Vaughan owned and used a variety of guitars during his career. His guitar of choice, and the instrument that he became most associated with, was the Fender Stratocaster, his favorite being a 1963 body with a 1962 neck and pickups dated from 1959. This is why Vaughan usually referred to his Stratocaster as a "1959 Strat". He explained why he favored this guitar in a 1983 interview: "I like the strength of its sound. Any guitar I play has got to be pretty versatile. It's got a big, strong tone and it'll take anything I do to it." Vaughan also referred to this instrument as his "first wife", or "Number One". Another favourite guitar was a slightly later Strat he named 'Lenny' after his wife, Lenora. While at a local pawn shop in 1980, Vaughan had noticed this particular guitar, a 1965 Stratocaster that had been refinished in red, with the original sunburst finish peeking through. It also had a 1910 Mandolin inlay just below the bridge. The pawn shop was asking $300 for it, which was way more than Vaughan had at the time. Lenny saw how badly he wanted this guitar, so she got six of their friends to chip in $50 each, and bought it for him. The guitar was presented to him on his birthday in 1980, and that night, after bringing "Lenny" (the guitar, and wife) home with him, he wrote the song, "Lenny". He started using a borrowed Stratocaster during high school and used Stratocasters predominantly in his live performances and recordings, although he did play other guitars, including custom guitars.
One of the custom guitars—nicknamed "Main"—was built by James Hamilton of Hamiltone Guitars in Buffalo, New York. It was a gift from Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top. Gibbons had commissioned Hamilton to build the guitar in 1979. There were some delays, including having to re-do the mother of pearl inlay of Vaughan's name on the fretboard when he changed his stage name from Stevie Vaughan to Stevie Ray Vaughan. The guitar was presented to him by Jim Hamilton on April 29, 1984. Hamilton recalls that Stevie Ray Vaughan was so happy with the guitar that he played it that night at Springfest on the University of Buffalo campus. It remained one of the main guitars he used on stage and in studio. Vaughan made some alterations to the guitar, including replacing the bronze color Gibson knobs with white Fender knobs, as he preferred the ribbing on the Fender knobs. The pickups had to be changed after the guitar was used in the "Couldn't Stand the Weather" video, in which Stevie and "Main" were drenched with water, and the pickups were ruined. Vaughan preferred guitar has been summarized as his,
Number One Strat, which Stevie claimed to be a ’59, since that was the date stamped on the back of the pickups… this was incorrect, however, as guitar tech Rene Martinez (who oversaw SRV’s guitars since 1980) found the stamp of 1963 on the body and 1962 on the original neck (the neck was replaced in 1989 after it could no longer be refretted properly; Rene used the neck from another SRV favorite, “Red”, as it was also a 1962 model). The pickups are also relatively low output, not the hot overwound myth that gained legs during the 80s… all 3 pickups are rumored to be under 6k ohms output impedance, which would be typical of a 1959 set (the neck pickups tended to be hottest, but not by much). Although the Fender SRV signature model uses Texas Special pickups, which Stevie was heavily involved in the making of, they do not accurately represent the sound of his original Number One.
Vaughan bought many Stratocasters and gave some away as gifts. A sunburst Diplomat Strat-style guitar was purchased by Vaughan and given to his girlfriend Janna Lapidus to learn to play on. Vaughan used a custom set of uncommonly heavy strings, gauges .013, .015, .019, .028, .038, .058, and tuned a half-step below standard tuning. He played with so much tension that it was not uncommon for him to separate his fingernail from the quick movement along the strings. The owner of an Austin club recalled Vaughan coming into the office between sets to borrow super glue, which he used to keep fingernail split from widening while he continued to play. The super glue was suggested by Rene Martinez, who was Stevie's guitar technician. Martinez eventually convinced Stevie to change to slightly lighter strings. He preferred a guitar neck with an asymmetrical profile (thicker at the top) which was more comfortable for his thumb-over style of playing. Heavy use of the vibrato bar necessitated frequent replacements; Vaughan often had his roadie, Byron Barr, obtain custom stainless steel bars made by Barr's father.
Vaughan was also photographed playing a Rickenbacker Capri, a National Duolian, Epiphone Riviera, Gibson Flying V, as well as several other models. Vaughan used a Gibson Johnny Smith to record "Stang's Swang", and a Guild 12-string acoustic for his performance on MTV Unplugged in January 1990. On June 24, 2004, one of Vaughan's Stratocasters, the aforementioned "Lenny" strat, was sold at an auction to benefit Eric Clapton's Crossroads Centre in Antigua; the instrument was bought by Guitar Center for $623,500.
Amplifiers and effects
Vaughan was a catalyst in the revival of vintage amplifiers and effects during the 1980s. His loud volume and use of heavy strings required powerful and robust amplifiers. Vaughan used two black-face Fender Super Reverbs, which were crucial in shaping his clear overdriven sound. He would often blend other amps with the Super Reverbs, including black-face Fender Vibroverbs, and brands such as Dumble, and Marshall, which he used for his clean sound.
While his mainstay effects were the Ibanez Tube Screamer and a Vox wah-wah pedal, Vaughan experimented with a range of effects. He used a Fender Vibratone, designed as a Leslie speaker for electric guitars, and provided a warbling chorus effect, which can be heard on the track "Cold Shot". He used a vintage Dallas Arbiter Fuzz Face that can be heard on In Step, as well as an Octavia. The Guitar Geek website provides a detailed illustration of Vaughan's 1985 equipment set up based on interviews with his guitar tech and effects builder, Cesar Diaz.
Legacy
Vaughan throughout his career revived blues rock and paved the way for many other artists. Vaughan's work continues to influence numerous blues, rock and alternative artists, including John Mayer, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Mike McCready, Albert Cummings, Los Lonely Boys and Chris Duarte, among others. AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine described Vaughan as "the leading light in American blues" and developed "a uniquely eclectic and fiery style that sounded like no other guitarist, regardless of genre". In 1983, Variety magazine called Vaughan the "guitar hero of the present era".
In the months that followed his death, Vaughan sold over 5.5 million albums in the United States. On September 25, 1990, Epic released Family Style, an LP the Vaughan brothers cut at Ardent Studios in Memphis, Tennessee. The label released several promotional singles and videos for the collaborative effort. In November 1990, CMV Enterprises released Pride and Joy, a collection of eight Double Trouble music videos. Sony signed a deal with the Vaughan estate to obtain control of his back catalog, as well as permission to release albums with previously unreleased material and new collections of released work. On October 29, 1991, The Sky Is Crying was released as Vaughan's first posthumous album with Double Trouble, and featured studio recordings from 1984 to 1985. Other compilations, live albums, and films have also been released since his death.
On October 3, 1991, Texas governor Ann Richards proclaimed "Stevie Ray Vaughan Commemoration Day", during which a memorial concert was held at the Texas Theatre. In 1993, a memorial statue of Vaughan was unveiled on Auditorium Shores and is the first public monument of a musician in Austin. In September 1994, a Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Run for Recovery was held in Dallas; the event was a benefit for the Ethel Daniels Foundation, established to help those in recovery from alcoholism and drug addiction who cannot afford treatment. In 1999, the Musicians' Assistance Program (later renamed MusiCares MAP Fund) created the "Stevie Ray Vaughan Award" to honor the memory of Vaughan and to recognize musicians for their devotion to helping other addicts struggling with the recovery process. The recipients include Eric Clapton, David Crosby, Steven Tyler, Alice Cooper, Ozzy Osbourne, Pete Townshend, Chris Cornell, Jerry Cantrell, Mike McCready, among others. In 1993, Martha Vaughan established the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial Scholarship Fund, awarded to students at W.E. Greiner Middle School in Oakcliff who intend to attend college and pursue the arts as a profession.
Awards and honors
Vaughan won five W. C. Handy Awards and was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2000. In 1985, he was named an honorary admiral in the Texas Navy. Vaughan had a single number-one hit on the Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks chart for the song "Crossfire". His album sales in the U.S. stand at over 15 million units. Family Style, released shortly after his death, won the 1991 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album and became his best-selling, non-Double Trouble studio album with over a million shipments in the U.S. In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked him seventh among the "100 Greatest Guitar Players of All Time". He also became eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008, but did not appear on a nominations roster until 2014. He was inducted in the RRHOF alongside Double Trouble in 2015. Guitar World magazine ranked him as Number One in its list of the greatest blues guitarists.
In 1994 the city of Austin, Texas, erected the Stevie Ray Vaughan Memorial on the hiking trail beside Lady Bird Lake.
Discography
Texas Flood (1983)
Couldn't Stand the Weather (1984)
Soul to Soul (1985)
In Step (1989)
Family Style (1990)
The Sky is Crying (1991)
See also
1980s in music
List of blues rock musicians
List of electric blues musicians
List of guitarists
List of Texas blues musicians
Music of Austin, Texas
Music of Texas
Notes
Footnotes
Citations
Sources
Further reading
External links
The Stevie Ray Vaughan Archive
1954 births
1990 deaths
Accidental deaths in Wisconsin
American blues guitarists
American male guitarists
American blues singers
American blues singer-songwriters
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
Blues rock musicians
Double Trouble (band) members
Electric blues musicians
Epic Records artists
Sony Music artists
Grammy Award winners
Lead guitarists
Musicians from Dallas
Texas blues musicians
Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1990
Victims of helicopter accidents or incidents in the United States
20th-century American singers
Slide guitarists
Resonator guitarists
Guitarists from Texas
20th-century American guitarists
People from Oak Cliff, Texas
20th-century American male singers
Musicians killed in aviation accidents or incidents
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Pipe smokers | true | [
"Zoran Dukić (born 1969 Zagreb) is a Croatian classical guitarist. Between 1990 and 1997, Dukić won more competitions than any other guitarist.\n\nLife\n\nHe started to play the guitar at the age of six. He graduated from the Music Academy of Zagreb with Darko Petrinjak and completed his studies with Hubert Käppel at the Hochschule für Music in Cologne, Germany.\n\nHe teaches at the Koninklijk Conservatorium in The Hague and at the Escola Superior de Música de Catalunya in Barcelona.\n\nSabrina Vlaškalić left Serbia to study with Zoran Dukic in The Hague. She said Dukic did not teach her guitar skills but to listen. He would have her listen and then imitate the subtle differences in the performances of Julian Bream or Ida Presti.\n\nRecordings\nAudio recordings at Plushmusic\nMario Castelnuovo-Tedesco: 24 Caprichos de Goya (Naxos 8.572252-53) - Recording: 2008\nDEWA, Stefan Soewandi - Guitarworks II (double CD) (kr 10043, Kreuzberg Records); Dukic and other guitarists - Recording: 1999\nTárrega, Antonio José, Bach, Takemitsu (1023-OPE, Ópera tres) - Recording: 1996\nPrintemps de la Guitare 94 (DMP 9522C, Plein Jeu) - Recording: 1994\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nAudio recordings at Plushmusic\n\nCroatian classical guitarists\n1969 births\nLiving people\nRoyal Conservatory of The Hague faculty",
"WPAQ is an Americana, and Bluegrass-formatted broadcast radio station licensed to Mount Airy, North Carolina, serving the Piedmont of North Carolina and the Southside and Southwestern sections of Virginia. WPAQ is owned and operated by WPAQ Radio, Inc.\n\nHistory\nRalph Epperson observed in 1948 that the popularity of old-time music was falling off, and one area radio station needed to take on the job of preserving it. As a child he enjoyed listening to distant AM radio stations, and in college he changed his major to radio technology. He worked for the United States Naval Research Laboratory before going into broadcasting, and he never dreamed he would own a radio station. But Epperson, his father, and cousin, literally built the new radio station, including the 305-foot tower still used over 65 years later. So much cursing took place that, according to Epperson, one minister said it would take a six-month revival meeting to make up for it. Fiddle player Benton Flippen helped dedicate the new studio February 1, 1948, the night before actual broadcasts began.\n\nEpperson's \"Merry Go-Round,\" which began airing on WPAQ in 1948, was the third-longest live-music show on radio in 1998 (The Grand Ole Opry was the longest-running). In the mid-1990s, the show moved to the Downtown Cinema. At one time, Epperson made recordings of the live performances to air later, and he continued to play these recordings in the 1990s on another show he hosted.\n\nEpperson did pretty much everything, working as a DJ during the day, selling air time, repairing equipment, sometimes sleeping on a cot at the station before he got married.\n\nAmong the big names who played on WPAQ: Bill Monroe's brother Charlie Monroe, Grandpa Jones, Little Jimmy Dickens, Del Reeves, Ralph Stanley, Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs, and Mac Wiseman. Among those local performers making appearances was Tommy Jarrell, a fiddle player from Surry County.\n\nIn the 1950s, WPAQ increased its power to 10,000 watts.\n\nWPAQ has consistently aired Christian music and preaching with entirely a bluegrass and old-time music format, and big band music in the evenings from 6 p.m. until sundown. In addition to music, WPAQ offered local news, community announcements and obituaries. Live broadcasts aired on weekends, with performers waiting as long as six months to go on the air.\n\nPaul Brown, who later became program director of WFDD, worked at WPAQ in the 1980s. He described his experience as \"like walking into another era.\"\n\nThe Winston-Salem Journal article on the station's 50th anniversary described the studios this way:\n\nLittle has changed since Flippin [sic] and his players jammed in Epperson's studio that first night. The golden, 6-inch-thick pine doors built by Epperson's cousin to cloak the sound in the station's studios remain in place. Epperson still uses some of the same equipment he installed at the beginning -- black, hulking boxes of electronics with sturdy knobs and rounded, glass gauges.\n\nUnlike other stations that changed in order to make money, WPAQ remained committed to its traditions.\n\nIn 1996, WPAQ took over WSYD, the other area AM station. Epperson and his wife Earlene owned WBRF in Galax, Virginia.\n\nIn 2005, the Surry Arts Council, using a grant from the North Carolina Arts Council, began working to preserve Epperson's extensive collection of recordings, including lacquered discs and reel-to-reel tapes. The recordings had been stored in boxes, but they were moved to a climate-controlled environment. Then, after an inventory, about 1,000 hours of recordings went to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for cleaning and digital recording, which would allow transfer to compact discs and the Internet. The original recordings were moved to the Southern Folklife Collection.\n\nIn 2006, Epperson was inducted into the North Carolina Broadcasters Hall of Fame.\n\nEpperson's death on May 31, 2006 led to rumors the station would make changes, but his son Kelly Epperson, who had taken over the station, did not plan to change—at least not what the station did. He did change how it was done. On April 5, 2007, which would have been Epperson's 86th birthday, WPAQ began streaming over the Internet—with Flippen playing his fiddle once again for the occasion—allowing the station to be heard all over the world. And responses came from all over the world. Streaming continued even after a significant increase in costs for royalties.\n\nThe station must power down to 7 watts at night to protect clear-channel stations, including CFZM in Toronto, Ontario.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n WPAQ AM740 Online\n\nPAQ"
] |
[
"Harry Price",
"Borley Rectory"
] | C_b266e36c145b4a1a9cd6eae0a45cf57e_1 | What is the Borley Rectory? | 1 | What is the Borley Rectory? | Harry Price | Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex. The building became known as "the most haunted house in England" after Price published a book about it in 1940. He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863. He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book. The psychical researcher John L. Randall wrote there was direct evidence of "dirty tricks" played upon Price by members of the SPR. On 9 October 1931, a past president of the SPR William Henry Salter visited the Borley Rectory in an attempt to persuade the Rector Lionel Foyster, to sever his links with Price and work with the SPR instead. After Price's death in 1948 Eric Dingwall, Kathleen M. Goldney, and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research, two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena. The "Borley Report", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote "when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away." Terence Hines wrote "Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself "salted the mine" and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory." Robert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote Price's defenders are unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly. Price's investigation of Borley was the subject of a 2013 best selling novel by Neil Spring, titled 'The Ghost Hunters.' This novel was subsequently adapted for television as 'Harry Price: Ghost Hunter,' starring Rafe Spall, Cara Theobold and Richie Campbell. CANNOTANSWER | Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex. | Harry Price (17 January 1881 – 29 March 1948) was a British psychic researcher and author, who gained public prominence for his investigations into psychical phenomena and his exposing fraudulent spiritualist mediums. He is best known for his well-publicised investigation of the purportedly haunted Borley Rectory in Essex, England.
Early life
Although Price claimed his birth was in Shropshire he was actually born in London in Red Lion Square on the site of the South Place Ethical Society's Conway Hall. He was educated in New Cross, first at Waller Road Infants School and then Haberdashers' Aske's Hatcham Boys School. At 15, Price founded the Carlton Dramatic Society and wrote plays, including a drama, about his early experience with a poltergeist which he said took place at a haunted manor house in Shropshire.
According to Richard Morris, in his biography Harry Price: The Psychic Detective (2006), Price came to the attention of the press when he claimed an early interest in space-telegraphy. He set up a receiver and transmitter between Telegraph Hill, Hatcham and St Peter's Church Brockley and captured a spark on a photographic plate. This, though, was nothing more than Price writing a press release saying he had performed the experiment, as nothing was verified. The young Price also had an avid interest in coin collecting and wrote several articles for The Askean, the magazine for Haberdashers' School. In his autobiography, Search for Truth, written between 1941 and 1942, Price claimed he was involved with archaeological excavations in Greenwich Park, London, but, in earlier writings on Greenwich, he denied any such involvement.
From around May 1908 Price continued his interest in archaeology at Pulborough, Sussex, where he had moved prior to marrying Constance Mary Knight that August. As well as working as a salesman for paper merchants Edward Saunders & Sons, he wrote for two local Sussex newspapers: the West Sussex Gazette and the Southern Weekly News in which he related his remarkable propensity for discovering 'clean' antiquities. One of these, a 'silver' ingot (discovered by Richard Morris to be housed in Price's collection of artefacts at Senate House, University of London and made of base materials) was stamped around the time of the last Roman emperor Honorius. A few years later, another celebrated Sussex archaeologist, Charles Dawson, found a brick at Pevensey Fort in Sussex, which was purportedly made in Honorius' time. In 1910 Professor E. J Haverfield of Oxford University, the country's foremost expert on Roman history and a Fellow of the Royal Academy, declared the ingot to be a fake.
A report for the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries (number 23, pages 121–9) in the same year reported that:
'... the double axe type of silver ingot was well known and dated from late Imperial times but the one recovered from Sussex was an inferior copy of one found at the Tower of London, with alterations to give it an air of authenticity. Both the shape and lettering betrayed its origin.'
Interest in magic and conjuring
In his autobiography, Search for Truth, Price said the "Great Sequah" in Shrewsbury was "entirely responsible for shaping much of my life's work", and led to him acquiring the first volume of what would become the Harry Price Library, Price later became an expert amateur conjurer, joined the Magic Circle in 1922 and maintained a lifelong interest in stage magic and conjuring. His expertise in sleight-of-hand and magic tricks stood him in good stead for what would become his all consuming passion, the investigation of paranormal phenomena.
The psychical researcher Eric Dingwall and Price re-published an anonymous work written by a former medium entitled Revelations of a Spirit Medium (1922) which exposed the tricks of mediumship and the fraudulent methods of producing "spirit hands". Originally all the copies of the book were bought up by spiritualists and deliberately destroyed.
Psychical research
Price joined the Society for Psychical Research (SPR) in 1920 and because of his knowledge in conjuring had debunked fraudulent mediums but in direct contrast to other magicians, Price endorsed some mediums that he believed were genuine. Price's first major success in psychical research came in 1922 when he exposed the 'spirit' photographer William Hope. In the same year he travelled to Germany together with Eric Dingwall and investigated Willi Schneider at the home of Baron Albert von Schrenck-Notzing in Munich. In 1923, Price exposed the medium Jan Guzyk, according to Price the "man was clever, especially with his feet, which were almost as useful to him as his hands in producing phenomena."
Price wrote that the photographs depicting the ectoplasm of the medium Eva Carrière taken with Schrenck-Notzing looked artificial and two-dimensional made from cardboard and newspaper portraits and that there were no scientific controls as both her hands were free. In 1920 Carrière was investigated by psychical researchers in London. An analysis of her ectoplasm revealed it to be made of chewed paper. She was also investigated in 1922 and the result of the tests were negative. In 1925, Price investigated Maria Silbert and caught her using her feet and toes to move objects in the séance room. He also investigated the "direct voice" mediumship of George Valiantine in London. In the séance Valiantine claimed to have contacted the "spirit" of the composer Luigi Arditi , speaking in Italian. Price wrote down every word that was attributed to Arditi and they were found to be word-for-word matches in an Italian phrase-book.
Price formed an organisation in 1925 called the National Laboratory of Psychical Research as a rival to the Society for Psychical Research. Price had a number of disputes with the SPR, most notably over the mediumship of Rudi Schneider. Price paid mediums to test them-the SPR criticised Price and disagreed about paying mediums for testing.
Price made a formal offer to the University of London to equip and endow a Department of Psychical Research, and to loan the equipment of the National Laboratory and its library. The University of London Board of Studies in Psychology responded positively to this proposal. In 1934, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research, which held Price's collection, was reconstituted as the University of London Council for Psychical Investigation with C. E. M. Joad as chairman and with Price as Honorary Secretary and editor, although it was not an official body of the University. In the meantime, in 1927 Price joined the Ghost Club, of which he remained a member until it (temporarily) closed in 1936.
In 1927, Price claimed that he had come into possession of Joanna Southcott's box, and arranged to have it opened in the presence of one reluctant prelate (the Bishop of Grantham, not a diocesan bishop but a suffragan of the Diocese of Lincoln): it was found to contain only a few oddments and unimportant papers, among them a lottery ticket and a horse-pistol. His claims to have had the true box have been disputed by historians and by followers of Southcott. Price exposed Frederick Tansley Munnings, who claimed to produce the independent "spirit" voices of Julius Caesar, Dan Leno, Hawley Harvey Crippen and King Henry VIII. Price invented and used a piece of apparatus known as a voice control recorder and proved that all the voices were those of Munnings. In 1928, Munnings admitted fraud and sold his confessions to a Sunday newspaper.
Price was friends with other debunkers of fraudulent mediums including Harry Houdini and the journalist Ernest Palmer.
In 1933, Frank Decker was investigated by Price at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Under strict scientific controls that Price contrived, Decker failed to produce any phenomena at all. Price's psychical research continued with investigations into Karachi's Indian rope trick and the fire-walking abilities of Kuda Bux in 1935. He was also involved in the formation of the National Film Library (British Film Institute) becoming its first chairman (until 1941) and was a founding member of the Shakespeare Film Society. In 1936, Price broadcast from a supposedly haunted manor house in Meopham, Kent for the BBC and published The Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter and The Haunting of Cashen's Gap. This year also saw the transfer of Price's library on permanent loan to the University of London (see external links below), followed shortly by the laboratory and investigative equipment. In 1937, he conducted further televised experiments into fire-walking with Ahmed Hussain at Carshalton and Alexandra Palace, and also rented Borley Rectory for one year. The following year, Price re-established the Ghost Club, with himself as chairman, modernising it and changing it from a spiritualist association to a group of more or less open-minded sceptics that gathered to discuss paranormal topics. He was also the first to admit women to the club.
In the same year, Price conducted experiments with Rahman Bey who was "buried alive" in Carshalton. He also drafted a Bill for the regulation of psychic practitioners. In 1939, he organised a national telepathic test in the periodical John O'London's Weekly. During the 1940s, Price concentrated on writing and the works The Most Haunted House in England, Poltergeist Over England and The End of Borley Rectory were all published.
Famous cases
William Hope
On 4 February 1922, Price with James Seymour, Eric Dingwall and William Marriott had proven the spirit photographer William Hope was a fraud during tests at the British College of Psychic Science. Price wrote in his SPR report "William Hope has been found guilty of deliberately substituting his own plates for those of a sitter ... It implies that the medium brings to the sitting a duplicate slide and faked plates for fraudulent purposes."
Price secretly marked Hope's photographic plates, and provided him with a packet of additional plates that had been covertly etched with the brand image of the Imperial Dry Plate Co. Ltd. in the knowledge that the logo would be transferred to any images created with them. Unaware that Price had tampered with his supplies, Hope then attempted to produce a number of Spirit photographs. Although Hope produced several images of alleged spirits, none of his materials contained the Imperial Dry Plate Co. Ltd logo, or the marks that Price had put on Hope's original equipment, showing that he had exchanged prepared materials containing fake spirit images for the provided materials.
Price later re-published the Society's experiment in a pamphlet of his own called Cold Light on Spiritualistic "Phenomena" – An Experiment with the Crewe Circle. Due to the exposure of Hope and other fraudulent spiritualists, Arthur Conan Doyle led a mass resignation of eighty-four members of the Society for Psychical Research, as they believed the Society was opposed to spiritualism. Doyle threatened to have Price evicted from his laboratory and claimed if he persisted to write "sewage" about spiritualists, he would meet the same fate as Houdini. Doyle and other spiritualists attacked Price and tried for years to have Price take his pamphlet out of circulation. Price wrote "Arthur Conan Doyle and his friends abused me for years for exposing Hope."
Eileen Garrett
On 7 October 1930 it was claimed by spiritualists that Eileen J. Garrett made contact with the spirit of Herbert Carmichael Irwin at a séance held with Price at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research two days after the R101 disaster, while attempting to contact the then recently deceased Arthur Conan Doyle, and discussed possible causes of the accident. The event "attracted worldwide attention", thanks to the presence of a reporter. Major Oliver Villiers, a friend of Brancker, Scott, Irwin, Colmore and others aboard the airship, participated in further séances with Garrett, at which he claimed to have contacted both Irwin and other victims. Price did not come to any definite conclusion about Garrett and the séances:
It is not my intention to discuss if the medium were really controlled by the discarnate entity of Irwin, or whether the utterances emanated from her subconscious mind or those of the sitters. "Spirit" or "trance personality" would be equally interesting explanations – and equally remarkable. There is no real evidence for either hypothesis. But it is not my intention to discuss hypotheses, but rather to put on record the detailed account of a remarkably interesting and thought-provoking experiment.
Garrett's claims have since been questioned. The magician John Booth analysed the mediumship of Garrett and the paranormal claims of R101 and considered her to be a fraud. According to Booth Garrett's notes and writings show she followed the building of the R101 and she may have been given aircraft blueprints by a technician from the airdrome. However, the researcher Melvin Harris who studied the case wrote no secret accomplice was needed as the information described in Garrett's séances were "either commonplace, easily absorbed bits and pieces, or plain gobbledegook. The so-called secret information just doesn't exist."
Rudi Schneider
In the 1920s and early 1930s Price investigated the medium Rudi Schneider in a number of experiments conducted at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Schneider claimed he could levitate objects but according to Price a photograph taken on 28 April 1932 showed that Schneider had managed to free his arm to move a handkerchief from the table. After this, many scientists considered Schneider to be exposed as a fraud. Price wrote that the findings of the other experiments should be revised due to the evidence showing how Schneider could free himself from the controls.
After Price had exposed Schneider, various scientists, such as Karl Przibram and the magician Henry Evans, wrote to Price telling him that they agreed that Schneider would evade control during his séances and congratulated Price on the success of unmasking the fraud. In opposition, SPR members who were highly critical of Price, supported Schneider's mediumship and promoted a conspiracy theory that Price had hoaxed the photograph. SPR member Anita Gregory claimed Price had deliberately faked the photograph to discredit SPR research and ruin Schneider's reputation. However, a photographic expert testified that the photograph was genuine. SPR member John L. Randall reviewed the Price and Schneider case and came to the conclusion that the photograph was genuine and that Price had caught Schneider in fraud.
Helen Duncan
In 1931, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research took on its most illustrious case. £50 was paid to the medium Helen Duncan so that she could be examined under scientific conditions. Price was sceptical of Duncan and had her perform a number of test séances. She was suspected of swallowing cheesecloth which was then regurgitated as "ectoplasm". Price had proven through analysis of a sample of ectoplasm produced by Duncan, that it was made of cheesecloth. Duncan reacted violently at attempts to X-ray her, running from the laboratory and making a scene in the street, where her husband had to restrain her, destroying the controlled nature of the test. Price wrote that Duncan had given her fake ectoplasm to her husband to hide. The ectoplasm of Duncan in another test was analysed by psychical researchers and reported to be made from egg white. According to Price:
The sight of half-a-dozen men, each with a pair of scissors waiting for the word, was amusing. It came and we all jumped. One of the doctors got hold of the stuff and secured a piece. The medium screamed and the rest of the "teleplasm" went down her throat. This time it wasn't cheese-cloth. It proved to be paper, soaked in white of egg, and folded into a flattened tube ... Could anything be more infantile than a group of grown-up men wasting time, money, and energy on the antics of a fat female crook.
Price wrote up the case in Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book (1933) in a chapter called "The Cheese-Cloth Worshippers". In his report Price published photographs of Duncan in his laboratory that revealed fake ectoplasm made from cheesecloth, rubber gloves and cut-out heads from magazine covers which she pretended to her audience were spirits. Following the report written by Price, Duncan's former maid Mary McGinlay confessed in detail to having aided Duncan in her mediumship tricks, and Duncan's husband admitted the ectoplasm materialisations to be the result of regurgitation. Later Duncan was caught cheating again pretending to be a spirit in the séance room. During Duncan's famous trial in 1944, Price gave his results as evidence for the prosecution. This time Duncan and her travelling companions, Frances Brown, Ernest and Elizabeth Homer were prosecuted and convicted. Duncan was jailed for nine months, Brown for four months and the Homers were bound over.
Brocken experiment
In 1932, Price travelled to Mount Brocken in Germany with C. E. M. Joad and members of the National Laboratory to conduct a 'black magic' experiment in connection with the centenary of Goethe. The "Bloksberg Tryst", involving the transformation of a goat into a young man by the invocation of a maiden, Ura Bohn (better known as the film actress Gloria Gordon, 1881–1962), produced a great deal of publicity but not the magical transformation. Price claimed he carried out the experiment "if only to prove the fallacy of transcendental magic."
Gef
In July 1935 Price and his friend Richard Lambert went to the Isle of Man to investigate the alleged case of Gef the talking mongoose and produced the book The Haunting of Cashen's Gap (1936). In the book they avoided saying that they believed the story but were careful to report it as though with an open mind. The book reports how a hair from the alleged mongoose was sent to Julian Huxley who then sent it to naturalist F. Martin Duncan who identified it as a dog hair. Price suspected the hair belonged to the Irving's sheepdog, Mona.
Price asked Reginald Pocock of the Natural History Museum to evaluate pawprints allegedly made by Gef in plasticine together with an impression of his supposed tooth marks. Pocock could not match them to any known animal, though he conceded that one of them might have been "conceivably made by a dog". He did state that none of the markings had been made by a mongoose.
Price visited the Irvings and observed double walls of wooden panelling covering the interior rooms of the old stone farmhouse which featured considerable interior air space between stone and wood walls that "makes the whole house one great speaking-tube, with walls like soundingboards. By speaking into one of the many apertures in the panels, it should be possible to convey the voice to various parts of the house." According to Richard Wiseman "Price and Lambert were less than enthusiastic about the case, concluding that only the most credulous of individuals would be impressed with the evidence for Gef."
The diaries of James Irving, along with reports about the case, are in Harry Price's archives in the Senate House Library, University of London.
Borley Rectory
Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex. The building became known as "the most haunted house in England" after Price published a book about it in 1940. He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863. He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book.
The psychical researcher John L. Randall wrote there was direct evidence of "dirty tricks" played upon Price by members of the SPR. On 9 October 1931, a past president of the SPR, William Henry Salter, visited the Borley Rectory in an attempt to persuade the Rector Lionel Foyster to sever his links with Price and work with the SPR instead. After Price's death in 1948 Eric Dingwall, Kathleen M. Goldney, and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research, two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena.
The "Borley Report", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote "when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away." Terence Hines wrote "Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself "salted the mine" and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory."
Robert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote Price's defenders are unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly.
Price's investigation of Borley was the subject of a 2013 best selling novel by Neil Spring, titled The Ghost Hunters. This novel was subsequently adapted for television as Harry Price: Ghost Hunter, starring Rafe Spall, Cara Theobold and Richie Campbell.
Rosalie
Price claimed to have attended a private séance on 15 December 1937 in which a small six-year-old girl called Rosalie appeared. Price wrote he controlled the room by placing starch powder over the floor, locking the door and taping the windows before the séance. However, the identity of the sitters, or the locality where the séance was held was not revealed due to the alleged request of the mother of the child. During the séance Price claimed a small girl emerged, she spoke and he took her pulse. Price was suspicious that the supposed spirit of the child was no different than a human being but after the séance had finished the starch powder was undisturbed and none of the seals had been removed on the window. Price was convinced no one had entered the room via door or window during the séance. Price's Fifty Years of Psychical Research (1939) describes his experiences at the sitting and includes a diagram of the séance room.
Eric Dingwall and Trevor Hall wrote the Rosalie séance was fictitious and Price had lied about the whole affair but had based some of the details on the description of the house from a sitting he attended at a much earlier time in Brockley, South London where he used to live. K. M. Goldney who had criticised Price over his investigation into Borley Rectory wrote after the morning of the Rosalie sitting she found Price "shaken to the core by his experience." Goldney believed Price had told the truth about the séance and informed the Two Worlds spiritualist weekly newspaper that she believed the Rosalie sitting to be genuine.
In 1985, Peter Underwood published a photograph of part of an anonymous letter that was sent to the SPR member David Cohen in the 1960s which claimed to be from a séance sitter who attended the séance. The letter confessed to having impersonated the Rosalie child in the sitting by the request of the father who had owed the mother of the child money. In 2017, Paul Adams published details of the location of the Rosalie seance and identities of the family involved.
Reception
Psychologist and sceptic Richard Wiseman has praised Price for his work in debunking fraudulent mediums and investigating paranormal claims. According to Wiseman "Price devoted the scientific study to weird stuff ... that both delighted the world's media and infuriated believers and sceptics alike." The stage magician and scientific sceptic James Randi wrote Price accomplished some valuable and genuine research but lived "a strange mixture of fact and fraud."
Psychical researcher Renée Haynes described Price as "one of the most fascinating and storm-provoking figures in psychical research." Science writer Mary Roach in her book Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife (2010) favourably mentioned Price's methods and research in debunking the fraudulent medium Helen Duncan.
Several biographies have been written about Price. Paul Tabori's biography (1974) is generally sympathetic. Historian Trevor H. Hall's (1978) is much more critical. The latest biography by Richard Morris (2006) is also critical, concluding that Price should best be remembered as a "supreme bluffer, a hedonistic con man, a terrific raconteur, a great conjuror, a gifted writer and a wonderful eccentric."
Death and legacy
Price suffered a massive heart attack at his home in Pulborough, West Sussex and died almost instantly on 29 March 1948.
His archives were deposited with the University of London between 1976 and 1978 by his widow. They include his correspondence, drafts of his publications, papers relating to libel cases, reports on his investigations, press cuttings and photographs. His collection of magic books and periodicals is held at Senate House Library, part of the University of London and is called the Harry Price Library of Magical Literature. The collection, which includes 13,000 items, was established by a bequest from his estate in 1948.
Published works
Revelations of a Spirit Medium, with Eric Dingwall, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co. Ltd, London, 1922.
Cold Light on Spiritualistic "Phenomena" – An Experiment with the Crewe Circle, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., 1922.
Stella C. An Account of Some Original Experiments in Psychical Research, Hurst & Blackett, 1925.
Rudi Schneider: A Scientific Examination of his Mediumship, Methuen & Co., London, 1930.
Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book, Victor Gollancz, London, 1933.
Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter, Putnam & Co., 1936.
The Haunting of Cashen's Gap: A Modern "Miracle" Investigated – with R.S. Lambert, Methuen & Co., 1936.
Fifty Years of Psychical Research: A Critical Survey Longmans, Green & Co., 1939.
The Most Haunted House in England: Ten Years' Investigation of Borley Rectory, Longmans, Green & Co., 1940.
Search for Truth: My Life for Psychical Research, Collins, 1942.
Poltergeist Over England: Three Centuries of Mischievous Ghosts, Country Life, 1945.
The End of Borley Rectory, Harrap & Co., 1946.
See also
Psychic telephone
James Randi
References
Bibliography
Harry Price, Biography of a Ghost Hunter by Paul Tabori, Athenaem Press, hardback, 1950. (Reprinted in 1974 by Sphere Books)
Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book, by Harry Price, Victor Gollancz Ltd., hardback, 1933.
Harry Price: The Psychic Detective by Richard Morris, Sutton Publishing hardback, 2006. .
External links
Harry Price Collection of Magical Literature at Senate House Library
Harry Price Archives
Harry Price Website
The Hunter of Ghosts by Leon Gellert
The Milwaukee Sentinel – Oct 1, 1933
The Milwaukee Sentinel – Oct 15, 1933
1881 births
1948 deaths
British writers
Parapsychologists
Paranormal investigators
People associated with Conway Hall Ethical Society | true | [
"Borley is a village and civil parish in rural north Essex, England close to the border with Suffolk. It is located near the River Stour. The closest town is Sudbury, Suffolk,\napproximately southeast of Borley; Sudbury is also the Post Town used by Royal Mail for Borley. The neighbouring parishes are Foxearth, Belchamp Walter and Bulmer.\n\nHistory\nThe name Borley may be a compound of the Saxon words \"Bap\" and \"Ley\", that is \"Boar's Pasture\". Recent local research suggests that the name Borley may be derived from the Celtic ‘borle’, meaning ‘summer meadows’ which are still a prominent feature of the area. A smaller parish, Borley Parva, was joined with Foxearth in the Middle Ages.\n\nIn the 11th century, the manor of Borley was held by a freeman called Lewin; by 1086, the Domesday Book records Borley manor in the hands of Adeliza, Countess of Albemarle (half-sister of William the Conqueror); it was subsequently transferred to Edward I.\n\nA document from 1308 sets out the 'Extent' of the manor, listing the main occupants and the rental income. Forty-six people are named in the extent: seven as free tenants, seven as molmen, 27 as villeins and five as cotemen – with an estimated population of 230. In 1346, the manor of Borley was transferred to the priory of Christ Church, Canterbury.\n\nFrom the 16th century, Borley was associated with the Waldegraves, one of the leading Essex Catholic families. Sir Edward Waldegrave, a courtier to Queen Mary, purchased the manor of Borley in 1546 and it became his principal residence. He died in the Tower of London in 1561 aged forty-four having fallen out of favour with Queen Elizabeth; his widow, Lady Frances Neville, later erected a monument to him and herself in Borley Church.\n\nFrom early times until local government reforms in 1894, Borley was one of the parishes in the Hinckford Hundred. It then became an area in Belchamp Rural District Council until that, in turn, was abolished in 1974 with the creation of Braintree District Council.\n\nLocal government\nDue to its small population, decision-making at parish level is through a Parish Meeting open to all electors rather than an elected council. \nBorley is in part of England having two tiers of \"principal\" local authorities. It is one of 12 parishes making up Stour Valley North Ward, which is represented by a district councillor on Braintree District Council. It is also within the area of Essex County Council, represented by one county councillor as part of the Hedingham County Electoral Division.\n\nFor elections to the UK Parliament, Borley is in the constituency of Braintree.\n\nNatural and built environment\n\nBorley consists of three clusters of buildings: one closest to the River Stour, including the village hall; one around the parish church; and a third at Borley Green. In 2012, there were 89 voting residents in a total of around 110, occupying 49 dwellings. Borley is notable for the high proportion of Listed Buildings. There are 15 Grade II listed houses, including Borley Hall (the fragment of a once much larger house), Borley Place (at one time the rectory) and Borley Lodge. The Grade I listed church (dedication unknown) is a small building of stone originally in the Romanesque/Early English style of the late 12th and early 13th centuries. Pevsner notes that a \"topiary walk to the porch is the most notable feature of the church\".\n\nThere is no \"defined village envelope\" and therefore for planning purposes, Borley and Borely Green (an area of grassland owned by Braintree District Council) are considered to be \"countryside\". Borley is located within Natural England's South Suffok and North Essex Clayland National Character Area, with \"an ancient landscape of wooded arable countryside with a distinct sense of enclosure\".\n\nBorley in popular culture\n\nDuring the 20th century, Borley became well known for the 'Borley Rectory Affair', involving the supposed haunting of a Victorian rectory (demolished in 1944). Beginning in 1929, psychical researcher Harry Price generated a story that captured the attention of the nation and convinced many of the proof of the permanence of the spirit after death. His supposed activities were reported widely by the press of that time, and Price published several popular books on the subject that brought him considerable fame. After Price's death, the story began to unravel under the scrutiny of experts from the Society for Psychical Research. The Society went through the records with great tenacity, suspecting that Price had exaggerated evidence to sensationalise events and to suggest supernatural causes for mundane phenomena. Any possible evidence of ghosts was irredeemably contaminated by Price's behaviour and the manipulation of the facts in his two books, The Most Haunted House in England and The End of Borley Rectory, produced during and immediately after the Second World War.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n The Foxearth and District Local History Society (covering Borley and surrounding area)\n Borley Parish Meeting\n\nVillages in Essex\nBraintree District",
"Borley Rectory was a house famous for being described as \"the most haunted house in England\" by psychic researcher Harry Price. Built in 1862 to house the rector of the parish of Borley and his family, it was badly damaged by fire in 1939 and demolished in 1944.\n\nThe large Gothic-style rectory in the village of Borley had been alleged to be haunted ever since it was built. These reports multiplied suddenly in 1929, after the Daily Mirror published an account of a visit by paranormal researcher Harry Price, who wrote two books supporting claims of paranormal activity.\n\nPrice's reports prompted a formal study by the Society for Psychical Research (SPR), which rejected most of the sightings as either imagined or fabricated and cast doubt on Price's credibility. His claims are now generally discredited by ghost historians. However, neither the SPR's report nor the more recent biography of Price has quelled public interest in these stories, and new books and television documentaries continue to satisfy public fascination with the rectory.\n\nA short programme commissioned by the BBC about the alleged manifestations, scheduled to be broadcast in September 1956, was cancelled owing to concerns about a possible legal action by Marianne Foyster, widow of the last rector to live in the house.\nIn 1975, the BBC aired a programme entitled The Ghost Hunters that focussed on Borley Rectory and conducted interviews with several psychic researchers, including Peter Underwood. It also featured a late-night psychic investigation of nearby Borley Church.\n\nHistory\nBorley Rectory was constructed on Hall Road near Borley Church by the Reverend Henry Dawson Ellis Bull in 1862; he moved in a year after being named rector of the parish. The house replaced an earlier rectory on the site that had been destroyed by fire in 1841. It was eventually enlarged by the addition of a wing to house Bull's family of fourteen children.\n\nThe nearby church, the nave of which may date from the 12th century, serves a scattered rural community of three hamlets that make up the parish. There are several substantial farmhouses and the fragmentary remains of Borley Hall, once the seat of the Waldegrave family. Ghost hunters quote the legend of a Benedictine monastery supposedly built in this area in about 1362, according to which a monk from the monastery conducted a relationship with a nun from a nearby convent. After their affair was discovered, the monk was executed and the nun reportedly bricked up alive in the convent walls. It was confirmed in 1938 that this legend had no historical basis known and could have been fabricated by the rector's children to romanticise their Gothic-style red-brick rectory. The story of the walling up of the nun may have come from Rider Haggard's novel Montezuma's Daughter (1893) or Walter Scott's epic poem Marmion (1808).\n\nHauntings\n\nThe first paranormal events reportedly occurred in about 1863, since a few locals later remembered having heard unexplained footsteps within the house at about that time. On 28 July 1900, four daughters of the rector, Henry Dawson Ellis Bull, saw what they thought was the ghost of a nun at twilight, about from the house; they tried to talk to it, but it disappeared as they got closer. The local organist Ernest Ambrose later said that the family at the rectory were \"very convinced that they had seen an apparition on several occasions\". Various people claimed to have witnessed a variety of puzzling incidents, such as a phantom coach driven by two headless horsemen, during the next four decades. Bull died in 1892 and his son, the Reverend Henry (\"Harry\") Foyster Bull, took over the living.\n\nOn 9 June 1927, Harry Bull died and the rectory again became vacant. In the following year, on the second day of October, the Reverend Guy Eric Smith and his wife moved into the house. Soon after moving in, Smith's wife, while cleaning out a cupboard, came across a brown paper package containing the skull of a young woman. Shortly after, the family reported a variety of incidents including the sounds of servant bells ringing despite their being disconnected, lights appearing in windows and unexplained footsteps. In addition, Smith's wife believed she saw a horse-drawn carriage at night. The Smiths contacted the Daily Mirror asking to be put in touch with the Society for Psychical Research (SPR). On 10 June 1929 the newspaper sent a reporter, who promptly wrote the first in a series of articles detailing the mysteries of Borley. The paper also arranged for Harry Price, a paranormal researcher, to make his first visit to the house. He arrived on 12 June and immediately phenomena of a new kind appeared, such as the throwing of stones, a vase and other objects. \"Spirit messages\" were tapped out from the frame of a mirror. As soon as Price left, these ceased. Smith's wife later maintained that she already suspected Price, an expert conjurer, of falsifying the phenomena.\n\nThe Smiths left Borley on 14 July 1929 and the parish had some difficulty in finding a replacement. The following year the Reverend Lionel Algernon Foyster (1878–1945), a first cousin of the Bulls, and his wife Marianne (née Mary Anne Emily Rebecca Shaw) (1899–1992) moved into the rectory with their adopted daughter Adelaide, on 16 October 1930. Lionel Foyster wrote an account of various strange incidents that occurred between the time the Foysters moved in and October 1935, which was sent to Harry Price. These included bell-ringing, windows shattering, throwing of stones and bottles, wall-writing and the locking of their daughter in a room with no key. Marianne Foyster reported to her husband a whole range of poltergeist phenomena that included her being thrown from her bed. On one occasion, Adelaide was attacked by \"something horrible\". Foyster tried twice to conduct an exorcism, but his efforts were fruitless; in the middle of the first exorcism, he was struck in the shoulder by a fist-size stone. Because of the publicity in the Daily Mirror, these incidents attracted the attention of several psychic researchers, who after investigation were unanimous in suspecting that they were caused, consciously or unconsciously, by Marianne Foyster. She later said that she felt that some of the incidents were caused by her husband in concert with one of the psychic researchers, but other events appeared to her to be genuine paranormal phenomena.\n\nShe later admitted that she was having a sexual relationship with the lodger Frank Pearless, and that she used paranormal explanations, to cover up her liaisons.\n\nThe Foysters left Borley in October 1935 as a result of Lionel Foyster's ill health.\n\nPrice investigation\nBorley remained vacant for some time after the Foysters' departure. In May 1937, Price took out a year-long rental agreement with Queen Anne's Bounty, the owners of the property.\n\nThrough an advertisement in The Times on 25 May 1937 and subsequent personal interviews, Price recruited a corps of 48 \"official observers\", mostly students, who spent periods, mainly during weekends, at the rectory with instructions to report any phenomena that occurred. In March 1938 Helen Glanville (the daughter of S. J. Glanville, one of Price's helpers) conducted a planchette séance in Streatham in south London. Price reported that she made contact with two spirits, the first of which was that of a young nun who identified herself as Marie Lairre. According to the planchette story, Marie was a French nun who left her religious order and travelled to England to marry a member of the Waldegrave family, the owners of Borley's 17th-century manor house, Borley Hall. She was said to have been murdered in an older building on the site of the rectory, and her body either buried in the cellar or thrown into a disused well. The wall writings were alleged to be her pleas for help; one read \"Marianne, please help me get out\".\n\nThe second spirit to be contacted identified himself as Sunex Amures, and claimed that he would set fire to the rectory at nine o'clock that night, 27 March 1938. He also said that, at that time, the bones of a murdered person would be revealed.\n\nFire\n\nOn 27 February 1939 the new owner of the rectory, Captain W. H. Gregson, was unpacking boxes and accidentally knocked over an oil lamp in the hallway. The fire quickly spread and the house was severely damaged. After investigating the cause of the blaze the insurance company concluded that the fire seemed to have been started deliberately.\n\nA Miss Williams from nearby Borley Lodge said she saw the figure of the ghostly nun in the upstairs window and, according to Harry Price, demanded a fee of one guinea for her story. In August 1943, Price conducted a brief dig in the cellars of the ruined house and discovered two bones thought to be of a young woman.\n\nThe bones were given a Christian burial in Liston churchyard, after the parish of Borley refused to allow the ceremony to take place on account of the local opinion that the bones found were those of a pig.\n\nThe land of what was the Rectory has been divided up partly with a farm and four bungalows (probably built in the 1960's).\n\nSociety for Psychical Research investigation\n\nAfter Price's death in 1948, Daily Mail reporter Charles Sutton accused him of faking phenomena. Sutton claimed that whilst visiting the rectory with Price in 1929 he was hit on the head by a large pebble. Sutton stated that he seized Price and found his coat pockets filled with different sized stones.\n\nIn 1948, Eric Dingwall, K. M. Goldney and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research (SPR), two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded that Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena.\n\nThe \"Borley Report\", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote \"when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away.\" Terence Hines wrote that \"Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself 'salted the mine' and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory.\"\n\nMarianne Foyster, later in her life, admitted she had seen no apparitions and that the alleged ghostly noises were caused by the wind, friends she invited to the house and in other cases by herself playing practical jokes on her husband. Many of the legends about the rectory had been invented. The children of the Rev. Harry Bull who lived in the house before Lionel Foyster claimed to have seen nothing and were surprised they had been living in what was described as England's most haunted house.\n\nRobert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote that Price's defenders were unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly.\n\nFilm\nIn 2017, the part-animated film Borley Rectory: The Most Haunted House in England was released. It was written and directed by Ashley Thorpe and starred Reece Shearsmith and Jonathan Rigby.\n\nIn 2021, the feature film The Ghosts Of Borley Rectory was released. It was written and directed by Steven M. Smith and starred Julian Sands, Toyah Willcox, Colin Baker and Christopher Ellison.\n\nSee also\nList of ghosts\n\nReferences\n\nNotes\n\nCitations\n\nBibliography\n\nFurther reading\n\nExternal links\n\nHarry Price Website – Contains a comprehensive section on Borley Rectory\nGhostbuster of Fraud by Simon Edge, reprinted in HarryPrice website\nLocal History site for Borley – Has a comprehensive historical analysis of the Borley Rectory affair\nLarge collection of photographs of Borley Rectory and the various participants of the affair \n Harry Price papers including archives on Borley Rectory\n 3D Interactive model built in Google Sketchup from the original Glanville plans\n\nClergy houses in England\nHouses in Essex\nEssex folklore\nParanormal hoaxes\nReportedly haunted locations in the East of England\nHouses completed in 1862"
] |
[
"Harry Price",
"Borley Rectory",
"What is the Borley Rectory?",
"Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex."
] | C_b266e36c145b4a1a9cd6eae0a45cf57e_1 | What happened at the Borley Rectory? | 2 | What happened to Harry Price at the Borley Rectory? | Harry Price | Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex. The building became known as "the most haunted house in England" after Price published a book about it in 1940. He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863. He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book. The psychical researcher John L. Randall wrote there was direct evidence of "dirty tricks" played upon Price by members of the SPR. On 9 October 1931, a past president of the SPR William Henry Salter visited the Borley Rectory in an attempt to persuade the Rector Lionel Foyster, to sever his links with Price and work with the SPR instead. After Price's death in 1948 Eric Dingwall, Kathleen M. Goldney, and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research, two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena. The "Borley Report", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote "when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away." Terence Hines wrote "Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself "salted the mine" and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory." Robert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote Price's defenders are unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly. Price's investigation of Borley was the subject of a 2013 best selling novel by Neil Spring, titled 'The Ghost Hunters.' This novel was subsequently adapted for television as 'Harry Price: Ghost Hunter,' starring Rafe Spall, Cara Theobold and Richie Campbell. CANNOTANSWER | He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863. | Harry Price (17 January 1881 – 29 March 1948) was a British psychic researcher and author, who gained public prominence for his investigations into psychical phenomena and his exposing fraudulent spiritualist mediums. He is best known for his well-publicised investigation of the purportedly haunted Borley Rectory in Essex, England.
Early life
Although Price claimed his birth was in Shropshire he was actually born in London in Red Lion Square on the site of the South Place Ethical Society's Conway Hall. He was educated in New Cross, first at Waller Road Infants School and then Haberdashers' Aske's Hatcham Boys School. At 15, Price founded the Carlton Dramatic Society and wrote plays, including a drama, about his early experience with a poltergeist which he said took place at a haunted manor house in Shropshire.
According to Richard Morris, in his biography Harry Price: The Psychic Detective (2006), Price came to the attention of the press when he claimed an early interest in space-telegraphy. He set up a receiver and transmitter between Telegraph Hill, Hatcham and St Peter's Church Brockley and captured a spark on a photographic plate. This, though, was nothing more than Price writing a press release saying he had performed the experiment, as nothing was verified. The young Price also had an avid interest in coin collecting and wrote several articles for The Askean, the magazine for Haberdashers' School. In his autobiography, Search for Truth, written between 1941 and 1942, Price claimed he was involved with archaeological excavations in Greenwich Park, London, but, in earlier writings on Greenwich, he denied any such involvement.
From around May 1908 Price continued his interest in archaeology at Pulborough, Sussex, where he had moved prior to marrying Constance Mary Knight that August. As well as working as a salesman for paper merchants Edward Saunders & Sons, he wrote for two local Sussex newspapers: the West Sussex Gazette and the Southern Weekly News in which he related his remarkable propensity for discovering 'clean' antiquities. One of these, a 'silver' ingot (discovered by Richard Morris to be housed in Price's collection of artefacts at Senate House, University of London and made of base materials) was stamped around the time of the last Roman emperor Honorius. A few years later, another celebrated Sussex archaeologist, Charles Dawson, found a brick at Pevensey Fort in Sussex, which was purportedly made in Honorius' time. In 1910 Professor E. J Haverfield of Oxford University, the country's foremost expert on Roman history and a Fellow of the Royal Academy, declared the ingot to be a fake.
A report for the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries (number 23, pages 121–9) in the same year reported that:
'... the double axe type of silver ingot was well known and dated from late Imperial times but the one recovered from Sussex was an inferior copy of one found at the Tower of London, with alterations to give it an air of authenticity. Both the shape and lettering betrayed its origin.'
Interest in magic and conjuring
In his autobiography, Search for Truth, Price said the "Great Sequah" in Shrewsbury was "entirely responsible for shaping much of my life's work", and led to him acquiring the first volume of what would become the Harry Price Library, Price later became an expert amateur conjurer, joined the Magic Circle in 1922 and maintained a lifelong interest in stage magic and conjuring. His expertise in sleight-of-hand and magic tricks stood him in good stead for what would become his all consuming passion, the investigation of paranormal phenomena.
The psychical researcher Eric Dingwall and Price re-published an anonymous work written by a former medium entitled Revelations of a Spirit Medium (1922) which exposed the tricks of mediumship and the fraudulent methods of producing "spirit hands". Originally all the copies of the book were bought up by spiritualists and deliberately destroyed.
Psychical research
Price joined the Society for Psychical Research (SPR) in 1920 and because of his knowledge in conjuring had debunked fraudulent mediums but in direct contrast to other magicians, Price endorsed some mediums that he believed were genuine. Price's first major success in psychical research came in 1922 when he exposed the 'spirit' photographer William Hope. In the same year he travelled to Germany together with Eric Dingwall and investigated Willi Schneider at the home of Baron Albert von Schrenck-Notzing in Munich. In 1923, Price exposed the medium Jan Guzyk, according to Price the "man was clever, especially with his feet, which were almost as useful to him as his hands in producing phenomena."
Price wrote that the photographs depicting the ectoplasm of the medium Eva Carrière taken with Schrenck-Notzing looked artificial and two-dimensional made from cardboard and newspaper portraits and that there were no scientific controls as both her hands were free. In 1920 Carrière was investigated by psychical researchers in London. An analysis of her ectoplasm revealed it to be made of chewed paper. She was also investigated in 1922 and the result of the tests were negative. In 1925, Price investigated Maria Silbert and caught her using her feet and toes to move objects in the séance room. He also investigated the "direct voice" mediumship of George Valiantine in London. In the séance Valiantine claimed to have contacted the "spirit" of the composer Luigi Arditi , speaking in Italian. Price wrote down every word that was attributed to Arditi and they were found to be word-for-word matches in an Italian phrase-book.
Price formed an organisation in 1925 called the National Laboratory of Psychical Research as a rival to the Society for Psychical Research. Price had a number of disputes with the SPR, most notably over the mediumship of Rudi Schneider. Price paid mediums to test them-the SPR criticised Price and disagreed about paying mediums for testing.
Price made a formal offer to the University of London to equip and endow a Department of Psychical Research, and to loan the equipment of the National Laboratory and its library. The University of London Board of Studies in Psychology responded positively to this proposal. In 1934, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research, which held Price's collection, was reconstituted as the University of London Council for Psychical Investigation with C. E. M. Joad as chairman and with Price as Honorary Secretary and editor, although it was not an official body of the University. In the meantime, in 1927 Price joined the Ghost Club, of which he remained a member until it (temporarily) closed in 1936.
In 1927, Price claimed that he had come into possession of Joanna Southcott's box, and arranged to have it opened in the presence of one reluctant prelate (the Bishop of Grantham, not a diocesan bishop but a suffragan of the Diocese of Lincoln): it was found to contain only a few oddments and unimportant papers, among them a lottery ticket and a horse-pistol. His claims to have had the true box have been disputed by historians and by followers of Southcott. Price exposed Frederick Tansley Munnings, who claimed to produce the independent "spirit" voices of Julius Caesar, Dan Leno, Hawley Harvey Crippen and King Henry VIII. Price invented and used a piece of apparatus known as a voice control recorder and proved that all the voices were those of Munnings. In 1928, Munnings admitted fraud and sold his confessions to a Sunday newspaper.
Price was friends with other debunkers of fraudulent mediums including Harry Houdini and the journalist Ernest Palmer.
In 1933, Frank Decker was investigated by Price at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Under strict scientific controls that Price contrived, Decker failed to produce any phenomena at all. Price's psychical research continued with investigations into Karachi's Indian rope trick and the fire-walking abilities of Kuda Bux in 1935. He was also involved in the formation of the National Film Library (British Film Institute) becoming its first chairman (until 1941) and was a founding member of the Shakespeare Film Society. In 1936, Price broadcast from a supposedly haunted manor house in Meopham, Kent for the BBC and published The Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter and The Haunting of Cashen's Gap. This year also saw the transfer of Price's library on permanent loan to the University of London (see external links below), followed shortly by the laboratory and investigative equipment. In 1937, he conducted further televised experiments into fire-walking with Ahmed Hussain at Carshalton and Alexandra Palace, and also rented Borley Rectory for one year. The following year, Price re-established the Ghost Club, with himself as chairman, modernising it and changing it from a spiritualist association to a group of more or less open-minded sceptics that gathered to discuss paranormal topics. He was also the first to admit women to the club.
In the same year, Price conducted experiments with Rahman Bey who was "buried alive" in Carshalton. He also drafted a Bill for the regulation of psychic practitioners. In 1939, he organised a national telepathic test in the periodical John O'London's Weekly. During the 1940s, Price concentrated on writing and the works The Most Haunted House in England, Poltergeist Over England and The End of Borley Rectory were all published.
Famous cases
William Hope
On 4 February 1922, Price with James Seymour, Eric Dingwall and William Marriott had proven the spirit photographer William Hope was a fraud during tests at the British College of Psychic Science. Price wrote in his SPR report "William Hope has been found guilty of deliberately substituting his own plates for those of a sitter ... It implies that the medium brings to the sitting a duplicate slide and faked plates for fraudulent purposes."
Price secretly marked Hope's photographic plates, and provided him with a packet of additional plates that had been covertly etched with the brand image of the Imperial Dry Plate Co. Ltd. in the knowledge that the logo would be transferred to any images created with them. Unaware that Price had tampered with his supplies, Hope then attempted to produce a number of Spirit photographs. Although Hope produced several images of alleged spirits, none of his materials contained the Imperial Dry Plate Co. Ltd logo, or the marks that Price had put on Hope's original equipment, showing that he had exchanged prepared materials containing fake spirit images for the provided materials.
Price later re-published the Society's experiment in a pamphlet of his own called Cold Light on Spiritualistic "Phenomena" – An Experiment with the Crewe Circle. Due to the exposure of Hope and other fraudulent spiritualists, Arthur Conan Doyle led a mass resignation of eighty-four members of the Society for Psychical Research, as they believed the Society was opposed to spiritualism. Doyle threatened to have Price evicted from his laboratory and claimed if he persisted to write "sewage" about spiritualists, he would meet the same fate as Houdini. Doyle and other spiritualists attacked Price and tried for years to have Price take his pamphlet out of circulation. Price wrote "Arthur Conan Doyle and his friends abused me for years for exposing Hope."
Eileen Garrett
On 7 October 1930 it was claimed by spiritualists that Eileen J. Garrett made contact with the spirit of Herbert Carmichael Irwin at a séance held with Price at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research two days after the R101 disaster, while attempting to contact the then recently deceased Arthur Conan Doyle, and discussed possible causes of the accident. The event "attracted worldwide attention", thanks to the presence of a reporter. Major Oliver Villiers, a friend of Brancker, Scott, Irwin, Colmore and others aboard the airship, participated in further séances with Garrett, at which he claimed to have contacted both Irwin and other victims. Price did not come to any definite conclusion about Garrett and the séances:
It is not my intention to discuss if the medium were really controlled by the discarnate entity of Irwin, or whether the utterances emanated from her subconscious mind or those of the sitters. "Spirit" or "trance personality" would be equally interesting explanations – and equally remarkable. There is no real evidence for either hypothesis. But it is not my intention to discuss hypotheses, but rather to put on record the detailed account of a remarkably interesting and thought-provoking experiment.
Garrett's claims have since been questioned. The magician John Booth analysed the mediumship of Garrett and the paranormal claims of R101 and considered her to be a fraud. According to Booth Garrett's notes and writings show she followed the building of the R101 and she may have been given aircraft blueprints by a technician from the airdrome. However, the researcher Melvin Harris who studied the case wrote no secret accomplice was needed as the information described in Garrett's séances were "either commonplace, easily absorbed bits and pieces, or plain gobbledegook. The so-called secret information just doesn't exist."
Rudi Schneider
In the 1920s and early 1930s Price investigated the medium Rudi Schneider in a number of experiments conducted at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Schneider claimed he could levitate objects but according to Price a photograph taken on 28 April 1932 showed that Schneider had managed to free his arm to move a handkerchief from the table. After this, many scientists considered Schneider to be exposed as a fraud. Price wrote that the findings of the other experiments should be revised due to the evidence showing how Schneider could free himself from the controls.
After Price had exposed Schneider, various scientists, such as Karl Przibram and the magician Henry Evans, wrote to Price telling him that they agreed that Schneider would evade control during his séances and congratulated Price on the success of unmasking the fraud. In opposition, SPR members who were highly critical of Price, supported Schneider's mediumship and promoted a conspiracy theory that Price had hoaxed the photograph. SPR member Anita Gregory claimed Price had deliberately faked the photograph to discredit SPR research and ruin Schneider's reputation. However, a photographic expert testified that the photograph was genuine. SPR member John L. Randall reviewed the Price and Schneider case and came to the conclusion that the photograph was genuine and that Price had caught Schneider in fraud.
Helen Duncan
In 1931, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research took on its most illustrious case. £50 was paid to the medium Helen Duncan so that she could be examined under scientific conditions. Price was sceptical of Duncan and had her perform a number of test séances. She was suspected of swallowing cheesecloth which was then regurgitated as "ectoplasm". Price had proven through analysis of a sample of ectoplasm produced by Duncan, that it was made of cheesecloth. Duncan reacted violently at attempts to X-ray her, running from the laboratory and making a scene in the street, where her husband had to restrain her, destroying the controlled nature of the test. Price wrote that Duncan had given her fake ectoplasm to her husband to hide. The ectoplasm of Duncan in another test was analysed by psychical researchers and reported to be made from egg white. According to Price:
The sight of half-a-dozen men, each with a pair of scissors waiting for the word, was amusing. It came and we all jumped. One of the doctors got hold of the stuff and secured a piece. The medium screamed and the rest of the "teleplasm" went down her throat. This time it wasn't cheese-cloth. It proved to be paper, soaked in white of egg, and folded into a flattened tube ... Could anything be more infantile than a group of grown-up men wasting time, money, and energy on the antics of a fat female crook.
Price wrote up the case in Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book (1933) in a chapter called "The Cheese-Cloth Worshippers". In his report Price published photographs of Duncan in his laboratory that revealed fake ectoplasm made from cheesecloth, rubber gloves and cut-out heads from magazine covers which she pretended to her audience were spirits. Following the report written by Price, Duncan's former maid Mary McGinlay confessed in detail to having aided Duncan in her mediumship tricks, and Duncan's husband admitted the ectoplasm materialisations to be the result of regurgitation. Later Duncan was caught cheating again pretending to be a spirit in the séance room. During Duncan's famous trial in 1944, Price gave his results as evidence for the prosecution. This time Duncan and her travelling companions, Frances Brown, Ernest and Elizabeth Homer were prosecuted and convicted. Duncan was jailed for nine months, Brown for four months and the Homers were bound over.
Brocken experiment
In 1932, Price travelled to Mount Brocken in Germany with C. E. M. Joad and members of the National Laboratory to conduct a 'black magic' experiment in connection with the centenary of Goethe. The "Bloksberg Tryst", involving the transformation of a goat into a young man by the invocation of a maiden, Ura Bohn (better known as the film actress Gloria Gordon, 1881–1962), produced a great deal of publicity but not the magical transformation. Price claimed he carried out the experiment "if only to prove the fallacy of transcendental magic."
Gef
In July 1935 Price and his friend Richard Lambert went to the Isle of Man to investigate the alleged case of Gef the talking mongoose and produced the book The Haunting of Cashen's Gap (1936). In the book they avoided saying that they believed the story but were careful to report it as though with an open mind. The book reports how a hair from the alleged mongoose was sent to Julian Huxley who then sent it to naturalist F. Martin Duncan who identified it as a dog hair. Price suspected the hair belonged to the Irving's sheepdog, Mona.
Price asked Reginald Pocock of the Natural History Museum to evaluate pawprints allegedly made by Gef in plasticine together with an impression of his supposed tooth marks. Pocock could not match them to any known animal, though he conceded that one of them might have been "conceivably made by a dog". He did state that none of the markings had been made by a mongoose.
Price visited the Irvings and observed double walls of wooden panelling covering the interior rooms of the old stone farmhouse which featured considerable interior air space between stone and wood walls that "makes the whole house one great speaking-tube, with walls like soundingboards. By speaking into one of the many apertures in the panels, it should be possible to convey the voice to various parts of the house." According to Richard Wiseman "Price and Lambert were less than enthusiastic about the case, concluding that only the most credulous of individuals would be impressed with the evidence for Gef."
The diaries of James Irving, along with reports about the case, are in Harry Price's archives in the Senate House Library, University of London.
Borley Rectory
Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex. The building became known as "the most haunted house in England" after Price published a book about it in 1940. He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863. He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book.
The psychical researcher John L. Randall wrote there was direct evidence of "dirty tricks" played upon Price by members of the SPR. On 9 October 1931, a past president of the SPR, William Henry Salter, visited the Borley Rectory in an attempt to persuade the Rector Lionel Foyster to sever his links with Price and work with the SPR instead. After Price's death in 1948 Eric Dingwall, Kathleen M. Goldney, and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research, two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena.
The "Borley Report", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote "when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away." Terence Hines wrote "Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself "salted the mine" and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory."
Robert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote Price's defenders are unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly.
Price's investigation of Borley was the subject of a 2013 best selling novel by Neil Spring, titled The Ghost Hunters. This novel was subsequently adapted for television as Harry Price: Ghost Hunter, starring Rafe Spall, Cara Theobold and Richie Campbell.
Rosalie
Price claimed to have attended a private séance on 15 December 1937 in which a small six-year-old girl called Rosalie appeared. Price wrote he controlled the room by placing starch powder over the floor, locking the door and taping the windows before the séance. However, the identity of the sitters, or the locality where the séance was held was not revealed due to the alleged request of the mother of the child. During the séance Price claimed a small girl emerged, she spoke and he took her pulse. Price was suspicious that the supposed spirit of the child was no different than a human being but after the séance had finished the starch powder was undisturbed and none of the seals had been removed on the window. Price was convinced no one had entered the room via door or window during the séance. Price's Fifty Years of Psychical Research (1939) describes his experiences at the sitting and includes a diagram of the séance room.
Eric Dingwall and Trevor Hall wrote the Rosalie séance was fictitious and Price had lied about the whole affair but had based some of the details on the description of the house from a sitting he attended at a much earlier time in Brockley, South London where he used to live. K. M. Goldney who had criticised Price over his investigation into Borley Rectory wrote after the morning of the Rosalie sitting she found Price "shaken to the core by his experience." Goldney believed Price had told the truth about the séance and informed the Two Worlds spiritualist weekly newspaper that she believed the Rosalie sitting to be genuine.
In 1985, Peter Underwood published a photograph of part of an anonymous letter that was sent to the SPR member David Cohen in the 1960s which claimed to be from a séance sitter who attended the séance. The letter confessed to having impersonated the Rosalie child in the sitting by the request of the father who had owed the mother of the child money. In 2017, Paul Adams published details of the location of the Rosalie seance and identities of the family involved.
Reception
Psychologist and sceptic Richard Wiseman has praised Price for his work in debunking fraudulent mediums and investigating paranormal claims. According to Wiseman "Price devoted the scientific study to weird stuff ... that both delighted the world's media and infuriated believers and sceptics alike." The stage magician and scientific sceptic James Randi wrote Price accomplished some valuable and genuine research but lived "a strange mixture of fact and fraud."
Psychical researcher Renée Haynes described Price as "one of the most fascinating and storm-provoking figures in psychical research." Science writer Mary Roach in her book Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife (2010) favourably mentioned Price's methods and research in debunking the fraudulent medium Helen Duncan.
Several biographies have been written about Price. Paul Tabori's biography (1974) is generally sympathetic. Historian Trevor H. Hall's (1978) is much more critical. The latest biography by Richard Morris (2006) is also critical, concluding that Price should best be remembered as a "supreme bluffer, a hedonistic con man, a terrific raconteur, a great conjuror, a gifted writer and a wonderful eccentric."
Death and legacy
Price suffered a massive heart attack at his home in Pulborough, West Sussex and died almost instantly on 29 March 1948.
His archives were deposited with the University of London between 1976 and 1978 by his widow. They include his correspondence, drafts of his publications, papers relating to libel cases, reports on his investigations, press cuttings and photographs. His collection of magic books and periodicals is held at Senate House Library, part of the University of London and is called the Harry Price Library of Magical Literature. The collection, which includes 13,000 items, was established by a bequest from his estate in 1948.
Published works
Revelations of a Spirit Medium, with Eric Dingwall, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co. Ltd, London, 1922.
Cold Light on Spiritualistic "Phenomena" – An Experiment with the Crewe Circle, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., 1922.
Stella C. An Account of Some Original Experiments in Psychical Research, Hurst & Blackett, 1925.
Rudi Schneider: A Scientific Examination of his Mediumship, Methuen & Co., London, 1930.
Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book, Victor Gollancz, London, 1933.
Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter, Putnam & Co., 1936.
The Haunting of Cashen's Gap: A Modern "Miracle" Investigated – with R.S. Lambert, Methuen & Co., 1936.
Fifty Years of Psychical Research: A Critical Survey Longmans, Green & Co., 1939.
The Most Haunted House in England: Ten Years' Investigation of Borley Rectory, Longmans, Green & Co., 1940.
Search for Truth: My Life for Psychical Research, Collins, 1942.
Poltergeist Over England: Three Centuries of Mischievous Ghosts, Country Life, 1945.
The End of Borley Rectory, Harrap & Co., 1946.
See also
Psychic telephone
James Randi
References
Bibliography
Harry Price, Biography of a Ghost Hunter by Paul Tabori, Athenaem Press, hardback, 1950. (Reprinted in 1974 by Sphere Books)
Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book, by Harry Price, Victor Gollancz Ltd., hardback, 1933.
Harry Price: The Psychic Detective by Richard Morris, Sutton Publishing hardback, 2006. .
External links
Harry Price Collection of Magical Literature at Senate House Library
Harry Price Archives
Harry Price Website
The Hunter of Ghosts by Leon Gellert
The Milwaukee Sentinel – Oct 1, 1933
The Milwaukee Sentinel – Oct 15, 1933
1881 births
1948 deaths
British writers
Parapsychologists
Paranormal investigators
People associated with Conway Hall Ethical Society | true | [
"Borley Rectory was a house famous for being described as \"the most haunted house in England\" by psychic researcher Harry Price. Built in 1862 to house the rector of the parish of Borley and his family, it was badly damaged by fire in 1939 and demolished in 1944.\n\nThe large Gothic-style rectory in the village of Borley had been alleged to be haunted ever since it was built. These reports multiplied suddenly in 1929, after the Daily Mirror published an account of a visit by paranormal researcher Harry Price, who wrote two books supporting claims of paranormal activity.\n\nPrice's reports prompted a formal study by the Society for Psychical Research (SPR), which rejected most of the sightings as either imagined or fabricated and cast doubt on Price's credibility. His claims are now generally discredited by ghost historians. However, neither the SPR's report nor the more recent biography of Price has quelled public interest in these stories, and new books and television documentaries continue to satisfy public fascination with the rectory.\n\nA short programme commissioned by the BBC about the alleged manifestations, scheduled to be broadcast in September 1956, was cancelled owing to concerns about a possible legal action by Marianne Foyster, widow of the last rector to live in the house.\nIn 1975, the BBC aired a programme entitled The Ghost Hunters that focussed on Borley Rectory and conducted interviews with several psychic researchers, including Peter Underwood. It also featured a late-night psychic investigation of nearby Borley Church.\n\nHistory\nBorley Rectory was constructed on Hall Road near Borley Church by the Reverend Henry Dawson Ellis Bull in 1862; he moved in a year after being named rector of the parish. The house replaced an earlier rectory on the site that had been destroyed by fire in 1841. It was eventually enlarged by the addition of a wing to house Bull's family of fourteen children.\n\nThe nearby church, the nave of which may date from the 12th century, serves a scattered rural community of three hamlets that make up the parish. There are several substantial farmhouses and the fragmentary remains of Borley Hall, once the seat of the Waldegrave family. Ghost hunters quote the legend of a Benedictine monastery supposedly built in this area in about 1362, according to which a monk from the monastery conducted a relationship with a nun from a nearby convent. After their affair was discovered, the monk was executed and the nun reportedly bricked up alive in the convent walls. It was confirmed in 1938 that this legend had no historical basis known and could have been fabricated by the rector's children to romanticise their Gothic-style red-brick rectory. The story of the walling up of the nun may have come from Rider Haggard's novel Montezuma's Daughter (1893) or Walter Scott's epic poem Marmion (1808).\n\nHauntings\n\nThe first paranormal events reportedly occurred in about 1863, since a few locals later remembered having heard unexplained footsteps within the house at about that time. On 28 July 1900, four daughters of the rector, Henry Dawson Ellis Bull, saw what they thought was the ghost of a nun at twilight, about from the house; they tried to talk to it, but it disappeared as they got closer. The local organist Ernest Ambrose later said that the family at the rectory were \"very convinced that they had seen an apparition on several occasions\". Various people claimed to have witnessed a variety of puzzling incidents, such as a phantom coach driven by two headless horsemen, during the next four decades. Bull died in 1892 and his son, the Reverend Henry (\"Harry\") Foyster Bull, took over the living.\n\nOn 9 June 1927, Harry Bull died and the rectory again became vacant. In the following year, on the second day of October, the Reverend Guy Eric Smith and his wife moved into the house. Soon after moving in, Smith's wife, while cleaning out a cupboard, came across a brown paper package containing the skull of a young woman. Shortly after, the family reported a variety of incidents including the sounds of servant bells ringing despite their being disconnected, lights appearing in windows and unexplained footsteps. In addition, Smith's wife believed she saw a horse-drawn carriage at night. The Smiths contacted the Daily Mirror asking to be put in touch with the Society for Psychical Research (SPR). On 10 June 1929 the newspaper sent a reporter, who promptly wrote the first in a series of articles detailing the mysteries of Borley. The paper also arranged for Harry Price, a paranormal researcher, to make his first visit to the house. He arrived on 12 June and immediately phenomena of a new kind appeared, such as the throwing of stones, a vase and other objects. \"Spirit messages\" were tapped out from the frame of a mirror. As soon as Price left, these ceased. Smith's wife later maintained that she already suspected Price, an expert conjurer, of falsifying the phenomena.\n\nThe Smiths left Borley on 14 July 1929 and the parish had some difficulty in finding a replacement. The following year the Reverend Lionel Algernon Foyster (1878–1945), a first cousin of the Bulls, and his wife Marianne (née Mary Anne Emily Rebecca Shaw) (1899–1992) moved into the rectory with their adopted daughter Adelaide, on 16 October 1930. Lionel Foyster wrote an account of various strange incidents that occurred between the time the Foysters moved in and October 1935, which was sent to Harry Price. These included bell-ringing, windows shattering, throwing of stones and bottles, wall-writing and the locking of their daughter in a room with no key. Marianne Foyster reported to her husband a whole range of poltergeist phenomena that included her being thrown from her bed. On one occasion, Adelaide was attacked by \"something horrible\". Foyster tried twice to conduct an exorcism, but his efforts were fruitless; in the middle of the first exorcism, he was struck in the shoulder by a fist-size stone. Because of the publicity in the Daily Mirror, these incidents attracted the attention of several psychic researchers, who after investigation were unanimous in suspecting that they were caused, consciously or unconsciously, by Marianne Foyster. She later said that she felt that some of the incidents were caused by her husband in concert with one of the psychic researchers, but other events appeared to her to be genuine paranormal phenomena.\n\nShe later admitted that she was having a sexual relationship with the lodger Frank Pearless, and that she used paranormal explanations, to cover up her liaisons.\n\nThe Foysters left Borley in October 1935 as a result of Lionel Foyster's ill health.\n\nPrice investigation\nBorley remained vacant for some time after the Foysters' departure. In May 1937, Price took out a year-long rental agreement with Queen Anne's Bounty, the owners of the property.\n\nThrough an advertisement in The Times on 25 May 1937 and subsequent personal interviews, Price recruited a corps of 48 \"official observers\", mostly students, who spent periods, mainly during weekends, at the rectory with instructions to report any phenomena that occurred. In March 1938 Helen Glanville (the daughter of S. J. Glanville, one of Price's helpers) conducted a planchette séance in Streatham in south London. Price reported that she made contact with two spirits, the first of which was that of a young nun who identified herself as Marie Lairre. According to the planchette story, Marie was a French nun who left her religious order and travelled to England to marry a member of the Waldegrave family, the owners of Borley's 17th-century manor house, Borley Hall. She was said to have been murdered in an older building on the site of the rectory, and her body either buried in the cellar or thrown into a disused well. The wall writings were alleged to be her pleas for help; one read \"Marianne, please help me get out\".\n\nThe second spirit to be contacted identified himself as Sunex Amures, and claimed that he would set fire to the rectory at nine o'clock that night, 27 March 1938. He also said that, at that time, the bones of a murdered person would be revealed.\n\nFire\n\nOn 27 February 1939 the new owner of the rectory, Captain W. H. Gregson, was unpacking boxes and accidentally knocked over an oil lamp in the hallway. The fire quickly spread and the house was severely damaged. After investigating the cause of the blaze the insurance company concluded that the fire seemed to have been started deliberately.\n\nA Miss Williams from nearby Borley Lodge said she saw the figure of the ghostly nun in the upstairs window and, according to Harry Price, demanded a fee of one guinea for her story. In August 1943, Price conducted a brief dig in the cellars of the ruined house and discovered two bones thought to be of a young woman.\n\nThe bones were given a Christian burial in Liston churchyard, after the parish of Borley refused to allow the ceremony to take place on account of the local opinion that the bones found were those of a pig.\n\nThe land of what was the Rectory has been divided up partly with a farm and four bungalows (probably built in the 1960's).\n\nSociety for Psychical Research investigation\n\nAfter Price's death in 1948, Daily Mail reporter Charles Sutton accused him of faking phenomena. Sutton claimed that whilst visiting the rectory with Price in 1929 he was hit on the head by a large pebble. Sutton stated that he seized Price and found his coat pockets filled with different sized stones.\n\nIn 1948, Eric Dingwall, K. M. Goldney and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research (SPR), two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded that Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena.\n\nThe \"Borley Report\", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote \"when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away.\" Terence Hines wrote that \"Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself 'salted the mine' and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory.\"\n\nMarianne Foyster, later in her life, admitted she had seen no apparitions and that the alleged ghostly noises were caused by the wind, friends she invited to the house and in other cases by herself playing practical jokes on her husband. Many of the legends about the rectory had been invented. The children of the Rev. Harry Bull who lived in the house before Lionel Foyster claimed to have seen nothing and were surprised they had been living in what was described as England's most haunted house.\n\nRobert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote that Price's defenders were unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly.\n\nFilm\nIn 2017, the part-animated film Borley Rectory: The Most Haunted House in England was released. It was written and directed by Ashley Thorpe and starred Reece Shearsmith and Jonathan Rigby.\n\nIn 2021, the feature film The Ghosts Of Borley Rectory was released. It was written and directed by Steven M. Smith and starred Julian Sands, Toyah Willcox, Colin Baker and Christopher Ellison.\n\nSee also\nList of ghosts\n\nReferences\n\nNotes\n\nCitations\n\nBibliography\n\nFurther reading\n\nExternal links\n\nHarry Price Website – Contains a comprehensive section on Borley Rectory\nGhostbuster of Fraud by Simon Edge, reprinted in HarryPrice website\nLocal History site for Borley – Has a comprehensive historical analysis of the Borley Rectory affair\nLarge collection of photographs of Borley Rectory and the various participants of the affair \n Harry Price papers including archives on Borley Rectory\n 3D Interactive model built in Google Sketchup from the original Glanville plans\n\nClergy houses in England\nHouses in Essex\nEssex folklore\nParanormal hoaxes\nReportedly haunted locations in the East of England\nHouses completed in 1862",
"Borley is a village and civil parish in rural north Essex, England close to the border with Suffolk. It is located near the River Stour. The closest town is Sudbury, Suffolk,\napproximately southeast of Borley; Sudbury is also the Post Town used by Royal Mail for Borley. The neighbouring parishes are Foxearth, Belchamp Walter and Bulmer.\n\nHistory\nThe name Borley may be a compound of the Saxon words \"Bap\" and \"Ley\", that is \"Boar's Pasture\". Recent local research suggests that the name Borley may be derived from the Celtic ‘borle’, meaning ‘summer meadows’ which are still a prominent feature of the area. A smaller parish, Borley Parva, was joined with Foxearth in the Middle Ages.\n\nIn the 11th century, the manor of Borley was held by a freeman called Lewin; by 1086, the Domesday Book records Borley manor in the hands of Adeliza, Countess of Albemarle (half-sister of William the Conqueror); it was subsequently transferred to Edward I.\n\nA document from 1308 sets out the 'Extent' of the manor, listing the main occupants and the rental income. Forty-six people are named in the extent: seven as free tenants, seven as molmen, 27 as villeins and five as cotemen – with an estimated population of 230. In 1346, the manor of Borley was transferred to the priory of Christ Church, Canterbury.\n\nFrom the 16th century, Borley was associated with the Waldegraves, one of the leading Essex Catholic families. Sir Edward Waldegrave, a courtier to Queen Mary, purchased the manor of Borley in 1546 and it became his principal residence. He died in the Tower of London in 1561 aged forty-four having fallen out of favour with Queen Elizabeth; his widow, Lady Frances Neville, later erected a monument to him and herself in Borley Church.\n\nFrom early times until local government reforms in 1894, Borley was one of the parishes in the Hinckford Hundred. It then became an area in Belchamp Rural District Council until that, in turn, was abolished in 1974 with the creation of Braintree District Council.\n\nLocal government\nDue to its small population, decision-making at parish level is through a Parish Meeting open to all electors rather than an elected council. \nBorley is in part of England having two tiers of \"principal\" local authorities. It is one of 12 parishes making up Stour Valley North Ward, which is represented by a district councillor on Braintree District Council. It is also within the area of Essex County Council, represented by one county councillor as part of the Hedingham County Electoral Division.\n\nFor elections to the UK Parliament, Borley is in the constituency of Braintree.\n\nNatural and built environment\n\nBorley consists of three clusters of buildings: one closest to the River Stour, including the village hall; one around the parish church; and a third at Borley Green. In 2012, there were 89 voting residents in a total of around 110, occupying 49 dwellings. Borley is notable for the high proportion of Listed Buildings. There are 15 Grade II listed houses, including Borley Hall (the fragment of a once much larger house), Borley Place (at one time the rectory) and Borley Lodge. The Grade I listed church (dedication unknown) is a small building of stone originally in the Romanesque/Early English style of the late 12th and early 13th centuries. Pevsner notes that a \"topiary walk to the porch is the most notable feature of the church\".\n\nThere is no \"defined village envelope\" and therefore for planning purposes, Borley and Borely Green (an area of grassland owned by Braintree District Council) are considered to be \"countryside\". Borley is located within Natural England's South Suffok and North Essex Clayland National Character Area, with \"an ancient landscape of wooded arable countryside with a distinct sense of enclosure\".\n\nBorley in popular culture\n\nDuring the 20th century, Borley became well known for the 'Borley Rectory Affair', involving the supposed haunting of a Victorian rectory (demolished in 1944). Beginning in 1929, psychical researcher Harry Price generated a story that captured the attention of the nation and convinced many of the proof of the permanence of the spirit after death. His supposed activities were reported widely by the press of that time, and Price published several popular books on the subject that brought him considerable fame. After Price's death, the story began to unravel under the scrutiny of experts from the Society for Psychical Research. The Society went through the records with great tenacity, suspecting that Price had exaggerated evidence to sensationalise events and to suggest supernatural causes for mundane phenomena. Any possible evidence of ghosts was irredeemably contaminated by Price's behaviour and the manipulation of the facts in his two books, The Most Haunted House in England and The End of Borley Rectory, produced during and immediately after the Second World War.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n The Foxearth and District Local History Society (covering Borley and surrounding area)\n Borley Parish Meeting\n\nVillages in Essex\nBraintree District"
] |
[
"Harry Price",
"Borley Rectory",
"What is the Borley Rectory?",
"Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex.",
"What happened at the Borley Rectory?",
"He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863."
] | C_b266e36c145b4a1a9cd6eae0a45cf57e_1 | What type of hauntings were they? | 3 | What type of hauntings did Harry Price document at the Borley Rectory? | Harry Price | Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex. The building became known as "the most haunted house in England" after Price published a book about it in 1940. He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863. He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book. The psychical researcher John L. Randall wrote there was direct evidence of "dirty tricks" played upon Price by members of the SPR. On 9 October 1931, a past president of the SPR William Henry Salter visited the Borley Rectory in an attempt to persuade the Rector Lionel Foyster, to sever his links with Price and work with the SPR instead. After Price's death in 1948 Eric Dingwall, Kathleen M. Goldney, and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research, two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena. The "Borley Report", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote "when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away." Terence Hines wrote "Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself "salted the mine" and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory." Robert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote Price's defenders are unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly. Price's investigation of Borley was the subject of a 2013 best selling novel by Neil Spring, titled 'The Ghost Hunters.' This novel was subsequently adapted for television as 'Harry Price: Ghost Hunter,' starring Rafe Spall, Cara Theobold and Richie Campbell. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Harry Price (17 January 1881 – 29 March 1948) was a British psychic researcher and author, who gained public prominence for his investigations into psychical phenomena and his exposing fraudulent spiritualist mediums. He is best known for his well-publicised investigation of the purportedly haunted Borley Rectory in Essex, England.
Early life
Although Price claimed his birth was in Shropshire he was actually born in London in Red Lion Square on the site of the South Place Ethical Society's Conway Hall. He was educated in New Cross, first at Waller Road Infants School and then Haberdashers' Aske's Hatcham Boys School. At 15, Price founded the Carlton Dramatic Society and wrote plays, including a drama, about his early experience with a poltergeist which he said took place at a haunted manor house in Shropshire.
According to Richard Morris, in his biography Harry Price: The Psychic Detective (2006), Price came to the attention of the press when he claimed an early interest in space-telegraphy. He set up a receiver and transmitter between Telegraph Hill, Hatcham and St Peter's Church Brockley and captured a spark on a photographic plate. This, though, was nothing more than Price writing a press release saying he had performed the experiment, as nothing was verified. The young Price also had an avid interest in coin collecting and wrote several articles for The Askean, the magazine for Haberdashers' School. In his autobiography, Search for Truth, written between 1941 and 1942, Price claimed he was involved with archaeological excavations in Greenwich Park, London, but, in earlier writings on Greenwich, he denied any such involvement.
From around May 1908 Price continued his interest in archaeology at Pulborough, Sussex, where he had moved prior to marrying Constance Mary Knight that August. As well as working as a salesman for paper merchants Edward Saunders & Sons, he wrote for two local Sussex newspapers: the West Sussex Gazette and the Southern Weekly News in which he related his remarkable propensity for discovering 'clean' antiquities. One of these, a 'silver' ingot (discovered by Richard Morris to be housed in Price's collection of artefacts at Senate House, University of London and made of base materials) was stamped around the time of the last Roman emperor Honorius. A few years later, another celebrated Sussex archaeologist, Charles Dawson, found a brick at Pevensey Fort in Sussex, which was purportedly made in Honorius' time. In 1910 Professor E. J Haverfield of Oxford University, the country's foremost expert on Roman history and a Fellow of the Royal Academy, declared the ingot to be a fake.
A report for the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries (number 23, pages 121–9) in the same year reported that:
'... the double axe type of silver ingot was well known and dated from late Imperial times but the one recovered from Sussex was an inferior copy of one found at the Tower of London, with alterations to give it an air of authenticity. Both the shape and lettering betrayed its origin.'
Interest in magic and conjuring
In his autobiography, Search for Truth, Price said the "Great Sequah" in Shrewsbury was "entirely responsible for shaping much of my life's work", and led to him acquiring the first volume of what would become the Harry Price Library, Price later became an expert amateur conjurer, joined the Magic Circle in 1922 and maintained a lifelong interest in stage magic and conjuring. His expertise in sleight-of-hand and magic tricks stood him in good stead for what would become his all consuming passion, the investigation of paranormal phenomena.
The psychical researcher Eric Dingwall and Price re-published an anonymous work written by a former medium entitled Revelations of a Spirit Medium (1922) which exposed the tricks of mediumship and the fraudulent methods of producing "spirit hands". Originally all the copies of the book were bought up by spiritualists and deliberately destroyed.
Psychical research
Price joined the Society for Psychical Research (SPR) in 1920 and because of his knowledge in conjuring had debunked fraudulent mediums but in direct contrast to other magicians, Price endorsed some mediums that he believed were genuine. Price's first major success in psychical research came in 1922 when he exposed the 'spirit' photographer William Hope. In the same year he travelled to Germany together with Eric Dingwall and investigated Willi Schneider at the home of Baron Albert von Schrenck-Notzing in Munich. In 1923, Price exposed the medium Jan Guzyk, according to Price the "man was clever, especially with his feet, which were almost as useful to him as his hands in producing phenomena."
Price wrote that the photographs depicting the ectoplasm of the medium Eva Carrière taken with Schrenck-Notzing looked artificial and two-dimensional made from cardboard and newspaper portraits and that there were no scientific controls as both her hands were free. In 1920 Carrière was investigated by psychical researchers in London. An analysis of her ectoplasm revealed it to be made of chewed paper. She was also investigated in 1922 and the result of the tests were negative. In 1925, Price investigated Maria Silbert and caught her using her feet and toes to move objects in the séance room. He also investigated the "direct voice" mediumship of George Valiantine in London. In the séance Valiantine claimed to have contacted the "spirit" of the composer Luigi Arditi , speaking in Italian. Price wrote down every word that was attributed to Arditi and they were found to be word-for-word matches in an Italian phrase-book.
Price formed an organisation in 1925 called the National Laboratory of Psychical Research as a rival to the Society for Psychical Research. Price had a number of disputes with the SPR, most notably over the mediumship of Rudi Schneider. Price paid mediums to test them-the SPR criticised Price and disagreed about paying mediums for testing.
Price made a formal offer to the University of London to equip and endow a Department of Psychical Research, and to loan the equipment of the National Laboratory and its library. The University of London Board of Studies in Psychology responded positively to this proposal. In 1934, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research, which held Price's collection, was reconstituted as the University of London Council for Psychical Investigation with C. E. M. Joad as chairman and with Price as Honorary Secretary and editor, although it was not an official body of the University. In the meantime, in 1927 Price joined the Ghost Club, of which he remained a member until it (temporarily) closed in 1936.
In 1927, Price claimed that he had come into possession of Joanna Southcott's box, and arranged to have it opened in the presence of one reluctant prelate (the Bishop of Grantham, not a diocesan bishop but a suffragan of the Diocese of Lincoln): it was found to contain only a few oddments and unimportant papers, among them a lottery ticket and a horse-pistol. His claims to have had the true box have been disputed by historians and by followers of Southcott. Price exposed Frederick Tansley Munnings, who claimed to produce the independent "spirit" voices of Julius Caesar, Dan Leno, Hawley Harvey Crippen and King Henry VIII. Price invented and used a piece of apparatus known as a voice control recorder and proved that all the voices were those of Munnings. In 1928, Munnings admitted fraud and sold his confessions to a Sunday newspaper.
Price was friends with other debunkers of fraudulent mediums including Harry Houdini and the journalist Ernest Palmer.
In 1933, Frank Decker was investigated by Price at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Under strict scientific controls that Price contrived, Decker failed to produce any phenomena at all. Price's psychical research continued with investigations into Karachi's Indian rope trick and the fire-walking abilities of Kuda Bux in 1935. He was also involved in the formation of the National Film Library (British Film Institute) becoming its first chairman (until 1941) and was a founding member of the Shakespeare Film Society. In 1936, Price broadcast from a supposedly haunted manor house in Meopham, Kent for the BBC and published The Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter and The Haunting of Cashen's Gap. This year also saw the transfer of Price's library on permanent loan to the University of London (see external links below), followed shortly by the laboratory and investigative equipment. In 1937, he conducted further televised experiments into fire-walking with Ahmed Hussain at Carshalton and Alexandra Palace, and also rented Borley Rectory for one year. The following year, Price re-established the Ghost Club, with himself as chairman, modernising it and changing it from a spiritualist association to a group of more or less open-minded sceptics that gathered to discuss paranormal topics. He was also the first to admit women to the club.
In the same year, Price conducted experiments with Rahman Bey who was "buried alive" in Carshalton. He also drafted a Bill for the regulation of psychic practitioners. In 1939, he organised a national telepathic test in the periodical John O'London's Weekly. During the 1940s, Price concentrated on writing and the works The Most Haunted House in England, Poltergeist Over England and The End of Borley Rectory were all published.
Famous cases
William Hope
On 4 February 1922, Price with James Seymour, Eric Dingwall and William Marriott had proven the spirit photographer William Hope was a fraud during tests at the British College of Psychic Science. Price wrote in his SPR report "William Hope has been found guilty of deliberately substituting his own plates for those of a sitter ... It implies that the medium brings to the sitting a duplicate slide and faked plates for fraudulent purposes."
Price secretly marked Hope's photographic plates, and provided him with a packet of additional plates that had been covertly etched with the brand image of the Imperial Dry Plate Co. Ltd. in the knowledge that the logo would be transferred to any images created with them. Unaware that Price had tampered with his supplies, Hope then attempted to produce a number of Spirit photographs. Although Hope produced several images of alleged spirits, none of his materials contained the Imperial Dry Plate Co. Ltd logo, or the marks that Price had put on Hope's original equipment, showing that he had exchanged prepared materials containing fake spirit images for the provided materials.
Price later re-published the Society's experiment in a pamphlet of his own called Cold Light on Spiritualistic "Phenomena" – An Experiment with the Crewe Circle. Due to the exposure of Hope and other fraudulent spiritualists, Arthur Conan Doyle led a mass resignation of eighty-four members of the Society for Psychical Research, as they believed the Society was opposed to spiritualism. Doyle threatened to have Price evicted from his laboratory and claimed if he persisted to write "sewage" about spiritualists, he would meet the same fate as Houdini. Doyle and other spiritualists attacked Price and tried for years to have Price take his pamphlet out of circulation. Price wrote "Arthur Conan Doyle and his friends abused me for years for exposing Hope."
Eileen Garrett
On 7 October 1930 it was claimed by spiritualists that Eileen J. Garrett made contact with the spirit of Herbert Carmichael Irwin at a séance held with Price at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research two days after the R101 disaster, while attempting to contact the then recently deceased Arthur Conan Doyle, and discussed possible causes of the accident. The event "attracted worldwide attention", thanks to the presence of a reporter. Major Oliver Villiers, a friend of Brancker, Scott, Irwin, Colmore and others aboard the airship, participated in further séances with Garrett, at which he claimed to have contacted both Irwin and other victims. Price did not come to any definite conclusion about Garrett and the séances:
It is not my intention to discuss if the medium were really controlled by the discarnate entity of Irwin, or whether the utterances emanated from her subconscious mind or those of the sitters. "Spirit" or "trance personality" would be equally interesting explanations – and equally remarkable. There is no real evidence for either hypothesis. But it is not my intention to discuss hypotheses, but rather to put on record the detailed account of a remarkably interesting and thought-provoking experiment.
Garrett's claims have since been questioned. The magician John Booth analysed the mediumship of Garrett and the paranormal claims of R101 and considered her to be a fraud. According to Booth Garrett's notes and writings show she followed the building of the R101 and she may have been given aircraft blueprints by a technician from the airdrome. However, the researcher Melvin Harris who studied the case wrote no secret accomplice was needed as the information described in Garrett's séances were "either commonplace, easily absorbed bits and pieces, or plain gobbledegook. The so-called secret information just doesn't exist."
Rudi Schneider
In the 1920s and early 1930s Price investigated the medium Rudi Schneider in a number of experiments conducted at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Schneider claimed he could levitate objects but according to Price a photograph taken on 28 April 1932 showed that Schneider had managed to free his arm to move a handkerchief from the table. After this, many scientists considered Schneider to be exposed as a fraud. Price wrote that the findings of the other experiments should be revised due to the evidence showing how Schneider could free himself from the controls.
After Price had exposed Schneider, various scientists, such as Karl Przibram and the magician Henry Evans, wrote to Price telling him that they agreed that Schneider would evade control during his séances and congratulated Price on the success of unmasking the fraud. In opposition, SPR members who were highly critical of Price, supported Schneider's mediumship and promoted a conspiracy theory that Price had hoaxed the photograph. SPR member Anita Gregory claimed Price had deliberately faked the photograph to discredit SPR research and ruin Schneider's reputation. However, a photographic expert testified that the photograph was genuine. SPR member John L. Randall reviewed the Price and Schneider case and came to the conclusion that the photograph was genuine and that Price had caught Schneider in fraud.
Helen Duncan
In 1931, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research took on its most illustrious case. £50 was paid to the medium Helen Duncan so that she could be examined under scientific conditions. Price was sceptical of Duncan and had her perform a number of test séances. She was suspected of swallowing cheesecloth which was then regurgitated as "ectoplasm". Price had proven through analysis of a sample of ectoplasm produced by Duncan, that it was made of cheesecloth. Duncan reacted violently at attempts to X-ray her, running from the laboratory and making a scene in the street, where her husband had to restrain her, destroying the controlled nature of the test. Price wrote that Duncan had given her fake ectoplasm to her husband to hide. The ectoplasm of Duncan in another test was analysed by psychical researchers and reported to be made from egg white. According to Price:
The sight of half-a-dozen men, each with a pair of scissors waiting for the word, was amusing. It came and we all jumped. One of the doctors got hold of the stuff and secured a piece. The medium screamed and the rest of the "teleplasm" went down her throat. This time it wasn't cheese-cloth. It proved to be paper, soaked in white of egg, and folded into a flattened tube ... Could anything be more infantile than a group of grown-up men wasting time, money, and energy on the antics of a fat female crook.
Price wrote up the case in Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book (1933) in a chapter called "The Cheese-Cloth Worshippers". In his report Price published photographs of Duncan in his laboratory that revealed fake ectoplasm made from cheesecloth, rubber gloves and cut-out heads from magazine covers which she pretended to her audience were spirits. Following the report written by Price, Duncan's former maid Mary McGinlay confessed in detail to having aided Duncan in her mediumship tricks, and Duncan's husband admitted the ectoplasm materialisations to be the result of regurgitation. Later Duncan was caught cheating again pretending to be a spirit in the séance room. During Duncan's famous trial in 1944, Price gave his results as evidence for the prosecution. This time Duncan and her travelling companions, Frances Brown, Ernest and Elizabeth Homer were prosecuted and convicted. Duncan was jailed for nine months, Brown for four months and the Homers were bound over.
Brocken experiment
In 1932, Price travelled to Mount Brocken in Germany with C. E. M. Joad and members of the National Laboratory to conduct a 'black magic' experiment in connection with the centenary of Goethe. The "Bloksberg Tryst", involving the transformation of a goat into a young man by the invocation of a maiden, Ura Bohn (better known as the film actress Gloria Gordon, 1881–1962), produced a great deal of publicity but not the magical transformation. Price claimed he carried out the experiment "if only to prove the fallacy of transcendental magic."
Gef
In July 1935 Price and his friend Richard Lambert went to the Isle of Man to investigate the alleged case of Gef the talking mongoose and produced the book The Haunting of Cashen's Gap (1936). In the book they avoided saying that they believed the story but were careful to report it as though with an open mind. The book reports how a hair from the alleged mongoose was sent to Julian Huxley who then sent it to naturalist F. Martin Duncan who identified it as a dog hair. Price suspected the hair belonged to the Irving's sheepdog, Mona.
Price asked Reginald Pocock of the Natural History Museum to evaluate pawprints allegedly made by Gef in plasticine together with an impression of his supposed tooth marks. Pocock could not match them to any known animal, though he conceded that one of them might have been "conceivably made by a dog". He did state that none of the markings had been made by a mongoose.
Price visited the Irvings and observed double walls of wooden panelling covering the interior rooms of the old stone farmhouse which featured considerable interior air space between stone and wood walls that "makes the whole house one great speaking-tube, with walls like soundingboards. By speaking into one of the many apertures in the panels, it should be possible to convey the voice to various parts of the house." According to Richard Wiseman "Price and Lambert were less than enthusiastic about the case, concluding that only the most credulous of individuals would be impressed with the evidence for Gef."
The diaries of James Irving, along with reports about the case, are in Harry Price's archives in the Senate House Library, University of London.
Borley Rectory
Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex. The building became known as "the most haunted house in England" after Price published a book about it in 1940. He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863. He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book.
The psychical researcher John L. Randall wrote there was direct evidence of "dirty tricks" played upon Price by members of the SPR. On 9 October 1931, a past president of the SPR, William Henry Salter, visited the Borley Rectory in an attempt to persuade the Rector Lionel Foyster to sever his links with Price and work with the SPR instead. After Price's death in 1948 Eric Dingwall, Kathleen M. Goldney, and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research, two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena.
The "Borley Report", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote "when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away." Terence Hines wrote "Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself "salted the mine" and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory."
Robert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote Price's defenders are unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly.
Price's investigation of Borley was the subject of a 2013 best selling novel by Neil Spring, titled The Ghost Hunters. This novel was subsequently adapted for television as Harry Price: Ghost Hunter, starring Rafe Spall, Cara Theobold and Richie Campbell.
Rosalie
Price claimed to have attended a private séance on 15 December 1937 in which a small six-year-old girl called Rosalie appeared. Price wrote he controlled the room by placing starch powder over the floor, locking the door and taping the windows before the séance. However, the identity of the sitters, or the locality where the séance was held was not revealed due to the alleged request of the mother of the child. During the séance Price claimed a small girl emerged, she spoke and he took her pulse. Price was suspicious that the supposed spirit of the child was no different than a human being but after the séance had finished the starch powder was undisturbed and none of the seals had been removed on the window. Price was convinced no one had entered the room via door or window during the séance. Price's Fifty Years of Psychical Research (1939) describes his experiences at the sitting and includes a diagram of the séance room.
Eric Dingwall and Trevor Hall wrote the Rosalie séance was fictitious and Price had lied about the whole affair but had based some of the details on the description of the house from a sitting he attended at a much earlier time in Brockley, South London where he used to live. K. M. Goldney who had criticised Price over his investigation into Borley Rectory wrote after the morning of the Rosalie sitting she found Price "shaken to the core by his experience." Goldney believed Price had told the truth about the séance and informed the Two Worlds spiritualist weekly newspaper that she believed the Rosalie sitting to be genuine.
In 1985, Peter Underwood published a photograph of part of an anonymous letter that was sent to the SPR member David Cohen in the 1960s which claimed to be from a séance sitter who attended the séance. The letter confessed to having impersonated the Rosalie child in the sitting by the request of the father who had owed the mother of the child money. In 2017, Paul Adams published details of the location of the Rosalie seance and identities of the family involved.
Reception
Psychologist and sceptic Richard Wiseman has praised Price for his work in debunking fraudulent mediums and investigating paranormal claims. According to Wiseman "Price devoted the scientific study to weird stuff ... that both delighted the world's media and infuriated believers and sceptics alike." The stage magician and scientific sceptic James Randi wrote Price accomplished some valuable and genuine research but lived "a strange mixture of fact and fraud."
Psychical researcher Renée Haynes described Price as "one of the most fascinating and storm-provoking figures in psychical research." Science writer Mary Roach in her book Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife (2010) favourably mentioned Price's methods and research in debunking the fraudulent medium Helen Duncan.
Several biographies have been written about Price. Paul Tabori's biography (1974) is generally sympathetic. Historian Trevor H. Hall's (1978) is much more critical. The latest biography by Richard Morris (2006) is also critical, concluding that Price should best be remembered as a "supreme bluffer, a hedonistic con man, a terrific raconteur, a great conjuror, a gifted writer and a wonderful eccentric."
Death and legacy
Price suffered a massive heart attack at his home in Pulborough, West Sussex and died almost instantly on 29 March 1948.
His archives were deposited with the University of London between 1976 and 1978 by his widow. They include his correspondence, drafts of his publications, papers relating to libel cases, reports on his investigations, press cuttings and photographs. His collection of magic books and periodicals is held at Senate House Library, part of the University of London and is called the Harry Price Library of Magical Literature. The collection, which includes 13,000 items, was established by a bequest from his estate in 1948.
Published works
Revelations of a Spirit Medium, with Eric Dingwall, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co. Ltd, London, 1922.
Cold Light on Spiritualistic "Phenomena" – An Experiment with the Crewe Circle, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., 1922.
Stella C. An Account of Some Original Experiments in Psychical Research, Hurst & Blackett, 1925.
Rudi Schneider: A Scientific Examination of his Mediumship, Methuen & Co., London, 1930.
Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book, Victor Gollancz, London, 1933.
Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter, Putnam & Co., 1936.
The Haunting of Cashen's Gap: A Modern "Miracle" Investigated – with R.S. Lambert, Methuen & Co., 1936.
Fifty Years of Psychical Research: A Critical Survey Longmans, Green & Co., 1939.
The Most Haunted House in England: Ten Years' Investigation of Borley Rectory, Longmans, Green & Co., 1940.
Search for Truth: My Life for Psychical Research, Collins, 1942.
Poltergeist Over England: Three Centuries of Mischievous Ghosts, Country Life, 1945.
The End of Borley Rectory, Harrap & Co., 1946.
See also
Psychic telephone
James Randi
References
Bibliography
Harry Price, Biography of a Ghost Hunter by Paul Tabori, Athenaem Press, hardback, 1950. (Reprinted in 1974 by Sphere Books)
Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book, by Harry Price, Victor Gollancz Ltd., hardback, 1933.
Harry Price: The Psychic Detective by Richard Morris, Sutton Publishing hardback, 2006. .
External links
Harry Price Collection of Magical Literature at Senate House Library
Harry Price Archives
Harry Price Website
The Hunter of Ghosts by Leon Gellert
The Milwaukee Sentinel – Oct 1, 1933
The Milwaukee Sentinel – Oct 15, 1933
1881 births
1948 deaths
British writers
Parapsychologists
Paranormal investigators
People associated with Conway Hall Ethical Society | false | [
"Bianca Biasi (born 13 May 1979) is an Australian producer, director, actress and author who has more recently specialised in projects involving supernatural or reportedly haunted locations, mostly on Sydney's northern beaches.\n\nShe appeared in soap opera Home and Away as Constable Pia Correlli.\n\nActing credits\n Home and Away as Constable Pia Correlli\n All Saints as Elly Chapman\n White Collar Blue as Francesca Decia\n Above the Law as Sheena Clancy\n Breakers as Melanie\n BeastMaster as Elka\n The Junction Boys as Nurse\n Burke & Wills as Asha\n Touched By Fellini as Waitress\n Soul Traces: The Introduction as Jasmine Dahlia\n Delirium as Constable Sophia Larkin\n The Parkway Hauntings as Bianca\n The Quarantine Hauntings as Marina Santini\n CNNNN: Chaser Non-stop News Network as Fungry's Customer\n Life Support\n\nFeature films\nIn 2006, she made her feature film debut in Burke & Wills (Cake Productions) in the role of Asha.\n\nProducer credits\nAs of 1 January 2014, Biasi's studio had four films in post-production: The Quarantine Hauntings, The Parkway Hauntings, Delirium and The Q Station Experiment.\n\nThe location on Wakehurst Parkway was the subject of \"countless anonymous stories online that speak of a girl in a white dress that appears on the Middle Creek Bridge as unsuspecting drivers go through her, or a nun apparition that sits in the back seat of cars,\" The Daily Telegraph reported. It also reported that both films, The Parkway Hauntings and The Quarantine Hauntings would be released in 2015.\n\nOther activity\n\nBianca is also an outspoken advocate of LGBT rights in Australia and has appeared with her partner in media coverage across various outlets as a same sex mothers of twin girls, to raise awareness of the increased risk of violence against same sex parents in the lead up to divisive debate that preceded the 2017 Same-sex marriageplebiscite and subsequent legislation allowing same sex marriage.\n\nReferences\n\n1979 births\nActresses from Sydney\nLiving people",
"Ghosts of Versailles may refer to\n\nThe Ghosts of Versailles, a 1983 opera by John Corigliano and William M. Hoffman\nMoberly–Jourdain incident or Ghosts of Versailles, a 1901 claim of time travel and hauntings\nMiss Morison's Ghosts, a 1981 British supernatural television drama based on the Moberly-Joudain incident\n\nSee also\nVersailles (disambiguation)"
] |
[
"Harry Price",
"Borley Rectory",
"What is the Borley Rectory?",
"Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex.",
"What happened at the Borley Rectory?",
"He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863.",
"What type of hauntings were they?",
"I don't know."
] | C_b266e36c145b4a1a9cd6eae0a45cf57e_1 | What else did he say about the rectory? | 4 | Other than the hauntings, what else did Harry Price say about the Borley Rectory? | Harry Price | Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex. The building became known as "the most haunted house in England" after Price published a book about it in 1940. He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863. He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book. The psychical researcher John L. Randall wrote there was direct evidence of "dirty tricks" played upon Price by members of the SPR. On 9 October 1931, a past president of the SPR William Henry Salter visited the Borley Rectory in an attempt to persuade the Rector Lionel Foyster, to sever his links with Price and work with the SPR instead. After Price's death in 1948 Eric Dingwall, Kathleen M. Goldney, and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research, two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena. The "Borley Report", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote "when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away." Terence Hines wrote "Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself "salted the mine" and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory." Robert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote Price's defenders are unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly. Price's investigation of Borley was the subject of a 2013 best selling novel by Neil Spring, titled 'The Ghost Hunters.' This novel was subsequently adapted for television as 'Harry Price: Ghost Hunter,' starring Rafe Spall, Cara Theobold and Richie Campbell. CANNOTANSWER | He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book. | Harry Price (17 January 1881 – 29 March 1948) was a British psychic researcher and author, who gained public prominence for his investigations into psychical phenomena and his exposing fraudulent spiritualist mediums. He is best known for his well-publicised investigation of the purportedly haunted Borley Rectory in Essex, England.
Early life
Although Price claimed his birth was in Shropshire he was actually born in London in Red Lion Square on the site of the South Place Ethical Society's Conway Hall. He was educated in New Cross, first at Waller Road Infants School and then Haberdashers' Aske's Hatcham Boys School. At 15, Price founded the Carlton Dramatic Society and wrote plays, including a drama, about his early experience with a poltergeist which he said took place at a haunted manor house in Shropshire.
According to Richard Morris, in his biography Harry Price: The Psychic Detective (2006), Price came to the attention of the press when he claimed an early interest in space-telegraphy. He set up a receiver and transmitter between Telegraph Hill, Hatcham and St Peter's Church Brockley and captured a spark on a photographic plate. This, though, was nothing more than Price writing a press release saying he had performed the experiment, as nothing was verified. The young Price also had an avid interest in coin collecting and wrote several articles for The Askean, the magazine for Haberdashers' School. In his autobiography, Search for Truth, written between 1941 and 1942, Price claimed he was involved with archaeological excavations in Greenwich Park, London, but, in earlier writings on Greenwich, he denied any such involvement.
From around May 1908 Price continued his interest in archaeology at Pulborough, Sussex, where he had moved prior to marrying Constance Mary Knight that August. As well as working as a salesman for paper merchants Edward Saunders & Sons, he wrote for two local Sussex newspapers: the West Sussex Gazette and the Southern Weekly News in which he related his remarkable propensity for discovering 'clean' antiquities. One of these, a 'silver' ingot (discovered by Richard Morris to be housed in Price's collection of artefacts at Senate House, University of London and made of base materials) was stamped around the time of the last Roman emperor Honorius. A few years later, another celebrated Sussex archaeologist, Charles Dawson, found a brick at Pevensey Fort in Sussex, which was purportedly made in Honorius' time. In 1910 Professor E. J Haverfield of Oxford University, the country's foremost expert on Roman history and a Fellow of the Royal Academy, declared the ingot to be a fake.
A report for the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries (number 23, pages 121–9) in the same year reported that:
'... the double axe type of silver ingot was well known and dated from late Imperial times but the one recovered from Sussex was an inferior copy of one found at the Tower of London, with alterations to give it an air of authenticity. Both the shape and lettering betrayed its origin.'
Interest in magic and conjuring
In his autobiography, Search for Truth, Price said the "Great Sequah" in Shrewsbury was "entirely responsible for shaping much of my life's work", and led to him acquiring the first volume of what would become the Harry Price Library, Price later became an expert amateur conjurer, joined the Magic Circle in 1922 and maintained a lifelong interest in stage magic and conjuring. His expertise in sleight-of-hand and magic tricks stood him in good stead for what would become his all consuming passion, the investigation of paranormal phenomena.
The psychical researcher Eric Dingwall and Price re-published an anonymous work written by a former medium entitled Revelations of a Spirit Medium (1922) which exposed the tricks of mediumship and the fraudulent methods of producing "spirit hands". Originally all the copies of the book were bought up by spiritualists and deliberately destroyed.
Psychical research
Price joined the Society for Psychical Research (SPR) in 1920 and because of his knowledge in conjuring had debunked fraudulent mediums but in direct contrast to other magicians, Price endorsed some mediums that he believed were genuine. Price's first major success in psychical research came in 1922 when he exposed the 'spirit' photographer William Hope. In the same year he travelled to Germany together with Eric Dingwall and investigated Willi Schneider at the home of Baron Albert von Schrenck-Notzing in Munich. In 1923, Price exposed the medium Jan Guzyk, according to Price the "man was clever, especially with his feet, which were almost as useful to him as his hands in producing phenomena."
Price wrote that the photographs depicting the ectoplasm of the medium Eva Carrière taken with Schrenck-Notzing looked artificial and two-dimensional made from cardboard and newspaper portraits and that there were no scientific controls as both her hands were free. In 1920 Carrière was investigated by psychical researchers in London. An analysis of her ectoplasm revealed it to be made of chewed paper. She was also investigated in 1922 and the result of the tests were negative. In 1925, Price investigated Maria Silbert and caught her using her feet and toes to move objects in the séance room. He also investigated the "direct voice" mediumship of George Valiantine in London. In the séance Valiantine claimed to have contacted the "spirit" of the composer Luigi Arditi , speaking in Italian. Price wrote down every word that was attributed to Arditi and they were found to be word-for-word matches in an Italian phrase-book.
Price formed an organisation in 1925 called the National Laboratory of Psychical Research as a rival to the Society for Psychical Research. Price had a number of disputes with the SPR, most notably over the mediumship of Rudi Schneider. Price paid mediums to test them-the SPR criticised Price and disagreed about paying mediums for testing.
Price made a formal offer to the University of London to equip and endow a Department of Psychical Research, and to loan the equipment of the National Laboratory and its library. The University of London Board of Studies in Psychology responded positively to this proposal. In 1934, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research, which held Price's collection, was reconstituted as the University of London Council for Psychical Investigation with C. E. M. Joad as chairman and with Price as Honorary Secretary and editor, although it was not an official body of the University. In the meantime, in 1927 Price joined the Ghost Club, of which he remained a member until it (temporarily) closed in 1936.
In 1927, Price claimed that he had come into possession of Joanna Southcott's box, and arranged to have it opened in the presence of one reluctant prelate (the Bishop of Grantham, not a diocesan bishop but a suffragan of the Diocese of Lincoln): it was found to contain only a few oddments and unimportant papers, among them a lottery ticket and a horse-pistol. His claims to have had the true box have been disputed by historians and by followers of Southcott. Price exposed Frederick Tansley Munnings, who claimed to produce the independent "spirit" voices of Julius Caesar, Dan Leno, Hawley Harvey Crippen and King Henry VIII. Price invented and used a piece of apparatus known as a voice control recorder and proved that all the voices were those of Munnings. In 1928, Munnings admitted fraud and sold his confessions to a Sunday newspaper.
Price was friends with other debunkers of fraudulent mediums including Harry Houdini and the journalist Ernest Palmer.
In 1933, Frank Decker was investigated by Price at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Under strict scientific controls that Price contrived, Decker failed to produce any phenomena at all. Price's psychical research continued with investigations into Karachi's Indian rope trick and the fire-walking abilities of Kuda Bux in 1935. He was also involved in the formation of the National Film Library (British Film Institute) becoming its first chairman (until 1941) and was a founding member of the Shakespeare Film Society. In 1936, Price broadcast from a supposedly haunted manor house in Meopham, Kent for the BBC and published The Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter and The Haunting of Cashen's Gap. This year also saw the transfer of Price's library on permanent loan to the University of London (see external links below), followed shortly by the laboratory and investigative equipment. In 1937, he conducted further televised experiments into fire-walking with Ahmed Hussain at Carshalton and Alexandra Palace, and also rented Borley Rectory for one year. The following year, Price re-established the Ghost Club, with himself as chairman, modernising it and changing it from a spiritualist association to a group of more or less open-minded sceptics that gathered to discuss paranormal topics. He was also the first to admit women to the club.
In the same year, Price conducted experiments with Rahman Bey who was "buried alive" in Carshalton. He also drafted a Bill for the regulation of psychic practitioners. In 1939, he organised a national telepathic test in the periodical John O'London's Weekly. During the 1940s, Price concentrated on writing and the works The Most Haunted House in England, Poltergeist Over England and The End of Borley Rectory were all published.
Famous cases
William Hope
On 4 February 1922, Price with James Seymour, Eric Dingwall and William Marriott had proven the spirit photographer William Hope was a fraud during tests at the British College of Psychic Science. Price wrote in his SPR report "William Hope has been found guilty of deliberately substituting his own plates for those of a sitter ... It implies that the medium brings to the sitting a duplicate slide and faked plates for fraudulent purposes."
Price secretly marked Hope's photographic plates, and provided him with a packet of additional plates that had been covertly etched with the brand image of the Imperial Dry Plate Co. Ltd. in the knowledge that the logo would be transferred to any images created with them. Unaware that Price had tampered with his supplies, Hope then attempted to produce a number of Spirit photographs. Although Hope produced several images of alleged spirits, none of his materials contained the Imperial Dry Plate Co. Ltd logo, or the marks that Price had put on Hope's original equipment, showing that he had exchanged prepared materials containing fake spirit images for the provided materials.
Price later re-published the Society's experiment in a pamphlet of his own called Cold Light on Spiritualistic "Phenomena" – An Experiment with the Crewe Circle. Due to the exposure of Hope and other fraudulent spiritualists, Arthur Conan Doyle led a mass resignation of eighty-four members of the Society for Psychical Research, as they believed the Society was opposed to spiritualism. Doyle threatened to have Price evicted from his laboratory and claimed if he persisted to write "sewage" about spiritualists, he would meet the same fate as Houdini. Doyle and other spiritualists attacked Price and tried for years to have Price take his pamphlet out of circulation. Price wrote "Arthur Conan Doyle and his friends abused me for years for exposing Hope."
Eileen Garrett
On 7 October 1930 it was claimed by spiritualists that Eileen J. Garrett made contact with the spirit of Herbert Carmichael Irwin at a séance held with Price at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research two days after the R101 disaster, while attempting to contact the then recently deceased Arthur Conan Doyle, and discussed possible causes of the accident. The event "attracted worldwide attention", thanks to the presence of a reporter. Major Oliver Villiers, a friend of Brancker, Scott, Irwin, Colmore and others aboard the airship, participated in further séances with Garrett, at which he claimed to have contacted both Irwin and other victims. Price did not come to any definite conclusion about Garrett and the séances:
It is not my intention to discuss if the medium were really controlled by the discarnate entity of Irwin, or whether the utterances emanated from her subconscious mind or those of the sitters. "Spirit" or "trance personality" would be equally interesting explanations – and equally remarkable. There is no real evidence for either hypothesis. But it is not my intention to discuss hypotheses, but rather to put on record the detailed account of a remarkably interesting and thought-provoking experiment.
Garrett's claims have since been questioned. The magician John Booth analysed the mediumship of Garrett and the paranormal claims of R101 and considered her to be a fraud. According to Booth Garrett's notes and writings show she followed the building of the R101 and she may have been given aircraft blueprints by a technician from the airdrome. However, the researcher Melvin Harris who studied the case wrote no secret accomplice was needed as the information described in Garrett's séances were "either commonplace, easily absorbed bits and pieces, or plain gobbledegook. The so-called secret information just doesn't exist."
Rudi Schneider
In the 1920s and early 1930s Price investigated the medium Rudi Schneider in a number of experiments conducted at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Schneider claimed he could levitate objects but according to Price a photograph taken on 28 April 1932 showed that Schneider had managed to free his arm to move a handkerchief from the table. After this, many scientists considered Schneider to be exposed as a fraud. Price wrote that the findings of the other experiments should be revised due to the evidence showing how Schneider could free himself from the controls.
After Price had exposed Schneider, various scientists, such as Karl Przibram and the magician Henry Evans, wrote to Price telling him that they agreed that Schneider would evade control during his séances and congratulated Price on the success of unmasking the fraud. In opposition, SPR members who were highly critical of Price, supported Schneider's mediumship and promoted a conspiracy theory that Price had hoaxed the photograph. SPR member Anita Gregory claimed Price had deliberately faked the photograph to discredit SPR research and ruin Schneider's reputation. However, a photographic expert testified that the photograph was genuine. SPR member John L. Randall reviewed the Price and Schneider case and came to the conclusion that the photograph was genuine and that Price had caught Schneider in fraud.
Helen Duncan
In 1931, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research took on its most illustrious case. £50 was paid to the medium Helen Duncan so that she could be examined under scientific conditions. Price was sceptical of Duncan and had her perform a number of test séances. She was suspected of swallowing cheesecloth which was then regurgitated as "ectoplasm". Price had proven through analysis of a sample of ectoplasm produced by Duncan, that it was made of cheesecloth. Duncan reacted violently at attempts to X-ray her, running from the laboratory and making a scene in the street, where her husband had to restrain her, destroying the controlled nature of the test. Price wrote that Duncan had given her fake ectoplasm to her husband to hide. The ectoplasm of Duncan in another test was analysed by psychical researchers and reported to be made from egg white. According to Price:
The sight of half-a-dozen men, each with a pair of scissors waiting for the word, was amusing. It came and we all jumped. One of the doctors got hold of the stuff and secured a piece. The medium screamed and the rest of the "teleplasm" went down her throat. This time it wasn't cheese-cloth. It proved to be paper, soaked in white of egg, and folded into a flattened tube ... Could anything be more infantile than a group of grown-up men wasting time, money, and energy on the antics of a fat female crook.
Price wrote up the case in Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book (1933) in a chapter called "The Cheese-Cloth Worshippers". In his report Price published photographs of Duncan in his laboratory that revealed fake ectoplasm made from cheesecloth, rubber gloves and cut-out heads from magazine covers which she pretended to her audience were spirits. Following the report written by Price, Duncan's former maid Mary McGinlay confessed in detail to having aided Duncan in her mediumship tricks, and Duncan's husband admitted the ectoplasm materialisations to be the result of regurgitation. Later Duncan was caught cheating again pretending to be a spirit in the séance room. During Duncan's famous trial in 1944, Price gave his results as evidence for the prosecution. This time Duncan and her travelling companions, Frances Brown, Ernest and Elizabeth Homer were prosecuted and convicted. Duncan was jailed for nine months, Brown for four months and the Homers were bound over.
Brocken experiment
In 1932, Price travelled to Mount Brocken in Germany with C. E. M. Joad and members of the National Laboratory to conduct a 'black magic' experiment in connection with the centenary of Goethe. The "Bloksberg Tryst", involving the transformation of a goat into a young man by the invocation of a maiden, Ura Bohn (better known as the film actress Gloria Gordon, 1881–1962), produced a great deal of publicity but not the magical transformation. Price claimed he carried out the experiment "if only to prove the fallacy of transcendental magic."
Gef
In July 1935 Price and his friend Richard Lambert went to the Isle of Man to investigate the alleged case of Gef the talking mongoose and produced the book The Haunting of Cashen's Gap (1936). In the book they avoided saying that they believed the story but were careful to report it as though with an open mind. The book reports how a hair from the alleged mongoose was sent to Julian Huxley who then sent it to naturalist F. Martin Duncan who identified it as a dog hair. Price suspected the hair belonged to the Irving's sheepdog, Mona.
Price asked Reginald Pocock of the Natural History Museum to evaluate pawprints allegedly made by Gef in plasticine together with an impression of his supposed tooth marks. Pocock could not match them to any known animal, though he conceded that one of them might have been "conceivably made by a dog". He did state that none of the markings had been made by a mongoose.
Price visited the Irvings and observed double walls of wooden panelling covering the interior rooms of the old stone farmhouse which featured considerable interior air space between stone and wood walls that "makes the whole house one great speaking-tube, with walls like soundingboards. By speaking into one of the many apertures in the panels, it should be possible to convey the voice to various parts of the house." According to Richard Wiseman "Price and Lambert were less than enthusiastic about the case, concluding that only the most credulous of individuals would be impressed with the evidence for Gef."
The diaries of James Irving, along with reports about the case, are in Harry Price's archives in the Senate House Library, University of London.
Borley Rectory
Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex. The building became known as "the most haunted house in England" after Price published a book about it in 1940. He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863. He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book.
The psychical researcher John L. Randall wrote there was direct evidence of "dirty tricks" played upon Price by members of the SPR. On 9 October 1931, a past president of the SPR, William Henry Salter, visited the Borley Rectory in an attempt to persuade the Rector Lionel Foyster to sever his links with Price and work with the SPR instead. After Price's death in 1948 Eric Dingwall, Kathleen M. Goldney, and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research, two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena.
The "Borley Report", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote "when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away." Terence Hines wrote "Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself "salted the mine" and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory."
Robert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote Price's defenders are unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly.
Price's investigation of Borley was the subject of a 2013 best selling novel by Neil Spring, titled The Ghost Hunters. This novel was subsequently adapted for television as Harry Price: Ghost Hunter, starring Rafe Spall, Cara Theobold and Richie Campbell.
Rosalie
Price claimed to have attended a private séance on 15 December 1937 in which a small six-year-old girl called Rosalie appeared. Price wrote he controlled the room by placing starch powder over the floor, locking the door and taping the windows before the séance. However, the identity of the sitters, or the locality where the séance was held was not revealed due to the alleged request of the mother of the child. During the séance Price claimed a small girl emerged, she spoke and he took her pulse. Price was suspicious that the supposed spirit of the child was no different than a human being but after the séance had finished the starch powder was undisturbed and none of the seals had been removed on the window. Price was convinced no one had entered the room via door or window during the séance. Price's Fifty Years of Psychical Research (1939) describes his experiences at the sitting and includes a diagram of the séance room.
Eric Dingwall and Trevor Hall wrote the Rosalie séance was fictitious and Price had lied about the whole affair but had based some of the details on the description of the house from a sitting he attended at a much earlier time in Brockley, South London where he used to live. K. M. Goldney who had criticised Price over his investigation into Borley Rectory wrote after the morning of the Rosalie sitting she found Price "shaken to the core by his experience." Goldney believed Price had told the truth about the séance and informed the Two Worlds spiritualist weekly newspaper that she believed the Rosalie sitting to be genuine.
In 1985, Peter Underwood published a photograph of part of an anonymous letter that was sent to the SPR member David Cohen in the 1960s which claimed to be from a séance sitter who attended the séance. The letter confessed to having impersonated the Rosalie child in the sitting by the request of the father who had owed the mother of the child money. In 2017, Paul Adams published details of the location of the Rosalie seance and identities of the family involved.
Reception
Psychologist and sceptic Richard Wiseman has praised Price for his work in debunking fraudulent mediums and investigating paranormal claims. According to Wiseman "Price devoted the scientific study to weird stuff ... that both delighted the world's media and infuriated believers and sceptics alike." The stage magician and scientific sceptic James Randi wrote Price accomplished some valuable and genuine research but lived "a strange mixture of fact and fraud."
Psychical researcher Renée Haynes described Price as "one of the most fascinating and storm-provoking figures in psychical research." Science writer Mary Roach in her book Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife (2010) favourably mentioned Price's methods and research in debunking the fraudulent medium Helen Duncan.
Several biographies have been written about Price. Paul Tabori's biography (1974) is generally sympathetic. Historian Trevor H. Hall's (1978) is much more critical. The latest biography by Richard Morris (2006) is also critical, concluding that Price should best be remembered as a "supreme bluffer, a hedonistic con man, a terrific raconteur, a great conjuror, a gifted writer and a wonderful eccentric."
Death and legacy
Price suffered a massive heart attack at his home in Pulborough, West Sussex and died almost instantly on 29 March 1948.
His archives were deposited with the University of London between 1976 and 1978 by his widow. They include his correspondence, drafts of his publications, papers relating to libel cases, reports on his investigations, press cuttings and photographs. His collection of magic books and periodicals is held at Senate House Library, part of the University of London and is called the Harry Price Library of Magical Literature. The collection, which includes 13,000 items, was established by a bequest from his estate in 1948.
Published works
Revelations of a Spirit Medium, with Eric Dingwall, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co. Ltd, London, 1922.
Cold Light on Spiritualistic "Phenomena" – An Experiment with the Crewe Circle, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., 1922.
Stella C. An Account of Some Original Experiments in Psychical Research, Hurst & Blackett, 1925.
Rudi Schneider: A Scientific Examination of his Mediumship, Methuen & Co., London, 1930.
Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book, Victor Gollancz, London, 1933.
Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter, Putnam & Co., 1936.
The Haunting of Cashen's Gap: A Modern "Miracle" Investigated – with R.S. Lambert, Methuen & Co., 1936.
Fifty Years of Psychical Research: A Critical Survey Longmans, Green & Co., 1939.
The Most Haunted House in England: Ten Years' Investigation of Borley Rectory, Longmans, Green & Co., 1940.
Search for Truth: My Life for Psychical Research, Collins, 1942.
Poltergeist Over England: Three Centuries of Mischievous Ghosts, Country Life, 1945.
The End of Borley Rectory, Harrap & Co., 1946.
See also
Psychic telephone
James Randi
References
Bibliography
Harry Price, Biography of a Ghost Hunter by Paul Tabori, Athenaem Press, hardback, 1950. (Reprinted in 1974 by Sphere Books)
Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book, by Harry Price, Victor Gollancz Ltd., hardback, 1933.
Harry Price: The Psychic Detective by Richard Morris, Sutton Publishing hardback, 2006. .
External links
Harry Price Collection of Magical Literature at Senate House Library
Harry Price Archives
Harry Price Website
The Hunter of Ghosts by Leon Gellert
The Milwaukee Sentinel – Oct 1, 1933
The Milwaukee Sentinel – Oct 15, 1933
1881 births
1948 deaths
British writers
Parapsychologists
Paranormal investigators
People associated with Conway Hall Ethical Society | true | [
"\n\nTrack listing\n Opening Overture\n \"I Get a Kick Out of You\" (Cole Porter)\n \"You Are the Sunshine of My Life\" (Stevie Wonder)\n \"You Will Be My Music\" (Joe Raposo)\n \"Don't Worry 'bout Me\" (Ted Koehler, Rube Bloom)\n \"If\" (David Gates)\n \"Bad, Bad Leroy Brown\" (Jim Croce)\n \"Ol' Man River\" (Jerome Kern, Oscar Hammerstein II)\n Famous Monologue\n Saloon Trilogy: \"Last Night When We Were Young\"/\"Violets for Your Furs\"/\"Here's That Rainy Day\" (Harold Arlen, E.Y. Harburg)/(Matt Dennis, Tom Adair)/(Jimmy Van Heusen, Johnny Burke)\n \"I've Got You Under My Skin\" (Porter)\n \"My Kind of Town\" (Sammy Cahn, Van Heusen)\n \"Let Me Try Again\" (Paul Anka, Cahn, Michel Jourdan)\n \"The Lady Is a Tramp\" (Richard Rodgers, Lorenz Hart)\n \"My Way\" (Anka, Claude Francois, Jacques Revaux, Gilles Thibaut)\n\nFrank Sinatra's Monologue About the Australian Press\nI do believe this is my interval, as we say... We've been having a marvelous time being chased around the country for three days. You know, I think it's worth mentioning because it's so idiotic, it's so ridiculous what's been happening. We came all the way to Australia because I chose to come here. I haven't been here for a long time and I wanted to come back for a few days. Wait now, wait. I'm not buttering anybody at all. I don't have to. I really don't have to. I like coming here. I like the people. I love your attitude. I like the booze and the beer and everything else that comes into the scene. I also like the way the country's growing and it's a swinging place.\n\nSo we come here and what happens? We gotta run all day long because of the parasites who chase us with automobiles. That's dangerous, too, on the road, you know. Might cause an accident. They won't quit. They wonder why I won't talk to them. I wouldn't drink their water, let alone talk to them. And if any of you folks in the press are in the audience, please quote me properly. Don't mix it up, do it exactly as I'm saying it, please. Write it down very clearly. One idiot called me up and he wanted to know what I had for breakfast. What the hell does he care what I had for breakfast? I was about to tell him what I did after breakfast. Oh, boy, they're murder! We have a name in the States for their counterparts: They're called parasites. Because they take and take and take and never give, absolutely, never give. I don't care what you think about any press in the world, I say they're bums and they'll always be bums, everyone of them. There are just a few exceptions to the rule. Some good editorial writers who don't go out in the street and chase people around. Critics don't bother me, because if I do badly, I know I'm bad before they even write it, and if I'm good, I know I'm good before they write it. It's true. I know best about myself. So, a critic is a critic. He doesn't anger me. It's the scandal man who bugs you, drives you crazy. It's the two-bit-type work that they do. They're pimps. They're just crazy, you know. And the broads who work in the press are the hookers of the press. Need I explain that to you? I might offer them a buck and a half... I'm not sure. I once gave a chick in Washington $2 and I overpaid her, I found out. She didn't even bathe. Imagine what that was like, ha, ha.\n\nNow, it's a good thing I'm not angry. Really. It's a good thing I'm not angry. I couldn't care less. The press of the world never made a person a star who was untalented, nor did they ever hurt any artist who was talented. So we, who have God-given talent, say, \"To hell with them.\" It doesn't make any difference, you know. And I want to say one more thing. From what I see what's happened since I was last here... what, 16 years ago? Twelve years ago. From what I've seen to happen with the type of news that they print in this town shocked me. And do you know what is devastating? It's old-fashioned. It was done in America and England twenty years ago. And they're catching up with it now, with the scandal sheet. They're rags, that's what they are. You use them to train your dog and your parrot. What else do I have to say? Oh, I guess that's it. That'll keep them talking to themselves for a while. I think most of them are a bunch of fags anyway. Never did a hard day's work in their life. I love when they say, \"What do you mean, you won't stand still when I take your picture?\" All of a sudden, they're God. We gotta do what they want us to do. It's incredible. A pox on them... Now, let's get down to some serious business here...\n\nSee also\nConcerts of Frank Sinatra\n\nFrank Sinatra",
"\"What They'll Say About Us\" is a song by American singer-songwriter Finneas. It was released by OYOY as a single on September 2, 2020. The song was written and produced by Finneas. A lullaby-influenced ballad, the lyrics were inspired by the Black Lives Matter protests and Nick Cordero's death due to COVID-19. \"What They'll Say About Us\" was noted by music critics for its lyrical content. A music video for the song was released alongside the song and was directed by Sam Bennett in one take. It is the first single from his debut studio album Optimist.\n\nBackground and development\nFinneas wrote and produced \"What They'll Say About Us\". It was inspired by the spark of Black Lives Matter protests after racial inequality in the United States and the death of Canadian actor Nick Cordero, who died at the age of 41 from the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Finneas wrote the track in June 2020 while in quarantine. In an interview over Zoom with The Wall Street Journal, he said: \"I wrote this song in June after spending the day at a protest in Downtown LA, filled with hope with the prospect that millions of people were coming together from all over the world to fight against institutionalized racism and inequality\". He further stated: \"The other component of the song was [that] I was very closely following Nick Cordero's story on Instagram, via his wife [Amanda Kloots], and Nick and his wife were not people I'd ever met. I don't know them at all. I saw the headlines about his health, just like everybody else did. I just became incredibly attached to this family that I’d never met before. I kind of wrote this song as if you were singing to your loved one who was in a hospital bed while the world was protesting outside. I did make a point to keep the song fairly ambiguous because I know everybody's sort of going through different circumstances of the same things right now\".\n\nComposition and lyrics\n\"What They'll Say About Us\" begins \"calmly and reassuringly\": \"You're tired now, lie down/I'll be waiting to give you the good news/It might take patience/And when you wake up, it won't be over/So don't you give up\". However, as the beat and other instruments begin to arrive, the soundstage changes to be hazy. John Pareles, writing for The New York Times, says it \"mortality begins to haunt the song, all the way to a devastating last line\", noting the lyrics, \"It might take patience/And if you don't wake up/I'll know you tried to/I wish you could see him/He looks just like you\".\n\nReception\nIn a review for DIY magazine, the staff labeled \"What They'll Say About Us\" as \"poignant\" and an \"ode to human strength\". Writing for Billboard magazine, Jason Lipshutz said while the production on the track is \"effectively restrained\", people should credit Finneas for going \"full-on showstopper when he draws out the line, 'We've got the time to take the world / And make it better than it ever was\". Emily Tan of Spin magazine described the track as a song that \"aims to offer comfort to those who have lost someone due to Covid-19\".\n\nMusic video\nA music video for \"What They'll Say About Us\" was released to Finneas' YouTube channel on September 2, 2020. The video was directed by Sam Bennett and shot in one take. In the visual, lights and rain swirl around Finneas as he sings and offers comfort to people who have lost someone they love from COVID-19. Spins Emily Yan described the visual as \"simple\" and \"intimate\".\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2020s ballads\n2020 singles\n2020 songs\nSong recordings produced by Finneas O'Connell\nSongs written by Finneas O'Connell\nSongs in memory of deceased persons\nFinneas O'Connell songs"
] |
[
"Harry Price",
"Borley Rectory",
"What is the Borley Rectory?",
"Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex.",
"What happened at the Borley Rectory?",
"He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863.",
"What type of hauntings were they?",
"I don't know.",
"What else did he say about the rectory?",
"He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book."
] | C_b266e36c145b4a1a9cd6eae0a45cf57e_1 | What were his experiences? | 5 | What were Harry Price's experiences living in the Borley Rectory? | Harry Price | Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex. The building became known as "the most haunted house in England" after Price published a book about it in 1940. He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863. He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book. The psychical researcher John L. Randall wrote there was direct evidence of "dirty tricks" played upon Price by members of the SPR. On 9 October 1931, a past president of the SPR William Henry Salter visited the Borley Rectory in an attempt to persuade the Rector Lionel Foyster, to sever his links with Price and work with the SPR instead. After Price's death in 1948 Eric Dingwall, Kathleen M. Goldney, and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research, two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena. The "Borley Report", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote "when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away." Terence Hines wrote "Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself "salted the mine" and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory." Robert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote Price's defenders are unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly. Price's investigation of Borley was the subject of a 2013 best selling novel by Neil Spring, titled 'The Ghost Hunters.' This novel was subsequently adapted for television as 'Harry Price: Ghost Hunter,' starring Rafe Spall, Cara Theobold and Richie Campbell. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Harry Price (17 January 1881 – 29 March 1948) was a British psychic researcher and author, who gained public prominence for his investigations into psychical phenomena and his exposing fraudulent spiritualist mediums. He is best known for his well-publicised investigation of the purportedly haunted Borley Rectory in Essex, England.
Early life
Although Price claimed his birth was in Shropshire he was actually born in London in Red Lion Square on the site of the South Place Ethical Society's Conway Hall. He was educated in New Cross, first at Waller Road Infants School and then Haberdashers' Aske's Hatcham Boys School. At 15, Price founded the Carlton Dramatic Society and wrote plays, including a drama, about his early experience with a poltergeist which he said took place at a haunted manor house in Shropshire.
According to Richard Morris, in his biography Harry Price: The Psychic Detective (2006), Price came to the attention of the press when he claimed an early interest in space-telegraphy. He set up a receiver and transmitter between Telegraph Hill, Hatcham and St Peter's Church Brockley and captured a spark on a photographic plate. This, though, was nothing more than Price writing a press release saying he had performed the experiment, as nothing was verified. The young Price also had an avid interest in coin collecting and wrote several articles for The Askean, the magazine for Haberdashers' School. In his autobiography, Search for Truth, written between 1941 and 1942, Price claimed he was involved with archaeological excavations in Greenwich Park, London, but, in earlier writings on Greenwich, he denied any such involvement.
From around May 1908 Price continued his interest in archaeology at Pulborough, Sussex, where he had moved prior to marrying Constance Mary Knight that August. As well as working as a salesman for paper merchants Edward Saunders & Sons, he wrote for two local Sussex newspapers: the West Sussex Gazette and the Southern Weekly News in which he related his remarkable propensity for discovering 'clean' antiquities. One of these, a 'silver' ingot (discovered by Richard Morris to be housed in Price's collection of artefacts at Senate House, University of London and made of base materials) was stamped around the time of the last Roman emperor Honorius. A few years later, another celebrated Sussex archaeologist, Charles Dawson, found a brick at Pevensey Fort in Sussex, which was purportedly made in Honorius' time. In 1910 Professor E. J Haverfield of Oxford University, the country's foremost expert on Roman history and a Fellow of the Royal Academy, declared the ingot to be a fake.
A report for the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries (number 23, pages 121–9) in the same year reported that:
'... the double axe type of silver ingot was well known and dated from late Imperial times but the one recovered from Sussex was an inferior copy of one found at the Tower of London, with alterations to give it an air of authenticity. Both the shape and lettering betrayed its origin.'
Interest in magic and conjuring
In his autobiography, Search for Truth, Price said the "Great Sequah" in Shrewsbury was "entirely responsible for shaping much of my life's work", and led to him acquiring the first volume of what would become the Harry Price Library, Price later became an expert amateur conjurer, joined the Magic Circle in 1922 and maintained a lifelong interest in stage magic and conjuring. His expertise in sleight-of-hand and magic tricks stood him in good stead for what would become his all consuming passion, the investigation of paranormal phenomena.
The psychical researcher Eric Dingwall and Price re-published an anonymous work written by a former medium entitled Revelations of a Spirit Medium (1922) which exposed the tricks of mediumship and the fraudulent methods of producing "spirit hands". Originally all the copies of the book were bought up by spiritualists and deliberately destroyed.
Psychical research
Price joined the Society for Psychical Research (SPR) in 1920 and because of his knowledge in conjuring had debunked fraudulent mediums but in direct contrast to other magicians, Price endorsed some mediums that he believed were genuine. Price's first major success in psychical research came in 1922 when he exposed the 'spirit' photographer William Hope. In the same year he travelled to Germany together with Eric Dingwall and investigated Willi Schneider at the home of Baron Albert von Schrenck-Notzing in Munich. In 1923, Price exposed the medium Jan Guzyk, according to Price the "man was clever, especially with his feet, which were almost as useful to him as his hands in producing phenomena."
Price wrote that the photographs depicting the ectoplasm of the medium Eva Carrière taken with Schrenck-Notzing looked artificial and two-dimensional made from cardboard and newspaper portraits and that there were no scientific controls as both her hands were free. In 1920 Carrière was investigated by psychical researchers in London. An analysis of her ectoplasm revealed it to be made of chewed paper. She was also investigated in 1922 and the result of the tests were negative. In 1925, Price investigated Maria Silbert and caught her using her feet and toes to move objects in the séance room. He also investigated the "direct voice" mediumship of George Valiantine in London. In the séance Valiantine claimed to have contacted the "spirit" of the composer Luigi Arditi , speaking in Italian. Price wrote down every word that was attributed to Arditi and they were found to be word-for-word matches in an Italian phrase-book.
Price formed an organisation in 1925 called the National Laboratory of Psychical Research as a rival to the Society for Psychical Research. Price had a number of disputes with the SPR, most notably over the mediumship of Rudi Schneider. Price paid mediums to test them-the SPR criticised Price and disagreed about paying mediums for testing.
Price made a formal offer to the University of London to equip and endow a Department of Psychical Research, and to loan the equipment of the National Laboratory and its library. The University of London Board of Studies in Psychology responded positively to this proposal. In 1934, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research, which held Price's collection, was reconstituted as the University of London Council for Psychical Investigation with C. E. M. Joad as chairman and with Price as Honorary Secretary and editor, although it was not an official body of the University. In the meantime, in 1927 Price joined the Ghost Club, of which he remained a member until it (temporarily) closed in 1936.
In 1927, Price claimed that he had come into possession of Joanna Southcott's box, and arranged to have it opened in the presence of one reluctant prelate (the Bishop of Grantham, not a diocesan bishop but a suffragan of the Diocese of Lincoln): it was found to contain only a few oddments and unimportant papers, among them a lottery ticket and a horse-pistol. His claims to have had the true box have been disputed by historians and by followers of Southcott. Price exposed Frederick Tansley Munnings, who claimed to produce the independent "spirit" voices of Julius Caesar, Dan Leno, Hawley Harvey Crippen and King Henry VIII. Price invented and used a piece of apparatus known as a voice control recorder and proved that all the voices were those of Munnings. In 1928, Munnings admitted fraud and sold his confessions to a Sunday newspaper.
Price was friends with other debunkers of fraudulent mediums including Harry Houdini and the journalist Ernest Palmer.
In 1933, Frank Decker was investigated by Price at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Under strict scientific controls that Price contrived, Decker failed to produce any phenomena at all. Price's psychical research continued with investigations into Karachi's Indian rope trick and the fire-walking abilities of Kuda Bux in 1935. He was also involved in the formation of the National Film Library (British Film Institute) becoming its first chairman (until 1941) and was a founding member of the Shakespeare Film Society. In 1936, Price broadcast from a supposedly haunted manor house in Meopham, Kent for the BBC and published The Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter and The Haunting of Cashen's Gap. This year also saw the transfer of Price's library on permanent loan to the University of London (see external links below), followed shortly by the laboratory and investigative equipment. In 1937, he conducted further televised experiments into fire-walking with Ahmed Hussain at Carshalton and Alexandra Palace, and also rented Borley Rectory for one year. The following year, Price re-established the Ghost Club, with himself as chairman, modernising it and changing it from a spiritualist association to a group of more or less open-minded sceptics that gathered to discuss paranormal topics. He was also the first to admit women to the club.
In the same year, Price conducted experiments with Rahman Bey who was "buried alive" in Carshalton. He also drafted a Bill for the regulation of psychic practitioners. In 1939, he organised a national telepathic test in the periodical John O'London's Weekly. During the 1940s, Price concentrated on writing and the works The Most Haunted House in England, Poltergeist Over England and The End of Borley Rectory were all published.
Famous cases
William Hope
On 4 February 1922, Price with James Seymour, Eric Dingwall and William Marriott had proven the spirit photographer William Hope was a fraud during tests at the British College of Psychic Science. Price wrote in his SPR report "William Hope has been found guilty of deliberately substituting his own plates for those of a sitter ... It implies that the medium brings to the sitting a duplicate slide and faked plates for fraudulent purposes."
Price secretly marked Hope's photographic plates, and provided him with a packet of additional plates that had been covertly etched with the brand image of the Imperial Dry Plate Co. Ltd. in the knowledge that the logo would be transferred to any images created with them. Unaware that Price had tampered with his supplies, Hope then attempted to produce a number of Spirit photographs. Although Hope produced several images of alleged spirits, none of his materials contained the Imperial Dry Plate Co. Ltd logo, or the marks that Price had put on Hope's original equipment, showing that he had exchanged prepared materials containing fake spirit images for the provided materials.
Price later re-published the Society's experiment in a pamphlet of his own called Cold Light on Spiritualistic "Phenomena" – An Experiment with the Crewe Circle. Due to the exposure of Hope and other fraudulent spiritualists, Arthur Conan Doyle led a mass resignation of eighty-four members of the Society for Psychical Research, as they believed the Society was opposed to spiritualism. Doyle threatened to have Price evicted from his laboratory and claimed if he persisted to write "sewage" about spiritualists, he would meet the same fate as Houdini. Doyle and other spiritualists attacked Price and tried for years to have Price take his pamphlet out of circulation. Price wrote "Arthur Conan Doyle and his friends abused me for years for exposing Hope."
Eileen Garrett
On 7 October 1930 it was claimed by spiritualists that Eileen J. Garrett made contact with the spirit of Herbert Carmichael Irwin at a séance held with Price at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research two days after the R101 disaster, while attempting to contact the then recently deceased Arthur Conan Doyle, and discussed possible causes of the accident. The event "attracted worldwide attention", thanks to the presence of a reporter. Major Oliver Villiers, a friend of Brancker, Scott, Irwin, Colmore and others aboard the airship, participated in further séances with Garrett, at which he claimed to have contacted both Irwin and other victims. Price did not come to any definite conclusion about Garrett and the séances:
It is not my intention to discuss if the medium were really controlled by the discarnate entity of Irwin, or whether the utterances emanated from her subconscious mind or those of the sitters. "Spirit" or "trance personality" would be equally interesting explanations – and equally remarkable. There is no real evidence for either hypothesis. But it is not my intention to discuss hypotheses, but rather to put on record the detailed account of a remarkably interesting and thought-provoking experiment.
Garrett's claims have since been questioned. The magician John Booth analysed the mediumship of Garrett and the paranormal claims of R101 and considered her to be a fraud. According to Booth Garrett's notes and writings show she followed the building of the R101 and she may have been given aircraft blueprints by a technician from the airdrome. However, the researcher Melvin Harris who studied the case wrote no secret accomplice was needed as the information described in Garrett's séances were "either commonplace, easily absorbed bits and pieces, or plain gobbledegook. The so-called secret information just doesn't exist."
Rudi Schneider
In the 1920s and early 1930s Price investigated the medium Rudi Schneider in a number of experiments conducted at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Schneider claimed he could levitate objects but according to Price a photograph taken on 28 April 1932 showed that Schneider had managed to free his arm to move a handkerchief from the table. After this, many scientists considered Schneider to be exposed as a fraud. Price wrote that the findings of the other experiments should be revised due to the evidence showing how Schneider could free himself from the controls.
After Price had exposed Schneider, various scientists, such as Karl Przibram and the magician Henry Evans, wrote to Price telling him that they agreed that Schneider would evade control during his séances and congratulated Price on the success of unmasking the fraud. In opposition, SPR members who were highly critical of Price, supported Schneider's mediumship and promoted a conspiracy theory that Price had hoaxed the photograph. SPR member Anita Gregory claimed Price had deliberately faked the photograph to discredit SPR research and ruin Schneider's reputation. However, a photographic expert testified that the photograph was genuine. SPR member John L. Randall reviewed the Price and Schneider case and came to the conclusion that the photograph was genuine and that Price had caught Schneider in fraud.
Helen Duncan
In 1931, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research took on its most illustrious case. £50 was paid to the medium Helen Duncan so that she could be examined under scientific conditions. Price was sceptical of Duncan and had her perform a number of test séances. She was suspected of swallowing cheesecloth which was then regurgitated as "ectoplasm". Price had proven through analysis of a sample of ectoplasm produced by Duncan, that it was made of cheesecloth. Duncan reacted violently at attempts to X-ray her, running from the laboratory and making a scene in the street, where her husband had to restrain her, destroying the controlled nature of the test. Price wrote that Duncan had given her fake ectoplasm to her husband to hide. The ectoplasm of Duncan in another test was analysed by psychical researchers and reported to be made from egg white. According to Price:
The sight of half-a-dozen men, each with a pair of scissors waiting for the word, was amusing. It came and we all jumped. One of the doctors got hold of the stuff and secured a piece. The medium screamed and the rest of the "teleplasm" went down her throat. This time it wasn't cheese-cloth. It proved to be paper, soaked in white of egg, and folded into a flattened tube ... Could anything be more infantile than a group of grown-up men wasting time, money, and energy on the antics of a fat female crook.
Price wrote up the case in Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book (1933) in a chapter called "The Cheese-Cloth Worshippers". In his report Price published photographs of Duncan in his laboratory that revealed fake ectoplasm made from cheesecloth, rubber gloves and cut-out heads from magazine covers which she pretended to her audience were spirits. Following the report written by Price, Duncan's former maid Mary McGinlay confessed in detail to having aided Duncan in her mediumship tricks, and Duncan's husband admitted the ectoplasm materialisations to be the result of regurgitation. Later Duncan was caught cheating again pretending to be a spirit in the séance room. During Duncan's famous trial in 1944, Price gave his results as evidence for the prosecution. This time Duncan and her travelling companions, Frances Brown, Ernest and Elizabeth Homer were prosecuted and convicted. Duncan was jailed for nine months, Brown for four months and the Homers were bound over.
Brocken experiment
In 1932, Price travelled to Mount Brocken in Germany with C. E. M. Joad and members of the National Laboratory to conduct a 'black magic' experiment in connection with the centenary of Goethe. The "Bloksberg Tryst", involving the transformation of a goat into a young man by the invocation of a maiden, Ura Bohn (better known as the film actress Gloria Gordon, 1881–1962), produced a great deal of publicity but not the magical transformation. Price claimed he carried out the experiment "if only to prove the fallacy of transcendental magic."
Gef
In July 1935 Price and his friend Richard Lambert went to the Isle of Man to investigate the alleged case of Gef the talking mongoose and produced the book The Haunting of Cashen's Gap (1936). In the book they avoided saying that they believed the story but were careful to report it as though with an open mind. The book reports how a hair from the alleged mongoose was sent to Julian Huxley who then sent it to naturalist F. Martin Duncan who identified it as a dog hair. Price suspected the hair belonged to the Irving's sheepdog, Mona.
Price asked Reginald Pocock of the Natural History Museum to evaluate pawprints allegedly made by Gef in plasticine together with an impression of his supposed tooth marks. Pocock could not match them to any known animal, though he conceded that one of them might have been "conceivably made by a dog". He did state that none of the markings had been made by a mongoose.
Price visited the Irvings and observed double walls of wooden panelling covering the interior rooms of the old stone farmhouse which featured considerable interior air space between stone and wood walls that "makes the whole house one great speaking-tube, with walls like soundingboards. By speaking into one of the many apertures in the panels, it should be possible to convey the voice to various parts of the house." According to Richard Wiseman "Price and Lambert were less than enthusiastic about the case, concluding that only the most credulous of individuals would be impressed with the evidence for Gef."
The diaries of James Irving, along with reports about the case, are in Harry Price's archives in the Senate House Library, University of London.
Borley Rectory
Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex. The building became known as "the most haunted house in England" after Price published a book about it in 1940. He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863. He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book.
The psychical researcher John L. Randall wrote there was direct evidence of "dirty tricks" played upon Price by members of the SPR. On 9 October 1931, a past president of the SPR, William Henry Salter, visited the Borley Rectory in an attempt to persuade the Rector Lionel Foyster to sever his links with Price and work with the SPR instead. After Price's death in 1948 Eric Dingwall, Kathleen M. Goldney, and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research, two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena.
The "Borley Report", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote "when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away." Terence Hines wrote "Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself "salted the mine" and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory."
Robert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote Price's defenders are unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly.
Price's investigation of Borley was the subject of a 2013 best selling novel by Neil Spring, titled The Ghost Hunters. This novel was subsequently adapted for television as Harry Price: Ghost Hunter, starring Rafe Spall, Cara Theobold and Richie Campbell.
Rosalie
Price claimed to have attended a private séance on 15 December 1937 in which a small six-year-old girl called Rosalie appeared. Price wrote he controlled the room by placing starch powder over the floor, locking the door and taping the windows before the séance. However, the identity of the sitters, or the locality where the séance was held was not revealed due to the alleged request of the mother of the child. During the séance Price claimed a small girl emerged, she spoke and he took her pulse. Price was suspicious that the supposed spirit of the child was no different than a human being but after the séance had finished the starch powder was undisturbed and none of the seals had been removed on the window. Price was convinced no one had entered the room via door or window during the séance. Price's Fifty Years of Psychical Research (1939) describes his experiences at the sitting and includes a diagram of the séance room.
Eric Dingwall and Trevor Hall wrote the Rosalie séance was fictitious and Price had lied about the whole affair but had based some of the details on the description of the house from a sitting he attended at a much earlier time in Brockley, South London where he used to live. K. M. Goldney who had criticised Price over his investigation into Borley Rectory wrote after the morning of the Rosalie sitting she found Price "shaken to the core by his experience." Goldney believed Price had told the truth about the séance and informed the Two Worlds spiritualist weekly newspaper that she believed the Rosalie sitting to be genuine.
In 1985, Peter Underwood published a photograph of part of an anonymous letter that was sent to the SPR member David Cohen in the 1960s which claimed to be from a séance sitter who attended the séance. The letter confessed to having impersonated the Rosalie child in the sitting by the request of the father who had owed the mother of the child money. In 2017, Paul Adams published details of the location of the Rosalie seance and identities of the family involved.
Reception
Psychologist and sceptic Richard Wiseman has praised Price for his work in debunking fraudulent mediums and investigating paranormal claims. According to Wiseman "Price devoted the scientific study to weird stuff ... that both delighted the world's media and infuriated believers and sceptics alike." The stage magician and scientific sceptic James Randi wrote Price accomplished some valuable and genuine research but lived "a strange mixture of fact and fraud."
Psychical researcher Renée Haynes described Price as "one of the most fascinating and storm-provoking figures in psychical research." Science writer Mary Roach in her book Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife (2010) favourably mentioned Price's methods and research in debunking the fraudulent medium Helen Duncan.
Several biographies have been written about Price. Paul Tabori's biography (1974) is generally sympathetic. Historian Trevor H. Hall's (1978) is much more critical. The latest biography by Richard Morris (2006) is also critical, concluding that Price should best be remembered as a "supreme bluffer, a hedonistic con man, a terrific raconteur, a great conjuror, a gifted writer and a wonderful eccentric."
Death and legacy
Price suffered a massive heart attack at his home in Pulborough, West Sussex and died almost instantly on 29 March 1948.
His archives were deposited with the University of London between 1976 and 1978 by his widow. They include his correspondence, drafts of his publications, papers relating to libel cases, reports on his investigations, press cuttings and photographs. His collection of magic books and periodicals is held at Senate House Library, part of the University of London and is called the Harry Price Library of Magical Literature. The collection, which includes 13,000 items, was established by a bequest from his estate in 1948.
Published works
Revelations of a Spirit Medium, with Eric Dingwall, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co. Ltd, London, 1922.
Cold Light on Spiritualistic "Phenomena" – An Experiment with the Crewe Circle, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., 1922.
Stella C. An Account of Some Original Experiments in Psychical Research, Hurst & Blackett, 1925.
Rudi Schneider: A Scientific Examination of his Mediumship, Methuen & Co., London, 1930.
Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book, Victor Gollancz, London, 1933.
Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter, Putnam & Co., 1936.
The Haunting of Cashen's Gap: A Modern "Miracle" Investigated – with R.S. Lambert, Methuen & Co., 1936.
Fifty Years of Psychical Research: A Critical Survey Longmans, Green & Co., 1939.
The Most Haunted House in England: Ten Years' Investigation of Borley Rectory, Longmans, Green & Co., 1940.
Search for Truth: My Life for Psychical Research, Collins, 1942.
Poltergeist Over England: Three Centuries of Mischievous Ghosts, Country Life, 1945.
The End of Borley Rectory, Harrap & Co., 1946.
See also
Psychic telephone
James Randi
References
Bibliography
Harry Price, Biography of a Ghost Hunter by Paul Tabori, Athenaem Press, hardback, 1950. (Reprinted in 1974 by Sphere Books)
Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book, by Harry Price, Victor Gollancz Ltd., hardback, 1933.
Harry Price: The Psychic Detective by Richard Morris, Sutton Publishing hardback, 2006. .
External links
Harry Price Collection of Magical Literature at Senate House Library
Harry Price Archives
Harry Price Website
The Hunter of Ghosts by Leon Gellert
The Milwaukee Sentinel – Oct 1, 1933
The Milwaukee Sentinel – Oct 15, 1933
1881 births
1948 deaths
British writers
Parapsychologists
Paranormal investigators
People associated with Conway Hall Ethical Society | false | [
"What Am I Doing Here (1988) is a book by British author Bruce Chatwin containing a collection of essays, profiles and travel stories from his life. It was the last book published during Chatwin's life and draws on various experiences from it. These experiences include trekking in Nepal, sailing down the Volga, interviewing Madeleine Vionnet and making a film with Werner Herzog.\n\n1988 books\nBritish travel books\nBooks by Bruce Chatwin\nJonathan Cape books\nEnglish non-fiction books",
"A limit-experience () is a type of action or experience which approaches the edge of living in terms of its intensity and its seeming impossibility. This approach has led to the seeking of limit experiences as a sort of dark mysticism. A limit experience breaks the subject from itself. The idea is associated with writers Georges Bataille, Maurice Blanchot, and Michel Foucault.\n\nClassical instances of limit experiences include abandonment, fascination, suffering, madness, and poetry.\n\nBataille\n\nWorking in a French tradition of abjection reaching back to Baudelaire and his paradoxes – \"O filthy grandeur! O sublime disgrace!\" – Bataille was early struck by what he saw as \"the fact that these two complete contrasts were identical – divine ecstasy and extreme horror\". He went on to challenge surrealism with a kind of anti-idealism searching for what he called the impossible by breaking rules until something beyond all rules was reached.\n\nIn this way, he strove for what Foucault would call \"the point of life which lies as close as possible to the impossibility of living, which lies at the limit or the extreme\". Bataille sought to live at the edge of limits where the ability to comprehend experience breaks down.\n\nFoucault\n\nFor Foucault, \"the idea of a limit-experience that wrenches the subject from itself is what was important to me in my reading of Nietzsche, Bataille, and Blanchot\". In this way, the systems of philosophy and psychology, and their conceptions of reality and the unified subject, could be challenged and exposed, in favour of what systems/consciousness had to refuse and exclude.\n\nHow far Foucault's fascination with intense experiences provides a key to his entire body of work is however the subject of debate, with limit experiences arguably being absent from his later writings on sexuality and discipline, if strongly associated with the cult of the mad artist in The History of Madness.\n\nLimit-experience is a type of somaesthetic \"edgework\" that goes on to test the limits of ordered reality.\n\nLacan\n\nInfluenced by Bataille, from whom he drew the idea of impossibility, Lacan explored the role of limit-experiences – such as \"Desire, boredom, confinement, revolt, prayer, sleeplessness...and panic\" – in the formation of the Other.\n\nHe also adopted some of Bataille's views on love, seeing it as predicated on man having previously \"experienced the limit within which, like desire, he is bound\". He saw masochism in particular as a limit experience – something which fed into his article Kant avec Sade.\n\nCharles Taylor\n\nIn describing the conditions of belief Taylor attests to a sense of fullness, joy and fulfillment:\n\n[...]an experience which unsettles and breaks through our ordinary sense of being in the world, with its familiar objects, activities and points of reference [...] when \"ordinary reality is 'abolished' and something terrifyingly other shines through\"[...]\n\nWider ramifications\n\nConcern for limit experiences fed into existential phenomenology; and through figures like Sartre reached the anti-psychiatrists of the 1960s with their cult of authenticity in the pain of extreme madness.\n\nSee also\n\nReferences\n\nFurther reading\n\nDavid Macey, Lacan in Contexts (1988)\n\nCarolyn Dean, The Self and its Pleasures: Bataille, Lacan, and the History of the Decentered Subject (1992)\n\nJacques Lacan, 'Kant avec Sade' Critique 191 (1963) / 'Kant with Sade' October 51 (1989)\n\nExternal links\n 'The Negative Eschatology of Maurice Blanchot'\n\nGeorges Bataille\nMichel Foucault"
] |
[
"Harry Price",
"Borley Rectory",
"What is the Borley Rectory?",
"Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex.",
"What happened at the Borley Rectory?",
"He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863.",
"What type of hauntings were they?",
"I don't know.",
"What else did he say about the rectory?",
"He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book.",
"What were his experiences?",
"I don't know."
] | C_b266e36c145b4a1a9cd6eae0a45cf57e_1 | What happened after he lived in the rectory? | 6 | What happened after Harry Price lived in the Borley Rectory? | Harry Price | Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex. The building became known as "the most haunted house in England" after Price published a book about it in 1940. He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863. He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book. The psychical researcher John L. Randall wrote there was direct evidence of "dirty tricks" played upon Price by members of the SPR. On 9 October 1931, a past president of the SPR William Henry Salter visited the Borley Rectory in an attempt to persuade the Rector Lionel Foyster, to sever his links with Price and work with the SPR instead. After Price's death in 1948 Eric Dingwall, Kathleen M. Goldney, and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research, two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena. The "Borley Report", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote "when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away." Terence Hines wrote "Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself "salted the mine" and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory." Robert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote Price's defenders are unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly. Price's investigation of Borley was the subject of a 2013 best selling novel by Neil Spring, titled 'The Ghost Hunters.' This novel was subsequently adapted for television as 'Harry Price: Ghost Hunter,' starring Rafe Spall, Cara Theobold and Richie Campbell. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Harry Price (17 January 1881 – 29 March 1948) was a British psychic researcher and author, who gained public prominence for his investigations into psychical phenomena and his exposing fraudulent spiritualist mediums. He is best known for his well-publicised investigation of the purportedly haunted Borley Rectory in Essex, England.
Early life
Although Price claimed his birth was in Shropshire he was actually born in London in Red Lion Square on the site of the South Place Ethical Society's Conway Hall. He was educated in New Cross, first at Waller Road Infants School and then Haberdashers' Aske's Hatcham Boys School. At 15, Price founded the Carlton Dramatic Society and wrote plays, including a drama, about his early experience with a poltergeist which he said took place at a haunted manor house in Shropshire.
According to Richard Morris, in his biography Harry Price: The Psychic Detective (2006), Price came to the attention of the press when he claimed an early interest in space-telegraphy. He set up a receiver and transmitter between Telegraph Hill, Hatcham and St Peter's Church Brockley and captured a spark on a photographic plate. This, though, was nothing more than Price writing a press release saying he had performed the experiment, as nothing was verified. The young Price also had an avid interest in coin collecting and wrote several articles for The Askean, the magazine for Haberdashers' School. In his autobiography, Search for Truth, written between 1941 and 1942, Price claimed he was involved with archaeological excavations in Greenwich Park, London, but, in earlier writings on Greenwich, he denied any such involvement.
From around May 1908 Price continued his interest in archaeology at Pulborough, Sussex, where he had moved prior to marrying Constance Mary Knight that August. As well as working as a salesman for paper merchants Edward Saunders & Sons, he wrote for two local Sussex newspapers: the West Sussex Gazette and the Southern Weekly News in which he related his remarkable propensity for discovering 'clean' antiquities. One of these, a 'silver' ingot (discovered by Richard Morris to be housed in Price's collection of artefacts at Senate House, University of London and made of base materials) was stamped around the time of the last Roman emperor Honorius. A few years later, another celebrated Sussex archaeologist, Charles Dawson, found a brick at Pevensey Fort in Sussex, which was purportedly made in Honorius' time. In 1910 Professor E. J Haverfield of Oxford University, the country's foremost expert on Roman history and a Fellow of the Royal Academy, declared the ingot to be a fake.
A report for the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries (number 23, pages 121–9) in the same year reported that:
'... the double axe type of silver ingot was well known and dated from late Imperial times but the one recovered from Sussex was an inferior copy of one found at the Tower of London, with alterations to give it an air of authenticity. Both the shape and lettering betrayed its origin.'
Interest in magic and conjuring
In his autobiography, Search for Truth, Price said the "Great Sequah" in Shrewsbury was "entirely responsible for shaping much of my life's work", and led to him acquiring the first volume of what would become the Harry Price Library, Price later became an expert amateur conjurer, joined the Magic Circle in 1922 and maintained a lifelong interest in stage magic and conjuring. His expertise in sleight-of-hand and magic tricks stood him in good stead for what would become his all consuming passion, the investigation of paranormal phenomena.
The psychical researcher Eric Dingwall and Price re-published an anonymous work written by a former medium entitled Revelations of a Spirit Medium (1922) which exposed the tricks of mediumship and the fraudulent methods of producing "spirit hands". Originally all the copies of the book were bought up by spiritualists and deliberately destroyed.
Psychical research
Price joined the Society for Psychical Research (SPR) in 1920 and because of his knowledge in conjuring had debunked fraudulent mediums but in direct contrast to other magicians, Price endorsed some mediums that he believed were genuine. Price's first major success in psychical research came in 1922 when he exposed the 'spirit' photographer William Hope. In the same year he travelled to Germany together with Eric Dingwall and investigated Willi Schneider at the home of Baron Albert von Schrenck-Notzing in Munich. In 1923, Price exposed the medium Jan Guzyk, according to Price the "man was clever, especially with his feet, which were almost as useful to him as his hands in producing phenomena."
Price wrote that the photographs depicting the ectoplasm of the medium Eva Carrière taken with Schrenck-Notzing looked artificial and two-dimensional made from cardboard and newspaper portraits and that there were no scientific controls as both her hands were free. In 1920 Carrière was investigated by psychical researchers in London. An analysis of her ectoplasm revealed it to be made of chewed paper. She was also investigated in 1922 and the result of the tests were negative. In 1925, Price investigated Maria Silbert and caught her using her feet and toes to move objects in the séance room. He also investigated the "direct voice" mediumship of George Valiantine in London. In the séance Valiantine claimed to have contacted the "spirit" of the composer Luigi Arditi , speaking in Italian. Price wrote down every word that was attributed to Arditi and they were found to be word-for-word matches in an Italian phrase-book.
Price formed an organisation in 1925 called the National Laboratory of Psychical Research as a rival to the Society for Psychical Research. Price had a number of disputes with the SPR, most notably over the mediumship of Rudi Schneider. Price paid mediums to test them-the SPR criticised Price and disagreed about paying mediums for testing.
Price made a formal offer to the University of London to equip and endow a Department of Psychical Research, and to loan the equipment of the National Laboratory and its library. The University of London Board of Studies in Psychology responded positively to this proposal. In 1934, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research, which held Price's collection, was reconstituted as the University of London Council for Psychical Investigation with C. E. M. Joad as chairman and with Price as Honorary Secretary and editor, although it was not an official body of the University. In the meantime, in 1927 Price joined the Ghost Club, of which he remained a member until it (temporarily) closed in 1936.
In 1927, Price claimed that he had come into possession of Joanna Southcott's box, and arranged to have it opened in the presence of one reluctant prelate (the Bishop of Grantham, not a diocesan bishop but a suffragan of the Diocese of Lincoln): it was found to contain only a few oddments and unimportant papers, among them a lottery ticket and a horse-pistol. His claims to have had the true box have been disputed by historians and by followers of Southcott. Price exposed Frederick Tansley Munnings, who claimed to produce the independent "spirit" voices of Julius Caesar, Dan Leno, Hawley Harvey Crippen and King Henry VIII. Price invented and used a piece of apparatus known as a voice control recorder and proved that all the voices were those of Munnings. In 1928, Munnings admitted fraud and sold his confessions to a Sunday newspaper.
Price was friends with other debunkers of fraudulent mediums including Harry Houdini and the journalist Ernest Palmer.
In 1933, Frank Decker was investigated by Price at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Under strict scientific controls that Price contrived, Decker failed to produce any phenomena at all. Price's psychical research continued with investigations into Karachi's Indian rope trick and the fire-walking abilities of Kuda Bux in 1935. He was also involved in the formation of the National Film Library (British Film Institute) becoming its first chairman (until 1941) and was a founding member of the Shakespeare Film Society. In 1936, Price broadcast from a supposedly haunted manor house in Meopham, Kent for the BBC and published The Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter and The Haunting of Cashen's Gap. This year also saw the transfer of Price's library on permanent loan to the University of London (see external links below), followed shortly by the laboratory and investigative equipment. In 1937, he conducted further televised experiments into fire-walking with Ahmed Hussain at Carshalton and Alexandra Palace, and also rented Borley Rectory for one year. The following year, Price re-established the Ghost Club, with himself as chairman, modernising it and changing it from a spiritualist association to a group of more or less open-minded sceptics that gathered to discuss paranormal topics. He was also the first to admit women to the club.
In the same year, Price conducted experiments with Rahman Bey who was "buried alive" in Carshalton. He also drafted a Bill for the regulation of psychic practitioners. In 1939, he organised a national telepathic test in the periodical John O'London's Weekly. During the 1940s, Price concentrated on writing and the works The Most Haunted House in England, Poltergeist Over England and The End of Borley Rectory were all published.
Famous cases
William Hope
On 4 February 1922, Price with James Seymour, Eric Dingwall and William Marriott had proven the spirit photographer William Hope was a fraud during tests at the British College of Psychic Science. Price wrote in his SPR report "William Hope has been found guilty of deliberately substituting his own plates for those of a sitter ... It implies that the medium brings to the sitting a duplicate slide and faked plates for fraudulent purposes."
Price secretly marked Hope's photographic plates, and provided him with a packet of additional plates that had been covertly etched with the brand image of the Imperial Dry Plate Co. Ltd. in the knowledge that the logo would be transferred to any images created with them. Unaware that Price had tampered with his supplies, Hope then attempted to produce a number of Spirit photographs. Although Hope produced several images of alleged spirits, none of his materials contained the Imperial Dry Plate Co. Ltd logo, or the marks that Price had put on Hope's original equipment, showing that he had exchanged prepared materials containing fake spirit images for the provided materials.
Price later re-published the Society's experiment in a pamphlet of his own called Cold Light on Spiritualistic "Phenomena" – An Experiment with the Crewe Circle. Due to the exposure of Hope and other fraudulent spiritualists, Arthur Conan Doyle led a mass resignation of eighty-four members of the Society for Psychical Research, as they believed the Society was opposed to spiritualism. Doyle threatened to have Price evicted from his laboratory and claimed if he persisted to write "sewage" about spiritualists, he would meet the same fate as Houdini. Doyle and other spiritualists attacked Price and tried for years to have Price take his pamphlet out of circulation. Price wrote "Arthur Conan Doyle and his friends abused me for years for exposing Hope."
Eileen Garrett
On 7 October 1930 it was claimed by spiritualists that Eileen J. Garrett made contact with the spirit of Herbert Carmichael Irwin at a séance held with Price at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research two days after the R101 disaster, while attempting to contact the then recently deceased Arthur Conan Doyle, and discussed possible causes of the accident. The event "attracted worldwide attention", thanks to the presence of a reporter. Major Oliver Villiers, a friend of Brancker, Scott, Irwin, Colmore and others aboard the airship, participated in further séances with Garrett, at which he claimed to have contacted both Irwin and other victims. Price did not come to any definite conclusion about Garrett and the séances:
It is not my intention to discuss if the medium were really controlled by the discarnate entity of Irwin, or whether the utterances emanated from her subconscious mind or those of the sitters. "Spirit" or "trance personality" would be equally interesting explanations – and equally remarkable. There is no real evidence for either hypothesis. But it is not my intention to discuss hypotheses, but rather to put on record the detailed account of a remarkably interesting and thought-provoking experiment.
Garrett's claims have since been questioned. The magician John Booth analysed the mediumship of Garrett and the paranormal claims of R101 and considered her to be a fraud. According to Booth Garrett's notes and writings show she followed the building of the R101 and she may have been given aircraft blueprints by a technician from the airdrome. However, the researcher Melvin Harris who studied the case wrote no secret accomplice was needed as the information described in Garrett's séances were "either commonplace, easily absorbed bits and pieces, or plain gobbledegook. The so-called secret information just doesn't exist."
Rudi Schneider
In the 1920s and early 1930s Price investigated the medium Rudi Schneider in a number of experiments conducted at the National Laboratory of Psychical Research. Schneider claimed he could levitate objects but according to Price a photograph taken on 28 April 1932 showed that Schneider had managed to free his arm to move a handkerchief from the table. After this, many scientists considered Schneider to be exposed as a fraud. Price wrote that the findings of the other experiments should be revised due to the evidence showing how Schneider could free himself from the controls.
After Price had exposed Schneider, various scientists, such as Karl Przibram and the magician Henry Evans, wrote to Price telling him that they agreed that Schneider would evade control during his séances and congratulated Price on the success of unmasking the fraud. In opposition, SPR members who were highly critical of Price, supported Schneider's mediumship and promoted a conspiracy theory that Price had hoaxed the photograph. SPR member Anita Gregory claimed Price had deliberately faked the photograph to discredit SPR research and ruin Schneider's reputation. However, a photographic expert testified that the photograph was genuine. SPR member John L. Randall reviewed the Price and Schneider case and came to the conclusion that the photograph was genuine and that Price had caught Schneider in fraud.
Helen Duncan
In 1931, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research took on its most illustrious case. £50 was paid to the medium Helen Duncan so that she could be examined under scientific conditions. Price was sceptical of Duncan and had her perform a number of test séances. She was suspected of swallowing cheesecloth which was then regurgitated as "ectoplasm". Price had proven through analysis of a sample of ectoplasm produced by Duncan, that it was made of cheesecloth. Duncan reacted violently at attempts to X-ray her, running from the laboratory and making a scene in the street, where her husband had to restrain her, destroying the controlled nature of the test. Price wrote that Duncan had given her fake ectoplasm to her husband to hide. The ectoplasm of Duncan in another test was analysed by psychical researchers and reported to be made from egg white. According to Price:
The sight of half-a-dozen men, each with a pair of scissors waiting for the word, was amusing. It came and we all jumped. One of the doctors got hold of the stuff and secured a piece. The medium screamed and the rest of the "teleplasm" went down her throat. This time it wasn't cheese-cloth. It proved to be paper, soaked in white of egg, and folded into a flattened tube ... Could anything be more infantile than a group of grown-up men wasting time, money, and energy on the antics of a fat female crook.
Price wrote up the case in Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book (1933) in a chapter called "The Cheese-Cloth Worshippers". In his report Price published photographs of Duncan in his laboratory that revealed fake ectoplasm made from cheesecloth, rubber gloves and cut-out heads from magazine covers which she pretended to her audience were spirits. Following the report written by Price, Duncan's former maid Mary McGinlay confessed in detail to having aided Duncan in her mediumship tricks, and Duncan's husband admitted the ectoplasm materialisations to be the result of regurgitation. Later Duncan was caught cheating again pretending to be a spirit in the séance room. During Duncan's famous trial in 1944, Price gave his results as evidence for the prosecution. This time Duncan and her travelling companions, Frances Brown, Ernest and Elizabeth Homer were prosecuted and convicted. Duncan was jailed for nine months, Brown for four months and the Homers were bound over.
Brocken experiment
In 1932, Price travelled to Mount Brocken in Germany with C. E. M. Joad and members of the National Laboratory to conduct a 'black magic' experiment in connection with the centenary of Goethe. The "Bloksberg Tryst", involving the transformation of a goat into a young man by the invocation of a maiden, Ura Bohn (better known as the film actress Gloria Gordon, 1881–1962), produced a great deal of publicity but not the magical transformation. Price claimed he carried out the experiment "if only to prove the fallacy of transcendental magic."
Gef
In July 1935 Price and his friend Richard Lambert went to the Isle of Man to investigate the alleged case of Gef the talking mongoose and produced the book The Haunting of Cashen's Gap (1936). In the book they avoided saying that they believed the story but were careful to report it as though with an open mind. The book reports how a hair from the alleged mongoose was sent to Julian Huxley who then sent it to naturalist F. Martin Duncan who identified it as a dog hair. Price suspected the hair belonged to the Irving's sheepdog, Mona.
Price asked Reginald Pocock of the Natural History Museum to evaluate pawprints allegedly made by Gef in plasticine together with an impression of his supposed tooth marks. Pocock could not match them to any known animal, though he conceded that one of them might have been "conceivably made by a dog". He did state that none of the markings had been made by a mongoose.
Price visited the Irvings and observed double walls of wooden panelling covering the interior rooms of the old stone farmhouse which featured considerable interior air space between stone and wood walls that "makes the whole house one great speaking-tube, with walls like soundingboards. By speaking into one of the many apertures in the panels, it should be possible to convey the voice to various parts of the house." According to Richard Wiseman "Price and Lambert were less than enthusiastic about the case, concluding that only the most credulous of individuals would be impressed with the evidence for Gef."
The diaries of James Irving, along with reports about the case, are in Harry Price's archives in the Senate House Library, University of London.
Borley Rectory
Price was most famous for his investigation into the Borley Rectory, Essex. The building became known as "the most haunted house in England" after Price published a book about it in 1940. He documented a series of alleged hauntings from the time the rectory was built in 1863. He lived in the rectory from May 1937 to May 1938 and wrote of his experiences in the book.
The psychical researcher John L. Randall wrote there was direct evidence of "dirty tricks" played upon Price by members of the SPR. On 9 October 1931, a past president of the SPR, William Henry Salter, visited the Borley Rectory in an attempt to persuade the Rector Lionel Foyster to sever his links with Price and work with the SPR instead. After Price's death in 1948 Eric Dingwall, Kathleen M. Goldney, and Trevor H. Hall, three members of the Society for Psychical Research, two of whom had been Price's most loyal associates, investigated his claims about Borley. Their findings were published in a 1956 book, The Haunting of Borley Rectory, which concluded Price had fraudulently produced some of the phenomena.
The "Borley Report", as the SPR study has become known, stated that many of the phenomena were either faked or due to natural causes such as rats and the strange acoustics attributed to the odd shape of the house. In their conclusion, Dingwall, Goldney, and Hall wrote "when analysed, the evidence for haunting and poltergeist activity for each and every period appears to diminish in force and finally to vanish away." Terence Hines wrote "Mrs. Marianne Foyster, wife of the Rev. Lionel Foyster who lived at the rectory from 1930 to 1935, was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena. Price himself "salted the mine" and faked several phenomena while he was at the rectory."
Robert Hastings was one of the few SPR researchers to defend Price. Price's literary executor Paul Tabori and Peter Underwood have also defended Price against accusations of fraud. A similar approach was made by Ivan Banks in 1996. Michael Coleman in an SPR report in 1997 wrote Price's defenders are unable to rebut the criticisms convincingly.
Price's investigation of Borley was the subject of a 2013 best selling novel by Neil Spring, titled The Ghost Hunters. This novel was subsequently adapted for television as Harry Price: Ghost Hunter, starring Rafe Spall, Cara Theobold and Richie Campbell.
Rosalie
Price claimed to have attended a private séance on 15 December 1937 in which a small six-year-old girl called Rosalie appeared. Price wrote he controlled the room by placing starch powder over the floor, locking the door and taping the windows before the séance. However, the identity of the sitters, or the locality where the séance was held was not revealed due to the alleged request of the mother of the child. During the séance Price claimed a small girl emerged, she spoke and he took her pulse. Price was suspicious that the supposed spirit of the child was no different than a human being but after the séance had finished the starch powder was undisturbed and none of the seals had been removed on the window. Price was convinced no one had entered the room via door or window during the séance. Price's Fifty Years of Psychical Research (1939) describes his experiences at the sitting and includes a diagram of the séance room.
Eric Dingwall and Trevor Hall wrote the Rosalie séance was fictitious and Price had lied about the whole affair but had based some of the details on the description of the house from a sitting he attended at a much earlier time in Brockley, South London where he used to live. K. M. Goldney who had criticised Price over his investigation into Borley Rectory wrote after the morning of the Rosalie sitting she found Price "shaken to the core by his experience." Goldney believed Price had told the truth about the séance and informed the Two Worlds spiritualist weekly newspaper that she believed the Rosalie sitting to be genuine.
In 1985, Peter Underwood published a photograph of part of an anonymous letter that was sent to the SPR member David Cohen in the 1960s which claimed to be from a séance sitter who attended the séance. The letter confessed to having impersonated the Rosalie child in the sitting by the request of the father who had owed the mother of the child money. In 2017, Paul Adams published details of the location of the Rosalie seance and identities of the family involved.
Reception
Psychologist and sceptic Richard Wiseman has praised Price for his work in debunking fraudulent mediums and investigating paranormal claims. According to Wiseman "Price devoted the scientific study to weird stuff ... that both delighted the world's media and infuriated believers and sceptics alike." The stage magician and scientific sceptic James Randi wrote Price accomplished some valuable and genuine research but lived "a strange mixture of fact and fraud."
Psychical researcher Renée Haynes described Price as "one of the most fascinating and storm-provoking figures in psychical research." Science writer Mary Roach in her book Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife (2010) favourably mentioned Price's methods and research in debunking the fraudulent medium Helen Duncan.
Several biographies have been written about Price. Paul Tabori's biography (1974) is generally sympathetic. Historian Trevor H. Hall's (1978) is much more critical. The latest biography by Richard Morris (2006) is also critical, concluding that Price should best be remembered as a "supreme bluffer, a hedonistic con man, a terrific raconteur, a great conjuror, a gifted writer and a wonderful eccentric."
Death and legacy
Price suffered a massive heart attack at his home in Pulborough, West Sussex and died almost instantly on 29 March 1948.
His archives were deposited with the University of London between 1976 and 1978 by his widow. They include his correspondence, drafts of his publications, papers relating to libel cases, reports on his investigations, press cuttings and photographs. His collection of magic books and periodicals is held at Senate House Library, part of the University of London and is called the Harry Price Library of Magical Literature. The collection, which includes 13,000 items, was established by a bequest from his estate in 1948.
Published works
Revelations of a Spirit Medium, with Eric Dingwall, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co. Ltd, London, 1922.
Cold Light on Spiritualistic "Phenomena" – An Experiment with the Crewe Circle, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., 1922.
Stella C. An Account of Some Original Experiments in Psychical Research, Hurst & Blackett, 1925.
Rudi Schneider: A Scientific Examination of his Mediumship, Methuen & Co., London, 1930.
Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book, Victor Gollancz, London, 1933.
Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter, Putnam & Co., 1936.
The Haunting of Cashen's Gap: A Modern "Miracle" Investigated – with R.S. Lambert, Methuen & Co., 1936.
Fifty Years of Psychical Research: A Critical Survey Longmans, Green & Co., 1939.
The Most Haunted House in England: Ten Years' Investigation of Borley Rectory, Longmans, Green & Co., 1940.
Search for Truth: My Life for Psychical Research, Collins, 1942.
Poltergeist Over England: Three Centuries of Mischievous Ghosts, Country Life, 1945.
The End of Borley Rectory, Harrap & Co., 1946.
See also
Psychic telephone
James Randi
References
Bibliography
Harry Price, Biography of a Ghost Hunter by Paul Tabori, Athenaem Press, hardback, 1950. (Reprinted in 1974 by Sphere Books)
Leaves from a Psychist's Case Book, by Harry Price, Victor Gollancz Ltd., hardback, 1933.
Harry Price: The Psychic Detective by Richard Morris, Sutton Publishing hardback, 2006. .
External links
Harry Price Collection of Magical Literature at Senate House Library
Harry Price Archives
Harry Price Website
The Hunter of Ghosts by Leon Gellert
The Milwaukee Sentinel – Oct 1, 1933
The Milwaukee Sentinel – Oct 15, 1933
1881 births
1948 deaths
British writers
Parapsychologists
Paranormal investigators
People associated with Conway Hall Ethical Society | false | [
"Torkilstrup Rectory (Danish: Torkilstrup Præstegård) is located just east of Torkilstrup Church in the village of Torkilstrup, some 7 km (4 mi) southeast of Nørre Alslev, on the Danish island of Falster. A stone outside the rectory commemorates that Bernhard Severin Ingemann was born in the building. The rectory was listed in the Danish registry of protected buildings and places in 1950.\n\nHistory\n\nThe rectory was built in 1761. Bernhard Severin Ingemann's father Søren Sørensen Ingemann was rector at Torkilstrup Church from 1774 and from 1782 also provost of Falster Nørre Herred. Ingemann was born in the rectory as the youngest of nine children in 1789 and lived there until his father's death ten years later. The family then moved to Slagelse where Ingemann was awarded a scholarship to attend the local Slagelse Latin School. He has described his early childhood memories from the rectory in Denne Aldersopfattelse af hint Barndomsli.\n \nN. F. S. Grundtvig's brother Otto (1772-1843) succeeded Ingemann's father as rector of Torkilstrup. He resided in the rectory until 1823 when he was transferred to Gladsaxe. The poet Christian Winter spent his honeymoon in Torkilstrup Rectory.\n\nThe building was refurbished in 1909. It was listed in the Danish registry of protected buildings and places in 1950. In 2007, it was subject to a comprehensive renovation undertaken by Berings Tegnestue. The poet Christian Winter spent his honeymoon in Tprkildstrup Rectory.\n\nArchitecture\nThe rectory has white-plastered walls, a thatched roof and stands on a black-painted foundation of field stones. The original two-winged building is located on the north and west side of a yard. The residential north wing from 1763 is mostly built with timber framing but with smaller sections of masonry. The large, through-going gabled wall dormer dates from the 1840s. The west wing was originally used as stables and storage space. It is constructed in brick and has cast iron windows. A short, third \"garden wing\" projects northwards from the eastern end of the residential wing. It was built as downer house for Ingemann's mother. Floors, windows, windows and other details are painted in a bluish-green colour.\n\nSee also\n Store Tåstrup Rectory\n\nReferences\n\nListed buildings and structures in Guldborgsund Municipality\nClergy houses in Denmark\nTimber framed buildings in Guldborgsund Municipality\nThatched buildings in Denmark\nHouses completed in 1761\n1761 establishments in Denmark",
"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"
] |
[
"Mr. Children",
"1995-1997"
] | C_cc47c7df2d994d02b905ef7002dc163a_1 | What happened in 1995? | 1 | What happened in 1995 with Mr. Children? | Mr. Children | In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2. Mr. Children also became involved in charity work, doing a collaboration song with Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars. The single "Kiseki no hoshi" (Qi Ji noDi Qiu ) was used as the theme song for the Act Against AIDS campaign, was produced by Mr. Children and written by Kuwata. To promote the single and the campaign, they held a one-month tour from April 18 until May 14, entitled Live UFO '95 Rock Opera "Acoustic Revolution with Orchestra" Kiseki no hoshi (Live UFO '95 Rock Opera "Acoustic Revolution with Orchestra" Qi Ji noDi Qiu ), where the group did cover songs of many English speaking artists such as The Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan. During the tour the group was also filming a documentary/concert movie called Es ~Mr. Children in Film~. It was released in theaters on June 6, 1995, preceded by the group's eight single "Es (Theme of Es)" on May 10, to promote the movie. Two months later the group held an open air tour titled -Hounen Mansaku- Natsu matsuri tour Sora [ku:] (-Hounen Mansaku- Xia Ji ri1995 Kong [ku:]) from July 16 to September 10, during which the ninth single, "See-Saw Game (Yukan na Koi no Uta)" (shisogemu ~ Yong Gan naLian noGe ~ ) was released on August 10. On February 6, 1996 Mr. Children's tenth single "Namonaki Uta" (Ming monakiShi ) was released, to promote the Japanese drama Pure (piyua) and also for Daio Paper's Elleair (erieru) commercial. The single went on to become Japan's highest first week selling single of all time (which was later broken by idol group AKB48) and is currently Japan's eighth highest selling drama tie-in single. The success of the single was also a surprise for Sakurai, who admitted to spending very little time writing the song. Two months later, on April 5, 1996 the group's eleventh single "Hana (Memento Mori)" (Hua -Memento-Mori-) was released, followed by their fifth original album Shinkai (Shen Hai ) on June 24 and their twelfth single "Machine Gun o Buppanase (Mr. Children Bootleg)" (mashinganwobutsuFang se -Mr.Children Bootleg-), on August 8. To close the year, the Regress or Progress Tour started and lasted from August 24, 1996 to March 28, 1997. The group visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts. Mr. Children's 13th single, "Everything (It's You)", was released on February 5, 1997, with the title track used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Koi no Bakansu (Lian nobakansu). A month later, on March 5 Bolero, Mr. Children's sixth album was released. Soon after, rumors started of the group disbanding. Sakurai's reply: "The band will dissolve only when we have no more talent and have relationship problems with each other." Yet the group then decided to take some time off. Nakagawa and Suzuki start a side project band called Hayashi Hideo, and joined by Kenji Fujii from My Little Lover and Sawao Yamanaka from The Pillows, went on a club tour. CANNOTANSWER | In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2. | , commonly referred to by their contracted nickname , are a Japanese pop rock band formed in 1989. Consisting of Kazutoshi Sakurai, Kenichi Tahara, Keisuke Nakagawa, and Hideya Suzuki, they made their major label debut in 1992. They are one of the best selling artists in Japan and one of the most successful Japanese rock artists, having sold over 75 million records and creating the in the mid-1990s in Japan. They held the record for the highest first week sales of a single in Japan for 15 years, with 1.2 million copies of their 10th single , have 30 consecutive number 1 singles, replaced Glay as the all-male band (with 3 or more members) to have the most number 1 albums on the Oricon charts, and won the Japan Record Award in 1994 for "Innocent World" and in 2004 for "Sign". As of 2012, Mr. Children has published fifteen original studio albums and 34 physical singles, along with five compilations, a live album, and fifteen home video releases.
The band's music is mainly composed and written by lead singer Sakurai, with the exception of the Suzuki-penned songs "Asia" and "#2601" from the albums Atomic Heart and Discovery, and occasional collaborative song writing with producer Takeshi Kobayashi.
In 2012 they celebrated their 20th debut anniversary by releasing dual best album titled Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> and Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro>. Both albums dominated the best-selling album category in the 2012 Oricon yearly chart, selling over 2.5 million copies. Mr.Children has become the third artists who achieved TOP 2 spots on the yearly album ranking, and this is the first time in 14 years for any artist to achieve this. Moreover, [(An Imitation) Blood Orange], an album of new material released in November 2012, debuted No.1 on the Oricon Chart—at the end of the year, all three albums released that year were in the Top 10 best selling albums of 2012.
In 2015, Mr. Children was named No.1 Concert Mobilization Power Ranking based on the overall number of people whom attended their performances during 2015 in Japan, mobilizing 1,119,000 fans (36 concerts).
History
1987–1992
The group's members first met in the year of 1987, when Sakurai, Tahara and Nakagawa were in The Walls, which was originally influenced by the band Echoes. The frontman of Echoes, Jinsei Tsuji, was a political activist, and because of this, The Walls too became a political band. Drummer Hideya Suzuki was not an original member of The Walls. When the original drummer departed, the band recruited Suzuki, who went to the same school as the other members. In late 1988, The Walls disintegrated, while the remaining members formed Mr. Children in early 1989. The name of Mr. Children supposedly came about during a talk in a dinner, in which the group thought the word "children" had a nice ring to it, but because they were no longer children themselves, they decided to add Mr. in front of it. They credit this change as a new way they started to look at the group.
After changing their name and overall sound, Mr. Children auditioned at a music club called La Mama, failing to pass the first time, but passing a second audition to play at the club. After playing in the club, they were asked to try and debut as professionals. Mr. Children sent out five demo tapes; all failed to generate record label interest, and the group took a three-month hiatus in 1991. Hideya Suzuki worked as a receptionist at an economy hotel, while Kazutoshi Sakurai worked with his father who owned a construction company. When they returned, the group created a sixth demo tape and caught the attention of Toy's Factory. The label signed the group and had them play as the opening act for the rock group Jun Sky Walkers. It was also during this time that they were introduced to their long-time friend and producer Takeshi Kobayashi. Kobayashi was already known in the music industry as a music composer for Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars and Kyōko Koizumi.
1992–1994
On May 10, 1992, Mr. Children's debut album, Everything, was released and represented the long journey they took to get to this point. Three months later their first single was released on August 21, 1992. After the release of the single the group held two tours for the album, both held between September 23, 1992 and November 5 of the same year, the '92 Everything Tour comprising ten and the '92 Your Everything Tour consisting of twelve performances. To cap off the year and lead them into the next, Mr. Children released their second album, Kind of Love and their second single on December 1, 1992. "Dakishimetai" was later used as an insert song for the Japanese drama . Shortly after, a new tour called '92–93 Kind of Love Tour started and lasted from December 7, 1992 till January 25, 1993.
In 1993, with the completion of the band's tour they began work on for their third album. The first single of the new year to be released was "Replay", released on July 1, 1993 and used in commercials. On September 9, 1993 their third album Versus was released, but failed to bring the group into the spotlight. They continued on and held a new tour. The '93 Versus Tour was held from September 23 until November 5 and had the band holding nine performances. Shortly after, "Cross Road" was released on November 10, 1993, which was used to promote the Japanese drama . The single was not a hit, but through word of mouth "Cross Road" gained popularity and after 22 weeks sold over a million copies and later, though released in 1993, managed to become the fifteenth best selling single in Oricon's 1994 yearly charts. Sakurai confessed years later as to not liking his works up to this point. According to him:
On June 1, 1994 a new single called "Innocent World" was released and used a promotional song for the soft drink . The single solidified the groups popularity with its sales, managing to sell 1,935,830 copies and becoming the No. 1 selling single in Oricon's 1994 yearly charts. Afterwards work began on their fourth original album Atomic Heart. The album was released on September 1, 1994 and became the band's highest selling album to date. Due to the huge success the band received from the album and "Innocent World" single, the groups popularity built up creating the in Japan.
The band also had Takeshi Kobayashi produce two new tours for them. The first tour, named after the "Innocent World" single was held from September 18 to December 18. The band also released their sixth single "Tomorrow Never Knows" on November 10, 1994 which was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama . The song was written while the group was on tour, was later voted in 2006 as fans No. 1 all-time favorite song on Music Station, and is currently the third highest selling drama tie-in single in Japan. The next single, was released on December 12, 1994, though originally intended to be the B-side of "Tomorrow Never Knows". To end the year, "Innocent World" won the Song of the Year award at the 36th annual Japan Record Awards.
1995–1997
In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2. Mr. Children also became involved in charity work, doing a collaboration song with Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars. The single was used as the theme song for the Act Against AIDS campaign, was produced by Mr. Children and written by Kuwata. To promote the single and the campaign, they held a one-month tour from April 18 until May 14, entitled , where the group did cover songs of many English speaking artists such as The Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan. During the tour the group was also filming a documentary/concert movie called Es ~Mr. Children in Film~. It was released in theaters on June 6, 1995, preceded by the group's eight single "Es (Theme of Es)" on May 10, to promote the movie. Two months later the group held an open air tour titled from July 16 to September 10, during which the ninth single, was released on August 10.
On February 6, 1996 Mr. Children's tenth single was released, to promote the Japanese drama and also for Daio Paper's commercial. The single went on to become Japan's highest first week selling single of all time (which was later broken by idol group AKB48) and is currently Japan's eighth highest selling drama tie-in single. The success of the single was also a surprise for Sakurai, who admitted to spending very little time writing the song. Two months later, on April 5, 1996 the group's eleventh single was released, followed by their fifth original album on June 24 and their twelfth single , on August 8. To close the year, the Regress or Progress Tour started and lasted from August 24, 1996 to March 28, 1997. The group visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts.
Mr. Children's 13th single, "Everything (It's You)", was released on February 5, 1997, with the title track used as the theme song to the Japanese drama . A month later, on March 5 Bolero, Mr. Children's sixth album was released. Soon after, rumors started of the group disbanding. Sakurai's reply: "The band will dissolve only when we have no more talent and have relationship problems with each other." Yet the group then decided to take some time off. Nakagawa and Suzuki start a side project band called Hayashi Hideo, and joined by Kenji Fujii from My Little Lover and Sawao Yamanaka from The Pillows, went on a club tour.
1998–2000
On February 11, 1998, they released their 14th single , theme song to the Japanese drama . The group was still on hiatus during this time and made no live performances to promote the single and did not appear in the music video for the song. Finally on October 21, 1998, Mr. Children officially re-grouped and released their 15th single, with the Japanese drama using it as their theme song. The song remains a public favorite in voting polls, Oricon citing its inspirational lyrics as the reason.
On January 13, 1999, , their 16th single, was released, followed by their seventh album, Discovery, on February 3, 1999. Sakurai compared his approach to the songwriting for the record to surfing:
Eleven days later they began the Discovery Tour '99, from February 14 to July 12, where the group visited 16 cities and held 42 shows. During the tour, Mr. Children released their 17th single "I'll Be" on May 12, which was used in Sea Breeze commercials. Though originally released on the Discovery album, the song was re-released as a single with a lighter beat. The single was not a success and became Mr. Children's lowest selling single since "Cross Road". During the Discovery Tour '99, an idea for a live album was brought up. It was released as a 500,000 copy limited edition on September 8, 1999 and called 1/42 (referring to one of the 42 shows in the tour). Most of the tracks were recorded on June 16, 1999 at the Makomanai ice arena, while the bonus track "Dakishimetai" was recorded at the Okinawa Ginowan-Shi seaside park.
At the beginning of a new century , released on January 13, 2000 became the group's 18th single. While "I'll Be" failed to be a success, "Kuchibue" proved to be a hit selling 724,070 copies. On August 9, 2000, their 19th single "Not Found" was also used as the theme song to the Japanese drama , followed a month later by their 9th original album Q on September 27, 2000. The band went to New York to record this album, where they re-recorded some of their old indie material and for the first time, producer Takeshi Kobayashi performed with the band on a recording. The cover for the album was shot bought Size, Inc. at the Bonneville Salt Flats in the United States. The album was not a favorite amongst fans for various reasons and became their first album since Atomic Heart to not sell over one million copies. ‘Concert tour Q’ started, visiting 13 cities and holding 35 concerts between October 15, 2000 and February 24, 2001.
2001–2003
In 2001, Mr. Children continued their Q tour, followed by dual "Best Of" albums. Titled Mr. Children 1992–1995 and Mr. Children 1996–2000, they were both released on July 11, 2001. Both albums went on to sell a combined total of 4,034,785 copies. According to an interview done with MTV Japan Sakurai stated the best of albums weren't something they had planned on doing yet. During this time, the group was finishing up work for their new upcoming album and had planned to start promoting singles on it. However it was decided that a best of album was needed and so they were released. Four days following the dual album release, the group launched the ‘Popsaurus’ tour, visiting 10 cities and playing 15 shows, lasting from July 15, 2001 all the way through September 25, 2001. A month into the tour their 20th single was released and used to promote the Wonda Canned Coffee by Asahi Soft Drinks. Two months after the Popsaurus tour ended, "Youthful Days" was released. Released on November 7, 2001, it was their 21st single and was an insert song for the Japanese drama Antique Bakery. "Youthful Days" debuted at number-one on Japanese Oricon's Charts in its first week at retail (ahead of Mr. Moonlight (Ai no Big Band) by Morning Musume, from album 4th Ikimashoi!), and It ended up being their best selling single for the year. The b-side for the single, "Drawing", originally had no commercial tie-in, but two years later was used as the theme song to the 2003 Japanese drama , Starring former Shibugakitai member Masahiro Motoki.
Mr. Children released their 22nd single on New Year's Day of 2002 (January 1), which was used as a show song in the Japanese drama Antique Bakery. Four months later their tenth original album It's a Wonderful World was released on May 10, the groups' tenth anniversary. The release of the album on their 10th anniversary was not something that had originally intended. As the group was wrapping up recording, Sakurai asked if the album could be released in the spring time. While the group and their management was trying to think of how to promote an album in the spring time, they came up with releasing the album on their 10th anniversary. A new tour, titled Mr. Children Tour 2002 Dear Wonderful World was set to begin later that year. The previous single "I'll Be" from the Discovery album was selected to be used as an official theme for the 2002 FIFA World Cup, held in Japan and South Korea. On May 24, 2002 Mr. Children attended the first ever MTV Video Music Awards Japan and topped the awards show by winning 'Video of the Year' for the song "Kimi ga suki", the band also nominated in Best Group Category but losing to Backstreet Boys. Two months after the release of the new album, Mr.Children's 23rd single "Any", was released on July 11, 2002 and used to promote NTT DoCoMo Group 10th Anniversary. The group was not able to properly promote the single. As preparations for the new tour were beginning and promotion for the new single were being done, lead singer Sakurai was hospitalized on July 21, 2002, after a blockage in his cerebellum was detected. The Mr. Children Tour 2002 Dear Wonderful World was canceled and all group activities were put on a temporary hiatus. While recovering, Sakurai wrote a song called "Hero", that was inspired by his hospitalization. The song was released as the group's 24th single on December 11, 2002 and was used in NTT DoCoMo Group 10th Anniversary commercial. The first press version of the single included a DVD where, in addition to a Mr. Children 2002 documentary -Hero- that was aired, the singer talked about his hospitalization and inspiration for the song. On November 15, 2002 Mr.Children's website announced the band's return to the stage for a "stew of home pride" with a one night only live, December 21, 2002 the group returned to the stage for a single concert, later released on DVD, titled Wonederful World on Dec. 21.
The group remained quiet for most of 2003. Sakurai helped to launch Artists' Power Bank (AP Bank), a non-profit environmental financial institution, in June. Sakamoto Ryuichi, a well known composer, came up with the initial idea to build a wind-power plant. With the help of Sakurai and music producer Takeshi Kobayashi, their goal later became to invest in environmentally friendly projects, such as renewable energy, and as of 2007, participated in other social issues such as helping the victims of a Chuetsu offshore earthquake in Niigata Prefecture on July 16, 2007. Near the end of the year, Mr. Children re-grouped and released their 25th single . It became their first double a-side single with "Tenohira" receiving no commercial tie-in, and "Kurumi" used to promote . The single was a hit and became Mr.Children's best selling single since 2001's "Youthful Days" single.
2004–2006
In 2004, Sakurai started a solo project titled Bank Band, which became a spin-off of AP Bank. As Bank Band, Sakurai released a first album, titled , which contained covers of two Mr. Children songs, "Hero" and "Yasashii Uta". Mr. Children released their eleventh album on April 4, 2004, titled , which came with a documentary DVD showing the group working and talking about the concept behind the album. To help promote the album, Mr. Children used the song in 'Nissin Cup Noodle – NO Border' commercials and as the 'News 23' theme song. According to Sakurai, is
In the following month, they released their 26th single, "Sign", on May 26, which was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Orange Days and went on to win the Song of the Year award at the 46th annual Japan Record Awards ten years after their win for 'Innocent World'.
Most of the 2005 was spent working on a new album. As a solo act, Kazutoshi Sakurai appeared at Golden Circle vol.7 on February 28, 2005. Finally on June 29, 2005 the group released their 27th single . The single became a monster hit selling 569,000 copies its first week, and ending with 925,632 copies sold. As a quad a-side single, all four songs had a commercial tie in. promoted 'Pocari Sweat', "and I love you" promoted 'Nissin Cup Noodle – NO Border', became the theme song for the Japanese movie 'Fly Daddy Fly', and was used as a promotional song for Fuji TV's educational program 'Kodomo bangumi Ponkikkiizu, Gachagachapon'. Even though it was released as a single, it was classified as an album by the Recording Industry Association of Japan. A month later the group attended Kazutoshi Sakurai's 3-day festival 'ap bank fes’ 05' from July 16, 2005 through July 18, 2005, followed by 'SETSTOCK '05' at Kokuei bihoku kyuuryou park on July 23, 2005 and 'Higher Ground 2005' at Umi no nakamichi kaihinkouen outdoor theater on July 30, 2005. Three months later on September 21, 2005, I Love U (I♥U), Mr.Children’s 12th original album, was released. Two months later Dome Tour 2005 'I Love U' began, running from November 12, 2005 through December 27, 2005 and were only the fourth artist in Japanese history to play at the Osaka, Tokyo, Sapporo, Nagoya and Fukuoka dome's. The tour ended in Tokyo Come where they played to 45,000 fans, bringing the tour total to almost 390,000 fans. By the end of the year the group managed to pass the 45 million mark in sold records.
The first single for 2006, was their 28th single released on July 5, 2006 and used as the promotion song for Toyota's "Tobira wo akeyou" commercial and as the theme song to NTV's 2006 FIFA World Cup broadcasting. Due to the groups involvement with ap bank fes. '06, there were no magazine or radio promotions, and only 3 live performances were done to promote the single. However the commercial tie-in's for the single proved to be a success and "Houkiboshi" was voted No. 3 as the favorite commercial song for 2006 and voted as the favorite winter song heard in the summer. Ten days following the release of 'Houkiboshi', Mr.Children participated in the 3 day festival, ap bank fes '06, where they performed "Hero", "Strange Chameleon", "Owarinaki tabi", and "Hokiboshi". One month later Mr.Children were special guests at The Mujintou fes. 2006 and performed "Mirai", "Innocent world", "Hokorobi", "Sign", "Owarinaki tabi", "Worlds end", and "Houkiboshi". Shortly after Mr.Children announced a joint tour with fellow Japanese rockers the pillows, known as 'Mr.Children & the pillows new big bang tour ~This is Hybrid Innocent~'. The tour was held from September 26, 2006 through October 11, 2006. On November 15, 2006, the group released their 29th single , which was used as the theme song , by NTV, a controversial television drama about underage pregnancy. Kazutoshi Sakurai had begun writing the song in February 2006 and finished writing in March 2006. and shot the promotional video in September 2006. One of the b-sides of single was a re-recording of Mr. Children's 2003 song "Kurumi", used as a theme song in the movie .
2007
On January 24, 2007, the band released their 30th single, , which was used as the theme song for the movie , and while only a limited edition single, brought the group to 26 consecutive No. 1 singles. Shortly after, the 13th original album, Home, was released on March 14, which would become the group's first in almost 13 years to chart at No. 1 for two consecutive weeks. It was also the first Japanese album in 2007 to sell more than a million copies. Work on the record had come to a standstill, during the recording of the song "Houkiboshi", due to a dispute among the group over "Home"'s direction. Producer Kobayashi suggested to make an album that "pays attention to the world with a message".
The album reflected a more personal touch from the group, with talking about the 9/11 attacks at New York City, and , being inspired by Kazutoshi Sakurai father who had been sick. The title of the album, Home, was originally suggested to be titled "Home Made" or "Home Ground", because the group wanted the album to have the meaning that it was made by hand. However, they choose to name it just Home because they felt that by adding another word it would be limiting the idea in mind. Three days after the release of Home, Mr. Children won the awards Best Video of the Year and Best Group Video for the single "Shirushi" at the Space Shower Music Video Awards '07. For the album, the group held two promotional tours. The first half called Mr. Children Home Tour 2007, started on May 4 and lasted until June 23. During the tour, a new compilation album titled B-Side was released on May 10, which was also the group's 15th anniversary. The release of a B-side compilation had been suggested by singer Sakurai while working on Home:
Releasing a public statement on their official site at Toy's Factory, both the group and Sakurai felt that the A-side tracks on their singles had started to dictate and overall theme as to who Mr. Children were as a group. They felt a lot of feelings and desires which have shaped them as a group came from these coupling songs, and thus decided to release them as a compilation album.
On May 5, 2007, after the second concert for the first half of the Home tour, drummer Hideya Suzuki injured his hand after accidentally touching a ventilator. He injured his left index finger, which required four stitches and the following two concerts had to be rescheduled. Publicity for the tour reached a high, when they performed in front of a sold-out tour for 15,000 fans at Yokohama Arena on June 7, 2007 and reignited speculation that the Mr.Children phenomenon was alive and well. A second half of the tour to promote 'Home', titled Mr.Children Home Tour 2007 -In the Field- took place from August 4 to September 30. Both tours ended up being a big success for the group, and became the most attended Japan tour in 2007 at 550,000 fans. The main promotional track for the Home album, , was selected to promote the Olympus E-410. During the E Goes to World campaign, the camera manufacturer had customers submit pictures to create a new promotional video for the song.
On July 10, Mr. Children announced a new song on their website titled . While initially a single release date wasn't issued, the group announced a month later it would be released on October 30, 2007. The title track, "Tabidachi no Uta", was used as a theme song for the Japanese movie , and a month later also be used to promote NTT Higashi Nihon. With the release of the single, Mr. Children managed to debut at number 1 for the week and in return obtained their 27th consecutive number 1 single. Similar to Jyūyonsai no Haha before, the movie Koizora deals with the struggles of a young girl, involving betrayal, rape and abortion. The group was scheduled to play at the ap bank fes '07 from July 14 to July 16, but due to a typhoon, the first two days had to be canceled, and only the final day proceeded as planned. With the announcement of the new single, Mr.Children also announced the 'Home' tour 2007 DVD, which was released on November 14, 2007. On December 18, 2007, Oricon announced that Home became their first album to top the yearly album charts since their debut with the sales of 1.18 million copies, surpassing the sales of Kumi Koda's album Black Cherry of 1.02 million copies.
2008
For the beginning of 2008, Sakurai released an album and DVD with his solo project Bank Band, followed a month later by the official announcement of a new song, , used in the NHK Japanese television drama . Afterwards Mr. Children announced the release of two singles. The first, "Gift", released on July 30, 2008, was used as the official theme song to the 2008 Beijing Olympics coverage on NHK. When writing this song, Sakurai focused on the meaning behind the Olympics and wanted to write a song not just for those who win, but for everyone who participates.
The ap bank announced that Mr.Children would appear for all 3 days at ap bank fes '08. Their second single of the year, "Hanabi", released on September 3, 2008, was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Code Blue, in which Tomohisa Yamashita played a main role. The single "Hanabi" topped the Oricon single charts for two weeks, becoming their 29th consecutive number-one single. However, their next single became their first download-only single for the music download market. The nun full-track ringtone downloads (Chaku Uta) of the song began on October 1 and the full-track downloads (Chaku Uta Full) began on November 1, 2008. Their studio album Supermarket Fantasy was released on December 10, 2008. Supermarket Fantasy sold about 708,000 copies in its initial week, debuting at the number-one position on the Oricon weekly album charts.
2009–2011
On October 20, 2009, it was announced that Mr. Children produced their first anime theme "Fanfare" for the movie One Piece Film: Strong World. "Fanfare" was digitally released as a non full-track ringtone song (Chaku Uta) on November 16 as a full-track ringtone song (Chaku Uta Full) on December 2, 2009. The song debuted at the number-one position on the RIAJ Digital Track Chart.
On May 10, 2010, Mr. Children released the DVD Mr. Children Dome Tour 2009 Supermarket Fantasy in Tokyo Dome, but it sold about 49,000 copies one day before the official release day, debuting at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart with the one-day sales. It became their seventh consecutive number-one music DVD and they tied the records of Arashi and KAT-TUN for having the most consecutive number-one DVDs on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart. It also debuted at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly comprehensive DVD chart, eclipsing the sales of Avatar in the week. It topped the Oricon comprehensive DVD charts for three consecutive weeks, making them the second artist to achieve that with the music DVD while the first is Arashi.
On September 4, 2010, Mr. Children released their second documentary/concert movie Mr. Children / Split the Difference (since first "Es" ~Mr. Children in Film~) and released DVD + CD includes the movie and selected songs by the band on November 10, 2010. It debuted at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart and they also became the first artist to have their eighth consecutive number-one music DVD.
On December 1, 2010, Mr. Children released their sixteenth studio album Sense includes digital release only single "Fanfare". But the details such as track list, number of tracks, cover and title of the album were not announced until just before a release date, November 29.
On April 4, 2011, Mr. Children released the download single "Kazoe Uta" to collect donations for the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake. "Kazoe Uta" debuted at number 1 on the RIAJ Digital Track Chart, surpassing the download sales of AKB48's charity single "Dareka no Tame ni (What Can I Do for Someone?)".
2012
On April 18, 2012, Mr. Children released the Triple A-side single "Inori ~Namida no Kidou/End of the Day/pieces", their first in 3 years and 7 months; the single debuted at number 1 on the Oricon Weekly Single Charts, selling 174,409 copies. Two of the songs, "Inori ~Namida no Kidou" and "pieces", were used as the themes to the Bokura ga Ita movies. In addition, "Inori ~Namida no Kidou" spent four weeks atop the RIAJ Digital Track Chart, tying the record set by GReeeeN's "Haruka". Also released on April 18 was the band's "Mr. Children 2011 Tour Sense -in the field-" DVD, which debuted at number 1 on both the Oricon DVD and Blu-ray charts, making Mr. Children the first artist to top three of Oricon's charts in a single week.
On May 10, 2012, Mr. Children released a pair of Best Albums titled Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> and Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro> in celebration of their 20th anniversary. The band also embarked on a 2-month dome tour, titled "POPSAURUS 2012", after the series of concerts they held in 2001 following the release of their first two Best Albums.
On November 28, 2012 Mr.Children released new album titled [(An Imitation) Blood Orange].
At the end of the year, Mr.Children had dominated the yearly album ranking for 2012 with all 3 albums in the top10. Their dual best albums Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro> and Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> monopolized TOP 2 the best selling album of 2012 yearly chart with selling 1.17 million copies sold and 1.11 million copies sold consecutively. Moreover, [(An Imitation) Blood Orange] placed 8th in the best selling album in 2012.
They have both achieved "the best selling album" and " the most Artist total sales Albums " for 2012. Mr.Children became the third artists who achieved TOP 2 spots on the yearly album ranking, and this is the first time in 14 years for any artist to achieve this . Mr.Children was the 4th artist by total sales revenue in Japan in 2012, with ¥9.947 billion (approximately $84 million).
2014
On November 19, 2014 Mr.Children released the single CD "Ashioto ~Be Strong"
2020
On December 2, 2020, Mr.Children released their 20th studio album SOUNDTRACKS.
Photographers
The band has collaborated with photographers such as Osami Yabuta, Reylia Slaby and Alfie Goodrich
Oricon Chart Statistics
Artist's Total sales (CD Total Sales) : 58.61 million copies sold ( #2 most selling artist)
No.1 on Oricon Year-End Charts: 1994 ("innocent world"); 1996 ("Namonaki Uta"), 2007 (HOME), 2012 (Mr.Children Macro 2005-2010)
Double Million Seller Singles: 2nd overall (1st - CHAGE and ASKA)
Million Seller Singles: 3rd overall (1st - B'z, 2nd - AKB48)
Million Seller Albums: 2nd overall (1st - B'z, 3rd - DREAMS COME TRUE)
The most non tie up Single sales : 1.82 million copies sold (by「See Saw Game」)
Won Japan Record Grand Prix in 1994 for "innocent world" and won it again 10 years later for "Sign"
Charitable and other activities
Since their official debut, Mr.Children has engaged in social and charitable causes. As a group they participated in the live concert for Act Against AIDS on December 1, 1994 and again on December 1, 1995. The goal of live was to raise awareness about AIDS. The proceeds from the event were donated to support children living with HIV. The live was followed up by a collaboration Act Against AIDS charity single with fellow Japanese artist Kuwata Keisuke titled ‘Kiseki no hoshi’ and released on January 23, 1995. On April 25, 2001 Kazutoshi Sakurai also participated in the recording of Zero Landmine, a single created to promote awareness of the problem of landmines and promote a ban on landmines. In addition the group has also participated in Kazutoshi Sakura's solo project, AP bank. AP Bank, a nonprofit lending group, carries the goal of tackling environmental problems by financing environmentally friendly projects such as renewable energy, in addition to holding yearly festivals to raise money to fund additional projects. Since its inception in 2005, Mr.Children has been actively participating in the festivals, with an announcement in 2008 that the group will now work more closely with its cause by participating during the entire three-day festival duration in addition to further details to be announced at a later time.
Members Kazutoshi Sakurai and Kenichi Tahara joined together to create Acid Test for the concert ‘Dream Power John Lennon Super live broadcasting’ on October 9, 2001. The live was part of Yoko Ono’s Dream Power and educational platform where artists came together to hold a charity concert to raise money for school construction funds for children in Africa and Asia. The John Lennon song covered by Acid Test during the live, "Mother", was later recorded and released on a tribute album Happy Birthday, John, and released on September 30, 2005.
In addition to social causes, Mr.Children's music has been used as background music for numerous television advertisements, television programs, television drama's, and motion pictures. Examples of the group's commercial tie-ins include "and I love you", "Bokura no Oto", and "Tagatame" for Nissin Cup Noodle no Border commercials, 'Gift' for the 2008 Beijing Olympics on NHK, and "Tabidachi no uta" for the 2007 Japanese movie . As a group, Mr.Children have not endorsed products by physically appearing in television commercials or printed media advertisements. One of the methods used to help promote the group is through Brajackets, a dust jacket for books, which are available at stands in bookstores for free. The Brajacket serve as free advertising for various products from ice cream to movies and musicals. Mr. Children have used this method to promote singles and albums; for example and I Love U (I♥U).
Fan club
The official fan club of Mr. Children is called Father & Mother, the title being derived from their name. The fan club, which started in 1994, was kept relatively secretive at first, as the group has never made any mention of it on their official website. In 2006, for the release of the group's 29th single "Shirushi", the official website was revamped and with it information about the fan club was finally added. Just like before however, the fan club can only be joined by mail and requires an admission fee of 3,500 yen, with yearly re-applications for membership.
Band members
Current members
Kazutoshi Sakurai – lead vocals, guitar, primary songwriter
Kenichi Tahara – guitar, backing vocals
He was born in Fukuoka and is charge of playing guitar in the band. He had joined the baseball team in high school but became interested in the guitar because he saw his classmate playing a guitar at a school festival. One day one of his classmates, Kazutoshi Sakurai brought his guitar to school. They bonded with each other over it and that became the catalyst for forming Mr.Children. Known for being quiet in live concerts, his fans become estatic when he says interacts with them.
Keisuke Nakagawa – bass, backing vocals
Nakagawa was born in Nagasaki. His nickname is "Nakakei". He went to the same junior high school as Kenichi and Hideya where he started playing the bass. He is also famous for being a baseball fan.
Hideya Suzuki – drums, backing vocals, also known as "Jen" and is the leader of Mr. Children
Supporting members
Takeshi Kobayashi – keyboards, producer
Naoto Inti Raymi – guitar, chorus
Takashi "Sunny" Katsuya – keyboards, backing vocals
Shuji Kouguchi – guitar, harmonica
Discography
Albums
* Compilation album.** Live album
Books
Official Books:
[es] Mr.Children in 370 DAYS (April 25, 1995) C0076
Mr.Children Everything 天才・桜井和寿 終わりなき音の冒険 (Mr.Children Everything -Tensai Sakurai Kazutoshi owarinaki oto no bouken-) (December 25, 1996) C0073
Mr.Children詩集「優しい歌」 (Mr.Children song collection -Yasashii Uta-) (December 10, 2001) C0092
Tours
Official Tours:
'92 Everything Tour (September 23, 1992 – November 5, 1992)
Visited 10 cities and held 10 concerts
'92 Your Everything Tour (September 26, 1992 – November 22, 1992)
Visited 11 cities and held 12 concerts
'92–93 Kind of Love Tour (December 7, 1992 – January 25, 1993)
Visited 9 cities and held 9 concerts
'93 Versus Tour (September 23, 1993 – November 5, 1993)
Visited 9 cities and held 9 concerts
Mr. Children '94 tour innocent world (September 18, 1994 – December 18, 1994)
Visited 24 cities and held 27 concerts
Mr.Children '95 Tour Atomic Heart (January 7, 1995 – February 20, 1995)
Visited 10 cities and held 21 concerts
(July 16, 1995 – September 10, 1995)
Visited 11 cities and held 19 concerts
Regress or Progress (August 24, 1996 – March 28, 1997)
Visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts
"Discovery" Tour '99 (February 14, 1999 – July 12, 1999)
Visited 16 cities and held 42 concerts
Mr. Children Concert tour Q (October 15, 2000 – February 24, 2001)
Visited 13 cities and held 35 concerts
Popsaurus Mr. Children (July 15, 2001 – September 25, 2001)
Visited 10 cities and held 15 concerts
Wonderful World on Dec. 21 (December 21, 2002)
A one night live. Originally intended to be a 26 city and 39 concert tour, but was canceled due to Kazutoshi Sakurai's hospitalization
(June 12, 2004 – September 25, 2004)
Stadium Tour, Visited 11 cities and held 21 concerts
Dome tour 2005 "I ♥ U" (November 12, 2005 – December 27, 2005)
Dome Tour, Visited 5 cities and held 10 concerts
Mr. Children & the pillows new big bang tour ~This is Hybrid Innocent~ (September 26, 2006 – October 11, 2006)
Hall tour, Visited 6 cities and held 7 concerts. The tour, a Zepp tour, was a joint effort with fellow rock group the pillows
Mr. Children "Home" Tour 2007 (May 4, 2007 – June 23, 2007)
Arena tour, Visited 7 cities and held 14 concerts
Mr. Children "Home" Tour 2007 -in the field- (August 4, 2007 – September 30, 2007)
Stadium tour, Visited 9 cities and held 14 concerts
" (Feb 14, 2009 – March 31, 2009)
Arena Tour, Visited 17 cities and held 34 concerts
Mr.Children DOME TOUR 2009 ~SUPERMARKET FANTASY~ (November 28, 2009 – December 27, 2009)
Dome tour, Visited 5 cities and held 11 concerts
Mr.Children Tour 2011 SENSE (February 19, 2011 – May 15, 2011)
Arena Tour, Visited 9 cities and held 19 concerts
Mr.Children STADIUM TOUR 2011 SENSE -in the field- (August 20, 2011 – September 25, 2011)
Stadium tour, Visited 6 cities and held 10 concerts
MR.CHILDREN TOUR POPSAURUS 2012 (April 14, 2012 – June 6, 2012)
Dome tour, Visited 6 cities and held 14 concerts
Mr.Children [(an imitation) blood orange] Tour (December 15, 2012 – June 9, 2012)
Dome tour, Visited 20 cities and held 40 concerts
Mr.Children FATHER&MOTHER 21st anniversary Fanclub Tour (September 17, 2014 – October 9, 2014)
Zepp tour, Visited 5 cities and held 5 concerts
Mr.Children TOUR 2015 REFLECTION (March 14, 2015 – June 4, 2015)
Arena Tour, Visited 10 cities and held 20 concerts
Mr.Children Stadium Tour 2015 未完 (July 8, 2015 – September 20, 2015)
Stadium tour, Visited 10 cities and held 16 concerts
Mr.Children Hall tour 2016 "Niji" (April 14, 2016 – May 26, 2016)
Hall Tour, Visited 13 cities and held 13 concerts
Note: It is the first time in 14 years to hold Hall tour since 2002
Awards and Records
See also
Japanese rock
Japan Record Awards
MTV Video Music Awards Japan
List of best-selling music artists in Japan
List of best-selling singles in Japan
Footnotes
a. Early on in the group's career, Takeshi Kobayashi collaborated with Kazutoshi Sakurai on various songs in addition to writing songs himself. For example, "Dance dance dance" on the album Atomic Heart was co-composed by him, and on the album Versus, was both composed and written by him. Over the years, his composing and lyrical work with the group has lessened with the last a-side track co-written by him and Kazutoshi Sakurai being which was released on December 12, 1994 .
References
External links
Official website
Mr. Children at Toy's Factory
Innocent World – Unofficial English translations of Mr. Children news and articles
Mr. Children English Fansite – Unofficial English translations of Mr. Children lyrics, guitar tabs and album reviews
Toy's Factory artists
Japanese pop rock music groups
Musical groups from Tokyo
Musical quartets
Musical groups established in 1988 | true | [
"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 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"
] |
[
"Mr. Children",
"1995-1997",
"What happened in 1995?",
"In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2."
] | C_cc47c7df2d994d02b905ef7002dc163a_1 | was the tour successful? | 2 | Was the second half of the Atomic Heart tour with Mr. Children successful? | Mr. Children | In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2. Mr. Children also became involved in charity work, doing a collaboration song with Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars. The single "Kiseki no hoshi" (Qi Ji noDi Qiu ) was used as the theme song for the Act Against AIDS campaign, was produced by Mr. Children and written by Kuwata. To promote the single and the campaign, they held a one-month tour from April 18 until May 14, entitled Live UFO '95 Rock Opera "Acoustic Revolution with Orchestra" Kiseki no hoshi (Live UFO '95 Rock Opera "Acoustic Revolution with Orchestra" Qi Ji noDi Qiu ), where the group did cover songs of many English speaking artists such as The Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan. During the tour the group was also filming a documentary/concert movie called Es ~Mr. Children in Film~. It was released in theaters on June 6, 1995, preceded by the group's eight single "Es (Theme of Es)" on May 10, to promote the movie. Two months later the group held an open air tour titled -Hounen Mansaku- Natsu matsuri tour Sora [ku:] (-Hounen Mansaku- Xia Ji ri1995 Kong [ku:]) from July 16 to September 10, during which the ninth single, "See-Saw Game (Yukan na Koi no Uta)" (shisogemu ~ Yong Gan naLian noGe ~ ) was released on August 10. On February 6, 1996 Mr. Children's tenth single "Namonaki Uta" (Ming monakiShi ) was released, to promote the Japanese drama Pure (piyua) and also for Daio Paper's Elleair (erieru) commercial. The single went on to become Japan's highest first week selling single of all time (which was later broken by idol group AKB48) and is currently Japan's eighth highest selling drama tie-in single. The success of the single was also a surprise for Sakurai, who admitted to spending very little time writing the song. Two months later, on April 5, 1996 the group's eleventh single "Hana (Memento Mori)" (Hua -Memento-Mori-) was released, followed by their fifth original album Shinkai (Shen Hai ) on June 24 and their twelfth single "Machine Gun o Buppanase (Mr. Children Bootleg)" (mashinganwobutsuFang se -Mr.Children Bootleg-), on August 8. To close the year, the Regress or Progress Tour started and lasted from August 24, 1996 to March 28, 1997. The group visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts. Mr. Children's 13th single, "Everything (It's You)", was released on February 5, 1997, with the title track used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Koi no Bakansu (Lian nobakansu). A month later, on March 5 Bolero, Mr. Children's sixth album was released. Soon after, rumors started of the group disbanding. Sakurai's reply: "The band will dissolve only when we have no more talent and have relationship problems with each other." Yet the group then decided to take some time off. Nakagawa and Suzuki start a side project band called Hayashi Hideo, and joined by Kenji Fujii from My Little Lover and Sawao Yamanaka from The Pillows, went on a club tour. CANNOTANSWER | Two months later the group held an open air tour titled -Hounen Mansaku- Natsu matsuri tour Sora [ku:] (-Hounen Mansaku- Xia Ji ri1995 Kong [ku:]) | , commonly referred to by their contracted nickname , are a Japanese pop rock band formed in 1989. Consisting of Kazutoshi Sakurai, Kenichi Tahara, Keisuke Nakagawa, and Hideya Suzuki, they made their major label debut in 1992. They are one of the best selling artists in Japan and one of the most successful Japanese rock artists, having sold over 75 million records and creating the in the mid-1990s in Japan. They held the record for the highest first week sales of a single in Japan for 15 years, with 1.2 million copies of their 10th single , have 30 consecutive number 1 singles, replaced Glay as the all-male band (with 3 or more members) to have the most number 1 albums on the Oricon charts, and won the Japan Record Award in 1994 for "Innocent World" and in 2004 for "Sign". As of 2012, Mr. Children has published fifteen original studio albums and 34 physical singles, along with five compilations, a live album, and fifteen home video releases.
The band's music is mainly composed and written by lead singer Sakurai, with the exception of the Suzuki-penned songs "Asia" and "#2601" from the albums Atomic Heart and Discovery, and occasional collaborative song writing with producer Takeshi Kobayashi.
In 2012 they celebrated their 20th debut anniversary by releasing dual best album titled Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> and Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro>. Both albums dominated the best-selling album category in the 2012 Oricon yearly chart, selling over 2.5 million copies. Mr.Children has become the third artists who achieved TOP 2 spots on the yearly album ranking, and this is the first time in 14 years for any artist to achieve this. Moreover, [(An Imitation) Blood Orange], an album of new material released in November 2012, debuted No.1 on the Oricon Chart—at the end of the year, all three albums released that year were in the Top 10 best selling albums of 2012.
In 2015, Mr. Children was named No.1 Concert Mobilization Power Ranking based on the overall number of people whom attended their performances during 2015 in Japan, mobilizing 1,119,000 fans (36 concerts).
History
1987–1992
The group's members first met in the year of 1987, when Sakurai, Tahara and Nakagawa were in The Walls, which was originally influenced by the band Echoes. The frontman of Echoes, Jinsei Tsuji, was a political activist, and because of this, The Walls too became a political band. Drummer Hideya Suzuki was not an original member of The Walls. When the original drummer departed, the band recruited Suzuki, who went to the same school as the other members. In late 1988, The Walls disintegrated, while the remaining members formed Mr. Children in early 1989. The name of Mr. Children supposedly came about during a talk in a dinner, in which the group thought the word "children" had a nice ring to it, but because they were no longer children themselves, they decided to add Mr. in front of it. They credit this change as a new way they started to look at the group.
After changing their name and overall sound, Mr. Children auditioned at a music club called La Mama, failing to pass the first time, but passing a second audition to play at the club. After playing in the club, they were asked to try and debut as professionals. Mr. Children sent out five demo tapes; all failed to generate record label interest, and the group took a three-month hiatus in 1991. Hideya Suzuki worked as a receptionist at an economy hotel, while Kazutoshi Sakurai worked with his father who owned a construction company. When they returned, the group created a sixth demo tape and caught the attention of Toy's Factory. The label signed the group and had them play as the opening act for the rock group Jun Sky Walkers. It was also during this time that they were introduced to their long-time friend and producer Takeshi Kobayashi. Kobayashi was already known in the music industry as a music composer for Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars and Kyōko Koizumi.
1992–1994
On May 10, 1992, Mr. Children's debut album, Everything, was released and represented the long journey they took to get to this point. Three months later their first single was released on August 21, 1992. After the release of the single the group held two tours for the album, both held between September 23, 1992 and November 5 of the same year, the '92 Everything Tour comprising ten and the '92 Your Everything Tour consisting of twelve performances. To cap off the year and lead them into the next, Mr. Children released their second album, Kind of Love and their second single on December 1, 1992. "Dakishimetai" was later used as an insert song for the Japanese drama . Shortly after, a new tour called '92–93 Kind of Love Tour started and lasted from December 7, 1992 till January 25, 1993.
In 1993, with the completion of the band's tour they began work on for their third album. The first single of the new year to be released was "Replay", released on July 1, 1993 and used in commercials. On September 9, 1993 their third album Versus was released, but failed to bring the group into the spotlight. They continued on and held a new tour. The '93 Versus Tour was held from September 23 until November 5 and had the band holding nine performances. Shortly after, "Cross Road" was released on November 10, 1993, which was used to promote the Japanese drama . The single was not a hit, but through word of mouth "Cross Road" gained popularity and after 22 weeks sold over a million copies and later, though released in 1993, managed to become the fifteenth best selling single in Oricon's 1994 yearly charts. Sakurai confessed years later as to not liking his works up to this point. According to him:
On June 1, 1994 a new single called "Innocent World" was released and used a promotional song for the soft drink . The single solidified the groups popularity with its sales, managing to sell 1,935,830 copies and becoming the No. 1 selling single in Oricon's 1994 yearly charts. Afterwards work began on their fourth original album Atomic Heart. The album was released on September 1, 1994 and became the band's highest selling album to date. Due to the huge success the band received from the album and "Innocent World" single, the groups popularity built up creating the in Japan.
The band also had Takeshi Kobayashi produce two new tours for them. The first tour, named after the "Innocent World" single was held from September 18 to December 18. The band also released their sixth single "Tomorrow Never Knows" on November 10, 1994 which was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama . The song was written while the group was on tour, was later voted in 2006 as fans No. 1 all-time favorite song on Music Station, and is currently the third highest selling drama tie-in single in Japan. The next single, was released on December 12, 1994, though originally intended to be the B-side of "Tomorrow Never Knows". To end the year, "Innocent World" won the Song of the Year award at the 36th annual Japan Record Awards.
1995–1997
In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2. Mr. Children also became involved in charity work, doing a collaboration song with Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars. The single was used as the theme song for the Act Against AIDS campaign, was produced by Mr. Children and written by Kuwata. To promote the single and the campaign, they held a one-month tour from April 18 until May 14, entitled , where the group did cover songs of many English speaking artists such as The Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan. During the tour the group was also filming a documentary/concert movie called Es ~Mr. Children in Film~. It was released in theaters on June 6, 1995, preceded by the group's eight single "Es (Theme of Es)" on May 10, to promote the movie. Two months later the group held an open air tour titled from July 16 to September 10, during which the ninth single, was released on August 10.
On February 6, 1996 Mr. Children's tenth single was released, to promote the Japanese drama and also for Daio Paper's commercial. The single went on to become Japan's highest first week selling single of all time (which was later broken by idol group AKB48) and is currently Japan's eighth highest selling drama tie-in single. The success of the single was also a surprise for Sakurai, who admitted to spending very little time writing the song. Two months later, on April 5, 1996 the group's eleventh single was released, followed by their fifth original album on June 24 and their twelfth single , on August 8. To close the year, the Regress or Progress Tour started and lasted from August 24, 1996 to March 28, 1997. The group visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts.
Mr. Children's 13th single, "Everything (It's You)", was released on February 5, 1997, with the title track used as the theme song to the Japanese drama . A month later, on March 5 Bolero, Mr. Children's sixth album was released. Soon after, rumors started of the group disbanding. Sakurai's reply: "The band will dissolve only when we have no more talent and have relationship problems with each other." Yet the group then decided to take some time off. Nakagawa and Suzuki start a side project band called Hayashi Hideo, and joined by Kenji Fujii from My Little Lover and Sawao Yamanaka from The Pillows, went on a club tour.
1998–2000
On February 11, 1998, they released their 14th single , theme song to the Japanese drama . The group was still on hiatus during this time and made no live performances to promote the single and did not appear in the music video for the song. Finally on October 21, 1998, Mr. Children officially re-grouped and released their 15th single, with the Japanese drama using it as their theme song. The song remains a public favorite in voting polls, Oricon citing its inspirational lyrics as the reason.
On January 13, 1999, , their 16th single, was released, followed by their seventh album, Discovery, on February 3, 1999. Sakurai compared his approach to the songwriting for the record to surfing:
Eleven days later they began the Discovery Tour '99, from February 14 to July 12, where the group visited 16 cities and held 42 shows. During the tour, Mr. Children released their 17th single "I'll Be" on May 12, which was used in Sea Breeze commercials. Though originally released on the Discovery album, the song was re-released as a single with a lighter beat. The single was not a success and became Mr. Children's lowest selling single since "Cross Road". During the Discovery Tour '99, an idea for a live album was brought up. It was released as a 500,000 copy limited edition on September 8, 1999 and called 1/42 (referring to one of the 42 shows in the tour). Most of the tracks were recorded on June 16, 1999 at the Makomanai ice arena, while the bonus track "Dakishimetai" was recorded at the Okinawa Ginowan-Shi seaside park.
At the beginning of a new century , released on January 13, 2000 became the group's 18th single. While "I'll Be" failed to be a success, "Kuchibue" proved to be a hit selling 724,070 copies. On August 9, 2000, their 19th single "Not Found" was also used as the theme song to the Japanese drama , followed a month later by their 9th original album Q on September 27, 2000. The band went to New York to record this album, where they re-recorded some of their old indie material and for the first time, producer Takeshi Kobayashi performed with the band on a recording. The cover for the album was shot bought Size, Inc. at the Bonneville Salt Flats in the United States. The album was not a favorite amongst fans for various reasons and became their first album since Atomic Heart to not sell over one million copies. ‘Concert tour Q’ started, visiting 13 cities and holding 35 concerts between October 15, 2000 and February 24, 2001.
2001–2003
In 2001, Mr. Children continued their Q tour, followed by dual "Best Of" albums. Titled Mr. Children 1992–1995 and Mr. Children 1996–2000, they were both released on July 11, 2001. Both albums went on to sell a combined total of 4,034,785 copies. According to an interview done with MTV Japan Sakurai stated the best of albums weren't something they had planned on doing yet. During this time, the group was finishing up work for their new upcoming album and had planned to start promoting singles on it. However it was decided that a best of album was needed and so they were released. Four days following the dual album release, the group launched the ‘Popsaurus’ tour, visiting 10 cities and playing 15 shows, lasting from July 15, 2001 all the way through September 25, 2001. A month into the tour their 20th single was released and used to promote the Wonda Canned Coffee by Asahi Soft Drinks. Two months after the Popsaurus tour ended, "Youthful Days" was released. Released on November 7, 2001, it was their 21st single and was an insert song for the Japanese drama Antique Bakery. "Youthful Days" debuted at number-one on Japanese Oricon's Charts in its first week at retail (ahead of Mr. Moonlight (Ai no Big Band) by Morning Musume, from album 4th Ikimashoi!), and It ended up being their best selling single for the year. The b-side for the single, "Drawing", originally had no commercial tie-in, but two years later was used as the theme song to the 2003 Japanese drama , Starring former Shibugakitai member Masahiro Motoki.
Mr. Children released their 22nd single on New Year's Day of 2002 (January 1), which was used as a show song in the Japanese drama Antique Bakery. Four months later their tenth original album It's a Wonderful World was released on May 10, the groups' tenth anniversary. The release of the album on their 10th anniversary was not something that had originally intended. As the group was wrapping up recording, Sakurai asked if the album could be released in the spring time. While the group and their management was trying to think of how to promote an album in the spring time, they came up with releasing the album on their 10th anniversary. A new tour, titled Mr. Children Tour 2002 Dear Wonderful World was set to begin later that year. The previous single "I'll Be" from the Discovery album was selected to be used as an official theme for the 2002 FIFA World Cup, held in Japan and South Korea. On May 24, 2002 Mr. Children attended the first ever MTV Video Music Awards Japan and topped the awards show by winning 'Video of the Year' for the song "Kimi ga suki", the band also nominated in Best Group Category but losing to Backstreet Boys. Two months after the release of the new album, Mr.Children's 23rd single "Any", was released on July 11, 2002 and used to promote NTT DoCoMo Group 10th Anniversary. The group was not able to properly promote the single. As preparations for the new tour were beginning and promotion for the new single were being done, lead singer Sakurai was hospitalized on July 21, 2002, after a blockage in his cerebellum was detected. The Mr. Children Tour 2002 Dear Wonderful World was canceled and all group activities were put on a temporary hiatus. While recovering, Sakurai wrote a song called "Hero", that was inspired by his hospitalization. The song was released as the group's 24th single on December 11, 2002 and was used in NTT DoCoMo Group 10th Anniversary commercial. The first press version of the single included a DVD where, in addition to a Mr. Children 2002 documentary -Hero- that was aired, the singer talked about his hospitalization and inspiration for the song. On November 15, 2002 Mr.Children's website announced the band's return to the stage for a "stew of home pride" with a one night only live, December 21, 2002 the group returned to the stage for a single concert, later released on DVD, titled Wonederful World on Dec. 21.
The group remained quiet for most of 2003. Sakurai helped to launch Artists' Power Bank (AP Bank), a non-profit environmental financial institution, in June. Sakamoto Ryuichi, a well known composer, came up with the initial idea to build a wind-power plant. With the help of Sakurai and music producer Takeshi Kobayashi, their goal later became to invest in environmentally friendly projects, such as renewable energy, and as of 2007, participated in other social issues such as helping the victims of a Chuetsu offshore earthquake in Niigata Prefecture on July 16, 2007. Near the end of the year, Mr. Children re-grouped and released their 25th single . It became their first double a-side single with "Tenohira" receiving no commercial tie-in, and "Kurumi" used to promote . The single was a hit and became Mr.Children's best selling single since 2001's "Youthful Days" single.
2004–2006
In 2004, Sakurai started a solo project titled Bank Band, which became a spin-off of AP Bank. As Bank Band, Sakurai released a first album, titled , which contained covers of two Mr. Children songs, "Hero" and "Yasashii Uta". Mr. Children released their eleventh album on April 4, 2004, titled , which came with a documentary DVD showing the group working and talking about the concept behind the album. To help promote the album, Mr. Children used the song in 'Nissin Cup Noodle – NO Border' commercials and as the 'News 23' theme song. According to Sakurai, is
In the following month, they released their 26th single, "Sign", on May 26, which was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Orange Days and went on to win the Song of the Year award at the 46th annual Japan Record Awards ten years after their win for 'Innocent World'.
Most of the 2005 was spent working on a new album. As a solo act, Kazutoshi Sakurai appeared at Golden Circle vol.7 on February 28, 2005. Finally on June 29, 2005 the group released their 27th single . The single became a monster hit selling 569,000 copies its first week, and ending with 925,632 copies sold. As a quad a-side single, all four songs had a commercial tie in. promoted 'Pocari Sweat', "and I love you" promoted 'Nissin Cup Noodle – NO Border', became the theme song for the Japanese movie 'Fly Daddy Fly', and was used as a promotional song for Fuji TV's educational program 'Kodomo bangumi Ponkikkiizu, Gachagachapon'. Even though it was released as a single, it was classified as an album by the Recording Industry Association of Japan. A month later the group attended Kazutoshi Sakurai's 3-day festival 'ap bank fes’ 05' from July 16, 2005 through July 18, 2005, followed by 'SETSTOCK '05' at Kokuei bihoku kyuuryou park on July 23, 2005 and 'Higher Ground 2005' at Umi no nakamichi kaihinkouen outdoor theater on July 30, 2005. Three months later on September 21, 2005, I Love U (I♥U), Mr.Children’s 12th original album, was released. Two months later Dome Tour 2005 'I Love U' began, running from November 12, 2005 through December 27, 2005 and were only the fourth artist in Japanese history to play at the Osaka, Tokyo, Sapporo, Nagoya and Fukuoka dome's. The tour ended in Tokyo Come where they played to 45,000 fans, bringing the tour total to almost 390,000 fans. By the end of the year the group managed to pass the 45 million mark in sold records.
The first single for 2006, was their 28th single released on July 5, 2006 and used as the promotion song for Toyota's "Tobira wo akeyou" commercial and as the theme song to NTV's 2006 FIFA World Cup broadcasting. Due to the groups involvement with ap bank fes. '06, there were no magazine or radio promotions, and only 3 live performances were done to promote the single. However the commercial tie-in's for the single proved to be a success and "Houkiboshi" was voted No. 3 as the favorite commercial song for 2006 and voted as the favorite winter song heard in the summer. Ten days following the release of 'Houkiboshi', Mr.Children participated in the 3 day festival, ap bank fes '06, where they performed "Hero", "Strange Chameleon", "Owarinaki tabi", and "Hokiboshi". One month later Mr.Children were special guests at The Mujintou fes. 2006 and performed "Mirai", "Innocent world", "Hokorobi", "Sign", "Owarinaki tabi", "Worlds end", and "Houkiboshi". Shortly after Mr.Children announced a joint tour with fellow Japanese rockers the pillows, known as 'Mr.Children & the pillows new big bang tour ~This is Hybrid Innocent~'. The tour was held from September 26, 2006 through October 11, 2006. On November 15, 2006, the group released their 29th single , which was used as the theme song , by NTV, a controversial television drama about underage pregnancy. Kazutoshi Sakurai had begun writing the song in February 2006 and finished writing in March 2006. and shot the promotional video in September 2006. One of the b-sides of single was a re-recording of Mr. Children's 2003 song "Kurumi", used as a theme song in the movie .
2007
On January 24, 2007, the band released their 30th single, , which was used as the theme song for the movie , and while only a limited edition single, brought the group to 26 consecutive No. 1 singles. Shortly after, the 13th original album, Home, was released on March 14, which would become the group's first in almost 13 years to chart at No. 1 for two consecutive weeks. It was also the first Japanese album in 2007 to sell more than a million copies. Work on the record had come to a standstill, during the recording of the song "Houkiboshi", due to a dispute among the group over "Home"'s direction. Producer Kobayashi suggested to make an album that "pays attention to the world with a message".
The album reflected a more personal touch from the group, with talking about the 9/11 attacks at New York City, and , being inspired by Kazutoshi Sakurai father who had been sick. The title of the album, Home, was originally suggested to be titled "Home Made" or "Home Ground", because the group wanted the album to have the meaning that it was made by hand. However, they choose to name it just Home because they felt that by adding another word it would be limiting the idea in mind. Three days after the release of Home, Mr. Children won the awards Best Video of the Year and Best Group Video for the single "Shirushi" at the Space Shower Music Video Awards '07. For the album, the group held two promotional tours. The first half called Mr. Children Home Tour 2007, started on May 4 and lasted until June 23. During the tour, a new compilation album titled B-Side was released on May 10, which was also the group's 15th anniversary. The release of a B-side compilation had been suggested by singer Sakurai while working on Home:
Releasing a public statement on their official site at Toy's Factory, both the group and Sakurai felt that the A-side tracks on their singles had started to dictate and overall theme as to who Mr. Children were as a group. They felt a lot of feelings and desires which have shaped them as a group came from these coupling songs, and thus decided to release them as a compilation album.
On May 5, 2007, after the second concert for the first half of the Home tour, drummer Hideya Suzuki injured his hand after accidentally touching a ventilator. He injured his left index finger, which required four stitches and the following two concerts had to be rescheduled. Publicity for the tour reached a high, when they performed in front of a sold-out tour for 15,000 fans at Yokohama Arena on June 7, 2007 and reignited speculation that the Mr.Children phenomenon was alive and well. A second half of the tour to promote 'Home', titled Mr.Children Home Tour 2007 -In the Field- took place from August 4 to September 30. Both tours ended up being a big success for the group, and became the most attended Japan tour in 2007 at 550,000 fans. The main promotional track for the Home album, , was selected to promote the Olympus E-410. During the E Goes to World campaign, the camera manufacturer had customers submit pictures to create a new promotional video for the song.
On July 10, Mr. Children announced a new song on their website titled . While initially a single release date wasn't issued, the group announced a month later it would be released on October 30, 2007. The title track, "Tabidachi no Uta", was used as a theme song for the Japanese movie , and a month later also be used to promote NTT Higashi Nihon. With the release of the single, Mr. Children managed to debut at number 1 for the week and in return obtained their 27th consecutive number 1 single. Similar to Jyūyonsai no Haha before, the movie Koizora deals with the struggles of a young girl, involving betrayal, rape and abortion. The group was scheduled to play at the ap bank fes '07 from July 14 to July 16, but due to a typhoon, the first two days had to be canceled, and only the final day proceeded as planned. With the announcement of the new single, Mr.Children also announced the 'Home' tour 2007 DVD, which was released on November 14, 2007. On December 18, 2007, Oricon announced that Home became their first album to top the yearly album charts since their debut with the sales of 1.18 million copies, surpassing the sales of Kumi Koda's album Black Cherry of 1.02 million copies.
2008
For the beginning of 2008, Sakurai released an album and DVD with his solo project Bank Band, followed a month later by the official announcement of a new song, , used in the NHK Japanese television drama . Afterwards Mr. Children announced the release of two singles. The first, "Gift", released on July 30, 2008, was used as the official theme song to the 2008 Beijing Olympics coverage on NHK. When writing this song, Sakurai focused on the meaning behind the Olympics and wanted to write a song not just for those who win, but for everyone who participates.
The ap bank announced that Mr.Children would appear for all 3 days at ap bank fes '08. Their second single of the year, "Hanabi", released on September 3, 2008, was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Code Blue, in which Tomohisa Yamashita played a main role. The single "Hanabi" topped the Oricon single charts for two weeks, becoming their 29th consecutive number-one single. However, their next single became their first download-only single for the music download market. The nun full-track ringtone downloads (Chaku Uta) of the song began on October 1 and the full-track downloads (Chaku Uta Full) began on November 1, 2008. Their studio album Supermarket Fantasy was released on December 10, 2008. Supermarket Fantasy sold about 708,000 copies in its initial week, debuting at the number-one position on the Oricon weekly album charts.
2009–2011
On October 20, 2009, it was announced that Mr. Children produced their first anime theme "Fanfare" for the movie One Piece Film: Strong World. "Fanfare" was digitally released as a non full-track ringtone song (Chaku Uta) on November 16 as a full-track ringtone song (Chaku Uta Full) on December 2, 2009. The song debuted at the number-one position on the RIAJ Digital Track Chart.
On May 10, 2010, Mr. Children released the DVD Mr. Children Dome Tour 2009 Supermarket Fantasy in Tokyo Dome, but it sold about 49,000 copies one day before the official release day, debuting at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart with the one-day sales. It became their seventh consecutive number-one music DVD and they tied the records of Arashi and KAT-TUN for having the most consecutive number-one DVDs on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart. It also debuted at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly comprehensive DVD chart, eclipsing the sales of Avatar in the week. It topped the Oricon comprehensive DVD charts for three consecutive weeks, making them the second artist to achieve that with the music DVD while the first is Arashi.
On September 4, 2010, Mr. Children released their second documentary/concert movie Mr. Children / Split the Difference (since first "Es" ~Mr. Children in Film~) and released DVD + CD includes the movie and selected songs by the band on November 10, 2010. It debuted at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart and they also became the first artist to have their eighth consecutive number-one music DVD.
On December 1, 2010, Mr. Children released their sixteenth studio album Sense includes digital release only single "Fanfare". But the details such as track list, number of tracks, cover and title of the album were not announced until just before a release date, November 29.
On April 4, 2011, Mr. Children released the download single "Kazoe Uta" to collect donations for the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake. "Kazoe Uta" debuted at number 1 on the RIAJ Digital Track Chart, surpassing the download sales of AKB48's charity single "Dareka no Tame ni (What Can I Do for Someone?)".
2012
On April 18, 2012, Mr. Children released the Triple A-side single "Inori ~Namida no Kidou/End of the Day/pieces", their first in 3 years and 7 months; the single debuted at number 1 on the Oricon Weekly Single Charts, selling 174,409 copies. Two of the songs, "Inori ~Namida no Kidou" and "pieces", were used as the themes to the Bokura ga Ita movies. In addition, "Inori ~Namida no Kidou" spent four weeks atop the RIAJ Digital Track Chart, tying the record set by GReeeeN's "Haruka". Also released on April 18 was the band's "Mr. Children 2011 Tour Sense -in the field-" DVD, which debuted at number 1 on both the Oricon DVD and Blu-ray charts, making Mr. Children the first artist to top three of Oricon's charts in a single week.
On May 10, 2012, Mr. Children released a pair of Best Albums titled Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> and Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro> in celebration of their 20th anniversary. The band also embarked on a 2-month dome tour, titled "POPSAURUS 2012", after the series of concerts they held in 2001 following the release of their first two Best Albums.
On November 28, 2012 Mr.Children released new album titled [(An Imitation) Blood Orange].
At the end of the year, Mr.Children had dominated the yearly album ranking for 2012 with all 3 albums in the top10. Their dual best albums Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro> and Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> monopolized TOP 2 the best selling album of 2012 yearly chart with selling 1.17 million copies sold and 1.11 million copies sold consecutively. Moreover, [(An Imitation) Blood Orange] placed 8th in the best selling album in 2012.
They have both achieved "the best selling album" and " the most Artist total sales Albums " for 2012. Mr.Children became the third artists who achieved TOP 2 spots on the yearly album ranking, and this is the first time in 14 years for any artist to achieve this . Mr.Children was the 4th artist by total sales revenue in Japan in 2012, with ¥9.947 billion (approximately $84 million).
2014
On November 19, 2014 Mr.Children released the single CD "Ashioto ~Be Strong"
2020
On December 2, 2020, Mr.Children released their 20th studio album SOUNDTRACKS.
Photographers
The band has collaborated with photographers such as Osami Yabuta, Reylia Slaby and Alfie Goodrich
Oricon Chart Statistics
Artist's Total sales (CD Total Sales) : 58.61 million copies sold ( #2 most selling artist)
No.1 on Oricon Year-End Charts: 1994 ("innocent world"); 1996 ("Namonaki Uta"), 2007 (HOME), 2012 (Mr.Children Macro 2005-2010)
Double Million Seller Singles: 2nd overall (1st - CHAGE and ASKA)
Million Seller Singles: 3rd overall (1st - B'z, 2nd - AKB48)
Million Seller Albums: 2nd overall (1st - B'z, 3rd - DREAMS COME TRUE)
The most non tie up Single sales : 1.82 million copies sold (by「See Saw Game」)
Won Japan Record Grand Prix in 1994 for "innocent world" and won it again 10 years later for "Sign"
Charitable and other activities
Since their official debut, Mr.Children has engaged in social and charitable causes. As a group they participated in the live concert for Act Against AIDS on December 1, 1994 and again on December 1, 1995. The goal of live was to raise awareness about AIDS. The proceeds from the event were donated to support children living with HIV. The live was followed up by a collaboration Act Against AIDS charity single with fellow Japanese artist Kuwata Keisuke titled ‘Kiseki no hoshi’ and released on January 23, 1995. On April 25, 2001 Kazutoshi Sakurai also participated in the recording of Zero Landmine, a single created to promote awareness of the problem of landmines and promote a ban on landmines. In addition the group has also participated in Kazutoshi Sakura's solo project, AP bank. AP Bank, a nonprofit lending group, carries the goal of tackling environmental problems by financing environmentally friendly projects such as renewable energy, in addition to holding yearly festivals to raise money to fund additional projects. Since its inception in 2005, Mr.Children has been actively participating in the festivals, with an announcement in 2008 that the group will now work more closely with its cause by participating during the entire three-day festival duration in addition to further details to be announced at a later time.
Members Kazutoshi Sakurai and Kenichi Tahara joined together to create Acid Test for the concert ‘Dream Power John Lennon Super live broadcasting’ on October 9, 2001. The live was part of Yoko Ono’s Dream Power and educational platform where artists came together to hold a charity concert to raise money for school construction funds for children in Africa and Asia. The John Lennon song covered by Acid Test during the live, "Mother", was later recorded and released on a tribute album Happy Birthday, John, and released on September 30, 2005.
In addition to social causes, Mr.Children's music has been used as background music for numerous television advertisements, television programs, television drama's, and motion pictures. Examples of the group's commercial tie-ins include "and I love you", "Bokura no Oto", and "Tagatame" for Nissin Cup Noodle no Border commercials, 'Gift' for the 2008 Beijing Olympics on NHK, and "Tabidachi no uta" for the 2007 Japanese movie . As a group, Mr.Children have not endorsed products by physically appearing in television commercials or printed media advertisements. One of the methods used to help promote the group is through Brajackets, a dust jacket for books, which are available at stands in bookstores for free. The Brajacket serve as free advertising for various products from ice cream to movies and musicals. Mr. Children have used this method to promote singles and albums; for example and I Love U (I♥U).
Fan club
The official fan club of Mr. Children is called Father & Mother, the title being derived from their name. The fan club, which started in 1994, was kept relatively secretive at first, as the group has never made any mention of it on their official website. In 2006, for the release of the group's 29th single "Shirushi", the official website was revamped and with it information about the fan club was finally added. Just like before however, the fan club can only be joined by mail and requires an admission fee of 3,500 yen, with yearly re-applications for membership.
Band members
Current members
Kazutoshi Sakurai – lead vocals, guitar, primary songwriter
Kenichi Tahara – guitar, backing vocals
He was born in Fukuoka and is charge of playing guitar in the band. He had joined the baseball team in high school but became interested in the guitar because he saw his classmate playing a guitar at a school festival. One day one of his classmates, Kazutoshi Sakurai brought his guitar to school. They bonded with each other over it and that became the catalyst for forming Mr.Children. Known for being quiet in live concerts, his fans become estatic when he says interacts with them.
Keisuke Nakagawa – bass, backing vocals
Nakagawa was born in Nagasaki. His nickname is "Nakakei". He went to the same junior high school as Kenichi and Hideya where he started playing the bass. He is also famous for being a baseball fan.
Hideya Suzuki – drums, backing vocals, also known as "Jen" and is the leader of Mr. Children
Supporting members
Takeshi Kobayashi – keyboards, producer
Naoto Inti Raymi – guitar, chorus
Takashi "Sunny" Katsuya – keyboards, backing vocals
Shuji Kouguchi – guitar, harmonica
Discography
Albums
* Compilation album.** Live album
Books
Official Books:
[es] Mr.Children in 370 DAYS (April 25, 1995) C0076
Mr.Children Everything 天才・桜井和寿 終わりなき音の冒険 (Mr.Children Everything -Tensai Sakurai Kazutoshi owarinaki oto no bouken-) (December 25, 1996) C0073
Mr.Children詩集「優しい歌」 (Mr.Children song collection -Yasashii Uta-) (December 10, 2001) C0092
Tours
Official Tours:
'92 Everything Tour (September 23, 1992 – November 5, 1992)
Visited 10 cities and held 10 concerts
'92 Your Everything Tour (September 26, 1992 – November 22, 1992)
Visited 11 cities and held 12 concerts
'92–93 Kind of Love Tour (December 7, 1992 – January 25, 1993)
Visited 9 cities and held 9 concerts
'93 Versus Tour (September 23, 1993 – November 5, 1993)
Visited 9 cities and held 9 concerts
Mr. Children '94 tour innocent world (September 18, 1994 – December 18, 1994)
Visited 24 cities and held 27 concerts
Mr.Children '95 Tour Atomic Heart (January 7, 1995 – February 20, 1995)
Visited 10 cities and held 21 concerts
(July 16, 1995 – September 10, 1995)
Visited 11 cities and held 19 concerts
Regress or Progress (August 24, 1996 – March 28, 1997)
Visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts
"Discovery" Tour '99 (February 14, 1999 – July 12, 1999)
Visited 16 cities and held 42 concerts
Mr. Children Concert tour Q (October 15, 2000 – February 24, 2001)
Visited 13 cities and held 35 concerts
Popsaurus Mr. Children (July 15, 2001 – September 25, 2001)
Visited 10 cities and held 15 concerts
Wonderful World on Dec. 21 (December 21, 2002)
A one night live. Originally intended to be a 26 city and 39 concert tour, but was canceled due to Kazutoshi Sakurai's hospitalization
(June 12, 2004 – September 25, 2004)
Stadium Tour, Visited 11 cities and held 21 concerts
Dome tour 2005 "I ♥ U" (November 12, 2005 – December 27, 2005)
Dome Tour, Visited 5 cities and held 10 concerts
Mr. Children & the pillows new big bang tour ~This is Hybrid Innocent~ (September 26, 2006 – October 11, 2006)
Hall tour, Visited 6 cities and held 7 concerts. The tour, a Zepp tour, was a joint effort with fellow rock group the pillows
Mr. Children "Home" Tour 2007 (May 4, 2007 – June 23, 2007)
Arena tour, Visited 7 cities and held 14 concerts
Mr. Children "Home" Tour 2007 -in the field- (August 4, 2007 – September 30, 2007)
Stadium tour, Visited 9 cities and held 14 concerts
" (Feb 14, 2009 – March 31, 2009)
Arena Tour, Visited 17 cities and held 34 concerts
Mr.Children DOME TOUR 2009 ~SUPERMARKET FANTASY~ (November 28, 2009 – December 27, 2009)
Dome tour, Visited 5 cities and held 11 concerts
Mr.Children Tour 2011 SENSE (February 19, 2011 – May 15, 2011)
Arena Tour, Visited 9 cities and held 19 concerts
Mr.Children STADIUM TOUR 2011 SENSE -in the field- (August 20, 2011 – September 25, 2011)
Stadium tour, Visited 6 cities and held 10 concerts
MR.CHILDREN TOUR POPSAURUS 2012 (April 14, 2012 – June 6, 2012)
Dome tour, Visited 6 cities and held 14 concerts
Mr.Children [(an imitation) blood orange] Tour (December 15, 2012 – June 9, 2012)
Dome tour, Visited 20 cities and held 40 concerts
Mr.Children FATHER&MOTHER 21st anniversary Fanclub Tour (September 17, 2014 – October 9, 2014)
Zepp tour, Visited 5 cities and held 5 concerts
Mr.Children TOUR 2015 REFLECTION (March 14, 2015 – June 4, 2015)
Arena Tour, Visited 10 cities and held 20 concerts
Mr.Children Stadium Tour 2015 未完 (July 8, 2015 – September 20, 2015)
Stadium tour, Visited 10 cities and held 16 concerts
Mr.Children Hall tour 2016 "Niji" (April 14, 2016 – May 26, 2016)
Hall Tour, Visited 13 cities and held 13 concerts
Note: It is the first time in 14 years to hold Hall tour since 2002
Awards and Records
See also
Japanese rock
Japan Record Awards
MTV Video Music Awards Japan
List of best-selling music artists in Japan
List of best-selling singles in Japan
Footnotes
a. Early on in the group's career, Takeshi Kobayashi collaborated with Kazutoshi Sakurai on various songs in addition to writing songs himself. For example, "Dance dance dance" on the album Atomic Heart was co-composed by him, and on the album Versus, was both composed and written by him. Over the years, his composing and lyrical work with the group has lessened with the last a-side track co-written by him and Kazutoshi Sakurai being which was released on December 12, 1994 .
References
External links
Official website
Mr. Children at Toy's Factory
Innocent World – Unofficial English translations of Mr. Children news and articles
Mr. Children English Fansite – Unofficial English translations of Mr. Children lyrics, guitar tabs and album reviews
Toy's Factory artists
Japanese pop rock music groups
Musical groups from Tokyo
Musical quartets
Musical groups established in 1988 | false | [
"This is a list of the 1970 PGA Tour Qualifying School graduates.\n\nThe tournament was held in early November at Tucson Country Club in Tucson, Arizona for the first time. There were nine 54-hole district tournaments to determine the final field of 60 players for the final 72-hole qualifying tournament. 18 players earned their tour cards with Bob Barbarossa being medalist. There was a five-for-one playoff for the last card.\n\nThis was the first year that Greg Powers attempted to qualify for the PGA Tour at PGA Tour Qualifying Tournament. He was not successful. Australian player David Graham also attempted to qualify. However, he was not successful either.\n\nSources:\n\nReferences\n\nPGA Tour Qualifying School\nGolf in Arizona\nPGA Tour Qualifying School Graduates\nPGA Tour Qualifying School Graduates",
"This is a list of the Spring 1978 PGA Tour Qualifying School graduates. The top 25 players and ties graduated onto the PGA Tour. There were 150 players in the field.\n\nRegional qualifying for the northeast was held at Grossinger's Country Club in Liberty, New York. The field was 50 players. Mike Zach was medallist at 286 (+2). Overall, 17 players from the northeast regional moved on to final qualifying.\n\nBrothers Bob Byman and Ed Byman qualified for the finals. It was the 3rd attempt for Bob and the 5th attempt for Ed. Both missed qualifying by a shot the previous year. The professional Lance Ten Broeck also qualified for the finals. It was at least his second time at the PGA Tour Qualifying Tournament.\n\nTournament summary \nFinal qualifying was held at University of New Mexico course in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The event was held June 7–10. A number of notable golfers with successful amateur careers attempted to qualify for the tour. They included Bill Sander, the 1976 U.S. Amateur champion, Scott Simpson, the 1976 and 1977 NCAA champion in golf, and John Fought, the 1977 U.S. Amateur champion. After two rounds, 25th place was at 143 strokes. At this point Fought was the only one inside the prospective cut-off point with 142 strokes. Sander was at 146 strokes and Simpson was at 148 strokes. Ultimately from this group, only Sander moved on.\n\nIn his third attempt at PGA Tour Qualifying School, Adam Adams, Jr. successfully made it onto the PGA Tour. He tied for 4th place. In addition, Mike Zach, the medallist from the northeast regional, was also successful, finishing in a tie for 6th place. The Byman brothers also successfully qualified.\n\nList of graduates \n\nSource:\n\nReferences\n\n1978 1\nPGA Tour Qualifying School Graduates\nPGA Tour Qualifying School Graduates"
] |
[
"Mr. Children",
"1995-1997",
"What happened in 1995?",
"In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2.",
"was the tour successful?",
"Two months later the group held an open air tour titled -Hounen Mansaku- Natsu matsuri tour Sora [ku:] (-Hounen Mansaku- Xia Ji ri1995 Kong [ku:])"
] | C_cc47c7df2d994d02b905ef7002dc163a_1 | did they produce any albums? | 3 | Did Mr. Children produce any albums? | Mr. Children | In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2. Mr. Children also became involved in charity work, doing a collaboration song with Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars. The single "Kiseki no hoshi" (Qi Ji noDi Qiu ) was used as the theme song for the Act Against AIDS campaign, was produced by Mr. Children and written by Kuwata. To promote the single and the campaign, they held a one-month tour from April 18 until May 14, entitled Live UFO '95 Rock Opera "Acoustic Revolution with Orchestra" Kiseki no hoshi (Live UFO '95 Rock Opera "Acoustic Revolution with Orchestra" Qi Ji noDi Qiu ), where the group did cover songs of many English speaking artists such as The Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan. During the tour the group was also filming a documentary/concert movie called Es ~Mr. Children in Film~. It was released in theaters on June 6, 1995, preceded by the group's eight single "Es (Theme of Es)" on May 10, to promote the movie. Two months later the group held an open air tour titled -Hounen Mansaku- Natsu matsuri tour Sora [ku:] (-Hounen Mansaku- Xia Ji ri1995 Kong [ku:]) from July 16 to September 10, during which the ninth single, "See-Saw Game (Yukan na Koi no Uta)" (shisogemu ~ Yong Gan naLian noGe ~ ) was released on August 10. On February 6, 1996 Mr. Children's tenth single "Namonaki Uta" (Ming monakiShi ) was released, to promote the Japanese drama Pure (piyua) and also for Daio Paper's Elleair (erieru) commercial. The single went on to become Japan's highest first week selling single of all time (which was later broken by idol group AKB48) and is currently Japan's eighth highest selling drama tie-in single. The success of the single was also a surprise for Sakurai, who admitted to spending very little time writing the song. Two months later, on April 5, 1996 the group's eleventh single "Hana (Memento Mori)" (Hua -Memento-Mori-) was released, followed by their fifth original album Shinkai (Shen Hai ) on June 24 and their twelfth single "Machine Gun o Buppanase (Mr. Children Bootleg)" (mashinganwobutsuFang se -Mr.Children Bootleg-), on August 8. To close the year, the Regress or Progress Tour started and lasted from August 24, 1996 to March 28, 1997. The group visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts. Mr. Children's 13th single, "Everything (It's You)", was released on February 5, 1997, with the title track used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Koi no Bakansu (Lian nobakansu). A month later, on March 5 Bolero, Mr. Children's sixth album was released. Soon after, rumors started of the group disbanding. Sakurai's reply: "The band will dissolve only when we have no more talent and have relationship problems with each other." Yet the group then decided to take some time off. Nakagawa and Suzuki start a side project band called Hayashi Hideo, and joined by Kenji Fujii from My Little Lover and Sawao Yamanaka from The Pillows, went on a club tour. CANNOTANSWER | Mr. Children's 13th single, "Everything (It's You)", was released on February 5, 1997, with the title track used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Koi no Bakansu | , commonly referred to by their contracted nickname , are a Japanese pop rock band formed in 1989. Consisting of Kazutoshi Sakurai, Kenichi Tahara, Keisuke Nakagawa, and Hideya Suzuki, they made their major label debut in 1992. They are one of the best selling artists in Japan and one of the most successful Japanese rock artists, having sold over 75 million records and creating the in the mid-1990s in Japan. They held the record for the highest first week sales of a single in Japan for 15 years, with 1.2 million copies of their 10th single , have 30 consecutive number 1 singles, replaced Glay as the all-male band (with 3 or more members) to have the most number 1 albums on the Oricon charts, and won the Japan Record Award in 1994 for "Innocent World" and in 2004 for "Sign". As of 2012, Mr. Children has published fifteen original studio albums and 34 physical singles, along with five compilations, a live album, and fifteen home video releases.
The band's music is mainly composed and written by lead singer Sakurai, with the exception of the Suzuki-penned songs "Asia" and "#2601" from the albums Atomic Heart and Discovery, and occasional collaborative song writing with producer Takeshi Kobayashi.
In 2012 they celebrated their 20th debut anniversary by releasing dual best album titled Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> and Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro>. Both albums dominated the best-selling album category in the 2012 Oricon yearly chart, selling over 2.5 million copies. Mr.Children has become the third artists who achieved TOP 2 spots on the yearly album ranking, and this is the first time in 14 years for any artist to achieve this. Moreover, [(An Imitation) Blood Orange], an album of new material released in November 2012, debuted No.1 on the Oricon Chart—at the end of the year, all three albums released that year were in the Top 10 best selling albums of 2012.
In 2015, Mr. Children was named No.1 Concert Mobilization Power Ranking based on the overall number of people whom attended their performances during 2015 in Japan, mobilizing 1,119,000 fans (36 concerts).
History
1987–1992
The group's members first met in the year of 1987, when Sakurai, Tahara and Nakagawa were in The Walls, which was originally influenced by the band Echoes. The frontman of Echoes, Jinsei Tsuji, was a political activist, and because of this, The Walls too became a political band. Drummer Hideya Suzuki was not an original member of The Walls. When the original drummer departed, the band recruited Suzuki, who went to the same school as the other members. In late 1988, The Walls disintegrated, while the remaining members formed Mr. Children in early 1989. The name of Mr. Children supposedly came about during a talk in a dinner, in which the group thought the word "children" had a nice ring to it, but because they were no longer children themselves, they decided to add Mr. in front of it. They credit this change as a new way they started to look at the group.
After changing their name and overall sound, Mr. Children auditioned at a music club called La Mama, failing to pass the first time, but passing a second audition to play at the club. After playing in the club, they were asked to try and debut as professionals. Mr. Children sent out five demo tapes; all failed to generate record label interest, and the group took a three-month hiatus in 1991. Hideya Suzuki worked as a receptionist at an economy hotel, while Kazutoshi Sakurai worked with his father who owned a construction company. When they returned, the group created a sixth demo tape and caught the attention of Toy's Factory. The label signed the group and had them play as the opening act for the rock group Jun Sky Walkers. It was also during this time that they were introduced to their long-time friend and producer Takeshi Kobayashi. Kobayashi was already known in the music industry as a music composer for Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars and Kyōko Koizumi.
1992–1994
On May 10, 1992, Mr. Children's debut album, Everything, was released and represented the long journey they took to get to this point. Three months later their first single was released on August 21, 1992. After the release of the single the group held two tours for the album, both held between September 23, 1992 and November 5 of the same year, the '92 Everything Tour comprising ten and the '92 Your Everything Tour consisting of twelve performances. To cap off the year and lead them into the next, Mr. Children released their second album, Kind of Love and their second single on December 1, 1992. "Dakishimetai" was later used as an insert song for the Japanese drama . Shortly after, a new tour called '92–93 Kind of Love Tour started and lasted from December 7, 1992 till January 25, 1993.
In 1993, with the completion of the band's tour they began work on for their third album. The first single of the new year to be released was "Replay", released on July 1, 1993 and used in commercials. On September 9, 1993 their third album Versus was released, but failed to bring the group into the spotlight. They continued on and held a new tour. The '93 Versus Tour was held from September 23 until November 5 and had the band holding nine performances. Shortly after, "Cross Road" was released on November 10, 1993, which was used to promote the Japanese drama . The single was not a hit, but through word of mouth "Cross Road" gained popularity and after 22 weeks sold over a million copies and later, though released in 1993, managed to become the fifteenth best selling single in Oricon's 1994 yearly charts. Sakurai confessed years later as to not liking his works up to this point. According to him:
On June 1, 1994 a new single called "Innocent World" was released and used a promotional song for the soft drink . The single solidified the groups popularity with its sales, managing to sell 1,935,830 copies and becoming the No. 1 selling single in Oricon's 1994 yearly charts. Afterwards work began on their fourth original album Atomic Heart. The album was released on September 1, 1994 and became the band's highest selling album to date. Due to the huge success the band received from the album and "Innocent World" single, the groups popularity built up creating the in Japan.
The band also had Takeshi Kobayashi produce two new tours for them. The first tour, named after the "Innocent World" single was held from September 18 to December 18. The band also released their sixth single "Tomorrow Never Knows" on November 10, 1994 which was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama . The song was written while the group was on tour, was later voted in 2006 as fans No. 1 all-time favorite song on Music Station, and is currently the third highest selling drama tie-in single in Japan. The next single, was released on December 12, 1994, though originally intended to be the B-side of "Tomorrow Never Knows". To end the year, "Innocent World" won the Song of the Year award at the 36th annual Japan Record Awards.
1995–1997
In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2. Mr. Children also became involved in charity work, doing a collaboration song with Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars. The single was used as the theme song for the Act Against AIDS campaign, was produced by Mr. Children and written by Kuwata. To promote the single and the campaign, they held a one-month tour from April 18 until May 14, entitled , where the group did cover songs of many English speaking artists such as The Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan. During the tour the group was also filming a documentary/concert movie called Es ~Mr. Children in Film~. It was released in theaters on June 6, 1995, preceded by the group's eight single "Es (Theme of Es)" on May 10, to promote the movie. Two months later the group held an open air tour titled from July 16 to September 10, during which the ninth single, was released on August 10.
On February 6, 1996 Mr. Children's tenth single was released, to promote the Japanese drama and also for Daio Paper's commercial. The single went on to become Japan's highest first week selling single of all time (which was later broken by idol group AKB48) and is currently Japan's eighth highest selling drama tie-in single. The success of the single was also a surprise for Sakurai, who admitted to spending very little time writing the song. Two months later, on April 5, 1996 the group's eleventh single was released, followed by their fifth original album on June 24 and their twelfth single , on August 8. To close the year, the Regress or Progress Tour started and lasted from August 24, 1996 to March 28, 1997. The group visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts.
Mr. Children's 13th single, "Everything (It's You)", was released on February 5, 1997, with the title track used as the theme song to the Japanese drama . A month later, on March 5 Bolero, Mr. Children's sixth album was released. Soon after, rumors started of the group disbanding. Sakurai's reply: "The band will dissolve only when we have no more talent and have relationship problems with each other." Yet the group then decided to take some time off. Nakagawa and Suzuki start a side project band called Hayashi Hideo, and joined by Kenji Fujii from My Little Lover and Sawao Yamanaka from The Pillows, went on a club tour.
1998–2000
On February 11, 1998, they released their 14th single , theme song to the Japanese drama . The group was still on hiatus during this time and made no live performances to promote the single and did not appear in the music video for the song. Finally on October 21, 1998, Mr. Children officially re-grouped and released their 15th single, with the Japanese drama using it as their theme song. The song remains a public favorite in voting polls, Oricon citing its inspirational lyrics as the reason.
On January 13, 1999, , their 16th single, was released, followed by their seventh album, Discovery, on February 3, 1999. Sakurai compared his approach to the songwriting for the record to surfing:
Eleven days later they began the Discovery Tour '99, from February 14 to July 12, where the group visited 16 cities and held 42 shows. During the tour, Mr. Children released their 17th single "I'll Be" on May 12, which was used in Sea Breeze commercials. Though originally released on the Discovery album, the song was re-released as a single with a lighter beat. The single was not a success and became Mr. Children's lowest selling single since "Cross Road". During the Discovery Tour '99, an idea for a live album was brought up. It was released as a 500,000 copy limited edition on September 8, 1999 and called 1/42 (referring to one of the 42 shows in the tour). Most of the tracks were recorded on June 16, 1999 at the Makomanai ice arena, while the bonus track "Dakishimetai" was recorded at the Okinawa Ginowan-Shi seaside park.
At the beginning of a new century , released on January 13, 2000 became the group's 18th single. While "I'll Be" failed to be a success, "Kuchibue" proved to be a hit selling 724,070 copies. On August 9, 2000, their 19th single "Not Found" was also used as the theme song to the Japanese drama , followed a month later by their 9th original album Q on September 27, 2000. The band went to New York to record this album, where they re-recorded some of their old indie material and for the first time, producer Takeshi Kobayashi performed with the band on a recording. The cover for the album was shot bought Size, Inc. at the Bonneville Salt Flats in the United States. The album was not a favorite amongst fans for various reasons and became their first album since Atomic Heart to not sell over one million copies. ‘Concert tour Q’ started, visiting 13 cities and holding 35 concerts between October 15, 2000 and February 24, 2001.
2001–2003
In 2001, Mr. Children continued their Q tour, followed by dual "Best Of" albums. Titled Mr. Children 1992–1995 and Mr. Children 1996–2000, they were both released on July 11, 2001. Both albums went on to sell a combined total of 4,034,785 copies. According to an interview done with MTV Japan Sakurai stated the best of albums weren't something they had planned on doing yet. During this time, the group was finishing up work for their new upcoming album and had planned to start promoting singles on it. However it was decided that a best of album was needed and so they were released. Four days following the dual album release, the group launched the ‘Popsaurus’ tour, visiting 10 cities and playing 15 shows, lasting from July 15, 2001 all the way through September 25, 2001. A month into the tour their 20th single was released and used to promote the Wonda Canned Coffee by Asahi Soft Drinks. Two months after the Popsaurus tour ended, "Youthful Days" was released. Released on November 7, 2001, it was their 21st single and was an insert song for the Japanese drama Antique Bakery. "Youthful Days" debuted at number-one on Japanese Oricon's Charts in its first week at retail (ahead of Mr. Moonlight (Ai no Big Band) by Morning Musume, from album 4th Ikimashoi!), and It ended up being their best selling single for the year. The b-side for the single, "Drawing", originally had no commercial tie-in, but two years later was used as the theme song to the 2003 Japanese drama , Starring former Shibugakitai member Masahiro Motoki.
Mr. Children released their 22nd single on New Year's Day of 2002 (January 1), which was used as a show song in the Japanese drama Antique Bakery. Four months later their tenth original album It's a Wonderful World was released on May 10, the groups' tenth anniversary. The release of the album on their 10th anniversary was not something that had originally intended. As the group was wrapping up recording, Sakurai asked if the album could be released in the spring time. While the group and their management was trying to think of how to promote an album in the spring time, they came up with releasing the album on their 10th anniversary. A new tour, titled Mr. Children Tour 2002 Dear Wonderful World was set to begin later that year. The previous single "I'll Be" from the Discovery album was selected to be used as an official theme for the 2002 FIFA World Cup, held in Japan and South Korea. On May 24, 2002 Mr. Children attended the first ever MTV Video Music Awards Japan and topped the awards show by winning 'Video of the Year' for the song "Kimi ga suki", the band also nominated in Best Group Category but losing to Backstreet Boys. Two months after the release of the new album, Mr.Children's 23rd single "Any", was released on July 11, 2002 and used to promote NTT DoCoMo Group 10th Anniversary. The group was not able to properly promote the single. As preparations for the new tour were beginning and promotion for the new single were being done, lead singer Sakurai was hospitalized on July 21, 2002, after a blockage in his cerebellum was detected. The Mr. Children Tour 2002 Dear Wonderful World was canceled and all group activities were put on a temporary hiatus. While recovering, Sakurai wrote a song called "Hero", that was inspired by his hospitalization. The song was released as the group's 24th single on December 11, 2002 and was used in NTT DoCoMo Group 10th Anniversary commercial. The first press version of the single included a DVD where, in addition to a Mr. Children 2002 documentary -Hero- that was aired, the singer talked about his hospitalization and inspiration for the song. On November 15, 2002 Mr.Children's website announced the band's return to the stage for a "stew of home pride" with a one night only live, December 21, 2002 the group returned to the stage for a single concert, later released on DVD, titled Wonederful World on Dec. 21.
The group remained quiet for most of 2003. Sakurai helped to launch Artists' Power Bank (AP Bank), a non-profit environmental financial institution, in June. Sakamoto Ryuichi, a well known composer, came up with the initial idea to build a wind-power plant. With the help of Sakurai and music producer Takeshi Kobayashi, their goal later became to invest in environmentally friendly projects, such as renewable energy, and as of 2007, participated in other social issues such as helping the victims of a Chuetsu offshore earthquake in Niigata Prefecture on July 16, 2007. Near the end of the year, Mr. Children re-grouped and released their 25th single . It became their first double a-side single with "Tenohira" receiving no commercial tie-in, and "Kurumi" used to promote . The single was a hit and became Mr.Children's best selling single since 2001's "Youthful Days" single.
2004–2006
In 2004, Sakurai started a solo project titled Bank Band, which became a spin-off of AP Bank. As Bank Band, Sakurai released a first album, titled , which contained covers of two Mr. Children songs, "Hero" and "Yasashii Uta". Mr. Children released their eleventh album on April 4, 2004, titled , which came with a documentary DVD showing the group working and talking about the concept behind the album. To help promote the album, Mr. Children used the song in 'Nissin Cup Noodle – NO Border' commercials and as the 'News 23' theme song. According to Sakurai, is
In the following month, they released their 26th single, "Sign", on May 26, which was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Orange Days and went on to win the Song of the Year award at the 46th annual Japan Record Awards ten years after their win for 'Innocent World'.
Most of the 2005 was spent working on a new album. As a solo act, Kazutoshi Sakurai appeared at Golden Circle vol.7 on February 28, 2005. Finally on June 29, 2005 the group released their 27th single . The single became a monster hit selling 569,000 copies its first week, and ending with 925,632 copies sold. As a quad a-side single, all four songs had a commercial tie in. promoted 'Pocari Sweat', "and I love you" promoted 'Nissin Cup Noodle – NO Border', became the theme song for the Japanese movie 'Fly Daddy Fly', and was used as a promotional song for Fuji TV's educational program 'Kodomo bangumi Ponkikkiizu, Gachagachapon'. Even though it was released as a single, it was classified as an album by the Recording Industry Association of Japan. A month later the group attended Kazutoshi Sakurai's 3-day festival 'ap bank fes’ 05' from July 16, 2005 through July 18, 2005, followed by 'SETSTOCK '05' at Kokuei bihoku kyuuryou park on July 23, 2005 and 'Higher Ground 2005' at Umi no nakamichi kaihinkouen outdoor theater on July 30, 2005. Three months later on September 21, 2005, I Love U (I♥U), Mr.Children’s 12th original album, was released. Two months later Dome Tour 2005 'I Love U' began, running from November 12, 2005 through December 27, 2005 and were only the fourth artist in Japanese history to play at the Osaka, Tokyo, Sapporo, Nagoya and Fukuoka dome's. The tour ended in Tokyo Come where they played to 45,000 fans, bringing the tour total to almost 390,000 fans. By the end of the year the group managed to pass the 45 million mark in sold records.
The first single for 2006, was their 28th single released on July 5, 2006 and used as the promotion song for Toyota's "Tobira wo akeyou" commercial and as the theme song to NTV's 2006 FIFA World Cup broadcasting. Due to the groups involvement with ap bank fes. '06, there were no magazine or radio promotions, and only 3 live performances were done to promote the single. However the commercial tie-in's for the single proved to be a success and "Houkiboshi" was voted No. 3 as the favorite commercial song for 2006 and voted as the favorite winter song heard in the summer. Ten days following the release of 'Houkiboshi', Mr.Children participated in the 3 day festival, ap bank fes '06, where they performed "Hero", "Strange Chameleon", "Owarinaki tabi", and "Hokiboshi". One month later Mr.Children were special guests at The Mujintou fes. 2006 and performed "Mirai", "Innocent world", "Hokorobi", "Sign", "Owarinaki tabi", "Worlds end", and "Houkiboshi". Shortly after Mr.Children announced a joint tour with fellow Japanese rockers the pillows, known as 'Mr.Children & the pillows new big bang tour ~This is Hybrid Innocent~'. The tour was held from September 26, 2006 through October 11, 2006. On November 15, 2006, the group released their 29th single , which was used as the theme song , by NTV, a controversial television drama about underage pregnancy. Kazutoshi Sakurai had begun writing the song in February 2006 and finished writing in March 2006. and shot the promotional video in September 2006. One of the b-sides of single was a re-recording of Mr. Children's 2003 song "Kurumi", used as a theme song in the movie .
2007
On January 24, 2007, the band released their 30th single, , which was used as the theme song for the movie , and while only a limited edition single, brought the group to 26 consecutive No. 1 singles. Shortly after, the 13th original album, Home, was released on March 14, which would become the group's first in almost 13 years to chart at No. 1 for two consecutive weeks. It was also the first Japanese album in 2007 to sell more than a million copies. Work on the record had come to a standstill, during the recording of the song "Houkiboshi", due to a dispute among the group over "Home"'s direction. Producer Kobayashi suggested to make an album that "pays attention to the world with a message".
The album reflected a more personal touch from the group, with talking about the 9/11 attacks at New York City, and , being inspired by Kazutoshi Sakurai father who had been sick. The title of the album, Home, was originally suggested to be titled "Home Made" or "Home Ground", because the group wanted the album to have the meaning that it was made by hand. However, they choose to name it just Home because they felt that by adding another word it would be limiting the idea in mind. Three days after the release of Home, Mr. Children won the awards Best Video of the Year and Best Group Video for the single "Shirushi" at the Space Shower Music Video Awards '07. For the album, the group held two promotional tours. The first half called Mr. Children Home Tour 2007, started on May 4 and lasted until June 23. During the tour, a new compilation album titled B-Side was released on May 10, which was also the group's 15th anniversary. The release of a B-side compilation had been suggested by singer Sakurai while working on Home:
Releasing a public statement on their official site at Toy's Factory, both the group and Sakurai felt that the A-side tracks on their singles had started to dictate and overall theme as to who Mr. Children were as a group. They felt a lot of feelings and desires which have shaped them as a group came from these coupling songs, and thus decided to release them as a compilation album.
On May 5, 2007, after the second concert for the first half of the Home tour, drummer Hideya Suzuki injured his hand after accidentally touching a ventilator. He injured his left index finger, which required four stitches and the following two concerts had to be rescheduled. Publicity for the tour reached a high, when they performed in front of a sold-out tour for 15,000 fans at Yokohama Arena on June 7, 2007 and reignited speculation that the Mr.Children phenomenon was alive and well. A second half of the tour to promote 'Home', titled Mr.Children Home Tour 2007 -In the Field- took place from August 4 to September 30. Both tours ended up being a big success for the group, and became the most attended Japan tour in 2007 at 550,000 fans. The main promotional track for the Home album, , was selected to promote the Olympus E-410. During the E Goes to World campaign, the camera manufacturer had customers submit pictures to create a new promotional video for the song.
On July 10, Mr. Children announced a new song on their website titled . While initially a single release date wasn't issued, the group announced a month later it would be released on October 30, 2007. The title track, "Tabidachi no Uta", was used as a theme song for the Japanese movie , and a month later also be used to promote NTT Higashi Nihon. With the release of the single, Mr. Children managed to debut at number 1 for the week and in return obtained their 27th consecutive number 1 single. Similar to Jyūyonsai no Haha before, the movie Koizora deals with the struggles of a young girl, involving betrayal, rape and abortion. The group was scheduled to play at the ap bank fes '07 from July 14 to July 16, but due to a typhoon, the first two days had to be canceled, and only the final day proceeded as planned. With the announcement of the new single, Mr.Children also announced the 'Home' tour 2007 DVD, which was released on November 14, 2007. On December 18, 2007, Oricon announced that Home became their first album to top the yearly album charts since their debut with the sales of 1.18 million copies, surpassing the sales of Kumi Koda's album Black Cherry of 1.02 million copies.
2008
For the beginning of 2008, Sakurai released an album and DVD with his solo project Bank Band, followed a month later by the official announcement of a new song, , used in the NHK Japanese television drama . Afterwards Mr. Children announced the release of two singles. The first, "Gift", released on July 30, 2008, was used as the official theme song to the 2008 Beijing Olympics coverage on NHK. When writing this song, Sakurai focused on the meaning behind the Olympics and wanted to write a song not just for those who win, but for everyone who participates.
The ap bank announced that Mr.Children would appear for all 3 days at ap bank fes '08. Their second single of the year, "Hanabi", released on September 3, 2008, was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Code Blue, in which Tomohisa Yamashita played a main role. The single "Hanabi" topped the Oricon single charts for two weeks, becoming their 29th consecutive number-one single. However, their next single became their first download-only single for the music download market. The nun full-track ringtone downloads (Chaku Uta) of the song began on October 1 and the full-track downloads (Chaku Uta Full) began on November 1, 2008. Their studio album Supermarket Fantasy was released on December 10, 2008. Supermarket Fantasy sold about 708,000 copies in its initial week, debuting at the number-one position on the Oricon weekly album charts.
2009–2011
On October 20, 2009, it was announced that Mr. Children produced their first anime theme "Fanfare" for the movie One Piece Film: Strong World. "Fanfare" was digitally released as a non full-track ringtone song (Chaku Uta) on November 16 as a full-track ringtone song (Chaku Uta Full) on December 2, 2009. The song debuted at the number-one position on the RIAJ Digital Track Chart.
On May 10, 2010, Mr. Children released the DVD Mr. Children Dome Tour 2009 Supermarket Fantasy in Tokyo Dome, but it sold about 49,000 copies one day before the official release day, debuting at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart with the one-day sales. It became their seventh consecutive number-one music DVD and they tied the records of Arashi and KAT-TUN for having the most consecutive number-one DVDs on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart. It also debuted at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly comprehensive DVD chart, eclipsing the sales of Avatar in the week. It topped the Oricon comprehensive DVD charts for three consecutive weeks, making them the second artist to achieve that with the music DVD while the first is Arashi.
On September 4, 2010, Mr. Children released their second documentary/concert movie Mr. Children / Split the Difference (since first "Es" ~Mr. Children in Film~) and released DVD + CD includes the movie and selected songs by the band on November 10, 2010. It debuted at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart and they also became the first artist to have their eighth consecutive number-one music DVD.
On December 1, 2010, Mr. Children released their sixteenth studio album Sense includes digital release only single "Fanfare". But the details such as track list, number of tracks, cover and title of the album were not announced until just before a release date, November 29.
On April 4, 2011, Mr. Children released the download single "Kazoe Uta" to collect donations for the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake. "Kazoe Uta" debuted at number 1 on the RIAJ Digital Track Chart, surpassing the download sales of AKB48's charity single "Dareka no Tame ni (What Can I Do for Someone?)".
2012
On April 18, 2012, Mr. Children released the Triple A-side single "Inori ~Namida no Kidou/End of the Day/pieces", their first in 3 years and 7 months; the single debuted at number 1 on the Oricon Weekly Single Charts, selling 174,409 copies. Two of the songs, "Inori ~Namida no Kidou" and "pieces", were used as the themes to the Bokura ga Ita movies. In addition, "Inori ~Namida no Kidou" spent four weeks atop the RIAJ Digital Track Chart, tying the record set by GReeeeN's "Haruka". Also released on April 18 was the band's "Mr. Children 2011 Tour Sense -in the field-" DVD, which debuted at number 1 on both the Oricon DVD and Blu-ray charts, making Mr. Children the first artist to top three of Oricon's charts in a single week.
On May 10, 2012, Mr. Children released a pair of Best Albums titled Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> and Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro> in celebration of their 20th anniversary. The band also embarked on a 2-month dome tour, titled "POPSAURUS 2012", after the series of concerts they held in 2001 following the release of their first two Best Albums.
On November 28, 2012 Mr.Children released new album titled [(An Imitation) Blood Orange].
At the end of the year, Mr.Children had dominated the yearly album ranking for 2012 with all 3 albums in the top10. Their dual best albums Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro> and Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> monopolized TOP 2 the best selling album of 2012 yearly chart with selling 1.17 million copies sold and 1.11 million copies sold consecutively. Moreover, [(An Imitation) Blood Orange] placed 8th in the best selling album in 2012.
They have both achieved "the best selling album" and " the most Artist total sales Albums " for 2012. Mr.Children became the third artists who achieved TOP 2 spots on the yearly album ranking, and this is the first time in 14 years for any artist to achieve this . Mr.Children was the 4th artist by total sales revenue in Japan in 2012, with ¥9.947 billion (approximately $84 million).
2014
On November 19, 2014 Mr.Children released the single CD "Ashioto ~Be Strong"
2020
On December 2, 2020, Mr.Children released their 20th studio album SOUNDTRACKS.
Photographers
The band has collaborated with photographers such as Osami Yabuta, Reylia Slaby and Alfie Goodrich
Oricon Chart Statistics
Artist's Total sales (CD Total Sales) : 58.61 million copies sold ( #2 most selling artist)
No.1 on Oricon Year-End Charts: 1994 ("innocent world"); 1996 ("Namonaki Uta"), 2007 (HOME), 2012 (Mr.Children Macro 2005-2010)
Double Million Seller Singles: 2nd overall (1st - CHAGE and ASKA)
Million Seller Singles: 3rd overall (1st - B'z, 2nd - AKB48)
Million Seller Albums: 2nd overall (1st - B'z, 3rd - DREAMS COME TRUE)
The most non tie up Single sales : 1.82 million copies sold (by「See Saw Game」)
Won Japan Record Grand Prix in 1994 for "innocent world" and won it again 10 years later for "Sign"
Charitable and other activities
Since their official debut, Mr.Children has engaged in social and charitable causes. As a group they participated in the live concert for Act Against AIDS on December 1, 1994 and again on December 1, 1995. The goal of live was to raise awareness about AIDS. The proceeds from the event were donated to support children living with HIV. The live was followed up by a collaboration Act Against AIDS charity single with fellow Japanese artist Kuwata Keisuke titled ‘Kiseki no hoshi’ and released on January 23, 1995. On April 25, 2001 Kazutoshi Sakurai also participated in the recording of Zero Landmine, a single created to promote awareness of the problem of landmines and promote a ban on landmines. In addition the group has also participated in Kazutoshi Sakura's solo project, AP bank. AP Bank, a nonprofit lending group, carries the goal of tackling environmental problems by financing environmentally friendly projects such as renewable energy, in addition to holding yearly festivals to raise money to fund additional projects. Since its inception in 2005, Mr.Children has been actively participating in the festivals, with an announcement in 2008 that the group will now work more closely with its cause by participating during the entire three-day festival duration in addition to further details to be announced at a later time.
Members Kazutoshi Sakurai and Kenichi Tahara joined together to create Acid Test for the concert ‘Dream Power John Lennon Super live broadcasting’ on October 9, 2001. The live was part of Yoko Ono’s Dream Power and educational platform where artists came together to hold a charity concert to raise money for school construction funds for children in Africa and Asia. The John Lennon song covered by Acid Test during the live, "Mother", was later recorded and released on a tribute album Happy Birthday, John, and released on September 30, 2005.
In addition to social causes, Mr.Children's music has been used as background music for numerous television advertisements, television programs, television drama's, and motion pictures. Examples of the group's commercial tie-ins include "and I love you", "Bokura no Oto", and "Tagatame" for Nissin Cup Noodle no Border commercials, 'Gift' for the 2008 Beijing Olympics on NHK, and "Tabidachi no uta" for the 2007 Japanese movie . As a group, Mr.Children have not endorsed products by physically appearing in television commercials or printed media advertisements. One of the methods used to help promote the group is through Brajackets, a dust jacket for books, which are available at stands in bookstores for free. The Brajacket serve as free advertising for various products from ice cream to movies and musicals. Mr. Children have used this method to promote singles and albums; for example and I Love U (I♥U).
Fan club
The official fan club of Mr. Children is called Father & Mother, the title being derived from their name. The fan club, which started in 1994, was kept relatively secretive at first, as the group has never made any mention of it on their official website. In 2006, for the release of the group's 29th single "Shirushi", the official website was revamped and with it information about the fan club was finally added. Just like before however, the fan club can only be joined by mail and requires an admission fee of 3,500 yen, with yearly re-applications for membership.
Band members
Current members
Kazutoshi Sakurai – lead vocals, guitar, primary songwriter
Kenichi Tahara – guitar, backing vocals
He was born in Fukuoka and is charge of playing guitar in the band. He had joined the baseball team in high school but became interested in the guitar because he saw his classmate playing a guitar at a school festival. One day one of his classmates, Kazutoshi Sakurai brought his guitar to school. They bonded with each other over it and that became the catalyst for forming Mr.Children. Known for being quiet in live concerts, his fans become estatic when he says interacts with them.
Keisuke Nakagawa – bass, backing vocals
Nakagawa was born in Nagasaki. His nickname is "Nakakei". He went to the same junior high school as Kenichi and Hideya where he started playing the bass. He is also famous for being a baseball fan.
Hideya Suzuki – drums, backing vocals, also known as "Jen" and is the leader of Mr. Children
Supporting members
Takeshi Kobayashi – keyboards, producer
Naoto Inti Raymi – guitar, chorus
Takashi "Sunny" Katsuya – keyboards, backing vocals
Shuji Kouguchi – guitar, harmonica
Discography
Albums
* Compilation album.** Live album
Books
Official Books:
[es] Mr.Children in 370 DAYS (April 25, 1995) C0076
Mr.Children Everything 天才・桜井和寿 終わりなき音の冒険 (Mr.Children Everything -Tensai Sakurai Kazutoshi owarinaki oto no bouken-) (December 25, 1996) C0073
Mr.Children詩集「優しい歌」 (Mr.Children song collection -Yasashii Uta-) (December 10, 2001) C0092
Tours
Official Tours:
'92 Everything Tour (September 23, 1992 – November 5, 1992)
Visited 10 cities and held 10 concerts
'92 Your Everything Tour (September 26, 1992 – November 22, 1992)
Visited 11 cities and held 12 concerts
'92–93 Kind of Love Tour (December 7, 1992 – January 25, 1993)
Visited 9 cities and held 9 concerts
'93 Versus Tour (September 23, 1993 – November 5, 1993)
Visited 9 cities and held 9 concerts
Mr. Children '94 tour innocent world (September 18, 1994 – December 18, 1994)
Visited 24 cities and held 27 concerts
Mr.Children '95 Tour Atomic Heart (January 7, 1995 – February 20, 1995)
Visited 10 cities and held 21 concerts
(July 16, 1995 – September 10, 1995)
Visited 11 cities and held 19 concerts
Regress or Progress (August 24, 1996 – March 28, 1997)
Visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts
"Discovery" Tour '99 (February 14, 1999 – July 12, 1999)
Visited 16 cities and held 42 concerts
Mr. Children Concert tour Q (October 15, 2000 – February 24, 2001)
Visited 13 cities and held 35 concerts
Popsaurus Mr. Children (July 15, 2001 – September 25, 2001)
Visited 10 cities and held 15 concerts
Wonderful World on Dec. 21 (December 21, 2002)
A one night live. Originally intended to be a 26 city and 39 concert tour, but was canceled due to Kazutoshi Sakurai's hospitalization
(June 12, 2004 – September 25, 2004)
Stadium Tour, Visited 11 cities and held 21 concerts
Dome tour 2005 "I ♥ U" (November 12, 2005 – December 27, 2005)
Dome Tour, Visited 5 cities and held 10 concerts
Mr. Children & the pillows new big bang tour ~This is Hybrid Innocent~ (September 26, 2006 – October 11, 2006)
Hall tour, Visited 6 cities and held 7 concerts. The tour, a Zepp tour, was a joint effort with fellow rock group the pillows
Mr. Children "Home" Tour 2007 (May 4, 2007 – June 23, 2007)
Arena tour, Visited 7 cities and held 14 concerts
Mr. Children "Home" Tour 2007 -in the field- (August 4, 2007 – September 30, 2007)
Stadium tour, Visited 9 cities and held 14 concerts
" (Feb 14, 2009 – March 31, 2009)
Arena Tour, Visited 17 cities and held 34 concerts
Mr.Children DOME TOUR 2009 ~SUPERMARKET FANTASY~ (November 28, 2009 – December 27, 2009)
Dome tour, Visited 5 cities and held 11 concerts
Mr.Children Tour 2011 SENSE (February 19, 2011 – May 15, 2011)
Arena Tour, Visited 9 cities and held 19 concerts
Mr.Children STADIUM TOUR 2011 SENSE -in the field- (August 20, 2011 – September 25, 2011)
Stadium tour, Visited 6 cities and held 10 concerts
MR.CHILDREN TOUR POPSAURUS 2012 (April 14, 2012 – June 6, 2012)
Dome tour, Visited 6 cities and held 14 concerts
Mr.Children [(an imitation) blood orange] Tour (December 15, 2012 – June 9, 2012)
Dome tour, Visited 20 cities and held 40 concerts
Mr.Children FATHER&MOTHER 21st anniversary Fanclub Tour (September 17, 2014 – October 9, 2014)
Zepp tour, Visited 5 cities and held 5 concerts
Mr.Children TOUR 2015 REFLECTION (March 14, 2015 – June 4, 2015)
Arena Tour, Visited 10 cities and held 20 concerts
Mr.Children Stadium Tour 2015 未完 (July 8, 2015 – September 20, 2015)
Stadium tour, Visited 10 cities and held 16 concerts
Mr.Children Hall tour 2016 "Niji" (April 14, 2016 – May 26, 2016)
Hall Tour, Visited 13 cities and held 13 concerts
Note: It is the first time in 14 years to hold Hall tour since 2002
Awards and Records
See also
Japanese rock
Japan Record Awards
MTV Video Music Awards Japan
List of best-selling music artists in Japan
List of best-selling singles in Japan
Footnotes
a. Early on in the group's career, Takeshi Kobayashi collaborated with Kazutoshi Sakurai on various songs in addition to writing songs himself. For example, "Dance dance dance" on the album Atomic Heart was co-composed by him, and on the album Versus, was both composed and written by him. Over the years, his composing and lyrical work with the group has lessened with the last a-side track co-written by him and Kazutoshi Sakurai being which was released on December 12, 1994 .
References
External links
Official website
Mr. Children at Toy's Factory
Innocent World – Unofficial English translations of Mr. Children news and articles
Mr. Children English Fansite – Unofficial English translations of Mr. Children lyrics, guitar tabs and album reviews
Toy's Factory artists
Japanese pop rock music groups
Musical groups from Tokyo
Musical quartets
Musical groups established in 1988 | false | [
"Get Into It is the seventh album by rapper/DJ, The Egyptian Lover. The album was released on June 2, 1998 for Egyptian Empire Records and was produced by Egytpian Lover. The album was a mild success and marked the first time since 1988's Filthy that Egyptian Lover made it to the Billboard Charts, making it to #72 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart. The album, however, did not produce any hit singles.\n\nTrack listing\n\"Love Theme\" – 4:16\n\"Got Me Goin' (Crazy)\" – 6:49\n\"\"Me\"\" – 3:32\n\"90's Ladies\" – 3:26\n\"Let's Get It On\" – 3:47\n\"Get Into It\" – 2:42\n\"$\" – 5:09\n\"Tear The Roof Off\" – 4:36\n\"Dance Music\" – 5:13\n\"Jam\" – 4:09\n\nReferences\n\nEgyptian Lover albums\n1990 albums\nAlbums produced by Egyptian Lover",
"Back From the Tomb is the fourth studio album and fifth overall by rapper/DJ, Egyptian Lover. The album was released in 1994 for Egyptian Empire Records and was produced by Egyptian Lover. The album was Egyptian Lover's first since 1988's Filthy, however due to Gangsta rap dominating the charts and air waves, the album was a critical and commercial failure and did not make it on any billboard charts or produce any singles.\n\nTrack listing\n\"I'm So Freaky\" – 4:19\n\"Bounce That Bootie\" – 3:50\n\"I Need a Freak\" – 4:51\n\"Gotta Have Ya\" – 4:24\n\"My Lil Telephone Freak (Dial-A-Freak, Pt. 2)\" – 4:32\n\"Make It Talk to Me Baby\" – 3:35\n\"Work, Freak, Pump That Body\" – 7:52\n\"Yea!\" – 4:39\n\"World of Girls\" – 5:18\n\"Release to the Beat\" – 4:39\n\nReferences \n\nEgyptian Lover albums\n1994 albums\nAlbums produced by Egyptian Lover"
] |
[
"Mr. Children",
"1995-1997",
"What happened in 1995?",
"In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2.",
"was the tour successful?",
"Two months later the group held an open air tour titled -Hounen Mansaku- Natsu matsuri tour Sora [ku:] (-Hounen Mansaku- Xia Ji ri1995 Kong [ku:])",
"did they produce any albums?",
"Mr. Children's 13th single, \"Everything (It's You)\", was released on February 5, 1997, with the title track used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Koi no Bakansu"
] | C_cc47c7df2d994d02b905ef7002dc163a_1 | was it successful? | 4 | Was "Everything (It's You)" by Mr. Children successful? | Mr. Children | In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2. Mr. Children also became involved in charity work, doing a collaboration song with Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars. The single "Kiseki no hoshi" (Qi Ji noDi Qiu ) was used as the theme song for the Act Against AIDS campaign, was produced by Mr. Children and written by Kuwata. To promote the single and the campaign, they held a one-month tour from April 18 until May 14, entitled Live UFO '95 Rock Opera "Acoustic Revolution with Orchestra" Kiseki no hoshi (Live UFO '95 Rock Opera "Acoustic Revolution with Orchestra" Qi Ji noDi Qiu ), where the group did cover songs of many English speaking artists such as The Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan. During the tour the group was also filming a documentary/concert movie called Es ~Mr. Children in Film~. It was released in theaters on June 6, 1995, preceded by the group's eight single "Es (Theme of Es)" on May 10, to promote the movie. Two months later the group held an open air tour titled -Hounen Mansaku- Natsu matsuri tour Sora [ku:] (-Hounen Mansaku- Xia Ji ri1995 Kong [ku:]) from July 16 to September 10, during which the ninth single, "See-Saw Game (Yukan na Koi no Uta)" (shisogemu ~ Yong Gan naLian noGe ~ ) was released on August 10. On February 6, 1996 Mr. Children's tenth single "Namonaki Uta" (Ming monakiShi ) was released, to promote the Japanese drama Pure (piyua) and also for Daio Paper's Elleair (erieru) commercial. The single went on to become Japan's highest first week selling single of all time (which was later broken by idol group AKB48) and is currently Japan's eighth highest selling drama tie-in single. The success of the single was also a surprise for Sakurai, who admitted to spending very little time writing the song. Two months later, on April 5, 1996 the group's eleventh single "Hana (Memento Mori)" (Hua -Memento-Mori-) was released, followed by their fifth original album Shinkai (Shen Hai ) on June 24 and their twelfth single "Machine Gun o Buppanase (Mr. Children Bootleg)" (mashinganwobutsuFang se -Mr.Children Bootleg-), on August 8. To close the year, the Regress or Progress Tour started and lasted from August 24, 1996 to March 28, 1997. The group visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts. Mr. Children's 13th single, "Everything (It's You)", was released on February 5, 1997, with the title track used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Koi no Bakansu (Lian nobakansu). A month later, on March 5 Bolero, Mr. Children's sixth album was released. Soon after, rumors started of the group disbanding. Sakurai's reply: "The band will dissolve only when we have no more talent and have relationship problems with each other." Yet the group then decided to take some time off. Nakagawa and Suzuki start a side project band called Hayashi Hideo, and joined by Kenji Fujii from My Little Lover and Sawao Yamanaka from The Pillows, went on a club tour. CANNOTANSWER | Mr. Children's sixth album was released. Soon after, rumors started of the group disbanding. | , commonly referred to by their contracted nickname , are a Japanese pop rock band formed in 1989. Consisting of Kazutoshi Sakurai, Kenichi Tahara, Keisuke Nakagawa, and Hideya Suzuki, they made their major label debut in 1992. They are one of the best selling artists in Japan and one of the most successful Japanese rock artists, having sold over 75 million records and creating the in the mid-1990s in Japan. They held the record for the highest first week sales of a single in Japan for 15 years, with 1.2 million copies of their 10th single , have 30 consecutive number 1 singles, replaced Glay as the all-male band (with 3 or more members) to have the most number 1 albums on the Oricon charts, and won the Japan Record Award in 1994 for "Innocent World" and in 2004 for "Sign". As of 2012, Mr. Children has published fifteen original studio albums and 34 physical singles, along with five compilations, a live album, and fifteen home video releases.
The band's music is mainly composed and written by lead singer Sakurai, with the exception of the Suzuki-penned songs "Asia" and "#2601" from the albums Atomic Heart and Discovery, and occasional collaborative song writing with producer Takeshi Kobayashi.
In 2012 they celebrated their 20th debut anniversary by releasing dual best album titled Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> and Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro>. Both albums dominated the best-selling album category in the 2012 Oricon yearly chart, selling over 2.5 million copies. Mr.Children has become the third artists who achieved TOP 2 spots on the yearly album ranking, and this is the first time in 14 years for any artist to achieve this. Moreover, [(An Imitation) Blood Orange], an album of new material released in November 2012, debuted No.1 on the Oricon Chart—at the end of the year, all three albums released that year were in the Top 10 best selling albums of 2012.
In 2015, Mr. Children was named No.1 Concert Mobilization Power Ranking based on the overall number of people whom attended their performances during 2015 in Japan, mobilizing 1,119,000 fans (36 concerts).
History
1987–1992
The group's members first met in the year of 1987, when Sakurai, Tahara and Nakagawa were in The Walls, which was originally influenced by the band Echoes. The frontman of Echoes, Jinsei Tsuji, was a political activist, and because of this, The Walls too became a political band. Drummer Hideya Suzuki was not an original member of The Walls. When the original drummer departed, the band recruited Suzuki, who went to the same school as the other members. In late 1988, The Walls disintegrated, while the remaining members formed Mr. Children in early 1989. The name of Mr. Children supposedly came about during a talk in a dinner, in which the group thought the word "children" had a nice ring to it, but because they were no longer children themselves, they decided to add Mr. in front of it. They credit this change as a new way they started to look at the group.
After changing their name and overall sound, Mr. Children auditioned at a music club called La Mama, failing to pass the first time, but passing a second audition to play at the club. After playing in the club, they were asked to try and debut as professionals. Mr. Children sent out five demo tapes; all failed to generate record label interest, and the group took a three-month hiatus in 1991. Hideya Suzuki worked as a receptionist at an economy hotel, while Kazutoshi Sakurai worked with his father who owned a construction company. When they returned, the group created a sixth demo tape and caught the attention of Toy's Factory. The label signed the group and had them play as the opening act for the rock group Jun Sky Walkers. It was also during this time that they were introduced to their long-time friend and producer Takeshi Kobayashi. Kobayashi was already known in the music industry as a music composer for Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars and Kyōko Koizumi.
1992–1994
On May 10, 1992, Mr. Children's debut album, Everything, was released and represented the long journey they took to get to this point. Three months later their first single was released on August 21, 1992. After the release of the single the group held two tours for the album, both held between September 23, 1992 and November 5 of the same year, the '92 Everything Tour comprising ten and the '92 Your Everything Tour consisting of twelve performances. To cap off the year and lead them into the next, Mr. Children released their second album, Kind of Love and their second single on December 1, 1992. "Dakishimetai" was later used as an insert song for the Japanese drama . Shortly after, a new tour called '92–93 Kind of Love Tour started and lasted from December 7, 1992 till January 25, 1993.
In 1993, with the completion of the band's tour they began work on for their third album. The first single of the new year to be released was "Replay", released on July 1, 1993 and used in commercials. On September 9, 1993 their third album Versus was released, but failed to bring the group into the spotlight. They continued on and held a new tour. The '93 Versus Tour was held from September 23 until November 5 and had the band holding nine performances. Shortly after, "Cross Road" was released on November 10, 1993, which was used to promote the Japanese drama . The single was not a hit, but through word of mouth "Cross Road" gained popularity and after 22 weeks sold over a million copies and later, though released in 1993, managed to become the fifteenth best selling single in Oricon's 1994 yearly charts. Sakurai confessed years later as to not liking his works up to this point. According to him:
On June 1, 1994 a new single called "Innocent World" was released and used a promotional song for the soft drink . The single solidified the groups popularity with its sales, managing to sell 1,935,830 copies and becoming the No. 1 selling single in Oricon's 1994 yearly charts. Afterwards work began on their fourth original album Atomic Heart. The album was released on September 1, 1994 and became the band's highest selling album to date. Due to the huge success the band received from the album and "Innocent World" single, the groups popularity built up creating the in Japan.
The band also had Takeshi Kobayashi produce two new tours for them. The first tour, named after the "Innocent World" single was held from September 18 to December 18. The band also released their sixth single "Tomorrow Never Knows" on November 10, 1994 which was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama . The song was written while the group was on tour, was later voted in 2006 as fans No. 1 all-time favorite song on Music Station, and is currently the third highest selling drama tie-in single in Japan. The next single, was released on December 12, 1994, though originally intended to be the B-side of "Tomorrow Never Knows". To end the year, "Innocent World" won the Song of the Year award at the 36th annual Japan Record Awards.
1995–1997
In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2. Mr. Children also became involved in charity work, doing a collaboration song with Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars. The single was used as the theme song for the Act Against AIDS campaign, was produced by Mr. Children and written by Kuwata. To promote the single and the campaign, they held a one-month tour from April 18 until May 14, entitled , where the group did cover songs of many English speaking artists such as The Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan. During the tour the group was also filming a documentary/concert movie called Es ~Mr. Children in Film~. It was released in theaters on June 6, 1995, preceded by the group's eight single "Es (Theme of Es)" on May 10, to promote the movie. Two months later the group held an open air tour titled from July 16 to September 10, during which the ninth single, was released on August 10.
On February 6, 1996 Mr. Children's tenth single was released, to promote the Japanese drama and also for Daio Paper's commercial. The single went on to become Japan's highest first week selling single of all time (which was later broken by idol group AKB48) and is currently Japan's eighth highest selling drama tie-in single. The success of the single was also a surprise for Sakurai, who admitted to spending very little time writing the song. Two months later, on April 5, 1996 the group's eleventh single was released, followed by their fifth original album on June 24 and their twelfth single , on August 8. To close the year, the Regress or Progress Tour started and lasted from August 24, 1996 to March 28, 1997. The group visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts.
Mr. Children's 13th single, "Everything (It's You)", was released on February 5, 1997, with the title track used as the theme song to the Japanese drama . A month later, on March 5 Bolero, Mr. Children's sixth album was released. Soon after, rumors started of the group disbanding. Sakurai's reply: "The band will dissolve only when we have no more talent and have relationship problems with each other." Yet the group then decided to take some time off. Nakagawa and Suzuki start a side project band called Hayashi Hideo, and joined by Kenji Fujii from My Little Lover and Sawao Yamanaka from The Pillows, went on a club tour.
1998–2000
On February 11, 1998, they released their 14th single , theme song to the Japanese drama . The group was still on hiatus during this time and made no live performances to promote the single and did not appear in the music video for the song. Finally on October 21, 1998, Mr. Children officially re-grouped and released their 15th single, with the Japanese drama using it as their theme song. The song remains a public favorite in voting polls, Oricon citing its inspirational lyrics as the reason.
On January 13, 1999, , their 16th single, was released, followed by their seventh album, Discovery, on February 3, 1999. Sakurai compared his approach to the songwriting for the record to surfing:
Eleven days later they began the Discovery Tour '99, from February 14 to July 12, where the group visited 16 cities and held 42 shows. During the tour, Mr. Children released their 17th single "I'll Be" on May 12, which was used in Sea Breeze commercials. Though originally released on the Discovery album, the song was re-released as a single with a lighter beat. The single was not a success and became Mr. Children's lowest selling single since "Cross Road". During the Discovery Tour '99, an idea for a live album was brought up. It was released as a 500,000 copy limited edition on September 8, 1999 and called 1/42 (referring to one of the 42 shows in the tour). Most of the tracks were recorded on June 16, 1999 at the Makomanai ice arena, while the bonus track "Dakishimetai" was recorded at the Okinawa Ginowan-Shi seaside park.
At the beginning of a new century , released on January 13, 2000 became the group's 18th single. While "I'll Be" failed to be a success, "Kuchibue" proved to be a hit selling 724,070 copies. On August 9, 2000, their 19th single "Not Found" was also used as the theme song to the Japanese drama , followed a month later by their 9th original album Q on September 27, 2000. The band went to New York to record this album, where they re-recorded some of their old indie material and for the first time, producer Takeshi Kobayashi performed with the band on a recording. The cover for the album was shot bought Size, Inc. at the Bonneville Salt Flats in the United States. The album was not a favorite amongst fans for various reasons and became their first album since Atomic Heart to not sell over one million copies. ‘Concert tour Q’ started, visiting 13 cities and holding 35 concerts between October 15, 2000 and February 24, 2001.
2001–2003
In 2001, Mr. Children continued their Q tour, followed by dual "Best Of" albums. Titled Mr. Children 1992–1995 and Mr. Children 1996–2000, they were both released on July 11, 2001. Both albums went on to sell a combined total of 4,034,785 copies. According to an interview done with MTV Japan Sakurai stated the best of albums weren't something they had planned on doing yet. During this time, the group was finishing up work for their new upcoming album and had planned to start promoting singles on it. However it was decided that a best of album was needed and so they were released. Four days following the dual album release, the group launched the ‘Popsaurus’ tour, visiting 10 cities and playing 15 shows, lasting from July 15, 2001 all the way through September 25, 2001. A month into the tour their 20th single was released and used to promote the Wonda Canned Coffee by Asahi Soft Drinks. Two months after the Popsaurus tour ended, "Youthful Days" was released. Released on November 7, 2001, it was their 21st single and was an insert song for the Japanese drama Antique Bakery. "Youthful Days" debuted at number-one on Japanese Oricon's Charts in its first week at retail (ahead of Mr. Moonlight (Ai no Big Band) by Morning Musume, from album 4th Ikimashoi!), and It ended up being their best selling single for the year. The b-side for the single, "Drawing", originally had no commercial tie-in, but two years later was used as the theme song to the 2003 Japanese drama , Starring former Shibugakitai member Masahiro Motoki.
Mr. Children released their 22nd single on New Year's Day of 2002 (January 1), which was used as a show song in the Japanese drama Antique Bakery. Four months later their tenth original album It's a Wonderful World was released on May 10, the groups' tenth anniversary. The release of the album on their 10th anniversary was not something that had originally intended. As the group was wrapping up recording, Sakurai asked if the album could be released in the spring time. While the group and their management was trying to think of how to promote an album in the spring time, they came up with releasing the album on their 10th anniversary. A new tour, titled Mr. Children Tour 2002 Dear Wonderful World was set to begin later that year. The previous single "I'll Be" from the Discovery album was selected to be used as an official theme for the 2002 FIFA World Cup, held in Japan and South Korea. On May 24, 2002 Mr. Children attended the first ever MTV Video Music Awards Japan and topped the awards show by winning 'Video of the Year' for the song "Kimi ga suki", the band also nominated in Best Group Category but losing to Backstreet Boys. Two months after the release of the new album, Mr.Children's 23rd single "Any", was released on July 11, 2002 and used to promote NTT DoCoMo Group 10th Anniversary. The group was not able to properly promote the single. As preparations for the new tour were beginning and promotion for the new single were being done, lead singer Sakurai was hospitalized on July 21, 2002, after a blockage in his cerebellum was detected. The Mr. Children Tour 2002 Dear Wonderful World was canceled and all group activities were put on a temporary hiatus. While recovering, Sakurai wrote a song called "Hero", that was inspired by his hospitalization. The song was released as the group's 24th single on December 11, 2002 and was used in NTT DoCoMo Group 10th Anniversary commercial. The first press version of the single included a DVD where, in addition to a Mr. Children 2002 documentary -Hero- that was aired, the singer talked about his hospitalization and inspiration for the song. On November 15, 2002 Mr.Children's website announced the band's return to the stage for a "stew of home pride" with a one night only live, December 21, 2002 the group returned to the stage for a single concert, later released on DVD, titled Wonederful World on Dec. 21.
The group remained quiet for most of 2003. Sakurai helped to launch Artists' Power Bank (AP Bank), a non-profit environmental financial institution, in June. Sakamoto Ryuichi, a well known composer, came up with the initial idea to build a wind-power plant. With the help of Sakurai and music producer Takeshi Kobayashi, their goal later became to invest in environmentally friendly projects, such as renewable energy, and as of 2007, participated in other social issues such as helping the victims of a Chuetsu offshore earthquake in Niigata Prefecture on July 16, 2007. Near the end of the year, Mr. Children re-grouped and released their 25th single . It became their first double a-side single with "Tenohira" receiving no commercial tie-in, and "Kurumi" used to promote . The single was a hit and became Mr.Children's best selling single since 2001's "Youthful Days" single.
2004–2006
In 2004, Sakurai started a solo project titled Bank Band, which became a spin-off of AP Bank. As Bank Band, Sakurai released a first album, titled , which contained covers of two Mr. Children songs, "Hero" and "Yasashii Uta". Mr. Children released their eleventh album on April 4, 2004, titled , which came with a documentary DVD showing the group working and talking about the concept behind the album. To help promote the album, Mr. Children used the song in 'Nissin Cup Noodle – NO Border' commercials and as the 'News 23' theme song. According to Sakurai, is
In the following month, they released their 26th single, "Sign", on May 26, which was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Orange Days and went on to win the Song of the Year award at the 46th annual Japan Record Awards ten years after their win for 'Innocent World'.
Most of the 2005 was spent working on a new album. As a solo act, Kazutoshi Sakurai appeared at Golden Circle vol.7 on February 28, 2005. Finally on June 29, 2005 the group released their 27th single . The single became a monster hit selling 569,000 copies its first week, and ending with 925,632 copies sold. As a quad a-side single, all four songs had a commercial tie in. promoted 'Pocari Sweat', "and I love you" promoted 'Nissin Cup Noodle – NO Border', became the theme song for the Japanese movie 'Fly Daddy Fly', and was used as a promotional song for Fuji TV's educational program 'Kodomo bangumi Ponkikkiizu, Gachagachapon'. Even though it was released as a single, it was classified as an album by the Recording Industry Association of Japan. A month later the group attended Kazutoshi Sakurai's 3-day festival 'ap bank fes’ 05' from July 16, 2005 through July 18, 2005, followed by 'SETSTOCK '05' at Kokuei bihoku kyuuryou park on July 23, 2005 and 'Higher Ground 2005' at Umi no nakamichi kaihinkouen outdoor theater on July 30, 2005. Three months later on September 21, 2005, I Love U (I♥U), Mr.Children’s 12th original album, was released. Two months later Dome Tour 2005 'I Love U' began, running from November 12, 2005 through December 27, 2005 and were only the fourth artist in Japanese history to play at the Osaka, Tokyo, Sapporo, Nagoya and Fukuoka dome's. The tour ended in Tokyo Come where they played to 45,000 fans, bringing the tour total to almost 390,000 fans. By the end of the year the group managed to pass the 45 million mark in sold records.
The first single for 2006, was their 28th single released on July 5, 2006 and used as the promotion song for Toyota's "Tobira wo akeyou" commercial and as the theme song to NTV's 2006 FIFA World Cup broadcasting. Due to the groups involvement with ap bank fes. '06, there were no magazine or radio promotions, and only 3 live performances were done to promote the single. However the commercial tie-in's for the single proved to be a success and "Houkiboshi" was voted No. 3 as the favorite commercial song for 2006 and voted as the favorite winter song heard in the summer. Ten days following the release of 'Houkiboshi', Mr.Children participated in the 3 day festival, ap bank fes '06, where they performed "Hero", "Strange Chameleon", "Owarinaki tabi", and "Hokiboshi". One month later Mr.Children were special guests at The Mujintou fes. 2006 and performed "Mirai", "Innocent world", "Hokorobi", "Sign", "Owarinaki tabi", "Worlds end", and "Houkiboshi". Shortly after Mr.Children announced a joint tour with fellow Japanese rockers the pillows, known as 'Mr.Children & the pillows new big bang tour ~This is Hybrid Innocent~'. The tour was held from September 26, 2006 through October 11, 2006. On November 15, 2006, the group released their 29th single , which was used as the theme song , by NTV, a controversial television drama about underage pregnancy. Kazutoshi Sakurai had begun writing the song in February 2006 and finished writing in March 2006. and shot the promotional video in September 2006. One of the b-sides of single was a re-recording of Mr. Children's 2003 song "Kurumi", used as a theme song in the movie .
2007
On January 24, 2007, the band released their 30th single, , which was used as the theme song for the movie , and while only a limited edition single, brought the group to 26 consecutive No. 1 singles. Shortly after, the 13th original album, Home, was released on March 14, which would become the group's first in almost 13 years to chart at No. 1 for two consecutive weeks. It was also the first Japanese album in 2007 to sell more than a million copies. Work on the record had come to a standstill, during the recording of the song "Houkiboshi", due to a dispute among the group over "Home"'s direction. Producer Kobayashi suggested to make an album that "pays attention to the world with a message".
The album reflected a more personal touch from the group, with talking about the 9/11 attacks at New York City, and , being inspired by Kazutoshi Sakurai father who had been sick. The title of the album, Home, was originally suggested to be titled "Home Made" or "Home Ground", because the group wanted the album to have the meaning that it was made by hand. However, they choose to name it just Home because they felt that by adding another word it would be limiting the idea in mind. Three days after the release of Home, Mr. Children won the awards Best Video of the Year and Best Group Video for the single "Shirushi" at the Space Shower Music Video Awards '07. For the album, the group held two promotional tours. The first half called Mr. Children Home Tour 2007, started on May 4 and lasted until June 23. During the tour, a new compilation album titled B-Side was released on May 10, which was also the group's 15th anniversary. The release of a B-side compilation had been suggested by singer Sakurai while working on Home:
Releasing a public statement on their official site at Toy's Factory, both the group and Sakurai felt that the A-side tracks on their singles had started to dictate and overall theme as to who Mr. Children were as a group. They felt a lot of feelings and desires which have shaped them as a group came from these coupling songs, and thus decided to release them as a compilation album.
On May 5, 2007, after the second concert for the first half of the Home tour, drummer Hideya Suzuki injured his hand after accidentally touching a ventilator. He injured his left index finger, which required four stitches and the following two concerts had to be rescheduled. Publicity for the tour reached a high, when they performed in front of a sold-out tour for 15,000 fans at Yokohama Arena on June 7, 2007 and reignited speculation that the Mr.Children phenomenon was alive and well. A second half of the tour to promote 'Home', titled Mr.Children Home Tour 2007 -In the Field- took place from August 4 to September 30. Both tours ended up being a big success for the group, and became the most attended Japan tour in 2007 at 550,000 fans. The main promotional track for the Home album, , was selected to promote the Olympus E-410. During the E Goes to World campaign, the camera manufacturer had customers submit pictures to create a new promotional video for the song.
On July 10, Mr. Children announced a new song on their website titled . While initially a single release date wasn't issued, the group announced a month later it would be released on October 30, 2007. The title track, "Tabidachi no Uta", was used as a theme song for the Japanese movie , and a month later also be used to promote NTT Higashi Nihon. With the release of the single, Mr. Children managed to debut at number 1 for the week and in return obtained their 27th consecutive number 1 single. Similar to Jyūyonsai no Haha before, the movie Koizora deals with the struggles of a young girl, involving betrayal, rape and abortion. The group was scheduled to play at the ap bank fes '07 from July 14 to July 16, but due to a typhoon, the first two days had to be canceled, and only the final day proceeded as planned. With the announcement of the new single, Mr.Children also announced the 'Home' tour 2007 DVD, which was released on November 14, 2007. On December 18, 2007, Oricon announced that Home became their first album to top the yearly album charts since their debut with the sales of 1.18 million copies, surpassing the sales of Kumi Koda's album Black Cherry of 1.02 million copies.
2008
For the beginning of 2008, Sakurai released an album and DVD with his solo project Bank Band, followed a month later by the official announcement of a new song, , used in the NHK Japanese television drama . Afterwards Mr. Children announced the release of two singles. The first, "Gift", released on July 30, 2008, was used as the official theme song to the 2008 Beijing Olympics coverage on NHK. When writing this song, Sakurai focused on the meaning behind the Olympics and wanted to write a song not just for those who win, but for everyone who participates.
The ap bank announced that Mr.Children would appear for all 3 days at ap bank fes '08. Their second single of the year, "Hanabi", released on September 3, 2008, was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Code Blue, in which Tomohisa Yamashita played a main role. The single "Hanabi" topped the Oricon single charts for two weeks, becoming their 29th consecutive number-one single. However, their next single became their first download-only single for the music download market. The nun full-track ringtone downloads (Chaku Uta) of the song began on October 1 and the full-track downloads (Chaku Uta Full) began on November 1, 2008. Their studio album Supermarket Fantasy was released on December 10, 2008. Supermarket Fantasy sold about 708,000 copies in its initial week, debuting at the number-one position on the Oricon weekly album charts.
2009–2011
On October 20, 2009, it was announced that Mr. Children produced their first anime theme "Fanfare" for the movie One Piece Film: Strong World. "Fanfare" was digitally released as a non full-track ringtone song (Chaku Uta) on November 16 as a full-track ringtone song (Chaku Uta Full) on December 2, 2009. The song debuted at the number-one position on the RIAJ Digital Track Chart.
On May 10, 2010, Mr. Children released the DVD Mr. Children Dome Tour 2009 Supermarket Fantasy in Tokyo Dome, but it sold about 49,000 copies one day before the official release day, debuting at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart with the one-day sales. It became their seventh consecutive number-one music DVD and they tied the records of Arashi and KAT-TUN for having the most consecutive number-one DVDs on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart. It also debuted at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly comprehensive DVD chart, eclipsing the sales of Avatar in the week. It topped the Oricon comprehensive DVD charts for three consecutive weeks, making them the second artist to achieve that with the music DVD while the first is Arashi.
On September 4, 2010, Mr. Children released their second documentary/concert movie Mr. Children / Split the Difference (since first "Es" ~Mr. Children in Film~) and released DVD + CD includes the movie and selected songs by the band on November 10, 2010. It debuted at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart and they also became the first artist to have their eighth consecutive number-one music DVD.
On December 1, 2010, Mr. Children released their sixteenth studio album Sense includes digital release only single "Fanfare". But the details such as track list, number of tracks, cover and title of the album were not announced until just before a release date, November 29.
On April 4, 2011, Mr. Children released the download single "Kazoe Uta" to collect donations for the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake. "Kazoe Uta" debuted at number 1 on the RIAJ Digital Track Chart, surpassing the download sales of AKB48's charity single "Dareka no Tame ni (What Can I Do for Someone?)".
2012
On April 18, 2012, Mr. Children released the Triple A-side single "Inori ~Namida no Kidou/End of the Day/pieces", their first in 3 years and 7 months; the single debuted at number 1 on the Oricon Weekly Single Charts, selling 174,409 copies. Two of the songs, "Inori ~Namida no Kidou" and "pieces", were used as the themes to the Bokura ga Ita movies. In addition, "Inori ~Namida no Kidou" spent four weeks atop the RIAJ Digital Track Chart, tying the record set by GReeeeN's "Haruka". Also released on April 18 was the band's "Mr. Children 2011 Tour Sense -in the field-" DVD, which debuted at number 1 on both the Oricon DVD and Blu-ray charts, making Mr. Children the first artist to top three of Oricon's charts in a single week.
On May 10, 2012, Mr. Children released a pair of Best Albums titled Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> and Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro> in celebration of their 20th anniversary. The band also embarked on a 2-month dome tour, titled "POPSAURUS 2012", after the series of concerts they held in 2001 following the release of their first two Best Albums.
On November 28, 2012 Mr.Children released new album titled [(An Imitation) Blood Orange].
At the end of the year, Mr.Children had dominated the yearly album ranking for 2012 with all 3 albums in the top10. Their dual best albums Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro> and Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> monopolized TOP 2 the best selling album of 2012 yearly chart with selling 1.17 million copies sold and 1.11 million copies sold consecutively. Moreover, [(An Imitation) Blood Orange] placed 8th in the best selling album in 2012.
They have both achieved "the best selling album" and " the most Artist total sales Albums " for 2012. Mr.Children became the third artists who achieved TOP 2 spots on the yearly album ranking, and this is the first time in 14 years for any artist to achieve this . Mr.Children was the 4th artist by total sales revenue in Japan in 2012, with ¥9.947 billion (approximately $84 million).
2014
On November 19, 2014 Mr.Children released the single CD "Ashioto ~Be Strong"
2020
On December 2, 2020, Mr.Children released their 20th studio album SOUNDTRACKS.
Photographers
The band has collaborated with photographers such as Osami Yabuta, Reylia Slaby and Alfie Goodrich
Oricon Chart Statistics
Artist's Total sales (CD Total Sales) : 58.61 million copies sold ( #2 most selling artist)
No.1 on Oricon Year-End Charts: 1994 ("innocent world"); 1996 ("Namonaki Uta"), 2007 (HOME), 2012 (Mr.Children Macro 2005-2010)
Double Million Seller Singles: 2nd overall (1st - CHAGE and ASKA)
Million Seller Singles: 3rd overall (1st - B'z, 2nd - AKB48)
Million Seller Albums: 2nd overall (1st - B'z, 3rd - DREAMS COME TRUE)
The most non tie up Single sales : 1.82 million copies sold (by「See Saw Game」)
Won Japan Record Grand Prix in 1994 for "innocent world" and won it again 10 years later for "Sign"
Charitable and other activities
Since their official debut, Mr.Children has engaged in social and charitable causes. As a group they participated in the live concert for Act Against AIDS on December 1, 1994 and again on December 1, 1995. The goal of live was to raise awareness about AIDS. The proceeds from the event were donated to support children living with HIV. The live was followed up by a collaboration Act Against AIDS charity single with fellow Japanese artist Kuwata Keisuke titled ‘Kiseki no hoshi’ and released on January 23, 1995. On April 25, 2001 Kazutoshi Sakurai also participated in the recording of Zero Landmine, a single created to promote awareness of the problem of landmines and promote a ban on landmines. In addition the group has also participated in Kazutoshi Sakura's solo project, AP bank. AP Bank, a nonprofit lending group, carries the goal of tackling environmental problems by financing environmentally friendly projects such as renewable energy, in addition to holding yearly festivals to raise money to fund additional projects. Since its inception in 2005, Mr.Children has been actively participating in the festivals, with an announcement in 2008 that the group will now work more closely with its cause by participating during the entire three-day festival duration in addition to further details to be announced at a later time.
Members Kazutoshi Sakurai and Kenichi Tahara joined together to create Acid Test for the concert ‘Dream Power John Lennon Super live broadcasting’ on October 9, 2001. The live was part of Yoko Ono’s Dream Power and educational platform where artists came together to hold a charity concert to raise money for school construction funds for children in Africa and Asia. The John Lennon song covered by Acid Test during the live, "Mother", was later recorded and released on a tribute album Happy Birthday, John, and released on September 30, 2005.
In addition to social causes, Mr.Children's music has been used as background music for numerous television advertisements, television programs, television drama's, and motion pictures. Examples of the group's commercial tie-ins include "and I love you", "Bokura no Oto", and "Tagatame" for Nissin Cup Noodle no Border commercials, 'Gift' for the 2008 Beijing Olympics on NHK, and "Tabidachi no uta" for the 2007 Japanese movie . As a group, Mr.Children have not endorsed products by physically appearing in television commercials or printed media advertisements. One of the methods used to help promote the group is through Brajackets, a dust jacket for books, which are available at stands in bookstores for free. The Brajacket serve as free advertising for various products from ice cream to movies and musicals. Mr. Children have used this method to promote singles and albums; for example and I Love U (I♥U).
Fan club
The official fan club of Mr. Children is called Father & Mother, the title being derived from their name. The fan club, which started in 1994, was kept relatively secretive at first, as the group has never made any mention of it on their official website. In 2006, for the release of the group's 29th single "Shirushi", the official website was revamped and with it information about the fan club was finally added. Just like before however, the fan club can only be joined by mail and requires an admission fee of 3,500 yen, with yearly re-applications for membership.
Band members
Current members
Kazutoshi Sakurai – lead vocals, guitar, primary songwriter
Kenichi Tahara – guitar, backing vocals
He was born in Fukuoka and is charge of playing guitar in the band. He had joined the baseball team in high school but became interested in the guitar because he saw his classmate playing a guitar at a school festival. One day one of his classmates, Kazutoshi Sakurai brought his guitar to school. They bonded with each other over it and that became the catalyst for forming Mr.Children. Known for being quiet in live concerts, his fans become estatic when he says interacts with them.
Keisuke Nakagawa – bass, backing vocals
Nakagawa was born in Nagasaki. His nickname is "Nakakei". He went to the same junior high school as Kenichi and Hideya where he started playing the bass. He is also famous for being a baseball fan.
Hideya Suzuki – drums, backing vocals, also known as "Jen" and is the leader of Mr. Children
Supporting members
Takeshi Kobayashi – keyboards, producer
Naoto Inti Raymi – guitar, chorus
Takashi "Sunny" Katsuya – keyboards, backing vocals
Shuji Kouguchi – guitar, harmonica
Discography
Albums
* Compilation album.** Live album
Books
Official Books:
[es] Mr.Children in 370 DAYS (April 25, 1995) C0076
Mr.Children Everything 天才・桜井和寿 終わりなき音の冒険 (Mr.Children Everything -Tensai Sakurai Kazutoshi owarinaki oto no bouken-) (December 25, 1996) C0073
Mr.Children詩集「優しい歌」 (Mr.Children song collection -Yasashii Uta-) (December 10, 2001) C0092
Tours
Official Tours:
'92 Everything Tour (September 23, 1992 – November 5, 1992)
Visited 10 cities and held 10 concerts
'92 Your Everything Tour (September 26, 1992 – November 22, 1992)
Visited 11 cities and held 12 concerts
'92–93 Kind of Love Tour (December 7, 1992 – January 25, 1993)
Visited 9 cities and held 9 concerts
'93 Versus Tour (September 23, 1993 – November 5, 1993)
Visited 9 cities and held 9 concerts
Mr. Children '94 tour innocent world (September 18, 1994 – December 18, 1994)
Visited 24 cities and held 27 concerts
Mr.Children '95 Tour Atomic Heart (January 7, 1995 – February 20, 1995)
Visited 10 cities and held 21 concerts
(July 16, 1995 – September 10, 1995)
Visited 11 cities and held 19 concerts
Regress or Progress (August 24, 1996 – March 28, 1997)
Visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts
"Discovery" Tour '99 (February 14, 1999 – July 12, 1999)
Visited 16 cities and held 42 concerts
Mr. Children Concert tour Q (October 15, 2000 – February 24, 2001)
Visited 13 cities and held 35 concerts
Popsaurus Mr. Children (July 15, 2001 – September 25, 2001)
Visited 10 cities and held 15 concerts
Wonderful World on Dec. 21 (December 21, 2002)
A one night live. Originally intended to be a 26 city and 39 concert tour, but was canceled due to Kazutoshi Sakurai's hospitalization
(June 12, 2004 – September 25, 2004)
Stadium Tour, Visited 11 cities and held 21 concerts
Dome tour 2005 "I ♥ U" (November 12, 2005 – December 27, 2005)
Dome Tour, Visited 5 cities and held 10 concerts
Mr. Children & the pillows new big bang tour ~This is Hybrid Innocent~ (September 26, 2006 – October 11, 2006)
Hall tour, Visited 6 cities and held 7 concerts. The tour, a Zepp tour, was a joint effort with fellow rock group the pillows
Mr. Children "Home" Tour 2007 (May 4, 2007 – June 23, 2007)
Arena tour, Visited 7 cities and held 14 concerts
Mr. Children "Home" Tour 2007 -in the field- (August 4, 2007 – September 30, 2007)
Stadium tour, Visited 9 cities and held 14 concerts
" (Feb 14, 2009 – March 31, 2009)
Arena Tour, Visited 17 cities and held 34 concerts
Mr.Children DOME TOUR 2009 ~SUPERMARKET FANTASY~ (November 28, 2009 – December 27, 2009)
Dome tour, Visited 5 cities and held 11 concerts
Mr.Children Tour 2011 SENSE (February 19, 2011 – May 15, 2011)
Arena Tour, Visited 9 cities and held 19 concerts
Mr.Children STADIUM TOUR 2011 SENSE -in the field- (August 20, 2011 – September 25, 2011)
Stadium tour, Visited 6 cities and held 10 concerts
MR.CHILDREN TOUR POPSAURUS 2012 (April 14, 2012 – June 6, 2012)
Dome tour, Visited 6 cities and held 14 concerts
Mr.Children [(an imitation) blood orange] Tour (December 15, 2012 – June 9, 2012)
Dome tour, Visited 20 cities and held 40 concerts
Mr.Children FATHER&MOTHER 21st anniversary Fanclub Tour (September 17, 2014 – October 9, 2014)
Zepp tour, Visited 5 cities and held 5 concerts
Mr.Children TOUR 2015 REFLECTION (March 14, 2015 – June 4, 2015)
Arena Tour, Visited 10 cities and held 20 concerts
Mr.Children Stadium Tour 2015 未完 (July 8, 2015 – September 20, 2015)
Stadium tour, Visited 10 cities and held 16 concerts
Mr.Children Hall tour 2016 "Niji" (April 14, 2016 – May 26, 2016)
Hall Tour, Visited 13 cities and held 13 concerts
Note: It is the first time in 14 years to hold Hall tour since 2002
Awards and Records
See also
Japanese rock
Japan Record Awards
MTV Video Music Awards Japan
List of best-selling music artists in Japan
List of best-selling singles in Japan
Footnotes
a. Early on in the group's career, Takeshi Kobayashi collaborated with Kazutoshi Sakurai on various songs in addition to writing songs himself. For example, "Dance dance dance" on the album Atomic Heart was co-composed by him, and on the album Versus, was both composed and written by him. Over the years, his composing and lyrical work with the group has lessened with the last a-side track co-written by him and Kazutoshi Sakurai being which was released on December 12, 1994 .
References
External links
Official website
Mr. Children at Toy's Factory
Innocent World – Unofficial English translations of Mr. Children news and articles
Mr. Children English Fansite – Unofficial English translations of Mr. Children lyrics, guitar tabs and album reviews
Toy's Factory artists
Japanese pop rock music groups
Musical groups from Tokyo
Musical quartets
Musical groups established in 1988 | 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"
] |
[
"Mr. Children",
"1995-1997",
"What happened in 1995?",
"In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2.",
"was the tour successful?",
"Two months later the group held an open air tour titled -Hounen Mansaku- Natsu matsuri tour Sora [ku:] (-Hounen Mansaku- Xia Ji ri1995 Kong [ku:])",
"did they produce any albums?",
"Mr. Children's 13th single, \"Everything (It's You)\", was released on February 5, 1997, with the title track used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Koi no Bakansu",
"was it successful?",
"Mr. Children's sixth album was released. Soon after, rumors started of the group disbanding."
] | C_cc47c7df2d994d02b905ef7002dc163a_1 | did they produce anything else? | 5 | Did Mr. Children produce anything else aside from "Everything (It's You)"? | Mr. Children | In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2. Mr. Children also became involved in charity work, doing a collaboration song with Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars. The single "Kiseki no hoshi" (Qi Ji noDi Qiu ) was used as the theme song for the Act Against AIDS campaign, was produced by Mr. Children and written by Kuwata. To promote the single and the campaign, they held a one-month tour from April 18 until May 14, entitled Live UFO '95 Rock Opera "Acoustic Revolution with Orchestra" Kiseki no hoshi (Live UFO '95 Rock Opera "Acoustic Revolution with Orchestra" Qi Ji noDi Qiu ), where the group did cover songs of many English speaking artists such as The Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan. During the tour the group was also filming a documentary/concert movie called Es ~Mr. Children in Film~. It was released in theaters on June 6, 1995, preceded by the group's eight single "Es (Theme of Es)" on May 10, to promote the movie. Two months later the group held an open air tour titled -Hounen Mansaku- Natsu matsuri tour Sora [ku:] (-Hounen Mansaku- Xia Ji ri1995 Kong [ku:]) from July 16 to September 10, during which the ninth single, "See-Saw Game (Yukan na Koi no Uta)" (shisogemu ~ Yong Gan naLian noGe ~ ) was released on August 10. On February 6, 1996 Mr. Children's tenth single "Namonaki Uta" (Ming monakiShi ) was released, to promote the Japanese drama Pure (piyua) and also for Daio Paper's Elleair (erieru) commercial. The single went on to become Japan's highest first week selling single of all time (which was later broken by idol group AKB48) and is currently Japan's eighth highest selling drama tie-in single. The success of the single was also a surprise for Sakurai, who admitted to spending very little time writing the song. Two months later, on April 5, 1996 the group's eleventh single "Hana (Memento Mori)" (Hua -Memento-Mori-) was released, followed by their fifth original album Shinkai (Shen Hai ) on June 24 and their twelfth single "Machine Gun o Buppanase (Mr. Children Bootleg)" (mashinganwobutsuFang se -Mr.Children Bootleg-), on August 8. To close the year, the Regress or Progress Tour started and lasted from August 24, 1996 to March 28, 1997. The group visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts. Mr. Children's 13th single, "Everything (It's You)", was released on February 5, 1997, with the title track used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Koi no Bakansu (Lian nobakansu). A month later, on March 5 Bolero, Mr. Children's sixth album was released. Soon after, rumors started of the group disbanding. Sakurai's reply: "The band will dissolve only when we have no more talent and have relationship problems with each other." Yet the group then decided to take some time off. Nakagawa and Suzuki start a side project band called Hayashi Hideo, and joined by Kenji Fujii from My Little Lover and Sawao Yamanaka from The Pillows, went on a club tour. CANNOTANSWER | On February 6, 1996 Mr. Children's tenth single "Namonaki Uta" (Ming monakiShi ) was released, to promote the Japanese drama Pure ( | , commonly referred to by their contracted nickname , are a Japanese pop rock band formed in 1989. Consisting of Kazutoshi Sakurai, Kenichi Tahara, Keisuke Nakagawa, and Hideya Suzuki, they made their major label debut in 1992. They are one of the best selling artists in Japan and one of the most successful Japanese rock artists, having sold over 75 million records and creating the in the mid-1990s in Japan. They held the record for the highest first week sales of a single in Japan for 15 years, with 1.2 million copies of their 10th single , have 30 consecutive number 1 singles, replaced Glay as the all-male band (with 3 or more members) to have the most number 1 albums on the Oricon charts, and won the Japan Record Award in 1994 for "Innocent World" and in 2004 for "Sign". As of 2012, Mr. Children has published fifteen original studio albums and 34 physical singles, along with five compilations, a live album, and fifteen home video releases.
The band's music is mainly composed and written by lead singer Sakurai, with the exception of the Suzuki-penned songs "Asia" and "#2601" from the albums Atomic Heart and Discovery, and occasional collaborative song writing with producer Takeshi Kobayashi.
In 2012 they celebrated their 20th debut anniversary by releasing dual best album titled Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> and Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro>. Both albums dominated the best-selling album category in the 2012 Oricon yearly chart, selling over 2.5 million copies. Mr.Children has become the third artists who achieved TOP 2 spots on the yearly album ranking, and this is the first time in 14 years for any artist to achieve this. Moreover, [(An Imitation) Blood Orange], an album of new material released in November 2012, debuted No.1 on the Oricon Chart—at the end of the year, all three albums released that year were in the Top 10 best selling albums of 2012.
In 2015, Mr. Children was named No.1 Concert Mobilization Power Ranking based on the overall number of people whom attended their performances during 2015 in Japan, mobilizing 1,119,000 fans (36 concerts).
History
1987–1992
The group's members first met in the year of 1987, when Sakurai, Tahara and Nakagawa were in The Walls, which was originally influenced by the band Echoes. The frontman of Echoes, Jinsei Tsuji, was a political activist, and because of this, The Walls too became a political band. Drummer Hideya Suzuki was not an original member of The Walls. When the original drummer departed, the band recruited Suzuki, who went to the same school as the other members. In late 1988, The Walls disintegrated, while the remaining members formed Mr. Children in early 1989. The name of Mr. Children supposedly came about during a talk in a dinner, in which the group thought the word "children" had a nice ring to it, but because they were no longer children themselves, they decided to add Mr. in front of it. They credit this change as a new way they started to look at the group.
After changing their name and overall sound, Mr. Children auditioned at a music club called La Mama, failing to pass the first time, but passing a second audition to play at the club. After playing in the club, they were asked to try and debut as professionals. Mr. Children sent out five demo tapes; all failed to generate record label interest, and the group took a three-month hiatus in 1991. Hideya Suzuki worked as a receptionist at an economy hotel, while Kazutoshi Sakurai worked with his father who owned a construction company. When they returned, the group created a sixth demo tape and caught the attention of Toy's Factory. The label signed the group and had them play as the opening act for the rock group Jun Sky Walkers. It was also during this time that they were introduced to their long-time friend and producer Takeshi Kobayashi. Kobayashi was already known in the music industry as a music composer for Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars and Kyōko Koizumi.
1992–1994
On May 10, 1992, Mr. Children's debut album, Everything, was released and represented the long journey they took to get to this point. Three months later their first single was released on August 21, 1992. After the release of the single the group held two tours for the album, both held between September 23, 1992 and November 5 of the same year, the '92 Everything Tour comprising ten and the '92 Your Everything Tour consisting of twelve performances. To cap off the year and lead them into the next, Mr. Children released their second album, Kind of Love and their second single on December 1, 1992. "Dakishimetai" was later used as an insert song for the Japanese drama . Shortly after, a new tour called '92–93 Kind of Love Tour started and lasted from December 7, 1992 till January 25, 1993.
In 1993, with the completion of the band's tour they began work on for their third album. The first single of the new year to be released was "Replay", released on July 1, 1993 and used in commercials. On September 9, 1993 their third album Versus was released, but failed to bring the group into the spotlight. They continued on and held a new tour. The '93 Versus Tour was held from September 23 until November 5 and had the band holding nine performances. Shortly after, "Cross Road" was released on November 10, 1993, which was used to promote the Japanese drama . The single was not a hit, but through word of mouth "Cross Road" gained popularity and after 22 weeks sold over a million copies and later, though released in 1993, managed to become the fifteenth best selling single in Oricon's 1994 yearly charts. Sakurai confessed years later as to not liking his works up to this point. According to him:
On June 1, 1994 a new single called "Innocent World" was released and used a promotional song for the soft drink . The single solidified the groups popularity with its sales, managing to sell 1,935,830 copies and becoming the No. 1 selling single in Oricon's 1994 yearly charts. Afterwards work began on their fourth original album Atomic Heart. The album was released on September 1, 1994 and became the band's highest selling album to date. Due to the huge success the band received from the album and "Innocent World" single, the groups popularity built up creating the in Japan.
The band also had Takeshi Kobayashi produce two new tours for them. The first tour, named after the "Innocent World" single was held from September 18 to December 18. The band also released their sixth single "Tomorrow Never Knows" on November 10, 1994 which was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama . The song was written while the group was on tour, was later voted in 2006 as fans No. 1 all-time favorite song on Music Station, and is currently the third highest selling drama tie-in single in Japan. The next single, was released on December 12, 1994, though originally intended to be the B-side of "Tomorrow Never Knows". To end the year, "Innocent World" won the Song of the Year award at the 36th annual Japan Record Awards.
1995–1997
In 1995, the second half of the Atomic Heart tour started, lasting from January 1 to February 2. Mr. Children also became involved in charity work, doing a collaboration song with Keisuke Kuwata of Southern All Stars. The single was used as the theme song for the Act Against AIDS campaign, was produced by Mr. Children and written by Kuwata. To promote the single and the campaign, they held a one-month tour from April 18 until May 14, entitled , where the group did cover songs of many English speaking artists such as The Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan. During the tour the group was also filming a documentary/concert movie called Es ~Mr. Children in Film~. It was released in theaters on June 6, 1995, preceded by the group's eight single "Es (Theme of Es)" on May 10, to promote the movie. Two months later the group held an open air tour titled from July 16 to September 10, during which the ninth single, was released on August 10.
On February 6, 1996 Mr. Children's tenth single was released, to promote the Japanese drama and also for Daio Paper's commercial. The single went on to become Japan's highest first week selling single of all time (which was later broken by idol group AKB48) and is currently Japan's eighth highest selling drama tie-in single. The success of the single was also a surprise for Sakurai, who admitted to spending very little time writing the song. Two months later, on April 5, 1996 the group's eleventh single was released, followed by their fifth original album on June 24 and their twelfth single , on August 8. To close the year, the Regress or Progress Tour started and lasted from August 24, 1996 to March 28, 1997. The group visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts.
Mr. Children's 13th single, "Everything (It's You)", was released on February 5, 1997, with the title track used as the theme song to the Japanese drama . A month later, on March 5 Bolero, Mr. Children's sixth album was released. Soon after, rumors started of the group disbanding. Sakurai's reply: "The band will dissolve only when we have no more talent and have relationship problems with each other." Yet the group then decided to take some time off. Nakagawa and Suzuki start a side project band called Hayashi Hideo, and joined by Kenji Fujii from My Little Lover and Sawao Yamanaka from The Pillows, went on a club tour.
1998–2000
On February 11, 1998, they released their 14th single , theme song to the Japanese drama . The group was still on hiatus during this time and made no live performances to promote the single and did not appear in the music video for the song. Finally on October 21, 1998, Mr. Children officially re-grouped and released their 15th single, with the Japanese drama using it as their theme song. The song remains a public favorite in voting polls, Oricon citing its inspirational lyrics as the reason.
On January 13, 1999, , their 16th single, was released, followed by their seventh album, Discovery, on February 3, 1999. Sakurai compared his approach to the songwriting for the record to surfing:
Eleven days later they began the Discovery Tour '99, from February 14 to July 12, where the group visited 16 cities and held 42 shows. During the tour, Mr. Children released their 17th single "I'll Be" on May 12, which was used in Sea Breeze commercials. Though originally released on the Discovery album, the song was re-released as a single with a lighter beat. The single was not a success and became Mr. Children's lowest selling single since "Cross Road". During the Discovery Tour '99, an idea for a live album was brought up. It was released as a 500,000 copy limited edition on September 8, 1999 and called 1/42 (referring to one of the 42 shows in the tour). Most of the tracks were recorded on June 16, 1999 at the Makomanai ice arena, while the bonus track "Dakishimetai" was recorded at the Okinawa Ginowan-Shi seaside park.
At the beginning of a new century , released on January 13, 2000 became the group's 18th single. While "I'll Be" failed to be a success, "Kuchibue" proved to be a hit selling 724,070 copies. On August 9, 2000, their 19th single "Not Found" was also used as the theme song to the Japanese drama , followed a month later by their 9th original album Q on September 27, 2000. The band went to New York to record this album, where they re-recorded some of their old indie material and for the first time, producer Takeshi Kobayashi performed with the band on a recording. The cover for the album was shot bought Size, Inc. at the Bonneville Salt Flats in the United States. The album was not a favorite amongst fans for various reasons and became their first album since Atomic Heart to not sell over one million copies. ‘Concert tour Q’ started, visiting 13 cities and holding 35 concerts between October 15, 2000 and February 24, 2001.
2001–2003
In 2001, Mr. Children continued their Q tour, followed by dual "Best Of" albums. Titled Mr. Children 1992–1995 and Mr. Children 1996–2000, they were both released on July 11, 2001. Both albums went on to sell a combined total of 4,034,785 copies. According to an interview done with MTV Japan Sakurai stated the best of albums weren't something they had planned on doing yet. During this time, the group was finishing up work for their new upcoming album and had planned to start promoting singles on it. However it was decided that a best of album was needed and so they were released. Four days following the dual album release, the group launched the ‘Popsaurus’ tour, visiting 10 cities and playing 15 shows, lasting from July 15, 2001 all the way through September 25, 2001. A month into the tour their 20th single was released and used to promote the Wonda Canned Coffee by Asahi Soft Drinks. Two months after the Popsaurus tour ended, "Youthful Days" was released. Released on November 7, 2001, it was their 21st single and was an insert song for the Japanese drama Antique Bakery. "Youthful Days" debuted at number-one on Japanese Oricon's Charts in its first week at retail (ahead of Mr. Moonlight (Ai no Big Band) by Morning Musume, from album 4th Ikimashoi!), and It ended up being their best selling single for the year. The b-side for the single, "Drawing", originally had no commercial tie-in, but two years later was used as the theme song to the 2003 Japanese drama , Starring former Shibugakitai member Masahiro Motoki.
Mr. Children released their 22nd single on New Year's Day of 2002 (January 1), which was used as a show song in the Japanese drama Antique Bakery. Four months later their tenth original album It's a Wonderful World was released on May 10, the groups' tenth anniversary. The release of the album on their 10th anniversary was not something that had originally intended. As the group was wrapping up recording, Sakurai asked if the album could be released in the spring time. While the group and their management was trying to think of how to promote an album in the spring time, they came up with releasing the album on their 10th anniversary. A new tour, titled Mr. Children Tour 2002 Dear Wonderful World was set to begin later that year. The previous single "I'll Be" from the Discovery album was selected to be used as an official theme for the 2002 FIFA World Cup, held in Japan and South Korea. On May 24, 2002 Mr. Children attended the first ever MTV Video Music Awards Japan and topped the awards show by winning 'Video of the Year' for the song "Kimi ga suki", the band also nominated in Best Group Category but losing to Backstreet Boys. Two months after the release of the new album, Mr.Children's 23rd single "Any", was released on July 11, 2002 and used to promote NTT DoCoMo Group 10th Anniversary. The group was not able to properly promote the single. As preparations for the new tour were beginning and promotion for the new single were being done, lead singer Sakurai was hospitalized on July 21, 2002, after a blockage in his cerebellum was detected. The Mr. Children Tour 2002 Dear Wonderful World was canceled and all group activities were put on a temporary hiatus. While recovering, Sakurai wrote a song called "Hero", that was inspired by his hospitalization. The song was released as the group's 24th single on December 11, 2002 and was used in NTT DoCoMo Group 10th Anniversary commercial. The first press version of the single included a DVD where, in addition to a Mr. Children 2002 documentary -Hero- that was aired, the singer talked about his hospitalization and inspiration for the song. On November 15, 2002 Mr.Children's website announced the band's return to the stage for a "stew of home pride" with a one night only live, December 21, 2002 the group returned to the stage for a single concert, later released on DVD, titled Wonederful World on Dec. 21.
The group remained quiet for most of 2003. Sakurai helped to launch Artists' Power Bank (AP Bank), a non-profit environmental financial institution, in June. Sakamoto Ryuichi, a well known composer, came up with the initial idea to build a wind-power plant. With the help of Sakurai and music producer Takeshi Kobayashi, their goal later became to invest in environmentally friendly projects, such as renewable energy, and as of 2007, participated in other social issues such as helping the victims of a Chuetsu offshore earthquake in Niigata Prefecture on July 16, 2007. Near the end of the year, Mr. Children re-grouped and released their 25th single . It became their first double a-side single with "Tenohira" receiving no commercial tie-in, and "Kurumi" used to promote . The single was a hit and became Mr.Children's best selling single since 2001's "Youthful Days" single.
2004–2006
In 2004, Sakurai started a solo project titled Bank Band, which became a spin-off of AP Bank. As Bank Band, Sakurai released a first album, titled , which contained covers of two Mr. Children songs, "Hero" and "Yasashii Uta". Mr. Children released their eleventh album on April 4, 2004, titled , which came with a documentary DVD showing the group working and talking about the concept behind the album. To help promote the album, Mr. Children used the song in 'Nissin Cup Noodle – NO Border' commercials and as the 'News 23' theme song. According to Sakurai, is
In the following month, they released their 26th single, "Sign", on May 26, which was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Orange Days and went on to win the Song of the Year award at the 46th annual Japan Record Awards ten years after their win for 'Innocent World'.
Most of the 2005 was spent working on a new album. As a solo act, Kazutoshi Sakurai appeared at Golden Circle vol.7 on February 28, 2005. Finally on June 29, 2005 the group released their 27th single . The single became a monster hit selling 569,000 copies its first week, and ending with 925,632 copies sold. As a quad a-side single, all four songs had a commercial tie in. promoted 'Pocari Sweat', "and I love you" promoted 'Nissin Cup Noodle – NO Border', became the theme song for the Japanese movie 'Fly Daddy Fly', and was used as a promotional song for Fuji TV's educational program 'Kodomo bangumi Ponkikkiizu, Gachagachapon'. Even though it was released as a single, it was classified as an album by the Recording Industry Association of Japan. A month later the group attended Kazutoshi Sakurai's 3-day festival 'ap bank fes’ 05' from July 16, 2005 through July 18, 2005, followed by 'SETSTOCK '05' at Kokuei bihoku kyuuryou park on July 23, 2005 and 'Higher Ground 2005' at Umi no nakamichi kaihinkouen outdoor theater on July 30, 2005. Three months later on September 21, 2005, I Love U (I♥U), Mr.Children’s 12th original album, was released. Two months later Dome Tour 2005 'I Love U' began, running from November 12, 2005 through December 27, 2005 and were only the fourth artist in Japanese history to play at the Osaka, Tokyo, Sapporo, Nagoya and Fukuoka dome's. The tour ended in Tokyo Come where they played to 45,000 fans, bringing the tour total to almost 390,000 fans. By the end of the year the group managed to pass the 45 million mark in sold records.
The first single for 2006, was their 28th single released on July 5, 2006 and used as the promotion song for Toyota's "Tobira wo akeyou" commercial and as the theme song to NTV's 2006 FIFA World Cup broadcasting. Due to the groups involvement with ap bank fes. '06, there were no magazine or radio promotions, and only 3 live performances were done to promote the single. However the commercial tie-in's for the single proved to be a success and "Houkiboshi" was voted No. 3 as the favorite commercial song for 2006 and voted as the favorite winter song heard in the summer. Ten days following the release of 'Houkiboshi', Mr.Children participated in the 3 day festival, ap bank fes '06, where they performed "Hero", "Strange Chameleon", "Owarinaki tabi", and "Hokiboshi". One month later Mr.Children were special guests at The Mujintou fes. 2006 and performed "Mirai", "Innocent world", "Hokorobi", "Sign", "Owarinaki tabi", "Worlds end", and "Houkiboshi". Shortly after Mr.Children announced a joint tour with fellow Japanese rockers the pillows, known as 'Mr.Children & the pillows new big bang tour ~This is Hybrid Innocent~'. The tour was held from September 26, 2006 through October 11, 2006. On November 15, 2006, the group released their 29th single , which was used as the theme song , by NTV, a controversial television drama about underage pregnancy. Kazutoshi Sakurai had begun writing the song in February 2006 and finished writing in March 2006. and shot the promotional video in September 2006. One of the b-sides of single was a re-recording of Mr. Children's 2003 song "Kurumi", used as a theme song in the movie .
2007
On January 24, 2007, the band released their 30th single, , which was used as the theme song for the movie , and while only a limited edition single, brought the group to 26 consecutive No. 1 singles. Shortly after, the 13th original album, Home, was released on March 14, which would become the group's first in almost 13 years to chart at No. 1 for two consecutive weeks. It was also the first Japanese album in 2007 to sell more than a million copies. Work on the record had come to a standstill, during the recording of the song "Houkiboshi", due to a dispute among the group over "Home"'s direction. Producer Kobayashi suggested to make an album that "pays attention to the world with a message".
The album reflected a more personal touch from the group, with talking about the 9/11 attacks at New York City, and , being inspired by Kazutoshi Sakurai father who had been sick. The title of the album, Home, was originally suggested to be titled "Home Made" or "Home Ground", because the group wanted the album to have the meaning that it was made by hand. However, they choose to name it just Home because they felt that by adding another word it would be limiting the idea in mind. Three days after the release of Home, Mr. Children won the awards Best Video of the Year and Best Group Video for the single "Shirushi" at the Space Shower Music Video Awards '07. For the album, the group held two promotional tours. The first half called Mr. Children Home Tour 2007, started on May 4 and lasted until June 23. During the tour, a new compilation album titled B-Side was released on May 10, which was also the group's 15th anniversary. The release of a B-side compilation had been suggested by singer Sakurai while working on Home:
Releasing a public statement on their official site at Toy's Factory, both the group and Sakurai felt that the A-side tracks on their singles had started to dictate and overall theme as to who Mr. Children were as a group. They felt a lot of feelings and desires which have shaped them as a group came from these coupling songs, and thus decided to release them as a compilation album.
On May 5, 2007, after the second concert for the first half of the Home tour, drummer Hideya Suzuki injured his hand after accidentally touching a ventilator. He injured his left index finger, which required four stitches and the following two concerts had to be rescheduled. Publicity for the tour reached a high, when they performed in front of a sold-out tour for 15,000 fans at Yokohama Arena on June 7, 2007 and reignited speculation that the Mr.Children phenomenon was alive and well. A second half of the tour to promote 'Home', titled Mr.Children Home Tour 2007 -In the Field- took place from August 4 to September 30. Both tours ended up being a big success for the group, and became the most attended Japan tour in 2007 at 550,000 fans. The main promotional track for the Home album, , was selected to promote the Olympus E-410. During the E Goes to World campaign, the camera manufacturer had customers submit pictures to create a new promotional video for the song.
On July 10, Mr. Children announced a new song on their website titled . While initially a single release date wasn't issued, the group announced a month later it would be released on October 30, 2007. The title track, "Tabidachi no Uta", was used as a theme song for the Japanese movie , and a month later also be used to promote NTT Higashi Nihon. With the release of the single, Mr. Children managed to debut at number 1 for the week and in return obtained their 27th consecutive number 1 single. Similar to Jyūyonsai no Haha before, the movie Koizora deals with the struggles of a young girl, involving betrayal, rape and abortion. The group was scheduled to play at the ap bank fes '07 from July 14 to July 16, but due to a typhoon, the first two days had to be canceled, and only the final day proceeded as planned. With the announcement of the new single, Mr.Children also announced the 'Home' tour 2007 DVD, which was released on November 14, 2007. On December 18, 2007, Oricon announced that Home became their first album to top the yearly album charts since their debut with the sales of 1.18 million copies, surpassing the sales of Kumi Koda's album Black Cherry of 1.02 million copies.
2008
For the beginning of 2008, Sakurai released an album and DVD with his solo project Bank Band, followed a month later by the official announcement of a new song, , used in the NHK Japanese television drama . Afterwards Mr. Children announced the release of two singles. The first, "Gift", released on July 30, 2008, was used as the official theme song to the 2008 Beijing Olympics coverage on NHK. When writing this song, Sakurai focused on the meaning behind the Olympics and wanted to write a song not just for those who win, but for everyone who participates.
The ap bank announced that Mr.Children would appear for all 3 days at ap bank fes '08. Their second single of the year, "Hanabi", released on September 3, 2008, was used as the theme song to the Japanese drama Code Blue, in which Tomohisa Yamashita played a main role. The single "Hanabi" topped the Oricon single charts for two weeks, becoming their 29th consecutive number-one single. However, their next single became their first download-only single for the music download market. The nun full-track ringtone downloads (Chaku Uta) of the song began on October 1 and the full-track downloads (Chaku Uta Full) began on November 1, 2008. Their studio album Supermarket Fantasy was released on December 10, 2008. Supermarket Fantasy sold about 708,000 copies in its initial week, debuting at the number-one position on the Oricon weekly album charts.
2009–2011
On October 20, 2009, it was announced that Mr. Children produced their first anime theme "Fanfare" for the movie One Piece Film: Strong World. "Fanfare" was digitally released as a non full-track ringtone song (Chaku Uta) on November 16 as a full-track ringtone song (Chaku Uta Full) on December 2, 2009. The song debuted at the number-one position on the RIAJ Digital Track Chart.
On May 10, 2010, Mr. Children released the DVD Mr. Children Dome Tour 2009 Supermarket Fantasy in Tokyo Dome, but it sold about 49,000 copies one day before the official release day, debuting at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart with the one-day sales. It became their seventh consecutive number-one music DVD and they tied the records of Arashi and KAT-TUN for having the most consecutive number-one DVDs on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart. It also debuted at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly comprehensive DVD chart, eclipsing the sales of Avatar in the week. It topped the Oricon comprehensive DVD charts for three consecutive weeks, making them the second artist to achieve that with the music DVD while the first is Arashi.
On September 4, 2010, Mr. Children released their second documentary/concert movie Mr. Children / Split the Difference (since first "Es" ~Mr. Children in Film~) and released DVD + CD includes the movie and selected songs by the band on November 10, 2010. It debuted at No. 1 on the Oricon weekly music DVD chart and they also became the first artist to have their eighth consecutive number-one music DVD.
On December 1, 2010, Mr. Children released their sixteenth studio album Sense includes digital release only single "Fanfare". But the details such as track list, number of tracks, cover and title of the album were not announced until just before a release date, November 29.
On April 4, 2011, Mr. Children released the download single "Kazoe Uta" to collect donations for the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake. "Kazoe Uta" debuted at number 1 on the RIAJ Digital Track Chart, surpassing the download sales of AKB48's charity single "Dareka no Tame ni (What Can I Do for Someone?)".
2012
On April 18, 2012, Mr. Children released the Triple A-side single "Inori ~Namida no Kidou/End of the Day/pieces", their first in 3 years and 7 months; the single debuted at number 1 on the Oricon Weekly Single Charts, selling 174,409 copies. Two of the songs, "Inori ~Namida no Kidou" and "pieces", were used as the themes to the Bokura ga Ita movies. In addition, "Inori ~Namida no Kidou" spent four weeks atop the RIAJ Digital Track Chart, tying the record set by GReeeeN's "Haruka". Also released on April 18 was the band's "Mr. Children 2011 Tour Sense -in the field-" DVD, which debuted at number 1 on both the Oricon DVD and Blu-ray charts, making Mr. Children the first artist to top three of Oricon's charts in a single week.
On May 10, 2012, Mr. Children released a pair of Best Albums titled Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> and Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro> in celebration of their 20th anniversary. The band also embarked on a 2-month dome tour, titled "POPSAURUS 2012", after the series of concerts they held in 2001 following the release of their first two Best Albums.
On November 28, 2012 Mr.Children released new album titled [(An Imitation) Blood Orange].
At the end of the year, Mr.Children had dominated the yearly album ranking for 2012 with all 3 albums in the top10. Their dual best albums Mr. Children 2005–2010 <macro> and Mr. Children 2001–2005 <micro> monopolized TOP 2 the best selling album of 2012 yearly chart with selling 1.17 million copies sold and 1.11 million copies sold consecutively. Moreover, [(An Imitation) Blood Orange] placed 8th in the best selling album in 2012.
They have both achieved "the best selling album" and " the most Artist total sales Albums " for 2012. Mr.Children became the third artists who achieved TOP 2 spots on the yearly album ranking, and this is the first time in 14 years for any artist to achieve this . Mr.Children was the 4th artist by total sales revenue in Japan in 2012, with ¥9.947 billion (approximately $84 million).
2014
On November 19, 2014 Mr.Children released the single CD "Ashioto ~Be Strong"
2020
On December 2, 2020, Mr.Children released their 20th studio album SOUNDTRACKS.
Photographers
The band has collaborated with photographers such as Osami Yabuta, Reylia Slaby and Alfie Goodrich
Oricon Chart Statistics
Artist's Total sales (CD Total Sales) : 58.61 million copies sold ( #2 most selling artist)
No.1 on Oricon Year-End Charts: 1994 ("innocent world"); 1996 ("Namonaki Uta"), 2007 (HOME), 2012 (Mr.Children Macro 2005-2010)
Double Million Seller Singles: 2nd overall (1st - CHAGE and ASKA)
Million Seller Singles: 3rd overall (1st - B'z, 2nd - AKB48)
Million Seller Albums: 2nd overall (1st - B'z, 3rd - DREAMS COME TRUE)
The most non tie up Single sales : 1.82 million copies sold (by「See Saw Game」)
Won Japan Record Grand Prix in 1994 for "innocent world" and won it again 10 years later for "Sign"
Charitable and other activities
Since their official debut, Mr.Children has engaged in social and charitable causes. As a group they participated in the live concert for Act Against AIDS on December 1, 1994 and again on December 1, 1995. The goal of live was to raise awareness about AIDS. The proceeds from the event were donated to support children living with HIV. The live was followed up by a collaboration Act Against AIDS charity single with fellow Japanese artist Kuwata Keisuke titled ‘Kiseki no hoshi’ and released on January 23, 1995. On April 25, 2001 Kazutoshi Sakurai also participated in the recording of Zero Landmine, a single created to promote awareness of the problem of landmines and promote a ban on landmines. In addition the group has also participated in Kazutoshi Sakura's solo project, AP bank. AP Bank, a nonprofit lending group, carries the goal of tackling environmental problems by financing environmentally friendly projects such as renewable energy, in addition to holding yearly festivals to raise money to fund additional projects. Since its inception in 2005, Mr.Children has been actively participating in the festivals, with an announcement in 2008 that the group will now work more closely with its cause by participating during the entire three-day festival duration in addition to further details to be announced at a later time.
Members Kazutoshi Sakurai and Kenichi Tahara joined together to create Acid Test for the concert ‘Dream Power John Lennon Super live broadcasting’ on October 9, 2001. The live was part of Yoko Ono’s Dream Power and educational platform where artists came together to hold a charity concert to raise money for school construction funds for children in Africa and Asia. The John Lennon song covered by Acid Test during the live, "Mother", was later recorded and released on a tribute album Happy Birthday, John, and released on September 30, 2005.
In addition to social causes, Mr.Children's music has been used as background music for numerous television advertisements, television programs, television drama's, and motion pictures. Examples of the group's commercial tie-ins include "and I love you", "Bokura no Oto", and "Tagatame" for Nissin Cup Noodle no Border commercials, 'Gift' for the 2008 Beijing Olympics on NHK, and "Tabidachi no uta" for the 2007 Japanese movie . As a group, Mr.Children have not endorsed products by physically appearing in television commercials or printed media advertisements. One of the methods used to help promote the group is through Brajackets, a dust jacket for books, which are available at stands in bookstores for free. The Brajacket serve as free advertising for various products from ice cream to movies and musicals. Mr. Children have used this method to promote singles and albums; for example and I Love U (I♥U).
Fan club
The official fan club of Mr. Children is called Father & Mother, the title being derived from their name. The fan club, which started in 1994, was kept relatively secretive at first, as the group has never made any mention of it on their official website. In 2006, for the release of the group's 29th single "Shirushi", the official website was revamped and with it information about the fan club was finally added. Just like before however, the fan club can only be joined by mail and requires an admission fee of 3,500 yen, with yearly re-applications for membership.
Band members
Current members
Kazutoshi Sakurai – lead vocals, guitar, primary songwriter
Kenichi Tahara – guitar, backing vocals
He was born in Fukuoka and is charge of playing guitar in the band. He had joined the baseball team in high school but became interested in the guitar because he saw his classmate playing a guitar at a school festival. One day one of his classmates, Kazutoshi Sakurai brought his guitar to school. They bonded with each other over it and that became the catalyst for forming Mr.Children. Known for being quiet in live concerts, his fans become estatic when he says interacts with them.
Keisuke Nakagawa – bass, backing vocals
Nakagawa was born in Nagasaki. His nickname is "Nakakei". He went to the same junior high school as Kenichi and Hideya where he started playing the bass. He is also famous for being a baseball fan.
Hideya Suzuki – drums, backing vocals, also known as "Jen" and is the leader of Mr. Children
Supporting members
Takeshi Kobayashi – keyboards, producer
Naoto Inti Raymi – guitar, chorus
Takashi "Sunny" Katsuya – keyboards, backing vocals
Shuji Kouguchi – guitar, harmonica
Discography
Albums
* Compilation album.** Live album
Books
Official Books:
[es] Mr.Children in 370 DAYS (April 25, 1995) C0076
Mr.Children Everything 天才・桜井和寿 終わりなき音の冒険 (Mr.Children Everything -Tensai Sakurai Kazutoshi owarinaki oto no bouken-) (December 25, 1996) C0073
Mr.Children詩集「優しい歌」 (Mr.Children song collection -Yasashii Uta-) (December 10, 2001) C0092
Tours
Official Tours:
'92 Everything Tour (September 23, 1992 – November 5, 1992)
Visited 10 cities and held 10 concerts
'92 Your Everything Tour (September 26, 1992 – November 22, 1992)
Visited 11 cities and held 12 concerts
'92–93 Kind of Love Tour (December 7, 1992 – January 25, 1993)
Visited 9 cities and held 9 concerts
'93 Versus Tour (September 23, 1993 – November 5, 1993)
Visited 9 cities and held 9 concerts
Mr. Children '94 tour innocent world (September 18, 1994 – December 18, 1994)
Visited 24 cities and held 27 concerts
Mr.Children '95 Tour Atomic Heart (January 7, 1995 – February 20, 1995)
Visited 10 cities and held 21 concerts
(July 16, 1995 – September 10, 1995)
Visited 11 cities and held 19 concerts
Regress or Progress (August 24, 1996 – March 28, 1997)
Visited 14 cities and held 55 concerts
"Discovery" Tour '99 (February 14, 1999 – July 12, 1999)
Visited 16 cities and held 42 concerts
Mr. Children Concert tour Q (October 15, 2000 – February 24, 2001)
Visited 13 cities and held 35 concerts
Popsaurus Mr. Children (July 15, 2001 – September 25, 2001)
Visited 10 cities and held 15 concerts
Wonderful World on Dec. 21 (December 21, 2002)
A one night live. Originally intended to be a 26 city and 39 concert tour, but was canceled due to Kazutoshi Sakurai's hospitalization
(June 12, 2004 – September 25, 2004)
Stadium Tour, Visited 11 cities and held 21 concerts
Dome tour 2005 "I ♥ U" (November 12, 2005 – December 27, 2005)
Dome Tour, Visited 5 cities and held 10 concerts
Mr. Children & the pillows new big bang tour ~This is Hybrid Innocent~ (September 26, 2006 – October 11, 2006)
Hall tour, Visited 6 cities and held 7 concerts. The tour, a Zepp tour, was a joint effort with fellow rock group the pillows
Mr. Children "Home" Tour 2007 (May 4, 2007 – June 23, 2007)
Arena tour, Visited 7 cities and held 14 concerts
Mr. Children "Home" Tour 2007 -in the field- (August 4, 2007 – September 30, 2007)
Stadium tour, Visited 9 cities and held 14 concerts
" (Feb 14, 2009 – March 31, 2009)
Arena Tour, Visited 17 cities and held 34 concerts
Mr.Children DOME TOUR 2009 ~SUPERMARKET FANTASY~ (November 28, 2009 – December 27, 2009)
Dome tour, Visited 5 cities and held 11 concerts
Mr.Children Tour 2011 SENSE (February 19, 2011 – May 15, 2011)
Arena Tour, Visited 9 cities and held 19 concerts
Mr.Children STADIUM TOUR 2011 SENSE -in the field- (August 20, 2011 – September 25, 2011)
Stadium tour, Visited 6 cities and held 10 concerts
MR.CHILDREN TOUR POPSAURUS 2012 (April 14, 2012 – June 6, 2012)
Dome tour, Visited 6 cities and held 14 concerts
Mr.Children [(an imitation) blood orange] Tour (December 15, 2012 – June 9, 2012)
Dome tour, Visited 20 cities and held 40 concerts
Mr.Children FATHER&MOTHER 21st anniversary Fanclub Tour (September 17, 2014 – October 9, 2014)
Zepp tour, Visited 5 cities and held 5 concerts
Mr.Children TOUR 2015 REFLECTION (March 14, 2015 – June 4, 2015)
Arena Tour, Visited 10 cities and held 20 concerts
Mr.Children Stadium Tour 2015 未完 (July 8, 2015 – September 20, 2015)
Stadium tour, Visited 10 cities and held 16 concerts
Mr.Children Hall tour 2016 "Niji" (April 14, 2016 – May 26, 2016)
Hall Tour, Visited 13 cities and held 13 concerts
Note: It is the first time in 14 years to hold Hall tour since 2002
Awards and Records
See also
Japanese rock
Japan Record Awards
MTV Video Music Awards Japan
List of best-selling music artists in Japan
List of best-selling singles in Japan
Footnotes
a. Early on in the group's career, Takeshi Kobayashi collaborated with Kazutoshi Sakurai on various songs in addition to writing songs himself. For example, "Dance dance dance" on the album Atomic Heart was co-composed by him, and on the album Versus, was both composed and written by him. Over the years, his composing and lyrical work with the group has lessened with the last a-side track co-written by him and Kazutoshi Sakurai being which was released on December 12, 1994 .
References
External links
Official website
Mr. Children at Toy's Factory
Innocent World – Unofficial English translations of Mr. Children news and articles
Mr. Children English Fansite – Unofficial English translations of Mr. Children lyrics, guitar tabs and album reviews
Toy's Factory artists
Japanese pop rock music groups
Musical groups from Tokyo
Musical quartets
Musical groups established in 1988 | false | [
"A patent holding company (PHC) exists to hold patents on behalf of one or more other companies but does not necessarily manufacture products or supply services based upon the patents held. \n\nPatent holding companies may exist for tax reasons. Patent holding companies may also operate patent pools in order to provide a single source for licensing a patented technology. However, patent holding companies that aggressively seek to enforce patent rights through litigation or threats of litigation are referred to as patent assertion entities (PAEs) or, more pejoratively, patent trolls.\n\nPatent trolling\n\nOn June 4, 2013, in the United States, the National Economic Council and Council of Economic Advisers released a report entitled Patent Assertion and U.S. Innovation that found significant harm to the economy from patent assertion entities and made recommendations to address them. President Barack Obama also addressed the issue, criticizing companies that did not produce anything themselves and existed only to \"leverage and hijack somebody else's idea and see if they can extort some money out of them\".\n\nSee also \n Patent portfolio\n Patent thicket\n\nReferences\n\nBusiness terms\nPatent monetization companies of the United States\nCriticism of intellectual property\nzh:專利持有公司",
"Say Anything may refer to:\n\nFilm and television\n Say Anything..., a 1989 American film by Cameron Crowe\n \"Say Anything\" (BoJack Horseman), a television episode\n\nMusic\n Say Anything (band), an American rock band\n Say Anything (album), a 2009 album by the band\n \"Say Anything\", a 2012 song by Say Anything from Anarchy, My Dear\n \"Say Anything\" (Marianas Trench song), 2006\n \"Say Anything\" (X Japan song), 1991\n \"Say Anything\", a song by Aimee Mann from Whatever, 1993\n \"Say Anything\", a song by the Bouncing Souls from The Bouncing Souls, 1997\n \"Say Anything\", a song by Good Charlotte from The Young and the Hopeless, 2002\n \"Say Anything\", a song by Girl in Red, 2018\n \"Say Anything\", a song by Will Young from Lexicon, 2019\n \"Say Anything (Else)\", a song by Cartel from Chroma, 2005\n\nOther uses\n Say Anything (party game), a 2008 board game published by North Star Games\n \"Say Anything\", a column in YM magazine\n\nSee also\n Say Something (disambiguation)"
] |
[
"Billy Southworth",
"Early career as a manager"
] | C_6ce4cbb2d5684e1f9efefcec6866478f_0 | What started his career as a manager? | 1 | What started Billy Southworth's career as a manager? | Billy Southworth | Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season. Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for 1929, replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,131 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats. His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place. Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy -- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, and had a daughter. CANNOTANSWER | Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League | William Harold Southworth (March 9, 1893 – November 15, 1969) was an American outfielder and manager in Major League Baseball (MLB). As a player in and and from to for five big-league teams, Southworth took part in almost 1,200 games, fell just short of 1,300 hits and batted .297 lifetime. Southworth managed in and from through . He oversaw three pennant-winning St. Louis Cardinals teams, winning two World Series, and another pennant with the Boston Braves, the last National League title in Boston baseball history. As manager of the Cardinals, his .642 winning percentage is the second-highest in franchise history and the highest since 1900.
Late in life, Southworth served as a scout for the Braves. He endured a great deal of tragedy in his baseball career, first experiencing the stillbirth of his twin babies and the deaths of his wife and his adult son. He died in 1969. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. Six years later, the Cardinals inducted him into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum. He also belongs to the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame. Southworth had a son, Billy Southworth Jr., and a cousin, Bill Southworth, who both played professional baseball.
Early life and playing career
Southworth was born in Harvard, Nebraska, to Orlando and Mariah Southworth and raised in Columbus, Ohio. He had four older brothers who played baseball. Before he was old enough to play with them, Southworth would give his old socks to his brothers so they could create makeshift balls. Southworth decided to play baseball against his father's wishes. Orlando Southworth had wanted his son to attend college. At the age of 19, he signed a contract with the Portsmouth team in the Ohio State League. He joined the Cleveland Indians in 1913, but only appeared in one game, entering as a replacement on defense.
In 1914, Southworth married Lida Brooks. She was a minister's daughter and they had met while Southworth was playing for Portsmouth. The couple's son, William Brooks Southworth, was born during Southworth's early playing career. Billy Southworth Jr. later became a professional baseball player for several seasons. The elder Southworth returned to the Cleveland Indians in 1915 and appeared in 60 games. He played for the Birmingham Barons in 1917 and part of 1918, when he made the Pittsburgh Pirates and played in 64 major league games.
Southworth played more regularly in 1919, appearing in 121 games and leading the league with 14 triples. With the exception of two seasons, Southworth played in at least that many games through 1926. In 1926, Southworth's offensive production increased and he finished the season with a .320 batting average, 16 home runs and 99 RBI. He ran into difficulty with New York manager John McGraw that year, as Southworth's independent style became incompatible with McGraw's strict leadership. He was traded from the New York Giants to the St. Louis Cardinals in the middle of the season. Southworth suffered a 1927 rib injury that limited his playing time. The Cardinals' leadership began to look for a role for Southworth beyond his playing career.
Early career as a manager
Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season.
Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for , replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,192 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats.
His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place.
Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy — the death of his wife Lida at age 42 — began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, with whom he had a daughter.
Return to the Cardinals
In June , he received a second chance with the struggling Cardinals when owner Sam Breadon fired manager Ray Blades and promoted Southworth from Rochester. This time, the Cards flourished under him. With talented players such as Enos Slaughter, Marty Marion, Stan Musial, Walker Cooper, Mort Cooper, Whitey Kurowski and Johnny Beazley being harvested each spring from the club's farm system, the Cardinals entered a Golden Age in their history. Upon Southworth's appointment, they won 69 of 109 games and jumped from seventh to third place in 1940. The following season they won 97 games and finished second.
From 1942 to 1944, the Cardinals won 106, 105 and 105 games, three pennants and two World Series titles. Southworth was the first manager to lead a team to 100 wins in three consecutive seasons. His 1942 Cardinals, who breezed to the World Series championship in five games, were the only team (out of eight) to ever defeat Joe McCarthy's New York Yankees in a Fall Classic. In 1943, both teams met again in the World Series; but this time, the Yankees turned the tables on the Redbirds, winning in five games. The Cards' third successive National League pennant, in , produced another world championship, a six-game triumph over the American League (AL) St. Louis Browns. With it, Southworth had presided over one of the most dominant three-year stretches in National League (NL) history.
However, another personal family tragedy struck when on February 15, 1945, his son, Billy Jr., by then a United States Army Air Forces major, died when his Boeing B-29 Superfortress crashed into Flushing Bay, New York after taking off from Mitchel Field, New York, on a training flight to Florida.
Still, Southworth began managing at the beginning of the season, which saw his Cardinals win 95 games but finished second, three games behind the Chicago Cubs.
Later managerial career
Southworth moved to the Boston Braves in , signing a then-lucrative managing contract for a reported $50,000 per season, and immediately led the Braves into the first division. Talented pitchers Johnny Sain and Warren Spahn had both returned from service in World War II that year.
In , the Braves won their second NL pennant of the 20th century—and Boston's last National League title—but were defeated in six games by the Cleveland Indians in the 1948 World Series. In that World Series, all of the games were close except for one, when the Braves beat pitcher Bob Feller 11–5. Author John Rossi writes that Sain lost some respect for Southworth after the manager said the managing and not talent had won the 1948 pennant. Sain had already become irritated with Southworth after the 1948 signing of unproven "bonus baby" pitcher Johnny Antonelli. Sain and Southworth rarely spoke after 1948.
During the following season, 1949, Boston struggled on the field and was in chaos off the diamond. Southworth was rumored to be drinking heavily and near nervous collapse. Some players complained about his rules and regulations, and some, including starting shortstop Alvin Dark and second baseman Eddie Stanky, were critical of his drinking. Meanwhile, others, like Sain, resented the amount of credit Southworth had received for the 1948 pennant. With Boston at 55–54 on August 16, Southworth turned the Braves over to coach Johnny Cooney for the remainder of . A newspaper account at the time characterized the change as a leave of absence for health reasons. With Cooney, the Braves finished fourth. A finish that high in the standings guaranteed the team shares of the World Series money, but the Braves players voted to only give Southworth a quarter share.
After some of the rebellious players (including Dark and Stanky) had been traded, Southworth returned to his post in and led the Braves to a fourth place finish. On August 29, 1950, Southworth recorded his 1,000th win as manager, leading the Braves to a 4-0 win over Cincinnati. Southworth had managed to convert a team that hadn't finished fourth since 1934 into one that would finish fourth or better for six straight seasons. However, an aging team and declining attendance would bode poorly for both Southworth's career and the Braves' future in New England. In , Southworth's club was only 28–31 on June 19. He called the team's general manager, John Quinn, and asked to be allowed to resign, and he was replaced by his former standout right fielder, Tommy Holmes (he would finish out the season but was fired in the middle of what turned out to be the final season of the Braves in Boston).
Southworth's major league managerial win-loss record was 1,044–704–22. His .597 winning percentage is seventh all-time among managers to McCarthy's .615. Southworth has the least amount of games managed (1,770) for any manager to have won 1,000 games. Southworth was the first to win the World Series as a player and again as a manager.
Southworth remained with the Braves as a scout in the 1950s. He was acquitted of drunken driving charges after a 1955 arrest, and retired from scouting at the end of his contract following the 1956 season. During his scouting days, he signed future all-time home run leader Hank Aaron, who was playing for the Indianapolis Clowns of the Negro leagues.
Managerial career
Later life
For the last couple of decades of his life, Southworth lived outside of Sunbury, Ohio. By the summer of 1969, his health had begun to fail and he was confined to his home. He gave a final interview to a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch; he commented on how difficult it would be for the 1969 Cardinals to win a third straight championship, as the 1944 team had done. Though he had quit smoking many years earlier, Southworth died of emphysema that year in Columbus, Ohio, and was buried in Green Lawn Cemetery.
Southworth's cousin, Bill Southworth, appeared in the major leagues in 1964.
Legacy
Dark recalled that Southworth was a "mild" person who wanted everyone to like him. He preferred to let his players play according to their respective styles, rather than micro-managing their every moves. However, he would give some advice - when going over lineups before a game, he would tell his pitchers to pitch every hitter "High, tight, and low and away." On batting practice, he wanted every hitter to approach it like he was in an actual game, and he would award bench players who performed well with additional playing time.
Southworth was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. He had been eligible for election as a player in the 1940s, but he received few votes. After Southworth had been left off of the ballot as a manager in 2003, author Raymond Mileur had begun a campaign of letter writing, phone calls to the Hall of Fame, radio show comments and advocacy through his website known as "The Birdhouse". Southworth was elected after receiving 13 votes from the 16-member Veterans Committee.
On the occasion of Southworth's election to the Hall of Fame, one of his former players on the 1948 Braves, Clint Conatser, paid tribute to his old manager. "He just had a gut feeling about the right thing to do in a situation", Conatser recalled. "The moves he would make would work for him — all the time, not occasionally. Leo Durocher was the same way. It's like some guys can pick horses out of nowhere. Southworth was a genius like that on the diamond."
In January 2014, the Cardinals announced that Southworth was among 22 former players and personnel to be inducted into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum for the inaugural class of 2014. He is also a member of the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame.
See also
List of St. Louis Cardinals team records
List of Major League Baseball annual triples leaders
List of Major League Baseball player-managers
List of Major League Baseball managers by wins
Notes
References
Skipper, John C. (2013). Billy Southworth: A Biography of the Hall of Fame Manager and Ballplayer. McFarland. .
External links
Billy Southworth at The Deadball Era
Southworth's Cardinals were dominant
Southworth family tribute website
Baseball Hall of Fame – 2008 inductee profile
St. Louis skipper Southworth enshrined in Hall
Baseball Evolution Hall of Fame – Player Profile
1893 births
1969 deaths
Asheville Tourists managers
Asheville Tourists players
Baseball players from Nebraska
Birmingham Barons players
Boston Braves managers
Boston Braves players
Boston Braves scouts
Burials at Green Lawn Cemetery (Columbus, Ohio)
Cleveland Bearcats players
Cleveland Indians players
Cleveland Naps players
Cleveland Spiders players
Columbus Red Birds players
Major League Baseball center fielders
Major League Baseball player-managers
Major League Baseball right fielders
Milwaukee Braves scouts
National Baseball Hall of Fame inductees
New York Giants (NL) coaches
New York Giants (NL) players
People from Clay County, Nebraska
Pittsburgh Pirates players
Portland Beavers players
Portsmouth Cobblers players
Rochester Red Wings managers
Rochester Red Wings players
St. Louis Cardinals managers
St. Louis Cardinals players
Baseball players from Columbus, Ohio
Toledo Mud Hens players
So
People from Sunbury, Ohio
Deaths from emphysema | true | [
"Praveen Kumar is an Indian film producer. Started his career as Production manager with film like Money Money, Gulabi, Anaganaga Oka Roju and Rangeela. And started producing films independently with movies like Kalusukovalani, Bhagyalakshmi Bumper Draw and Pothe Poni in 2006.\n\nCareer\n\n1995 - 2008\nKumar started his career in Telugu film industry as an executive in-charge of production with Rangeela in 1995. Later associated with director RGV for film Money Money as production manager in the same year and also for Krishna Vamshi's film Gulabi.\n\n2009 - Now \nSince 2009, Praveen kumar is Ram Charan's Business manager, who worked with Ram Charan for movies Magadheera, Oragne, Racha, Naayak, Thoofan, Yevadu, Govindudu Andarivadele and now with Bruce Lee - The Fighter he is also Executive producer.\n\nFilmography\n\nAs producer\n\nEarly career\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nLiving people\nFilm producers from Andhra Pradesh\nTelugu film producers\nYear of birth missing (living people)",
"Fabian Boll (born 16 June 1979) is a German football manager and former player who manages SC Victoria Hamburg. During his playing career as a midfielder, he spent almost his entire senior career with FC St. Pauli.\n\nPlaying career\nAs a police officer he was the only one on his St. Pauli team who had a non-football job. He inherited his number 17 from Ivan Klasnić who left St. Pauli for Werder Bremen.\n\nCoaching career\nIn June 2014, Boll started his coaching career, starting as a playing assistant manager for the reserve team of FC St. Pauli. Boll became caretaker manager from the beginning of September 2014 to the end of the month.\n\nIn the summer 2018, Boll was hired as an assistant manager for SC Condor Hamburg. Together with manager, Olufemi Smith, Boll was fired on 11 December 2018.\n\nOn 4 January 2019, Boll was appointed as the new manager of SC Victoria Hamburg with his former teammate from FC St. Pauli, Marius Ebbers, as his assistant.\n\nFor the start of the 2019–20 season Boll was appointed assistant manager of Holstein Kiel.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Fabian Boll at kiezkicker.de \n \n\n1979 births\nLiving people\nGerman police officers\nGerman footballers\nAssociation football midfielders\nBundesliga players\n2. Bundesliga players\nFC Eintracht Norderstedt 03 players\nFC St. Pauli players"
] |
[
"Billy Southworth",
"Early career as a manager",
"What started his career as a manager?",
"Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League"
] | C_6ce4cbb2d5684e1f9efefcec6866478f_0 | Was he a good manager there? | 2 | Was Billy Southworth a good manager for the Rochester Red Wings? | Billy Southworth | Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season. Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for 1929, replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,131 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats. His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place. Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy -- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, and had a daughter. CANNOTANSWER | The team won the IL championship that season. | William Harold Southworth (March 9, 1893 – November 15, 1969) was an American outfielder and manager in Major League Baseball (MLB). As a player in and and from to for five big-league teams, Southworth took part in almost 1,200 games, fell just short of 1,300 hits and batted .297 lifetime. Southworth managed in and from through . He oversaw three pennant-winning St. Louis Cardinals teams, winning two World Series, and another pennant with the Boston Braves, the last National League title in Boston baseball history. As manager of the Cardinals, his .642 winning percentage is the second-highest in franchise history and the highest since 1900.
Late in life, Southworth served as a scout for the Braves. He endured a great deal of tragedy in his baseball career, first experiencing the stillbirth of his twin babies and the deaths of his wife and his adult son. He died in 1969. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. Six years later, the Cardinals inducted him into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum. He also belongs to the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame. Southworth had a son, Billy Southworth Jr., and a cousin, Bill Southworth, who both played professional baseball.
Early life and playing career
Southworth was born in Harvard, Nebraska, to Orlando and Mariah Southworth and raised in Columbus, Ohio. He had four older brothers who played baseball. Before he was old enough to play with them, Southworth would give his old socks to his brothers so they could create makeshift balls. Southworth decided to play baseball against his father's wishes. Orlando Southworth had wanted his son to attend college. At the age of 19, he signed a contract with the Portsmouth team in the Ohio State League. He joined the Cleveland Indians in 1913, but only appeared in one game, entering as a replacement on defense.
In 1914, Southworth married Lida Brooks. She was a minister's daughter and they had met while Southworth was playing for Portsmouth. The couple's son, William Brooks Southworth, was born during Southworth's early playing career. Billy Southworth Jr. later became a professional baseball player for several seasons. The elder Southworth returned to the Cleveland Indians in 1915 and appeared in 60 games. He played for the Birmingham Barons in 1917 and part of 1918, when he made the Pittsburgh Pirates and played in 64 major league games.
Southworth played more regularly in 1919, appearing in 121 games and leading the league with 14 triples. With the exception of two seasons, Southworth played in at least that many games through 1926. In 1926, Southworth's offensive production increased and he finished the season with a .320 batting average, 16 home runs and 99 RBI. He ran into difficulty with New York manager John McGraw that year, as Southworth's independent style became incompatible with McGraw's strict leadership. He was traded from the New York Giants to the St. Louis Cardinals in the middle of the season. Southworth suffered a 1927 rib injury that limited his playing time. The Cardinals' leadership began to look for a role for Southworth beyond his playing career.
Early career as a manager
Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season.
Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for , replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,192 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats.
His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place.
Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy — the death of his wife Lida at age 42 — began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, with whom he had a daughter.
Return to the Cardinals
In June , he received a second chance with the struggling Cardinals when owner Sam Breadon fired manager Ray Blades and promoted Southworth from Rochester. This time, the Cards flourished under him. With talented players such as Enos Slaughter, Marty Marion, Stan Musial, Walker Cooper, Mort Cooper, Whitey Kurowski and Johnny Beazley being harvested each spring from the club's farm system, the Cardinals entered a Golden Age in their history. Upon Southworth's appointment, they won 69 of 109 games and jumped from seventh to third place in 1940. The following season they won 97 games and finished second.
From 1942 to 1944, the Cardinals won 106, 105 and 105 games, three pennants and two World Series titles. Southworth was the first manager to lead a team to 100 wins in three consecutive seasons. His 1942 Cardinals, who breezed to the World Series championship in five games, were the only team (out of eight) to ever defeat Joe McCarthy's New York Yankees in a Fall Classic. In 1943, both teams met again in the World Series; but this time, the Yankees turned the tables on the Redbirds, winning in five games. The Cards' third successive National League pennant, in , produced another world championship, a six-game triumph over the American League (AL) St. Louis Browns. With it, Southworth had presided over one of the most dominant three-year stretches in National League (NL) history.
However, another personal family tragedy struck when on February 15, 1945, his son, Billy Jr., by then a United States Army Air Forces major, died when his Boeing B-29 Superfortress crashed into Flushing Bay, New York after taking off from Mitchel Field, New York, on a training flight to Florida.
Still, Southworth began managing at the beginning of the season, which saw his Cardinals win 95 games but finished second, three games behind the Chicago Cubs.
Later managerial career
Southworth moved to the Boston Braves in , signing a then-lucrative managing contract for a reported $50,000 per season, and immediately led the Braves into the first division. Talented pitchers Johnny Sain and Warren Spahn had both returned from service in World War II that year.
In , the Braves won their second NL pennant of the 20th century—and Boston's last National League title—but were defeated in six games by the Cleveland Indians in the 1948 World Series. In that World Series, all of the games were close except for one, when the Braves beat pitcher Bob Feller 11–5. Author John Rossi writes that Sain lost some respect for Southworth after the manager said the managing and not talent had won the 1948 pennant. Sain had already become irritated with Southworth after the 1948 signing of unproven "bonus baby" pitcher Johnny Antonelli. Sain and Southworth rarely spoke after 1948.
During the following season, 1949, Boston struggled on the field and was in chaos off the diamond. Southworth was rumored to be drinking heavily and near nervous collapse. Some players complained about his rules and regulations, and some, including starting shortstop Alvin Dark and second baseman Eddie Stanky, were critical of his drinking. Meanwhile, others, like Sain, resented the amount of credit Southworth had received for the 1948 pennant. With Boston at 55–54 on August 16, Southworth turned the Braves over to coach Johnny Cooney for the remainder of . A newspaper account at the time characterized the change as a leave of absence for health reasons. With Cooney, the Braves finished fourth. A finish that high in the standings guaranteed the team shares of the World Series money, but the Braves players voted to only give Southworth a quarter share.
After some of the rebellious players (including Dark and Stanky) had been traded, Southworth returned to his post in and led the Braves to a fourth place finish. On August 29, 1950, Southworth recorded his 1,000th win as manager, leading the Braves to a 4-0 win over Cincinnati. Southworth had managed to convert a team that hadn't finished fourth since 1934 into one that would finish fourth or better for six straight seasons. However, an aging team and declining attendance would bode poorly for both Southworth's career and the Braves' future in New England. In , Southworth's club was only 28–31 on June 19. He called the team's general manager, John Quinn, and asked to be allowed to resign, and he was replaced by his former standout right fielder, Tommy Holmes (he would finish out the season but was fired in the middle of what turned out to be the final season of the Braves in Boston).
Southworth's major league managerial win-loss record was 1,044–704–22. His .597 winning percentage is seventh all-time among managers to McCarthy's .615. Southworth has the least amount of games managed (1,770) for any manager to have won 1,000 games. Southworth was the first to win the World Series as a player and again as a manager.
Southworth remained with the Braves as a scout in the 1950s. He was acquitted of drunken driving charges after a 1955 arrest, and retired from scouting at the end of his contract following the 1956 season. During his scouting days, he signed future all-time home run leader Hank Aaron, who was playing for the Indianapolis Clowns of the Negro leagues.
Managerial career
Later life
For the last couple of decades of his life, Southworth lived outside of Sunbury, Ohio. By the summer of 1969, his health had begun to fail and he was confined to his home. He gave a final interview to a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch; he commented on how difficult it would be for the 1969 Cardinals to win a third straight championship, as the 1944 team had done. Though he had quit smoking many years earlier, Southworth died of emphysema that year in Columbus, Ohio, and was buried in Green Lawn Cemetery.
Southworth's cousin, Bill Southworth, appeared in the major leagues in 1964.
Legacy
Dark recalled that Southworth was a "mild" person who wanted everyone to like him. He preferred to let his players play according to their respective styles, rather than micro-managing their every moves. However, he would give some advice - when going over lineups before a game, he would tell his pitchers to pitch every hitter "High, tight, and low and away." On batting practice, he wanted every hitter to approach it like he was in an actual game, and he would award bench players who performed well with additional playing time.
Southworth was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. He had been eligible for election as a player in the 1940s, but he received few votes. After Southworth had been left off of the ballot as a manager in 2003, author Raymond Mileur had begun a campaign of letter writing, phone calls to the Hall of Fame, radio show comments and advocacy through his website known as "The Birdhouse". Southworth was elected after receiving 13 votes from the 16-member Veterans Committee.
On the occasion of Southworth's election to the Hall of Fame, one of his former players on the 1948 Braves, Clint Conatser, paid tribute to his old manager. "He just had a gut feeling about the right thing to do in a situation", Conatser recalled. "The moves he would make would work for him — all the time, not occasionally. Leo Durocher was the same way. It's like some guys can pick horses out of nowhere. Southworth was a genius like that on the diamond."
In January 2014, the Cardinals announced that Southworth was among 22 former players and personnel to be inducted into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum for the inaugural class of 2014. He is also a member of the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame.
See also
List of St. Louis Cardinals team records
List of Major League Baseball annual triples leaders
List of Major League Baseball player-managers
List of Major League Baseball managers by wins
Notes
References
Skipper, John C. (2013). Billy Southworth: A Biography of the Hall of Fame Manager and Ballplayer. McFarland. .
External links
Billy Southworth at The Deadball Era
Southworth's Cardinals were dominant
Southworth family tribute website
Baseball Hall of Fame – 2008 inductee profile
St. Louis skipper Southworth enshrined in Hall
Baseball Evolution Hall of Fame – Player Profile
1893 births
1969 deaths
Asheville Tourists managers
Asheville Tourists players
Baseball players from Nebraska
Birmingham Barons players
Boston Braves managers
Boston Braves players
Boston Braves scouts
Burials at Green Lawn Cemetery (Columbus, Ohio)
Cleveland Bearcats players
Cleveland Indians players
Cleveland Naps players
Cleveland Spiders players
Columbus Red Birds players
Major League Baseball center fielders
Major League Baseball player-managers
Major League Baseball right fielders
Milwaukee Braves scouts
National Baseball Hall of Fame inductees
New York Giants (NL) coaches
New York Giants (NL) players
People from Clay County, Nebraska
Pittsburgh Pirates players
Portland Beavers players
Portsmouth Cobblers players
Rochester Red Wings managers
Rochester Red Wings players
St. Louis Cardinals managers
St. Louis Cardinals players
Baseball players from Columbus, Ohio
Toledo Mud Hens players
So
People from Sunbury, Ohio
Deaths from emphysema | true | [
"Norman Good Young (April 16, 1894 – October 24, 1984) was an American civil engineer who served as borough manager of Hollidaysburg, Pennsylvania and Phoenixville, Pennsylvania and Town Manager of Saugus, Massachusetts.\n\nEarly life\nYoung was born on April 16, 1894 in Hollidaysburg, Pennsylvania to Michael A. and Anna M. (Good) Young. He graduated from Phillips Andover Academy and the University of Pennsylvania (Class of 1922).\n\nCareer\nYoung was named borough manager of Hollidaysburg, Pennsylvania in 1922. On January 3, 1928 he was relieved of his duties after the borough council, in an effort to cut costs, voted to eliminate the position. In 1929 he was hired to work for the engineering department of DuPont. From 1930 to 1950 he was borough manager of Phoenixville, Pennsylvania. In 1950 he was appointed town manager of Saugus, Massachusetts. He was recommended for the position by Cambridge, Massachusetts City Manager John B. Atkinson. On January 30, 1952 Young resigned his position effect March 1 to become city engineer of Chester, Pennsylvania. At $9,000 a year, he was Chester's highest paid employee at the time of his hiring. He remained in this position until his retirement in 1967.\n\nLater life and death\nAfter his retirement, Young settled in Nokomis, Florida. He died on October 24, 1984 after a long illness.\n\nReferences\n\n1894 births\n1984 deaths\nAmerican civil engineers\nPeople from Hollidaysburg, Pennsylvania\nPeople from Nokomis, Florida\nPhillips Academy alumni\nTown Managers of Saugus, Massachusetts\nUniversity of Pennsylvania alumni\nEngineers from Pennsylvania\n20th-century American engineers",
"Paweł Barylski (born 20 September 1975) is a Polish football coach. Usually an assistant manager, he was the interim manager of Śląsk Wrocław on three occasions. He most recently was in charge of I liga side Górnik Polkowice.\n\nFootball\n\nBarylski played for MKS Łodzianka, but retired at the age of 24 when he realised he was not good enough for a career in football. After retiring from football, Barylski held positions with the Lotnik Wrocław youth team and the Gawina Królewska Wola reserve side. In 2010 Barylski became interim manager in 2010, before becoming the assistant manager of Śląsk Wrocław when Orest Lenczyk was appointed. After Lenczyk was sacked in 2012, Barylski became the interim manager again. After being part of the coaching staff, Barylski once again became the assistant manager with the newly appointed Tadeusz Pawłowski and kept his position when Romuald Szukiełowicz was manager of Śląsk. In 2016 Barylski joined the coaching staff of Miedź Legnica for a season, becoming the assistant manager to Ryszard Tarasiewicz. After Tarasiewicz was sacked by Miedź, Barylski once again joined Śląsk Wrocław in 2018, teaming up with Tadeusz Pawłowski for the second time. After Pawłowski was sacked by Śląsk, Barylski became the interim manager for the third time.\n\nReferences\n\n1975 births\nLiving people\nPolish football managers\nŚląsk Wrocław managers\nSportspeople from Łódź"
] |
[
"Billy Southworth",
"Early career as a manager",
"What started his career as a manager?",
"Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League",
"Was he a good manager there?",
"The team won the IL championship that season."
] | C_6ce4cbb2d5684e1f9efefcec6866478f_0 | What was his strategy as a manager? | 3 | What was Billy Southworth's strategy as a team manager? | Billy Southworth | Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season. Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for 1929, replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,131 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats. His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place. Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy -- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, and had a daughter. CANNOTANSWER | he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, | William Harold Southworth (March 9, 1893 – November 15, 1969) was an American outfielder and manager in Major League Baseball (MLB). As a player in and and from to for five big-league teams, Southworth took part in almost 1,200 games, fell just short of 1,300 hits and batted .297 lifetime. Southworth managed in and from through . He oversaw three pennant-winning St. Louis Cardinals teams, winning two World Series, and another pennant with the Boston Braves, the last National League title in Boston baseball history. As manager of the Cardinals, his .642 winning percentage is the second-highest in franchise history and the highest since 1900.
Late in life, Southworth served as a scout for the Braves. He endured a great deal of tragedy in his baseball career, first experiencing the stillbirth of his twin babies and the deaths of his wife and his adult son. He died in 1969. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. Six years later, the Cardinals inducted him into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum. He also belongs to the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame. Southworth had a son, Billy Southworth Jr., and a cousin, Bill Southworth, who both played professional baseball.
Early life and playing career
Southworth was born in Harvard, Nebraska, to Orlando and Mariah Southworth and raised in Columbus, Ohio. He had four older brothers who played baseball. Before he was old enough to play with them, Southworth would give his old socks to his brothers so they could create makeshift balls. Southworth decided to play baseball against his father's wishes. Orlando Southworth had wanted his son to attend college. At the age of 19, he signed a contract with the Portsmouth team in the Ohio State League. He joined the Cleveland Indians in 1913, but only appeared in one game, entering as a replacement on defense.
In 1914, Southworth married Lida Brooks. She was a minister's daughter and they had met while Southworth was playing for Portsmouth. The couple's son, William Brooks Southworth, was born during Southworth's early playing career. Billy Southworth Jr. later became a professional baseball player for several seasons. The elder Southworth returned to the Cleveland Indians in 1915 and appeared in 60 games. He played for the Birmingham Barons in 1917 and part of 1918, when he made the Pittsburgh Pirates and played in 64 major league games.
Southworth played more regularly in 1919, appearing in 121 games and leading the league with 14 triples. With the exception of two seasons, Southworth played in at least that many games through 1926. In 1926, Southworth's offensive production increased and he finished the season with a .320 batting average, 16 home runs and 99 RBI. He ran into difficulty with New York manager John McGraw that year, as Southworth's independent style became incompatible with McGraw's strict leadership. He was traded from the New York Giants to the St. Louis Cardinals in the middle of the season. Southworth suffered a 1927 rib injury that limited his playing time. The Cardinals' leadership began to look for a role for Southworth beyond his playing career.
Early career as a manager
Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season.
Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for , replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,192 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats.
His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place.
Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy — the death of his wife Lida at age 42 — began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, with whom he had a daughter.
Return to the Cardinals
In June , he received a second chance with the struggling Cardinals when owner Sam Breadon fired manager Ray Blades and promoted Southworth from Rochester. This time, the Cards flourished under him. With talented players such as Enos Slaughter, Marty Marion, Stan Musial, Walker Cooper, Mort Cooper, Whitey Kurowski and Johnny Beazley being harvested each spring from the club's farm system, the Cardinals entered a Golden Age in their history. Upon Southworth's appointment, they won 69 of 109 games and jumped from seventh to third place in 1940. The following season they won 97 games and finished second.
From 1942 to 1944, the Cardinals won 106, 105 and 105 games, three pennants and two World Series titles. Southworth was the first manager to lead a team to 100 wins in three consecutive seasons. His 1942 Cardinals, who breezed to the World Series championship in five games, were the only team (out of eight) to ever defeat Joe McCarthy's New York Yankees in a Fall Classic. In 1943, both teams met again in the World Series; but this time, the Yankees turned the tables on the Redbirds, winning in five games. The Cards' third successive National League pennant, in , produced another world championship, a six-game triumph over the American League (AL) St. Louis Browns. With it, Southworth had presided over one of the most dominant three-year stretches in National League (NL) history.
However, another personal family tragedy struck when on February 15, 1945, his son, Billy Jr., by then a United States Army Air Forces major, died when his Boeing B-29 Superfortress crashed into Flushing Bay, New York after taking off from Mitchel Field, New York, on a training flight to Florida.
Still, Southworth began managing at the beginning of the season, which saw his Cardinals win 95 games but finished second, three games behind the Chicago Cubs.
Later managerial career
Southworth moved to the Boston Braves in , signing a then-lucrative managing contract for a reported $50,000 per season, and immediately led the Braves into the first division. Talented pitchers Johnny Sain and Warren Spahn had both returned from service in World War II that year.
In , the Braves won their second NL pennant of the 20th century—and Boston's last National League title—but were defeated in six games by the Cleveland Indians in the 1948 World Series. In that World Series, all of the games were close except for one, when the Braves beat pitcher Bob Feller 11–5. Author John Rossi writes that Sain lost some respect for Southworth after the manager said the managing and not talent had won the 1948 pennant. Sain had already become irritated with Southworth after the 1948 signing of unproven "bonus baby" pitcher Johnny Antonelli. Sain and Southworth rarely spoke after 1948.
During the following season, 1949, Boston struggled on the field and was in chaos off the diamond. Southworth was rumored to be drinking heavily and near nervous collapse. Some players complained about his rules and regulations, and some, including starting shortstop Alvin Dark and second baseman Eddie Stanky, were critical of his drinking. Meanwhile, others, like Sain, resented the amount of credit Southworth had received for the 1948 pennant. With Boston at 55–54 on August 16, Southworth turned the Braves over to coach Johnny Cooney for the remainder of . A newspaper account at the time characterized the change as a leave of absence for health reasons. With Cooney, the Braves finished fourth. A finish that high in the standings guaranteed the team shares of the World Series money, but the Braves players voted to only give Southworth a quarter share.
After some of the rebellious players (including Dark and Stanky) had been traded, Southworth returned to his post in and led the Braves to a fourth place finish. On August 29, 1950, Southworth recorded his 1,000th win as manager, leading the Braves to a 4-0 win over Cincinnati. Southworth had managed to convert a team that hadn't finished fourth since 1934 into one that would finish fourth or better for six straight seasons. However, an aging team and declining attendance would bode poorly for both Southworth's career and the Braves' future in New England. In , Southworth's club was only 28–31 on June 19. He called the team's general manager, John Quinn, and asked to be allowed to resign, and he was replaced by his former standout right fielder, Tommy Holmes (he would finish out the season but was fired in the middle of what turned out to be the final season of the Braves in Boston).
Southworth's major league managerial win-loss record was 1,044–704–22. His .597 winning percentage is seventh all-time among managers to McCarthy's .615. Southworth has the least amount of games managed (1,770) for any manager to have won 1,000 games. Southworth was the first to win the World Series as a player and again as a manager.
Southworth remained with the Braves as a scout in the 1950s. He was acquitted of drunken driving charges after a 1955 arrest, and retired from scouting at the end of his contract following the 1956 season. During his scouting days, he signed future all-time home run leader Hank Aaron, who was playing for the Indianapolis Clowns of the Negro leagues.
Managerial career
Later life
For the last couple of decades of his life, Southworth lived outside of Sunbury, Ohio. By the summer of 1969, his health had begun to fail and he was confined to his home. He gave a final interview to a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch; he commented on how difficult it would be for the 1969 Cardinals to win a third straight championship, as the 1944 team had done. Though he had quit smoking many years earlier, Southworth died of emphysema that year in Columbus, Ohio, and was buried in Green Lawn Cemetery.
Southworth's cousin, Bill Southworth, appeared in the major leagues in 1964.
Legacy
Dark recalled that Southworth was a "mild" person who wanted everyone to like him. He preferred to let his players play according to their respective styles, rather than micro-managing their every moves. However, he would give some advice - when going over lineups before a game, he would tell his pitchers to pitch every hitter "High, tight, and low and away." On batting practice, he wanted every hitter to approach it like he was in an actual game, and he would award bench players who performed well with additional playing time.
Southworth was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. He had been eligible for election as a player in the 1940s, but he received few votes. After Southworth had been left off of the ballot as a manager in 2003, author Raymond Mileur had begun a campaign of letter writing, phone calls to the Hall of Fame, radio show comments and advocacy through his website known as "The Birdhouse". Southworth was elected after receiving 13 votes from the 16-member Veterans Committee.
On the occasion of Southworth's election to the Hall of Fame, one of his former players on the 1948 Braves, Clint Conatser, paid tribute to his old manager. "He just had a gut feeling about the right thing to do in a situation", Conatser recalled. "The moves he would make would work for him — all the time, not occasionally. Leo Durocher was the same way. It's like some guys can pick horses out of nowhere. Southworth was a genius like that on the diamond."
In January 2014, the Cardinals announced that Southworth was among 22 former players and personnel to be inducted into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum for the inaugural class of 2014. He is also a member of the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame.
See also
List of St. Louis Cardinals team records
List of Major League Baseball annual triples leaders
List of Major League Baseball player-managers
List of Major League Baseball managers by wins
Notes
References
Skipper, John C. (2013). Billy Southworth: A Biography of the Hall of Fame Manager and Ballplayer. McFarland. .
External links
Billy Southworth at The Deadball Era
Southworth's Cardinals were dominant
Southworth family tribute website
Baseball Hall of Fame – 2008 inductee profile
St. Louis skipper Southworth enshrined in Hall
Baseball Evolution Hall of Fame – Player Profile
1893 births
1969 deaths
Asheville Tourists managers
Asheville Tourists players
Baseball players from Nebraska
Birmingham Barons players
Boston Braves managers
Boston Braves players
Boston Braves scouts
Burials at Green Lawn Cemetery (Columbus, Ohio)
Cleveland Bearcats players
Cleveland Indians players
Cleveland Naps players
Cleveland Spiders players
Columbus Red Birds players
Major League Baseball center fielders
Major League Baseball player-managers
Major League Baseball right fielders
Milwaukee Braves scouts
National Baseball Hall of Fame inductees
New York Giants (NL) coaches
New York Giants (NL) players
People from Clay County, Nebraska
Pittsburgh Pirates players
Portland Beavers players
Portsmouth Cobblers players
Rochester Red Wings managers
Rochester Red Wings players
St. Louis Cardinals managers
St. Louis Cardinals players
Baseball players from Columbus, Ohio
Toledo Mud Hens players
So
People from Sunbury, Ohio
Deaths from emphysema | true | [
"Kevin C. Abrams (born August 1971) is a Canadian-born American football executive who is currently the senior vice president of football operations & strategy of the New York Giants of the National Football League. Abrams worked as the Interim General Manager during the 2017 NFL season following the firing of his boss Jerry Reese.\n\nCareer\n\nEarly career\nAbrams began his career working as an intern for Ohio University football program, the Buffalo Bills, the Washington Redskins, and the London Monarchs.\n\nNFL\nAbrams began his career in the NFL working for the NFL Management Council as a salary cap analyst analyzing NFL player contracts.\n\nIn July 1999, following his work with the NFL Management Council, Abrams was hired by the New York Giants as a salary cap analyst, a newly created position by the team. In 2002 Abrams was promoted to Assistant General Manager working under GM Ernie Accorsi.\nDuring the 2017 NFL season, Abrams worked as the Interim General Manager due to the firing of his boss, GM Jerry Reese. Abrams was interviewed for the Giants GM position, however, he was beat out by former Carolina Panthers General Manager and former longtime Giants employee, Dave Gettleman.\n\nOn February 5, 2022, Abrams was named senior vice president of football operations and strategy for the New York Giants.\n\nPersonal life\nAbrams currently lives in Manhattan with his wife, Sarah-Jane, and three kids, Cormac, Grace, and Joseph.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n New York Giants profile\n\nNew York Giants executives\nSportspeople from Toronto\nLiving people\nNational Football League general managers\n1971 births",
"Alex Mubiru is a Ugandan economist and public administrator, who was appointed Acting Director General in the Cabinet of the President of the African Development Bank (AfDB), effective 17 December 2021. He concurrently serves as the substantive Director of Strategy and Delivery, in the Office of the President of the AfDB, a position he has held since November 2020. He is based at the bank's headquarters in Abidjan, Ivory Coast.\n\nBackground and education\nMubiru is a Ugandan national by birth. His late father, Joseph Mubiru, served as the Governor of the Bank of Uganda in the 1970s.\n\nAlex Mubiru holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Philosophy, Political Science and Economics from Macalester College, in Saint Paul, Minnesota, in the United States. His Master's Degree in Public Affairs and his Doctor of Philosophy degree in Public Affairs, were both awarded by Princeton University, in New Jersey, in the United States.\n\nCareer\nHe started out at the Thailand Development Research Institute (TDRI), working there as a Research Associate, in their International Economics Program, from 1994 until 1995. Later, from 1999 until 2001, he worked as the Project Economist for the World Bank, based at their Thailand Office.\n\nMubiru then spent the next nine years in academia. He was an Assistant Professor of Public Policy at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, from 2001 until 2008. He was then hired as Assistant Professor of Social Science, by the Singapore Management University from 2008 until 2009.\n\nIn 2009, he joined the AfDB as a Principal Research Economist. He then served as the Principal Country Economist, at the AfDB Country Office to Tanzania, serving there from 2010 until 2012. He was then assigned to the Strategy and Operations Policy Department, working there as the Lead Strategy Advisor, from 2012 until 2014. During this time, Mubiru was a member of the core team that oversaw the development of AfDB's Ten-Year Strategy (2013 to 2022) and was the \"Task Manager\" for the development of the AfDB's Private Sector Strategy (2013 to 2017).\n\nMubiru served as the Manager, Resource Mobilization Department at the AfDB, from 2014 until 2018. That year, he was appointed as the AfDB's Country Representative to the Republic of Tanzania, serving there until 2020. In November 2020, Akinwumi Adesina, the President of AfDB, appointed Mubiru to his Cabinet as Director of Strategy and Delivery.\n\nOther considerations\nIn his capacity as Acting Director General at AfDB, Mubiru replaced Yacine Fal, a national of Senegal who was promoted to serve as Acting Vice President for Regional Development, Integration and Business Delivery, at AfDB.\n\nSee also\n Economy of Africa\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Website of the African Development Bank\n\nLiving people\nGanda people\nUgandan economists\n1970 births\nMacalester College alumni\nPrinceton University alumni\nPeople from Central Region, Uganda"
] |
[
"Billy Southworth",
"Early career as a manager",
"What started his career as a manager?",
"Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League",
"Was he a good manager there?",
"The team won the IL championship that season.",
"What was his strategy as a manager?",
"he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals,"
] | C_6ce4cbb2d5684e1f9efefcec6866478f_0 | Did he work with anyone of note? | 4 | Did Billy Southworth work with anyone of note? | Billy Southworth | Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season. Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for 1929, replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,131 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats. His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place. Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy -- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, and had a daughter. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | William Harold Southworth (March 9, 1893 – November 15, 1969) was an American outfielder and manager in Major League Baseball (MLB). As a player in and and from to for five big-league teams, Southworth took part in almost 1,200 games, fell just short of 1,300 hits and batted .297 lifetime. Southworth managed in and from through . He oversaw three pennant-winning St. Louis Cardinals teams, winning two World Series, and another pennant with the Boston Braves, the last National League title in Boston baseball history. As manager of the Cardinals, his .642 winning percentage is the second-highest in franchise history and the highest since 1900.
Late in life, Southworth served as a scout for the Braves. He endured a great deal of tragedy in his baseball career, first experiencing the stillbirth of his twin babies and the deaths of his wife and his adult son. He died in 1969. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. Six years later, the Cardinals inducted him into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum. He also belongs to the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame. Southworth had a son, Billy Southworth Jr., and a cousin, Bill Southworth, who both played professional baseball.
Early life and playing career
Southworth was born in Harvard, Nebraska, to Orlando and Mariah Southworth and raised in Columbus, Ohio. He had four older brothers who played baseball. Before he was old enough to play with them, Southworth would give his old socks to his brothers so they could create makeshift balls. Southworth decided to play baseball against his father's wishes. Orlando Southworth had wanted his son to attend college. At the age of 19, he signed a contract with the Portsmouth team in the Ohio State League. He joined the Cleveland Indians in 1913, but only appeared in one game, entering as a replacement on defense.
In 1914, Southworth married Lida Brooks. She was a minister's daughter and they had met while Southworth was playing for Portsmouth. The couple's son, William Brooks Southworth, was born during Southworth's early playing career. Billy Southworth Jr. later became a professional baseball player for several seasons. The elder Southworth returned to the Cleveland Indians in 1915 and appeared in 60 games. He played for the Birmingham Barons in 1917 and part of 1918, when he made the Pittsburgh Pirates and played in 64 major league games.
Southworth played more regularly in 1919, appearing in 121 games and leading the league with 14 triples. With the exception of two seasons, Southworth played in at least that many games through 1926. In 1926, Southworth's offensive production increased and he finished the season with a .320 batting average, 16 home runs and 99 RBI. He ran into difficulty with New York manager John McGraw that year, as Southworth's independent style became incompatible with McGraw's strict leadership. He was traded from the New York Giants to the St. Louis Cardinals in the middle of the season. Southworth suffered a 1927 rib injury that limited his playing time. The Cardinals' leadership began to look for a role for Southworth beyond his playing career.
Early career as a manager
Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season.
Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for , replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,192 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats.
His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place.
Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy — the death of his wife Lida at age 42 — began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, with whom he had a daughter.
Return to the Cardinals
In June , he received a second chance with the struggling Cardinals when owner Sam Breadon fired manager Ray Blades and promoted Southworth from Rochester. This time, the Cards flourished under him. With talented players such as Enos Slaughter, Marty Marion, Stan Musial, Walker Cooper, Mort Cooper, Whitey Kurowski and Johnny Beazley being harvested each spring from the club's farm system, the Cardinals entered a Golden Age in their history. Upon Southworth's appointment, they won 69 of 109 games and jumped from seventh to third place in 1940. The following season they won 97 games and finished second.
From 1942 to 1944, the Cardinals won 106, 105 and 105 games, three pennants and two World Series titles. Southworth was the first manager to lead a team to 100 wins in three consecutive seasons. His 1942 Cardinals, who breezed to the World Series championship in five games, were the only team (out of eight) to ever defeat Joe McCarthy's New York Yankees in a Fall Classic. In 1943, both teams met again in the World Series; but this time, the Yankees turned the tables on the Redbirds, winning in five games. The Cards' third successive National League pennant, in , produced another world championship, a six-game triumph over the American League (AL) St. Louis Browns. With it, Southworth had presided over one of the most dominant three-year stretches in National League (NL) history.
However, another personal family tragedy struck when on February 15, 1945, his son, Billy Jr., by then a United States Army Air Forces major, died when his Boeing B-29 Superfortress crashed into Flushing Bay, New York after taking off from Mitchel Field, New York, on a training flight to Florida.
Still, Southworth began managing at the beginning of the season, which saw his Cardinals win 95 games but finished second, three games behind the Chicago Cubs.
Later managerial career
Southworth moved to the Boston Braves in , signing a then-lucrative managing contract for a reported $50,000 per season, and immediately led the Braves into the first division. Talented pitchers Johnny Sain and Warren Spahn had both returned from service in World War II that year.
In , the Braves won their second NL pennant of the 20th century—and Boston's last National League title—but were defeated in six games by the Cleveland Indians in the 1948 World Series. In that World Series, all of the games were close except for one, when the Braves beat pitcher Bob Feller 11–5. Author John Rossi writes that Sain lost some respect for Southworth after the manager said the managing and not talent had won the 1948 pennant. Sain had already become irritated with Southworth after the 1948 signing of unproven "bonus baby" pitcher Johnny Antonelli. Sain and Southworth rarely spoke after 1948.
During the following season, 1949, Boston struggled on the field and was in chaos off the diamond. Southworth was rumored to be drinking heavily and near nervous collapse. Some players complained about his rules and regulations, and some, including starting shortstop Alvin Dark and second baseman Eddie Stanky, were critical of his drinking. Meanwhile, others, like Sain, resented the amount of credit Southworth had received for the 1948 pennant. With Boston at 55–54 on August 16, Southworth turned the Braves over to coach Johnny Cooney for the remainder of . A newspaper account at the time characterized the change as a leave of absence for health reasons. With Cooney, the Braves finished fourth. A finish that high in the standings guaranteed the team shares of the World Series money, but the Braves players voted to only give Southworth a quarter share.
After some of the rebellious players (including Dark and Stanky) had been traded, Southworth returned to his post in and led the Braves to a fourth place finish. On August 29, 1950, Southworth recorded his 1,000th win as manager, leading the Braves to a 4-0 win over Cincinnati. Southworth had managed to convert a team that hadn't finished fourth since 1934 into one that would finish fourth or better for six straight seasons. However, an aging team and declining attendance would bode poorly for both Southworth's career and the Braves' future in New England. In , Southworth's club was only 28–31 on June 19. He called the team's general manager, John Quinn, and asked to be allowed to resign, and he was replaced by his former standout right fielder, Tommy Holmes (he would finish out the season but was fired in the middle of what turned out to be the final season of the Braves in Boston).
Southworth's major league managerial win-loss record was 1,044–704–22. His .597 winning percentage is seventh all-time among managers to McCarthy's .615. Southworth has the least amount of games managed (1,770) for any manager to have won 1,000 games. Southworth was the first to win the World Series as a player and again as a manager.
Southworth remained with the Braves as a scout in the 1950s. He was acquitted of drunken driving charges after a 1955 arrest, and retired from scouting at the end of his contract following the 1956 season. During his scouting days, he signed future all-time home run leader Hank Aaron, who was playing for the Indianapolis Clowns of the Negro leagues.
Managerial career
Later life
For the last couple of decades of his life, Southworth lived outside of Sunbury, Ohio. By the summer of 1969, his health had begun to fail and he was confined to his home. He gave a final interview to a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch; he commented on how difficult it would be for the 1969 Cardinals to win a third straight championship, as the 1944 team had done. Though he had quit smoking many years earlier, Southworth died of emphysema that year in Columbus, Ohio, and was buried in Green Lawn Cemetery.
Southworth's cousin, Bill Southworth, appeared in the major leagues in 1964.
Legacy
Dark recalled that Southworth was a "mild" person who wanted everyone to like him. He preferred to let his players play according to their respective styles, rather than micro-managing their every moves. However, he would give some advice - when going over lineups before a game, he would tell his pitchers to pitch every hitter "High, tight, and low and away." On batting practice, he wanted every hitter to approach it like he was in an actual game, and he would award bench players who performed well with additional playing time.
Southworth was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. He had been eligible for election as a player in the 1940s, but he received few votes. After Southworth had been left off of the ballot as a manager in 2003, author Raymond Mileur had begun a campaign of letter writing, phone calls to the Hall of Fame, radio show comments and advocacy through his website known as "The Birdhouse". Southworth was elected after receiving 13 votes from the 16-member Veterans Committee.
On the occasion of Southworth's election to the Hall of Fame, one of his former players on the 1948 Braves, Clint Conatser, paid tribute to his old manager. "He just had a gut feeling about the right thing to do in a situation", Conatser recalled. "The moves he would make would work for him — all the time, not occasionally. Leo Durocher was the same way. It's like some guys can pick horses out of nowhere. Southworth was a genius like that on the diamond."
In January 2014, the Cardinals announced that Southworth was among 22 former players and personnel to be inducted into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum for the inaugural class of 2014. He is also a member of the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame.
See also
List of St. Louis Cardinals team records
List of Major League Baseball annual triples leaders
List of Major League Baseball player-managers
List of Major League Baseball managers by wins
Notes
References
Skipper, John C. (2013). Billy Southworth: A Biography of the Hall of Fame Manager and Ballplayer. McFarland. .
External links
Billy Southworth at The Deadball Era
Southworth's Cardinals were dominant
Southworth family tribute website
Baseball Hall of Fame – 2008 inductee profile
St. Louis skipper Southworth enshrined in Hall
Baseball Evolution Hall of Fame – Player Profile
1893 births
1969 deaths
Asheville Tourists managers
Asheville Tourists players
Baseball players from Nebraska
Birmingham Barons players
Boston Braves managers
Boston Braves players
Boston Braves scouts
Burials at Green Lawn Cemetery (Columbus, Ohio)
Cleveland Bearcats players
Cleveland Indians players
Cleveland Naps players
Cleveland Spiders players
Columbus Red Birds players
Major League Baseball center fielders
Major League Baseball player-managers
Major League Baseball right fielders
Milwaukee Braves scouts
National Baseball Hall of Fame inductees
New York Giants (NL) coaches
New York Giants (NL) players
People from Clay County, Nebraska
Pittsburgh Pirates players
Portland Beavers players
Portsmouth Cobblers players
Rochester Red Wings managers
Rochester Red Wings players
St. Louis Cardinals managers
St. Louis Cardinals players
Baseball players from Columbus, Ohio
Toledo Mud Hens players
So
People from Sunbury, Ohio
Deaths from emphysema | false | [
"It's Christmas Again is an album by the American jazz drummer Max Roach recorded in 1984 for the Italian Soul Note label.\n\nCritical reception\n\nThe Allmusic review by Scott Yanow awarded the album 2½ stars stating, \"It's Christmas Again is a project that for many did not work, but no matter how you slice it, an intriguing aside to Roach's discography. As he often mixed words with jazz, this is less ambitious than previous works, but could be looked upon as more than a little ambiguous, and certainly a cynical view of a time of the year that should be joyous, but for many is difficult.\" The Penguin Guide to Jazz commented on the albums links with other material from around the same time: \"anyone familiar with this period or who takes the time to listen to these Soul Notes in a structured way will find a great deal of cross-fertilization going on\".\n\nTrack listing\nAll compositions by Max Roach\n \"It's Christmas Again\" – 20:41\n \"Christina\" – 21:12\n\nPersonnel\n Max Roach – drums, keyboards, percussion, vibraphone, voice\n Cecil Bridgewater – trumpet\n Tony Scott – clarinet (track 2)\n Lee Konitz – alto saxophone (track 2)\n Odean Pope – tenor saxophone, voice\n Tomaso Lama – guitar (track 2)\n Tyrone Brown – electric bass guitar\n\nReferences\n\nBlack Saint/Soul Note albums\nMax Roach albums\n1984 albums",
"is the pen name of a Japanese manga writer, best known for authoring the Death Note manga series with illustrator Takeshi Obata from 2003 to 2006, which has 30 million collected volumes in circulation. The duo's second series, Bakuman. (2008–2012), was also successful with 15 million in circulation. In 2014, Ohba collaborated with My Little Monster creator Robico for the one-shot \"Skip! Yamada-kun\". Another series with Obata called Platinum End began in the December 2015 issue of Jump SQ on November 4, 2015.\n\nOhba's real identity is a closely guarded secret. They have cited Shotaro Ishinomori, Fujiko Fujio, and Fujio Akatsuka as manga creators by whom they are heavily inspired. As stated by the profile placed at the beginning of each Death Note manga, Ohba collects teacups and develops manga plots while holding their knees on a chair, similar to a habit of L, one of the main characters of the series. There is speculation that Tsugumi Ohba is a pen name of Hiroshi Gamo, pointing out that in Bakuman the main character's uncle was a one-hit wonder manga artist who worked on a gag super-hero manga, very similar to Gamo and Tottemo! Luckyman in all aspects, and also that the storyboards drawn by Ohba greatly resemble Tottemo! Luckyman in style.\n\nWorks \n Death Note with Takeshi Obata (2003–2006)\nCenters on high school student Light Yagami, who discovers a supernatural notebook that allows him to kill anyone by writing the victim's name (and knowing their face). The plot follows his attempt to create and lead a world \"cleansed of evil\" which he will rule as \"God\" using the notebook, and the conflicts between himself and anyone he sees as an obstacle, from law enforcement to the mafia to the greatest detective in the world.\n Bakuman with Takeshi Obata (2008–2012)\nRevolves around two high school students who team up to try to create a successful manga, so it will be made into an anime in order for the artist of the group, Moritaka Mashiro, to fulfill the promise he made to a girl named Miho Azuki, whose dream is to become a voice actress for anime, as well as the dream of Akito Takagi, the writer of the duo.\n with Robico (2014)\n Platinum End with Takeshi Obata (2015–2021)\n\nAwards and nominations\n 2007 Nominated – Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize Grand Prize for Death Note\n 2008 Nominated – Angoulême International Comics Festival Official Selection for Death Note\n 2008 Won – Eagle Award for Favourite Manga for Death Note\n 2010 Nominated – Manga Taishō for Bakuman.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n \n\nDeath Note\nLiving people\nManga artists from Tokyo\nPseudonymous writers\nUnidentified people\nYear of birth missing (living people)\nManga writers"
] |
[
"Billy Southworth",
"Early career as a manager",
"What started his career as a manager?",
"Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League",
"Was he a good manager there?",
"The team won the IL championship that season.",
"What was his strategy as a manager?",
"he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals,",
"Did he work with anyone of note?",
"I don't know."
] | C_6ce4cbb2d5684e1f9efefcec6866478f_0 | What other teams did he manager? | 5 | Besides the Rochester Red Wings and the Cardinals, what other teams did Billy Southworth manage? | Billy Southworth | Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season. Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for 1929, replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,131 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats. His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place. Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy -- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, and had a daughter. CANNOTANSWER | he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants | William Harold Southworth (March 9, 1893 – November 15, 1969) was an American outfielder and manager in Major League Baseball (MLB). As a player in and and from to for five big-league teams, Southworth took part in almost 1,200 games, fell just short of 1,300 hits and batted .297 lifetime. Southworth managed in and from through . He oversaw three pennant-winning St. Louis Cardinals teams, winning two World Series, and another pennant with the Boston Braves, the last National League title in Boston baseball history. As manager of the Cardinals, his .642 winning percentage is the second-highest in franchise history and the highest since 1900.
Late in life, Southworth served as a scout for the Braves. He endured a great deal of tragedy in his baseball career, first experiencing the stillbirth of his twin babies and the deaths of his wife and his adult son. He died in 1969. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. Six years later, the Cardinals inducted him into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum. He also belongs to the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame. Southworth had a son, Billy Southworth Jr., and a cousin, Bill Southworth, who both played professional baseball.
Early life and playing career
Southworth was born in Harvard, Nebraska, to Orlando and Mariah Southworth and raised in Columbus, Ohio. He had four older brothers who played baseball. Before he was old enough to play with them, Southworth would give his old socks to his brothers so they could create makeshift balls. Southworth decided to play baseball against his father's wishes. Orlando Southworth had wanted his son to attend college. At the age of 19, he signed a contract with the Portsmouth team in the Ohio State League. He joined the Cleveland Indians in 1913, but only appeared in one game, entering as a replacement on defense.
In 1914, Southworth married Lida Brooks. She was a minister's daughter and they had met while Southworth was playing for Portsmouth. The couple's son, William Brooks Southworth, was born during Southworth's early playing career. Billy Southworth Jr. later became a professional baseball player for several seasons. The elder Southworth returned to the Cleveland Indians in 1915 and appeared in 60 games. He played for the Birmingham Barons in 1917 and part of 1918, when he made the Pittsburgh Pirates and played in 64 major league games.
Southworth played more regularly in 1919, appearing in 121 games and leading the league with 14 triples. With the exception of two seasons, Southworth played in at least that many games through 1926. In 1926, Southworth's offensive production increased and he finished the season with a .320 batting average, 16 home runs and 99 RBI. He ran into difficulty with New York manager John McGraw that year, as Southworth's independent style became incompatible with McGraw's strict leadership. He was traded from the New York Giants to the St. Louis Cardinals in the middle of the season. Southworth suffered a 1927 rib injury that limited his playing time. The Cardinals' leadership began to look for a role for Southworth beyond his playing career.
Early career as a manager
Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season.
Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for , replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,192 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats.
His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place.
Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy — the death of his wife Lida at age 42 — began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, with whom he had a daughter.
Return to the Cardinals
In June , he received a second chance with the struggling Cardinals when owner Sam Breadon fired manager Ray Blades and promoted Southworth from Rochester. This time, the Cards flourished under him. With talented players such as Enos Slaughter, Marty Marion, Stan Musial, Walker Cooper, Mort Cooper, Whitey Kurowski and Johnny Beazley being harvested each spring from the club's farm system, the Cardinals entered a Golden Age in their history. Upon Southworth's appointment, they won 69 of 109 games and jumped from seventh to third place in 1940. The following season they won 97 games and finished second.
From 1942 to 1944, the Cardinals won 106, 105 and 105 games, three pennants and two World Series titles. Southworth was the first manager to lead a team to 100 wins in three consecutive seasons. His 1942 Cardinals, who breezed to the World Series championship in five games, were the only team (out of eight) to ever defeat Joe McCarthy's New York Yankees in a Fall Classic. In 1943, both teams met again in the World Series; but this time, the Yankees turned the tables on the Redbirds, winning in five games. The Cards' third successive National League pennant, in , produced another world championship, a six-game triumph over the American League (AL) St. Louis Browns. With it, Southworth had presided over one of the most dominant three-year stretches in National League (NL) history.
However, another personal family tragedy struck when on February 15, 1945, his son, Billy Jr., by then a United States Army Air Forces major, died when his Boeing B-29 Superfortress crashed into Flushing Bay, New York after taking off from Mitchel Field, New York, on a training flight to Florida.
Still, Southworth began managing at the beginning of the season, which saw his Cardinals win 95 games but finished second, three games behind the Chicago Cubs.
Later managerial career
Southworth moved to the Boston Braves in , signing a then-lucrative managing contract for a reported $50,000 per season, and immediately led the Braves into the first division. Talented pitchers Johnny Sain and Warren Spahn had both returned from service in World War II that year.
In , the Braves won their second NL pennant of the 20th century—and Boston's last National League title—but were defeated in six games by the Cleveland Indians in the 1948 World Series. In that World Series, all of the games were close except for one, when the Braves beat pitcher Bob Feller 11–5. Author John Rossi writes that Sain lost some respect for Southworth after the manager said the managing and not talent had won the 1948 pennant. Sain had already become irritated with Southworth after the 1948 signing of unproven "bonus baby" pitcher Johnny Antonelli. Sain and Southworth rarely spoke after 1948.
During the following season, 1949, Boston struggled on the field and was in chaos off the diamond. Southworth was rumored to be drinking heavily and near nervous collapse. Some players complained about his rules and regulations, and some, including starting shortstop Alvin Dark and second baseman Eddie Stanky, were critical of his drinking. Meanwhile, others, like Sain, resented the amount of credit Southworth had received for the 1948 pennant. With Boston at 55–54 on August 16, Southworth turned the Braves over to coach Johnny Cooney for the remainder of . A newspaper account at the time characterized the change as a leave of absence for health reasons. With Cooney, the Braves finished fourth. A finish that high in the standings guaranteed the team shares of the World Series money, but the Braves players voted to only give Southworth a quarter share.
After some of the rebellious players (including Dark and Stanky) had been traded, Southworth returned to his post in and led the Braves to a fourth place finish. On August 29, 1950, Southworth recorded his 1,000th win as manager, leading the Braves to a 4-0 win over Cincinnati. Southworth had managed to convert a team that hadn't finished fourth since 1934 into one that would finish fourth or better for six straight seasons. However, an aging team and declining attendance would bode poorly for both Southworth's career and the Braves' future in New England. In , Southworth's club was only 28–31 on June 19. He called the team's general manager, John Quinn, and asked to be allowed to resign, and he was replaced by his former standout right fielder, Tommy Holmes (he would finish out the season but was fired in the middle of what turned out to be the final season of the Braves in Boston).
Southworth's major league managerial win-loss record was 1,044–704–22. His .597 winning percentage is seventh all-time among managers to McCarthy's .615. Southworth has the least amount of games managed (1,770) for any manager to have won 1,000 games. Southworth was the first to win the World Series as a player and again as a manager.
Southworth remained with the Braves as a scout in the 1950s. He was acquitted of drunken driving charges after a 1955 arrest, and retired from scouting at the end of his contract following the 1956 season. During his scouting days, he signed future all-time home run leader Hank Aaron, who was playing for the Indianapolis Clowns of the Negro leagues.
Managerial career
Later life
For the last couple of decades of his life, Southworth lived outside of Sunbury, Ohio. By the summer of 1969, his health had begun to fail and he was confined to his home. He gave a final interview to a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch; he commented on how difficult it would be for the 1969 Cardinals to win a third straight championship, as the 1944 team had done. Though he had quit smoking many years earlier, Southworth died of emphysema that year in Columbus, Ohio, and was buried in Green Lawn Cemetery.
Southworth's cousin, Bill Southworth, appeared in the major leagues in 1964.
Legacy
Dark recalled that Southworth was a "mild" person who wanted everyone to like him. He preferred to let his players play according to their respective styles, rather than micro-managing their every moves. However, he would give some advice - when going over lineups before a game, he would tell his pitchers to pitch every hitter "High, tight, and low and away." On batting practice, he wanted every hitter to approach it like he was in an actual game, and he would award bench players who performed well with additional playing time.
Southworth was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. He had been eligible for election as a player in the 1940s, but he received few votes. After Southworth had been left off of the ballot as a manager in 2003, author Raymond Mileur had begun a campaign of letter writing, phone calls to the Hall of Fame, radio show comments and advocacy through his website known as "The Birdhouse". Southworth was elected after receiving 13 votes from the 16-member Veterans Committee.
On the occasion of Southworth's election to the Hall of Fame, one of his former players on the 1948 Braves, Clint Conatser, paid tribute to his old manager. "He just had a gut feeling about the right thing to do in a situation", Conatser recalled. "The moves he would make would work for him — all the time, not occasionally. Leo Durocher was the same way. It's like some guys can pick horses out of nowhere. Southworth was a genius like that on the diamond."
In January 2014, the Cardinals announced that Southworth was among 22 former players and personnel to be inducted into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum for the inaugural class of 2014. He is also a member of the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame.
See also
List of St. Louis Cardinals team records
List of Major League Baseball annual triples leaders
List of Major League Baseball player-managers
List of Major League Baseball managers by wins
Notes
References
Skipper, John C. (2013). Billy Southworth: A Biography of the Hall of Fame Manager and Ballplayer. McFarland. .
External links
Billy Southworth at The Deadball Era
Southworth's Cardinals were dominant
Southworth family tribute website
Baseball Hall of Fame – 2008 inductee profile
St. Louis skipper Southworth enshrined in Hall
Baseball Evolution Hall of Fame – Player Profile
1893 births
1969 deaths
Asheville Tourists managers
Asheville Tourists players
Baseball players from Nebraska
Birmingham Barons players
Boston Braves managers
Boston Braves players
Boston Braves scouts
Burials at Green Lawn Cemetery (Columbus, Ohio)
Cleveland Bearcats players
Cleveland Indians players
Cleveland Naps players
Cleveland Spiders players
Columbus Red Birds players
Major League Baseball center fielders
Major League Baseball player-managers
Major League Baseball right fielders
Milwaukee Braves scouts
National Baseball Hall of Fame inductees
New York Giants (NL) coaches
New York Giants (NL) players
People from Clay County, Nebraska
Pittsburgh Pirates players
Portland Beavers players
Portsmouth Cobblers players
Rochester Red Wings managers
Rochester Red Wings players
St. Louis Cardinals managers
St. Louis Cardinals players
Baseball players from Columbus, Ohio
Toledo Mud Hens players
So
People from Sunbury, Ohio
Deaths from emphysema | true | [
"The 2016–17 Argentine Primera División – Torneo de la Independencia was the 127th season of top-flight professional football in Argentina. The tournament was named in commemoration of the 200th anniversary of the Independence of Argentina.\n\nThe season began on August 26, 2016 and ended on June 27, 2017. Thirty teams competed in the league, twenty-nine returning from the 2016 season, and the addition of Talleres de Córdoba as the Primera B Nacional champion. Argentinos Juniors did not take part having been relegated the previous season.\n\nBoca Juniors were crowned champions of Argentina for a 32nd time after rivals Banfield were beaten by San Lorenzo on June 20, 2017. As a result, Boca Juniors qualified for the 2018 Copa Libertadores and the 2017 Supercopa Argentina.\n\nCompetition format \nThe tournament for the 2016 season was composed of 30 teams. Each team played the other 29 teams in a single round-robin tournament, and also played an additional match against its main rival team, named \"Fecha de Clásicos\" (Derbies Fixture).\n\nClub information\n\nStadia and locations\n\nPersonnel\n\nManagerial changes \n\nInterim Managers\n1. Interim manager in the 1st round.\n2. Alberto Fanesi was interim manager in the 5th round.\n3. Juan Carlos Pires was interim manager in the 9th round.\n4. Interim manager, but later promoted to manager.\n5. Luciano Precone was interim manager in the 11th and 12th rounds.\n6. Hugo Garelli was interim manager in the 12th–14th rounds.\n7. Néstor Apuzzo was interim manager in the 13th and 14th rounds.\n8. Juan Barbas was interim manager in the 13th and 14th rounds.\n9. Leonardo Fernández was interim manager in the 14th round.\n10. Fabián Castro was interim manager in the 17th round.\n11. Leonardo Lemos was interim manager in the 19th round.\n12. Eduardo Magnín was interim manager in the 22nd round.\n13. Interim manager until the end of the tournament.\n14. Diego Erroz was interim manager in the 29th round.\n15. Interim manager in the 30th round.\n\nLeague table\n\nResults \nTeams play every other team once (either at home or away), and play one additional round against their local derby rival (or assigned match by AFA if a club doesn't have derby), completing a total of 30 rounds.\n\nSeason statistics\n\nTop Goalscorers \n\nSource: AFA\n\nTop Assists\n\nSource: AFA\n\nRelegation\nRelegation at the end of the season is based on coefficients, which take into consideration the points obtained by the clubs during the present season and the three previous seasons (only seasons at the top-flight are counted). The total tally is then divided by the total number of games played in the top flight on those four seasons and an average is calculated. The four teams with the worst average at the end of the season are relegated to Primera B Nacional.\n\nSource: AFA\n\nSee also\n2016–17 Primera B Nacional\n2015–16 Copa Argentina\n2016–17 Copa Argentina\n\nReferences \n\nArgentine Primera División seasons\n2016–17 in Argentine football leagues",
"Championship Manager is the first game in the Championship Manager series of association football management simulation games. The game was released on the Amiga and Atari ST in September, 1992 and ported to MS-DOS soon after. The game was written by Paul and Oliver Collyer (the co-founders of Sports Interactive) in their bedroom.\n\nGameplay\nThe game featured four playable English divisions (First through to Fourth; the newly formed FA Premier League did not appear until CM 93/94). In the game, each division contained only 20 teams, whereas in real life they contained 22 or 24 teams at that time.\nAlso included were all of the major domestic cups of the time (including the Anglo-Italian Cup) and the 3 major European trophies (including the now defunct Cup Winners' Cup).\n\nAny teams outside of the four playable divisions and all foreign teams had no player names at all. Instead, players were simply called \"No.3\" or \"No.10\" depending on which position they played.\n\nOne of the most innovative things about the game was the introduction of \"average ratings\" for players - after each match the performance of every player was graded from 0-10 and as the season went on the player's average rating would allow the manager to easily see how each player was performing.\n\nOther versions\nIn 1993, Intelek and Ubisoft used the Collyers' game code to produce a version for the French market, known as Guy Roux Manager (named after the legendary AJ Auxerre manager). It was fully localised for France and included the French first and second divisions as playable leagues, and all text and commentary in French. The Guy Roux Manager franchise has since become a very popular and long running franchise in France with games on many platforms.\n\nAlso in 1993, the first Norwegian version was released; a year later, an Italian version. While the Norwegian version was very much similar to the English one, in the Italian version it was possible to substitute up to 4 players in any game and the transfer deadline occurred much earlier in the season. Both the Norwegian and Italian versions featured real named players though, adding to the popularity of the game.\n\nDevelopment\nElectronic Arts reportedly turned down the chance to publish Championship Manager in 1992. Subsequently, the release of this first version of the game was not an outstanding success and sales were steady rather than spectacular. Reviews ranged from the encouraging to the dismissive.\n\nEven by early 1990s standards, the graphics of Championship Manager were primitive and there were many other management games available that were much more visually pleasing, such as Premier Manager and The Manager. Critics berated the lack of any real graphics, other than coloured text on top of a background image and the complete lack of any sound effects. Also, what became known as the \"match engine\" was very basic, consisting of a clock, 3 small meters showing each team's possession and lines of text commentary describing the match action. Rival game, The Manager, included a small screen showing TV-style clips of match action. Another drawback was the absence of real player names, as each team was populated with players generated at random by the computer.\n\nSales\nThe game sold more than 5 million copies by 2004.\n\nSee also\n Championship Manager series\n Football Manager\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Reviews at classicgaming.com- A website containing several old magazine reviews of Championship Manager\n Official game info- Championship Manager 1 section on the official Sports Interactive website\n\n1992 video games\nAmiga games\nAtari ST games\nDomark games\nDOS games\nVideo games scored by Barry Leitch\nVideo games developed in the United Kingdom\nAssociation football management video games"
] |
[
"Billy Southworth",
"Early career as a manager",
"What started his career as a manager?",
"Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League",
"Was he a good manager there?",
"The team won the IL championship that season.",
"What was his strategy as a manager?",
"he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals,",
"Did he work with anyone of note?",
"I don't know.",
"What other teams did he manager?",
"he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants"
] | C_6ce4cbb2d5684e1f9efefcec6866478f_0 | Why did he quit? | 6 | Why did Billy Southworth quit his coaching job with the 1933 Giants? | Billy Southworth | Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season. Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for 1929, replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,131 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats. His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place. Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy -- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, and had a daughter. CANNOTANSWER | -- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, | William Harold Southworth (March 9, 1893 – November 15, 1969) was an American outfielder and manager in Major League Baseball (MLB). As a player in and and from to for five big-league teams, Southworth took part in almost 1,200 games, fell just short of 1,300 hits and batted .297 lifetime. Southworth managed in and from through . He oversaw three pennant-winning St. Louis Cardinals teams, winning two World Series, and another pennant with the Boston Braves, the last National League title in Boston baseball history. As manager of the Cardinals, his .642 winning percentage is the second-highest in franchise history and the highest since 1900.
Late in life, Southworth served as a scout for the Braves. He endured a great deal of tragedy in his baseball career, first experiencing the stillbirth of his twin babies and the deaths of his wife and his adult son. He died in 1969. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. Six years later, the Cardinals inducted him into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum. He also belongs to the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame. Southworth had a son, Billy Southworth Jr., and a cousin, Bill Southworth, who both played professional baseball.
Early life and playing career
Southworth was born in Harvard, Nebraska, to Orlando and Mariah Southworth and raised in Columbus, Ohio. He had four older brothers who played baseball. Before he was old enough to play with them, Southworth would give his old socks to his brothers so they could create makeshift balls. Southworth decided to play baseball against his father's wishes. Orlando Southworth had wanted his son to attend college. At the age of 19, he signed a contract with the Portsmouth team in the Ohio State League. He joined the Cleveland Indians in 1913, but only appeared in one game, entering as a replacement on defense.
In 1914, Southworth married Lida Brooks. She was a minister's daughter and they had met while Southworth was playing for Portsmouth. The couple's son, William Brooks Southworth, was born during Southworth's early playing career. Billy Southworth Jr. later became a professional baseball player for several seasons. The elder Southworth returned to the Cleveland Indians in 1915 and appeared in 60 games. He played for the Birmingham Barons in 1917 and part of 1918, when he made the Pittsburgh Pirates and played in 64 major league games.
Southworth played more regularly in 1919, appearing in 121 games and leading the league with 14 triples. With the exception of two seasons, Southworth played in at least that many games through 1926. In 1926, Southworth's offensive production increased and he finished the season with a .320 batting average, 16 home runs and 99 RBI. He ran into difficulty with New York manager John McGraw that year, as Southworth's independent style became incompatible with McGraw's strict leadership. He was traded from the New York Giants to the St. Louis Cardinals in the middle of the season. Southworth suffered a 1927 rib injury that limited his playing time. The Cardinals' leadership began to look for a role for Southworth beyond his playing career.
Early career as a manager
Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season.
Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for , replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,192 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats.
His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place.
Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy — the death of his wife Lida at age 42 — began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, with whom he had a daughter.
Return to the Cardinals
In June , he received a second chance with the struggling Cardinals when owner Sam Breadon fired manager Ray Blades and promoted Southworth from Rochester. This time, the Cards flourished under him. With talented players such as Enos Slaughter, Marty Marion, Stan Musial, Walker Cooper, Mort Cooper, Whitey Kurowski and Johnny Beazley being harvested each spring from the club's farm system, the Cardinals entered a Golden Age in their history. Upon Southworth's appointment, they won 69 of 109 games and jumped from seventh to third place in 1940. The following season they won 97 games and finished second.
From 1942 to 1944, the Cardinals won 106, 105 and 105 games, three pennants and two World Series titles. Southworth was the first manager to lead a team to 100 wins in three consecutive seasons. His 1942 Cardinals, who breezed to the World Series championship in five games, were the only team (out of eight) to ever defeat Joe McCarthy's New York Yankees in a Fall Classic. In 1943, both teams met again in the World Series; but this time, the Yankees turned the tables on the Redbirds, winning in five games. The Cards' third successive National League pennant, in , produced another world championship, a six-game triumph over the American League (AL) St. Louis Browns. With it, Southworth had presided over one of the most dominant three-year stretches in National League (NL) history.
However, another personal family tragedy struck when on February 15, 1945, his son, Billy Jr., by then a United States Army Air Forces major, died when his Boeing B-29 Superfortress crashed into Flushing Bay, New York after taking off from Mitchel Field, New York, on a training flight to Florida.
Still, Southworth began managing at the beginning of the season, which saw his Cardinals win 95 games but finished second, three games behind the Chicago Cubs.
Later managerial career
Southworth moved to the Boston Braves in , signing a then-lucrative managing contract for a reported $50,000 per season, and immediately led the Braves into the first division. Talented pitchers Johnny Sain and Warren Spahn had both returned from service in World War II that year.
In , the Braves won their second NL pennant of the 20th century—and Boston's last National League title—but were defeated in six games by the Cleveland Indians in the 1948 World Series. In that World Series, all of the games were close except for one, when the Braves beat pitcher Bob Feller 11–5. Author John Rossi writes that Sain lost some respect for Southworth after the manager said the managing and not talent had won the 1948 pennant. Sain had already become irritated with Southworth after the 1948 signing of unproven "bonus baby" pitcher Johnny Antonelli. Sain and Southworth rarely spoke after 1948.
During the following season, 1949, Boston struggled on the field and was in chaos off the diamond. Southworth was rumored to be drinking heavily and near nervous collapse. Some players complained about his rules and regulations, and some, including starting shortstop Alvin Dark and second baseman Eddie Stanky, were critical of his drinking. Meanwhile, others, like Sain, resented the amount of credit Southworth had received for the 1948 pennant. With Boston at 55–54 on August 16, Southworth turned the Braves over to coach Johnny Cooney for the remainder of . A newspaper account at the time characterized the change as a leave of absence for health reasons. With Cooney, the Braves finished fourth. A finish that high in the standings guaranteed the team shares of the World Series money, but the Braves players voted to only give Southworth a quarter share.
After some of the rebellious players (including Dark and Stanky) had been traded, Southworth returned to his post in and led the Braves to a fourth place finish. On August 29, 1950, Southworth recorded his 1,000th win as manager, leading the Braves to a 4-0 win over Cincinnati. Southworth had managed to convert a team that hadn't finished fourth since 1934 into one that would finish fourth or better for six straight seasons. However, an aging team and declining attendance would bode poorly for both Southworth's career and the Braves' future in New England. In , Southworth's club was only 28–31 on June 19. He called the team's general manager, John Quinn, and asked to be allowed to resign, and he was replaced by his former standout right fielder, Tommy Holmes (he would finish out the season but was fired in the middle of what turned out to be the final season of the Braves in Boston).
Southworth's major league managerial win-loss record was 1,044–704–22. His .597 winning percentage is seventh all-time among managers to McCarthy's .615. Southworth has the least amount of games managed (1,770) for any manager to have won 1,000 games. Southworth was the first to win the World Series as a player and again as a manager.
Southworth remained with the Braves as a scout in the 1950s. He was acquitted of drunken driving charges after a 1955 arrest, and retired from scouting at the end of his contract following the 1956 season. During his scouting days, he signed future all-time home run leader Hank Aaron, who was playing for the Indianapolis Clowns of the Negro leagues.
Managerial career
Later life
For the last couple of decades of his life, Southworth lived outside of Sunbury, Ohio. By the summer of 1969, his health had begun to fail and he was confined to his home. He gave a final interview to a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch; he commented on how difficult it would be for the 1969 Cardinals to win a third straight championship, as the 1944 team had done. Though he had quit smoking many years earlier, Southworth died of emphysema that year in Columbus, Ohio, and was buried in Green Lawn Cemetery.
Southworth's cousin, Bill Southworth, appeared in the major leagues in 1964.
Legacy
Dark recalled that Southworth was a "mild" person who wanted everyone to like him. He preferred to let his players play according to their respective styles, rather than micro-managing their every moves. However, he would give some advice - when going over lineups before a game, he would tell his pitchers to pitch every hitter "High, tight, and low and away." On batting practice, he wanted every hitter to approach it like he was in an actual game, and he would award bench players who performed well with additional playing time.
Southworth was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. He had been eligible for election as a player in the 1940s, but he received few votes. After Southworth had been left off of the ballot as a manager in 2003, author Raymond Mileur had begun a campaign of letter writing, phone calls to the Hall of Fame, radio show comments and advocacy through his website known as "The Birdhouse". Southworth was elected after receiving 13 votes from the 16-member Veterans Committee.
On the occasion of Southworth's election to the Hall of Fame, one of his former players on the 1948 Braves, Clint Conatser, paid tribute to his old manager. "He just had a gut feeling about the right thing to do in a situation", Conatser recalled. "The moves he would make would work for him — all the time, not occasionally. Leo Durocher was the same way. It's like some guys can pick horses out of nowhere. Southworth was a genius like that on the diamond."
In January 2014, the Cardinals announced that Southworth was among 22 former players and personnel to be inducted into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum for the inaugural class of 2014. He is also a member of the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame.
See also
List of St. Louis Cardinals team records
List of Major League Baseball annual triples leaders
List of Major League Baseball player-managers
List of Major League Baseball managers by wins
Notes
References
Skipper, John C. (2013). Billy Southworth: A Biography of the Hall of Fame Manager and Ballplayer. McFarland. .
External links
Billy Southworth at The Deadball Era
Southworth's Cardinals were dominant
Southworth family tribute website
Baseball Hall of Fame – 2008 inductee profile
St. Louis skipper Southworth enshrined in Hall
Baseball Evolution Hall of Fame – Player Profile
1893 births
1969 deaths
Asheville Tourists managers
Asheville Tourists players
Baseball players from Nebraska
Birmingham Barons players
Boston Braves managers
Boston Braves players
Boston Braves scouts
Burials at Green Lawn Cemetery (Columbus, Ohio)
Cleveland Bearcats players
Cleveland Indians players
Cleveland Naps players
Cleveland Spiders players
Columbus Red Birds players
Major League Baseball center fielders
Major League Baseball player-managers
Major League Baseball right fielders
Milwaukee Braves scouts
National Baseball Hall of Fame inductees
New York Giants (NL) coaches
New York Giants (NL) players
People from Clay County, Nebraska
Pittsburgh Pirates players
Portland Beavers players
Portsmouth Cobblers players
Rochester Red Wings managers
Rochester Red Wings players
St. Louis Cardinals managers
St. Louis Cardinals players
Baseball players from Columbus, Ohio
Toledo Mud Hens players
So
People from Sunbury, Ohio
Deaths from emphysema | false | [
"In linguistics, slifting is a grammatical construction in which the embedded clause of a propositional attitude, speech report, or emotive is preposed. For instance the English sentence Nick is a great singer, Sara claims is the slifted variant of Sarah claims Nick is a great singer. The concept was first identified and named by Haj Ross in 1973. Slifting is more restricted than other kinds of preposing. Sentences involving slifting are often referred to as slifting parentheticals since the content of the slifted clause must be at-issue. For instance, the example above is most naturally understood as asserting that Nick is a great singer while parenthetically acknowledging Sara as the source of this information. The examples below show that this interpretation is strong enough to produce infelicity when a preceding question establishes a context where the wrong proposition is at-issue.\n\n Q: Why is Freedia not here? A: She quit, Sara told me. (slifting)\n Q: What did Sara tell you? A: # She quit, Sara told me. (slifting)\n\n Q: Why is Freedia not here? A: Sara told me she quit. (non-slifting)\n Q: What did Sara tell you? A: Sara told me she quit. (non-slifting)\n\nAdditionally, not all embedding predicates allow slifting.\n\n #She quit, Sara doubts.\n Jame'll be here next week, she emailed me.\n\nSlifted clauses also cannot have an overt complementizer.\n\n Q: Why is Freedia not here? A: # That she quit, Sara claims. (slifting)\n That she quit, Sara told me. That she won the lottery, I only found out later. (non-slifting preoposing)\n\nMoreover, interrogative instances of slifting show subject-auxiliary inversion.\n\n Will Freedia report our company's crimes to ESMA, Sara wondered. (slifting)\n Whether Freedia will report our company's crimes to ESMA, I don't know. (non-slifting)\n\nRoss analyzed slifting as the result of a movement rule. However, many subsequent researchers have argued that slifting is fundamentally different from true preposing and that the slifted clause may not be an embedded clause at all. Semantic analyses have been proposed which treat slifting as a kind of evidentiality.\n\nSee also\n Evidentiality\n Haj Ross\n Information structure\n Inversion (linguistics)\n Propositional attitude\n\nNotes\n\nSemantics\nPragmatics\nSyntactic entities\nSyntactic transformation",
"Serenadium is the first studio album by Danish death metal band Iniquity released in 1996.\n\nTrack listing\n \"Tranquil Seizure\" - 6:20 \n \"Prophecy of the Dying Watcher\" - 4:26 \n \"Serenadium\" - 4:42 \n \"Spectral Scent\" - 6:25\n \"Mockery Retained to Obturate\" - 4:28\n \"Encysted and Dormant\" - 5:48 \n \"Son of Cosmos\" - 3:38 \n \"Retorn\" - 5:35\n\nCredits\nThomas Christensen - Bass\nLars Friis - Guitar\nBrian Petrowsky - vocals, Guitar\nJacob Olsen - drums\nJan Borsing - Producer, Engineer, Mixing\n\nJacob Olsen did the drums on this CD, and then quit the band. Jesper Frost joined just before it was released and that is why his picture is in the booklet.\n\n1996 debut albums\nIniquity (band) albums"
] |
[
"Billy Southworth",
"Early career as a manager",
"What started his career as a manager?",
"Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League",
"Was he a good manager there?",
"The team won the IL championship that season.",
"What was his strategy as a manager?",
"he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals,",
"Did he work with anyone of note?",
"I don't know.",
"What other teams did he manager?",
"he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants",
"Why did he quit?",
"-- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism,"
] | C_6ce4cbb2d5684e1f9efefcec6866478f_0 | Did he manager any other teams after he quit coaching for the Giants? | 7 | Did Billy Southworth manage any other teams besides the Giants after he quit coaching for the Giants? | Billy Southworth | Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season. Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for 1929, replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,131 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats. His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place. Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy -- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, and had a daughter. CANNOTANSWER | he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. | William Harold Southworth (March 9, 1893 – November 15, 1969) was an American outfielder and manager in Major League Baseball (MLB). As a player in and and from to for five big-league teams, Southworth took part in almost 1,200 games, fell just short of 1,300 hits and batted .297 lifetime. Southworth managed in and from through . He oversaw three pennant-winning St. Louis Cardinals teams, winning two World Series, and another pennant with the Boston Braves, the last National League title in Boston baseball history. As manager of the Cardinals, his .642 winning percentage is the second-highest in franchise history and the highest since 1900.
Late in life, Southworth served as a scout for the Braves. He endured a great deal of tragedy in his baseball career, first experiencing the stillbirth of his twin babies and the deaths of his wife and his adult son. He died in 1969. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. Six years later, the Cardinals inducted him into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum. He also belongs to the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame. Southworth had a son, Billy Southworth Jr., and a cousin, Bill Southworth, who both played professional baseball.
Early life and playing career
Southworth was born in Harvard, Nebraska, to Orlando and Mariah Southworth and raised in Columbus, Ohio. He had four older brothers who played baseball. Before he was old enough to play with them, Southworth would give his old socks to his brothers so they could create makeshift balls. Southworth decided to play baseball against his father's wishes. Orlando Southworth had wanted his son to attend college. At the age of 19, he signed a contract with the Portsmouth team in the Ohio State League. He joined the Cleveland Indians in 1913, but only appeared in one game, entering as a replacement on defense.
In 1914, Southworth married Lida Brooks. She was a minister's daughter and they had met while Southworth was playing for Portsmouth. The couple's son, William Brooks Southworth, was born during Southworth's early playing career. Billy Southworth Jr. later became a professional baseball player for several seasons. The elder Southworth returned to the Cleveland Indians in 1915 and appeared in 60 games. He played for the Birmingham Barons in 1917 and part of 1918, when he made the Pittsburgh Pirates and played in 64 major league games.
Southworth played more regularly in 1919, appearing in 121 games and leading the league with 14 triples. With the exception of two seasons, Southworth played in at least that many games through 1926. In 1926, Southworth's offensive production increased and he finished the season with a .320 batting average, 16 home runs and 99 RBI. He ran into difficulty with New York manager John McGraw that year, as Southworth's independent style became incompatible with McGraw's strict leadership. He was traded from the New York Giants to the St. Louis Cardinals in the middle of the season. Southworth suffered a 1927 rib injury that limited his playing time. The Cardinals' leadership began to look for a role for Southworth beyond his playing career.
Early career as a manager
Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season.
Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for , replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,192 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats.
His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place.
Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy — the death of his wife Lida at age 42 — began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, with whom he had a daughter.
Return to the Cardinals
In June , he received a second chance with the struggling Cardinals when owner Sam Breadon fired manager Ray Blades and promoted Southworth from Rochester. This time, the Cards flourished under him. With talented players such as Enos Slaughter, Marty Marion, Stan Musial, Walker Cooper, Mort Cooper, Whitey Kurowski and Johnny Beazley being harvested each spring from the club's farm system, the Cardinals entered a Golden Age in their history. Upon Southworth's appointment, they won 69 of 109 games and jumped from seventh to third place in 1940. The following season they won 97 games and finished second.
From 1942 to 1944, the Cardinals won 106, 105 and 105 games, three pennants and two World Series titles. Southworth was the first manager to lead a team to 100 wins in three consecutive seasons. His 1942 Cardinals, who breezed to the World Series championship in five games, were the only team (out of eight) to ever defeat Joe McCarthy's New York Yankees in a Fall Classic. In 1943, both teams met again in the World Series; but this time, the Yankees turned the tables on the Redbirds, winning in five games. The Cards' third successive National League pennant, in , produced another world championship, a six-game triumph over the American League (AL) St. Louis Browns. With it, Southworth had presided over one of the most dominant three-year stretches in National League (NL) history.
However, another personal family tragedy struck when on February 15, 1945, his son, Billy Jr., by then a United States Army Air Forces major, died when his Boeing B-29 Superfortress crashed into Flushing Bay, New York after taking off from Mitchel Field, New York, on a training flight to Florida.
Still, Southworth began managing at the beginning of the season, which saw his Cardinals win 95 games but finished second, three games behind the Chicago Cubs.
Later managerial career
Southworth moved to the Boston Braves in , signing a then-lucrative managing contract for a reported $50,000 per season, and immediately led the Braves into the first division. Talented pitchers Johnny Sain and Warren Spahn had both returned from service in World War II that year.
In , the Braves won their second NL pennant of the 20th century—and Boston's last National League title—but were defeated in six games by the Cleveland Indians in the 1948 World Series. In that World Series, all of the games were close except for one, when the Braves beat pitcher Bob Feller 11–5. Author John Rossi writes that Sain lost some respect for Southworth after the manager said the managing and not talent had won the 1948 pennant. Sain had already become irritated with Southworth after the 1948 signing of unproven "bonus baby" pitcher Johnny Antonelli. Sain and Southworth rarely spoke after 1948.
During the following season, 1949, Boston struggled on the field and was in chaos off the diamond. Southworth was rumored to be drinking heavily and near nervous collapse. Some players complained about his rules and regulations, and some, including starting shortstop Alvin Dark and second baseman Eddie Stanky, were critical of his drinking. Meanwhile, others, like Sain, resented the amount of credit Southworth had received for the 1948 pennant. With Boston at 55–54 on August 16, Southworth turned the Braves over to coach Johnny Cooney for the remainder of . A newspaper account at the time characterized the change as a leave of absence for health reasons. With Cooney, the Braves finished fourth. A finish that high in the standings guaranteed the team shares of the World Series money, but the Braves players voted to only give Southworth a quarter share.
After some of the rebellious players (including Dark and Stanky) had been traded, Southworth returned to his post in and led the Braves to a fourth place finish. On August 29, 1950, Southworth recorded his 1,000th win as manager, leading the Braves to a 4-0 win over Cincinnati. Southworth had managed to convert a team that hadn't finished fourth since 1934 into one that would finish fourth or better for six straight seasons. However, an aging team and declining attendance would bode poorly for both Southworth's career and the Braves' future in New England. In , Southworth's club was only 28–31 on June 19. He called the team's general manager, John Quinn, and asked to be allowed to resign, and he was replaced by his former standout right fielder, Tommy Holmes (he would finish out the season but was fired in the middle of what turned out to be the final season of the Braves in Boston).
Southworth's major league managerial win-loss record was 1,044–704–22. His .597 winning percentage is seventh all-time among managers to McCarthy's .615. Southworth has the least amount of games managed (1,770) for any manager to have won 1,000 games. Southworth was the first to win the World Series as a player and again as a manager.
Southworth remained with the Braves as a scout in the 1950s. He was acquitted of drunken driving charges after a 1955 arrest, and retired from scouting at the end of his contract following the 1956 season. During his scouting days, he signed future all-time home run leader Hank Aaron, who was playing for the Indianapolis Clowns of the Negro leagues.
Managerial career
Later life
For the last couple of decades of his life, Southworth lived outside of Sunbury, Ohio. By the summer of 1969, his health had begun to fail and he was confined to his home. He gave a final interview to a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch; he commented on how difficult it would be for the 1969 Cardinals to win a third straight championship, as the 1944 team had done. Though he had quit smoking many years earlier, Southworth died of emphysema that year in Columbus, Ohio, and was buried in Green Lawn Cemetery.
Southworth's cousin, Bill Southworth, appeared in the major leagues in 1964.
Legacy
Dark recalled that Southworth was a "mild" person who wanted everyone to like him. He preferred to let his players play according to their respective styles, rather than micro-managing their every moves. However, he would give some advice - when going over lineups before a game, he would tell his pitchers to pitch every hitter "High, tight, and low and away." On batting practice, he wanted every hitter to approach it like he was in an actual game, and he would award bench players who performed well with additional playing time.
Southworth was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. He had been eligible for election as a player in the 1940s, but he received few votes. After Southworth had been left off of the ballot as a manager in 2003, author Raymond Mileur had begun a campaign of letter writing, phone calls to the Hall of Fame, radio show comments and advocacy through his website known as "The Birdhouse". Southworth was elected after receiving 13 votes from the 16-member Veterans Committee.
On the occasion of Southworth's election to the Hall of Fame, one of his former players on the 1948 Braves, Clint Conatser, paid tribute to his old manager. "He just had a gut feeling about the right thing to do in a situation", Conatser recalled. "The moves he would make would work for him — all the time, not occasionally. Leo Durocher was the same way. It's like some guys can pick horses out of nowhere. Southworth was a genius like that on the diamond."
In January 2014, the Cardinals announced that Southworth was among 22 former players and personnel to be inducted into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum for the inaugural class of 2014. He is also a member of the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame.
See also
List of St. Louis Cardinals team records
List of Major League Baseball annual triples leaders
List of Major League Baseball player-managers
List of Major League Baseball managers by wins
Notes
References
Skipper, John C. (2013). Billy Southworth: A Biography of the Hall of Fame Manager and Ballplayer. McFarland. .
External links
Billy Southworth at The Deadball Era
Southworth's Cardinals were dominant
Southworth family tribute website
Baseball Hall of Fame – 2008 inductee profile
St. Louis skipper Southworth enshrined in Hall
Baseball Evolution Hall of Fame – Player Profile
1893 births
1969 deaths
Asheville Tourists managers
Asheville Tourists players
Baseball players from Nebraska
Birmingham Barons players
Boston Braves managers
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Boston Braves scouts
Burials at Green Lawn Cemetery (Columbus, Ohio)
Cleveland Bearcats players
Cleveland Indians players
Cleveland Naps players
Cleveland Spiders players
Columbus Red Birds players
Major League Baseball center fielders
Major League Baseball player-managers
Major League Baseball right fielders
Milwaukee Braves scouts
National Baseball Hall of Fame inductees
New York Giants (NL) coaches
New York Giants (NL) players
People from Clay County, Nebraska
Pittsburgh Pirates players
Portland Beavers players
Portsmouth Cobblers players
Rochester Red Wings managers
Rochester Red Wings players
St. Louis Cardinals managers
St. Louis Cardinals players
Baseball players from Columbus, Ohio
Toledo Mud Hens players
So
People from Sunbury, Ohio
Deaths from emphysema | true | [
"Stephen Michael Decker (born October 25, 1965) is an American former professional baseball catcher. He played for four Major League Baseball teams from –, –, and .\n\nCoaching career\nDecker began his coaching career as a hitting coach for the Salem-Keizer Volcanoes in 2001–02 and the Fresno Grizzlies in 2003–04. He then managed for Salem-Keizer (2005–07), the San Jose Giants (2008), the Connecticut Defenders (2009), and the Fresno Grizzlies (2010–11). \n\nIn 2012, he swapped positions with Bob Mariano, who replaced him as the Grizzlies' manager, and became coordinator of minor-league hitting instruction for the Giants. In 2015, he took his first major league coaching position as assistant hitting coach for the San Francisco Giants.\n\nPersonal life\nDecker is married with two daughters and resides in Keizer, Oregon.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1965 births\nLiving people\nAmerican expatriate baseball players in Canada\nAnaheim Angels players\nBaseball coaches from Illinois\nBaseball players from Illinois\nColorado Rockies players\nColorado Springs Sky Sox players\nEdmonton Trappers players\nEverett Giants players\nFlorida Marlins players\nHouston Cougars baseball players\nLewis–Clark State Warriors baseball players\nMajor League Baseball catchers\nMajor League Baseball hitting coaches\nMinor league baseball managers\nNashville Sounds players\nNorfolk Tides players\nPhoenix Firebirds players\nSacramento River Cats players\nSalem-Keizer Volcanoes\nSan Francisco Giants coaches\nSan Francisco Giants players\nSan Francisco Giants scouts\nSan Jose Giants players\nShreveport Captains players\nSportspeople from Rock Island, Illinois\nTacoma Rainiers players",
"Kim Yong-hee (born October 4, 1955, in Busan) is a retired player and former manager in the KBO League.\n\nA graduate of Kyungnam High School and Korea University, Kim played for the silver medal-winning South Korea national baseball team at the 1981 World Games.\n\nWith the formation of the KBO League in 1982, Kim joined the Lotte Giants, for whom he played all eight seasons of his career. He won the KBO League Golden Glove Award three times, twice at third base and once at designated hitter.\n\nAfter retiring at age 33 in 1989, Kim got directly into coaching, also for the Giants. He coached for the Giants at the KBO level from 1989 to 1992, and was promoted to the team's manager in 1994. He left the Giants after the 1998 season to coach for the Samsung Lions; he was the Lions' manager for the 2000 season.\n\nKim returned to Lotte as a coach from 2001 to 2006; he served as caretaker manager for part of 2002.\n\nAfter leaving the KBO for awhile, Kim joined the SK Wyverns as a coach for 2012–2013. He was the manager of the Wyverns in 2015–2016.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nCareer statistics and player information from Korea Baseball Organization\n\nSK Wyverns managers\nSamsung Lions managers\nLotte Giants managers\nSK Wyverns coaches\nLotte Giants coaches\nSamsung Lions coaches\nLotte Giants players\nKBO League designated hitters\nKBO League third basemen\nSouth Korean baseball players\nKorea University alumni\nKyungnam High School alumni\nSportspeople from Busan\n1955 births\nLiving people\nGimhae Kim clan\nSouth Korean Buddhists\nCompetitors at the 1981 World Games"
] |
[
"Billy Southworth",
"Early career as a manager",
"What started his career as a manager?",
"Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League",
"Was he a good manager there?",
"The team won the IL championship that season.",
"What was his strategy as a manager?",
"he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals,",
"Did he work with anyone of note?",
"I don't know.",
"What other teams did he manager?",
"he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants",
"Why did he quit?",
"-- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism,",
"Did he manager any other teams after he quit coaching for the Giants?",
"he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager."
] | C_6ce4cbb2d5684e1f9efefcec6866478f_0 | What was his most prominent moment as a coach for the Cardinals? | 8 | What was Billy Southworth's most prominent moment as a coach for the Cardinals? | Billy Southworth | Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season. Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for 1929, replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,131 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats. His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place. Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy -- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, and had a daughter. CANNOTANSWER | Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place. | William Harold Southworth (March 9, 1893 – November 15, 1969) was an American outfielder and manager in Major League Baseball (MLB). As a player in and and from to for five big-league teams, Southworth took part in almost 1,200 games, fell just short of 1,300 hits and batted .297 lifetime. Southworth managed in and from through . He oversaw three pennant-winning St. Louis Cardinals teams, winning two World Series, and another pennant with the Boston Braves, the last National League title in Boston baseball history. As manager of the Cardinals, his .642 winning percentage is the second-highest in franchise history and the highest since 1900.
Late in life, Southworth served as a scout for the Braves. He endured a great deal of tragedy in his baseball career, first experiencing the stillbirth of his twin babies and the deaths of his wife and his adult son. He died in 1969. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. Six years later, the Cardinals inducted him into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum. He also belongs to the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame. Southworth had a son, Billy Southworth Jr., and a cousin, Bill Southworth, who both played professional baseball.
Early life and playing career
Southworth was born in Harvard, Nebraska, to Orlando and Mariah Southworth and raised in Columbus, Ohio. He had four older brothers who played baseball. Before he was old enough to play with them, Southworth would give his old socks to his brothers so they could create makeshift balls. Southworth decided to play baseball against his father's wishes. Orlando Southworth had wanted his son to attend college. At the age of 19, he signed a contract with the Portsmouth team in the Ohio State League. He joined the Cleveland Indians in 1913, but only appeared in one game, entering as a replacement on defense.
In 1914, Southworth married Lida Brooks. She was a minister's daughter and they had met while Southworth was playing for Portsmouth. The couple's son, William Brooks Southworth, was born during Southworth's early playing career. Billy Southworth Jr. later became a professional baseball player for several seasons. The elder Southworth returned to the Cleveland Indians in 1915 and appeared in 60 games. He played for the Birmingham Barons in 1917 and part of 1918, when he made the Pittsburgh Pirates and played in 64 major league games.
Southworth played more regularly in 1919, appearing in 121 games and leading the league with 14 triples. With the exception of two seasons, Southworth played in at least that many games through 1926. In 1926, Southworth's offensive production increased and he finished the season with a .320 batting average, 16 home runs and 99 RBI. He ran into difficulty with New York manager John McGraw that year, as Southworth's independent style became incompatible with McGraw's strict leadership. He was traded from the New York Giants to the St. Louis Cardinals in the middle of the season. Southworth suffered a 1927 rib injury that limited his playing time. The Cardinals' leadership began to look for a role for Southworth beyond his playing career.
Early career as a manager
Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season.
Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for , replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,192 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats.
His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place.
Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy — the death of his wife Lida at age 42 — began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, with whom he had a daughter.
Return to the Cardinals
In June , he received a second chance with the struggling Cardinals when owner Sam Breadon fired manager Ray Blades and promoted Southworth from Rochester. This time, the Cards flourished under him. With talented players such as Enos Slaughter, Marty Marion, Stan Musial, Walker Cooper, Mort Cooper, Whitey Kurowski and Johnny Beazley being harvested each spring from the club's farm system, the Cardinals entered a Golden Age in their history. Upon Southworth's appointment, they won 69 of 109 games and jumped from seventh to third place in 1940. The following season they won 97 games and finished second.
From 1942 to 1944, the Cardinals won 106, 105 and 105 games, three pennants and two World Series titles. Southworth was the first manager to lead a team to 100 wins in three consecutive seasons. His 1942 Cardinals, who breezed to the World Series championship in five games, were the only team (out of eight) to ever defeat Joe McCarthy's New York Yankees in a Fall Classic. In 1943, both teams met again in the World Series; but this time, the Yankees turned the tables on the Redbirds, winning in five games. The Cards' third successive National League pennant, in , produced another world championship, a six-game triumph over the American League (AL) St. Louis Browns. With it, Southworth had presided over one of the most dominant three-year stretches in National League (NL) history.
However, another personal family tragedy struck when on February 15, 1945, his son, Billy Jr., by then a United States Army Air Forces major, died when his Boeing B-29 Superfortress crashed into Flushing Bay, New York after taking off from Mitchel Field, New York, on a training flight to Florida.
Still, Southworth began managing at the beginning of the season, which saw his Cardinals win 95 games but finished second, three games behind the Chicago Cubs.
Later managerial career
Southworth moved to the Boston Braves in , signing a then-lucrative managing contract for a reported $50,000 per season, and immediately led the Braves into the first division. Talented pitchers Johnny Sain and Warren Spahn had both returned from service in World War II that year.
In , the Braves won their second NL pennant of the 20th century—and Boston's last National League title—but were defeated in six games by the Cleveland Indians in the 1948 World Series. In that World Series, all of the games were close except for one, when the Braves beat pitcher Bob Feller 11–5. Author John Rossi writes that Sain lost some respect for Southworth after the manager said the managing and not talent had won the 1948 pennant. Sain had already become irritated with Southworth after the 1948 signing of unproven "bonus baby" pitcher Johnny Antonelli. Sain and Southworth rarely spoke after 1948.
During the following season, 1949, Boston struggled on the field and was in chaos off the diamond. Southworth was rumored to be drinking heavily and near nervous collapse. Some players complained about his rules and regulations, and some, including starting shortstop Alvin Dark and second baseman Eddie Stanky, were critical of his drinking. Meanwhile, others, like Sain, resented the amount of credit Southworth had received for the 1948 pennant. With Boston at 55–54 on August 16, Southworth turned the Braves over to coach Johnny Cooney for the remainder of . A newspaper account at the time characterized the change as a leave of absence for health reasons. With Cooney, the Braves finished fourth. A finish that high in the standings guaranteed the team shares of the World Series money, but the Braves players voted to only give Southworth a quarter share.
After some of the rebellious players (including Dark and Stanky) had been traded, Southworth returned to his post in and led the Braves to a fourth place finish. On August 29, 1950, Southworth recorded his 1,000th win as manager, leading the Braves to a 4-0 win over Cincinnati. Southworth had managed to convert a team that hadn't finished fourth since 1934 into one that would finish fourth or better for six straight seasons. However, an aging team and declining attendance would bode poorly for both Southworth's career and the Braves' future in New England. In , Southworth's club was only 28–31 on June 19. He called the team's general manager, John Quinn, and asked to be allowed to resign, and he was replaced by his former standout right fielder, Tommy Holmes (he would finish out the season but was fired in the middle of what turned out to be the final season of the Braves in Boston).
Southworth's major league managerial win-loss record was 1,044–704–22. His .597 winning percentage is seventh all-time among managers to McCarthy's .615. Southworth has the least amount of games managed (1,770) for any manager to have won 1,000 games. Southworth was the first to win the World Series as a player and again as a manager.
Southworth remained with the Braves as a scout in the 1950s. He was acquitted of drunken driving charges after a 1955 arrest, and retired from scouting at the end of his contract following the 1956 season. During his scouting days, he signed future all-time home run leader Hank Aaron, who was playing for the Indianapolis Clowns of the Negro leagues.
Managerial career
Later life
For the last couple of decades of his life, Southworth lived outside of Sunbury, Ohio. By the summer of 1969, his health had begun to fail and he was confined to his home. He gave a final interview to a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch; he commented on how difficult it would be for the 1969 Cardinals to win a third straight championship, as the 1944 team had done. Though he had quit smoking many years earlier, Southworth died of emphysema that year in Columbus, Ohio, and was buried in Green Lawn Cemetery.
Southworth's cousin, Bill Southworth, appeared in the major leagues in 1964.
Legacy
Dark recalled that Southworth was a "mild" person who wanted everyone to like him. He preferred to let his players play according to their respective styles, rather than micro-managing their every moves. However, he would give some advice - when going over lineups before a game, he would tell his pitchers to pitch every hitter "High, tight, and low and away." On batting practice, he wanted every hitter to approach it like he was in an actual game, and he would award bench players who performed well with additional playing time.
Southworth was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. He had been eligible for election as a player in the 1940s, but he received few votes. After Southworth had been left off of the ballot as a manager in 2003, author Raymond Mileur had begun a campaign of letter writing, phone calls to the Hall of Fame, radio show comments and advocacy through his website known as "The Birdhouse". Southworth was elected after receiving 13 votes from the 16-member Veterans Committee.
On the occasion of Southworth's election to the Hall of Fame, one of his former players on the 1948 Braves, Clint Conatser, paid tribute to his old manager. "He just had a gut feeling about the right thing to do in a situation", Conatser recalled. "The moves he would make would work for him — all the time, not occasionally. Leo Durocher was the same way. It's like some guys can pick horses out of nowhere. Southworth was a genius like that on the diamond."
In January 2014, the Cardinals announced that Southworth was among 22 former players and personnel to be inducted into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum for the inaugural class of 2014. He is also a member of the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame.
See also
List of St. Louis Cardinals team records
List of Major League Baseball annual triples leaders
List of Major League Baseball player-managers
List of Major League Baseball managers by wins
Notes
References
Skipper, John C. (2013). Billy Southworth: A Biography of the Hall of Fame Manager and Ballplayer. McFarland. .
External links
Billy Southworth at The Deadball Era
Southworth's Cardinals were dominant
Southworth family tribute website
Baseball Hall of Fame – 2008 inductee profile
St. Louis skipper Southworth enshrined in Hall
Baseball Evolution Hall of Fame – Player Profile
1893 births
1969 deaths
Asheville Tourists managers
Asheville Tourists players
Baseball players from Nebraska
Birmingham Barons players
Boston Braves managers
Boston Braves players
Boston Braves scouts
Burials at Green Lawn Cemetery (Columbus, Ohio)
Cleveland Bearcats players
Cleveland Indians players
Cleveland Naps players
Cleveland Spiders players
Columbus Red Birds players
Major League Baseball center fielders
Major League Baseball player-managers
Major League Baseball right fielders
Milwaukee Braves scouts
National Baseball Hall of Fame inductees
New York Giants (NL) coaches
New York Giants (NL) players
People from Clay County, Nebraska
Pittsburgh Pirates players
Portland Beavers players
Portsmouth Cobblers players
Rochester Red Wings managers
Rochester Red Wings players
St. Louis Cardinals managers
St. Louis Cardinals players
Baseball players from Columbus, Ohio
Toledo Mud Hens players
So
People from Sunbury, Ohio
Deaths from emphysema | true | [
"Philip Jacob Handler (July 21, 1908 – December 8, 1968) was an American football player and coach who spent his entire professional career in the city of Chicago. He had a seven-year, 53-game NFL playing career, during which he was named All-Pro four times. On three separate occasions, Handler served as head coach of the Chicago Cardinals, and later as an assistant coach for the Chicago Bears. He served as an assistant coach for the Cardinals when they won the 1947 NFL Championship; and with the Bears when they won the 1963 NFL Championship.\n\nEarly life\nHandler was born in Fort Worth, Texas, and was Jewish. His parents had immigrated to the United States from Lithuania. He was nicknamed \"Motsy.\"\n\nCollege career\nPrior to his professional debut, Handler played college football at Texas Christian University. He played at TCU for three years beginning in 1927 under head coach Francis Schmidt. During his college career, Handler earned All-SWC honors as an offensive guard, and was an Honorable Mention All-American in 1929. In 1929 Handler and the Horned Frogs won the Southwest Conference.\n\nNFL career\nAfter graduating from college in 1930, Handler decided to pursue a career in pro football. However, he was an undersized lineman, standing at just , . Despite Cardinals' coach Ernie Nevers' dismissive comment upon his arrival with the Cardinals in summer 1930: \"You'll never make it kid. You're too small\", Handler went on to a seven-year, 53-game NFL playing career with the team, during which he was named All-Pro from 1931 to 1933, and 2nd Team All-Pro (UPI) in 1935. He also served in a player-coach during the 1935 and 1936 seasons.\n\nCoaching career\n\nChicago Cardinals\nUpon his retirement during the 1937 NFL season, Handler was named to the Cardinals' coaching staff. His career with the Cardinals appeared to have ended on November 28, 1938, when he and head coach Milan Creighton resigned following a 2–9 finish, however Handler later reconsidered his decision and continued as an assistant coach.\n\nOn July 3, 1943, Handler took over the Cardinals' head coaching duties when head coach Jimmy Conzelman accepted a front office position with baseball's St. Louis Browns. However, with manning shortages due to World War II, the Cardinals lost all 10 games that season. The team then merged with the Pittsburgh Steelers in 1944 to form what was referred to as \"Card-Pitt\" in the standings. Handler and Walt Kiesling were named the team's co-coaches. That effort also resulted in a winless season in 1944, and after a 1–9 season the next year, Handler gave way for the returning Conzelman.\n\nThe return of Conzelman and many of their top players, helped the Cardinals improve to 6–5 in 1946, followed by the franchise's only undisputed NFL title the next season, with a 28–21 victory over the Philadelphia Eagles on December 28, 1947, at Comiskey Park in Chicago. That season Handler was an assistant coach on the Cardinals' NFL Championship team.\n\nIn 1949 Conzelman again resigned as head coach of the Cardinals. As a result, Handler and fellow assistant Buddy Parker were named as co-head coaches for the team in a unique arrangement on February 3, 1949. The decision was brought about by the two owners' different coaching preferences. The decision was blamed for the Cardinals 2–4 start that season. However Parker soon took over as sole coach when Handler shifted to a front office role later that season.\n\nWhen Parker left after the season, Curly Lambeau, the legendary coach and founder of the Green Bay Packers, was hired as his replacement. Upon taking over the coaching position, Lambeau brought back Handler as the team's offensive line coach. However, the new staff continued to struggle, and after a 7–15 mark, Lambeau resigned as the team's coach on December 7, 1951. Handler and Cecil Isbell were then left to coach the team's last two games.\n\nHandler's 0.105 winning percentage is the lowest in NFL history for coaches with at least five seasons.\n\nChicago Bears\nAfter more than two decades with the same team, Handler moved to the north side of Chicago to become the offensive line coach for the Chicago Bears on July 19, 1952. There he soon became a top assistant under coach George Halas. In addition to his coaching duties, Handler also served as a scout for the team for the next 16 seasons.\n\nIn 1956 Handler helped the team reach the NFL Championship game. He then helped the squad capture the NFL title seven years later, in a storied 14–10 Bears victory over the New York Giants, on a frigid day at Wrigley Field in late 1963.\n\nDeath and closure\nSeveral months after the 1967 NFL season had ended, Handler was vacationing in Florida when he suffered the first of two heart attacks and spent several weeks in a hospital for treatment. Upon his release, doctors decreed that while he could spend time with the team during the week, at practices, and in helping the coaching staff with its weekly game plan, he would not be able to attend Bears' games. Indeed, he was advised not to watch the games — an order Handler did not follow.\n\nOn Sunday, December 8, 1968, just moments after a dramatic 17–16 Bears win over the Los Angeles Rams in Los Angeles, he died of his third heart attack at home in Skokie, Illinois. Two days after his death, more than 500 people attended his funeral, with the Bears canceling a team practice so players, coaches, and staff could attend. The following Sunday, December 15, 1968, when the Bears hosted the Green Bay Packers at Wrigley Field, a moment of silence was held before kickoff.\n\nHandler had two children and two grandchildren when he died, and was survived by his wife. Notably, Handler's third grandson was born five days after his death and was not only named after the coach — Philip Handler — but also later worked for the Chicago Bears for 11 years.\n\nHandler is a member of the Chicago Sports Hall of Fame, the Chicago Jewish Sports Hall of Fame, and the B'nai B'rith Jewish Sports Hall of Fame. His 17 seasons as a Chicago Bears assistant rank second in the history of the NFL's oldest franchise. All told, Handler spent 39 years as a player and coach in the NFL.\n\nSee also\n List of select Jewish football players\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Pro Football Reference (player)\n Pro Football Reference (coach)\n\n1908 births\n1968 deaths\nAmerican football guards\nChicago Bears coaches\nChicago Cardinals coaches\nChicago Cardinals head coaches\nChicago Cardinals players\nJewish American sportspeople\nPlayers of American football from Texas\nSportspeople from Fort Worth, Texas\nTCU Horned Frogs football players\n20th-century American Jews",
"Al Barbre (born October 13, 1942) is an American former basketball coach. He has coached men's and women's basketball at the high school and college level. He served as an assistant coach for the Stephen F. Austin and Lamar men's basketball teams. At Stephen F. Austin, the Lumberjacks won 29 straight games in the 1969–70 season. He took over as the Lamar Lady Cardinals basketball head coach prior to the 1987–88 season. As head coach for the Lady Cardinals, his team's results improved each year. His 1990–91 team qualified for the 1991 NCAA Women's Division I Basketball Tournament and defeated Texas, LSU, and Arkansas before losing to the eventual tournament champion finalist, Virginia Cavaliers, in the Elite Eight round. In addition to his coaching skills, he was a good recruiter.\n\nAt 29–4, his 1990–91 team holds the Lamar Lady Cardinals record for most wins in a season. The 1991 NCAA regional tournament game held on the Lady Cardinals' home court, the Montagne Center, against the LSU Lady Tigers set a Montagne Center attendance record for a women's basketball game with 9,143 fans in attendance.\n\nHonors and probation\nAs head coach for the Lady Cardinals, Al Barbe was named American South Conference Co-coach of the Year in 1988 and 1989. In 1991, he was named American South Conference Coach of the Year and Converse District VI Coach of the Year.\n\nFollowing an NCAA investigation, all wins for the 1990–91 season were vacated due to violations by the program. In addition, the program was placed on two years' probation and the number of allowed scholarships was reduced during the probation period. Al Barbre resigned as head coach. Barbre did not coach at the collegiate level again following his resignation in 1992.\n\nHead coaching record\n\n* 1990–91 wins vacated by the NCAA\n\nReferences \n\n1942 births\nLiving people\nHigh school basketball coaches in Texas\nLamar Cardinals basketball coaches\nLamar Lady Cardinals basketball coaches\nLon Morris College alumni\nStephen F. Austin Lumberjacks basketball coaches\nStephen F. Austin State University alumni\nAmerican women's basketball coaches"
] |
[
"Billy Southworth",
"Early career as a manager",
"What started his career as a manager?",
"Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League",
"Was he a good manager there?",
"The team won the IL championship that season.",
"What was his strategy as a manager?",
"he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals,",
"Did he work with anyone of note?",
"I don't know.",
"What other teams did he manager?",
"he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants",
"Why did he quit?",
"-- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism,",
"Did he manager any other teams after he quit coaching for the Giants?",
"he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager.",
"What was his most prominent moment as a coach for the Cardinals?",
"Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place."
] | C_6ce4cbb2d5684e1f9efefcec6866478f_0 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | 9 | Besides Billy Southworth's career with Rochester, the Cardinals, and the Giants, are there any other interesting aspects about this article on Billy Southworth? | Billy Southworth | Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season. Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for 1929, replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,131 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats. His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place. Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy -- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, and had a daughter. CANNOTANSWER | playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, | William Harold Southworth (March 9, 1893 – November 15, 1969) was an American outfielder and manager in Major League Baseball (MLB). As a player in and and from to for five big-league teams, Southworth took part in almost 1,200 games, fell just short of 1,300 hits and batted .297 lifetime. Southworth managed in and from through . He oversaw three pennant-winning St. Louis Cardinals teams, winning two World Series, and another pennant with the Boston Braves, the last National League title in Boston baseball history. As manager of the Cardinals, his .642 winning percentage is the second-highest in franchise history and the highest since 1900.
Late in life, Southworth served as a scout for the Braves. He endured a great deal of tragedy in his baseball career, first experiencing the stillbirth of his twin babies and the deaths of his wife and his adult son. He died in 1969. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. Six years later, the Cardinals inducted him into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum. He also belongs to the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame. Southworth had a son, Billy Southworth Jr., and a cousin, Bill Southworth, who both played professional baseball.
Early life and playing career
Southworth was born in Harvard, Nebraska, to Orlando and Mariah Southworth and raised in Columbus, Ohio. He had four older brothers who played baseball. Before he was old enough to play with them, Southworth would give his old socks to his brothers so they could create makeshift balls. Southworth decided to play baseball against his father's wishes. Orlando Southworth had wanted his son to attend college. At the age of 19, he signed a contract with the Portsmouth team in the Ohio State League. He joined the Cleveland Indians in 1913, but only appeared in one game, entering as a replacement on defense.
In 1914, Southworth married Lida Brooks. She was a minister's daughter and they had met while Southworth was playing for Portsmouth. The couple's son, William Brooks Southworth, was born during Southworth's early playing career. Billy Southworth Jr. later became a professional baseball player for several seasons. The elder Southworth returned to the Cleveland Indians in 1915 and appeared in 60 games. He played for the Birmingham Barons in 1917 and part of 1918, when he made the Pittsburgh Pirates and played in 64 major league games.
Southworth played more regularly in 1919, appearing in 121 games and leading the league with 14 triples. With the exception of two seasons, Southworth played in at least that many games through 1926. In 1926, Southworth's offensive production increased and he finished the season with a .320 batting average, 16 home runs and 99 RBI. He ran into difficulty with New York manager John McGraw that year, as Southworth's independent style became incompatible with McGraw's strict leadership. He was traded from the New York Giants to the St. Louis Cardinals in the middle of the season. Southworth suffered a 1927 rib injury that limited his playing time. The Cardinals' leadership began to look for a role for Southworth beyond his playing career.
Early career as a manager
Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season.
Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for , replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,192 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats.
His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place.
Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy — the death of his wife Lida at age 42 — began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, with whom he had a daughter.
Return to the Cardinals
In June , he received a second chance with the struggling Cardinals when owner Sam Breadon fired manager Ray Blades and promoted Southworth from Rochester. This time, the Cards flourished under him. With talented players such as Enos Slaughter, Marty Marion, Stan Musial, Walker Cooper, Mort Cooper, Whitey Kurowski and Johnny Beazley being harvested each spring from the club's farm system, the Cardinals entered a Golden Age in their history. Upon Southworth's appointment, they won 69 of 109 games and jumped from seventh to third place in 1940. The following season they won 97 games and finished second.
From 1942 to 1944, the Cardinals won 106, 105 and 105 games, three pennants and two World Series titles. Southworth was the first manager to lead a team to 100 wins in three consecutive seasons. His 1942 Cardinals, who breezed to the World Series championship in five games, were the only team (out of eight) to ever defeat Joe McCarthy's New York Yankees in a Fall Classic. In 1943, both teams met again in the World Series; but this time, the Yankees turned the tables on the Redbirds, winning in five games. The Cards' third successive National League pennant, in , produced another world championship, a six-game triumph over the American League (AL) St. Louis Browns. With it, Southworth had presided over one of the most dominant three-year stretches in National League (NL) history.
However, another personal family tragedy struck when on February 15, 1945, his son, Billy Jr., by then a United States Army Air Forces major, died when his Boeing B-29 Superfortress crashed into Flushing Bay, New York after taking off from Mitchel Field, New York, on a training flight to Florida.
Still, Southworth began managing at the beginning of the season, which saw his Cardinals win 95 games but finished second, three games behind the Chicago Cubs.
Later managerial career
Southworth moved to the Boston Braves in , signing a then-lucrative managing contract for a reported $50,000 per season, and immediately led the Braves into the first division. Talented pitchers Johnny Sain and Warren Spahn had both returned from service in World War II that year.
In , the Braves won their second NL pennant of the 20th century—and Boston's last National League title—but were defeated in six games by the Cleveland Indians in the 1948 World Series. In that World Series, all of the games were close except for one, when the Braves beat pitcher Bob Feller 11–5. Author John Rossi writes that Sain lost some respect for Southworth after the manager said the managing and not talent had won the 1948 pennant. Sain had already become irritated with Southworth after the 1948 signing of unproven "bonus baby" pitcher Johnny Antonelli. Sain and Southworth rarely spoke after 1948.
During the following season, 1949, Boston struggled on the field and was in chaos off the diamond. Southworth was rumored to be drinking heavily and near nervous collapse. Some players complained about his rules and regulations, and some, including starting shortstop Alvin Dark and second baseman Eddie Stanky, were critical of his drinking. Meanwhile, others, like Sain, resented the amount of credit Southworth had received for the 1948 pennant. With Boston at 55–54 on August 16, Southworth turned the Braves over to coach Johnny Cooney for the remainder of . A newspaper account at the time characterized the change as a leave of absence for health reasons. With Cooney, the Braves finished fourth. A finish that high in the standings guaranteed the team shares of the World Series money, but the Braves players voted to only give Southworth a quarter share.
After some of the rebellious players (including Dark and Stanky) had been traded, Southworth returned to his post in and led the Braves to a fourth place finish. On August 29, 1950, Southworth recorded his 1,000th win as manager, leading the Braves to a 4-0 win over Cincinnati. Southworth had managed to convert a team that hadn't finished fourth since 1934 into one that would finish fourth or better for six straight seasons. However, an aging team and declining attendance would bode poorly for both Southworth's career and the Braves' future in New England. In , Southworth's club was only 28–31 on June 19. He called the team's general manager, John Quinn, and asked to be allowed to resign, and he was replaced by his former standout right fielder, Tommy Holmes (he would finish out the season but was fired in the middle of what turned out to be the final season of the Braves in Boston).
Southworth's major league managerial win-loss record was 1,044–704–22. His .597 winning percentage is seventh all-time among managers to McCarthy's .615. Southworth has the least amount of games managed (1,770) for any manager to have won 1,000 games. Southworth was the first to win the World Series as a player and again as a manager.
Southworth remained with the Braves as a scout in the 1950s. He was acquitted of drunken driving charges after a 1955 arrest, and retired from scouting at the end of his contract following the 1956 season. During his scouting days, he signed future all-time home run leader Hank Aaron, who was playing for the Indianapolis Clowns of the Negro leagues.
Managerial career
Later life
For the last couple of decades of his life, Southworth lived outside of Sunbury, Ohio. By the summer of 1969, his health had begun to fail and he was confined to his home. He gave a final interview to a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch; he commented on how difficult it would be for the 1969 Cardinals to win a third straight championship, as the 1944 team had done. Though he had quit smoking many years earlier, Southworth died of emphysema that year in Columbus, Ohio, and was buried in Green Lawn Cemetery.
Southworth's cousin, Bill Southworth, appeared in the major leagues in 1964.
Legacy
Dark recalled that Southworth was a "mild" person who wanted everyone to like him. He preferred to let his players play according to their respective styles, rather than micro-managing their every moves. However, he would give some advice - when going over lineups before a game, he would tell his pitchers to pitch every hitter "High, tight, and low and away." On batting practice, he wanted every hitter to approach it like he was in an actual game, and he would award bench players who performed well with additional playing time.
Southworth was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. He had been eligible for election as a player in the 1940s, but he received few votes. After Southworth had been left off of the ballot as a manager in 2003, author Raymond Mileur had begun a campaign of letter writing, phone calls to the Hall of Fame, radio show comments and advocacy through his website known as "The Birdhouse". Southworth was elected after receiving 13 votes from the 16-member Veterans Committee.
On the occasion of Southworth's election to the Hall of Fame, one of his former players on the 1948 Braves, Clint Conatser, paid tribute to his old manager. "He just had a gut feeling about the right thing to do in a situation", Conatser recalled. "The moves he would make would work for him — all the time, not occasionally. Leo Durocher was the same way. It's like some guys can pick horses out of nowhere. Southworth was a genius like that on the diamond."
In January 2014, the Cardinals announced that Southworth was among 22 former players and personnel to be inducted into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum for the inaugural class of 2014. He is also a member of the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame.
See also
List of St. Louis Cardinals team records
List of Major League Baseball annual triples leaders
List of Major League Baseball player-managers
List of Major League Baseball managers by wins
Notes
References
Skipper, John C. (2013). Billy Southworth: A Biography of the Hall of Fame Manager and Ballplayer. McFarland. .
External links
Billy Southworth at The Deadball Era
Southworth's Cardinals were dominant
Southworth family tribute website
Baseball Hall of Fame – 2008 inductee profile
St. Louis skipper Southworth enshrined in Hall
Baseball Evolution Hall of Fame – Player Profile
1893 births
1969 deaths
Asheville Tourists managers
Asheville Tourists players
Baseball players from Nebraska
Birmingham Barons players
Boston Braves managers
Boston Braves players
Boston Braves scouts
Burials at Green Lawn Cemetery (Columbus, Ohio)
Cleveland Bearcats players
Cleveland Indians players
Cleveland Naps players
Cleveland Spiders players
Columbus Red Birds players
Major League Baseball center fielders
Major League Baseball player-managers
Major League Baseball right fielders
Milwaukee Braves scouts
National Baseball Hall of Fame inductees
New York Giants (NL) coaches
New York Giants (NL) players
People from Clay County, Nebraska
Pittsburgh Pirates players
Portland Beavers players
Portsmouth Cobblers players
Rochester Red Wings managers
Rochester Red Wings players
St. Louis Cardinals managers
St. Louis Cardinals players
Baseball players from Columbus, Ohio
Toledo Mud Hens players
So
People from Sunbury, Ohio
Deaths from emphysema | 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"
] |
[
"Billy Southworth",
"Early career as a manager",
"What started his career as a manager?",
"Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League",
"Was he a good manager there?",
"The team won the IL championship that season.",
"What was his strategy as a manager?",
"he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals,",
"Did he work with anyone of note?",
"I don't know.",
"What other teams did he manager?",
"he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants",
"Why did he quit?",
"-- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism,",
"Did he manager any other teams after he quit coaching for the Giants?",
"he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager.",
"What was his most prominent moment as a coach for the Cardinals?",
"Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place.",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games,"
] | C_6ce4cbb2d5684e1f9efefcec6866478f_0 | Why was his playing career ending? | 10 | Why was Billy Southworth's playing career ending? | Billy Southworth | Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season. Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for 1929, replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,131 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats. His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place. Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy -- the death of his wife Lida at age 42 -- began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, and had a daughter. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | William Harold Southworth (March 9, 1893 – November 15, 1969) was an American outfielder and manager in Major League Baseball (MLB). As a player in and and from to for five big-league teams, Southworth took part in almost 1,200 games, fell just short of 1,300 hits and batted .297 lifetime. Southworth managed in and from through . He oversaw three pennant-winning St. Louis Cardinals teams, winning two World Series, and another pennant with the Boston Braves, the last National League title in Boston baseball history. As manager of the Cardinals, his .642 winning percentage is the second-highest in franchise history and the highest since 1900.
Late in life, Southworth served as a scout for the Braves. He endured a great deal of tragedy in his baseball career, first experiencing the stillbirth of his twin babies and the deaths of his wife and his adult son. He died in 1969. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. Six years later, the Cardinals inducted him into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum. He also belongs to the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame. Southworth had a son, Billy Southworth Jr., and a cousin, Bill Southworth, who both played professional baseball.
Early life and playing career
Southworth was born in Harvard, Nebraska, to Orlando and Mariah Southworth and raised in Columbus, Ohio. He had four older brothers who played baseball. Before he was old enough to play with them, Southworth would give his old socks to his brothers so they could create makeshift balls. Southworth decided to play baseball against his father's wishes. Orlando Southworth had wanted his son to attend college. At the age of 19, he signed a contract with the Portsmouth team in the Ohio State League. He joined the Cleveland Indians in 1913, but only appeared in one game, entering as a replacement on defense.
In 1914, Southworth married Lida Brooks. She was a minister's daughter and they had met while Southworth was playing for Portsmouth. The couple's son, William Brooks Southworth, was born during Southworth's early playing career. Billy Southworth Jr. later became a professional baseball player for several seasons. The elder Southworth returned to the Cleveland Indians in 1915 and appeared in 60 games. He played for the Birmingham Barons in 1917 and part of 1918, when he made the Pittsburgh Pirates and played in 64 major league games.
Southworth played more regularly in 1919, appearing in 121 games and leading the league with 14 triples. With the exception of two seasons, Southworth played in at least that many games through 1926. In 1926, Southworth's offensive production increased and he finished the season with a .320 batting average, 16 home runs and 99 RBI. He ran into difficulty with New York manager John McGraw that year, as Southworth's independent style became incompatible with McGraw's strict leadership. He was traded from the New York Giants to the St. Louis Cardinals in the middle of the season. Southworth suffered a 1927 rib injury that limited his playing time. The Cardinals' leadership began to look for a role for Southworth beyond his playing career.
Early career as a manager
Southworth's managerial career began in 1928 with the Rochester Red Wings of the AA International League (IL), the top club in the Cardinals' farm system. In May, Southworth and his wife experienced the stillbirths of twins. Southworth returned home after losing the twins, but he quickly came back to Rochester. Late in the season, Southworth received word that Billy Jr. had been accidentally shot by a neighbor in Columbus. His son recovered, but the experience shook the manager. The team won the IL championship that season.
Southworth was promoted to St. Louis as player-manager for , replacing Bill McKechnie, who won a National League pennant in 1928 and lost the World Series in four straight games to the New York Yankees. Southworth's Major League playing career reached the end of the road, as he appeared in only 19 games, five in the outfield, and batted only .188 with six hits. He finished with a .297 batting average in 1,192 MLB games played, 52 home runs, 91 triples, 173 doubles, 661 runs scored, and 561 RBI. He stole 138 bases in his career and had double-digit steal totals in eight seasons. As a big leaguer, Southworth had 1,296 hits in 4,359 at bats.
His 1929 MLB managerial debut was not much more successful than his playing stint. Only one year removed from being a teammate of his charges, he attempted to impose discipline on the Cardinals, banning them from driving their own automobiles. The team did not respond to his hard line and won only 43 of their first 88 games. Southworth was sent back to Rochester on July 21, McKechnie was rehired, and the Cardinals finished in fourth place.
Although Southworth immediately resumed his successful minor league managerial career, the firing and personal tragedy — the death of his wife Lida at age 42 — began a downward spiral. Beset by struggles with alcoholism, he quit a coaching job with the 1933 Giants during spring training and left baseball for two seasons. After a recovery, he rejoined the Cardinals' minor league system in 1935 and by 1939 he was again enjoying success as Rochester's manager. He remarried in 1935, wedding the former Mabel Stemen, with whom he had a daughter.
Return to the Cardinals
In June , he received a second chance with the struggling Cardinals when owner Sam Breadon fired manager Ray Blades and promoted Southworth from Rochester. This time, the Cards flourished under him. With talented players such as Enos Slaughter, Marty Marion, Stan Musial, Walker Cooper, Mort Cooper, Whitey Kurowski and Johnny Beazley being harvested each spring from the club's farm system, the Cardinals entered a Golden Age in their history. Upon Southworth's appointment, they won 69 of 109 games and jumped from seventh to third place in 1940. The following season they won 97 games and finished second.
From 1942 to 1944, the Cardinals won 106, 105 and 105 games, three pennants and two World Series titles. Southworth was the first manager to lead a team to 100 wins in three consecutive seasons. His 1942 Cardinals, who breezed to the World Series championship in five games, were the only team (out of eight) to ever defeat Joe McCarthy's New York Yankees in a Fall Classic. In 1943, both teams met again in the World Series; but this time, the Yankees turned the tables on the Redbirds, winning in five games. The Cards' third successive National League pennant, in , produced another world championship, a six-game triumph over the American League (AL) St. Louis Browns. With it, Southworth had presided over one of the most dominant three-year stretches in National League (NL) history.
However, another personal family tragedy struck when on February 15, 1945, his son, Billy Jr., by then a United States Army Air Forces major, died when his Boeing B-29 Superfortress crashed into Flushing Bay, New York after taking off from Mitchel Field, New York, on a training flight to Florida.
Still, Southworth began managing at the beginning of the season, which saw his Cardinals win 95 games but finished second, three games behind the Chicago Cubs.
Later managerial career
Southworth moved to the Boston Braves in , signing a then-lucrative managing contract for a reported $50,000 per season, and immediately led the Braves into the first division. Talented pitchers Johnny Sain and Warren Spahn had both returned from service in World War II that year.
In , the Braves won their second NL pennant of the 20th century—and Boston's last National League title—but were defeated in six games by the Cleveland Indians in the 1948 World Series. In that World Series, all of the games were close except for one, when the Braves beat pitcher Bob Feller 11–5. Author John Rossi writes that Sain lost some respect for Southworth after the manager said the managing and not talent had won the 1948 pennant. Sain had already become irritated with Southworth after the 1948 signing of unproven "bonus baby" pitcher Johnny Antonelli. Sain and Southworth rarely spoke after 1948.
During the following season, 1949, Boston struggled on the field and was in chaos off the diamond. Southworth was rumored to be drinking heavily and near nervous collapse. Some players complained about his rules and regulations, and some, including starting shortstop Alvin Dark and second baseman Eddie Stanky, were critical of his drinking. Meanwhile, others, like Sain, resented the amount of credit Southworth had received for the 1948 pennant. With Boston at 55–54 on August 16, Southworth turned the Braves over to coach Johnny Cooney for the remainder of . A newspaper account at the time characterized the change as a leave of absence for health reasons. With Cooney, the Braves finished fourth. A finish that high in the standings guaranteed the team shares of the World Series money, but the Braves players voted to only give Southworth a quarter share.
After some of the rebellious players (including Dark and Stanky) had been traded, Southworth returned to his post in and led the Braves to a fourth place finish. On August 29, 1950, Southworth recorded his 1,000th win as manager, leading the Braves to a 4-0 win over Cincinnati. Southworth had managed to convert a team that hadn't finished fourth since 1934 into one that would finish fourth or better for six straight seasons. However, an aging team and declining attendance would bode poorly for both Southworth's career and the Braves' future in New England. In , Southworth's club was only 28–31 on June 19. He called the team's general manager, John Quinn, and asked to be allowed to resign, and he was replaced by his former standout right fielder, Tommy Holmes (he would finish out the season but was fired in the middle of what turned out to be the final season of the Braves in Boston).
Southworth's major league managerial win-loss record was 1,044–704–22. His .597 winning percentage is seventh all-time among managers to McCarthy's .615. Southworth has the least amount of games managed (1,770) for any manager to have won 1,000 games. Southworth was the first to win the World Series as a player and again as a manager.
Southworth remained with the Braves as a scout in the 1950s. He was acquitted of drunken driving charges after a 1955 arrest, and retired from scouting at the end of his contract following the 1956 season. During his scouting days, he signed future all-time home run leader Hank Aaron, who was playing for the Indianapolis Clowns of the Negro leagues.
Managerial career
Later life
For the last couple of decades of his life, Southworth lived outside of Sunbury, Ohio. By the summer of 1969, his health had begun to fail and he was confined to his home. He gave a final interview to a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch; he commented on how difficult it would be for the 1969 Cardinals to win a third straight championship, as the 1944 team had done. Though he had quit smoking many years earlier, Southworth died of emphysema that year in Columbus, Ohio, and was buried in Green Lawn Cemetery.
Southworth's cousin, Bill Southworth, appeared in the major leagues in 1964.
Legacy
Dark recalled that Southworth was a "mild" person who wanted everyone to like him. He preferred to let his players play according to their respective styles, rather than micro-managing their every moves. However, he would give some advice - when going over lineups before a game, he would tell his pitchers to pitch every hitter "High, tight, and low and away." On batting practice, he wanted every hitter to approach it like he was in an actual game, and he would award bench players who performed well with additional playing time.
Southworth was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008. He had been eligible for election as a player in the 1940s, but he received few votes. After Southworth had been left off of the ballot as a manager in 2003, author Raymond Mileur had begun a campaign of letter writing, phone calls to the Hall of Fame, radio show comments and advocacy through his website known as "The Birdhouse". Southworth was elected after receiving 13 votes from the 16-member Veterans Committee.
On the occasion of Southworth's election to the Hall of Fame, one of his former players on the 1948 Braves, Clint Conatser, paid tribute to his old manager. "He just had a gut feeling about the right thing to do in a situation", Conatser recalled. "The moves he would make would work for him — all the time, not occasionally. Leo Durocher was the same way. It's like some guys can pick horses out of nowhere. Southworth was a genius like that on the diamond."
In January 2014, the Cardinals announced that Southworth was among 22 former players and personnel to be inducted into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum for the inaugural class of 2014. He is also a member of the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame.
See also
List of St. Louis Cardinals team records
List of Major League Baseball annual triples leaders
List of Major League Baseball player-managers
List of Major League Baseball managers by wins
Notes
References
Skipper, John C. (2013). Billy Southworth: A Biography of the Hall of Fame Manager and Ballplayer. McFarland. .
External links
Billy Southworth at The Deadball Era
Southworth's Cardinals were dominant
Southworth family tribute website
Baseball Hall of Fame – 2008 inductee profile
St. Louis skipper Southworth enshrined in Hall
Baseball Evolution Hall of Fame – Player Profile
1893 births
1969 deaths
Asheville Tourists managers
Asheville Tourists players
Baseball players from Nebraska
Birmingham Barons players
Boston Braves managers
Boston Braves players
Boston Braves scouts
Burials at Green Lawn Cemetery (Columbus, Ohio)
Cleveland Bearcats players
Cleveland Indians players
Cleveland Naps players
Cleveland Spiders players
Columbus Red Birds players
Major League Baseball center fielders
Major League Baseball player-managers
Major League Baseball right fielders
Milwaukee Braves scouts
National Baseball Hall of Fame inductees
New York Giants (NL) coaches
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People from Clay County, Nebraska
Pittsburgh Pirates players
Portland Beavers players
Portsmouth Cobblers players
Rochester Red Wings managers
Rochester Red Wings players
St. Louis Cardinals managers
St. Louis Cardinals players
Baseball players from Columbus, Ohio
Toledo Mud Hens players
So
People from Sunbury, Ohio
Deaths from emphysema | false | [
"Albert George Henry Why, known by the alias Alby Carr, (1899–1969) was an Australian rugby league footballer who played in the 1920s player for South Sydney, who played under his alias for most of his career.\n\nPlaying career\nHe was born at Brewarrina in 1899. His family later moved to Redfern and he played his junior football in Wellington and later at Mascot.\n\nAs Alby Carr, he played four seasons for South Sydney between 1924 and 1927, including winning the 1926 and 1927 Grand Final's. Carr was also a premiership winner with South Sydney in 1925 as the club went the entire season undefeated. He represented New South Wales in 1924 under his alias. He played one last season with South Sydney in 1930, this time under his correct name of Alby Why. He played one season as Alby Why in 1930 before retiring. He was the brother of Australian Kangaroo, Jack Why.\n\nCoaching career\nIn 1950, Alby Why coached the Canterbury-Bankstown team for a season before taking over from Vic Bulgin halfway through 1951. He continued to coach Canterbury-Bankstown in 1952.\n\nAlias, and exposure\nA newspaper report from 1929 exposed Alby Carr as a 'ring-in' , who was actually Alby Why, the brother of Jack Why. The report was tabled at the NSWRFL on 13 May 1929. Alby Carr's true identity was revealed at the meeting regarding the 'ring-in' allegations. Alby Why tells the story: \"I commenced my footballing days at Wellington in 1917. In 1921 he was at Redfern Oval and was asked to play third grade for the Mascot team as 'A.Carr'. Alby Why candidly admitted that he was Alby Carr, in what was known in the turf-world as a 'ring-in'. Then selected as A. Carr, he played one year with Newtown in 1922, then joining the City Houses Competition before being graded with South Sydney Rabbitohs in 1924. During this time and later in England playing with Huddersfield, he retained the name 'Carr', but by 1929 he wished to be recognized by his real name, as his brother Jack Why also played with Souths.\"\n\nDeath\nAlbert George Henry Why died on 29 December 1969, aged 70.\n\nReferences\n\nSources\n \n\n1899 births\n1969 deaths\nAustralian rugby league coaches\nAustralian rugby league players\nCanterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs coaches\n\nNew South Wales rugby league team players\nRugby league centres\nRugby league second-rows\nSouth Sydney Rabbitohs players",
"Zenon Trzonkowski (19 September 1957 – 18 November 2021) was a Polish professional footballer who played as a defender and later coach and manager.\n\nPlaying career\nStarting his career at Stal Brzeg Trzonkowski went on to play 34 matches in the top division for Śląsk Wrocław. He also played for their reserves when they won promotion to the third division in 1982, before ending his career at rivals Zagłębie Lubin.\n\nHe ended his playing career aged 26 due to a career-ending knee injury.\n\nCoaching and managerial career\nTrzonkowski managed Śląsk's youth and reserve teams, and won promotion to the third division with the latter. In 1985 he was briefly manager of Odra Opole. He later also managed Karpaty Krosno and ended his career at home club, called BTP at the time.\n\nReferences\n\n1957 births\n2021 deaths\nSportspeople from Lower Silesian Voivodeship\nPolish footballers\nAssociation football defenders\nEkstraklasa players\nŚląsk Wrocław players\nZagłębie Lubin players\nPolish football managers\nŚląsk Wrocław managers\nOdra Opole managers\nKarpaty Krosno managers"
] |
[
"Melungeon",
"Definition"
] | C_94dac338bec64838b4053fc31727774a_1 | What is the definition? | 1 | What is the definition of Melungeon? | Melungeon | The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity, as they are of mixed racial ancestry. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse origins who migrated, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900. Melungeons have been defined as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese," "Native American," or "light-skinned African American". During the ninetee|nth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies. Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to "marry white" since before the twentieth century. Scholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them "core" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales and marriage licenses. Other researchers include the surnames Powell, LeBon, Bolling, Bunch, Goins, Goodman, Heard, Minor, Mise, those Mullins who are not descended from Booker Mullins (1768-1864) , and several others. Descendants of Booker Mullins are excluded because 1) the Mullins Y-DNA Project in Virginia confirmed that Booker was the son of Sherwood/Sherrod Adkins and is not a "true Mullins" and 2) DNA-tests of Booker's descendants do not have an Melungeon markers in their DNA. (Family lines have to be researched individually, as not all families with these surnames are Melungeon.) As with many other surname groups, not all families with each surname have the same racial background and ancestry. The original meaning of the word "Melungeon" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee. CANNOTANSWER | Melungeons have been defined as having multiracial ancestry. | Melungeons ( ) are an ethnic group of people from the Southeastern United States who descend from European settlers and Sub-Saharan African slaves. Historically, the Melungeons were associated with settlements in the Cumberland Gap area of central Appalachia, which includes portions of East Tennessee, Southwest Virginia, and eastern Kentucky.
Tri-racial describes populations who claim to be of mixed European, African and Native American ancestry. Although there is no consensus on how many such groups exist, estimates range as high as 200.
Definition
The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse ethnic origins who migrated to frontier areas, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous through the 19th century, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900.
Melungeons have been defined and documented as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese", "Native American", or "light-skinned African American". During the nineteenth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies.
Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to "marry white" since before the twentieth century.
Scholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them "core" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales, and marriage licenses.
The original meaning of the word "Melungeon" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee.
Origins
According to the principle of partus sequitur ventrem, which Virginia incorporated into law in 1662, children born in the colonies were assigned the social status of their mother, regardless of their father's ethnicity or citizenship. This meant the children of enslaved African or African-American women were born into slavery. But it also meant the children of free white or mulatto women, even if fathered by enslaved African men, were born free. The free descendants of such unions formed the majority of ancestors of the free families of color listed in the 1790 and 1810 US censuses. Early colonial Virginia was very much a "melting pot" of peoples, and before slavery hardened as a racial caste, white and black working-class people often lived and worked in close quarters and formed relationships and marriages.
Some of these early multiracial families were ancestors of the later Melungeons, yet each family line must be traced separately. Over the generations, most individuals of the group called Melungeon were persons of mixed European and African descent, sometimes also with Native American ancestry, whose ancestors had been free in colonial Virginia.
Edward Price's dissertation on Mixed-Blood Populations of the Eastern United States as to Origins, Localizations, and Persistence (1950) said that children of European and free black unions had also intermarried with persons of alleged Native American ancestry. In 1894, the U.S. Department of the Interior, in its "Report of Indians Taxed and Not Taxed," noted that the Melungeons in Hawkins County "claim to be Cherokee of mixed blood". The term Melungeon has since sometimes been applied as a catch-all phrase for a number of groups of individuals with mixed-race ancestry.
In 1995, Paul Heinegg published Free African American Families in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, and has since published regular updates. He found through his research and documented that the great majority of free people of color in the 1790 and 1810 censuses had ancestors from colonial Virginia, who were the children of unions between free white women and free, indentured or enslaved African or African-American men.
Similarly, in 2012, the genealogist Roberta Estes and her fellow researchers of the Melungeon DNA Project reported that the Melungeon lines likely originated in the unions of black and white indentured servants living in Virginia in the mid-1600s before slavery became widespread in the United States. They concluded that as laws to prevent the mixing of races were put in place, these family groups intermarried with each other, creating an endogamous group. They migrated together, sometimes along with white neighbors, from western Virginia through the Piedmont frontier of North Carolina, before settling primarily in the mountains of East Tennessee. In addition, the Melungeon DNA Project has documented multiracial ancestry, primarily European and African, for numerous people identified as Melungeon, affirming the evidence from written documentation.
Evidence
Free people of color are documented as migrating with European-American neighbors in the first half of the 18th century to the frontiers of Virginia and North Carolina, where they received land grants like their neighbors. For instance, the Collins, Gibson, and Ridley (Riddle) families owned land adjacent to one another in Orange County, North Carolina, where they and the Bunch family were listed in 1755 as "free Molatas (mulattoes)", subject to taxation on tithes. By settling in frontier areas, free people of color found more amenable living conditions and could escape some of the racial strictures of Virginia and North Carolina Tidewater plantation areas.
Historian Jack D. Forbes has discussed laws in South Carolina related to racial classification:
In 1719, South Carolina decided who should be an "Indian" for tax purposes since American [Indian] slaves were taxed at a lesser rate than African slaves. The act stated: "And for preventing all doubts and scruples that may arise what ought to be rated on mustees, mulattoes, etc. all such slaves as are not entirely Indian shall be accounted as negro.
Forbes said that, at the time, "mustees" and "mulattoes" were terms for persons of part-Native American ancestry. He wrote,
My judgment (to be discussed later) is that a mustee was primarily part-African and American [Indian] and that a mulatto was usually part-European and American [Indian]. The act is also significant because it asserts that part-American [Indians] with or without [emphasis added] African ancestry could be counted as Negroes, thus having an implication for all later slave censuses.This view does not have a consensus.
Beginning about 1767, some of the ancestors of the Melungeons reached the frontier New River area, where they are listed in the 1780s on tax lists of Montgomery County, Virginia. From there they migrated south in the Appalachian Range to Wilkes County, North Carolina, where some are listed as "white" on the 1790 census. They resided in a part that became Ashe County, where they are designated as "other free" in 1800.
The Collins and Gibson families (identified as Melungeon ancestors) were recorded in 1813 as members of the Stony Creek Primitive Baptist Church in Scott County, Virginia. They appear to have been treated as social equals of the white members. The earliest documented use of the term "Melungeon" is found in the minutes of this church (see Etymology below). While there are historical references to the documents, the evidence has come from transcribed copies.
From the Virginia and North Carolina frontiers, the families migrated west into frontier Tennessee and Kentucky. The earliest known Melungeon in what is now northeast Tennessee was Millington Collins, who executed a deed in Hawkins County in 1802. However, there is some evidence that Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hawkins (what is now Hancock County) by 1790. Several Collins and Gibson households were listed in Floyd County, Kentucky in the 1820 census, where they were classified as "free persons of color". On the 1830 censuses of Hawkins and neighboring Grainger County, Tennessee, the Collins and Gibson families are listed as "free-colored". Melungeons were residents of the part of Hawkins that in 1844 was organized as Hancock County.
By 1830, the Melungeon community in Hawkins County numbered 330 people in 55 families; in adjoining Grainger County, there were 130 people in 24 families. According to Edward Price, "Because of them, Hawkins County had more free colored persons in the 1830 census than any other county in Tennessee except Davidson (which includes Nashville) and more free colored families named Collins than any other county in the United States." Melungeon families have also been traced in Ashe County in northwestern North Carolina.
Contemporary accounts documented that Melungeon ancestors were considered by appearance to be mixed race. During the 18th and early 19th centuries, census enumerators classified them as "mulatto", "other free", or as "free persons of color". Sometimes they were listed as "white", sometimes as "black" or "negro", but almost never as "Indian". One family described as "Indian" was the Ridley (Riddle) family, noted as such on a 1767 Pittsylvania County, Virginia, tax list. They had been designated as "mulattoes" in an earlier record of 1755. Estes et al., in their 2012 summary of the Melungeon Core DNA Testing Program, stated that the Riddle family is the only Melungeon participant with historical records identifying them as having Native American origins, but their DNA is European. Among the participants, only the Sizemore family is documented as having Native American DNA.
The court record of Jacob Perkins vs. John White (1858) in Johnson County, Tennessee, provides definitions of the time related to race and free people of color. As in Virginia, if a free person was mostly white (one-eighth or less black), he was considered legally white and a citizen of the state:
"Persons that are known and recognized by the Constitution and laws of Tennessee, as free persons of color are those who by the act of 1794 section 32 are taken and deemed to be capable in law to be certified in any case what is in, except against each other or in the language of the statute "all Negroes, Indians, Mulattoes, and all persons of mixed blood descended from Negro or Indian ancestors to the third generation inclusive though one ancestor of each generation may have been a white person, white bond or free."... That if the great grandfather of Plaintiff was an Indian or Negro and he is descended on the mother's side from a white woman, without any further Negro or Indian blood than such as he derived on the father's side, then the Plaintiff is not of mix blood, or within the third generation inclusive; in other words that if the Plaintiff has not in his veins more than 1/8 of Negro or Indian blood, he is a citizen of this state and it would be slanderous to call him a Negro."
During the 19th century, due to their intermarriages with white spouses, Melungeon-surnamed families were increasingly classified as white on census records. In 1935, a Nevada newspaper anecdotally described Melungeons as "mulattoes" with "straight hair."
Assimilation
Ariela Gross has shown by analysis of court cases, the shift from perceptions of an individual as "mulatto" to "white" was often dependent upon appearance and, especially, community perception of a person's activities in life: who one associated with and whether the person fulfilled the common obligations of citizens. Census takers were generally people of a community, so they classified people racially as they were known by the community. Definitions of racial categories were often imprecise and ambiguous, especially for "mulatto" and "free person of color". In the Thirteen Colonies and the United States at times in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, "mulatto" could mean a mixture of African and European, African and Native American, European and Native American, or all three. At the same time, these groups intermarried.
Persons were often identified by the company they kept and which ethnic culture they identified with. There were differences between how people identified themselves and how others identified them. Because of slavery, colonial and state laws were biased toward identifying multiracial people of partial African origin as African or 'black,' although persons of mixed African and Native American descent often identified and lived culturally as Native Americans, particularly if their maternal line was Native American. Many Native American tribes were organized into matrilineal kinship systems, in which children were considered born into the mother's clan and took their social status from her people; inheritance and descent was figured through the maternal lines.
Because of the loose terminology and social attitudes to mixed-race persons, remnant non-reservation American Indians in the Upper South were generally not recorded separately as Indians. They were often gradually reclassified as mulatto or free people of color, especially as generations intermarried with neighbors of African descent. In the early decades of the 20th century, Virginia and some other states passed laws imposing the one-drop rule, requiring all persons to be classified as either white or black: those of any known African ancestry were to be classified as black, regardless of appearance, and how they self-identified or were known in the community.
After Virginia passed its Racial Integrity Act of 1924, officials went so far as to alter existing birth and marriage records to reclassify as "colored" some mixed-race individuals or families who identified as and had been recorded as "Indian". These actions destroyed the documented continuity of identity of several Indian communities. The historical documentation of continuity of self-identified Native American families was lost. If the families happened to be Catholic, their churches continued to record births and marriages as being among "Indian" families. But the process of loss of historical and cultural continuity appeared to have happened also with some of the non-reservation remnant Lenape Indians of Delaware.
According to the Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture, in his 1950 dissertation, cultural geographer Edward Price proposed that Melungeons were families descended from free people of color (who were of European and African ancestry) and mixed-race unions between persons of African ancestry and Native Americans in colonial Virginia, whose territory included the modern-day states of Kentucky and West Virginia.
Acceptance
The families known as "Melungeons" in the 19th century were generally well integrated into the communities in which they lived, though they may still have been affected by racism. Records show that on the whole, they enjoyed the same rights as whites. For example, they held property, voted, and served in the Army; some, such as the Gibsons, owned slaves as early as the 18th century.
Under the first Tennessee constitution of 1796, free people of color (males only) were allowed to vote. Following fears raised by the 1831 Nat Turner slave rebellion in Virginia, Tennessee and other southern states passed new restrictions on free people of color. By its new constitution of 1834, Tennessee disfranchised free people of color, reducing them to second-class status and excluding them from the political system.
In this period, several Melungeon men were tried in Hawkins County in 1846 for "illegal voting", under suspicion of being black or free men of color (and thereby ineligible for voting). They were acquitted, presumably by demonstrating to the court's satisfaction that they had no appreciable black ancestry. Standards were not as strict as under the later laws of the "one drop rule" of the 20th century. As in some other cases, racial status was chiefly determined by people testifying as to how the men were perceived by the community and whether they had "acted white" by voting, serving in the militia, or undertaking other common citizens' obligations available to white men.
After the American Civil War and following the Reconstruction Era, southern whites struggled to regain political power and re-assert white supremacy over freedmen and traditionally free families such as the Melungeons. The white Democrat-dominated state legislatures passed Jim Crow laws. But issues of race were often brought to court as a result of arguments about money.
For example, in 1872, a widowed woman's Melungeon ancestry was assessed in a trial in Hamilton County, Tennessee. The case was brought by relatives of her late husband, who challenged her inheritance of money from him after his death. They questioned the legitimacy of a marriage between a white man and a woman known to be Melungeon, and argued the marriage was not legitimate because the woman was of black ancestry. Based on the testimony of people in the community, the court decided the woman in the case was not of African ancestry, or had no such ancestors recently enough to matter.
During the period of segregation, a North Carolina statute barred "Portuguese" people—presumably Melungeons, as North Carolina does not have a large Portuguese American community—from whites-only schools. However, under this statute the "Portuguese" were not classified as Black, and they were not required to attend Black schools.
Modern anthropological and sociological studies of Melungeon descendants in Appalachia have demonstrated that they have become culturally indistinguishable from their "non-Melungeon," white neighbors: they share a Baptist religious affiliation and other community features. With changing attitudes and a desire for more work opportunities, numerous descendants of the early Melungeon pioneer families have migrated from Appalachia to make their lives in other parts of the United States.
Legends
In spite of being culturally and linguistically similar to their European neighbors, these multi-racial families were of a sufficiently different physical appearance to provoke speculation as to their identity and origins. In the first half of the 19th century, the pejorative term "Melungeon" began to be applied to these families by local white (European-American) neighbors. Local "knowledge" or myths soon began to arise about them. According to historian Pat Elder, the earliest of these was that they were "Indian" (more specifically, "Cherokee"). Jack Goins, an identified Melungeon descendant and researcher, states that the Melungeons claimed to be both Indian and Portuguese. An example was "Spanish Peggy" Gibson, wife of Vardy Collins.
A few ancestors may have been of mixed Iberian (Spanish and/or Portuguese) and African origin. Historian Ira Berlin has noted that some early slaves and free blacks of the charter generation in the colonies were "Atlantic Creoles", mixed-race descendants of Iberian workers and African women from slave ports in Africa. Their male descendants grew up bilingual and accompanied Europeans as workers or slaves. The majority of Melungeon early ancestors, who had migrated from Virginia over time, are of northern European and African ancestry, given the history of settlement in late 17th–early-18th century eastern Virginia. Later generations in Tennessee intermarried with descendants of Scotch-Irish immigrants who arrived in the mid- to late-18th century and settled in the backcountry before the American Revolution.
Given historical evidence of Native American settlement patterns, Cherokee Nation descent is highly unlikely for the original Melungeon ancestral families. These families were formed during the colonial era in the Virginia Tidewater areas, which were not Cherokee territory. Some of their descendants may have later intermarried with isolated individuals of Cherokee or other Native American ancestry in East Tennessee. Melungeons in Graysville, Tennessee claimed Cherokee ancestors.
Anthropologist E. Raymond Evans wrote (1979) regarding these claims:
In Graysville, the Melungeons strongly deny their Black heritage and explain their genetic differences by claiming to have had Cherokee grandmothers. Many of the local whites also claim Cherokee ancestry and appear to accept the Melungeon claim ...
In 1999 historian C. S. Everett hypothesized that John Collins (recorded as a Sapony Indian who was expelled from Orange County, Virginia about January 1743), might be the same man as the Melungeon ancestor John Collins, classified as a "mulatto" in 1755 North Carolina records. But Everett has revised that theory after having discovered evidence that these were two different men named John Collins. Only descendants of the latter man, identified as mulatto in the 1755 record in North Carolina, has any proven connection to the Melungeon families of eastern Tennessee.
Other peoples frequently suggested as Melungeon ancestors are the Black Dutch and the Powhatan Indian group. The Powhatan were an Algonquian-speaking tribe who inhabited eastern Virginia during the initial period of European colonization.
Speculation about Melungeon origins continued during the 19th and 20th centuries. Writers recounted folk tales of shipwrecked sailors, lost colonists, hoards of silver, and ancient peoples such as the Carthaginians or Phoenicians. With each writer, new elements were added to the mythology surrounding this group, and more surnames were added to the list of possible Melungeon ancestors. Journalist Will Allen Dromgoole wrote several articles on the Melungeons in the 1890s.
In the late 20th century, amateur researchers suggested that the Melungeons' ethnic identity may include ancestors who were Turks and Sephardi (Iberian) Jews. The writers David Beers Quinn and Ivor Noel Hume theorize that the Melungeons were descended from Sephardi Jews who fled the Inquisition and came as sailors to North America. They also say that Francis Drake did not repatriate all the Turks he saved from the sack of Cartagena, but some came to the colonies. But Janet Crain notes that there is no written documentation to support this theory.
The paper on the Melungeon DNA Project, published by Paul Heinegg, Jack Goins, and Roberta Estes in the Journal of Genetic Genealogy, shows that ancestry of the sample is primarily European and African, with only one person having a Native American paternal haplotype. There is no genetic evidence to support the Turkish or Jewish ancestry theories.
Etymology
There are many hypotheses about the etymology of the term Melungeon. Linguists and many researchers believe that it may have been derived from the French mélange, meaning mixture, or perhaps [nous] mélangeons meaning "[we] mix/mingle". This etymology is also found in several dictionaries. There were numerous French Huguenot immigrants in Virginia from 1700, and their language could have contributed a term.
Joanne Pezzullo and Karlton Douglas speculate that a more likely derivation of Melungeon, related to the dominance of the English language in the colonies, may have been from the now obsolete English word malengin (also spelled mal engin) meaning "guile", "deceit", or "ill intent." It was used by Edmund Spenser as the name of a trickster figure in his epic poem, The Faerie Queene (1590–1596), popular in Elizabethan England. The phrase, "harbored them Melungins," would be equivalent to "harbored someone of ill will", or could mean "harbored evil people", without reference to any ethnicity.
A different explanation traces the word to malungu (or malungo), a Luso-African word from Angola, meaning shipmate, derived from the Kimbundu word ma'luno, meaning "companion" or "friend". The word, spelled as Melungo and Mulungo, has been found in numerous Portuguese records. It is said to be a derogatory word that Africans used for people of Portuguese or other white ancestry. If so, the word was likely brought to America through people of African ancestry.
Kennedy (1994) speculates that the word derives from the Turkish melun can (from Arabic mal`un jinn ملعون جنّ), which purportedly means "damned soul." He suggests that, at the time, the (condemned soul) was a term used by Turks for Muslims who had been captured and enslaved aboard Spanish galleons.
Some writers try to connect the term Melungeon to an ethnic origin of people designated by that term, but there is no basis for this assumption. It appears the name arose as an exonym, something which neighboring people, of whatever origin, called the multi-racial people.
On October 7, 1840, the polemical Brownlow's Whig of Jonesborough, Tennessee, published an article entitled "Negro Speaking!" The publisher referred to a rival Democratic politician with a party in Sullivan County as "an impudent Malungeon from Washington City a scoundrel who is half Negro and half Indian," then as a "free negroe". In this and related articles, he does not identify the Democrat by name.
Modern identity
The term Melungeon was historically considered an insult, a label applied to Appalachians who were by appearance or reputation of mixed-race ancestry. In southwest Virginia, the term Ramp was similarly applied to people of mixed race. This term has never shed its pejorative character.
In December 1943, Virginia State Registrar of Vital Statistics, Walter Ashby Plecker, sent county officials a letter warning against "colored" families trying to pass as "white" or "Indian" in violation of the Racial Integrity Act of 1924. He identified specific surnames by county, including: "Lee, Smyth and Wise: Collins, Gibson, (Gipson), Moore, Goins, Ramsey, Delph, Bunch, Freeman, Mise, Barlow, Bolden (Bolin), Mullins, Hawkins (chiefly Tennessee Melungeons)". (Lee County, Virginia borders Hancock County, Tennessee.) He directed the offices to reclassify members of certain families as black, causing the loss for numerous families of documentation in records that showed their continued identification as Native American.
Different researchers have developed their own lists of the surnames of core Melungeon families. Generally, specific lines within families have to be traced to document such identity. For example, DeMarce (1992) listed Hale as a Melungeon surname.
By the mid-to-late 19th century, the term Melungeon appeared to have been used most frequently to refer to the biracial families of Hancock County and neighboring areas. Several other uses of the term in the print media, from mid-19th to early 20th century, have been collected at the Melungeon Heritage Association Website. The spelling of the term varied widely, as was common for words and names at the time. Eventually, the form "Melungeon" became standard.
Since the late 1960s, "Melungeon" has been increasingly adopted by individuals who identify with the ethnic group. This shift in meaning may have resulted from the popularity of Walk Toward the Sunset, a drama written by playwright Kermit Hunter and produced outdoors. The play was first presented in 1969 in Sneedville, the county seat of Hancock County. Making no claim to historical accuracy, Hunter portrayed the Melungeons as indigenous people of uncertain race who were mistakenly perceived as black by neighboring white settlers. As the drama portrayed Melungeons in a positive, romantic light, many individuals began for the first time to self-identify by that term. Hunter intended for his drama "to improve the socio-economic climate" of Hancock County, and to "lift the Melungeon name 'from shame to the hall of fame'." The play helped revive interest in the history of Melungeons. The civil rights movement and social changes of the 1960s further contributed to wider acceptance of members of the group. Research in social history and genealogy has documented new facts about people identified as Melungeons.
Since the mid-1990s, popular interest in the Melungeons has grown tremendously, although many descendants have left the region of historical concentration. Writer Bill Bryson devoted the better part of a chapter to them in his The Lost Continent (1989).
N. Brent Kennedy, a non-specialist, wrote a book on his claimed Melungeon roots, The Melungeons: The Resurrection of a Proud People (1994). With the advent of the internet, many people are researching family history and the number of people self-identifying as having Melungeon ancestry has increased rapidly, according to Kennedy. Some individuals have begun to self-identify as Melungeons after reading about the group on a website and discovering their surname on the expanding list of "Melungeon-associated" surnames. Others believe they have certain "characteristic" physical traits or conditions or assume that a multi-racial heritage means they are Melungeon.
For example, some Melungeons are allegedly identifiable by shovel-shaped incisors, a dental feature more commonly found among, but not restricted to, Native Americans and Northeast Asians. After an unsubstantiated hypothesis, popularized by N. Brent Kennedy, that Melungeons are of Turkish origin, some people have identified as having an enlarged external occipital protuberance, dubbed an "Anatolian bump".
Academic historians have not found any evidence for this thesis, nor is it supported by results from the Melungeon DNA Project. As noted before, this analysis shows that Melungeon descendants overwhelmingly have northern European and African DNA ancestry.
Internet sites promote the anecdotal claim that Melungeons are more prone to certain diseases, such as sarcoidosis or familial Mediterranean fever. Academic medical centers have noted that neither of these diseases is confined to a single population.
Kennedy's claims of ancestral connections to this group have been strongly disputed. The professional genealogist and historian, Virginia E. DeMarce, reviewed his 1994 book and found that Kennedy's documentation of his Melungeon ancestry was seriously flawed. He had a very indistinct definition of Melungeons, although the group had already been extensively studied and documented by other researchers. She criticized Kennedy for trying to include people who might have had other than northern European ancestry, and said that he did not properly take account of existing historical records or recognized genealogical practice in his research. He claimed to have ancestors who were persecuted for racial reasons. However, she found that his named ancestors were all classified as white in records, held various political offices (which showed they could vote and were supported by their community), and were landowners. Kennedy responded to her critique in an article of his own.<ref>[http://underonesky.org/SEKMIE_PDF/SEKMIE3A.pdf "Dr. Brent Kennedy Responds to Virginia DeMarce", Southeastern Kentucky Melungeon Information Exchange]</ref>
The Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians in Kentucky, which is neither federally recognized or state recognized as an Indian tribe, claims that most families in its area who are commonly identified as Melungeon are of partial Native American descent. The organization says their ancestors migrated to the region in the late 18th and early to mid-19th centuries. Most of these families claimed the Ridgetop Shawnee heritage to explain their dark skin and Indian features and to avoid racial persecution. In 2010 the Kentucky General Assembly passed resolutions that acknowledged the civic contributions of the Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians to the state.
Similar groups
The following are other multi-racial groups that at one time were classified as tri-racial isolates. Some identify as Native American and have received state recognition, as have six tribes in Virginia.
Delaware
Nanticoke-Moors (and in Maryland) Nanticoke groups in Delaware and New Jersey (where they are intermarried with Lenape) have received state recognition. Most had left the area in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Florida
Dominickers of Holmes County in the Florida Panhandle
Indiana
Ben-Ishmael Tribe, pejoratively called "Grasshopper Gypsies"
Louisiana
Redbones (and in Texas)
Maryland
Piscataway Indian Nation, formerly also known as We-Sorts, one of three Piscataway-related groups recognized as Native American tribes by the state
New Jersey and New York
Ramapough Mountain Indians (aka "Jackson Whites") of the Ramapo Mountains, recognized by both New Jersey and New York as Native Americans
North Carolina
Coree or "Faircloth" Indians of Carteret County
Haliwa-Saponi, recognized by the state as Native American
Lumbee, recognized by the state as Native American
Person County Indians, aka "Cubans and Portuguese"
Ohio
Carmel Indians of Highland County
South Carolina
Red Bones (NB: distinct from the Gulf States Redbones)
Turks
Brass Ankles
Virginia
Monacan Indians (a.k.a. "Issues") of Amherst and Rockbridge counties, recognized by state of Virginia and the federal government (2018) as a Native American tribe, along with five other Virginia tribes
West Virginia
Chestnut Ridge people of Barbour County (also known as Mayles or, pejoratively, "Guineas")
Each of these groupings of multiracial populations has a particular history. There is evidence for connections between some of them, going back to common ancestry in colonial Virginia. For example, the Goins surname group in eastern Tennessee has long been identified as Melungeon. The surname Goins is also found among the Lumbee of southern North Carolina, a multi-racial group that has been recognized by the state as a Native American tribe. In most cases, the multi-racial families have to be traced through specific branches and lines, as not all descendants were considered to be Melungeon or other groups.
See also
Melungeon DNA Project
List of topics related to the African diaspora
Vardy Community School
Mulatto
Pardo
References
Further reading
Ball, Bonnie (1992). The Melungeons: Notes on the Origin of a Race' '. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.
Berry, Brewton (1963). Almost White: A Study of Certain Racial Hybrids in the Eastern United States. New York: Macmillan Press.
Bible, Jean Patterson (1975). Melungeons Yesterday and Today. Signal Mountain, Tennessee: Mountain Press.
Brake, Katherine Vande. How They Shine: How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in Fiction of Appalachia. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Brake, Katherine Vande. Through the Back Door: Melungeon Literacies and Twenty-First Century Technologies. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Cavender, Anthony P. "The Melungeons of Upper East Tennessee: Persisting Social Identity," Tennessee Anthropologist 6 (1981): 27-36
DeMarce, Virginia E. (1993). "Looking at Legends – Lumbee and Melungeon: Applied Genealogy and the Origins of Tri-Racial Isolate Settlements." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 81 (March 1993): 24–45, scanned online, Historical-Melungeons
Forbes, Jack D. (1993). Africans and Native Americans: The Language of Race and the Evolution of Red-Black Peoples. University of Illinois Press.
Goins, Jack H. (2000). Melungeons: And Other Pioneer Families, Blountville, Tennessee: Continuity Press.
Hashaw, Tim. Children of Perdition: Melungeons and the Struggle of Mixed America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Heinegg, Paul (2005). FREE AFRICAN AMERICANS OF VIRGINIA, NORTH CAROLINA, SOUTH CAROLINA, MARYLAND AND DELAWARE Including the family histories of more than 80% of those counted as "all other free persons" in the 1790 and 1800 census, Baltimore, Maryland: Genealogical Publishing, 1999–2005. Available in its entirety online.
Hirschman, Elizabeth. Melungeons: The Last Lost Tribe in America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Johnson, Mattie Ruth (1997). My Melungeon Heritage: A Story of Life on Newman's Ridge. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.
Kennedy, N. Brent (1997) The Melungeons: the resurrection of a proud people. Mercer University Press.
Kessler, John S. and Donald Ball. North From the Mountains: A Folk History of the Carmel Melungeon Settlement, Highland County, Ohio. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Langdon, Barbara Tracy (1998). The Melungeons: An Annotated Bibliography: References in both Fiction and Nonfiction, Hemphill, Texas: Dogwood Press.
McGowan, Kathleen (2003). "Where do we really come from?", DISCOVER 24 (5, May 2003)
Offutt, Chris. (1999) "Melungeons", in Out of the Woods, Simon & Schuster.
Overbay, DruAnna Williams. Windows on the Past: The Cultural Heritage of Vardy, Hancock County, Tennessee. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Podber, Jacob. The Electronic Front Porch: An Oral History of the Arrival of Modern Media in Rural Appalachia and the Melungeon Community. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Price, Henry R. (1966). "Melungeons: The Vanishing Colony of Newman's Ridge." Conference paper. American Studies Association of Kentucky and Tennessee. March 25–26, 1966.
Reed, John Shelton (1997). "Mixing in the Mountains", Southern Cultures 3 (Winter 1997): 25–36.
Scolnick, Joseph M Jr. and N. Brent Kennedy. (2004). From Anatolia to Appalachia: A Turkish American Dialogue. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Vande Brake, Katherine (2001). How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in the Fiction of Appalachia, Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.
Williamson, Joel (1980). New People: Miscegenation and Mulattoes in the United States, New York: Free Press.
Winkler, Wayne. 2019. Beyond the sunset: The Melungeon drama, 1969-1976. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Winkler, Wayne (2004). "Walking Toward the Sunset: The Melungeons of Appalachia", Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.
Winkler, Wayne (1997). " The Melungeons", All Things Considered. National Public Radio. 21 September 1997.
External links
Paul Brodwin, ""Bioethics in action" and human population genetics researMacon, GA: Mercer University Press.ch", Culture, Medicine and Psychiatry, Volume 29, Number 2 (2005), 145-178, DOI: 10.1007/s11013-005-7423-2 PDF, addresses issue of 2002 Melungeon DNA study by Kevin Jones, which is unpublished
Melungeon Heritage Association, Official Website
"The Graysville Melungeons", Tennessee Anthropologist, November 1979, hosted at Rootsweb
Paul Heinegg, Free African Americans of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, 1999–2005
"Melungeons", Digital Library of Appalachia. Contains numerous photographs and documents related to Melungeons, mostly from 1900 to 1950.
A Mystery People – The Melungeons From Louis Gates Jr's "Finding your Roots."
"kindness our heroine shows Melungeon outcast Pearl (Erika Coleman)" from AC-T review of Big-Stone-Gap film. Accessed 6/8/2016
Multiracial ethnic groups in the United States
African-American history
Appalachian society
Ethnic groups in Appalachia
Ethnic groups in the United States
History of North Carolina
History of Tennessee
History of Virginia
Scotch-Irish American history
Multiracial affairs in the United States | false | [
"The Open Definition is a document published by the Open Knowledge Foundation (OKF) (previously Open Knowledge International) to define openness in relation to data and content. It specifies what licences for such material may and may not stipulate, in order to be considered open licences. The definition itself was derived from the Open Source Definition for software.\n\nOKI summarise the document as:\n\nThe latest form of the document, published in November 2015, is version 2.1. The use of language in the document is conformant with RFC 2119.\n\nThe document is available under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which itself meets the Open Definition.\n\nHistory \n\n August 2005: Circulation of the first draft of the Open Definition, v0.1. \n July 2006: publication of v1.0\n November 2009: publication of v1.1\n October 2014: publication of v2.0\n November 2015: publication of v2.1\n\nSee also \n Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities\n Budapest Open Access Initiative\nDefinition of Free Cultural Works\n UNESCO 2012 Paris OER Declaration\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\n \n Why the Open Definition Matters for Open Data, September 2014 blog post by Rufus Pollock, founder and president of OKI\n\nOpen data\nOpen content\n2005 documents",
"A definition is a statement of the meaning of a term (a word, phrase, or other set of symbols). Definitions can be classified into two large categories, intensional definitions (which try to give the sense of a term) and extensional definitions (which try to list the objects that a term describes). Another important category of definitions is the class of ostensive definitions, which convey the meaning of a term by pointing out examples. A term may have many different senses and multiple meanings, and thus require multiple definitions.\n\nIn mathematics, a definition is used to give a precise meaning to a new term, by describing a condition which unambiguously qualifies what a mathematical term is and is not. Definitions and axioms form the basis on which all of modern mathematics is to be constructed.\n\nBasic terminology\n\nIn modern usage, a definition is something, typically expressed in words, that attaches a meaning to a word or group of words. The word or group of words that is to be defined is called the definiendum, and the word, group of words, or action that defines it is called the definiens. For example, in the definition \"An elephant is a large gray animal native to Asia and Africa\", the word \"elephant\" is the definiendum, and everything after the word \"is\" is the definiens.\n\nThe definiens is not the meaning of the word defined, but is instead something that conveys the same meaning as that word.\n\nThere are many sub-types of definitions, often specific to a given field of knowledge or study. These include, among many others, lexical definitions, or the common dictionary definitions of words already in a language; demonstrative definitions, which define something by pointing to an example of it (\"This,\" [said while pointing to a large grey animal], \"is an Asian elephant.\"); and precising definitions, which reduce the vagueness of a word, typically in some special sense (\"'Large', among female Asian elephants, is any individual weighing over 5,500 pounds.\").\n\nIntensional definitions vs extensional definitions\n\nAn intensional definition, also called a connotative definition, specifies the necessary and sufficient conditions for a thing to be a member of a specific set. Any definition that attempts to set out the essence of something, such as that by genus and differentia, is an intensional definition.\n\nAn extensional definition, also called a denotative definition, of a concept or term specifies its extension. It is a list naming every object that is a member of a specific set.\n\nThus, the \"seven deadly sins\" can be defined intensionally as those singled out by Pope Gregory I as particularly destructive of the life of grace and charity within a person, thus creating the threat of eternal damnation. An extensional definition, on the other hand, would be the list of wrath, greed, sloth, pride, lust, envy, and gluttony. In contrast, while an intensional definition of \"Prime Minister\" might be \"the most senior minister of a cabinet in the executive branch of parliamentary government\", an extensional definition is not possible since it is not known who the future prime ministers will be (even though all prime ministers from the past and present can be listed).\n\nClasses of intensional definitions\n\nA genus–differentia definition is a type of intensional definition that takes a large category (the genus) and narrows it down to a smaller category by a distinguishing characteristic (i.e. the differentia).\n\nMore formally, a genus–differentia definition consists of:\n a genus (or family): An existing definition that serves as a portion of the new definition; all definitions with the same genus are considered members of that genus.\n the differentia: The portion of the new definition that is not provided by the genus.\n\nFor example, consider the following genus–differentia definitions:\n a triangle: A plane figure that has three straight bounding sides.\n a quadrilateral: A plane figure that has four straight bounding sides.\n\nThose definitions can be expressed as a genus (\"a plane figure\") and two differentiae (\"that has three straight bounding sides\" and \"that has four straight bounding sides\", respectively).\n\nIt is also possible to have two different genus–differentia definitions that describe the same term, especially when the term describes the overlap of two large categories. For instance, both of these genus–differentia definitions of \"square\" are equally acceptable:\n a square: a rectangle that is a rhombus.\n a square: a rhombus that is a rectangle.\n\nThus, a \"square\" is a member of both genera (the plural of genus): the genus \"rectangle\" and the genus \"rhombus\".\n\nClasses of extensional definitions\nOne important form of the extensional definition is ostensive definition. This gives the meaning of a term by pointing, in the case of an individual, to the thing itself, or in the case of a class, to examples of the right kind. For example, one can explain who Alice (an individual) is, by pointing her out to another; or what a rabbit (a class) is, by pointing at several and expecting another to understand. The process of ostensive definition itself was critically appraised by Ludwig Wittgenstein.\n\nAn enumerative definition of a concept or a term is an extensional definition that gives an explicit and exhaustive listing of all the objects that fall under the concept or term in question. Enumerative definitions are only possible for finite sets (and in fact only practical for relatively small sets).\n\nDivisio and partitio\nDivisio and partitio are classical terms for definitions. A partitio is simply an intensional definition. A divisio is not an extensional definition, but an exhaustive list of subsets of a set, in the sense that every member of the \"divided\" set is a member of one of the subsets. An extreme form of divisio lists all sets whose only member is a member of the \"divided\" set. The difference between this and an extensional definition is that extensional definitions list members, and not subsets.\n\nNominal definitions vs real definitions\n\nIn classical thought, a definition was taken to be a statement of the essence of a thing. Aristotle had it that an object's essential attributes form its \"essential nature\", and that a definition of the object must include these essential attributes.\n\nThe idea that a definition should state the essence of a thing led to the distinction between nominal and real essence—a distinction originating with Aristotle. In the Posterior Analytics, he says that the meaning of a made-up name can be known (he gives the example \"goat stag\") without knowing what he calls the \"essential nature\" of the thing that the name would denote (if there were such a thing). This led medieval logicians to distinguish between what they called the quid nominis, or the \"whatness of the name\", and the underlying nature common to all the things it names, which they called the quid rei, or the \"whatness of the thing\". The name \"hobbit\", for example, is perfectly meaningful. It has a quid nominis, but one could not know the real nature of hobbits, and so the quid rei of hobbits cannot be known. By contrast, the name \"man\" denotes real things (men) that have a certain quid rei. The meaning of a name is distinct from the nature that a thing must have in order that the name apply to it.\n\nThis leads to a corresponding distinction between nominal and real definitions. A nominal definition is the definition explaining what a word means (i.e., which says what the \"nominal essence\" is), and is definition in the classical sense as given above. A real definition, by contrast, is one expressing the real nature or quid rei of the thing.\n\nThis preoccupation with essence dissipated in much of modern philosophy. Analytic philosophy, in particular, is critical of attempts to elucidate the essence of a thing. Russell described essence as \"a hopelessly muddle-headed notion\".\n\nMore recently Kripke's formalisation of possible world semantics in modal logic led to a new approach to essentialism. Insofar as the essential properties of a thing are necessary to it, they are those things that it possesses in all possible worlds. Kripke refers to names used in this way as rigid designators.\n\nOperational vs. theoretical definitions\nA definition may also be classified as an operational definition or theoretical definition.\n\nTerms with multiple definitions\n\nHomonyms\n\nA homonym is, in the strict sense, one of a group of words that share the same spelling and pronunciation but have different meanings. Thus homonyms are simultaneously homographs (words that share the same spelling, regardless of their pronunciation) and homophones (words that share the same pronunciation, regardless of their spelling). The state of being a homonym is called homonymy. Examples of homonyms are the pair stalk (part of a plant) and stalk (follow/harass a person) and the pair left (past tense of leave) and left (opposite of right). A distinction is sometimes made between \"true\" homonyms, which are unrelated in origin, such as skate (glide on ice) and skate (the fish), and polysemous homonyms, or polysemes, which have a shared origin, such as mouth (of a river) and mouth (of an animal).\n\nPolysemes\n\nPolysemy is the capacity for a sign (such as a word, phrase, or symbol) to have multiple meanings (that is, multiple semes or sememes and thus multiple senses), usually related by contiguity of meaning within a semantic field. It is thus usually regarded as distinct from homonymy, in which the multiple meanings of a word may be unconnected or unrelated.\n\nIn logic and mathematics\nIn mathematics, definitions are generally not used to describe existing terms, but to describe or characterize a concept. For naming the object of a definition mathematicians can use either a neologism (this was mainly the case in the past) or words or phrases of the common language (this is generally the case in modern mathematics). The precise meaning of a term given by a mathematical definition is often different than the English definition of the word used, which can lead to confusion, particularly when the meanings are close. For example a set is not exactly the same thing in mathematics and in common language. In some case, the word used can be misleading; for example, a real number has nothing more (or less) real than an imaginary number. Frequently, a definition uses a phrase built with common English words, which has no meaning outside mathematics, such as primitive group or irreducible variety.\n\nClassification\nAuthors have used different terms to classify definitions used in formal languages like mathematics. Norman Swartz classifies a definition as \"stipulative\" if it is intended to guide a specific discussion. A stipulative definition might be considered a temporary, working definition, and can only be disproved by showing a logical contradiction. In contrast, a \"descriptive\" definition can be shown to be \"right\" or \"wrong\" with reference to general usage.\n\nSwartz defines a precising definition as one that extends the descriptive dictionary definition (lexical definition) for a specific purpose by including additional criteria. A precising definition narrows the set of things that meet the definition.\n\nC.L. Stevenson has identified persuasive definition as a form of stipulative definition which purports to state the \"true\" or \"commonly accepted\" meaning of a term, while in reality stipulating an altered use (perhaps as an argument for some specific belief). Stevenson has also noted that some definitions are \"legal\" or \"coercive\" – their object is to create or alter rights, duties, or crimes.\n\nRecursive definitions\nA recursive definition, sometimes also called an inductive definition, is one that defines a word in terms of itself, so to speak, albeit in a useful way. Normally this consists of three steps:\n At least one thing is stated to be a member of the set being defined; this is sometimes called a \"base set\".\n All things bearing a certain relation to other members of the set are also to count as members of the set. It is this step that makes the definition recursive.\n All other things are excluded from the set\n\nFor instance, we could define a natural number as follows (after Peano): \n \"0\" is a natural number.\n Each natural number has a unique successor, such that:\n the successor of a natural number is also a natural number;\n distinct natural numbers have distinct successors;\n no natural number is succeeded by \"0\".\n Nothing else is a natural number.\n\nSo \"0\" will have exactly one successor, which for convenience can be called \"1\". In turn, \"1\" will have exactly one successor, which could be called \"2\", and so on. Notice that the second condition in the definition itself refers to natural numbers, and hence involves self-reference. Although this sort of definition involves a form of circularity, it is not vicious, and the definition has been quite successful.\n\nIn the same way, we can define ancestor as follows:\nA parent is an ancestor.\nA parent of an ancestor is an ancestor.\nNothing else is an ancestor.\nOr simply: an ancestor is a parent or a parent of an ancestor.\n\nIn medicine\nIn medical dictionaries, guidelines and other consensus statements and classifications, definitions should as far as possible be:\nsimple and easy to understand, preferably even by the general public;\nuseful clinically or in related areas where the definition will be used;\nspecific (that is, by reading the definition only, it should ideally not be possible to refer to any other entity than that being defined);\nmeasurable;\na reflection of current scientific knowledge.\n\nProblems\n\nCertain rules have traditionally been given for definitions (in particular, genus-differentia definitions).\nA definition must set out the essential attributes of the thing defined.\nDefinitions should avoid circularity. To define a horse as \"a member of the species equus\" would convey no information whatsoever. For this reason, Locke adds that a definition of a term must not consist of terms which are synonymous with it. This would be a circular definition, a circulus in definiendo. Note, however, that it is acceptable to define two relative terms in respect of each other. Clearly, we cannot define \"antecedent\" without using the term \"consequent\", nor conversely.\nThe definition must not be too wide or too narrow. It must be applicable to everything to which the defined term applies (i.e. not miss anything out), and to nothing else (i.e. not include any things to which the defined term would not truly apply).\nThe definition must not be obscure. The purpose of a definition is to explain the meaning of a term which may be obscure or difficult, by the use of terms that are commonly understood and whose meaning is clear. The violation of this rule is known by the Latin term obscurum per obscurius. However, sometimes scientific and philosophical terms are difficult to define without obscurity.\nA definition should not be negative where it can be positive. We should not define \"wisdom\" as the absence of folly, or a healthy thing as whatever is not sick. Sometimes this is unavoidable, however. For example, it appears difficult to define blindness in positive terms rather than as \"the absence of sight in a creature that is normally sighted\".\n\nFallacies of definition\n\nLimitations of definition\nGiven that a natural language such as English contains, at any given time, a finite number of words, any comprehensive list of definitions must either be circular or rely upon primitive notions. If every term of every definiens must itself be defined, \"where at last should we stop?\" A dictionary, for instance, insofar as it is a comprehensive list of lexical definitions, must resort to circularity.\n\nMany philosophers have chosen instead to leave some terms undefined. The scholastic philosophers claimed that the highest genera (called the ten generalissima) cannot be defined, since a higher genus cannot be assigned under which they may fall. Thus being, unity and similar concepts cannot be defined. Locke supposes in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding that the names of simple concepts do not admit of any definition. More recently Bertrand Russell sought to develop a formal language based on logical atoms. Other philosophers, notably Wittgenstein, rejected the need for any undefined simples. Wittgenstein pointed out in his Philosophical Investigations that what counts as a \"simple\" in one circumstance might not do so in another. He rejected the very idea that every explanation of the meaning of a term needed itself to be explained: \"As though an explanation hung in the air unless supported by another one\", claiming instead that explanation of a term is only needed to avoid misunderstanding.\n\nLocke and Mill also argued that individuals cannot be defined. Names are learned by connecting an idea with a sound, so that speaker and hearer have the same idea when the same word is used. This is not possible when no one else is acquainted with the particular thing that has \"fallen under our notice\". Russell offered his theory of descriptions in part as a way of defining a proper name, the definition being given by a definite description that \"picks out\" exactly one individual. Saul Kripke pointed to difficulties with this approach, especially in relation to modality, in his book Naming and Necessity.\n\nThere is a presumption in the classic example of a definition that the definiens can be stated. Wittgenstein argued that for some terms this is not the case.<ref>Philosophical Investigations</ref> The examples he used include game, number and family. In such cases, he argued, there is no fixed boundary that can be used to provide a definition. Rather, the items are grouped together because of a family resemblance. For terms such as these it is not possible and indeed not necessary to state a definition; rather, one simply comes to understand the use of the term.\n\nSee also\n\nAnalytic proposition\nCircular definition\nDefinable set\nDefinitionism\nExtensional definition\nFallacies of definition\nIndeterminacy\nIntensional definition\nLexical definition\nOperational definition\nOstensive definition\nRamsey–Lewis method\nSemantics\nSynthetic proposition\nTheoretical definition\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\n (full text of 1st ed. (1906))\n (worldcat) (full text of 2nd ed. (1916))\n (full text: vol 1, vol 2)\n\nExternal links\n \nDefinitions, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Gupta, Anil (2008)\nDefinitions, Dictionaries, and Meanings, Norman Swartz 1997\nGuy Longworth (ca. 2008) \"Definitions: Uses and Varieties of\". = in: K. Brown (ed.): Elsevier Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics'', Elsevier.\nDefinition and Meaning, a very short introduction by Garth Kemerling (2001).\n\n \nPhilosophical logic\nPhilosophy of language\nSemantics\nLinguistics terminology\nMathematical terminology\nConcepts in logic\nLexicography\nMeaning (philosophy of language)"
] |
[
"Melungeon",
"Definition",
"What is the definition?",
"Melungeons have been defined as having multiracial ancestry."
] | C_94dac338bec64838b4053fc31727774a_1 | Were they considered a certain race on their own? | 2 | Were the Melungeon considered a certain race on their own? | Melungeon | The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity, as they are of mixed racial ancestry. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse origins who migrated, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900. Melungeons have been defined as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese," "Native American," or "light-skinned African American". During the ninetee|nth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies. Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to "marry white" since before the twentieth century. Scholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them "core" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales and marriage licenses. Other researchers include the surnames Powell, LeBon, Bolling, Bunch, Goins, Goodman, Heard, Minor, Mise, those Mullins who are not descended from Booker Mullins (1768-1864) , and several others. Descendants of Booker Mullins are excluded because 1) the Mullins Y-DNA Project in Virginia confirmed that Booker was the son of Sherwood/Sherrod Adkins and is not a "true Mullins" and 2) DNA-tests of Booker's descendants do not have an Melungeon markers in their DNA. (Family lines have to be researched individually, as not all families with these surnames are Melungeon.) As with many other surname groups, not all families with each surname have the same racial background and ancestry. The original meaning of the word "Melungeon" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee. CANNOTANSWER | They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. | Melungeons ( ) are an ethnic group of people from the Southeastern United States who descend from European settlers and Sub-Saharan African slaves. Historically, the Melungeons were associated with settlements in the Cumberland Gap area of central Appalachia, which includes portions of East Tennessee, Southwest Virginia, and eastern Kentucky.
Tri-racial describes populations who claim to be of mixed European, African and Native American ancestry. Although there is no consensus on how many such groups exist, estimates range as high as 200.
Definition
The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse ethnic origins who migrated to frontier areas, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous through the 19th century, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900.
Melungeons have been defined and documented as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese", "Native American", or "light-skinned African American". During the nineteenth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies.
Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to "marry white" since before the twentieth century.
Scholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them "core" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales, and marriage licenses.
The original meaning of the word "Melungeon" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee.
Origins
According to the principle of partus sequitur ventrem, which Virginia incorporated into law in 1662, children born in the colonies were assigned the social status of their mother, regardless of their father's ethnicity or citizenship. This meant the children of enslaved African or African-American women were born into slavery. But it also meant the children of free white or mulatto women, even if fathered by enslaved African men, were born free. The free descendants of such unions formed the majority of ancestors of the free families of color listed in the 1790 and 1810 US censuses. Early colonial Virginia was very much a "melting pot" of peoples, and before slavery hardened as a racial caste, white and black working-class people often lived and worked in close quarters and formed relationships and marriages.
Some of these early multiracial families were ancestors of the later Melungeons, yet each family line must be traced separately. Over the generations, most individuals of the group called Melungeon were persons of mixed European and African descent, sometimes also with Native American ancestry, whose ancestors had been free in colonial Virginia.
Edward Price's dissertation on Mixed-Blood Populations of the Eastern United States as to Origins, Localizations, and Persistence (1950) said that children of European and free black unions had also intermarried with persons of alleged Native American ancestry. In 1894, the U.S. Department of the Interior, in its "Report of Indians Taxed and Not Taxed," noted that the Melungeons in Hawkins County "claim to be Cherokee of mixed blood". The term Melungeon has since sometimes been applied as a catch-all phrase for a number of groups of individuals with mixed-race ancestry.
In 1995, Paul Heinegg published Free African American Families in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, and has since published regular updates. He found through his research and documented that the great majority of free people of color in the 1790 and 1810 censuses had ancestors from colonial Virginia, who were the children of unions between free white women and free, indentured or enslaved African or African-American men.
Similarly, in 2012, the genealogist Roberta Estes and her fellow researchers of the Melungeon DNA Project reported that the Melungeon lines likely originated in the unions of black and white indentured servants living in Virginia in the mid-1600s before slavery became widespread in the United States. They concluded that as laws to prevent the mixing of races were put in place, these family groups intermarried with each other, creating an endogamous group. They migrated together, sometimes along with white neighbors, from western Virginia through the Piedmont frontier of North Carolina, before settling primarily in the mountains of East Tennessee. In addition, the Melungeon DNA Project has documented multiracial ancestry, primarily European and African, for numerous people identified as Melungeon, affirming the evidence from written documentation.
Evidence
Free people of color are documented as migrating with European-American neighbors in the first half of the 18th century to the frontiers of Virginia and North Carolina, where they received land grants like their neighbors. For instance, the Collins, Gibson, and Ridley (Riddle) families owned land adjacent to one another in Orange County, North Carolina, where they and the Bunch family were listed in 1755 as "free Molatas (mulattoes)", subject to taxation on tithes. By settling in frontier areas, free people of color found more amenable living conditions and could escape some of the racial strictures of Virginia and North Carolina Tidewater plantation areas.
Historian Jack D. Forbes has discussed laws in South Carolina related to racial classification:
In 1719, South Carolina decided who should be an "Indian" for tax purposes since American [Indian] slaves were taxed at a lesser rate than African slaves. The act stated: "And for preventing all doubts and scruples that may arise what ought to be rated on mustees, mulattoes, etc. all such slaves as are not entirely Indian shall be accounted as negro.
Forbes said that, at the time, "mustees" and "mulattoes" were terms for persons of part-Native American ancestry. He wrote,
My judgment (to be discussed later) is that a mustee was primarily part-African and American [Indian] and that a mulatto was usually part-European and American [Indian]. The act is also significant because it asserts that part-American [Indians] with or without [emphasis added] African ancestry could be counted as Negroes, thus having an implication for all later slave censuses.This view does not have a consensus.
Beginning about 1767, some of the ancestors of the Melungeons reached the frontier New River area, where they are listed in the 1780s on tax lists of Montgomery County, Virginia. From there they migrated south in the Appalachian Range to Wilkes County, North Carolina, where some are listed as "white" on the 1790 census. They resided in a part that became Ashe County, where they are designated as "other free" in 1800.
The Collins and Gibson families (identified as Melungeon ancestors) were recorded in 1813 as members of the Stony Creek Primitive Baptist Church in Scott County, Virginia. They appear to have been treated as social equals of the white members. The earliest documented use of the term "Melungeon" is found in the minutes of this church (see Etymology below). While there are historical references to the documents, the evidence has come from transcribed copies.
From the Virginia and North Carolina frontiers, the families migrated west into frontier Tennessee and Kentucky. The earliest known Melungeon in what is now northeast Tennessee was Millington Collins, who executed a deed in Hawkins County in 1802. However, there is some evidence that Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hawkins (what is now Hancock County) by 1790. Several Collins and Gibson households were listed in Floyd County, Kentucky in the 1820 census, where they were classified as "free persons of color". On the 1830 censuses of Hawkins and neighboring Grainger County, Tennessee, the Collins and Gibson families are listed as "free-colored". Melungeons were residents of the part of Hawkins that in 1844 was organized as Hancock County.
By 1830, the Melungeon community in Hawkins County numbered 330 people in 55 families; in adjoining Grainger County, there were 130 people in 24 families. According to Edward Price, "Because of them, Hawkins County had more free colored persons in the 1830 census than any other county in Tennessee except Davidson (which includes Nashville) and more free colored families named Collins than any other county in the United States." Melungeon families have also been traced in Ashe County in northwestern North Carolina.
Contemporary accounts documented that Melungeon ancestors were considered by appearance to be mixed race. During the 18th and early 19th centuries, census enumerators classified them as "mulatto", "other free", or as "free persons of color". Sometimes they were listed as "white", sometimes as "black" or "negro", but almost never as "Indian". One family described as "Indian" was the Ridley (Riddle) family, noted as such on a 1767 Pittsylvania County, Virginia, tax list. They had been designated as "mulattoes" in an earlier record of 1755. Estes et al., in their 2012 summary of the Melungeon Core DNA Testing Program, stated that the Riddle family is the only Melungeon participant with historical records identifying them as having Native American origins, but their DNA is European. Among the participants, only the Sizemore family is documented as having Native American DNA.
The court record of Jacob Perkins vs. John White (1858) in Johnson County, Tennessee, provides definitions of the time related to race and free people of color. As in Virginia, if a free person was mostly white (one-eighth or less black), he was considered legally white and a citizen of the state:
"Persons that are known and recognized by the Constitution and laws of Tennessee, as free persons of color are those who by the act of 1794 section 32 are taken and deemed to be capable in law to be certified in any case what is in, except against each other or in the language of the statute "all Negroes, Indians, Mulattoes, and all persons of mixed blood descended from Negro or Indian ancestors to the third generation inclusive though one ancestor of each generation may have been a white person, white bond or free."... That if the great grandfather of Plaintiff was an Indian or Negro and he is descended on the mother's side from a white woman, without any further Negro or Indian blood than such as he derived on the father's side, then the Plaintiff is not of mix blood, or within the third generation inclusive; in other words that if the Plaintiff has not in his veins more than 1/8 of Negro or Indian blood, he is a citizen of this state and it would be slanderous to call him a Negro."
During the 19th century, due to their intermarriages with white spouses, Melungeon-surnamed families were increasingly classified as white on census records. In 1935, a Nevada newspaper anecdotally described Melungeons as "mulattoes" with "straight hair."
Assimilation
Ariela Gross has shown by analysis of court cases, the shift from perceptions of an individual as "mulatto" to "white" was often dependent upon appearance and, especially, community perception of a person's activities in life: who one associated with and whether the person fulfilled the common obligations of citizens. Census takers were generally people of a community, so they classified people racially as they were known by the community. Definitions of racial categories were often imprecise and ambiguous, especially for "mulatto" and "free person of color". In the Thirteen Colonies and the United States at times in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, "mulatto" could mean a mixture of African and European, African and Native American, European and Native American, or all three. At the same time, these groups intermarried.
Persons were often identified by the company they kept and which ethnic culture they identified with. There were differences between how people identified themselves and how others identified them. Because of slavery, colonial and state laws were biased toward identifying multiracial people of partial African origin as African or 'black,' although persons of mixed African and Native American descent often identified and lived culturally as Native Americans, particularly if their maternal line was Native American. Many Native American tribes were organized into matrilineal kinship systems, in which children were considered born into the mother's clan and took their social status from her people; inheritance and descent was figured through the maternal lines.
Because of the loose terminology and social attitudes to mixed-race persons, remnant non-reservation American Indians in the Upper South were generally not recorded separately as Indians. They were often gradually reclassified as mulatto or free people of color, especially as generations intermarried with neighbors of African descent. In the early decades of the 20th century, Virginia and some other states passed laws imposing the one-drop rule, requiring all persons to be classified as either white or black: those of any known African ancestry were to be classified as black, regardless of appearance, and how they self-identified or were known in the community.
After Virginia passed its Racial Integrity Act of 1924, officials went so far as to alter existing birth and marriage records to reclassify as "colored" some mixed-race individuals or families who identified as and had been recorded as "Indian". These actions destroyed the documented continuity of identity of several Indian communities. The historical documentation of continuity of self-identified Native American families was lost. If the families happened to be Catholic, their churches continued to record births and marriages as being among "Indian" families. But the process of loss of historical and cultural continuity appeared to have happened also with some of the non-reservation remnant Lenape Indians of Delaware.
According to the Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture, in his 1950 dissertation, cultural geographer Edward Price proposed that Melungeons were families descended from free people of color (who were of European and African ancestry) and mixed-race unions between persons of African ancestry and Native Americans in colonial Virginia, whose territory included the modern-day states of Kentucky and West Virginia.
Acceptance
The families known as "Melungeons" in the 19th century were generally well integrated into the communities in which they lived, though they may still have been affected by racism. Records show that on the whole, they enjoyed the same rights as whites. For example, they held property, voted, and served in the Army; some, such as the Gibsons, owned slaves as early as the 18th century.
Under the first Tennessee constitution of 1796, free people of color (males only) were allowed to vote. Following fears raised by the 1831 Nat Turner slave rebellion in Virginia, Tennessee and other southern states passed new restrictions on free people of color. By its new constitution of 1834, Tennessee disfranchised free people of color, reducing them to second-class status and excluding them from the political system.
In this period, several Melungeon men were tried in Hawkins County in 1846 for "illegal voting", under suspicion of being black or free men of color (and thereby ineligible for voting). They were acquitted, presumably by demonstrating to the court's satisfaction that they had no appreciable black ancestry. Standards were not as strict as under the later laws of the "one drop rule" of the 20th century. As in some other cases, racial status was chiefly determined by people testifying as to how the men were perceived by the community and whether they had "acted white" by voting, serving in the militia, or undertaking other common citizens' obligations available to white men.
After the American Civil War and following the Reconstruction Era, southern whites struggled to regain political power and re-assert white supremacy over freedmen and traditionally free families such as the Melungeons. The white Democrat-dominated state legislatures passed Jim Crow laws. But issues of race were often brought to court as a result of arguments about money.
For example, in 1872, a widowed woman's Melungeon ancestry was assessed in a trial in Hamilton County, Tennessee. The case was brought by relatives of her late husband, who challenged her inheritance of money from him after his death. They questioned the legitimacy of a marriage between a white man and a woman known to be Melungeon, and argued the marriage was not legitimate because the woman was of black ancestry. Based on the testimony of people in the community, the court decided the woman in the case was not of African ancestry, or had no such ancestors recently enough to matter.
During the period of segregation, a North Carolina statute barred "Portuguese" people—presumably Melungeons, as North Carolina does not have a large Portuguese American community—from whites-only schools. However, under this statute the "Portuguese" were not classified as Black, and they were not required to attend Black schools.
Modern anthropological and sociological studies of Melungeon descendants in Appalachia have demonstrated that they have become culturally indistinguishable from their "non-Melungeon," white neighbors: they share a Baptist religious affiliation and other community features. With changing attitudes and a desire for more work opportunities, numerous descendants of the early Melungeon pioneer families have migrated from Appalachia to make their lives in other parts of the United States.
Legends
In spite of being culturally and linguistically similar to their European neighbors, these multi-racial families were of a sufficiently different physical appearance to provoke speculation as to their identity and origins. In the first half of the 19th century, the pejorative term "Melungeon" began to be applied to these families by local white (European-American) neighbors. Local "knowledge" or myths soon began to arise about them. According to historian Pat Elder, the earliest of these was that they were "Indian" (more specifically, "Cherokee"). Jack Goins, an identified Melungeon descendant and researcher, states that the Melungeons claimed to be both Indian and Portuguese. An example was "Spanish Peggy" Gibson, wife of Vardy Collins.
A few ancestors may have been of mixed Iberian (Spanish and/or Portuguese) and African origin. Historian Ira Berlin has noted that some early slaves and free blacks of the charter generation in the colonies were "Atlantic Creoles", mixed-race descendants of Iberian workers and African women from slave ports in Africa. Their male descendants grew up bilingual and accompanied Europeans as workers or slaves. The majority of Melungeon early ancestors, who had migrated from Virginia over time, are of northern European and African ancestry, given the history of settlement in late 17th–early-18th century eastern Virginia. Later generations in Tennessee intermarried with descendants of Scotch-Irish immigrants who arrived in the mid- to late-18th century and settled in the backcountry before the American Revolution.
Given historical evidence of Native American settlement patterns, Cherokee Nation descent is highly unlikely for the original Melungeon ancestral families. These families were formed during the colonial era in the Virginia Tidewater areas, which were not Cherokee territory. Some of their descendants may have later intermarried with isolated individuals of Cherokee or other Native American ancestry in East Tennessee. Melungeons in Graysville, Tennessee claimed Cherokee ancestors.
Anthropologist E. Raymond Evans wrote (1979) regarding these claims:
In Graysville, the Melungeons strongly deny their Black heritage and explain their genetic differences by claiming to have had Cherokee grandmothers. Many of the local whites also claim Cherokee ancestry and appear to accept the Melungeon claim ...
In 1999 historian C. S. Everett hypothesized that John Collins (recorded as a Sapony Indian who was expelled from Orange County, Virginia about January 1743), might be the same man as the Melungeon ancestor John Collins, classified as a "mulatto" in 1755 North Carolina records. But Everett has revised that theory after having discovered evidence that these were two different men named John Collins. Only descendants of the latter man, identified as mulatto in the 1755 record in North Carolina, has any proven connection to the Melungeon families of eastern Tennessee.
Other peoples frequently suggested as Melungeon ancestors are the Black Dutch and the Powhatan Indian group. The Powhatan were an Algonquian-speaking tribe who inhabited eastern Virginia during the initial period of European colonization.
Speculation about Melungeon origins continued during the 19th and 20th centuries. Writers recounted folk tales of shipwrecked sailors, lost colonists, hoards of silver, and ancient peoples such as the Carthaginians or Phoenicians. With each writer, new elements were added to the mythology surrounding this group, and more surnames were added to the list of possible Melungeon ancestors. Journalist Will Allen Dromgoole wrote several articles on the Melungeons in the 1890s.
In the late 20th century, amateur researchers suggested that the Melungeons' ethnic identity may include ancestors who were Turks and Sephardi (Iberian) Jews. The writers David Beers Quinn and Ivor Noel Hume theorize that the Melungeons were descended from Sephardi Jews who fled the Inquisition and came as sailors to North America. They also say that Francis Drake did not repatriate all the Turks he saved from the sack of Cartagena, but some came to the colonies. But Janet Crain notes that there is no written documentation to support this theory.
The paper on the Melungeon DNA Project, published by Paul Heinegg, Jack Goins, and Roberta Estes in the Journal of Genetic Genealogy, shows that ancestry of the sample is primarily European and African, with only one person having a Native American paternal haplotype. There is no genetic evidence to support the Turkish or Jewish ancestry theories.
Etymology
There are many hypotheses about the etymology of the term Melungeon. Linguists and many researchers believe that it may have been derived from the French mélange, meaning mixture, or perhaps [nous] mélangeons meaning "[we] mix/mingle". This etymology is also found in several dictionaries. There were numerous French Huguenot immigrants in Virginia from 1700, and their language could have contributed a term.
Joanne Pezzullo and Karlton Douglas speculate that a more likely derivation of Melungeon, related to the dominance of the English language in the colonies, may have been from the now obsolete English word malengin (also spelled mal engin) meaning "guile", "deceit", or "ill intent." It was used by Edmund Spenser as the name of a trickster figure in his epic poem, The Faerie Queene (1590–1596), popular in Elizabethan England. The phrase, "harbored them Melungins," would be equivalent to "harbored someone of ill will", or could mean "harbored evil people", without reference to any ethnicity.
A different explanation traces the word to malungu (or malungo), a Luso-African word from Angola, meaning shipmate, derived from the Kimbundu word ma'luno, meaning "companion" or "friend". The word, spelled as Melungo and Mulungo, has been found in numerous Portuguese records. It is said to be a derogatory word that Africans used for people of Portuguese or other white ancestry. If so, the word was likely brought to America through people of African ancestry.
Kennedy (1994) speculates that the word derives from the Turkish melun can (from Arabic mal`un jinn ملعون جنّ), which purportedly means "damned soul." He suggests that, at the time, the (condemned soul) was a term used by Turks for Muslims who had been captured and enslaved aboard Spanish galleons.
Some writers try to connect the term Melungeon to an ethnic origin of people designated by that term, but there is no basis for this assumption. It appears the name arose as an exonym, something which neighboring people, of whatever origin, called the multi-racial people.
On October 7, 1840, the polemical Brownlow's Whig of Jonesborough, Tennessee, published an article entitled "Negro Speaking!" The publisher referred to a rival Democratic politician with a party in Sullivan County as "an impudent Malungeon from Washington City a scoundrel who is half Negro and half Indian," then as a "free negroe". In this and related articles, he does not identify the Democrat by name.
Modern identity
The term Melungeon was historically considered an insult, a label applied to Appalachians who were by appearance or reputation of mixed-race ancestry. In southwest Virginia, the term Ramp was similarly applied to people of mixed race. This term has never shed its pejorative character.
In December 1943, Virginia State Registrar of Vital Statistics, Walter Ashby Plecker, sent county officials a letter warning against "colored" families trying to pass as "white" or "Indian" in violation of the Racial Integrity Act of 1924. He identified specific surnames by county, including: "Lee, Smyth and Wise: Collins, Gibson, (Gipson), Moore, Goins, Ramsey, Delph, Bunch, Freeman, Mise, Barlow, Bolden (Bolin), Mullins, Hawkins (chiefly Tennessee Melungeons)". (Lee County, Virginia borders Hancock County, Tennessee.) He directed the offices to reclassify members of certain families as black, causing the loss for numerous families of documentation in records that showed their continued identification as Native American.
Different researchers have developed their own lists of the surnames of core Melungeon families. Generally, specific lines within families have to be traced to document such identity. For example, DeMarce (1992) listed Hale as a Melungeon surname.
By the mid-to-late 19th century, the term Melungeon appeared to have been used most frequently to refer to the biracial families of Hancock County and neighboring areas. Several other uses of the term in the print media, from mid-19th to early 20th century, have been collected at the Melungeon Heritage Association Website. The spelling of the term varied widely, as was common for words and names at the time. Eventually, the form "Melungeon" became standard.
Since the late 1960s, "Melungeon" has been increasingly adopted by individuals who identify with the ethnic group. This shift in meaning may have resulted from the popularity of Walk Toward the Sunset, a drama written by playwright Kermit Hunter and produced outdoors. The play was first presented in 1969 in Sneedville, the county seat of Hancock County. Making no claim to historical accuracy, Hunter portrayed the Melungeons as indigenous people of uncertain race who were mistakenly perceived as black by neighboring white settlers. As the drama portrayed Melungeons in a positive, romantic light, many individuals began for the first time to self-identify by that term. Hunter intended for his drama "to improve the socio-economic climate" of Hancock County, and to "lift the Melungeon name 'from shame to the hall of fame'." The play helped revive interest in the history of Melungeons. The civil rights movement and social changes of the 1960s further contributed to wider acceptance of members of the group. Research in social history and genealogy has documented new facts about people identified as Melungeons.
Since the mid-1990s, popular interest in the Melungeons has grown tremendously, although many descendants have left the region of historical concentration. Writer Bill Bryson devoted the better part of a chapter to them in his The Lost Continent (1989).
N. Brent Kennedy, a non-specialist, wrote a book on his claimed Melungeon roots, The Melungeons: The Resurrection of a Proud People (1994). With the advent of the internet, many people are researching family history and the number of people self-identifying as having Melungeon ancestry has increased rapidly, according to Kennedy. Some individuals have begun to self-identify as Melungeons after reading about the group on a website and discovering their surname on the expanding list of "Melungeon-associated" surnames. Others believe they have certain "characteristic" physical traits or conditions or assume that a multi-racial heritage means they are Melungeon.
For example, some Melungeons are allegedly identifiable by shovel-shaped incisors, a dental feature more commonly found among, but not restricted to, Native Americans and Northeast Asians. After an unsubstantiated hypothesis, popularized by N. Brent Kennedy, that Melungeons are of Turkish origin, some people have identified as having an enlarged external occipital protuberance, dubbed an "Anatolian bump".
Academic historians have not found any evidence for this thesis, nor is it supported by results from the Melungeon DNA Project. As noted before, this analysis shows that Melungeon descendants overwhelmingly have northern European and African DNA ancestry.
Internet sites promote the anecdotal claim that Melungeons are more prone to certain diseases, such as sarcoidosis or familial Mediterranean fever. Academic medical centers have noted that neither of these diseases is confined to a single population.
Kennedy's claims of ancestral connections to this group have been strongly disputed. The professional genealogist and historian, Virginia E. DeMarce, reviewed his 1994 book and found that Kennedy's documentation of his Melungeon ancestry was seriously flawed. He had a very indistinct definition of Melungeons, although the group had already been extensively studied and documented by other researchers. She criticized Kennedy for trying to include people who might have had other than northern European ancestry, and said that he did not properly take account of existing historical records or recognized genealogical practice in his research. He claimed to have ancestors who were persecuted for racial reasons. However, she found that his named ancestors were all classified as white in records, held various political offices (which showed they could vote and were supported by their community), and were landowners. Kennedy responded to her critique in an article of his own.<ref>[http://underonesky.org/SEKMIE_PDF/SEKMIE3A.pdf "Dr. Brent Kennedy Responds to Virginia DeMarce", Southeastern Kentucky Melungeon Information Exchange]</ref>
The Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians in Kentucky, which is neither federally recognized or state recognized as an Indian tribe, claims that most families in its area who are commonly identified as Melungeon are of partial Native American descent. The organization says their ancestors migrated to the region in the late 18th and early to mid-19th centuries. Most of these families claimed the Ridgetop Shawnee heritage to explain their dark skin and Indian features and to avoid racial persecution. In 2010 the Kentucky General Assembly passed resolutions that acknowledged the civic contributions of the Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians to the state.
Similar groups
The following are other multi-racial groups that at one time were classified as tri-racial isolates. Some identify as Native American and have received state recognition, as have six tribes in Virginia.
Delaware
Nanticoke-Moors (and in Maryland) Nanticoke groups in Delaware and New Jersey (where they are intermarried with Lenape) have received state recognition. Most had left the area in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Florida
Dominickers of Holmes County in the Florida Panhandle
Indiana
Ben-Ishmael Tribe, pejoratively called "Grasshopper Gypsies"
Louisiana
Redbones (and in Texas)
Maryland
Piscataway Indian Nation, formerly also known as We-Sorts, one of three Piscataway-related groups recognized as Native American tribes by the state
New Jersey and New York
Ramapough Mountain Indians (aka "Jackson Whites") of the Ramapo Mountains, recognized by both New Jersey and New York as Native Americans
North Carolina
Coree or "Faircloth" Indians of Carteret County
Haliwa-Saponi, recognized by the state as Native American
Lumbee, recognized by the state as Native American
Person County Indians, aka "Cubans and Portuguese"
Ohio
Carmel Indians of Highland County
South Carolina
Red Bones (NB: distinct from the Gulf States Redbones)
Turks
Brass Ankles
Virginia
Monacan Indians (a.k.a. "Issues") of Amherst and Rockbridge counties, recognized by state of Virginia and the federal government (2018) as a Native American tribe, along with five other Virginia tribes
West Virginia
Chestnut Ridge people of Barbour County (also known as Mayles or, pejoratively, "Guineas")
Each of these groupings of multiracial populations has a particular history. There is evidence for connections between some of them, going back to common ancestry in colonial Virginia. For example, the Goins surname group in eastern Tennessee has long been identified as Melungeon. The surname Goins is also found among the Lumbee of southern North Carolina, a multi-racial group that has been recognized by the state as a Native American tribe. In most cases, the multi-racial families have to be traced through specific branches and lines, as not all descendants were considered to be Melungeon or other groups.
See also
Melungeon DNA Project
List of topics related to the African diaspora
Vardy Community School
Mulatto
Pardo
References
Further reading
Ball, Bonnie (1992). The Melungeons: Notes on the Origin of a Race' '. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.
Berry, Brewton (1963). Almost White: A Study of Certain Racial Hybrids in the Eastern United States. New York: Macmillan Press.
Bible, Jean Patterson (1975). Melungeons Yesterday and Today. Signal Mountain, Tennessee: Mountain Press.
Brake, Katherine Vande. How They Shine: How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in Fiction of Appalachia. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Brake, Katherine Vande. Through the Back Door: Melungeon Literacies and Twenty-First Century Technologies. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Cavender, Anthony P. "The Melungeons of Upper East Tennessee: Persisting Social Identity," Tennessee Anthropologist 6 (1981): 27-36
DeMarce, Virginia E. (1993). "Looking at Legends – Lumbee and Melungeon: Applied Genealogy and the Origins of Tri-Racial Isolate Settlements." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 81 (March 1993): 24–45, scanned online, Historical-Melungeons
Forbes, Jack D. (1993). Africans and Native Americans: The Language of Race and the Evolution of Red-Black Peoples. University of Illinois Press.
Goins, Jack H. (2000). Melungeons: And Other Pioneer Families, Blountville, Tennessee: Continuity Press.
Hashaw, Tim. Children of Perdition: Melungeons and the Struggle of Mixed America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Heinegg, Paul (2005). FREE AFRICAN AMERICANS OF VIRGINIA, NORTH CAROLINA, SOUTH CAROLINA, MARYLAND AND DELAWARE Including the family histories of more than 80% of those counted as "all other free persons" in the 1790 and 1800 census, Baltimore, Maryland: Genealogical Publishing, 1999–2005. Available in its entirety online.
Hirschman, Elizabeth. Melungeons: The Last Lost Tribe in America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Johnson, Mattie Ruth (1997). My Melungeon Heritage: A Story of Life on Newman's Ridge. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.
Kennedy, N. Brent (1997) The Melungeons: the resurrection of a proud people. Mercer University Press.
Kessler, John S. and Donald Ball. North From the Mountains: A Folk History of the Carmel Melungeon Settlement, Highland County, Ohio. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Langdon, Barbara Tracy (1998). The Melungeons: An Annotated Bibliography: References in both Fiction and Nonfiction, Hemphill, Texas: Dogwood Press.
McGowan, Kathleen (2003). "Where do we really come from?", DISCOVER 24 (5, May 2003)
Offutt, Chris. (1999) "Melungeons", in Out of the Woods, Simon & Schuster.
Overbay, DruAnna Williams. Windows on the Past: The Cultural Heritage of Vardy, Hancock County, Tennessee. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Podber, Jacob. The Electronic Front Porch: An Oral History of the Arrival of Modern Media in Rural Appalachia and the Melungeon Community. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Price, Henry R. (1966). "Melungeons: The Vanishing Colony of Newman's Ridge." Conference paper. American Studies Association of Kentucky and Tennessee. March 25–26, 1966.
Reed, John Shelton (1997). "Mixing in the Mountains", Southern Cultures 3 (Winter 1997): 25–36.
Scolnick, Joseph M Jr. and N. Brent Kennedy. (2004). From Anatolia to Appalachia: A Turkish American Dialogue. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Vande Brake, Katherine (2001). How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in the Fiction of Appalachia, Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.
Williamson, Joel (1980). New People: Miscegenation and Mulattoes in the United States, New York: Free Press.
Winkler, Wayne. 2019. Beyond the sunset: The Melungeon drama, 1969-1976. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Winkler, Wayne (2004). "Walking Toward the Sunset: The Melungeons of Appalachia", Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.
Winkler, Wayne (1997). " The Melungeons", All Things Considered. National Public Radio. 21 September 1997.
External links
Paul Brodwin, ""Bioethics in action" and human population genetics researMacon, GA: Mercer University Press.ch", Culture, Medicine and Psychiatry, Volume 29, Number 2 (2005), 145-178, DOI: 10.1007/s11013-005-7423-2 PDF, addresses issue of 2002 Melungeon DNA study by Kevin Jones, which is unpublished
Melungeon Heritage Association, Official Website
"The Graysville Melungeons", Tennessee Anthropologist, November 1979, hosted at Rootsweb
Paul Heinegg, Free African Americans of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, 1999–2005
"Melungeons", Digital Library of Appalachia. Contains numerous photographs and documents related to Melungeons, mostly from 1900 to 1950.
A Mystery People – The Melungeons From Louis Gates Jr's "Finding your Roots."
"kindness our heroine shows Melungeon outcast Pearl (Erika Coleman)" from AC-T review of Big-Stone-Gap film. Accessed 6/8/2016
Multiracial ethnic groups in the United States
African-American history
Appalachian society
Ethnic groups in Appalachia
Ethnic groups in the United States
History of North Carolina
History of Tennessee
History of Virginia
Scotch-Irish American history
Multiracial affairs in the United States | true | [
"Ether Saga Odyssey (commonly abbreviated as ESO), was a free-to-play MMORPG developed by Perfect World. The International version was released worldwide in an English-language format. Ether Saga launched its closed beta February 2, 2009. The open beta began on March 17, 2009. And was fully released on July 1, 2009. Arcgames shut down Ether Saga Odyssey on January 4, 2016.\n\nEther Saga Online is heavily based on the Chinese novel Journey to the West.\n\nRaces\nRen is the archetypal human race. The Ren run most of the major cities. They have advanced technology, societies and political systems. Their influence extends far and wide. It is the Human task to collect fragments of the Divine Chalice which were scattered about the world when a clumsy official dropped it.\n\nShenzu is the Demigod race. These individuals keep mostly to themselves focusing on spiritual cultivation and reaching higher levels of consciousness. They have been instructed to capture a certain pig demon who is actually the reincarnation of a powerful yet unruly heavenly general.\n\nYaoh were once animals but through advanced spiritual cultivation they were acknowledged by Heaven and granted acceptance as powerful and worthy of respect. Yaoh communities are found in various parts of the land. Their goal is to find a Sacred Ark that was discovered missing during the Peach Yard Banquet. Without this vessel the sacred knowledge cannot be brought to the Middle Kingdom.\n\nMogui are descents of Dragons. They are dark skinned with horns who live in volcano like area called Zappah Altar, where they Worship their deity, the Zappah Dragon. Currently all Mogui players are set on a mission to advertise their existence and power to the other races, the world, and to the gods.\n\nClasses\nDragoon\nConsidered as a Tank. Engages in battle using a spear and wears Guardian armor.\n\nRogue\nConsidered as a damage dealer. Uses poison-tipped daggers and wears Scout armor.\n\nMystic\nis a healer, can cast Buffs. Uses a staff for battle and wears Arcane armor.\n\nRanger\nConsidered a ranged damage dealer. Can cast debuffs on enemies. Wears Scout armor and fights with a bow.\n\nConjurer\nis an offensive spell-caster. Can cast positive buffs. Equips a type of weapon called and wears Arcane armor in battle.\n\nShaman\nis a healer with great debuffing abilities. Wears Guardian armor and fights with a hammer.\n\nMaven\nis an offensive spell-caster with many bleeding curses. Wears Arcane armors and fight with a scepter\n\nHellion\nis an offensive melee class. Has a special system, rage system that means they get mana by being hit. They can sacrifice their own hp to get rage. Wears Guardian armor and fights with dual-axes\n\nFeatures\nPet System\nEther Saga Online has an expansive pet system in which pets can be leveled, trained, evolved and combined with each other. All four races have a starter pet.\nThe starter pets consist of:\n the Shenzu race get a Baby Matou Longtail\n the Yaoh race get a Baby Katsu Fox\n the Mogui get a Redmalkin Cub\n the Ren race get a Baby Dewdrop Bunny\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Ether Saga Official Website\n Ether Saga US Official Website\n Ether Saga English Unofficial Wikipedia\n Ether Saga Encyclopedia\n\n2008 video games\nMassively multiplayer online role-playing games\nFantasy massively multiplayer online role-playing games\nFantasy video games\nPerfect World games\nShenmo fiction\nProducts and services discontinued in 2016\nVideo games developed in China\nLua (programming language)-scripted video games\nInactive massively multiplayer online games\nWindows games\nWindows-only games\nVideo games based on Chinese mythology",
"The 1965 Giro d'Italia was the 48th running of the Giro d'Italia, one of cycling's Grand Tour races. The Giro started in San Marino, on 15 May, with a stage and concluded in Florence, on 6 June, with a leg. A total of 100 riders from 10 teams entered the 22-stage race, which was won by Italian Vittorio Adorni of the Salvarani team. The second and third places were taken by Italian riders Italo Zilioli and Felice Gimondi, respectively.\n\nTeams\n\nTen teams were invited by the race organizers to participate in the 1965 edition of the Giro d'Italia. Each team sent a squad of ten riders, which meant that the race started with a peloton of 100 cyclists. From the riders that began the race, 80 made it to the finish in Florence.\n\nThe teams entering the race were:\n\nRoute and stages\n\nThe race route was revealed to the public on 25 March 1965 by race director Vincenzo Torriani. San Marino hosted the start of the race, which marked the first time in race history that the race began outside of Italy. The small country only hosted the stage's start as the stage concluded in Perugia.\n\nClassification leadership\n\nOne jersey was worn during the 1965 Giro d'Italia. The leader of the general classification – calculated by adding the stage finish times of each rider – wore a pink jersey. This classification is the most important of the race, and its winner is considered as the winner of the Giro.\n\nThe mountains classification leader. Certain climbs were given different categories based on their difficulty, which each awarded different levels of points for each category. The first riders to the top of the climbs were awarded points. Although no jersey was awarded, there was also one classification for the teams, in which the teams were awarded points for their rider's performance during the stages.\n\nFinal standings\n\nGeneral classification\n\nMountains classification\n\nReferences\n\nCitations\n\n \n1965\nGiro d'Italia\nGiro d'Italia\nGiro d'Italia\nGiro d'Italia\n1965 Super Prestige Pernod"
] |
[
"Melungeon",
"Definition",
"What is the definition?",
"Melungeons have been defined as having multiracial ancestry.",
"Were they considered a certain race on their own?",
"They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype."
] | C_94dac338bec64838b4053fc31727774a_1 | Were there more dominant characteristics? | 3 | Were there more dominant characteristics among the Melungeon? | Melungeon | The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity, as they are of mixed racial ancestry. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse origins who migrated, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900. Melungeons have been defined as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese," "Native American," or "light-skinned African American". During the ninetee|nth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies. Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to "marry white" since before the twentieth century. Scholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them "core" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales and marriage licenses. Other researchers include the surnames Powell, LeBon, Bolling, Bunch, Goins, Goodman, Heard, Minor, Mise, those Mullins who are not descended from Booker Mullins (1768-1864) , and several others. Descendants of Booker Mullins are excluded because 1) the Mullins Y-DNA Project in Virginia confirmed that Booker was the son of Sherwood/Sherrod Adkins and is not a "true Mullins" and 2) DNA-tests of Booker's descendants do not have an Melungeon markers in their DNA. (Family lines have to be researched individually, as not all families with these surnames are Melungeon.) As with many other surname groups, not all families with each surname have the same racial background and ancestry. The original meaning of the word "Melungeon" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee. CANNOTANSWER | They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. | Melungeons ( ) are an ethnic group of people from the Southeastern United States who descend from European settlers and Sub-Saharan African slaves. Historically, the Melungeons were associated with settlements in the Cumberland Gap area of central Appalachia, which includes portions of East Tennessee, Southwest Virginia, and eastern Kentucky.
Tri-racial describes populations who claim to be of mixed European, African and Native American ancestry. Although there is no consensus on how many such groups exist, estimates range as high as 200.
Definition
The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse ethnic origins who migrated to frontier areas, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous through the 19th century, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900.
Melungeons have been defined and documented as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese", "Native American", or "light-skinned African American". During the nineteenth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies.
Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to "marry white" since before the twentieth century.
Scholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them "core" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales, and marriage licenses.
The original meaning of the word "Melungeon" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee.
Origins
According to the principle of partus sequitur ventrem, which Virginia incorporated into law in 1662, children born in the colonies were assigned the social status of their mother, regardless of their father's ethnicity or citizenship. This meant the children of enslaved African or African-American women were born into slavery. But it also meant the children of free white or mulatto women, even if fathered by enslaved African men, were born free. The free descendants of such unions formed the majority of ancestors of the free families of color listed in the 1790 and 1810 US censuses. Early colonial Virginia was very much a "melting pot" of peoples, and before slavery hardened as a racial caste, white and black working-class people often lived and worked in close quarters and formed relationships and marriages.
Some of these early multiracial families were ancestors of the later Melungeons, yet each family line must be traced separately. Over the generations, most individuals of the group called Melungeon were persons of mixed European and African descent, sometimes also with Native American ancestry, whose ancestors had been free in colonial Virginia.
Edward Price's dissertation on Mixed-Blood Populations of the Eastern United States as to Origins, Localizations, and Persistence (1950) said that children of European and free black unions had also intermarried with persons of alleged Native American ancestry. In 1894, the U.S. Department of the Interior, in its "Report of Indians Taxed and Not Taxed," noted that the Melungeons in Hawkins County "claim to be Cherokee of mixed blood". The term Melungeon has since sometimes been applied as a catch-all phrase for a number of groups of individuals with mixed-race ancestry.
In 1995, Paul Heinegg published Free African American Families in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, and has since published regular updates. He found through his research and documented that the great majority of free people of color in the 1790 and 1810 censuses had ancestors from colonial Virginia, who were the children of unions between free white women and free, indentured or enslaved African or African-American men.
Similarly, in 2012, the genealogist Roberta Estes and her fellow researchers of the Melungeon DNA Project reported that the Melungeon lines likely originated in the unions of black and white indentured servants living in Virginia in the mid-1600s before slavery became widespread in the United States. They concluded that as laws to prevent the mixing of races were put in place, these family groups intermarried with each other, creating an endogamous group. They migrated together, sometimes along with white neighbors, from western Virginia through the Piedmont frontier of North Carolina, before settling primarily in the mountains of East Tennessee. In addition, the Melungeon DNA Project has documented multiracial ancestry, primarily European and African, for numerous people identified as Melungeon, affirming the evidence from written documentation.
Evidence
Free people of color are documented as migrating with European-American neighbors in the first half of the 18th century to the frontiers of Virginia and North Carolina, where they received land grants like their neighbors. For instance, the Collins, Gibson, and Ridley (Riddle) families owned land adjacent to one another in Orange County, North Carolina, where they and the Bunch family were listed in 1755 as "free Molatas (mulattoes)", subject to taxation on tithes. By settling in frontier areas, free people of color found more amenable living conditions and could escape some of the racial strictures of Virginia and North Carolina Tidewater plantation areas.
Historian Jack D. Forbes has discussed laws in South Carolina related to racial classification:
In 1719, South Carolina decided who should be an "Indian" for tax purposes since American [Indian] slaves were taxed at a lesser rate than African slaves. The act stated: "And for preventing all doubts and scruples that may arise what ought to be rated on mustees, mulattoes, etc. all such slaves as are not entirely Indian shall be accounted as negro.
Forbes said that, at the time, "mustees" and "mulattoes" were terms for persons of part-Native American ancestry. He wrote,
My judgment (to be discussed later) is that a mustee was primarily part-African and American [Indian] and that a mulatto was usually part-European and American [Indian]. The act is also significant because it asserts that part-American [Indians] with or without [emphasis added] African ancestry could be counted as Negroes, thus having an implication for all later slave censuses.This view does not have a consensus.
Beginning about 1767, some of the ancestors of the Melungeons reached the frontier New River area, where they are listed in the 1780s on tax lists of Montgomery County, Virginia. From there they migrated south in the Appalachian Range to Wilkes County, North Carolina, where some are listed as "white" on the 1790 census. They resided in a part that became Ashe County, where they are designated as "other free" in 1800.
The Collins and Gibson families (identified as Melungeon ancestors) were recorded in 1813 as members of the Stony Creek Primitive Baptist Church in Scott County, Virginia. They appear to have been treated as social equals of the white members. The earliest documented use of the term "Melungeon" is found in the minutes of this church (see Etymology below). While there are historical references to the documents, the evidence has come from transcribed copies.
From the Virginia and North Carolina frontiers, the families migrated west into frontier Tennessee and Kentucky. The earliest known Melungeon in what is now northeast Tennessee was Millington Collins, who executed a deed in Hawkins County in 1802. However, there is some evidence that Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hawkins (what is now Hancock County) by 1790. Several Collins and Gibson households were listed in Floyd County, Kentucky in the 1820 census, where they were classified as "free persons of color". On the 1830 censuses of Hawkins and neighboring Grainger County, Tennessee, the Collins and Gibson families are listed as "free-colored". Melungeons were residents of the part of Hawkins that in 1844 was organized as Hancock County.
By 1830, the Melungeon community in Hawkins County numbered 330 people in 55 families; in adjoining Grainger County, there were 130 people in 24 families. According to Edward Price, "Because of them, Hawkins County had more free colored persons in the 1830 census than any other county in Tennessee except Davidson (which includes Nashville) and more free colored families named Collins than any other county in the United States." Melungeon families have also been traced in Ashe County in northwestern North Carolina.
Contemporary accounts documented that Melungeon ancestors were considered by appearance to be mixed race. During the 18th and early 19th centuries, census enumerators classified them as "mulatto", "other free", or as "free persons of color". Sometimes they were listed as "white", sometimes as "black" or "negro", but almost never as "Indian". One family described as "Indian" was the Ridley (Riddle) family, noted as such on a 1767 Pittsylvania County, Virginia, tax list. They had been designated as "mulattoes" in an earlier record of 1755. Estes et al., in their 2012 summary of the Melungeon Core DNA Testing Program, stated that the Riddle family is the only Melungeon participant with historical records identifying them as having Native American origins, but their DNA is European. Among the participants, only the Sizemore family is documented as having Native American DNA.
The court record of Jacob Perkins vs. John White (1858) in Johnson County, Tennessee, provides definitions of the time related to race and free people of color. As in Virginia, if a free person was mostly white (one-eighth or less black), he was considered legally white and a citizen of the state:
"Persons that are known and recognized by the Constitution and laws of Tennessee, as free persons of color are those who by the act of 1794 section 32 are taken and deemed to be capable in law to be certified in any case what is in, except against each other or in the language of the statute "all Negroes, Indians, Mulattoes, and all persons of mixed blood descended from Negro or Indian ancestors to the third generation inclusive though one ancestor of each generation may have been a white person, white bond or free."... That if the great grandfather of Plaintiff was an Indian or Negro and he is descended on the mother's side from a white woman, without any further Negro or Indian blood than such as he derived on the father's side, then the Plaintiff is not of mix blood, or within the third generation inclusive; in other words that if the Plaintiff has not in his veins more than 1/8 of Negro or Indian blood, he is a citizen of this state and it would be slanderous to call him a Negro."
During the 19th century, due to their intermarriages with white spouses, Melungeon-surnamed families were increasingly classified as white on census records. In 1935, a Nevada newspaper anecdotally described Melungeons as "mulattoes" with "straight hair."
Assimilation
Ariela Gross has shown by analysis of court cases, the shift from perceptions of an individual as "mulatto" to "white" was often dependent upon appearance and, especially, community perception of a person's activities in life: who one associated with and whether the person fulfilled the common obligations of citizens. Census takers were generally people of a community, so they classified people racially as they were known by the community. Definitions of racial categories were often imprecise and ambiguous, especially for "mulatto" and "free person of color". In the Thirteen Colonies and the United States at times in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, "mulatto" could mean a mixture of African and European, African and Native American, European and Native American, or all three. At the same time, these groups intermarried.
Persons were often identified by the company they kept and which ethnic culture they identified with. There were differences between how people identified themselves and how others identified them. Because of slavery, colonial and state laws were biased toward identifying multiracial people of partial African origin as African or 'black,' although persons of mixed African and Native American descent often identified and lived culturally as Native Americans, particularly if their maternal line was Native American. Many Native American tribes were organized into matrilineal kinship systems, in which children were considered born into the mother's clan and took their social status from her people; inheritance and descent was figured through the maternal lines.
Because of the loose terminology and social attitudes to mixed-race persons, remnant non-reservation American Indians in the Upper South were generally not recorded separately as Indians. They were often gradually reclassified as mulatto or free people of color, especially as generations intermarried with neighbors of African descent. In the early decades of the 20th century, Virginia and some other states passed laws imposing the one-drop rule, requiring all persons to be classified as either white or black: those of any known African ancestry were to be classified as black, regardless of appearance, and how they self-identified or were known in the community.
After Virginia passed its Racial Integrity Act of 1924, officials went so far as to alter existing birth and marriage records to reclassify as "colored" some mixed-race individuals or families who identified as and had been recorded as "Indian". These actions destroyed the documented continuity of identity of several Indian communities. The historical documentation of continuity of self-identified Native American families was lost. If the families happened to be Catholic, their churches continued to record births and marriages as being among "Indian" families. But the process of loss of historical and cultural continuity appeared to have happened also with some of the non-reservation remnant Lenape Indians of Delaware.
According to the Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture, in his 1950 dissertation, cultural geographer Edward Price proposed that Melungeons were families descended from free people of color (who were of European and African ancestry) and mixed-race unions between persons of African ancestry and Native Americans in colonial Virginia, whose territory included the modern-day states of Kentucky and West Virginia.
Acceptance
The families known as "Melungeons" in the 19th century were generally well integrated into the communities in which they lived, though they may still have been affected by racism. Records show that on the whole, they enjoyed the same rights as whites. For example, they held property, voted, and served in the Army; some, such as the Gibsons, owned slaves as early as the 18th century.
Under the first Tennessee constitution of 1796, free people of color (males only) were allowed to vote. Following fears raised by the 1831 Nat Turner slave rebellion in Virginia, Tennessee and other southern states passed new restrictions on free people of color. By its new constitution of 1834, Tennessee disfranchised free people of color, reducing them to second-class status and excluding them from the political system.
In this period, several Melungeon men were tried in Hawkins County in 1846 for "illegal voting", under suspicion of being black or free men of color (and thereby ineligible for voting). They were acquitted, presumably by demonstrating to the court's satisfaction that they had no appreciable black ancestry. Standards were not as strict as under the later laws of the "one drop rule" of the 20th century. As in some other cases, racial status was chiefly determined by people testifying as to how the men were perceived by the community and whether they had "acted white" by voting, serving in the militia, or undertaking other common citizens' obligations available to white men.
After the American Civil War and following the Reconstruction Era, southern whites struggled to regain political power and re-assert white supremacy over freedmen and traditionally free families such as the Melungeons. The white Democrat-dominated state legislatures passed Jim Crow laws. But issues of race were often brought to court as a result of arguments about money.
For example, in 1872, a widowed woman's Melungeon ancestry was assessed in a trial in Hamilton County, Tennessee. The case was brought by relatives of her late husband, who challenged her inheritance of money from him after his death. They questioned the legitimacy of a marriage between a white man and a woman known to be Melungeon, and argued the marriage was not legitimate because the woman was of black ancestry. Based on the testimony of people in the community, the court decided the woman in the case was not of African ancestry, or had no such ancestors recently enough to matter.
During the period of segregation, a North Carolina statute barred "Portuguese" people—presumably Melungeons, as North Carolina does not have a large Portuguese American community—from whites-only schools. However, under this statute the "Portuguese" were not classified as Black, and they were not required to attend Black schools.
Modern anthropological and sociological studies of Melungeon descendants in Appalachia have demonstrated that they have become culturally indistinguishable from their "non-Melungeon," white neighbors: they share a Baptist religious affiliation and other community features. With changing attitudes and a desire for more work opportunities, numerous descendants of the early Melungeon pioneer families have migrated from Appalachia to make their lives in other parts of the United States.
Legends
In spite of being culturally and linguistically similar to their European neighbors, these multi-racial families were of a sufficiently different physical appearance to provoke speculation as to their identity and origins. In the first half of the 19th century, the pejorative term "Melungeon" began to be applied to these families by local white (European-American) neighbors. Local "knowledge" or myths soon began to arise about them. According to historian Pat Elder, the earliest of these was that they were "Indian" (more specifically, "Cherokee"). Jack Goins, an identified Melungeon descendant and researcher, states that the Melungeons claimed to be both Indian and Portuguese. An example was "Spanish Peggy" Gibson, wife of Vardy Collins.
A few ancestors may have been of mixed Iberian (Spanish and/or Portuguese) and African origin. Historian Ira Berlin has noted that some early slaves and free blacks of the charter generation in the colonies were "Atlantic Creoles", mixed-race descendants of Iberian workers and African women from slave ports in Africa. Their male descendants grew up bilingual and accompanied Europeans as workers or slaves. The majority of Melungeon early ancestors, who had migrated from Virginia over time, are of northern European and African ancestry, given the history of settlement in late 17th–early-18th century eastern Virginia. Later generations in Tennessee intermarried with descendants of Scotch-Irish immigrants who arrived in the mid- to late-18th century and settled in the backcountry before the American Revolution.
Given historical evidence of Native American settlement patterns, Cherokee Nation descent is highly unlikely for the original Melungeon ancestral families. These families were formed during the colonial era in the Virginia Tidewater areas, which were not Cherokee territory. Some of their descendants may have later intermarried with isolated individuals of Cherokee or other Native American ancestry in East Tennessee. Melungeons in Graysville, Tennessee claimed Cherokee ancestors.
Anthropologist E. Raymond Evans wrote (1979) regarding these claims:
In Graysville, the Melungeons strongly deny their Black heritage and explain their genetic differences by claiming to have had Cherokee grandmothers. Many of the local whites also claim Cherokee ancestry and appear to accept the Melungeon claim ...
In 1999 historian C. S. Everett hypothesized that John Collins (recorded as a Sapony Indian who was expelled from Orange County, Virginia about January 1743), might be the same man as the Melungeon ancestor John Collins, classified as a "mulatto" in 1755 North Carolina records. But Everett has revised that theory after having discovered evidence that these were two different men named John Collins. Only descendants of the latter man, identified as mulatto in the 1755 record in North Carolina, has any proven connection to the Melungeon families of eastern Tennessee.
Other peoples frequently suggested as Melungeon ancestors are the Black Dutch and the Powhatan Indian group. The Powhatan were an Algonquian-speaking tribe who inhabited eastern Virginia during the initial period of European colonization.
Speculation about Melungeon origins continued during the 19th and 20th centuries. Writers recounted folk tales of shipwrecked sailors, lost colonists, hoards of silver, and ancient peoples such as the Carthaginians or Phoenicians. With each writer, new elements were added to the mythology surrounding this group, and more surnames were added to the list of possible Melungeon ancestors. Journalist Will Allen Dromgoole wrote several articles on the Melungeons in the 1890s.
In the late 20th century, amateur researchers suggested that the Melungeons' ethnic identity may include ancestors who were Turks and Sephardi (Iberian) Jews. The writers David Beers Quinn and Ivor Noel Hume theorize that the Melungeons were descended from Sephardi Jews who fled the Inquisition and came as sailors to North America. They also say that Francis Drake did not repatriate all the Turks he saved from the sack of Cartagena, but some came to the colonies. But Janet Crain notes that there is no written documentation to support this theory.
The paper on the Melungeon DNA Project, published by Paul Heinegg, Jack Goins, and Roberta Estes in the Journal of Genetic Genealogy, shows that ancestry of the sample is primarily European and African, with only one person having a Native American paternal haplotype. There is no genetic evidence to support the Turkish or Jewish ancestry theories.
Etymology
There are many hypotheses about the etymology of the term Melungeon. Linguists and many researchers believe that it may have been derived from the French mélange, meaning mixture, or perhaps [nous] mélangeons meaning "[we] mix/mingle". This etymology is also found in several dictionaries. There were numerous French Huguenot immigrants in Virginia from 1700, and their language could have contributed a term.
Joanne Pezzullo and Karlton Douglas speculate that a more likely derivation of Melungeon, related to the dominance of the English language in the colonies, may have been from the now obsolete English word malengin (also spelled mal engin) meaning "guile", "deceit", or "ill intent." It was used by Edmund Spenser as the name of a trickster figure in his epic poem, The Faerie Queene (1590–1596), popular in Elizabethan England. The phrase, "harbored them Melungins," would be equivalent to "harbored someone of ill will", or could mean "harbored evil people", without reference to any ethnicity.
A different explanation traces the word to malungu (or malungo), a Luso-African word from Angola, meaning shipmate, derived from the Kimbundu word ma'luno, meaning "companion" or "friend". The word, spelled as Melungo and Mulungo, has been found in numerous Portuguese records. It is said to be a derogatory word that Africans used for people of Portuguese or other white ancestry. If so, the word was likely brought to America through people of African ancestry.
Kennedy (1994) speculates that the word derives from the Turkish melun can (from Arabic mal`un jinn ملعون جنّ), which purportedly means "damned soul." He suggests that, at the time, the (condemned soul) was a term used by Turks for Muslims who had been captured and enslaved aboard Spanish galleons.
Some writers try to connect the term Melungeon to an ethnic origin of people designated by that term, but there is no basis for this assumption. It appears the name arose as an exonym, something which neighboring people, of whatever origin, called the multi-racial people.
On October 7, 1840, the polemical Brownlow's Whig of Jonesborough, Tennessee, published an article entitled "Negro Speaking!" The publisher referred to a rival Democratic politician with a party in Sullivan County as "an impudent Malungeon from Washington City a scoundrel who is half Negro and half Indian," then as a "free negroe". In this and related articles, he does not identify the Democrat by name.
Modern identity
The term Melungeon was historically considered an insult, a label applied to Appalachians who were by appearance or reputation of mixed-race ancestry. In southwest Virginia, the term Ramp was similarly applied to people of mixed race. This term has never shed its pejorative character.
In December 1943, Virginia State Registrar of Vital Statistics, Walter Ashby Plecker, sent county officials a letter warning against "colored" families trying to pass as "white" or "Indian" in violation of the Racial Integrity Act of 1924. He identified specific surnames by county, including: "Lee, Smyth and Wise: Collins, Gibson, (Gipson), Moore, Goins, Ramsey, Delph, Bunch, Freeman, Mise, Barlow, Bolden (Bolin), Mullins, Hawkins (chiefly Tennessee Melungeons)". (Lee County, Virginia borders Hancock County, Tennessee.) He directed the offices to reclassify members of certain families as black, causing the loss for numerous families of documentation in records that showed their continued identification as Native American.
Different researchers have developed their own lists of the surnames of core Melungeon families. Generally, specific lines within families have to be traced to document such identity. For example, DeMarce (1992) listed Hale as a Melungeon surname.
By the mid-to-late 19th century, the term Melungeon appeared to have been used most frequently to refer to the biracial families of Hancock County and neighboring areas. Several other uses of the term in the print media, from mid-19th to early 20th century, have been collected at the Melungeon Heritage Association Website. The spelling of the term varied widely, as was common for words and names at the time. Eventually, the form "Melungeon" became standard.
Since the late 1960s, "Melungeon" has been increasingly adopted by individuals who identify with the ethnic group. This shift in meaning may have resulted from the popularity of Walk Toward the Sunset, a drama written by playwright Kermit Hunter and produced outdoors. The play was first presented in 1969 in Sneedville, the county seat of Hancock County. Making no claim to historical accuracy, Hunter portrayed the Melungeons as indigenous people of uncertain race who were mistakenly perceived as black by neighboring white settlers. As the drama portrayed Melungeons in a positive, romantic light, many individuals began for the first time to self-identify by that term. Hunter intended for his drama "to improve the socio-economic climate" of Hancock County, and to "lift the Melungeon name 'from shame to the hall of fame'." The play helped revive interest in the history of Melungeons. The civil rights movement and social changes of the 1960s further contributed to wider acceptance of members of the group. Research in social history and genealogy has documented new facts about people identified as Melungeons.
Since the mid-1990s, popular interest in the Melungeons has grown tremendously, although many descendants have left the region of historical concentration. Writer Bill Bryson devoted the better part of a chapter to them in his The Lost Continent (1989).
N. Brent Kennedy, a non-specialist, wrote a book on his claimed Melungeon roots, The Melungeons: The Resurrection of a Proud People (1994). With the advent of the internet, many people are researching family history and the number of people self-identifying as having Melungeon ancestry has increased rapidly, according to Kennedy. Some individuals have begun to self-identify as Melungeons after reading about the group on a website and discovering their surname on the expanding list of "Melungeon-associated" surnames. Others believe they have certain "characteristic" physical traits or conditions or assume that a multi-racial heritage means they are Melungeon.
For example, some Melungeons are allegedly identifiable by shovel-shaped incisors, a dental feature more commonly found among, but not restricted to, Native Americans and Northeast Asians. After an unsubstantiated hypothesis, popularized by N. Brent Kennedy, that Melungeons are of Turkish origin, some people have identified as having an enlarged external occipital protuberance, dubbed an "Anatolian bump".
Academic historians have not found any evidence for this thesis, nor is it supported by results from the Melungeon DNA Project. As noted before, this analysis shows that Melungeon descendants overwhelmingly have northern European and African DNA ancestry.
Internet sites promote the anecdotal claim that Melungeons are more prone to certain diseases, such as sarcoidosis or familial Mediterranean fever. Academic medical centers have noted that neither of these diseases is confined to a single population.
Kennedy's claims of ancestral connections to this group have been strongly disputed. The professional genealogist and historian, Virginia E. DeMarce, reviewed his 1994 book and found that Kennedy's documentation of his Melungeon ancestry was seriously flawed. He had a very indistinct definition of Melungeons, although the group had already been extensively studied and documented by other researchers. She criticized Kennedy for trying to include people who might have had other than northern European ancestry, and said that he did not properly take account of existing historical records or recognized genealogical practice in his research. He claimed to have ancestors who were persecuted for racial reasons. However, she found that his named ancestors were all classified as white in records, held various political offices (which showed they could vote and were supported by their community), and were landowners. Kennedy responded to her critique in an article of his own.<ref>[http://underonesky.org/SEKMIE_PDF/SEKMIE3A.pdf "Dr. Brent Kennedy Responds to Virginia DeMarce", Southeastern Kentucky Melungeon Information Exchange]</ref>
The Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians in Kentucky, which is neither federally recognized or state recognized as an Indian tribe, claims that most families in its area who are commonly identified as Melungeon are of partial Native American descent. The organization says their ancestors migrated to the region in the late 18th and early to mid-19th centuries. Most of these families claimed the Ridgetop Shawnee heritage to explain their dark skin and Indian features and to avoid racial persecution. In 2010 the Kentucky General Assembly passed resolutions that acknowledged the civic contributions of the Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians to the state.
Similar groups
The following are other multi-racial groups that at one time were classified as tri-racial isolates. Some identify as Native American and have received state recognition, as have six tribes in Virginia.
Delaware
Nanticoke-Moors (and in Maryland) Nanticoke groups in Delaware and New Jersey (where they are intermarried with Lenape) have received state recognition. Most had left the area in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Florida
Dominickers of Holmes County in the Florida Panhandle
Indiana
Ben-Ishmael Tribe, pejoratively called "Grasshopper Gypsies"
Louisiana
Redbones (and in Texas)
Maryland
Piscataway Indian Nation, formerly also known as We-Sorts, one of three Piscataway-related groups recognized as Native American tribes by the state
New Jersey and New York
Ramapough Mountain Indians (aka "Jackson Whites") of the Ramapo Mountains, recognized by both New Jersey and New York as Native Americans
North Carolina
Coree or "Faircloth" Indians of Carteret County
Haliwa-Saponi, recognized by the state as Native American
Lumbee, recognized by the state as Native American
Person County Indians, aka "Cubans and Portuguese"
Ohio
Carmel Indians of Highland County
South Carolina
Red Bones (NB: distinct from the Gulf States Redbones)
Turks
Brass Ankles
Virginia
Monacan Indians (a.k.a. "Issues") of Amherst and Rockbridge counties, recognized by state of Virginia and the federal government (2018) as a Native American tribe, along with five other Virginia tribes
West Virginia
Chestnut Ridge people of Barbour County (also known as Mayles or, pejoratively, "Guineas")
Each of these groupings of multiracial populations has a particular history. There is evidence for connections between some of them, going back to common ancestry in colonial Virginia. For example, the Goins surname group in eastern Tennessee has long been identified as Melungeon. The surname Goins is also found among the Lumbee of southern North Carolina, a multi-racial group that has been recognized by the state as a Native American tribe. In most cases, the multi-racial families have to be traced through specific branches and lines, as not all descendants were considered to be Melungeon or other groups.
See also
Melungeon DNA Project
List of topics related to the African diaspora
Vardy Community School
Mulatto
Pardo
References
Further reading
Ball, Bonnie (1992). The Melungeons: Notes on the Origin of a Race' '. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.
Berry, Brewton (1963). Almost White: A Study of Certain Racial Hybrids in the Eastern United States. New York: Macmillan Press.
Bible, Jean Patterson (1975). Melungeons Yesterday and Today. Signal Mountain, Tennessee: Mountain Press.
Brake, Katherine Vande. How They Shine: How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in Fiction of Appalachia. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Brake, Katherine Vande. Through the Back Door: Melungeon Literacies and Twenty-First Century Technologies. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Cavender, Anthony P. "The Melungeons of Upper East Tennessee: Persisting Social Identity," Tennessee Anthropologist 6 (1981): 27-36
DeMarce, Virginia E. (1993). "Looking at Legends – Lumbee and Melungeon: Applied Genealogy and the Origins of Tri-Racial Isolate Settlements." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 81 (March 1993): 24–45, scanned online, Historical-Melungeons
Forbes, Jack D. (1993). Africans and Native Americans: The Language of Race and the Evolution of Red-Black Peoples. University of Illinois Press.
Goins, Jack H. (2000). Melungeons: And Other Pioneer Families, Blountville, Tennessee: Continuity Press.
Hashaw, Tim. Children of Perdition: Melungeons and the Struggle of Mixed America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Heinegg, Paul (2005). FREE AFRICAN AMERICANS OF VIRGINIA, NORTH CAROLINA, SOUTH CAROLINA, MARYLAND AND DELAWARE Including the family histories of more than 80% of those counted as "all other free persons" in the 1790 and 1800 census, Baltimore, Maryland: Genealogical Publishing, 1999–2005. Available in its entirety online.
Hirschman, Elizabeth. Melungeons: The Last Lost Tribe in America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Johnson, Mattie Ruth (1997). My Melungeon Heritage: A Story of Life on Newman's Ridge. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.
Kennedy, N. Brent (1997) The Melungeons: the resurrection of a proud people. Mercer University Press.
Kessler, John S. and Donald Ball. North From the Mountains: A Folk History of the Carmel Melungeon Settlement, Highland County, Ohio. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Langdon, Barbara Tracy (1998). The Melungeons: An Annotated Bibliography: References in both Fiction and Nonfiction, Hemphill, Texas: Dogwood Press.
McGowan, Kathleen (2003). "Where do we really come from?", DISCOVER 24 (5, May 2003)
Offutt, Chris. (1999) "Melungeons", in Out of the Woods, Simon & Schuster.
Overbay, DruAnna Williams. Windows on the Past: The Cultural Heritage of Vardy, Hancock County, Tennessee. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Podber, Jacob. The Electronic Front Porch: An Oral History of the Arrival of Modern Media in Rural Appalachia and the Melungeon Community. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Price, Henry R. (1966). "Melungeons: The Vanishing Colony of Newman's Ridge." Conference paper. American Studies Association of Kentucky and Tennessee. March 25–26, 1966.
Reed, John Shelton (1997). "Mixing in the Mountains", Southern Cultures 3 (Winter 1997): 25–36.
Scolnick, Joseph M Jr. and N. Brent Kennedy. (2004). From Anatolia to Appalachia: A Turkish American Dialogue. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Vande Brake, Katherine (2001). How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in the Fiction of Appalachia, Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.
Williamson, Joel (1980). New People: Miscegenation and Mulattoes in the United States, New York: Free Press.
Winkler, Wayne. 2019. Beyond the sunset: The Melungeon drama, 1969-1976. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Winkler, Wayne (2004). "Walking Toward the Sunset: The Melungeons of Appalachia", Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.
Winkler, Wayne (1997). " The Melungeons", All Things Considered. National Public Radio. 21 September 1997.
External links
Paul Brodwin, ""Bioethics in action" and human population genetics researMacon, GA: Mercer University Press.ch", Culture, Medicine and Psychiatry, Volume 29, Number 2 (2005), 145-178, DOI: 10.1007/s11013-005-7423-2 PDF, addresses issue of 2002 Melungeon DNA study by Kevin Jones, which is unpublished
Melungeon Heritage Association, Official Website
"The Graysville Melungeons", Tennessee Anthropologist, November 1979, hosted at Rootsweb
Paul Heinegg, Free African Americans of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, 1999–2005
"Melungeons", Digital Library of Appalachia. Contains numerous photographs and documents related to Melungeons, mostly from 1900 to 1950.
A Mystery People – The Melungeons From Louis Gates Jr's "Finding your Roots."
"kindness our heroine shows Melungeon outcast Pearl (Erika Coleman)" from AC-T review of Big-Stone-Gap film. Accessed 6/8/2016
Multiracial ethnic groups in the United States
African-American history
Appalachian society
Ethnic groups in Appalachia
Ethnic groups in the United States
History of North Carolina
History of Tennessee
History of Virginia
Scotch-Irish American history
Multiracial affairs in the United States | true | [
"A dominant caste is one which preponderates numerically over other castes and also wields preponderant economic and political power. A large and powerful caste group can be more easily dominant if its position in the local caste hierarchy is not too low. The concept of dominant caste was introduced in 1959 by sociologist M. N. Srinivas.\n\nCharacteristics\nSrinivas asserts that to be a dominant caste, a caste must have the following characteristics:\n It must own a sizeable amount of cultivable land.\n It must be of considerable numerical strength.\n It must enjoy a high place in the local caste hierarchy.\n\nWestern education, jobs in administration and political clout and contacts have been considered by subsequent authors to be additional factors of dominance.\n\nReferences\n\nCaste",
"Ellen Damgaard Andersen is a physician and researcher who described Andersen Syndrome. This autosomal, dominant trait and the syndrome was described as a condition where ventricular arrhythmia, with an accompanying a variant of long QT interval, periodic paralysis and distinctive physical characteristics.\n\nReferences\n\nDanish women physicians\nLiving people\n1939 births"
] |
[
"Melungeon",
"Definition",
"What is the definition?",
"Melungeons have been defined as having multiracial ancestry.",
"Were they considered a certain race on their own?",
"They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype.",
"Were there more dominant characteristics?",
"They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype."
] | C_94dac338bec64838b4053fc31727774a_1 | Has the definition changed? | 4 | Has the definition of Melungeon changed? | Melungeon | The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity, as they are of mixed racial ancestry. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse origins who migrated, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900. Melungeons have been defined as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese," "Native American," or "light-skinned African American". During the ninetee|nth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies. Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to "marry white" since before the twentieth century. Scholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them "core" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales and marriage licenses. Other researchers include the surnames Powell, LeBon, Bolling, Bunch, Goins, Goodman, Heard, Minor, Mise, those Mullins who are not descended from Booker Mullins (1768-1864) , and several others. Descendants of Booker Mullins are excluded because 1) the Mullins Y-DNA Project in Virginia confirmed that Booker was the son of Sherwood/Sherrod Adkins and is not a "true Mullins" and 2) DNA-tests of Booker's descendants do not have an Melungeon markers in their DNA. (Family lines have to be researched individually, as not all families with these surnames are Melungeon.) As with many other surname groups, not all families with each surname have the same racial background and ancestry. The original meaning of the word "Melungeon" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee. CANNOTANSWER | Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. | Melungeons ( ) are an ethnic group of people from the Southeastern United States who descend from European settlers and Sub-Saharan African slaves. Historically, the Melungeons were associated with settlements in the Cumberland Gap area of central Appalachia, which includes portions of East Tennessee, Southwest Virginia, and eastern Kentucky.
Tri-racial describes populations who claim to be of mixed European, African and Native American ancestry. Although there is no consensus on how many such groups exist, estimates range as high as 200.
Definition
The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse ethnic origins who migrated to frontier areas, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous through the 19th century, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900.
Melungeons have been defined and documented as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese", "Native American", or "light-skinned African American". During the nineteenth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies.
Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to "marry white" since before the twentieth century.
Scholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them "core" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales, and marriage licenses.
The original meaning of the word "Melungeon" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee.
Origins
According to the principle of partus sequitur ventrem, which Virginia incorporated into law in 1662, children born in the colonies were assigned the social status of their mother, regardless of their father's ethnicity or citizenship. This meant the children of enslaved African or African-American women were born into slavery. But it also meant the children of free white or mulatto women, even if fathered by enslaved African men, were born free. The free descendants of such unions formed the majority of ancestors of the free families of color listed in the 1790 and 1810 US censuses. Early colonial Virginia was very much a "melting pot" of peoples, and before slavery hardened as a racial caste, white and black working-class people often lived and worked in close quarters and formed relationships and marriages.
Some of these early multiracial families were ancestors of the later Melungeons, yet each family line must be traced separately. Over the generations, most individuals of the group called Melungeon were persons of mixed European and African descent, sometimes also with Native American ancestry, whose ancestors had been free in colonial Virginia.
Edward Price's dissertation on Mixed-Blood Populations of the Eastern United States as to Origins, Localizations, and Persistence (1950) said that children of European and free black unions had also intermarried with persons of alleged Native American ancestry. In 1894, the U.S. Department of the Interior, in its "Report of Indians Taxed and Not Taxed," noted that the Melungeons in Hawkins County "claim to be Cherokee of mixed blood". The term Melungeon has since sometimes been applied as a catch-all phrase for a number of groups of individuals with mixed-race ancestry.
In 1995, Paul Heinegg published Free African American Families in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, and has since published regular updates. He found through his research and documented that the great majority of free people of color in the 1790 and 1810 censuses had ancestors from colonial Virginia, who were the children of unions between free white women and free, indentured or enslaved African or African-American men.
Similarly, in 2012, the genealogist Roberta Estes and her fellow researchers of the Melungeon DNA Project reported that the Melungeon lines likely originated in the unions of black and white indentured servants living in Virginia in the mid-1600s before slavery became widespread in the United States. They concluded that as laws to prevent the mixing of races were put in place, these family groups intermarried with each other, creating an endogamous group. They migrated together, sometimes along with white neighbors, from western Virginia through the Piedmont frontier of North Carolina, before settling primarily in the mountains of East Tennessee. In addition, the Melungeon DNA Project has documented multiracial ancestry, primarily European and African, for numerous people identified as Melungeon, affirming the evidence from written documentation.
Evidence
Free people of color are documented as migrating with European-American neighbors in the first half of the 18th century to the frontiers of Virginia and North Carolina, where they received land grants like their neighbors. For instance, the Collins, Gibson, and Ridley (Riddle) families owned land adjacent to one another in Orange County, North Carolina, where they and the Bunch family were listed in 1755 as "free Molatas (mulattoes)", subject to taxation on tithes. By settling in frontier areas, free people of color found more amenable living conditions and could escape some of the racial strictures of Virginia and North Carolina Tidewater plantation areas.
Historian Jack D. Forbes has discussed laws in South Carolina related to racial classification:
In 1719, South Carolina decided who should be an "Indian" for tax purposes since American [Indian] slaves were taxed at a lesser rate than African slaves. The act stated: "And for preventing all doubts and scruples that may arise what ought to be rated on mustees, mulattoes, etc. all such slaves as are not entirely Indian shall be accounted as negro.
Forbes said that, at the time, "mustees" and "mulattoes" were terms for persons of part-Native American ancestry. He wrote,
My judgment (to be discussed later) is that a mustee was primarily part-African and American [Indian] and that a mulatto was usually part-European and American [Indian]. The act is also significant because it asserts that part-American [Indians] with or without [emphasis added] African ancestry could be counted as Negroes, thus having an implication for all later slave censuses.This view does not have a consensus.
Beginning about 1767, some of the ancestors of the Melungeons reached the frontier New River area, where they are listed in the 1780s on tax lists of Montgomery County, Virginia. From there they migrated south in the Appalachian Range to Wilkes County, North Carolina, where some are listed as "white" on the 1790 census. They resided in a part that became Ashe County, where they are designated as "other free" in 1800.
The Collins and Gibson families (identified as Melungeon ancestors) were recorded in 1813 as members of the Stony Creek Primitive Baptist Church in Scott County, Virginia. They appear to have been treated as social equals of the white members. The earliest documented use of the term "Melungeon" is found in the minutes of this church (see Etymology below). While there are historical references to the documents, the evidence has come from transcribed copies.
From the Virginia and North Carolina frontiers, the families migrated west into frontier Tennessee and Kentucky. The earliest known Melungeon in what is now northeast Tennessee was Millington Collins, who executed a deed in Hawkins County in 1802. However, there is some evidence that Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hawkins (what is now Hancock County) by 1790. Several Collins and Gibson households were listed in Floyd County, Kentucky in the 1820 census, where they were classified as "free persons of color". On the 1830 censuses of Hawkins and neighboring Grainger County, Tennessee, the Collins and Gibson families are listed as "free-colored". Melungeons were residents of the part of Hawkins that in 1844 was organized as Hancock County.
By 1830, the Melungeon community in Hawkins County numbered 330 people in 55 families; in adjoining Grainger County, there were 130 people in 24 families. According to Edward Price, "Because of them, Hawkins County had more free colored persons in the 1830 census than any other county in Tennessee except Davidson (which includes Nashville) and more free colored families named Collins than any other county in the United States." Melungeon families have also been traced in Ashe County in northwestern North Carolina.
Contemporary accounts documented that Melungeon ancestors were considered by appearance to be mixed race. During the 18th and early 19th centuries, census enumerators classified them as "mulatto", "other free", or as "free persons of color". Sometimes they were listed as "white", sometimes as "black" or "negro", but almost never as "Indian". One family described as "Indian" was the Ridley (Riddle) family, noted as such on a 1767 Pittsylvania County, Virginia, tax list. They had been designated as "mulattoes" in an earlier record of 1755. Estes et al., in their 2012 summary of the Melungeon Core DNA Testing Program, stated that the Riddle family is the only Melungeon participant with historical records identifying them as having Native American origins, but their DNA is European. Among the participants, only the Sizemore family is documented as having Native American DNA.
The court record of Jacob Perkins vs. John White (1858) in Johnson County, Tennessee, provides definitions of the time related to race and free people of color. As in Virginia, if a free person was mostly white (one-eighth or less black), he was considered legally white and a citizen of the state:
"Persons that are known and recognized by the Constitution and laws of Tennessee, as free persons of color are those who by the act of 1794 section 32 are taken and deemed to be capable in law to be certified in any case what is in, except against each other or in the language of the statute "all Negroes, Indians, Mulattoes, and all persons of mixed blood descended from Negro or Indian ancestors to the third generation inclusive though one ancestor of each generation may have been a white person, white bond or free."... That if the great grandfather of Plaintiff was an Indian or Negro and he is descended on the mother's side from a white woman, without any further Negro or Indian blood than such as he derived on the father's side, then the Plaintiff is not of mix blood, or within the third generation inclusive; in other words that if the Plaintiff has not in his veins more than 1/8 of Negro or Indian blood, he is a citizen of this state and it would be slanderous to call him a Negro."
During the 19th century, due to their intermarriages with white spouses, Melungeon-surnamed families were increasingly classified as white on census records. In 1935, a Nevada newspaper anecdotally described Melungeons as "mulattoes" with "straight hair."
Assimilation
Ariela Gross has shown by analysis of court cases, the shift from perceptions of an individual as "mulatto" to "white" was often dependent upon appearance and, especially, community perception of a person's activities in life: who one associated with and whether the person fulfilled the common obligations of citizens. Census takers were generally people of a community, so they classified people racially as they were known by the community. Definitions of racial categories were often imprecise and ambiguous, especially for "mulatto" and "free person of color". In the Thirteen Colonies and the United States at times in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, "mulatto" could mean a mixture of African and European, African and Native American, European and Native American, or all three. At the same time, these groups intermarried.
Persons were often identified by the company they kept and which ethnic culture they identified with. There were differences between how people identified themselves and how others identified them. Because of slavery, colonial and state laws were biased toward identifying multiracial people of partial African origin as African or 'black,' although persons of mixed African and Native American descent often identified and lived culturally as Native Americans, particularly if their maternal line was Native American. Many Native American tribes were organized into matrilineal kinship systems, in which children were considered born into the mother's clan and took their social status from her people; inheritance and descent was figured through the maternal lines.
Because of the loose terminology and social attitudes to mixed-race persons, remnant non-reservation American Indians in the Upper South were generally not recorded separately as Indians. They were often gradually reclassified as mulatto or free people of color, especially as generations intermarried with neighbors of African descent. In the early decades of the 20th century, Virginia and some other states passed laws imposing the one-drop rule, requiring all persons to be classified as either white or black: those of any known African ancestry were to be classified as black, regardless of appearance, and how they self-identified or were known in the community.
After Virginia passed its Racial Integrity Act of 1924, officials went so far as to alter existing birth and marriage records to reclassify as "colored" some mixed-race individuals or families who identified as and had been recorded as "Indian". These actions destroyed the documented continuity of identity of several Indian communities. The historical documentation of continuity of self-identified Native American families was lost. If the families happened to be Catholic, their churches continued to record births and marriages as being among "Indian" families. But the process of loss of historical and cultural continuity appeared to have happened also with some of the non-reservation remnant Lenape Indians of Delaware.
According to the Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture, in his 1950 dissertation, cultural geographer Edward Price proposed that Melungeons were families descended from free people of color (who were of European and African ancestry) and mixed-race unions between persons of African ancestry and Native Americans in colonial Virginia, whose territory included the modern-day states of Kentucky and West Virginia.
Acceptance
The families known as "Melungeons" in the 19th century were generally well integrated into the communities in which they lived, though they may still have been affected by racism. Records show that on the whole, they enjoyed the same rights as whites. For example, they held property, voted, and served in the Army; some, such as the Gibsons, owned slaves as early as the 18th century.
Under the first Tennessee constitution of 1796, free people of color (males only) were allowed to vote. Following fears raised by the 1831 Nat Turner slave rebellion in Virginia, Tennessee and other southern states passed new restrictions on free people of color. By its new constitution of 1834, Tennessee disfranchised free people of color, reducing them to second-class status and excluding them from the political system.
In this period, several Melungeon men were tried in Hawkins County in 1846 for "illegal voting", under suspicion of being black or free men of color (and thereby ineligible for voting). They were acquitted, presumably by demonstrating to the court's satisfaction that they had no appreciable black ancestry. Standards were not as strict as under the later laws of the "one drop rule" of the 20th century. As in some other cases, racial status was chiefly determined by people testifying as to how the men were perceived by the community and whether they had "acted white" by voting, serving in the militia, or undertaking other common citizens' obligations available to white men.
After the American Civil War and following the Reconstruction Era, southern whites struggled to regain political power and re-assert white supremacy over freedmen and traditionally free families such as the Melungeons. The white Democrat-dominated state legislatures passed Jim Crow laws. But issues of race were often brought to court as a result of arguments about money.
For example, in 1872, a widowed woman's Melungeon ancestry was assessed in a trial in Hamilton County, Tennessee. The case was brought by relatives of her late husband, who challenged her inheritance of money from him after his death. They questioned the legitimacy of a marriage between a white man and a woman known to be Melungeon, and argued the marriage was not legitimate because the woman was of black ancestry. Based on the testimony of people in the community, the court decided the woman in the case was not of African ancestry, or had no such ancestors recently enough to matter.
During the period of segregation, a North Carolina statute barred "Portuguese" people—presumably Melungeons, as North Carolina does not have a large Portuguese American community—from whites-only schools. However, under this statute the "Portuguese" were not classified as Black, and they were not required to attend Black schools.
Modern anthropological and sociological studies of Melungeon descendants in Appalachia have demonstrated that they have become culturally indistinguishable from their "non-Melungeon," white neighbors: they share a Baptist religious affiliation and other community features. With changing attitudes and a desire for more work opportunities, numerous descendants of the early Melungeon pioneer families have migrated from Appalachia to make their lives in other parts of the United States.
Legends
In spite of being culturally and linguistically similar to their European neighbors, these multi-racial families were of a sufficiently different physical appearance to provoke speculation as to their identity and origins. In the first half of the 19th century, the pejorative term "Melungeon" began to be applied to these families by local white (European-American) neighbors. Local "knowledge" or myths soon began to arise about them. According to historian Pat Elder, the earliest of these was that they were "Indian" (more specifically, "Cherokee"). Jack Goins, an identified Melungeon descendant and researcher, states that the Melungeons claimed to be both Indian and Portuguese. An example was "Spanish Peggy" Gibson, wife of Vardy Collins.
A few ancestors may have been of mixed Iberian (Spanish and/or Portuguese) and African origin. Historian Ira Berlin has noted that some early slaves and free blacks of the charter generation in the colonies were "Atlantic Creoles", mixed-race descendants of Iberian workers and African women from slave ports in Africa. Their male descendants grew up bilingual and accompanied Europeans as workers or slaves. The majority of Melungeon early ancestors, who had migrated from Virginia over time, are of northern European and African ancestry, given the history of settlement in late 17th–early-18th century eastern Virginia. Later generations in Tennessee intermarried with descendants of Scotch-Irish immigrants who arrived in the mid- to late-18th century and settled in the backcountry before the American Revolution.
Given historical evidence of Native American settlement patterns, Cherokee Nation descent is highly unlikely for the original Melungeon ancestral families. These families were formed during the colonial era in the Virginia Tidewater areas, which were not Cherokee territory. Some of their descendants may have later intermarried with isolated individuals of Cherokee or other Native American ancestry in East Tennessee. Melungeons in Graysville, Tennessee claimed Cherokee ancestors.
Anthropologist E. Raymond Evans wrote (1979) regarding these claims:
In Graysville, the Melungeons strongly deny their Black heritage and explain their genetic differences by claiming to have had Cherokee grandmothers. Many of the local whites also claim Cherokee ancestry and appear to accept the Melungeon claim ...
In 1999 historian C. S. Everett hypothesized that John Collins (recorded as a Sapony Indian who was expelled from Orange County, Virginia about January 1743), might be the same man as the Melungeon ancestor John Collins, classified as a "mulatto" in 1755 North Carolina records. But Everett has revised that theory after having discovered evidence that these were two different men named John Collins. Only descendants of the latter man, identified as mulatto in the 1755 record in North Carolina, has any proven connection to the Melungeon families of eastern Tennessee.
Other peoples frequently suggested as Melungeon ancestors are the Black Dutch and the Powhatan Indian group. The Powhatan were an Algonquian-speaking tribe who inhabited eastern Virginia during the initial period of European colonization.
Speculation about Melungeon origins continued during the 19th and 20th centuries. Writers recounted folk tales of shipwrecked sailors, lost colonists, hoards of silver, and ancient peoples such as the Carthaginians or Phoenicians. With each writer, new elements were added to the mythology surrounding this group, and more surnames were added to the list of possible Melungeon ancestors. Journalist Will Allen Dromgoole wrote several articles on the Melungeons in the 1890s.
In the late 20th century, amateur researchers suggested that the Melungeons' ethnic identity may include ancestors who were Turks and Sephardi (Iberian) Jews. The writers David Beers Quinn and Ivor Noel Hume theorize that the Melungeons were descended from Sephardi Jews who fled the Inquisition and came as sailors to North America. They also say that Francis Drake did not repatriate all the Turks he saved from the sack of Cartagena, but some came to the colonies. But Janet Crain notes that there is no written documentation to support this theory.
The paper on the Melungeon DNA Project, published by Paul Heinegg, Jack Goins, and Roberta Estes in the Journal of Genetic Genealogy, shows that ancestry of the sample is primarily European and African, with only one person having a Native American paternal haplotype. There is no genetic evidence to support the Turkish or Jewish ancestry theories.
Etymology
There are many hypotheses about the etymology of the term Melungeon. Linguists and many researchers believe that it may have been derived from the French mélange, meaning mixture, or perhaps [nous] mélangeons meaning "[we] mix/mingle". This etymology is also found in several dictionaries. There were numerous French Huguenot immigrants in Virginia from 1700, and their language could have contributed a term.
Joanne Pezzullo and Karlton Douglas speculate that a more likely derivation of Melungeon, related to the dominance of the English language in the colonies, may have been from the now obsolete English word malengin (also spelled mal engin) meaning "guile", "deceit", or "ill intent." It was used by Edmund Spenser as the name of a trickster figure in his epic poem, The Faerie Queene (1590–1596), popular in Elizabethan England. The phrase, "harbored them Melungins," would be equivalent to "harbored someone of ill will", or could mean "harbored evil people", without reference to any ethnicity.
A different explanation traces the word to malungu (or malungo), a Luso-African word from Angola, meaning shipmate, derived from the Kimbundu word ma'luno, meaning "companion" or "friend". The word, spelled as Melungo and Mulungo, has been found in numerous Portuguese records. It is said to be a derogatory word that Africans used for people of Portuguese or other white ancestry. If so, the word was likely brought to America through people of African ancestry.
Kennedy (1994) speculates that the word derives from the Turkish melun can (from Arabic mal`un jinn ملعون جنّ), which purportedly means "damned soul." He suggests that, at the time, the (condemned soul) was a term used by Turks for Muslims who had been captured and enslaved aboard Spanish galleons.
Some writers try to connect the term Melungeon to an ethnic origin of people designated by that term, but there is no basis for this assumption. It appears the name arose as an exonym, something which neighboring people, of whatever origin, called the multi-racial people.
On October 7, 1840, the polemical Brownlow's Whig of Jonesborough, Tennessee, published an article entitled "Negro Speaking!" The publisher referred to a rival Democratic politician with a party in Sullivan County as "an impudent Malungeon from Washington City a scoundrel who is half Negro and half Indian," then as a "free negroe". In this and related articles, he does not identify the Democrat by name.
Modern identity
The term Melungeon was historically considered an insult, a label applied to Appalachians who were by appearance or reputation of mixed-race ancestry. In southwest Virginia, the term Ramp was similarly applied to people of mixed race. This term has never shed its pejorative character.
In December 1943, Virginia State Registrar of Vital Statistics, Walter Ashby Plecker, sent county officials a letter warning against "colored" families trying to pass as "white" or "Indian" in violation of the Racial Integrity Act of 1924. He identified specific surnames by county, including: "Lee, Smyth and Wise: Collins, Gibson, (Gipson), Moore, Goins, Ramsey, Delph, Bunch, Freeman, Mise, Barlow, Bolden (Bolin), Mullins, Hawkins (chiefly Tennessee Melungeons)". (Lee County, Virginia borders Hancock County, Tennessee.) He directed the offices to reclassify members of certain families as black, causing the loss for numerous families of documentation in records that showed their continued identification as Native American.
Different researchers have developed their own lists of the surnames of core Melungeon families. Generally, specific lines within families have to be traced to document such identity. For example, DeMarce (1992) listed Hale as a Melungeon surname.
By the mid-to-late 19th century, the term Melungeon appeared to have been used most frequently to refer to the biracial families of Hancock County and neighboring areas. Several other uses of the term in the print media, from mid-19th to early 20th century, have been collected at the Melungeon Heritage Association Website. The spelling of the term varied widely, as was common for words and names at the time. Eventually, the form "Melungeon" became standard.
Since the late 1960s, "Melungeon" has been increasingly adopted by individuals who identify with the ethnic group. This shift in meaning may have resulted from the popularity of Walk Toward the Sunset, a drama written by playwright Kermit Hunter and produced outdoors. The play was first presented in 1969 in Sneedville, the county seat of Hancock County. Making no claim to historical accuracy, Hunter portrayed the Melungeons as indigenous people of uncertain race who were mistakenly perceived as black by neighboring white settlers. As the drama portrayed Melungeons in a positive, romantic light, many individuals began for the first time to self-identify by that term. Hunter intended for his drama "to improve the socio-economic climate" of Hancock County, and to "lift the Melungeon name 'from shame to the hall of fame'." The play helped revive interest in the history of Melungeons. The civil rights movement and social changes of the 1960s further contributed to wider acceptance of members of the group. Research in social history and genealogy has documented new facts about people identified as Melungeons.
Since the mid-1990s, popular interest in the Melungeons has grown tremendously, although many descendants have left the region of historical concentration. Writer Bill Bryson devoted the better part of a chapter to them in his The Lost Continent (1989).
N. Brent Kennedy, a non-specialist, wrote a book on his claimed Melungeon roots, The Melungeons: The Resurrection of a Proud People (1994). With the advent of the internet, many people are researching family history and the number of people self-identifying as having Melungeon ancestry has increased rapidly, according to Kennedy. Some individuals have begun to self-identify as Melungeons after reading about the group on a website and discovering their surname on the expanding list of "Melungeon-associated" surnames. Others believe they have certain "characteristic" physical traits or conditions or assume that a multi-racial heritage means they are Melungeon.
For example, some Melungeons are allegedly identifiable by shovel-shaped incisors, a dental feature more commonly found among, but not restricted to, Native Americans and Northeast Asians. After an unsubstantiated hypothesis, popularized by N. Brent Kennedy, that Melungeons are of Turkish origin, some people have identified as having an enlarged external occipital protuberance, dubbed an "Anatolian bump".
Academic historians have not found any evidence for this thesis, nor is it supported by results from the Melungeon DNA Project. As noted before, this analysis shows that Melungeon descendants overwhelmingly have northern European and African DNA ancestry.
Internet sites promote the anecdotal claim that Melungeons are more prone to certain diseases, such as sarcoidosis or familial Mediterranean fever. Academic medical centers have noted that neither of these diseases is confined to a single population.
Kennedy's claims of ancestral connections to this group have been strongly disputed. The professional genealogist and historian, Virginia E. DeMarce, reviewed his 1994 book and found that Kennedy's documentation of his Melungeon ancestry was seriously flawed. He had a very indistinct definition of Melungeons, although the group had already been extensively studied and documented by other researchers. She criticized Kennedy for trying to include people who might have had other than northern European ancestry, and said that he did not properly take account of existing historical records or recognized genealogical practice in his research. He claimed to have ancestors who were persecuted for racial reasons. However, she found that his named ancestors were all classified as white in records, held various political offices (which showed they could vote and were supported by their community), and were landowners. Kennedy responded to her critique in an article of his own.<ref>[http://underonesky.org/SEKMIE_PDF/SEKMIE3A.pdf "Dr. Brent Kennedy Responds to Virginia DeMarce", Southeastern Kentucky Melungeon Information Exchange]</ref>
The Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians in Kentucky, which is neither federally recognized or state recognized as an Indian tribe, claims that most families in its area who are commonly identified as Melungeon are of partial Native American descent. The organization says their ancestors migrated to the region in the late 18th and early to mid-19th centuries. Most of these families claimed the Ridgetop Shawnee heritage to explain their dark skin and Indian features and to avoid racial persecution. In 2010 the Kentucky General Assembly passed resolutions that acknowledged the civic contributions of the Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians to the state.
Similar groups
The following are other multi-racial groups that at one time were classified as tri-racial isolates. Some identify as Native American and have received state recognition, as have six tribes in Virginia.
Delaware
Nanticoke-Moors (and in Maryland) Nanticoke groups in Delaware and New Jersey (where they are intermarried with Lenape) have received state recognition. Most had left the area in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Florida
Dominickers of Holmes County in the Florida Panhandle
Indiana
Ben-Ishmael Tribe, pejoratively called "Grasshopper Gypsies"
Louisiana
Redbones (and in Texas)
Maryland
Piscataway Indian Nation, formerly also known as We-Sorts, one of three Piscataway-related groups recognized as Native American tribes by the state
New Jersey and New York
Ramapough Mountain Indians (aka "Jackson Whites") of the Ramapo Mountains, recognized by both New Jersey and New York as Native Americans
North Carolina
Coree or "Faircloth" Indians of Carteret County
Haliwa-Saponi, recognized by the state as Native American
Lumbee, recognized by the state as Native American
Person County Indians, aka "Cubans and Portuguese"
Ohio
Carmel Indians of Highland County
South Carolina
Red Bones (NB: distinct from the Gulf States Redbones)
Turks
Brass Ankles
Virginia
Monacan Indians (a.k.a. "Issues") of Amherst and Rockbridge counties, recognized by state of Virginia and the federal government (2018) as a Native American tribe, along with five other Virginia tribes
West Virginia
Chestnut Ridge people of Barbour County (also known as Mayles or, pejoratively, "Guineas")
Each of these groupings of multiracial populations has a particular history. There is evidence for connections between some of them, going back to common ancestry in colonial Virginia. For example, the Goins surname group in eastern Tennessee has long been identified as Melungeon. The surname Goins is also found among the Lumbee of southern North Carolina, a multi-racial group that has been recognized by the state as a Native American tribe. In most cases, the multi-racial families have to be traced through specific branches and lines, as not all descendants were considered to be Melungeon or other groups.
See also
Melungeon DNA Project
List of topics related to the African diaspora
Vardy Community School
Mulatto
Pardo
References
Further reading
Ball, Bonnie (1992). The Melungeons: Notes on the Origin of a Race' '. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.
Berry, Brewton (1963). Almost White: A Study of Certain Racial Hybrids in the Eastern United States. New York: Macmillan Press.
Bible, Jean Patterson (1975). Melungeons Yesterday and Today. Signal Mountain, Tennessee: Mountain Press.
Brake, Katherine Vande. How They Shine: How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in Fiction of Appalachia. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Brake, Katherine Vande. Through the Back Door: Melungeon Literacies and Twenty-First Century Technologies. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Cavender, Anthony P. "The Melungeons of Upper East Tennessee: Persisting Social Identity," Tennessee Anthropologist 6 (1981): 27-36
DeMarce, Virginia E. (1993). "Looking at Legends – Lumbee and Melungeon: Applied Genealogy and the Origins of Tri-Racial Isolate Settlements." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 81 (March 1993): 24–45, scanned online, Historical-Melungeons
Forbes, Jack D. (1993). Africans and Native Americans: The Language of Race and the Evolution of Red-Black Peoples. University of Illinois Press.
Goins, Jack H. (2000). Melungeons: And Other Pioneer Families, Blountville, Tennessee: Continuity Press.
Hashaw, Tim. Children of Perdition: Melungeons and the Struggle of Mixed America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Heinegg, Paul (2005). FREE AFRICAN AMERICANS OF VIRGINIA, NORTH CAROLINA, SOUTH CAROLINA, MARYLAND AND DELAWARE Including the family histories of more than 80% of those counted as "all other free persons" in the 1790 and 1800 census, Baltimore, Maryland: Genealogical Publishing, 1999–2005. Available in its entirety online.
Hirschman, Elizabeth. Melungeons: The Last Lost Tribe in America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Johnson, Mattie Ruth (1997). My Melungeon Heritage: A Story of Life on Newman's Ridge. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.
Kennedy, N. Brent (1997) The Melungeons: the resurrection of a proud people. Mercer University Press.
Kessler, John S. and Donald Ball. North From the Mountains: A Folk History of the Carmel Melungeon Settlement, Highland County, Ohio. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Langdon, Barbara Tracy (1998). The Melungeons: An Annotated Bibliography: References in both Fiction and Nonfiction, Hemphill, Texas: Dogwood Press.
McGowan, Kathleen (2003). "Where do we really come from?", DISCOVER 24 (5, May 2003)
Offutt, Chris. (1999) "Melungeons", in Out of the Woods, Simon & Schuster.
Overbay, DruAnna Williams. Windows on the Past: The Cultural Heritage of Vardy, Hancock County, Tennessee. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Podber, Jacob. The Electronic Front Porch: An Oral History of the Arrival of Modern Media in Rural Appalachia and the Melungeon Community. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Price, Henry R. (1966). "Melungeons: The Vanishing Colony of Newman's Ridge." Conference paper. American Studies Association of Kentucky and Tennessee. March 25–26, 1966.
Reed, John Shelton (1997). "Mixing in the Mountains", Southern Cultures 3 (Winter 1997): 25–36.
Scolnick, Joseph M Jr. and N. Brent Kennedy. (2004). From Anatolia to Appalachia: A Turkish American Dialogue. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Vande Brake, Katherine (2001). How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in the Fiction of Appalachia, Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.
Williamson, Joel (1980). New People: Miscegenation and Mulattoes in the United States, New York: Free Press.
Winkler, Wayne. 2019. Beyond the sunset: The Melungeon drama, 1969-1976. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Winkler, Wayne (2004). "Walking Toward the Sunset: The Melungeons of Appalachia", Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.
Winkler, Wayne (1997). " The Melungeons", All Things Considered. National Public Radio. 21 September 1997.
External links
Paul Brodwin, ""Bioethics in action" and human population genetics researMacon, GA: Mercer University Press.ch", Culture, Medicine and Psychiatry, Volume 29, Number 2 (2005), 145-178, DOI: 10.1007/s11013-005-7423-2 PDF, addresses issue of 2002 Melungeon DNA study by Kevin Jones, which is unpublished
Melungeon Heritage Association, Official Website
"The Graysville Melungeons", Tennessee Anthropologist, November 1979, hosted at Rootsweb
Paul Heinegg, Free African Americans of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, 1999–2005
"Melungeons", Digital Library of Appalachia. Contains numerous photographs and documents related to Melungeons, mostly from 1900 to 1950.
A Mystery People – The Melungeons From Louis Gates Jr's "Finding your Roots."
"kindness our heroine shows Melungeon outcast Pearl (Erika Coleman)" from AC-T review of Big-Stone-Gap film. Accessed 6/8/2016
Multiracial ethnic groups in the United States
African-American history
Appalachian society
Ethnic groups in Appalachia
Ethnic groups in the United States
History of North Carolina
History of Tennessee
History of Virginia
Scotch-Irish American history
Multiracial affairs in the United States | true | [
"In compiler theory, a reaching definition for a given instruction is an earlier instruction whose target variable can reach (be assigned to) the given one without an intervening assignment. For example, in the following code:\n\n d1 : y := 3\n d2 : x := y\n\nd1 is a reaching definition for d2. In the following, example, however:\n\n d1 : y := 3\n d2 : y := 4\n d3 : x := y\n\nd1 is no longer a reaching definition for d3, because d2 kills its reach: the value defined in d1 is no longer available and cannot reach d3.\n\nAs analysis \n\nThe similarly named reaching definitions is a data-flow analysis which statically determines which definitions may reach a given point in the code. Because of its simplicity, it is often used as the canonical example of a data-flow analysis in textbooks. The data-flow confluence operator used is set union, and the analysis is forward flow. Reaching definitions are used to compute use-def chains.\n\nThe data-flow equations used for a given basic block in reaching definitions are:\n\n \n \n\nIn other words, the set of reaching definitions going into are all of the reaching definitions from 's predecessors, . consists of all of the basic blocks that come before in the control-flow graph. The reaching definitions coming out of are all reaching definitions of its predecessors minus those reaching definitions whose variable is killed by plus any new definitions generated within .\n\nFor a generic instruction, we define the and sets as follows:\n\n , a set of locally available definitions in a basic block \n , a set of definitions (not locally available, but in the rest of the program) killed by definitions in the basic block. \n\nwhere is the set of all definitions that assign to the variable . Here is a unique label attached to the assigning instruction; thus, the domain of values in reaching definitions are these instruction labels.\n\nWorklist algorithm\nReaching definition is usually calculated using an iterative worklist algorithm. \n\nInput: control-flow graph CFG = (Nodes, Edges, Entry, Exit)\n// Initialize\nfor all CFG nodes n in N,\n OUT[n] = emptyset; // can optimize by OUT[n] = GEN[n];\n\n// put all nodes into the changed set\n// N is all nodes in graph,\nChanged = N;\n\n// Iterate \nwhile (Changed != emptyset)\n{\n choose a node n in Changed;\n // remove it from the changed set\n Changed = Changed -{ n };\n\n // init IN[n] to be empty\n IN[n] = emptyset;\n\n // calculate IN[n] from predecessors' OUT[p]\n for all nodes p in predecessors(n)\n IN[n] = IN[n] Union OUT[p];\n\n oldout = OUT[n]; // save old OUT[n]\n \n // update OUT[n] using transfer function f_n ()\n OUT[n] = GEN[n] Union (IN[n] -KILL[n]);\n\n // any change to OUT[n] compared to previous value?\n if (OUT[n] changed) // compare oldout vs. OUT[n]\n { \n // if yes, put all successors of n into the changed set\n for all nodes s in successors(n)\n Changed = Changed U { s };\n }\n}\n\nFurther reading\n\nSee also \n\n Static single assignment form\n Reachable uses\n\nProgram analysis\nData-flow analysis",
"Boxing has featured as a sport at the Youth Olympic Summer Games since its first edition in 2010. The Youth Olympic Games are multi-sport event and the games are held every four years just like the Olympic Games.\n\nEditions\n\nFormat\nThe boxing competition is organized as a set of tournaments, one for each weight class. The number of weight classes has changed over the years and the definition of each class has changed as shown in the following tables.\n\nMedal table\nAs of the 2018 Summer Youth Olympics.\n\nParticipating nations\n\nSee also\nBoxing at the Summer Olympics\n\nExternal links\nYouth Olympic Games\n\n \nYouth Olympics\nSports at the Summer Youth Olympics"
] |
[
"Melungeon",
"Definition",
"What is the definition?",
"Melungeons have been defined as having multiracial ancestry.",
"Were they considered a certain race on their own?",
"They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype.",
"Were there more dominant characteristics?",
"They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype.",
"Has the definition changed?",
"Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion."
] | C_94dac338bec64838b4053fc31727774a_1 | Has that definition be consistent? | 5 | Has the definition of Melungeon been consistent? | Melungeon | The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity, as they are of mixed racial ancestry. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse origins who migrated, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900. Melungeons have been defined as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese," "Native American," or "light-skinned African American". During the ninetee|nth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies. Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to "marry white" since before the twentieth century. Scholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them "core" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales and marriage licenses. Other researchers include the surnames Powell, LeBon, Bolling, Bunch, Goins, Goodman, Heard, Minor, Mise, those Mullins who are not descended from Booker Mullins (1768-1864) , and several others. Descendants of Booker Mullins are excluded because 1) the Mullins Y-DNA Project in Virginia confirmed that Booker was the son of Sherwood/Sherrod Adkins and is not a "true Mullins" and 2) DNA-tests of Booker's descendants do not have an Melungeon markers in their DNA. (Family lines have to be researched individually, as not all families with these surnames are Melungeon.) As with many other surname groups, not all families with each surname have the same racial background and ancestry. The original meaning of the word "Melungeon" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee. CANNOTANSWER | in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese," "Native American," or "light-skinned African American". | Melungeons ( ) are an ethnic group of people from the Southeastern United States who descend from European settlers and Sub-Saharan African slaves. Historically, the Melungeons were associated with settlements in the Cumberland Gap area of central Appalachia, which includes portions of East Tennessee, Southwest Virginia, and eastern Kentucky.
Tri-racial describes populations who claim to be of mixed European, African and Native American ancestry. Although there is no consensus on how many such groups exist, estimates range as high as 200.
Definition
The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse ethnic origins who migrated to frontier areas, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous through the 19th century, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900.
Melungeons have been defined and documented as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese", "Native American", or "light-skinned African American". During the nineteenth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies.
Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to "marry white" since before the twentieth century.
Scholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them "core" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales, and marriage licenses.
The original meaning of the word "Melungeon" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee.
Origins
According to the principle of partus sequitur ventrem, which Virginia incorporated into law in 1662, children born in the colonies were assigned the social status of their mother, regardless of their father's ethnicity or citizenship. This meant the children of enslaved African or African-American women were born into slavery. But it also meant the children of free white or mulatto women, even if fathered by enslaved African men, were born free. The free descendants of such unions formed the majority of ancestors of the free families of color listed in the 1790 and 1810 US censuses. Early colonial Virginia was very much a "melting pot" of peoples, and before slavery hardened as a racial caste, white and black working-class people often lived and worked in close quarters and formed relationships and marriages.
Some of these early multiracial families were ancestors of the later Melungeons, yet each family line must be traced separately. Over the generations, most individuals of the group called Melungeon were persons of mixed European and African descent, sometimes also with Native American ancestry, whose ancestors had been free in colonial Virginia.
Edward Price's dissertation on Mixed-Blood Populations of the Eastern United States as to Origins, Localizations, and Persistence (1950) said that children of European and free black unions had also intermarried with persons of alleged Native American ancestry. In 1894, the U.S. Department of the Interior, in its "Report of Indians Taxed and Not Taxed," noted that the Melungeons in Hawkins County "claim to be Cherokee of mixed blood". The term Melungeon has since sometimes been applied as a catch-all phrase for a number of groups of individuals with mixed-race ancestry.
In 1995, Paul Heinegg published Free African American Families in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, and has since published regular updates. He found through his research and documented that the great majority of free people of color in the 1790 and 1810 censuses had ancestors from colonial Virginia, who were the children of unions between free white women and free, indentured or enslaved African or African-American men.
Similarly, in 2012, the genealogist Roberta Estes and her fellow researchers of the Melungeon DNA Project reported that the Melungeon lines likely originated in the unions of black and white indentured servants living in Virginia in the mid-1600s before slavery became widespread in the United States. They concluded that as laws to prevent the mixing of races were put in place, these family groups intermarried with each other, creating an endogamous group. They migrated together, sometimes along with white neighbors, from western Virginia through the Piedmont frontier of North Carolina, before settling primarily in the mountains of East Tennessee. In addition, the Melungeon DNA Project has documented multiracial ancestry, primarily European and African, for numerous people identified as Melungeon, affirming the evidence from written documentation.
Evidence
Free people of color are documented as migrating with European-American neighbors in the first half of the 18th century to the frontiers of Virginia and North Carolina, where they received land grants like their neighbors. For instance, the Collins, Gibson, and Ridley (Riddle) families owned land adjacent to one another in Orange County, North Carolina, where they and the Bunch family were listed in 1755 as "free Molatas (mulattoes)", subject to taxation on tithes. By settling in frontier areas, free people of color found more amenable living conditions and could escape some of the racial strictures of Virginia and North Carolina Tidewater plantation areas.
Historian Jack D. Forbes has discussed laws in South Carolina related to racial classification:
In 1719, South Carolina decided who should be an "Indian" for tax purposes since American [Indian] slaves were taxed at a lesser rate than African slaves. The act stated: "And for preventing all doubts and scruples that may arise what ought to be rated on mustees, mulattoes, etc. all such slaves as are not entirely Indian shall be accounted as negro.
Forbes said that, at the time, "mustees" and "mulattoes" were terms for persons of part-Native American ancestry. He wrote,
My judgment (to be discussed later) is that a mustee was primarily part-African and American [Indian] and that a mulatto was usually part-European and American [Indian]. The act is also significant because it asserts that part-American [Indians] with or without [emphasis added] African ancestry could be counted as Negroes, thus having an implication for all later slave censuses.This view does not have a consensus.
Beginning about 1767, some of the ancestors of the Melungeons reached the frontier New River area, where they are listed in the 1780s on tax lists of Montgomery County, Virginia. From there they migrated south in the Appalachian Range to Wilkes County, North Carolina, where some are listed as "white" on the 1790 census. They resided in a part that became Ashe County, where they are designated as "other free" in 1800.
The Collins and Gibson families (identified as Melungeon ancestors) were recorded in 1813 as members of the Stony Creek Primitive Baptist Church in Scott County, Virginia. They appear to have been treated as social equals of the white members. The earliest documented use of the term "Melungeon" is found in the minutes of this church (see Etymology below). While there are historical references to the documents, the evidence has come from transcribed copies.
From the Virginia and North Carolina frontiers, the families migrated west into frontier Tennessee and Kentucky. The earliest known Melungeon in what is now northeast Tennessee was Millington Collins, who executed a deed in Hawkins County in 1802. However, there is some evidence that Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hawkins (what is now Hancock County) by 1790. Several Collins and Gibson households were listed in Floyd County, Kentucky in the 1820 census, where they were classified as "free persons of color". On the 1830 censuses of Hawkins and neighboring Grainger County, Tennessee, the Collins and Gibson families are listed as "free-colored". Melungeons were residents of the part of Hawkins that in 1844 was organized as Hancock County.
By 1830, the Melungeon community in Hawkins County numbered 330 people in 55 families; in adjoining Grainger County, there were 130 people in 24 families. According to Edward Price, "Because of them, Hawkins County had more free colored persons in the 1830 census than any other county in Tennessee except Davidson (which includes Nashville) and more free colored families named Collins than any other county in the United States." Melungeon families have also been traced in Ashe County in northwestern North Carolina.
Contemporary accounts documented that Melungeon ancestors were considered by appearance to be mixed race. During the 18th and early 19th centuries, census enumerators classified them as "mulatto", "other free", or as "free persons of color". Sometimes they were listed as "white", sometimes as "black" or "negro", but almost never as "Indian". One family described as "Indian" was the Ridley (Riddle) family, noted as such on a 1767 Pittsylvania County, Virginia, tax list. They had been designated as "mulattoes" in an earlier record of 1755. Estes et al., in their 2012 summary of the Melungeon Core DNA Testing Program, stated that the Riddle family is the only Melungeon participant with historical records identifying them as having Native American origins, but their DNA is European. Among the participants, only the Sizemore family is documented as having Native American DNA.
The court record of Jacob Perkins vs. John White (1858) in Johnson County, Tennessee, provides definitions of the time related to race and free people of color. As in Virginia, if a free person was mostly white (one-eighth or less black), he was considered legally white and a citizen of the state:
"Persons that are known and recognized by the Constitution and laws of Tennessee, as free persons of color are those who by the act of 1794 section 32 are taken and deemed to be capable in law to be certified in any case what is in, except against each other or in the language of the statute "all Negroes, Indians, Mulattoes, and all persons of mixed blood descended from Negro or Indian ancestors to the third generation inclusive though one ancestor of each generation may have been a white person, white bond or free."... That if the great grandfather of Plaintiff was an Indian or Negro and he is descended on the mother's side from a white woman, without any further Negro or Indian blood than such as he derived on the father's side, then the Plaintiff is not of mix blood, or within the third generation inclusive; in other words that if the Plaintiff has not in his veins more than 1/8 of Negro or Indian blood, he is a citizen of this state and it would be slanderous to call him a Negro."
During the 19th century, due to their intermarriages with white spouses, Melungeon-surnamed families were increasingly classified as white on census records. In 1935, a Nevada newspaper anecdotally described Melungeons as "mulattoes" with "straight hair."
Assimilation
Ariela Gross has shown by analysis of court cases, the shift from perceptions of an individual as "mulatto" to "white" was often dependent upon appearance and, especially, community perception of a person's activities in life: who one associated with and whether the person fulfilled the common obligations of citizens. Census takers were generally people of a community, so they classified people racially as they were known by the community. Definitions of racial categories were often imprecise and ambiguous, especially for "mulatto" and "free person of color". In the Thirteen Colonies and the United States at times in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, "mulatto" could mean a mixture of African and European, African and Native American, European and Native American, or all three. At the same time, these groups intermarried.
Persons were often identified by the company they kept and which ethnic culture they identified with. There were differences between how people identified themselves and how others identified them. Because of slavery, colonial and state laws were biased toward identifying multiracial people of partial African origin as African or 'black,' although persons of mixed African and Native American descent often identified and lived culturally as Native Americans, particularly if their maternal line was Native American. Many Native American tribes were organized into matrilineal kinship systems, in which children were considered born into the mother's clan and took their social status from her people; inheritance and descent was figured through the maternal lines.
Because of the loose terminology and social attitudes to mixed-race persons, remnant non-reservation American Indians in the Upper South were generally not recorded separately as Indians. They were often gradually reclassified as mulatto or free people of color, especially as generations intermarried with neighbors of African descent. In the early decades of the 20th century, Virginia and some other states passed laws imposing the one-drop rule, requiring all persons to be classified as either white or black: those of any known African ancestry were to be classified as black, regardless of appearance, and how they self-identified or were known in the community.
After Virginia passed its Racial Integrity Act of 1924, officials went so far as to alter existing birth and marriage records to reclassify as "colored" some mixed-race individuals or families who identified as and had been recorded as "Indian". These actions destroyed the documented continuity of identity of several Indian communities. The historical documentation of continuity of self-identified Native American families was lost. If the families happened to be Catholic, their churches continued to record births and marriages as being among "Indian" families. But the process of loss of historical and cultural continuity appeared to have happened also with some of the non-reservation remnant Lenape Indians of Delaware.
According to the Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture, in his 1950 dissertation, cultural geographer Edward Price proposed that Melungeons were families descended from free people of color (who were of European and African ancestry) and mixed-race unions between persons of African ancestry and Native Americans in colonial Virginia, whose territory included the modern-day states of Kentucky and West Virginia.
Acceptance
The families known as "Melungeons" in the 19th century were generally well integrated into the communities in which they lived, though they may still have been affected by racism. Records show that on the whole, they enjoyed the same rights as whites. For example, they held property, voted, and served in the Army; some, such as the Gibsons, owned slaves as early as the 18th century.
Under the first Tennessee constitution of 1796, free people of color (males only) were allowed to vote. Following fears raised by the 1831 Nat Turner slave rebellion in Virginia, Tennessee and other southern states passed new restrictions on free people of color. By its new constitution of 1834, Tennessee disfranchised free people of color, reducing them to second-class status and excluding them from the political system.
In this period, several Melungeon men were tried in Hawkins County in 1846 for "illegal voting", under suspicion of being black or free men of color (and thereby ineligible for voting). They were acquitted, presumably by demonstrating to the court's satisfaction that they had no appreciable black ancestry. Standards were not as strict as under the later laws of the "one drop rule" of the 20th century. As in some other cases, racial status was chiefly determined by people testifying as to how the men were perceived by the community and whether they had "acted white" by voting, serving in the militia, or undertaking other common citizens' obligations available to white men.
After the American Civil War and following the Reconstruction Era, southern whites struggled to regain political power and re-assert white supremacy over freedmen and traditionally free families such as the Melungeons. The white Democrat-dominated state legislatures passed Jim Crow laws. But issues of race were often brought to court as a result of arguments about money.
For example, in 1872, a widowed woman's Melungeon ancestry was assessed in a trial in Hamilton County, Tennessee. The case was brought by relatives of her late husband, who challenged her inheritance of money from him after his death. They questioned the legitimacy of a marriage between a white man and a woman known to be Melungeon, and argued the marriage was not legitimate because the woman was of black ancestry. Based on the testimony of people in the community, the court decided the woman in the case was not of African ancestry, or had no such ancestors recently enough to matter.
During the period of segregation, a North Carolina statute barred "Portuguese" people—presumably Melungeons, as North Carolina does not have a large Portuguese American community—from whites-only schools. However, under this statute the "Portuguese" were not classified as Black, and they were not required to attend Black schools.
Modern anthropological and sociological studies of Melungeon descendants in Appalachia have demonstrated that they have become culturally indistinguishable from their "non-Melungeon," white neighbors: they share a Baptist religious affiliation and other community features. With changing attitudes and a desire for more work opportunities, numerous descendants of the early Melungeon pioneer families have migrated from Appalachia to make their lives in other parts of the United States.
Legends
In spite of being culturally and linguistically similar to their European neighbors, these multi-racial families were of a sufficiently different physical appearance to provoke speculation as to their identity and origins. In the first half of the 19th century, the pejorative term "Melungeon" began to be applied to these families by local white (European-American) neighbors. Local "knowledge" or myths soon began to arise about them. According to historian Pat Elder, the earliest of these was that they were "Indian" (more specifically, "Cherokee"). Jack Goins, an identified Melungeon descendant and researcher, states that the Melungeons claimed to be both Indian and Portuguese. An example was "Spanish Peggy" Gibson, wife of Vardy Collins.
A few ancestors may have been of mixed Iberian (Spanish and/or Portuguese) and African origin. Historian Ira Berlin has noted that some early slaves and free blacks of the charter generation in the colonies were "Atlantic Creoles", mixed-race descendants of Iberian workers and African women from slave ports in Africa. Their male descendants grew up bilingual and accompanied Europeans as workers or slaves. The majority of Melungeon early ancestors, who had migrated from Virginia over time, are of northern European and African ancestry, given the history of settlement in late 17th–early-18th century eastern Virginia. Later generations in Tennessee intermarried with descendants of Scotch-Irish immigrants who arrived in the mid- to late-18th century and settled in the backcountry before the American Revolution.
Given historical evidence of Native American settlement patterns, Cherokee Nation descent is highly unlikely for the original Melungeon ancestral families. These families were formed during the colonial era in the Virginia Tidewater areas, which were not Cherokee territory. Some of their descendants may have later intermarried with isolated individuals of Cherokee or other Native American ancestry in East Tennessee. Melungeons in Graysville, Tennessee claimed Cherokee ancestors.
Anthropologist E. Raymond Evans wrote (1979) regarding these claims:
In Graysville, the Melungeons strongly deny their Black heritage and explain their genetic differences by claiming to have had Cherokee grandmothers. Many of the local whites also claim Cherokee ancestry and appear to accept the Melungeon claim ...
In 1999 historian C. S. Everett hypothesized that John Collins (recorded as a Sapony Indian who was expelled from Orange County, Virginia about January 1743), might be the same man as the Melungeon ancestor John Collins, classified as a "mulatto" in 1755 North Carolina records. But Everett has revised that theory after having discovered evidence that these were two different men named John Collins. Only descendants of the latter man, identified as mulatto in the 1755 record in North Carolina, has any proven connection to the Melungeon families of eastern Tennessee.
Other peoples frequently suggested as Melungeon ancestors are the Black Dutch and the Powhatan Indian group. The Powhatan were an Algonquian-speaking tribe who inhabited eastern Virginia during the initial period of European colonization.
Speculation about Melungeon origins continued during the 19th and 20th centuries. Writers recounted folk tales of shipwrecked sailors, lost colonists, hoards of silver, and ancient peoples such as the Carthaginians or Phoenicians. With each writer, new elements were added to the mythology surrounding this group, and more surnames were added to the list of possible Melungeon ancestors. Journalist Will Allen Dromgoole wrote several articles on the Melungeons in the 1890s.
In the late 20th century, amateur researchers suggested that the Melungeons' ethnic identity may include ancestors who were Turks and Sephardi (Iberian) Jews. The writers David Beers Quinn and Ivor Noel Hume theorize that the Melungeons were descended from Sephardi Jews who fled the Inquisition and came as sailors to North America. They also say that Francis Drake did not repatriate all the Turks he saved from the sack of Cartagena, but some came to the colonies. But Janet Crain notes that there is no written documentation to support this theory.
The paper on the Melungeon DNA Project, published by Paul Heinegg, Jack Goins, and Roberta Estes in the Journal of Genetic Genealogy, shows that ancestry of the sample is primarily European and African, with only one person having a Native American paternal haplotype. There is no genetic evidence to support the Turkish or Jewish ancestry theories.
Etymology
There are many hypotheses about the etymology of the term Melungeon. Linguists and many researchers believe that it may have been derived from the French mélange, meaning mixture, or perhaps [nous] mélangeons meaning "[we] mix/mingle". This etymology is also found in several dictionaries. There were numerous French Huguenot immigrants in Virginia from 1700, and their language could have contributed a term.
Joanne Pezzullo and Karlton Douglas speculate that a more likely derivation of Melungeon, related to the dominance of the English language in the colonies, may have been from the now obsolete English word malengin (also spelled mal engin) meaning "guile", "deceit", or "ill intent." It was used by Edmund Spenser as the name of a trickster figure in his epic poem, The Faerie Queene (1590–1596), popular in Elizabethan England. The phrase, "harbored them Melungins," would be equivalent to "harbored someone of ill will", or could mean "harbored evil people", without reference to any ethnicity.
A different explanation traces the word to malungu (or malungo), a Luso-African word from Angola, meaning shipmate, derived from the Kimbundu word ma'luno, meaning "companion" or "friend". The word, spelled as Melungo and Mulungo, has been found in numerous Portuguese records. It is said to be a derogatory word that Africans used for people of Portuguese or other white ancestry. If so, the word was likely brought to America through people of African ancestry.
Kennedy (1994) speculates that the word derives from the Turkish melun can (from Arabic mal`un jinn ملعون جنّ), which purportedly means "damned soul." He suggests that, at the time, the (condemned soul) was a term used by Turks for Muslims who had been captured and enslaved aboard Spanish galleons.
Some writers try to connect the term Melungeon to an ethnic origin of people designated by that term, but there is no basis for this assumption. It appears the name arose as an exonym, something which neighboring people, of whatever origin, called the multi-racial people.
On October 7, 1840, the polemical Brownlow's Whig of Jonesborough, Tennessee, published an article entitled "Negro Speaking!" The publisher referred to a rival Democratic politician with a party in Sullivan County as "an impudent Malungeon from Washington City a scoundrel who is half Negro and half Indian," then as a "free negroe". In this and related articles, he does not identify the Democrat by name.
Modern identity
The term Melungeon was historically considered an insult, a label applied to Appalachians who were by appearance or reputation of mixed-race ancestry. In southwest Virginia, the term Ramp was similarly applied to people of mixed race. This term has never shed its pejorative character.
In December 1943, Virginia State Registrar of Vital Statistics, Walter Ashby Plecker, sent county officials a letter warning against "colored" families trying to pass as "white" or "Indian" in violation of the Racial Integrity Act of 1924. He identified specific surnames by county, including: "Lee, Smyth and Wise: Collins, Gibson, (Gipson), Moore, Goins, Ramsey, Delph, Bunch, Freeman, Mise, Barlow, Bolden (Bolin), Mullins, Hawkins (chiefly Tennessee Melungeons)". (Lee County, Virginia borders Hancock County, Tennessee.) He directed the offices to reclassify members of certain families as black, causing the loss for numerous families of documentation in records that showed their continued identification as Native American.
Different researchers have developed their own lists of the surnames of core Melungeon families. Generally, specific lines within families have to be traced to document such identity. For example, DeMarce (1992) listed Hale as a Melungeon surname.
By the mid-to-late 19th century, the term Melungeon appeared to have been used most frequently to refer to the biracial families of Hancock County and neighboring areas. Several other uses of the term in the print media, from mid-19th to early 20th century, have been collected at the Melungeon Heritage Association Website. The spelling of the term varied widely, as was common for words and names at the time. Eventually, the form "Melungeon" became standard.
Since the late 1960s, "Melungeon" has been increasingly adopted by individuals who identify with the ethnic group. This shift in meaning may have resulted from the popularity of Walk Toward the Sunset, a drama written by playwright Kermit Hunter and produced outdoors. The play was first presented in 1969 in Sneedville, the county seat of Hancock County. Making no claim to historical accuracy, Hunter portrayed the Melungeons as indigenous people of uncertain race who were mistakenly perceived as black by neighboring white settlers. As the drama portrayed Melungeons in a positive, romantic light, many individuals began for the first time to self-identify by that term. Hunter intended for his drama "to improve the socio-economic climate" of Hancock County, and to "lift the Melungeon name 'from shame to the hall of fame'." The play helped revive interest in the history of Melungeons. The civil rights movement and social changes of the 1960s further contributed to wider acceptance of members of the group. Research in social history and genealogy has documented new facts about people identified as Melungeons.
Since the mid-1990s, popular interest in the Melungeons has grown tremendously, although many descendants have left the region of historical concentration. Writer Bill Bryson devoted the better part of a chapter to them in his The Lost Continent (1989).
N. Brent Kennedy, a non-specialist, wrote a book on his claimed Melungeon roots, The Melungeons: The Resurrection of a Proud People (1994). With the advent of the internet, many people are researching family history and the number of people self-identifying as having Melungeon ancestry has increased rapidly, according to Kennedy. Some individuals have begun to self-identify as Melungeons after reading about the group on a website and discovering their surname on the expanding list of "Melungeon-associated" surnames. Others believe they have certain "characteristic" physical traits or conditions or assume that a multi-racial heritage means they are Melungeon.
For example, some Melungeons are allegedly identifiable by shovel-shaped incisors, a dental feature more commonly found among, but not restricted to, Native Americans and Northeast Asians. After an unsubstantiated hypothesis, popularized by N. Brent Kennedy, that Melungeons are of Turkish origin, some people have identified as having an enlarged external occipital protuberance, dubbed an "Anatolian bump".
Academic historians have not found any evidence for this thesis, nor is it supported by results from the Melungeon DNA Project. As noted before, this analysis shows that Melungeon descendants overwhelmingly have northern European and African DNA ancestry.
Internet sites promote the anecdotal claim that Melungeons are more prone to certain diseases, such as sarcoidosis or familial Mediterranean fever. Academic medical centers have noted that neither of these diseases is confined to a single population.
Kennedy's claims of ancestral connections to this group have been strongly disputed. The professional genealogist and historian, Virginia E. DeMarce, reviewed his 1994 book and found that Kennedy's documentation of his Melungeon ancestry was seriously flawed. He had a very indistinct definition of Melungeons, although the group had already been extensively studied and documented by other researchers. She criticized Kennedy for trying to include people who might have had other than northern European ancestry, and said that he did not properly take account of existing historical records or recognized genealogical practice in his research. He claimed to have ancestors who were persecuted for racial reasons. However, she found that his named ancestors were all classified as white in records, held various political offices (which showed they could vote and were supported by their community), and were landowners. Kennedy responded to her critique in an article of his own.<ref>[http://underonesky.org/SEKMIE_PDF/SEKMIE3A.pdf "Dr. Brent Kennedy Responds to Virginia DeMarce", Southeastern Kentucky Melungeon Information Exchange]</ref>
The Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians in Kentucky, which is neither federally recognized or state recognized as an Indian tribe, claims that most families in its area who are commonly identified as Melungeon are of partial Native American descent. The organization says their ancestors migrated to the region in the late 18th and early to mid-19th centuries. Most of these families claimed the Ridgetop Shawnee heritage to explain their dark skin and Indian features and to avoid racial persecution. In 2010 the Kentucky General Assembly passed resolutions that acknowledged the civic contributions of the Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians to the state.
Similar groups
The following are other multi-racial groups that at one time were classified as tri-racial isolates. Some identify as Native American and have received state recognition, as have six tribes in Virginia.
Delaware
Nanticoke-Moors (and in Maryland) Nanticoke groups in Delaware and New Jersey (where they are intermarried with Lenape) have received state recognition. Most had left the area in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Florida
Dominickers of Holmes County in the Florida Panhandle
Indiana
Ben-Ishmael Tribe, pejoratively called "Grasshopper Gypsies"
Louisiana
Redbones (and in Texas)
Maryland
Piscataway Indian Nation, formerly also known as We-Sorts, one of three Piscataway-related groups recognized as Native American tribes by the state
New Jersey and New York
Ramapough Mountain Indians (aka "Jackson Whites") of the Ramapo Mountains, recognized by both New Jersey and New York as Native Americans
North Carolina
Coree or "Faircloth" Indians of Carteret County
Haliwa-Saponi, recognized by the state as Native American
Lumbee, recognized by the state as Native American
Person County Indians, aka "Cubans and Portuguese"
Ohio
Carmel Indians of Highland County
South Carolina
Red Bones (NB: distinct from the Gulf States Redbones)
Turks
Brass Ankles
Virginia
Monacan Indians (a.k.a. "Issues") of Amherst and Rockbridge counties, recognized by state of Virginia and the federal government (2018) as a Native American tribe, along with five other Virginia tribes
West Virginia
Chestnut Ridge people of Barbour County (also known as Mayles or, pejoratively, "Guineas")
Each of these groupings of multiracial populations has a particular history. There is evidence for connections between some of them, going back to common ancestry in colonial Virginia. For example, the Goins surname group in eastern Tennessee has long been identified as Melungeon. The surname Goins is also found among the Lumbee of southern North Carolina, a multi-racial group that has been recognized by the state as a Native American tribe. In most cases, the multi-racial families have to be traced through specific branches and lines, as not all descendants were considered to be Melungeon or other groups.
See also
Melungeon DNA Project
List of topics related to the African diaspora
Vardy Community School
Mulatto
Pardo
References
Further reading
Ball, Bonnie (1992). The Melungeons: Notes on the Origin of a Race' '. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.
Berry, Brewton (1963). Almost White: A Study of Certain Racial Hybrids in the Eastern United States. New York: Macmillan Press.
Bible, Jean Patterson (1975). Melungeons Yesterday and Today. Signal Mountain, Tennessee: Mountain Press.
Brake, Katherine Vande. How They Shine: How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in Fiction of Appalachia. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Brake, Katherine Vande. Through the Back Door: Melungeon Literacies and Twenty-First Century Technologies. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Cavender, Anthony P. "The Melungeons of Upper East Tennessee: Persisting Social Identity," Tennessee Anthropologist 6 (1981): 27-36
DeMarce, Virginia E. (1993). "Looking at Legends – Lumbee and Melungeon: Applied Genealogy and the Origins of Tri-Racial Isolate Settlements." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 81 (March 1993): 24–45, scanned online, Historical-Melungeons
Forbes, Jack D. (1993). Africans and Native Americans: The Language of Race and the Evolution of Red-Black Peoples. University of Illinois Press.
Goins, Jack H. (2000). Melungeons: And Other Pioneer Families, Blountville, Tennessee: Continuity Press.
Hashaw, Tim. Children of Perdition: Melungeons and the Struggle of Mixed America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Heinegg, Paul (2005). FREE AFRICAN AMERICANS OF VIRGINIA, NORTH CAROLINA, SOUTH CAROLINA, MARYLAND AND DELAWARE Including the family histories of more than 80% of those counted as "all other free persons" in the 1790 and 1800 census, Baltimore, Maryland: Genealogical Publishing, 1999–2005. Available in its entirety online.
Hirschman, Elizabeth. Melungeons: The Last Lost Tribe in America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Johnson, Mattie Ruth (1997). My Melungeon Heritage: A Story of Life on Newman's Ridge. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.
Kennedy, N. Brent (1997) The Melungeons: the resurrection of a proud people. Mercer University Press.
Kessler, John S. and Donald Ball. North From the Mountains: A Folk History of the Carmel Melungeon Settlement, Highland County, Ohio. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Langdon, Barbara Tracy (1998). The Melungeons: An Annotated Bibliography: References in both Fiction and Nonfiction, Hemphill, Texas: Dogwood Press.
McGowan, Kathleen (2003). "Where do we really come from?", DISCOVER 24 (5, May 2003)
Offutt, Chris. (1999) "Melungeons", in Out of the Woods, Simon & Schuster.
Overbay, DruAnna Williams. Windows on the Past: The Cultural Heritage of Vardy, Hancock County, Tennessee. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Podber, Jacob. The Electronic Front Porch: An Oral History of the Arrival of Modern Media in Rural Appalachia and the Melungeon Community. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Price, Henry R. (1966). "Melungeons: The Vanishing Colony of Newman's Ridge." Conference paper. American Studies Association of Kentucky and Tennessee. March 25–26, 1966.
Reed, John Shelton (1997). "Mixing in the Mountains", Southern Cultures 3 (Winter 1997): 25–36.
Scolnick, Joseph M Jr. and N. Brent Kennedy. (2004). From Anatolia to Appalachia: A Turkish American Dialogue. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Vande Brake, Katherine (2001). How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in the Fiction of Appalachia, Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.
Williamson, Joel (1980). New People: Miscegenation and Mulattoes in the United States, New York: Free Press.
Winkler, Wayne. 2019. Beyond the sunset: The Melungeon drama, 1969-1976. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Winkler, Wayne (2004). "Walking Toward the Sunset: The Melungeons of Appalachia", Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.
Winkler, Wayne (1997). " The Melungeons", All Things Considered. National Public Radio. 21 September 1997.
External links
Paul Brodwin, ""Bioethics in action" and human population genetics researMacon, GA: Mercer University Press.ch", Culture, Medicine and Psychiatry, Volume 29, Number 2 (2005), 145-178, DOI: 10.1007/s11013-005-7423-2 PDF, addresses issue of 2002 Melungeon DNA study by Kevin Jones, which is unpublished
Melungeon Heritage Association, Official Website
"The Graysville Melungeons", Tennessee Anthropologist, November 1979, hosted at Rootsweb
Paul Heinegg, Free African Americans of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, 1999–2005
"Melungeons", Digital Library of Appalachia. Contains numerous photographs and documents related to Melungeons, mostly from 1900 to 1950.
A Mystery People – The Melungeons From Louis Gates Jr's "Finding your Roots."
"kindness our heroine shows Melungeon outcast Pearl (Erika Coleman)" from AC-T review of Big-Stone-Gap film. Accessed 6/8/2016
Multiracial ethnic groups in the United States
African-American history
Appalachian society
Ethnic groups in Appalachia
Ethnic groups in the United States
History of North Carolina
History of Tennessee
History of Virginia
Scotch-Irish American history
Multiracial affairs in the United States | false | [
"In mathematics, a rotation map is a function that represents an undirected edge-labeled graph, where each vertex enumerates its outgoing neighbors. Rotation maps were first introduced by Reingold, Vadhan and Wigderson (“Entropy waves, the zig-zag graph product, and new constant-degree expanders”, 2002) in order to conveniently define the zig-zag product and prove its properties.\nGiven a vertex and an edge label , the rotation map returns the 'th neighbor of and the edge label that would lead back to .\n\nDefinition\nFor a D-regular graph G, the rotation map is defined as follows: if the i th edge leaving v leads to w, and the j th edge leaving w leads to v.\n\nBasic properties\nFrom the definition we see that is a permutation, and moreover is the identity map ( is an involution).\n\nSpecial cases and properties \n A rotation map is consistently labeled if all the edges leaving each vertex are labeled in such a way that at each vertex, the labels of the incoming edges are all distinct. Every regular graph has some consistent labeling.\n A consistent rotation map can be used to encode a coined discrete time quantum walk on a (regular) graph.\n A rotation map is -consistent if . From the definition, a -consistent rotation map is consistently labeled.\n\nSee also\nZig-zag product\nRotation system\n\nReferences\n\n \n\n \n\n \n\nExtensions and generalizations of graphs\nGraph operations",
"In statistics, a consistent estimator or asymptotically consistent estimator is an estimator—a rule for computing estimates of a parameter θ0—having the property that as the number of data points used increases indefinitely, the resulting sequence of estimates converges in probability to θ0. This means that the distributions of the estimates become more and more concentrated near the true value of the parameter being estimated, so that the probability of the estimator being arbitrarily close to θ0 converges to one.\n\nIn practice one constructs an estimator as a function of an available sample of size n, and then imagines being able to keep collecting data and expanding the sample ad infinitum. In this way one would obtain a sequence of estimates indexed by n, and consistency is a property of what occurs as the sample size “grows to infinity”. If the sequence of estimates can be mathematically shown to converge in probability to the true value θ0, it is called a consistent estimator; otherwise the estimator is said to be inconsistent.\n\nConsistency as defined here is sometimes referred to as weak consistency. When we replace convergence in probability with almost sure convergence, then the estimator is said to be strongly consistent. Consistency is related to bias; see bias versus consistency.\n\nDefinition \nFormally speaking, an estimator Tn of parameter θ is said to be consistent, if it converges in probability to the true value of the parameter:\n \ni.e. if, for all ε > 0\n \n\nA more rigorous definition takes into account the fact that θ is actually unknown, and thus the convergence in probability must take place for every possible value of this parameter. Suppose } is a family of distributions (the parametric model), and } is an infinite sample from the distribution pθ. Let { Tn(Xθ) } be a sequence of estimators for some parameter g(θ). Usually Tn will be based on the first n observations of a sample. Then this sequence {Tn} is said to be (weakly) consistent if \n \n\nThis definition uses g(θ) instead of simply θ, because often one is interested in estimating a certain function or a sub-vector of the underlying parameter. In the next example we estimate the location parameter of the model, but not the scale:\n\nExamples\n\nSample mean of a normal random variable \n\nSuppose one has a sequence of observations {X1, X2, ...} from a normal N(μ, σ2) distribution. To estimate μ based on the first n observations, one can use the sample mean: Tn = (X1 + ... + Xn)/n. This defines a sequence of estimators, indexed by the sample size n.\n\nFrom the properties of the normal distribution, we know the sampling distribution of this statistic: Tn is itself normally distributed, with mean μ and variance σ2/n. Equivalently, has a standard normal distribution:\n \nas n tends to infinity, for any fixed . Therefore, the sequence Tn of sample means is consistent for the population mean μ (recalling that is the cumulative distribution of the normal distribution).\n\nEstablishing consistency \n\nThe notion of asymptotic consistency is very close, almost synonymous to the notion of convergence in probability. As such, any theorem, lemma, or property which establishes convergence in probability may be used to prove the consistency. Many such tools exist:\n\n In order to demonstrate consistency directly from the definition one can use the inequality \n \nthe most common choice for function h being either the absolute value (in which case it is known as Markov inequality), or the quadratic function (respectively Chebyshev's inequality).\n\n Another useful result is the continuous mapping theorem: if Tn is consistent for θ and g(·) is a real-valued function continuous at point θ, then g(Tn) will be consistent for g(θ):\n \n\n Slutsky’s theorem can be used to combine several different estimators, or an estimator with a non-random convergent sequence. If Tn →dα, and Sn →pβ, then \n \n\n If estimator Tn is given by an explicit formula, then most likely the formula will employ sums of random variables, and then the law of large numbers can be used: for a sequence {Xn} of random variables and under suitable conditions,\n \n\n If estimator Tn is defined implicitly, for example as a value that maximizes certain objective function (see extremum estimator), then a more complicated argument involving stochastic equicontinuity has to be used.\n\nBias versus consistency\n\nUnbiased but not consistent \nAn estimator can be unbiased but not consistent. For example, for an iid sample {x,..., x} one can use T(X) = x as the estimator of the mean E[x]. Note that here the sampling distribution of T is the same as the underlying distribution (for any n, as it ignores all points but the last), so E[T(X)] = E[x] and it is unbiased, but it does not converge to any value.\n\nHowever, if a sequence of estimators is unbiased and converges to a value, then it is consistent, as it must converge to the correct value.\n\nBiased but consistent \nAlternatively, an estimator can be biased but consistent. For example, if the mean is estimated by it is biased, but as , it approaches the correct value, and so it is consistent.\n\nImportant examples include the sample variance and sample standard deviation. Without Bessel's correction (that is, when using the sample size instead of the degrees of freedom ), these are both negatively biased but consistent estimators. With the correction, the corrected sample variance is unbiased, while the corrected sample standard deviation is still biased, but less so, and both are still consistent: the correction factor converges to 1 as sample size grows.\n\nHere is another example. Let be a sequence of estimators for .\n\nWe can see that , , and the bias does not converge to zero.\n\nSee also \n Efficient estimator\n Fisher consistency — alternative, although rarely used concept of consistency for the estimators\n Regression dilution\n Statistical hypothesis testing\n\nNotes\n\nReferences \n \n \n \n \n.\n\nExternal links \n by Mark Thoma\n\nEstimator\nAsymptotic theory (statistics)"
] |
[
"Melungeon",
"Definition",
"What is the definition?",
"Melungeons have been defined as having multiracial ancestry.",
"Were they considered a certain race on their own?",
"They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype.",
"Were there more dominant characteristics?",
"They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype.",
"Has the definition changed?",
"Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion.",
"Has that definition be consistent?",
"in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as \"Portuguese,\" \"Native American,\" or \"light-skinned African American\"."
] | C_94dac338bec64838b4053fc31727774a_1 | What are some of the other characteristics? | 6 | Other than being identified as "Portuguese," "Native American," or "light-skinned African American", what are some other characteristics of the Melungeon? | Melungeon | The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity, as they are of mixed racial ancestry. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse origins who migrated, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900. Melungeons have been defined as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese," "Native American," or "light-skinned African American". During the ninetee|nth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies. Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to "marry white" since before the twentieth century. Scholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them "core" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales and marriage licenses. Other researchers include the surnames Powell, LeBon, Bolling, Bunch, Goins, Goodman, Heard, Minor, Mise, those Mullins who are not descended from Booker Mullins (1768-1864) , and several others. Descendants of Booker Mullins are excluded because 1) the Mullins Y-DNA Project in Virginia confirmed that Booker was the son of Sherwood/Sherrod Adkins and is not a "true Mullins" and 2) DNA-tests of Booker's descendants do not have an Melungeon markers in their DNA. (Family lines have to be researched individually, as not all families with these surnames are Melungeon.) As with many other surname groups, not all families with each surname have the same racial background and ancestry. The original meaning of the word "Melungeon" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee. CANNOTANSWER | Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. | Melungeons ( ) are an ethnic group of people from the Southeastern United States who descend from European settlers and Sub-Saharan African slaves. Historically, the Melungeons were associated with settlements in the Cumberland Gap area of central Appalachia, which includes portions of East Tennessee, Southwest Virginia, and eastern Kentucky.
Tri-racial describes populations who claim to be of mixed European, African and Native American ancestry. Although there is no consensus on how many such groups exist, estimates range as high as 200.
Definition
The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse ethnic origins who migrated to frontier areas, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous through the 19th century, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900.
Melungeons have been defined and documented as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese", "Native American", or "light-skinned African American". During the nineteenth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies.
Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to "marry white" since before the twentieth century.
Scholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them "core" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales, and marriage licenses.
The original meaning of the word "Melungeon" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee.
Origins
According to the principle of partus sequitur ventrem, which Virginia incorporated into law in 1662, children born in the colonies were assigned the social status of their mother, regardless of their father's ethnicity or citizenship. This meant the children of enslaved African or African-American women were born into slavery. But it also meant the children of free white or mulatto women, even if fathered by enslaved African men, were born free. The free descendants of such unions formed the majority of ancestors of the free families of color listed in the 1790 and 1810 US censuses. Early colonial Virginia was very much a "melting pot" of peoples, and before slavery hardened as a racial caste, white and black working-class people often lived and worked in close quarters and formed relationships and marriages.
Some of these early multiracial families were ancestors of the later Melungeons, yet each family line must be traced separately. Over the generations, most individuals of the group called Melungeon were persons of mixed European and African descent, sometimes also with Native American ancestry, whose ancestors had been free in colonial Virginia.
Edward Price's dissertation on Mixed-Blood Populations of the Eastern United States as to Origins, Localizations, and Persistence (1950) said that children of European and free black unions had also intermarried with persons of alleged Native American ancestry. In 1894, the U.S. Department of the Interior, in its "Report of Indians Taxed and Not Taxed," noted that the Melungeons in Hawkins County "claim to be Cherokee of mixed blood". The term Melungeon has since sometimes been applied as a catch-all phrase for a number of groups of individuals with mixed-race ancestry.
In 1995, Paul Heinegg published Free African American Families in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, and has since published regular updates. He found through his research and documented that the great majority of free people of color in the 1790 and 1810 censuses had ancestors from colonial Virginia, who were the children of unions between free white women and free, indentured or enslaved African or African-American men.
Similarly, in 2012, the genealogist Roberta Estes and her fellow researchers of the Melungeon DNA Project reported that the Melungeon lines likely originated in the unions of black and white indentured servants living in Virginia in the mid-1600s before slavery became widespread in the United States. They concluded that as laws to prevent the mixing of races were put in place, these family groups intermarried with each other, creating an endogamous group. They migrated together, sometimes along with white neighbors, from western Virginia through the Piedmont frontier of North Carolina, before settling primarily in the mountains of East Tennessee. In addition, the Melungeon DNA Project has documented multiracial ancestry, primarily European and African, for numerous people identified as Melungeon, affirming the evidence from written documentation.
Evidence
Free people of color are documented as migrating with European-American neighbors in the first half of the 18th century to the frontiers of Virginia and North Carolina, where they received land grants like their neighbors. For instance, the Collins, Gibson, and Ridley (Riddle) families owned land adjacent to one another in Orange County, North Carolina, where they and the Bunch family were listed in 1755 as "free Molatas (mulattoes)", subject to taxation on tithes. By settling in frontier areas, free people of color found more amenable living conditions and could escape some of the racial strictures of Virginia and North Carolina Tidewater plantation areas.
Historian Jack D. Forbes has discussed laws in South Carolina related to racial classification:
In 1719, South Carolina decided who should be an "Indian" for tax purposes since American [Indian] slaves were taxed at a lesser rate than African slaves. The act stated: "And for preventing all doubts and scruples that may arise what ought to be rated on mustees, mulattoes, etc. all such slaves as are not entirely Indian shall be accounted as negro.
Forbes said that, at the time, "mustees" and "mulattoes" were terms for persons of part-Native American ancestry. He wrote,
My judgment (to be discussed later) is that a mustee was primarily part-African and American [Indian] and that a mulatto was usually part-European and American [Indian]. The act is also significant because it asserts that part-American [Indians] with or without [emphasis added] African ancestry could be counted as Negroes, thus having an implication for all later slave censuses.This view does not have a consensus.
Beginning about 1767, some of the ancestors of the Melungeons reached the frontier New River area, where they are listed in the 1780s on tax lists of Montgomery County, Virginia. From there they migrated south in the Appalachian Range to Wilkes County, North Carolina, where some are listed as "white" on the 1790 census. They resided in a part that became Ashe County, where they are designated as "other free" in 1800.
The Collins and Gibson families (identified as Melungeon ancestors) were recorded in 1813 as members of the Stony Creek Primitive Baptist Church in Scott County, Virginia. They appear to have been treated as social equals of the white members. The earliest documented use of the term "Melungeon" is found in the minutes of this church (see Etymology below). While there are historical references to the documents, the evidence has come from transcribed copies.
From the Virginia and North Carolina frontiers, the families migrated west into frontier Tennessee and Kentucky. The earliest known Melungeon in what is now northeast Tennessee was Millington Collins, who executed a deed in Hawkins County in 1802. However, there is some evidence that Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hawkins (what is now Hancock County) by 1790. Several Collins and Gibson households were listed in Floyd County, Kentucky in the 1820 census, where they were classified as "free persons of color". On the 1830 censuses of Hawkins and neighboring Grainger County, Tennessee, the Collins and Gibson families are listed as "free-colored". Melungeons were residents of the part of Hawkins that in 1844 was organized as Hancock County.
By 1830, the Melungeon community in Hawkins County numbered 330 people in 55 families; in adjoining Grainger County, there were 130 people in 24 families. According to Edward Price, "Because of them, Hawkins County had more free colored persons in the 1830 census than any other county in Tennessee except Davidson (which includes Nashville) and more free colored families named Collins than any other county in the United States." Melungeon families have also been traced in Ashe County in northwestern North Carolina.
Contemporary accounts documented that Melungeon ancestors were considered by appearance to be mixed race. During the 18th and early 19th centuries, census enumerators classified them as "mulatto", "other free", or as "free persons of color". Sometimes they were listed as "white", sometimes as "black" or "negro", but almost never as "Indian". One family described as "Indian" was the Ridley (Riddle) family, noted as such on a 1767 Pittsylvania County, Virginia, tax list. They had been designated as "mulattoes" in an earlier record of 1755. Estes et al., in their 2012 summary of the Melungeon Core DNA Testing Program, stated that the Riddle family is the only Melungeon participant with historical records identifying them as having Native American origins, but their DNA is European. Among the participants, only the Sizemore family is documented as having Native American DNA.
The court record of Jacob Perkins vs. John White (1858) in Johnson County, Tennessee, provides definitions of the time related to race and free people of color. As in Virginia, if a free person was mostly white (one-eighth or less black), he was considered legally white and a citizen of the state:
"Persons that are known and recognized by the Constitution and laws of Tennessee, as free persons of color are those who by the act of 1794 section 32 are taken and deemed to be capable in law to be certified in any case what is in, except against each other or in the language of the statute "all Negroes, Indians, Mulattoes, and all persons of mixed blood descended from Negro or Indian ancestors to the third generation inclusive though one ancestor of each generation may have been a white person, white bond or free."... That if the great grandfather of Plaintiff was an Indian or Negro and he is descended on the mother's side from a white woman, without any further Negro or Indian blood than such as he derived on the father's side, then the Plaintiff is not of mix blood, or within the third generation inclusive; in other words that if the Plaintiff has not in his veins more than 1/8 of Negro or Indian blood, he is a citizen of this state and it would be slanderous to call him a Negro."
During the 19th century, due to their intermarriages with white spouses, Melungeon-surnamed families were increasingly classified as white on census records. In 1935, a Nevada newspaper anecdotally described Melungeons as "mulattoes" with "straight hair."
Assimilation
Ariela Gross has shown by analysis of court cases, the shift from perceptions of an individual as "mulatto" to "white" was often dependent upon appearance and, especially, community perception of a person's activities in life: who one associated with and whether the person fulfilled the common obligations of citizens. Census takers were generally people of a community, so they classified people racially as they were known by the community. Definitions of racial categories were often imprecise and ambiguous, especially for "mulatto" and "free person of color". In the Thirteen Colonies and the United States at times in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, "mulatto" could mean a mixture of African and European, African and Native American, European and Native American, or all three. At the same time, these groups intermarried.
Persons were often identified by the company they kept and which ethnic culture they identified with. There were differences between how people identified themselves and how others identified them. Because of slavery, colonial and state laws were biased toward identifying multiracial people of partial African origin as African or 'black,' although persons of mixed African and Native American descent often identified and lived culturally as Native Americans, particularly if their maternal line was Native American. Many Native American tribes were organized into matrilineal kinship systems, in which children were considered born into the mother's clan and took their social status from her people; inheritance and descent was figured through the maternal lines.
Because of the loose terminology and social attitudes to mixed-race persons, remnant non-reservation American Indians in the Upper South were generally not recorded separately as Indians. They were often gradually reclassified as mulatto or free people of color, especially as generations intermarried with neighbors of African descent. In the early decades of the 20th century, Virginia and some other states passed laws imposing the one-drop rule, requiring all persons to be classified as either white or black: those of any known African ancestry were to be classified as black, regardless of appearance, and how they self-identified or were known in the community.
After Virginia passed its Racial Integrity Act of 1924, officials went so far as to alter existing birth and marriage records to reclassify as "colored" some mixed-race individuals or families who identified as and had been recorded as "Indian". These actions destroyed the documented continuity of identity of several Indian communities. The historical documentation of continuity of self-identified Native American families was lost. If the families happened to be Catholic, their churches continued to record births and marriages as being among "Indian" families. But the process of loss of historical and cultural continuity appeared to have happened also with some of the non-reservation remnant Lenape Indians of Delaware.
According to the Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture, in his 1950 dissertation, cultural geographer Edward Price proposed that Melungeons were families descended from free people of color (who were of European and African ancestry) and mixed-race unions between persons of African ancestry and Native Americans in colonial Virginia, whose territory included the modern-day states of Kentucky and West Virginia.
Acceptance
The families known as "Melungeons" in the 19th century were generally well integrated into the communities in which they lived, though they may still have been affected by racism. Records show that on the whole, they enjoyed the same rights as whites. For example, they held property, voted, and served in the Army; some, such as the Gibsons, owned slaves as early as the 18th century.
Under the first Tennessee constitution of 1796, free people of color (males only) were allowed to vote. Following fears raised by the 1831 Nat Turner slave rebellion in Virginia, Tennessee and other southern states passed new restrictions on free people of color. By its new constitution of 1834, Tennessee disfranchised free people of color, reducing them to second-class status and excluding them from the political system.
In this period, several Melungeon men were tried in Hawkins County in 1846 for "illegal voting", under suspicion of being black or free men of color (and thereby ineligible for voting). They were acquitted, presumably by demonstrating to the court's satisfaction that they had no appreciable black ancestry. Standards were not as strict as under the later laws of the "one drop rule" of the 20th century. As in some other cases, racial status was chiefly determined by people testifying as to how the men were perceived by the community and whether they had "acted white" by voting, serving in the militia, or undertaking other common citizens' obligations available to white men.
After the American Civil War and following the Reconstruction Era, southern whites struggled to regain political power and re-assert white supremacy over freedmen and traditionally free families such as the Melungeons. The white Democrat-dominated state legislatures passed Jim Crow laws. But issues of race were often brought to court as a result of arguments about money.
For example, in 1872, a widowed woman's Melungeon ancestry was assessed in a trial in Hamilton County, Tennessee. The case was brought by relatives of her late husband, who challenged her inheritance of money from him after his death. They questioned the legitimacy of a marriage between a white man and a woman known to be Melungeon, and argued the marriage was not legitimate because the woman was of black ancestry. Based on the testimony of people in the community, the court decided the woman in the case was not of African ancestry, or had no such ancestors recently enough to matter.
During the period of segregation, a North Carolina statute barred "Portuguese" people—presumably Melungeons, as North Carolina does not have a large Portuguese American community—from whites-only schools. However, under this statute the "Portuguese" were not classified as Black, and they were not required to attend Black schools.
Modern anthropological and sociological studies of Melungeon descendants in Appalachia have demonstrated that they have become culturally indistinguishable from their "non-Melungeon," white neighbors: they share a Baptist religious affiliation and other community features. With changing attitudes and a desire for more work opportunities, numerous descendants of the early Melungeon pioneer families have migrated from Appalachia to make their lives in other parts of the United States.
Legends
In spite of being culturally and linguistically similar to their European neighbors, these multi-racial families were of a sufficiently different physical appearance to provoke speculation as to their identity and origins. In the first half of the 19th century, the pejorative term "Melungeon" began to be applied to these families by local white (European-American) neighbors. Local "knowledge" or myths soon began to arise about them. According to historian Pat Elder, the earliest of these was that they were "Indian" (more specifically, "Cherokee"). Jack Goins, an identified Melungeon descendant and researcher, states that the Melungeons claimed to be both Indian and Portuguese. An example was "Spanish Peggy" Gibson, wife of Vardy Collins.
A few ancestors may have been of mixed Iberian (Spanish and/or Portuguese) and African origin. Historian Ira Berlin has noted that some early slaves and free blacks of the charter generation in the colonies were "Atlantic Creoles", mixed-race descendants of Iberian workers and African women from slave ports in Africa. Their male descendants grew up bilingual and accompanied Europeans as workers or slaves. The majority of Melungeon early ancestors, who had migrated from Virginia over time, are of northern European and African ancestry, given the history of settlement in late 17th–early-18th century eastern Virginia. Later generations in Tennessee intermarried with descendants of Scotch-Irish immigrants who arrived in the mid- to late-18th century and settled in the backcountry before the American Revolution.
Given historical evidence of Native American settlement patterns, Cherokee Nation descent is highly unlikely for the original Melungeon ancestral families. These families were formed during the colonial era in the Virginia Tidewater areas, which were not Cherokee territory. Some of their descendants may have later intermarried with isolated individuals of Cherokee or other Native American ancestry in East Tennessee. Melungeons in Graysville, Tennessee claimed Cherokee ancestors.
Anthropologist E. Raymond Evans wrote (1979) regarding these claims:
In Graysville, the Melungeons strongly deny their Black heritage and explain their genetic differences by claiming to have had Cherokee grandmothers. Many of the local whites also claim Cherokee ancestry and appear to accept the Melungeon claim ...
In 1999 historian C. S. Everett hypothesized that John Collins (recorded as a Sapony Indian who was expelled from Orange County, Virginia about January 1743), might be the same man as the Melungeon ancestor John Collins, classified as a "mulatto" in 1755 North Carolina records. But Everett has revised that theory after having discovered evidence that these were two different men named John Collins. Only descendants of the latter man, identified as mulatto in the 1755 record in North Carolina, has any proven connection to the Melungeon families of eastern Tennessee.
Other peoples frequently suggested as Melungeon ancestors are the Black Dutch and the Powhatan Indian group. The Powhatan were an Algonquian-speaking tribe who inhabited eastern Virginia during the initial period of European colonization.
Speculation about Melungeon origins continued during the 19th and 20th centuries. Writers recounted folk tales of shipwrecked sailors, lost colonists, hoards of silver, and ancient peoples such as the Carthaginians or Phoenicians. With each writer, new elements were added to the mythology surrounding this group, and more surnames were added to the list of possible Melungeon ancestors. Journalist Will Allen Dromgoole wrote several articles on the Melungeons in the 1890s.
In the late 20th century, amateur researchers suggested that the Melungeons' ethnic identity may include ancestors who were Turks and Sephardi (Iberian) Jews. The writers David Beers Quinn and Ivor Noel Hume theorize that the Melungeons were descended from Sephardi Jews who fled the Inquisition and came as sailors to North America. They also say that Francis Drake did not repatriate all the Turks he saved from the sack of Cartagena, but some came to the colonies. But Janet Crain notes that there is no written documentation to support this theory.
The paper on the Melungeon DNA Project, published by Paul Heinegg, Jack Goins, and Roberta Estes in the Journal of Genetic Genealogy, shows that ancestry of the sample is primarily European and African, with only one person having a Native American paternal haplotype. There is no genetic evidence to support the Turkish or Jewish ancestry theories.
Etymology
There are many hypotheses about the etymology of the term Melungeon. Linguists and many researchers believe that it may have been derived from the French mélange, meaning mixture, or perhaps [nous] mélangeons meaning "[we] mix/mingle". This etymology is also found in several dictionaries. There were numerous French Huguenot immigrants in Virginia from 1700, and their language could have contributed a term.
Joanne Pezzullo and Karlton Douglas speculate that a more likely derivation of Melungeon, related to the dominance of the English language in the colonies, may have been from the now obsolete English word malengin (also spelled mal engin) meaning "guile", "deceit", or "ill intent." It was used by Edmund Spenser as the name of a trickster figure in his epic poem, The Faerie Queene (1590–1596), popular in Elizabethan England. The phrase, "harbored them Melungins," would be equivalent to "harbored someone of ill will", or could mean "harbored evil people", without reference to any ethnicity.
A different explanation traces the word to malungu (or malungo), a Luso-African word from Angola, meaning shipmate, derived from the Kimbundu word ma'luno, meaning "companion" or "friend". The word, spelled as Melungo and Mulungo, has been found in numerous Portuguese records. It is said to be a derogatory word that Africans used for people of Portuguese or other white ancestry. If so, the word was likely brought to America through people of African ancestry.
Kennedy (1994) speculates that the word derives from the Turkish melun can (from Arabic mal`un jinn ملعون جنّ), which purportedly means "damned soul." He suggests that, at the time, the (condemned soul) was a term used by Turks for Muslims who had been captured and enslaved aboard Spanish galleons.
Some writers try to connect the term Melungeon to an ethnic origin of people designated by that term, but there is no basis for this assumption. It appears the name arose as an exonym, something which neighboring people, of whatever origin, called the multi-racial people.
On October 7, 1840, the polemical Brownlow's Whig of Jonesborough, Tennessee, published an article entitled "Negro Speaking!" The publisher referred to a rival Democratic politician with a party in Sullivan County as "an impudent Malungeon from Washington City a scoundrel who is half Negro and half Indian," then as a "free negroe". In this and related articles, he does not identify the Democrat by name.
Modern identity
The term Melungeon was historically considered an insult, a label applied to Appalachians who were by appearance or reputation of mixed-race ancestry. In southwest Virginia, the term Ramp was similarly applied to people of mixed race. This term has never shed its pejorative character.
In December 1943, Virginia State Registrar of Vital Statistics, Walter Ashby Plecker, sent county officials a letter warning against "colored" families trying to pass as "white" or "Indian" in violation of the Racial Integrity Act of 1924. He identified specific surnames by county, including: "Lee, Smyth and Wise: Collins, Gibson, (Gipson), Moore, Goins, Ramsey, Delph, Bunch, Freeman, Mise, Barlow, Bolden (Bolin), Mullins, Hawkins (chiefly Tennessee Melungeons)". (Lee County, Virginia borders Hancock County, Tennessee.) He directed the offices to reclassify members of certain families as black, causing the loss for numerous families of documentation in records that showed their continued identification as Native American.
Different researchers have developed their own lists of the surnames of core Melungeon families. Generally, specific lines within families have to be traced to document such identity. For example, DeMarce (1992) listed Hale as a Melungeon surname.
By the mid-to-late 19th century, the term Melungeon appeared to have been used most frequently to refer to the biracial families of Hancock County and neighboring areas. Several other uses of the term in the print media, from mid-19th to early 20th century, have been collected at the Melungeon Heritage Association Website. The spelling of the term varied widely, as was common for words and names at the time. Eventually, the form "Melungeon" became standard.
Since the late 1960s, "Melungeon" has been increasingly adopted by individuals who identify with the ethnic group. This shift in meaning may have resulted from the popularity of Walk Toward the Sunset, a drama written by playwright Kermit Hunter and produced outdoors. The play was first presented in 1969 in Sneedville, the county seat of Hancock County. Making no claim to historical accuracy, Hunter portrayed the Melungeons as indigenous people of uncertain race who were mistakenly perceived as black by neighboring white settlers. As the drama portrayed Melungeons in a positive, romantic light, many individuals began for the first time to self-identify by that term. Hunter intended for his drama "to improve the socio-economic climate" of Hancock County, and to "lift the Melungeon name 'from shame to the hall of fame'." The play helped revive interest in the history of Melungeons. The civil rights movement and social changes of the 1960s further contributed to wider acceptance of members of the group. Research in social history and genealogy has documented new facts about people identified as Melungeons.
Since the mid-1990s, popular interest in the Melungeons has grown tremendously, although many descendants have left the region of historical concentration. Writer Bill Bryson devoted the better part of a chapter to them in his The Lost Continent (1989).
N. Brent Kennedy, a non-specialist, wrote a book on his claimed Melungeon roots, The Melungeons: The Resurrection of a Proud People (1994). With the advent of the internet, many people are researching family history and the number of people self-identifying as having Melungeon ancestry has increased rapidly, according to Kennedy. Some individuals have begun to self-identify as Melungeons after reading about the group on a website and discovering their surname on the expanding list of "Melungeon-associated" surnames. Others believe they have certain "characteristic" physical traits or conditions or assume that a multi-racial heritage means they are Melungeon.
For example, some Melungeons are allegedly identifiable by shovel-shaped incisors, a dental feature more commonly found among, but not restricted to, Native Americans and Northeast Asians. After an unsubstantiated hypothesis, popularized by N. Brent Kennedy, that Melungeons are of Turkish origin, some people have identified as having an enlarged external occipital protuberance, dubbed an "Anatolian bump".
Academic historians have not found any evidence for this thesis, nor is it supported by results from the Melungeon DNA Project. As noted before, this analysis shows that Melungeon descendants overwhelmingly have northern European and African DNA ancestry.
Internet sites promote the anecdotal claim that Melungeons are more prone to certain diseases, such as sarcoidosis or familial Mediterranean fever. Academic medical centers have noted that neither of these diseases is confined to a single population.
Kennedy's claims of ancestral connections to this group have been strongly disputed. The professional genealogist and historian, Virginia E. DeMarce, reviewed his 1994 book and found that Kennedy's documentation of his Melungeon ancestry was seriously flawed. He had a very indistinct definition of Melungeons, although the group had already been extensively studied and documented by other researchers. She criticized Kennedy for trying to include people who might have had other than northern European ancestry, and said that he did not properly take account of existing historical records or recognized genealogical practice in his research. He claimed to have ancestors who were persecuted for racial reasons. However, she found that his named ancestors were all classified as white in records, held various political offices (which showed they could vote and were supported by their community), and were landowners. Kennedy responded to her critique in an article of his own.<ref>[http://underonesky.org/SEKMIE_PDF/SEKMIE3A.pdf "Dr. Brent Kennedy Responds to Virginia DeMarce", Southeastern Kentucky Melungeon Information Exchange]</ref>
The Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians in Kentucky, which is neither federally recognized or state recognized as an Indian tribe, claims that most families in its area who are commonly identified as Melungeon are of partial Native American descent. The organization says their ancestors migrated to the region in the late 18th and early to mid-19th centuries. Most of these families claimed the Ridgetop Shawnee heritage to explain their dark skin and Indian features and to avoid racial persecution. In 2010 the Kentucky General Assembly passed resolutions that acknowledged the civic contributions of the Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians to the state.
Similar groups
The following are other multi-racial groups that at one time were classified as tri-racial isolates. Some identify as Native American and have received state recognition, as have six tribes in Virginia.
Delaware
Nanticoke-Moors (and in Maryland) Nanticoke groups in Delaware and New Jersey (where they are intermarried with Lenape) have received state recognition. Most had left the area in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Florida
Dominickers of Holmes County in the Florida Panhandle
Indiana
Ben-Ishmael Tribe, pejoratively called "Grasshopper Gypsies"
Louisiana
Redbones (and in Texas)
Maryland
Piscataway Indian Nation, formerly also known as We-Sorts, one of three Piscataway-related groups recognized as Native American tribes by the state
New Jersey and New York
Ramapough Mountain Indians (aka "Jackson Whites") of the Ramapo Mountains, recognized by both New Jersey and New York as Native Americans
North Carolina
Coree or "Faircloth" Indians of Carteret County
Haliwa-Saponi, recognized by the state as Native American
Lumbee, recognized by the state as Native American
Person County Indians, aka "Cubans and Portuguese"
Ohio
Carmel Indians of Highland County
South Carolina
Red Bones (NB: distinct from the Gulf States Redbones)
Turks
Brass Ankles
Virginia
Monacan Indians (a.k.a. "Issues") of Amherst and Rockbridge counties, recognized by state of Virginia and the federal government (2018) as a Native American tribe, along with five other Virginia tribes
West Virginia
Chestnut Ridge people of Barbour County (also known as Mayles or, pejoratively, "Guineas")
Each of these groupings of multiracial populations has a particular history. There is evidence for connections between some of them, going back to common ancestry in colonial Virginia. For example, the Goins surname group in eastern Tennessee has long been identified as Melungeon. The surname Goins is also found among the Lumbee of southern North Carolina, a multi-racial group that has been recognized by the state as a Native American tribe. In most cases, the multi-racial families have to be traced through specific branches and lines, as not all descendants were considered to be Melungeon or other groups.
See also
Melungeon DNA Project
List of topics related to the African diaspora
Vardy Community School
Mulatto
Pardo
References
Further reading
Ball, Bonnie (1992). The Melungeons: Notes on the Origin of a Race' '. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.
Berry, Brewton (1963). Almost White: A Study of Certain Racial Hybrids in the Eastern United States. New York: Macmillan Press.
Bible, Jean Patterson (1975). Melungeons Yesterday and Today. Signal Mountain, Tennessee: Mountain Press.
Brake, Katherine Vande. How They Shine: How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in Fiction of Appalachia. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Brake, Katherine Vande. Through the Back Door: Melungeon Literacies and Twenty-First Century Technologies. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Cavender, Anthony P. "The Melungeons of Upper East Tennessee: Persisting Social Identity," Tennessee Anthropologist 6 (1981): 27-36
DeMarce, Virginia E. (1993). "Looking at Legends – Lumbee and Melungeon: Applied Genealogy and the Origins of Tri-Racial Isolate Settlements." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 81 (March 1993): 24–45, scanned online, Historical-Melungeons
Forbes, Jack D. (1993). Africans and Native Americans: The Language of Race and the Evolution of Red-Black Peoples. University of Illinois Press.
Goins, Jack H. (2000). Melungeons: And Other Pioneer Families, Blountville, Tennessee: Continuity Press.
Hashaw, Tim. Children of Perdition: Melungeons and the Struggle of Mixed America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Heinegg, Paul (2005). FREE AFRICAN AMERICANS OF VIRGINIA, NORTH CAROLINA, SOUTH CAROLINA, MARYLAND AND DELAWARE Including the family histories of more than 80% of those counted as "all other free persons" in the 1790 and 1800 census, Baltimore, Maryland: Genealogical Publishing, 1999–2005. Available in its entirety online.
Hirschman, Elizabeth. Melungeons: The Last Lost Tribe in America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Johnson, Mattie Ruth (1997). My Melungeon Heritage: A Story of Life on Newman's Ridge. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.
Kennedy, N. Brent (1997) The Melungeons: the resurrection of a proud people. Mercer University Press.
Kessler, John S. and Donald Ball. North From the Mountains: A Folk History of the Carmel Melungeon Settlement, Highland County, Ohio. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Langdon, Barbara Tracy (1998). The Melungeons: An Annotated Bibliography: References in both Fiction and Nonfiction, Hemphill, Texas: Dogwood Press.
McGowan, Kathleen (2003). "Where do we really come from?", DISCOVER 24 (5, May 2003)
Offutt, Chris. (1999) "Melungeons", in Out of the Woods, Simon & Schuster.
Overbay, DruAnna Williams. Windows on the Past: The Cultural Heritage of Vardy, Hancock County, Tennessee. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Podber, Jacob. The Electronic Front Porch: An Oral History of the Arrival of Modern Media in Rural Appalachia and the Melungeon Community. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Price, Henry R. (1966). "Melungeons: The Vanishing Colony of Newman's Ridge." Conference paper. American Studies Association of Kentucky and Tennessee. March 25–26, 1966.
Reed, John Shelton (1997). "Mixing in the Mountains", Southern Cultures 3 (Winter 1997): 25–36.
Scolnick, Joseph M Jr. and N. Brent Kennedy. (2004). From Anatolia to Appalachia: A Turkish American Dialogue. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Vande Brake, Katherine (2001). How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in the Fiction of Appalachia, Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.
Williamson, Joel (1980). New People: Miscegenation and Mulattoes in the United States, New York: Free Press.
Winkler, Wayne. 2019. Beyond the sunset: The Melungeon drama, 1969-1976. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Winkler, Wayne (2004). "Walking Toward the Sunset: The Melungeons of Appalachia", Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.
Winkler, Wayne (1997). " The Melungeons", All Things Considered. National Public Radio. 21 September 1997.
External links
Paul Brodwin, ""Bioethics in action" and human population genetics researMacon, GA: Mercer University Press.ch", Culture, Medicine and Psychiatry, Volume 29, Number 2 (2005), 145-178, DOI: 10.1007/s11013-005-7423-2 PDF, addresses issue of 2002 Melungeon DNA study by Kevin Jones, which is unpublished
Melungeon Heritage Association, Official Website
"The Graysville Melungeons", Tennessee Anthropologist, November 1979, hosted at Rootsweb
Paul Heinegg, Free African Americans of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, 1999–2005
"Melungeons", Digital Library of Appalachia. Contains numerous photographs and documents related to Melungeons, mostly from 1900 to 1950.
A Mystery People – The Melungeons From Louis Gates Jr's "Finding your Roots."
"kindness our heroine shows Melungeon outcast Pearl (Erika Coleman)" from AC-T review of Big-Stone-Gap film. Accessed 6/8/2016
Multiracial ethnic groups in the United States
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Appalachian society
Ethnic groups in Appalachia
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Scotch-Irish American history
Multiracial affairs in the United States | true | [
"In process theology, dipolar theism is the position that to conceive a perfect God, one must conceive him as embodying the \"good\" in sometimes-opposing characteristics, and therefore such a deity cannot be understood to embody only one set of characteristics.\n\nFor instance, here are some characteristics commonly associated with God:\nOne — Many\nTranscendent — Immanent\nEternal — Temporal\nMutable — Immutable\nMerciful — Just\nSimple — Complex\n\nDipolar theism holds that in each pair, both of the characteristics contain some element of good. To embody all perfections, therefore, God must embody the good in both characteristics, and cannot be limited to one, because a God limited to one would suffer the limits of the one, and lack the good in the other.\n\nFor instance, there is a \"good\" in being just, and also a good in being merciful. In being just, God determines that the good are rewarded and the evil are punished. In being merciful, God forgives those who sin. It follows, therefore, that a God that was only just or only merciful would be less than perfect. Dipolar theism holds that a perfect God must embody the good in both of those characteristics. Thus, a perfect God has the \"good\" characteristics of justice and the good characteristics of mercy.\n\nAlternatively, there is good in having absolute power, and good in leading by persuasion. For a God to be perfect, he cannot rule solely by predestination, because then he would lack the good possessed by a God who led by persuasion. God must therefore embody the \"good\" in both power and persuasion. From this conclusion, some reject the existence of an omnipotent God.\n\nCritique of dipolar theism\nThose rejecting dipolar theism argue that it fails to distinguish between what we think God is and what God actually is. Just because we think God should be a certain way to embody our idea of perfection does not mean God embodies those characteristics in reality. \n\nThis critique is analogous to the critique of Anselm's ontological argument by Gaunilo: \"Just because I can imagine a perfect island does not mean that it actually exists. Things are what they are no matter what I think they should be.\"\n\nPhilosophy of religion\nProcess theology\nTheism",
"Azeban is a lower-level trickster spirit in Abenaki mythology. The traditional homeland of the Abenaki is Wobanakik (Place of the Dawn), what is now called northern New England, southern Quebec, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. Azeban (also spelled Azban, Asban or Azaban) is a raccoon, the Abenaki trickster figure. Pronounced ah-zuh-bahn. Azeban does many foolish and/or mischievous things in Abenaki folktales, but unlike animal tricksters in some other tribes, is not dangerous or malevolent.\n\nAzeban deceives animals and other beings for food or other services.\n\nThere is an Abenaki story where a woman names her six dogs after their characteristics. She named one of the dogs Azeban. This woman Cedar Girl of the Abenaki [Dawn Land People] naming her dog \"Azeban\" has caused some confusion, causing people to assume the Abenaki trickster figure is a dog, not realizing she called the dog Azeban because he has the characteristics of the raccoon, the actual Abenaki Trickster figure.\n\nIn the story the dog Azeban is one of a litter of six dogs born to Awasosqua (Bear Woman). The others are Awasosis (Little Bear), Kwaniwibid (Long Tooth), Mikwe (Squirrel), Moosis (Little Moose) and Soksemo (Good Nose). All the spirits in Awasosqua's broods are dogs, and are named after their characteristics.\n\nReferences\n\nAbenaki legendary creatures\nMythological dogs\nTrickster gods\nFictional raccoons"
] |
[
"Melungeon",
"Definition",
"What is the definition?",
"Melungeons have been defined as having multiracial ancestry.",
"Were they considered a certain race on their own?",
"They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype.",
"Were there more dominant characteristics?",
"They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype.",
"Has the definition changed?",
"Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion.",
"Has that definition be consistent?",
"in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as \"Portuguese,\" \"Native American,\" or \"light-skinned African American\".",
"What are some of the other characteristics?",
"Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century."
] | C_94dac338bec64838b4053fc31727774a_1 | Are any Melungeon's considered other races? | 7 | Other Melungeon individuals and families who are accepted and identify as white, are any Melungeons considered other races? | Melungeon | The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity, as they are of mixed racial ancestry. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse origins who migrated, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900. Melungeons have been defined as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese," "Native American," or "light-skinned African American". During the ninetee|nth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies. Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to "marry white" since before the twentieth century. Scholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them "core" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales and marriage licenses. Other researchers include the surnames Powell, LeBon, Bolling, Bunch, Goins, Goodman, Heard, Minor, Mise, those Mullins who are not descended from Booker Mullins (1768-1864) , and several others. Descendants of Booker Mullins are excluded because 1) the Mullins Y-DNA Project in Virginia confirmed that Booker was the son of Sherwood/Sherrod Adkins and is not a "true Mullins" and 2) DNA-tests of Booker's descendants do not have an Melungeon markers in their DNA. (Family lines have to be researched individually, as not all families with these surnames are Melungeon.) As with many other surname groups, not all families with each surname have the same racial background and ancestry. The original meaning of the word "Melungeon" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee. CANNOTANSWER | they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese, | Melungeons ( ) are an ethnic group of people from the Southeastern United States who descend from European settlers and Sub-Saharan African slaves. Historically, the Melungeons were associated with settlements in the Cumberland Gap area of central Appalachia, which includes portions of East Tennessee, Southwest Virginia, and eastern Kentucky.
Tri-racial describes populations who claim to be of mixed European, African and Native American ancestry. Although there is no consensus on how many such groups exist, estimates range as high as 200.
Definition
The ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse ethnic origins who migrated to frontier areas, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous through the 19th century, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900.
Melungeons have been defined and documented as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as "Portuguese", "Native American", or "light-skinned African American". During the nineteenth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies.
Other Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to "marry white" since before the twentieth century.
Scholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them "core" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales, and marriage licenses.
The original meaning of the word "Melungeon" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee.
Origins
According to the principle of partus sequitur ventrem, which Virginia incorporated into law in 1662, children born in the colonies were assigned the social status of their mother, regardless of their father's ethnicity or citizenship. This meant the children of enslaved African or African-American women were born into slavery. But it also meant the children of free white or mulatto women, even if fathered by enslaved African men, were born free. The free descendants of such unions formed the majority of ancestors of the free families of color listed in the 1790 and 1810 US censuses. Early colonial Virginia was very much a "melting pot" of peoples, and before slavery hardened as a racial caste, white and black working-class people often lived and worked in close quarters and formed relationships and marriages.
Some of these early multiracial families were ancestors of the later Melungeons, yet each family line must be traced separately. Over the generations, most individuals of the group called Melungeon were persons of mixed European and African descent, sometimes also with Native American ancestry, whose ancestors had been free in colonial Virginia.
Edward Price's dissertation on Mixed-Blood Populations of the Eastern United States as to Origins, Localizations, and Persistence (1950) said that children of European and free black unions had also intermarried with persons of alleged Native American ancestry. In 1894, the U.S. Department of the Interior, in its "Report of Indians Taxed and Not Taxed," noted that the Melungeons in Hawkins County "claim to be Cherokee of mixed blood". The term Melungeon has since sometimes been applied as a catch-all phrase for a number of groups of individuals with mixed-race ancestry.
In 1995, Paul Heinegg published Free African American Families in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, and has since published regular updates. He found through his research and documented that the great majority of free people of color in the 1790 and 1810 censuses had ancestors from colonial Virginia, who were the children of unions between free white women and free, indentured or enslaved African or African-American men.
Similarly, in 2012, the genealogist Roberta Estes and her fellow researchers of the Melungeon DNA Project reported that the Melungeon lines likely originated in the unions of black and white indentured servants living in Virginia in the mid-1600s before slavery became widespread in the United States. They concluded that as laws to prevent the mixing of races were put in place, these family groups intermarried with each other, creating an endogamous group. They migrated together, sometimes along with white neighbors, from western Virginia through the Piedmont frontier of North Carolina, before settling primarily in the mountains of East Tennessee. In addition, the Melungeon DNA Project has documented multiracial ancestry, primarily European and African, for numerous people identified as Melungeon, affirming the evidence from written documentation.
Evidence
Free people of color are documented as migrating with European-American neighbors in the first half of the 18th century to the frontiers of Virginia and North Carolina, where they received land grants like their neighbors. For instance, the Collins, Gibson, and Ridley (Riddle) families owned land adjacent to one another in Orange County, North Carolina, where they and the Bunch family were listed in 1755 as "free Molatas (mulattoes)", subject to taxation on tithes. By settling in frontier areas, free people of color found more amenable living conditions and could escape some of the racial strictures of Virginia and North Carolina Tidewater plantation areas.
Historian Jack D. Forbes has discussed laws in South Carolina related to racial classification:
In 1719, South Carolina decided who should be an "Indian" for tax purposes since American [Indian] slaves were taxed at a lesser rate than African slaves. The act stated: "And for preventing all doubts and scruples that may arise what ought to be rated on mustees, mulattoes, etc. all such slaves as are not entirely Indian shall be accounted as negro.
Forbes said that, at the time, "mustees" and "mulattoes" were terms for persons of part-Native American ancestry. He wrote,
My judgment (to be discussed later) is that a mustee was primarily part-African and American [Indian] and that a mulatto was usually part-European and American [Indian]. The act is also significant because it asserts that part-American [Indians] with or without [emphasis added] African ancestry could be counted as Negroes, thus having an implication for all later slave censuses.This view does not have a consensus.
Beginning about 1767, some of the ancestors of the Melungeons reached the frontier New River area, where they are listed in the 1780s on tax lists of Montgomery County, Virginia. From there they migrated south in the Appalachian Range to Wilkes County, North Carolina, where some are listed as "white" on the 1790 census. They resided in a part that became Ashe County, where they are designated as "other free" in 1800.
The Collins and Gibson families (identified as Melungeon ancestors) were recorded in 1813 as members of the Stony Creek Primitive Baptist Church in Scott County, Virginia. They appear to have been treated as social equals of the white members. The earliest documented use of the term "Melungeon" is found in the minutes of this church (see Etymology below). While there are historical references to the documents, the evidence has come from transcribed copies.
From the Virginia and North Carolina frontiers, the families migrated west into frontier Tennessee and Kentucky. The earliest known Melungeon in what is now northeast Tennessee was Millington Collins, who executed a deed in Hawkins County in 1802. However, there is some evidence that Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hawkins (what is now Hancock County) by 1790. Several Collins and Gibson households were listed in Floyd County, Kentucky in the 1820 census, where they were classified as "free persons of color". On the 1830 censuses of Hawkins and neighboring Grainger County, Tennessee, the Collins and Gibson families are listed as "free-colored". Melungeons were residents of the part of Hawkins that in 1844 was organized as Hancock County.
By 1830, the Melungeon community in Hawkins County numbered 330 people in 55 families; in adjoining Grainger County, there were 130 people in 24 families. According to Edward Price, "Because of them, Hawkins County had more free colored persons in the 1830 census than any other county in Tennessee except Davidson (which includes Nashville) and more free colored families named Collins than any other county in the United States." Melungeon families have also been traced in Ashe County in northwestern North Carolina.
Contemporary accounts documented that Melungeon ancestors were considered by appearance to be mixed race. During the 18th and early 19th centuries, census enumerators classified them as "mulatto", "other free", or as "free persons of color". Sometimes they were listed as "white", sometimes as "black" or "negro", but almost never as "Indian". One family described as "Indian" was the Ridley (Riddle) family, noted as such on a 1767 Pittsylvania County, Virginia, tax list. They had been designated as "mulattoes" in an earlier record of 1755. Estes et al., in their 2012 summary of the Melungeon Core DNA Testing Program, stated that the Riddle family is the only Melungeon participant with historical records identifying them as having Native American origins, but their DNA is European. Among the participants, only the Sizemore family is documented as having Native American DNA.
The court record of Jacob Perkins vs. John White (1858) in Johnson County, Tennessee, provides definitions of the time related to race and free people of color. As in Virginia, if a free person was mostly white (one-eighth or less black), he was considered legally white and a citizen of the state:
"Persons that are known and recognized by the Constitution and laws of Tennessee, as free persons of color are those who by the act of 1794 section 32 are taken and deemed to be capable in law to be certified in any case what is in, except against each other or in the language of the statute "all Negroes, Indians, Mulattoes, and all persons of mixed blood descended from Negro or Indian ancestors to the third generation inclusive though one ancestor of each generation may have been a white person, white bond or free."... That if the great grandfather of Plaintiff was an Indian or Negro and he is descended on the mother's side from a white woman, without any further Negro or Indian blood than such as he derived on the father's side, then the Plaintiff is not of mix blood, or within the third generation inclusive; in other words that if the Plaintiff has not in his veins more than 1/8 of Negro or Indian blood, he is a citizen of this state and it would be slanderous to call him a Negro."
During the 19th century, due to their intermarriages with white spouses, Melungeon-surnamed families were increasingly classified as white on census records. In 1935, a Nevada newspaper anecdotally described Melungeons as "mulattoes" with "straight hair."
Assimilation
Ariela Gross has shown by analysis of court cases, the shift from perceptions of an individual as "mulatto" to "white" was often dependent upon appearance and, especially, community perception of a person's activities in life: who one associated with and whether the person fulfilled the common obligations of citizens. Census takers were generally people of a community, so they classified people racially as they were known by the community. Definitions of racial categories were often imprecise and ambiguous, especially for "mulatto" and "free person of color". In the Thirteen Colonies and the United States at times in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, "mulatto" could mean a mixture of African and European, African and Native American, European and Native American, or all three. At the same time, these groups intermarried.
Persons were often identified by the company they kept and which ethnic culture they identified with. There were differences between how people identified themselves and how others identified them. Because of slavery, colonial and state laws were biased toward identifying multiracial people of partial African origin as African or 'black,' although persons of mixed African and Native American descent often identified and lived culturally as Native Americans, particularly if their maternal line was Native American. Many Native American tribes were organized into matrilineal kinship systems, in which children were considered born into the mother's clan and took their social status from her people; inheritance and descent was figured through the maternal lines.
Because of the loose terminology and social attitudes to mixed-race persons, remnant non-reservation American Indians in the Upper South were generally not recorded separately as Indians. They were often gradually reclassified as mulatto or free people of color, especially as generations intermarried with neighbors of African descent. In the early decades of the 20th century, Virginia and some other states passed laws imposing the one-drop rule, requiring all persons to be classified as either white or black: those of any known African ancestry were to be classified as black, regardless of appearance, and how they self-identified or were known in the community.
After Virginia passed its Racial Integrity Act of 1924, officials went so far as to alter existing birth and marriage records to reclassify as "colored" some mixed-race individuals or families who identified as and had been recorded as "Indian". These actions destroyed the documented continuity of identity of several Indian communities. The historical documentation of continuity of self-identified Native American families was lost. If the families happened to be Catholic, their churches continued to record births and marriages as being among "Indian" families. But the process of loss of historical and cultural continuity appeared to have happened also with some of the non-reservation remnant Lenape Indians of Delaware.
According to the Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture, in his 1950 dissertation, cultural geographer Edward Price proposed that Melungeons were families descended from free people of color (who were of European and African ancestry) and mixed-race unions between persons of African ancestry and Native Americans in colonial Virginia, whose territory included the modern-day states of Kentucky and West Virginia.
Acceptance
The families known as "Melungeons" in the 19th century were generally well integrated into the communities in which they lived, though they may still have been affected by racism. Records show that on the whole, they enjoyed the same rights as whites. For example, they held property, voted, and served in the Army; some, such as the Gibsons, owned slaves as early as the 18th century.
Under the first Tennessee constitution of 1796, free people of color (males only) were allowed to vote. Following fears raised by the 1831 Nat Turner slave rebellion in Virginia, Tennessee and other southern states passed new restrictions on free people of color. By its new constitution of 1834, Tennessee disfranchised free people of color, reducing them to second-class status and excluding them from the political system.
In this period, several Melungeon men were tried in Hawkins County in 1846 for "illegal voting", under suspicion of being black or free men of color (and thereby ineligible for voting). They were acquitted, presumably by demonstrating to the court's satisfaction that they had no appreciable black ancestry. Standards were not as strict as under the later laws of the "one drop rule" of the 20th century. As in some other cases, racial status was chiefly determined by people testifying as to how the men were perceived by the community and whether they had "acted white" by voting, serving in the militia, or undertaking other common citizens' obligations available to white men.
After the American Civil War and following the Reconstruction Era, southern whites struggled to regain political power and re-assert white supremacy over freedmen and traditionally free families such as the Melungeons. The white Democrat-dominated state legislatures passed Jim Crow laws. But issues of race were often brought to court as a result of arguments about money.
For example, in 1872, a widowed woman's Melungeon ancestry was assessed in a trial in Hamilton County, Tennessee. The case was brought by relatives of her late husband, who challenged her inheritance of money from him after his death. They questioned the legitimacy of a marriage between a white man and a woman known to be Melungeon, and argued the marriage was not legitimate because the woman was of black ancestry. Based on the testimony of people in the community, the court decided the woman in the case was not of African ancestry, or had no such ancestors recently enough to matter.
During the period of segregation, a North Carolina statute barred "Portuguese" people—presumably Melungeons, as North Carolina does not have a large Portuguese American community—from whites-only schools. However, under this statute the "Portuguese" were not classified as Black, and they were not required to attend Black schools.
Modern anthropological and sociological studies of Melungeon descendants in Appalachia have demonstrated that they have become culturally indistinguishable from their "non-Melungeon," white neighbors: they share a Baptist religious affiliation and other community features. With changing attitudes and a desire for more work opportunities, numerous descendants of the early Melungeon pioneer families have migrated from Appalachia to make their lives in other parts of the United States.
Legends
In spite of being culturally and linguistically similar to their European neighbors, these multi-racial families were of a sufficiently different physical appearance to provoke speculation as to their identity and origins. In the first half of the 19th century, the pejorative term "Melungeon" began to be applied to these families by local white (European-American) neighbors. Local "knowledge" or myths soon began to arise about them. According to historian Pat Elder, the earliest of these was that they were "Indian" (more specifically, "Cherokee"). Jack Goins, an identified Melungeon descendant and researcher, states that the Melungeons claimed to be both Indian and Portuguese. An example was "Spanish Peggy" Gibson, wife of Vardy Collins.
A few ancestors may have been of mixed Iberian (Spanish and/or Portuguese) and African origin. Historian Ira Berlin has noted that some early slaves and free blacks of the charter generation in the colonies were "Atlantic Creoles", mixed-race descendants of Iberian workers and African women from slave ports in Africa. Their male descendants grew up bilingual and accompanied Europeans as workers or slaves. The majority of Melungeon early ancestors, who had migrated from Virginia over time, are of northern European and African ancestry, given the history of settlement in late 17th–early-18th century eastern Virginia. Later generations in Tennessee intermarried with descendants of Scotch-Irish immigrants who arrived in the mid- to late-18th century and settled in the backcountry before the American Revolution.
Given historical evidence of Native American settlement patterns, Cherokee Nation descent is highly unlikely for the original Melungeon ancestral families. These families were formed during the colonial era in the Virginia Tidewater areas, which were not Cherokee territory. Some of their descendants may have later intermarried with isolated individuals of Cherokee or other Native American ancestry in East Tennessee. Melungeons in Graysville, Tennessee claimed Cherokee ancestors.
Anthropologist E. Raymond Evans wrote (1979) regarding these claims:
In Graysville, the Melungeons strongly deny their Black heritage and explain their genetic differences by claiming to have had Cherokee grandmothers. Many of the local whites also claim Cherokee ancestry and appear to accept the Melungeon claim ...
In 1999 historian C. S. Everett hypothesized that John Collins (recorded as a Sapony Indian who was expelled from Orange County, Virginia about January 1743), might be the same man as the Melungeon ancestor John Collins, classified as a "mulatto" in 1755 North Carolina records. But Everett has revised that theory after having discovered evidence that these were two different men named John Collins. Only descendants of the latter man, identified as mulatto in the 1755 record in North Carolina, has any proven connection to the Melungeon families of eastern Tennessee.
Other peoples frequently suggested as Melungeon ancestors are the Black Dutch and the Powhatan Indian group. The Powhatan were an Algonquian-speaking tribe who inhabited eastern Virginia during the initial period of European colonization.
Speculation about Melungeon origins continued during the 19th and 20th centuries. Writers recounted folk tales of shipwrecked sailors, lost colonists, hoards of silver, and ancient peoples such as the Carthaginians or Phoenicians. With each writer, new elements were added to the mythology surrounding this group, and more surnames were added to the list of possible Melungeon ancestors. Journalist Will Allen Dromgoole wrote several articles on the Melungeons in the 1890s.
In the late 20th century, amateur researchers suggested that the Melungeons' ethnic identity may include ancestors who were Turks and Sephardi (Iberian) Jews. The writers David Beers Quinn and Ivor Noel Hume theorize that the Melungeons were descended from Sephardi Jews who fled the Inquisition and came as sailors to North America. They also say that Francis Drake did not repatriate all the Turks he saved from the sack of Cartagena, but some came to the colonies. But Janet Crain notes that there is no written documentation to support this theory.
The paper on the Melungeon DNA Project, published by Paul Heinegg, Jack Goins, and Roberta Estes in the Journal of Genetic Genealogy, shows that ancestry of the sample is primarily European and African, with only one person having a Native American paternal haplotype. There is no genetic evidence to support the Turkish or Jewish ancestry theories.
Etymology
There are many hypotheses about the etymology of the term Melungeon. Linguists and many researchers believe that it may have been derived from the French mélange, meaning mixture, or perhaps [nous] mélangeons meaning "[we] mix/mingle". This etymology is also found in several dictionaries. There were numerous French Huguenot immigrants in Virginia from 1700, and their language could have contributed a term.
Joanne Pezzullo and Karlton Douglas speculate that a more likely derivation of Melungeon, related to the dominance of the English language in the colonies, may have been from the now obsolete English word malengin (also spelled mal engin) meaning "guile", "deceit", or "ill intent." It was used by Edmund Spenser as the name of a trickster figure in his epic poem, The Faerie Queene (1590–1596), popular in Elizabethan England. The phrase, "harbored them Melungins," would be equivalent to "harbored someone of ill will", or could mean "harbored evil people", without reference to any ethnicity.
A different explanation traces the word to malungu (or malungo), a Luso-African word from Angola, meaning shipmate, derived from the Kimbundu word ma'luno, meaning "companion" or "friend". The word, spelled as Melungo and Mulungo, has been found in numerous Portuguese records. It is said to be a derogatory word that Africans used for people of Portuguese or other white ancestry. If so, the word was likely brought to America through people of African ancestry.
Kennedy (1994) speculates that the word derives from the Turkish melun can (from Arabic mal`un jinn ملعون جنّ), which purportedly means "damned soul." He suggests that, at the time, the (condemned soul) was a term used by Turks for Muslims who had been captured and enslaved aboard Spanish galleons.
Some writers try to connect the term Melungeon to an ethnic origin of people designated by that term, but there is no basis for this assumption. It appears the name arose as an exonym, something which neighboring people, of whatever origin, called the multi-racial people.
On October 7, 1840, the polemical Brownlow's Whig of Jonesborough, Tennessee, published an article entitled "Negro Speaking!" The publisher referred to a rival Democratic politician with a party in Sullivan County as "an impudent Malungeon from Washington City a scoundrel who is half Negro and half Indian," then as a "free negroe". In this and related articles, he does not identify the Democrat by name.
Modern identity
The term Melungeon was historically considered an insult, a label applied to Appalachians who were by appearance or reputation of mixed-race ancestry. In southwest Virginia, the term Ramp was similarly applied to people of mixed race. This term has never shed its pejorative character.
In December 1943, Virginia State Registrar of Vital Statistics, Walter Ashby Plecker, sent county officials a letter warning against "colored" families trying to pass as "white" or "Indian" in violation of the Racial Integrity Act of 1924. He identified specific surnames by county, including: "Lee, Smyth and Wise: Collins, Gibson, (Gipson), Moore, Goins, Ramsey, Delph, Bunch, Freeman, Mise, Barlow, Bolden (Bolin), Mullins, Hawkins (chiefly Tennessee Melungeons)". (Lee County, Virginia borders Hancock County, Tennessee.) He directed the offices to reclassify members of certain families as black, causing the loss for numerous families of documentation in records that showed their continued identification as Native American.
Different researchers have developed their own lists of the surnames of core Melungeon families. Generally, specific lines within families have to be traced to document such identity. For example, DeMarce (1992) listed Hale as a Melungeon surname.
By the mid-to-late 19th century, the term Melungeon appeared to have been used most frequently to refer to the biracial families of Hancock County and neighboring areas. Several other uses of the term in the print media, from mid-19th to early 20th century, have been collected at the Melungeon Heritage Association Website. The spelling of the term varied widely, as was common for words and names at the time. Eventually, the form "Melungeon" became standard.
Since the late 1960s, "Melungeon" has been increasingly adopted by individuals who identify with the ethnic group. This shift in meaning may have resulted from the popularity of Walk Toward the Sunset, a drama written by playwright Kermit Hunter and produced outdoors. The play was first presented in 1969 in Sneedville, the county seat of Hancock County. Making no claim to historical accuracy, Hunter portrayed the Melungeons as indigenous people of uncertain race who were mistakenly perceived as black by neighboring white settlers. As the drama portrayed Melungeons in a positive, romantic light, many individuals began for the first time to self-identify by that term. Hunter intended for his drama "to improve the socio-economic climate" of Hancock County, and to "lift the Melungeon name 'from shame to the hall of fame'." The play helped revive interest in the history of Melungeons. The civil rights movement and social changes of the 1960s further contributed to wider acceptance of members of the group. Research in social history and genealogy has documented new facts about people identified as Melungeons.
Since the mid-1990s, popular interest in the Melungeons has grown tremendously, although many descendants have left the region of historical concentration. Writer Bill Bryson devoted the better part of a chapter to them in his The Lost Continent (1989).
N. Brent Kennedy, a non-specialist, wrote a book on his claimed Melungeon roots, The Melungeons: The Resurrection of a Proud People (1994). With the advent of the internet, many people are researching family history and the number of people self-identifying as having Melungeon ancestry has increased rapidly, according to Kennedy. Some individuals have begun to self-identify as Melungeons after reading about the group on a website and discovering their surname on the expanding list of "Melungeon-associated" surnames. Others believe they have certain "characteristic" physical traits or conditions or assume that a multi-racial heritage means they are Melungeon.
For example, some Melungeons are allegedly identifiable by shovel-shaped incisors, a dental feature more commonly found among, but not restricted to, Native Americans and Northeast Asians. After an unsubstantiated hypothesis, popularized by N. Brent Kennedy, that Melungeons are of Turkish origin, some people have identified as having an enlarged external occipital protuberance, dubbed an "Anatolian bump".
Academic historians have not found any evidence for this thesis, nor is it supported by results from the Melungeon DNA Project. As noted before, this analysis shows that Melungeon descendants overwhelmingly have northern European and African DNA ancestry.
Internet sites promote the anecdotal claim that Melungeons are more prone to certain diseases, such as sarcoidosis or familial Mediterranean fever. Academic medical centers have noted that neither of these diseases is confined to a single population.
Kennedy's claims of ancestral connections to this group have been strongly disputed. The professional genealogist and historian, Virginia E. DeMarce, reviewed his 1994 book and found that Kennedy's documentation of his Melungeon ancestry was seriously flawed. He had a very indistinct definition of Melungeons, although the group had already been extensively studied and documented by other researchers. She criticized Kennedy for trying to include people who might have had other than northern European ancestry, and said that he did not properly take account of existing historical records or recognized genealogical practice in his research. He claimed to have ancestors who were persecuted for racial reasons. However, she found that his named ancestors were all classified as white in records, held various political offices (which showed they could vote and were supported by their community), and were landowners. Kennedy responded to her critique in an article of his own.<ref>[http://underonesky.org/SEKMIE_PDF/SEKMIE3A.pdf "Dr. Brent Kennedy Responds to Virginia DeMarce", Southeastern Kentucky Melungeon Information Exchange]</ref>
The Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians in Kentucky, which is neither federally recognized or state recognized as an Indian tribe, claims that most families in its area who are commonly identified as Melungeon are of partial Native American descent. The organization says their ancestors migrated to the region in the late 18th and early to mid-19th centuries. Most of these families claimed the Ridgetop Shawnee heritage to explain their dark skin and Indian features and to avoid racial persecution. In 2010 the Kentucky General Assembly passed resolutions that acknowledged the civic contributions of the Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians to the state.
Similar groups
The following are other multi-racial groups that at one time were classified as tri-racial isolates. Some identify as Native American and have received state recognition, as have six tribes in Virginia.
Delaware
Nanticoke-Moors (and in Maryland) Nanticoke groups in Delaware and New Jersey (where they are intermarried with Lenape) have received state recognition. Most had left the area in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Florida
Dominickers of Holmes County in the Florida Panhandle
Indiana
Ben-Ishmael Tribe, pejoratively called "Grasshopper Gypsies"
Louisiana
Redbones (and in Texas)
Maryland
Piscataway Indian Nation, formerly also known as We-Sorts, one of three Piscataway-related groups recognized as Native American tribes by the state
New Jersey and New York
Ramapough Mountain Indians (aka "Jackson Whites") of the Ramapo Mountains, recognized by both New Jersey and New York as Native Americans
North Carolina
Coree or "Faircloth" Indians of Carteret County
Haliwa-Saponi, recognized by the state as Native American
Lumbee, recognized by the state as Native American
Person County Indians, aka "Cubans and Portuguese"
Ohio
Carmel Indians of Highland County
South Carolina
Red Bones (NB: distinct from the Gulf States Redbones)
Turks
Brass Ankles
Virginia
Monacan Indians (a.k.a. "Issues") of Amherst and Rockbridge counties, recognized by state of Virginia and the federal government (2018) as a Native American tribe, along with five other Virginia tribes
West Virginia
Chestnut Ridge people of Barbour County (also known as Mayles or, pejoratively, "Guineas")
Each of these groupings of multiracial populations has a particular history. There is evidence for connections between some of them, going back to common ancestry in colonial Virginia. For example, the Goins surname group in eastern Tennessee has long been identified as Melungeon. The surname Goins is also found among the Lumbee of southern North Carolina, a multi-racial group that has been recognized by the state as a Native American tribe. In most cases, the multi-racial families have to be traced through specific branches and lines, as not all descendants were considered to be Melungeon or other groups.
See also
Melungeon DNA Project
List of topics related to the African diaspora
Vardy Community School
Mulatto
Pardo
References
Further reading
Ball, Bonnie (1992). The Melungeons: Notes on the Origin of a Race' '. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.
Berry, Brewton (1963). Almost White: A Study of Certain Racial Hybrids in the Eastern United States. New York: Macmillan Press.
Bible, Jean Patterson (1975). Melungeons Yesterday and Today. Signal Mountain, Tennessee: Mountain Press.
Brake, Katherine Vande. How They Shine: How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in Fiction of Appalachia. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Brake, Katherine Vande. Through the Back Door: Melungeon Literacies and Twenty-First Century Technologies. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Cavender, Anthony P. "The Melungeons of Upper East Tennessee: Persisting Social Identity," Tennessee Anthropologist 6 (1981): 27-36
DeMarce, Virginia E. (1993). "Looking at Legends – Lumbee and Melungeon: Applied Genealogy and the Origins of Tri-Racial Isolate Settlements." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 81 (March 1993): 24–45, scanned online, Historical-Melungeons
Forbes, Jack D. (1993). Africans and Native Americans: The Language of Race and the Evolution of Red-Black Peoples. University of Illinois Press.
Goins, Jack H. (2000). Melungeons: And Other Pioneer Families, Blountville, Tennessee: Continuity Press.
Hashaw, Tim. Children of Perdition: Melungeons and the Struggle of Mixed America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Heinegg, Paul (2005). FREE AFRICAN AMERICANS OF VIRGINIA, NORTH CAROLINA, SOUTH CAROLINA, MARYLAND AND DELAWARE Including the family histories of more than 80% of those counted as "all other free persons" in the 1790 and 1800 census, Baltimore, Maryland: Genealogical Publishing, 1999–2005. Available in its entirety online.
Hirschman, Elizabeth. Melungeons: The Last Lost Tribe in America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Johnson, Mattie Ruth (1997). My Melungeon Heritage: A Story of Life on Newman's Ridge. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.
Kennedy, N. Brent (1997) The Melungeons: the resurrection of a proud people. Mercer University Press.
Kessler, John S. and Donald Ball. North From the Mountains: A Folk History of the Carmel Melungeon Settlement, Highland County, Ohio. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Langdon, Barbara Tracy (1998). The Melungeons: An Annotated Bibliography: References in both Fiction and Nonfiction, Hemphill, Texas: Dogwood Press.
McGowan, Kathleen (2003). "Where do we really come from?", DISCOVER 24 (5, May 2003)
Offutt, Chris. (1999) "Melungeons", in Out of the Woods, Simon & Schuster.
Overbay, DruAnna Williams. Windows on the Past: The Cultural Heritage of Vardy, Hancock County, Tennessee. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Podber, Jacob. The Electronic Front Porch: An Oral History of the Arrival of Modern Media in Rural Appalachia and the Melungeon Community. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Price, Henry R. (1966). "Melungeons: The Vanishing Colony of Newman's Ridge." Conference paper. American Studies Association of Kentucky and Tennessee. March 25–26, 1966.
Reed, John Shelton (1997). "Mixing in the Mountains", Southern Cultures 3 (Winter 1997): 25–36.
Scolnick, Joseph M Jr. and N. Brent Kennedy. (2004). From Anatolia to Appalachia: A Turkish American Dialogue. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Vande Brake, Katherine (2001). How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in the Fiction of Appalachia, Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.
Williamson, Joel (1980). New People: Miscegenation and Mulattoes in the United States, New York: Free Press.
Winkler, Wayne. 2019. Beyond the sunset: The Melungeon drama, 1969-1976. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
Winkler, Wayne (2004). "Walking Toward the Sunset: The Melungeons of Appalachia", Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.
Winkler, Wayne (1997). " The Melungeons", All Things Considered. National Public Radio. 21 September 1997.
External links
Paul Brodwin, ""Bioethics in action" and human population genetics researMacon, GA: Mercer University Press.ch", Culture, Medicine and Psychiatry, Volume 29, Number 2 (2005), 145-178, DOI: 10.1007/s11013-005-7423-2 PDF, addresses issue of 2002 Melungeon DNA study by Kevin Jones, which is unpublished
Melungeon Heritage Association, Official Website
"The Graysville Melungeons", Tennessee Anthropologist, November 1979, hosted at Rootsweb
Paul Heinegg, Free African Americans of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, 1999–2005
"Melungeons", Digital Library of Appalachia. Contains numerous photographs and documents related to Melungeons, mostly from 1900 to 1950.
A Mystery People – The Melungeons From Louis Gates Jr's "Finding your Roots."
"kindness our heroine shows Melungeon outcast Pearl (Erika Coleman)" from AC-T review of Big-Stone-Gap film. Accessed 6/8/2016
Multiracial ethnic groups in the United States
African-American history
Appalachian society
Ethnic groups in Appalachia
Ethnic groups in the United States
History of North Carolina
History of Tennessee
History of Virginia
Scotch-Irish American history
Multiracial affairs in the United States | false | [
"The Melungeon DNA Project is a genetic study started in 2005 by the private company Family Tree DNA of people with identified Melungeon ancestors (according to historic records), mostly residing in Hancock County, Tennessee and people with ancestors identified as Carmel Indians who lived in nearby areas of Kentucky. The Melungeon people are a mixed-race group who married within the group up until about 1900. There was speculation about their identity and ancestry for decades, and many differing accounts of their origins. \n\nThis study was started in 2005. Researchers published an article in 2012 summarizing their results. The female ancestors were shown to have had European DNA, while male ancestors had DNA from African or European haplogroups. Only one male had a Native American haplogroup.\n\nBackground \nThe term \"Melungeon\" was used by others from the early 19th century to describe a group of people living in Hancock County, Tennessee, and nearby areas. It was originally a pejorative. Vardy Collins is considered the patriarch of the Melungeons. Author Roberta Estes states that the first mention of Melungeons was in an 1810 record, identifying them as \"foreigners\" or \"Portuguese\", rather than either Negro or Indian. \n\nMarriage between Whites, Blacks, and Native Americans (including free people of color) was prohibited or taboo in many parts of the Thirteen colonies from the mid-18th century onwards, but free mixed-race families were formed by white women and African or African-American men before the American Revolutionary War. As the women were free, their children were born free, under the laws of the colonies that said children were born into their mother's status, according to the principle of partus sequitur ventrem. \n\nIn the mid-to-late 19th century, some Melungeons were living on the frontier and considered white by their neighbors and by the law. Some Melungeons served in the military, voted, and carried arms—all of which obligations and rights were reserved at the time for White male citizens. Following the 1831 Nat Turner slave rebellion, southern states such as North Carolina had reduced the rights they had formerly extended to free people of color and free blacks.\n\nWhile the Melungeon communities largely practiced endogamy until c. 1900, marrying among their neighbors and known cohort; since then, individuals identifying as Melungeon have increasingly been marrying into the general population of White Americans.\n\nProject\n\nProject organization \nJack Goins, the project coordinator, is also the Hawkins County archivist. Of proven Melungeon ancestry, Goins has been researching the group for years and is the author of Melungeon and Other Pioneer Families and Melungeons Footprints From the Past. Additional project administrators have included Roberta Estes, Janet Crain, Penny Ferguson, and Kathy James. Estes founded 'DNA-explained' in 2004.\n\nParticipant identification \nMelungeon researchers determined participants' genealogical suitability for inclusion in the study based on historical documentation; a number of surnames have been identified as associated with Melungeon families (see below). The project was initiated in 2005 and is on-going. Participants must descend in a direct paternal line for Y chromosome (Y-DNA) testing, or in a direct female line for Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) testing.\n\nStudy subjects \nThe project organizers designated the following as core families, based on historical documentation: \nGroup 1 Core Melungeon\nBunch, Goins, Gibson, Minor, Collins, Williams, Goodman, Denham, Bowlin, Mullins, Moore, Shumake, Boltons, Perkins, Mornings, Menleys, Breedlove, Hopkins and Mallett; including name variations. \n\nGroup 2 Melungeon Related.\nIf the above names are in the participant's family, but are not in a direct line to enable Y-DNA or mtDNA testing, participants are placed in the Melungeon Related group.\n\nMore surnames may be added as this is an ongoing project.\n\nSome initial results \nResults of the Melungeon Core DNA Project were summarized in \"Melungeons, A Multi-Ethnic Population\", published in the Journal of Genetic Genealogy (April 2012). \n\nThe few women tested all belonged to haplogroup H (predominantly found in Europe) in their direct female lines. There is no single mtDNA maternal line for all Melungeons tested. All the mtDNA of subjects tested was found to be of European origin. \n\nTested males belonged primarily to African and European haplogroups, with the majority (12 of 21) in the latter. One male showed descent from a Native American haplogroup. Only one person in the project (from the Freeman line) tested as having Native American ancestry on the Y side. Eight lines were found to have African Y chromosome haplogroups, while 12 were European. \n\nParticipant breakdown by haplogroup was as follows: R1b (38 people) 47.5% , E1b1a1-M2 (27 people) 33.75%, R1a (6 people) 7.5%, I1 (3 people) 3.75%, A (2 people) 2.5%, E1b1b1 (2 people) 2.5%, Q1a3a1 (1 person) 1.25%, I2 (1 person) 1.25%.\n\nThe results-by-surnames-tested are not shown on the public website for the project.\n\nConclusions \nThere is no proof regarding the parentage of Vardy Collins, considered the patriarch of the Melungeons. Vardy Collins' DNA belonged to the R1a1a (European) haplogroup. His wife, Margaret Gibson, nicknamed \"Spanish Peggy,\" showed positive for maternal haplogroup H. Gibson is thought to be the daughter of Andrew Gibson (R1b1b2 group).\"\n\nThe DNA test shows the regional origin of the original ancestors of direct male or female lines, but not which culture their descendants may have identified with in succeeding years. Neither does it indicate how far back the admixture occurred.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \nMelungeon DNA Project – Y Line Results, Family Tree DNA\nMelungeon DNA Project – mtDNA Line Results, Family Tree DNA\n\nAppalachian society\nEthnic groups in Appalachia\nGenetic genealogy projects",
"Melungeons ( ) are an ethnic group of people from the Southeastern United States who descend from European settlers and Sub-Saharan African slaves. Historically, the Melungeons were associated with settlements in the Cumberland Gap area of central Appalachia, which includes portions of East Tennessee, Southwest Virginia, and eastern Kentucky.\n\nTri-racial describes populations who claim to be of mixed European, African and Native American ancestry. Although there is no consensus on how many such groups exist, estimates range as high as 200.\n\nDefinition\nThe ancestry and identity of Melungeons has been a highly controversial subject. Secondary sources disagree as to their ethnic, linguistic, cultural, and geographic origins and identity. They might accurately be described as a loose collection of families of diverse ethnic origins who migrated to frontier areas, settled near each other, and intermarried, mostly in Hancock and Hawkins counties in Tennessee, nearby areas of Kentucky, and in Lee County, Virginia. Their ancestors can usually be traced back to colonial Virginia and the Carolinas. They were largely endogamous through the 19th century, marrying primarily within their community until about 1900.\n\nMelungeons have been defined and documented as having multiracial ancestry. They did not exhibit characteristics that could be classified as those of a single racial phenotype. Most modern-day descendants of Appalachian families traditionally regarded as Melungeon are generally European American in appearance, often (though not always) with dark hair and eyes, and a swarthy or olive complexion. Descriptions of Melungeons have varied widely over time; in the 19th and early 20th century, they were sometimes identified as \"Portuguese\", \"Native American\", or \"light-skinned African American\". During the nineteenth century, free people of color sometimes identified as Portuguese or Native American in order to avoid being classified as black in the segregated slave societies.\n\nOther Melungeon individuals and families are accepted and identify as white, particularly since the mid-20th century. They have tended to \"marry white\" since before the twentieth century.\n\nScholars and commentators do not agree on who should be included under the term Melungeon. Contemporary authors identify differing lists of surnames to be included as families associated with Melungeons. The English surname Gibson and Irish surname Collins appear frequently; genealogist Pat Elder calls them \"core\" surnames. Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hancock County, and they and other Melungeons are documented by land deeds, slave sales, and marriage licenses. \nThe original meaning of the word \"Melungeon\" is obscure (see Etymology below). From about the mid-19th to the late 20th centuries, it referred exclusively to one tri-racial isolate group, the descendants of the multiracial Collins, Gibson, and several other related families at Newman's Ridge, Vardy Valley, and other settlements in and around Hancock and Hawkins counties, Tennessee.\n\nOrigins\n\nAccording to the principle of partus sequitur ventrem, which Virginia incorporated into law in 1662, children born in the colonies were assigned the social status of their mother, regardless of their father's ethnicity or citizenship. This meant the children of enslaved African or African-American women were born into slavery. But it also meant the children of free white or mulatto women, even if fathered by enslaved African men, were born free. The free descendants of such unions formed the majority of ancestors of the free families of color listed in the 1790 and 1810 US censuses. Early colonial Virginia was very much a \"melting pot\" of peoples, and before slavery hardened as a racial caste, white and black working-class people often lived and worked in close quarters and formed relationships and marriages.\n\nSome of these early multiracial families were ancestors of the later Melungeons, yet each family line must be traced separately. Over the generations, most individuals of the group called Melungeon were persons of mixed European and African descent, sometimes also with Native American ancestry, whose ancestors had been free in colonial Virginia.\n\nEdward Price's dissertation on Mixed-Blood Populations of the Eastern United States as to Origins, Localizations, and Persistence (1950) said that children of European and free black unions had also intermarried with persons of alleged Native American ancestry. In 1894, the U.S. Department of the Interior, in its \"Report of Indians Taxed and Not Taxed,\" noted that the Melungeons in Hawkins County \"claim to be Cherokee of mixed blood\". The term Melungeon has since sometimes been applied as a catch-all phrase for a number of groups of individuals with mixed-race ancestry.\n\nIn 1995, Paul Heinegg published Free African American Families in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, and has since published regular updates. He found through his research and documented that the great majority of free people of color in the 1790 and 1810 censuses had ancestors from colonial Virginia, who were the children of unions between free white women and free, indentured or enslaved African or African-American men.\n\nSimilarly, in 2012, the genealogist Roberta Estes and her fellow researchers of the Melungeon DNA Project reported that the Melungeon lines likely originated in the unions of black and white indentured servants living in Virginia in the mid-1600s before slavery became widespread in the United States. They concluded that as laws to prevent the mixing of races were put in place, these family groups intermarried with each other, creating an endogamous group. They migrated together, sometimes along with white neighbors, from western Virginia through the Piedmont frontier of North Carolina, before settling primarily in the mountains of East Tennessee. In addition, the Melungeon DNA Project has documented multiracial ancestry, primarily European and African, for numerous people identified as Melungeon, affirming the evidence from written documentation.\n\nEvidence\nFree people of color are documented as migrating with European-American neighbors in the first half of the 18th century to the frontiers of Virginia and North Carolina, where they received land grants like their neighbors. For instance, the Collins, Gibson, and Ridley (Riddle) families owned land adjacent to one another in Orange County, North Carolina, where they and the Bunch family were listed in 1755 as \"free Molatas (mulattoes)\", subject to taxation on tithes. By settling in frontier areas, free people of color found more amenable living conditions and could escape some of the racial strictures of Virginia and North Carolina Tidewater plantation areas.\n\nHistorian Jack D. Forbes has discussed laws in South Carolina related to racial classification:\nIn 1719, South Carolina decided who should be an \"Indian\" for tax purposes since American [Indian] slaves were taxed at a lesser rate than African slaves. The act stated: \"And for preventing all doubts and scruples that may arise what ought to be rated on mustees, mulattoes, etc. all such slaves as are not entirely Indian shall be accounted as negro. \nForbes said that, at the time, \"mustees\" and \"mulattoes\" were terms for persons of part-Native American ancestry. He wrote,\nMy judgment (to be discussed later) is that a mustee was primarily part-African and American [Indian] and that a mulatto was usually part-European and American [Indian]. The act is also significant because it asserts that part-American [Indians] with or without [emphasis added] African ancestry could be counted as Negroes, thus having an implication for all later slave censuses.This view does not have a consensus.\n\nBeginning about 1767, some of the ancestors of the Melungeons reached the frontier New River area, where they are listed in the 1780s on tax lists of Montgomery County, Virginia. From there they migrated south in the Appalachian Range to Wilkes County, North Carolina, where some are listed as \"white\" on the 1790 census. They resided in a part that became Ashe County, where they are designated as \"other free\" in 1800.\n\nThe Collins and Gibson families (identified as Melungeon ancestors) were recorded in 1813 as members of the Stony Creek Primitive Baptist Church in Scott County, Virginia. They appear to have been treated as social equals of the white members. The earliest documented use of the term \"Melungeon\" is found in the minutes of this church (see Etymology below). While there are historical references to the documents, the evidence has come from transcribed copies.\n\nFrom the Virginia and North Carolina frontiers, the families migrated west into frontier Tennessee and Kentucky. The earliest known Melungeon in what is now northeast Tennessee was Millington Collins, who executed a deed in Hawkins County in 1802. However, there is some evidence that Vardy Collins and Shep Gibson had settled in Hawkins (what is now Hancock County) by 1790. Several Collins and Gibson households were listed in Floyd County, Kentucky in the 1820 census, where they were classified as \"free persons of color\". On the 1830 censuses of Hawkins and neighboring Grainger County, Tennessee, the Collins and Gibson families are listed as \"free-colored\". Melungeons were residents of the part of Hawkins that in 1844 was organized as Hancock County.\n\nBy 1830, the Melungeon community in Hawkins County numbered 330 people in 55 families; in adjoining Grainger County, there were 130 people in 24 families. According to Edward Price, \"Because of them, Hawkins County had more free colored persons in the 1830 census than any other county in Tennessee except Davidson (which includes Nashville) and more free colored families named Collins than any other county in the United States.\" Melungeon families have also been traced in Ashe County in northwestern North Carolina.\n\nContemporary accounts documented that Melungeon ancestors were considered by appearance to be mixed race. During the 18th and early 19th centuries, census enumerators classified them as \"mulatto\", \"other free\", or as \"free persons of color\". Sometimes they were listed as \"white\", sometimes as \"black\" or \"negro\", but almost never as \"Indian\". One family described as \"Indian\" was the Ridley (Riddle) family, noted as such on a 1767 Pittsylvania County, Virginia, tax list. They had been designated as \"mulattoes\" in an earlier record of 1755. Estes et al., in their 2012 summary of the Melungeon Core DNA Testing Program, stated that the Riddle family is the only Melungeon participant with historical records identifying them as having Native American origins, but their DNA is European. Among the participants, only the Sizemore family is documented as having Native American DNA.\n\nThe court record of Jacob Perkins vs. John White (1858) in Johnson County, Tennessee, provides definitions of the time related to race and free people of color. As in Virginia, if a free person was mostly white (one-eighth or less black), he was considered legally white and a citizen of the state:\n\n\"Persons that are known and recognized by the Constitution and laws of Tennessee, as free persons of color are those who by the act of 1794 section 32 are taken and deemed to be capable in law to be certified in any case what is in, except against each other or in the language of the statute \"all Negroes, Indians, Mulattoes, and all persons of mixed blood descended from Negro or Indian ancestors to the third generation inclusive though one ancestor of each generation may have been a white person, white bond or free.\"... That if the great grandfather of Plaintiff was an Indian or Negro and he is descended on the mother's side from a white woman, without any further Negro or Indian blood than such as he derived on the father's side, then the Plaintiff is not of mix blood, or within the third generation inclusive; in other words that if the Plaintiff has not in his veins more than 1/8 of Negro or Indian blood, he is a citizen of this state and it would be slanderous to call him a Negro.\"\n\nDuring the 19th century, due to their intermarriages with white spouses, Melungeon-surnamed families were increasingly classified as white on census records. In 1935, a Nevada newspaper anecdotally described Melungeons as \"mulattoes\" with \"straight hair.\"\n\nAssimilation\nAriela Gross has shown by analysis of court cases, the shift from perceptions of an individual as \"mulatto\" to \"white\" was often dependent upon appearance and, especially, community perception of a person's activities in life: who one associated with and whether the person fulfilled the common obligations of citizens. Census takers were generally people of a community, so they classified people racially as they were known by the community. Definitions of racial categories were often imprecise and ambiguous, especially for \"mulatto\" and \"free person of color\". In the Thirteen Colonies and the United States at times in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, \"mulatto\" could mean a mixture of African and European, African and Native American, European and Native American, or all three. At the same time, these groups intermarried.\n\nPersons were often identified by the company they kept and which ethnic culture they identified with. There were differences between how people identified themselves and how others identified them. Because of slavery, colonial and state laws were biased toward identifying multiracial people of partial African origin as African or 'black,' although persons of mixed African and Native American descent often identified and lived culturally as Native Americans, particularly if their maternal line was Native American. Many Native American tribes were organized into matrilineal kinship systems, in which children were considered born into the mother's clan and took their social status from her people; inheritance and descent was figured through the maternal lines.\n\nBecause of the loose terminology and social attitudes to mixed-race persons, remnant non-reservation American Indians in the Upper South were generally not recorded separately as Indians. They were often gradually reclassified as mulatto or free people of color, especially as generations intermarried with neighbors of African descent. In the early decades of the 20th century, Virginia and some other states passed laws imposing the one-drop rule, requiring all persons to be classified as either white or black: those of any known African ancestry were to be classified as black, regardless of appearance, and how they self-identified or were known in the community.\n\nAfter Virginia passed its Racial Integrity Act of 1924, officials went so far as to alter existing birth and marriage records to reclassify as \"colored\" some mixed-race individuals or families who identified as and had been recorded as \"Indian\". These actions destroyed the documented continuity of identity of several Indian communities. The historical documentation of continuity of self-identified Native American families was lost. If the families happened to be Catholic, their churches continued to record births and marriages as being among \"Indian\" families. But the process of loss of historical and cultural continuity appeared to have happened also with some of the non-reservation remnant Lenape Indians of Delaware.\n\nAccording to the Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture, in his 1950 dissertation, cultural geographer Edward Price proposed that Melungeons were families descended from free people of color (who were of European and African ancestry) and mixed-race unions between persons of African ancestry and Native Americans in colonial Virginia, whose territory included the modern-day states of Kentucky and West Virginia.\n\nAcceptance\nThe families known as \"Melungeons\" in the 19th century were generally well integrated into the communities in which they lived, though they may still have been affected by racism. Records show that on the whole, they enjoyed the same rights as whites. For example, they held property, voted, and served in the Army; some, such as the Gibsons, owned slaves as early as the 18th century.\n\nUnder the first Tennessee constitution of 1796, free people of color (males only) were allowed to vote. Following fears raised by the 1831 Nat Turner slave rebellion in Virginia, Tennessee and other southern states passed new restrictions on free people of color. By its new constitution of 1834, Tennessee disfranchised free people of color, reducing them to second-class status and excluding them from the political system.\n\nIn this period, several Melungeon men were tried in Hawkins County in 1846 for \"illegal voting\", under suspicion of being black or free men of color (and thereby ineligible for voting). They were acquitted, presumably by demonstrating to the court's satisfaction that they had no appreciable black ancestry. Standards were not as strict as under the later laws of the \"one drop rule\" of the 20th century. As in some other cases, racial status was chiefly determined by people testifying as to how the men were perceived by the community and whether they had \"acted white\" by voting, serving in the militia, or undertaking other common citizens' obligations available to white men.\n\nAfter the American Civil War and following the Reconstruction Era, southern whites struggled to regain political power and re-assert white supremacy over freedmen and traditionally free families such as the Melungeons. The white Democrat-dominated state legislatures passed Jim Crow laws. But issues of race were often brought to court as a result of arguments about money.\n\nFor example, in 1872, a widowed woman's Melungeon ancestry was assessed in a trial in Hamilton County, Tennessee. The case was brought by relatives of her late husband, who challenged her inheritance of money from him after his death. They questioned the legitimacy of a marriage between a white man and a woman known to be Melungeon, and argued the marriage was not legitimate because the woman was of black ancestry. Based on the testimony of people in the community, the court decided the woman in the case was not of African ancestry, or had no such ancestors recently enough to matter.\n\nDuring the period of segregation, a North Carolina statute barred \"Portuguese\" people—presumably Melungeons, as North Carolina does not have a large Portuguese American community—from whites-only schools. However, under this statute the \"Portuguese\" were not classified as Black, and they were not required to attend Black schools.\n\nModern anthropological and sociological studies of Melungeon descendants in Appalachia have demonstrated that they have become culturally indistinguishable from their \"non-Melungeon,\" white neighbors: they share a Baptist religious affiliation and other community features. With changing attitudes and a desire for more work opportunities, numerous descendants of the early Melungeon pioneer families have migrated from Appalachia to make their lives in other parts of the United States.\n\nLegends\nIn spite of being culturally and linguistically similar to their European neighbors, these multi-racial families were of a sufficiently different physical appearance to provoke speculation as to their identity and origins. In the first half of the 19th century, the pejorative term \"Melungeon\" began to be applied to these families by local white (European-American) neighbors. Local \"knowledge\" or myths soon began to arise about them. According to historian Pat Elder, the earliest of these was that they were \"Indian\" (more specifically, \"Cherokee\"). Jack Goins, an identified Melungeon descendant and researcher, states that the Melungeons claimed to be both Indian and Portuguese. An example was \"Spanish Peggy\" Gibson, wife of Vardy Collins.\n\nA few ancestors may have been of mixed Iberian (Spanish and/or Portuguese) and African origin. Historian Ira Berlin has noted that some early slaves and free blacks of the charter generation in the colonies were \"Atlantic Creoles\", mixed-race descendants of Iberian workers and African women from slave ports in Africa. Their male descendants grew up bilingual and accompanied Europeans as workers or slaves. The majority of Melungeon early ancestors, who had migrated from Virginia over time, are of northern European and African ancestry, given the history of settlement in late 17th–early-18th century eastern Virginia. Later generations in Tennessee intermarried with descendants of Scotch-Irish immigrants who arrived in the mid- to late-18th century and settled in the backcountry before the American Revolution.\n\nGiven historical evidence of Native American settlement patterns, Cherokee Nation descent is highly unlikely for the original Melungeon ancestral families. These families were formed during the colonial era in the Virginia Tidewater areas, which were not Cherokee territory. Some of their descendants may have later intermarried with isolated individuals of Cherokee or other Native American ancestry in East Tennessee. Melungeons in Graysville, Tennessee claimed Cherokee ancestors.\n\nAnthropologist E. Raymond Evans wrote (1979) regarding these claims:\nIn Graysville, the Melungeons strongly deny their Black heritage and explain their genetic differences by claiming to have had Cherokee grandmothers. Many of the local whites also claim Cherokee ancestry and appear to accept the Melungeon claim ...\n\nIn 1999 historian C. S. Everett hypothesized that John Collins (recorded as a Sapony Indian who was expelled from Orange County, Virginia about January 1743), might be the same man as the Melungeon ancestor John Collins, classified as a \"mulatto\" in 1755 North Carolina records. But Everett has revised that theory after having discovered evidence that these were two different men named John Collins. Only descendants of the latter man, identified as mulatto in the 1755 record in North Carolina, has any proven connection to the Melungeon families of eastern Tennessee.\n\nOther peoples frequently suggested as Melungeon ancestors are the Black Dutch and the Powhatan Indian group. The Powhatan were an Algonquian-speaking tribe who inhabited eastern Virginia during the initial period of European colonization.\n\nSpeculation about Melungeon origins continued during the 19th and 20th centuries. Writers recounted folk tales of shipwrecked sailors, lost colonists, hoards of silver, and ancient peoples such as the Carthaginians or Phoenicians. With each writer, new elements were added to the mythology surrounding this group, and more surnames were added to the list of possible Melungeon ancestors. Journalist Will Allen Dromgoole wrote several articles on the Melungeons in the 1890s.\n\nIn the late 20th century, amateur researchers suggested that the Melungeons' ethnic identity may include ancestors who were Turks and Sephardi (Iberian) Jews. The writers David Beers Quinn and Ivor Noel Hume theorize that the Melungeons were descended from Sephardi Jews who fled the Inquisition and came as sailors to North America. They also say that Francis Drake did not repatriate all the Turks he saved from the sack of Cartagena, but some came to the colonies. But Janet Crain notes that there is no written documentation to support this theory.\n\nThe paper on the Melungeon DNA Project, published by Paul Heinegg, Jack Goins, and Roberta Estes in the Journal of Genetic Genealogy, shows that ancestry of the sample is primarily European and African, with only one person having a Native American paternal haplotype. There is no genetic evidence to support the Turkish or Jewish ancestry theories.\n\nEtymology\nThere are many hypotheses about the etymology of the term Melungeon. Linguists and many researchers believe that it may have been derived from the French mélange, meaning mixture, or perhaps [nous] mélangeons meaning \"[we] mix/mingle\". This etymology is also found in several dictionaries. There were numerous French Huguenot immigrants in Virginia from 1700, and their language could have contributed a term.\n\nJoanne Pezzullo and Karlton Douglas speculate that a more likely derivation of Melungeon, related to the dominance of the English language in the colonies, may have been from the now obsolete English word malengin (also spelled mal engin) meaning \"guile\", \"deceit\", or \"ill intent.\" It was used by Edmund Spenser as the name of a trickster figure in his epic poem, The Faerie Queene (1590–1596), popular in Elizabethan England. The phrase, \"harbored them Melungins,\" would be equivalent to \"harbored someone of ill will\", or could mean \"harbored evil people\", without reference to any ethnicity.\n\nA different explanation traces the word to malungu (or malungo), a Luso-African word from Angola, meaning shipmate, derived from the Kimbundu word ma'luno, meaning \"companion\" or \"friend\". The word, spelled as Melungo and Mulungo, has been found in numerous Portuguese records. It is said to be a derogatory word that Africans used for people of Portuguese or other white ancestry. If so, the word was likely brought to America through people of African ancestry.\n\nKennedy (1994) speculates that the word derives from the Turkish melun can (from Arabic mal`un jinn ملعون جنّ), which purportedly means \"damned soul.\" He suggests that, at the time, the (condemned soul) was a term used by Turks for Muslims who had been captured and enslaved aboard Spanish galleons.\n\nSome writers try to connect the term Melungeon to an ethnic origin of people designated by that term, but there is no basis for this assumption. It appears the name arose as an exonym, something which neighboring people, of whatever origin, called the multi-racial people.\n\nOn October 7, 1840, the polemical Brownlow's Whig of Jonesborough, Tennessee, published an article entitled \"Negro Speaking!\" The publisher referred to a rival Democratic politician with a party in Sullivan County as \"an impudent Malungeon from Washington City a scoundrel who is half Negro and half Indian,\" then as a \"free negroe\". In this and related articles, he does not identify the Democrat by name.\n\nModern identity\nThe term Melungeon was historically considered an insult, a label applied to Appalachians who were by appearance or reputation of mixed-race ancestry. In southwest Virginia, the term Ramp was similarly applied to people of mixed race. This term has never shed its pejorative character.\n\nIn December 1943, Virginia State Registrar of Vital Statistics, Walter Ashby Plecker, sent county officials a letter warning against \"colored\" families trying to pass as \"white\" or \"Indian\" in violation of the Racial Integrity Act of 1924. He identified specific surnames by county, including: \"Lee, Smyth and Wise: Collins, Gibson, (Gipson), Moore, Goins, Ramsey, Delph, Bunch, Freeman, Mise, Barlow, Bolden (Bolin), Mullins, Hawkins (chiefly Tennessee Melungeons)\". (Lee County, Virginia borders Hancock County, Tennessee.) He directed the offices to reclassify members of certain families as black, causing the loss for numerous families of documentation in records that showed their continued identification as Native American.\n\nDifferent researchers have developed their own lists of the surnames of core Melungeon families. Generally, specific lines within families have to be traced to document such identity. For example, DeMarce (1992) listed Hale as a Melungeon surname.\n\nBy the mid-to-late 19th century, the term Melungeon appeared to have been used most frequently to refer to the biracial families of Hancock County and neighboring areas. Several other uses of the term in the print media, from mid-19th to early 20th century, have been collected at the Melungeon Heritage Association Website. The spelling of the term varied widely, as was common for words and names at the time. Eventually, the form \"Melungeon\" became standard.\n\nSince the late 1960s, \"Melungeon\" has been increasingly adopted by individuals who identify with the ethnic group. This shift in meaning may have resulted from the popularity of Walk Toward the Sunset, a drama written by playwright Kermit Hunter and produced outdoors. The play was first presented in 1969 in Sneedville, the county seat of Hancock County. Making no claim to historical accuracy, Hunter portrayed the Melungeons as indigenous people of uncertain race who were mistakenly perceived as black by neighboring white settlers. As the drama portrayed Melungeons in a positive, romantic light, many individuals began for the first time to self-identify by that term. Hunter intended for his drama \"to improve the socio-economic climate\" of Hancock County, and to \"lift the Melungeon name 'from shame to the hall of fame'.\" The play helped revive interest in the history of Melungeons. The civil rights movement and social changes of the 1960s further contributed to wider acceptance of members of the group. Research in social history and genealogy has documented new facts about people identified as Melungeons.\n\nSince the mid-1990s, popular interest in the Melungeons has grown tremendously, although many descendants have left the region of historical concentration. Writer Bill Bryson devoted the better part of a chapter to them in his The Lost Continent (1989).\n\nN. Brent Kennedy, a non-specialist, wrote a book on his claimed Melungeon roots, The Melungeons: The Resurrection of a Proud People (1994). With the advent of the internet, many people are researching family history and the number of people self-identifying as having Melungeon ancestry has increased rapidly, according to Kennedy. Some individuals have begun to self-identify as Melungeons after reading about the group on a website and discovering their surname on the expanding list of \"Melungeon-associated\" surnames. Others believe they have certain \"characteristic\" physical traits or conditions or assume that a multi-racial heritage means they are Melungeon.\n\nFor example, some Melungeons are allegedly identifiable by shovel-shaped incisors, a dental feature more commonly found among, but not restricted to, Native Americans and Northeast Asians. After an unsubstantiated hypothesis, popularized by N. Brent Kennedy, that Melungeons are of Turkish origin, some people have identified as having an enlarged external occipital protuberance, dubbed an \"Anatolian bump\".\n\nAcademic historians have not found any evidence for this thesis, nor is it supported by results from the Melungeon DNA Project. As noted before, this analysis shows that Melungeon descendants overwhelmingly have northern European and African DNA ancestry.\n\nInternet sites promote the anecdotal claim that Melungeons are more prone to certain diseases, such as sarcoidosis or familial Mediterranean fever. Academic medical centers have noted that neither of these diseases is confined to a single population.\n\nKennedy's claims of ancestral connections to this group have been strongly disputed. The professional genealogist and historian, Virginia E. DeMarce, reviewed his 1994 book and found that Kennedy's documentation of his Melungeon ancestry was seriously flawed. He had a very indistinct definition of Melungeons, although the group had already been extensively studied and documented by other researchers. She criticized Kennedy for trying to include people who might have had other than northern European ancestry, and said that he did not properly take account of existing historical records or recognized genealogical practice in his research. He claimed to have ancestors who were persecuted for racial reasons. However, she found that his named ancestors were all classified as white in records, held various political offices (which showed they could vote and were supported by their community), and were landowners. Kennedy responded to her critique in an article of his own.<ref>[http://underonesky.org/SEKMIE_PDF/SEKMIE3A.pdf \"Dr. Brent Kennedy Responds to Virginia DeMarce\", Southeastern Kentucky Melungeon Information Exchange]</ref>\n\nThe Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians in Kentucky, which is neither federally recognized or state recognized as an Indian tribe, claims that most families in its area who are commonly identified as Melungeon are of partial Native American descent. The organization says their ancestors migrated to the region in the late 18th and early to mid-19th centuries. Most of these families claimed the Ridgetop Shawnee heritage to explain their dark skin and Indian features and to avoid racial persecution. In 2010 the Kentucky General Assembly passed resolutions that acknowledged the civic contributions of the Ridgetop Shawnee Tribe of Indians to the state.\n\nSimilar groups\nThe following are other multi-racial groups that at one time were classified as tri-racial isolates. Some identify as Native American and have received state recognition, as have six tribes in Virginia.\n\nDelaware\n Nanticoke-Moors (and in Maryland) Nanticoke groups in Delaware and New Jersey (where they are intermarried with Lenape) have received state recognition. Most had left the area in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.\nFlorida\n Dominickers of Holmes County in the Florida Panhandle\nIndiana\n Ben-Ishmael Tribe, pejoratively called \"Grasshopper Gypsies\"\nLouisiana\n Redbones (and in Texas)\nMaryland\n Piscataway Indian Nation, formerly also known as We-Sorts, one of three Piscataway-related groups recognized as Native American tribes by the state\nNew Jersey and New York\n Ramapough Mountain Indians (aka \"Jackson Whites\") of the Ramapo Mountains, recognized by both New Jersey and New York as Native Americans \nNorth Carolina\n Coree or \"Faircloth\" Indians of Carteret County\n Haliwa-Saponi, recognized by the state as Native American\n Lumbee, recognized by the state as Native American\n Person County Indians, aka \"Cubans and Portuguese\"\nOhio\n Carmel Indians of Highland County\nSouth Carolina\n Red Bones (NB: distinct from the Gulf States Redbones)\n Turks\n Brass Ankles\nVirginia\n Monacan Indians (a.k.a. \"Issues\") of Amherst and Rockbridge counties, recognized by state of Virginia and the federal government (2018) as a Native American tribe, along with five other Virginia tribes\nWest Virginia\n Chestnut Ridge people of Barbour County (also known as Mayles or, pejoratively, \"Guineas\")\n\nEach of these groupings of multiracial populations has a particular history. There is evidence for connections between some of them, going back to common ancestry in colonial Virginia. For example, the Goins surname group in eastern Tennessee has long been identified as Melungeon. The surname Goins is also found among the Lumbee of southern North Carolina, a multi-racial group that has been recognized by the state as a Native American tribe. In most cases, the multi-racial families have to be traced through specific branches and lines, as not all descendants were considered to be Melungeon or other groups.\n\nSee also\n Melungeon DNA Project\n List of topics related to the African diaspora\n Vardy Community School\n Mulatto\n Pardo\n\nReferences\n\nFurther reading\n\n Ball, Bonnie (1992). The Melungeons: Notes on the Origin of a Race' '. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.\n Berry, Brewton (1963). Almost White: A Study of Certain Racial Hybrids in the Eastern United States. New York: Macmillan Press.\n Bible, Jean Patterson (1975). Melungeons Yesterday and Today. Signal Mountain, Tennessee: Mountain Press.\n Brake, Katherine Vande. How They Shine: How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in Fiction of Appalachia. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.\n Brake, Katherine Vande. Through the Back Door: Melungeon Literacies and Twenty-First Century Technologies. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.\n Cavender, Anthony P. \"The Melungeons of Upper East Tennessee: Persisting Social Identity,\" Tennessee Anthropologist 6 (1981): 27-36\n DeMarce, Virginia E. (1993). \"Looking at Legends – Lumbee and Melungeon: Applied Genealogy and the Origins of Tri-Racial Isolate Settlements.\" National Genealogical Society Quarterly 81 (March 1993): 24–45, scanned online, Historical-Melungeons\n Forbes, Jack D. (1993). Africans and Native Americans: The Language of Race and the Evolution of Red-Black Peoples. University of Illinois Press.\n Goins, Jack H. (2000). Melungeons: And Other Pioneer Families, Blountville, Tennessee: Continuity Press.\n Hashaw, Tim. Children of Perdition: Melungeons and the Struggle of Mixed America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.\n Heinegg, Paul (2005). FREE AFRICAN AMERICANS OF VIRGINIA, NORTH CAROLINA, SOUTH CAROLINA, MARYLAND AND DELAWARE Including the family histories of more than 80% of those counted as \"all other free persons\" in the 1790 and 1800 census, Baltimore, Maryland: Genealogical Publishing, 1999–2005. Available in its entirety online.\n Hirschman, Elizabeth. Melungeons: The Last Lost Tribe in America. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.\n Johnson, Mattie Ruth (1997). My Melungeon Heritage: A Story of Life on Newman's Ridge. Johnson City, Tennessee: Overmountain Press.\n Kennedy, N. Brent (1997) The Melungeons: the resurrection of a proud people. Mercer University Press.\n Kessler, John S. and Donald Ball. North From the Mountains: A Folk History of the Carmel Melungeon Settlement, Highland County, Ohio. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.\n Langdon, Barbara Tracy (1998). The Melungeons: An Annotated Bibliography: References in both Fiction and Nonfiction, Hemphill, Texas: Dogwood Press.\n McGowan, Kathleen (2003). \"Where do we really come from?\", DISCOVER 24 (5, May 2003)\n Offutt, Chris. (1999) \"Melungeons\", in Out of the Woods, Simon & Schuster.\n Overbay, DruAnna Williams. Windows on the Past: The Cultural Heritage of Vardy, Hancock County, Tennessee. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.\n Podber, Jacob. The Electronic Front Porch: An Oral History of the Arrival of Modern Media in Rural Appalachia and the Melungeon Community. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.\n Price, Henry R. (1966). \"Melungeons: The Vanishing Colony of Newman's Ridge.\" Conference paper. American Studies Association of Kentucky and Tennessee. March 25–26, 1966.\n Reed, John Shelton (1997). \"Mixing in the Mountains\", Southern Cultures 3 (Winter 1997): 25–36.\n Scolnick, Joseph M Jr. and N. Brent Kennedy. (2004). From Anatolia to Appalachia: A Turkish American Dialogue. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.\n Vande Brake, Katherine (2001). How They Shine: Melungeon Characters in the Fiction of Appalachia, Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.\n Williamson, Joel (1980). New People: Miscegenation and Mulattoes in the United States, New York: Free Press.\n Winkler, Wayne. 2019. Beyond the sunset: The Melungeon drama, 1969-1976. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press. \n Winkler, Wayne (2004). \"Walking Toward the Sunset: The Melungeons of Appalachia\", Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press.\n Winkler, Wayne (1997). \" The Melungeons\", All Things Considered. National Public Radio. 21 September 1997.\n\nExternal links\n Paul Brodwin, \"\"Bioethics in action\" and human population genetics researMacon, GA: Mercer University Press.ch\", Culture, Medicine and Psychiatry, Volume 29, Number 2 (2005), 145-178, DOI: 10.1007/s11013-005-7423-2 PDF, addresses issue of 2002 Melungeon DNA study by Kevin Jones, which is unpublished\n Melungeon Heritage Association, Official Website\n \"The Graysville Melungeons\", Tennessee Anthropologist, November 1979, hosted at Rootsweb\n Paul Heinegg, Free African Americans of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, 1999–2005\n \"Melungeons\", Digital Library of Appalachia. Contains numerous photographs and documents related to Melungeons, mostly from 1900 to 1950.\nA Mystery People – The Melungeons From Louis Gates Jr's \"Finding your Roots.\"\n\"kindness our heroine shows Melungeon outcast Pearl (Erika Coleman)\" from AC-T review of Big-Stone-Gap film. Accessed 6/8/2016\n\nMultiracial ethnic groups in the United States\nAfrican-American history\nAppalachian society\nEthnic groups in Appalachia\nEthnic groups in the United States\nHistory of North Carolina\nHistory of Tennessee\nHistory of Virginia\nScotch-Irish American history\nMultiracial affairs in the United States"
] |
[
"Elliott Smith",
"1991-96: Heatmiser"
] | C_16dab7caf44f4fb980071052066a2132_1 | Who was Elliott Smith | 1 | Who was Elliott Smith of Heatmiser? | Elliott Smith | Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory". While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996). Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees, and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant". Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to the release of Mic City Sons, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO. CANNOTANSWER | While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. | Steven Paul Smith (August 6, 1969 – October 21, 2003), known professionally as Elliott Smith, was an American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. Smith was born in Omaha, Nebraska, raised primarily in Texas, and lived much of his life in Portland, Oregon, where he first gained popularity. Smith's primary instrument was the guitar, though he also played piano, clarinet, bass guitar, drums, and harmonica. Smith had a distinctive vocal style, characterized by his "whispery, spiderweb-thin delivery", and often used multi-tracking to create vocal layers, textures, and harmonies.
After playing in the rock band Heatmiser for several years, Smith began his solo career in 1994, with releases on the independent record labels Cavity Search and Kill Rock Stars (KRS). In 1997, he signed a contract with DreamWorks Records, for which he recorded two albums. Smith rose to mainstream prominence when his song "Miss Misery"—included in the soundtrack for the film Good Will Hunting (1997)—was nominated for an Oscar in the Best Original Song category in 1998.
Smith was a heavy drinker and drug user at times throughout his life, and was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and depression. His struggles with drugs and mental illness affected his life and work, and often appeared in his lyrics. In 2003, aged 34, he died in Los Angeles, California, from two stab wounds to the chest. The autopsy evidence was inconclusive as to whether the wounds were self-inflicted or the result of homicide. At the time of his death, Smith was working on his sixth studio album, From a Basement on the Hill, which was posthumously produced and released in 2004.
Early life
Steven Paul Smith was born at the Methodist Hospital in Omaha, Nebraska, the only child of Gary Smith, a student at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, and Bunny Kay Berryman, an elementary school music teacher. His parents divorced when he was six months old, and Smith moved with his mother to Duncanville, Texas. Smith later had a tattoo of a map of Texas drawn on his upper arm and said: "I didn't get it because I like Texas, kind of the opposite. But I won't forget about it, although I'm tempted to because I don't like it there."
Smith endured a difficult childhood and a troubled relationship with his stepfather Charlie Welch. Smith stated he may have been sexually abused by Welch at a young age, an allegation that Welch has denied. He wrote about this part of his life in "Some Song". The name "Charlie" also appears in songs "Flowers for Charlie" and "No Confidence Man." In a 2004 interview, Jennifer Chiba, Smith's partner at the time of his death, said that Smith's difficult childhood was partly why he needed to sedate himself with drugs as an adult: "He was remembering traumatic things from his childhood – parts of things. It's not my place to say what."
For much of his childhood, Smith's family was a part of the Community of Christ but began attending services at a local Methodist church. Smith felt that going to church did little for him, except make him "really scared of Hell". In 2001, he said: "I don't necessarily buy into any officially structured version of spirituality. But I have my own version of it."
Smith began playing piano at age nine, and at ten began learning guitar on a small acoustic guitar bought for him by his father. At this age he composed an original piano piece, "Fantasy", which won him a prize at an arts festival. Many of the people on his mother's side of the family were non-professional musicians; his grandfather was a Dixieland drummer, and his grandmother sang in a glee club.
At fourteen, Smith left his mother's home in Texas and moved to Portland, Oregon, to live with his father, who was then working as a psychiatrist. It was around this time that Smith began using drugs, including alcohol, with friends. He also began experimenting with recording for the first time after borrowing a four-track recorder. At high school, Smith played clarinet in the school band and played guitar and piano; he also sang in the bands Stranger Than Fiction and A Murder of Crows, billed as either Steven Smith or "Johnny Panic". He graduated from Lincoln High School as a National Merit Scholar.
After graduation, Smith began calling himself "Elliott", saying that he thought "Steve" sounded too much like a "jock" name, and that "Steven" sounded "too bookish". According to friends, he had also used the pseudonym "Elliott Stillwater-Rotter" during his time in the band A Murder of Crows. Biographer S. R. Shutt speculates that the name was either inspired by Elliott Avenue, a street that Smith had lived on in Portland, or that it was suggested by his then-girlfriend. A junior high acquaintance of Smith speculates Smith changed his name so as not to be confused with Steve Smith, the drummer of Journey.
Career
1991–1996: Heatmiser
In 1991 Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory".
While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996).
Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees, and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant".
Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to the release of Mic City Sons, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO.
1994: Roman Candle
In the early 1990s, Smith's girlfriend at the time convinced him to send a tape of songs he had recently recorded on a borrowed four-track to Cavity Search Records. Cavity owner Christopher Cooper asked to release the entire album of songs, which surprised Smith, as he was expecting only a deal for a seven-inch record. The album became Smith's release, Roman Candle (1994).
Smith said: "I thought my head would be chopped off immediately when it came out because at the time it was so opposite to the grunge thing that was popular ... The thing is that album was really well received, which was a total shock, and it immediately eclipsed [Heatmiser], unfortunately." Smith felt his solo songs were not representative of the music Heatmiser was making: "The idea of playing [my music] for people didn't occur to me... because at the time it was the Northwest—Mudhoney and Nirvana—and going out to play an acoustic show was like crawling out on a limb and begging for it to be sawed off."
One of Smith's first solo performances was at the now-defunct Umbra Penumbra on September 17, 1994. Only three songs from Roman Candle were performed, with the majority of the ten-song set being B-sides, Heatmiser tunes and unreleased tracks. The same year, Smith released a split 7-inch record with Pete Krebs via Slo-Mo Records, contributing the track "No Confidence Man".
1995–1997: Elliott Smith and Either/Or
In 1995, Smith's self-titled album was released on Kill Rock Stars; the record featured a style of recording similar to Roman Candle, but with hints of growth and experimentation. Though the majority of the album was recorded by Smith alone, friend and The Spinanes vocalist Rebecca Gates sang harmony vocals on "St. Ides Heaven", and Heatmiser guitarist Neil Gust played guitar on "Single File". Several songs made reference to drugs, but Smith explained that he used the theme of drugs as a vehicle for conveying dependence rather than the songs being about drugs specifically. Looking back, Smith felt that the album's pervasive mood gave him "a reputation for being a really dark, depressed person" and said that he later made a conscious move toward more diverse moods in his music.
In 1996, filmmaker Jem Cohen recorded Smith playing acoustic songs for the short film Lucky Three: An Elliott Smith Portrait. Two of these songs would appear on his next album, Either/Or, which was another Kill Rock Stars release. Either/Or came out in 1997 to favorable reviews. The album found Smith venturing further into full instrumentation, with several songs containing bass guitar, drums, keyboards, and electric guitars, all played by Smith. The album title was derived from the two-volume book of the same name by Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, whose works generally deal with themes such as existential despair, angst, death, and God.
By this time, Smith's already-heavy drinking was being compounded with use of antidepressants. At the end of the Either/Or tour, some of his close friends staged an intervention in Chicago, but it proved ineffective. Shortly after, Smith relocated from Portland to Jersey City, New Jersey, and later Brooklyn, New York.
1997–98: "Miss Misery" and the Oscars
In 1997, Smith was selected by director and fellow Portland resident Gus Van Sant to be a part of the soundtrack to his film, Good Will Hunting. Smith recorded an orchestral version of "Between the Bars" with composer Danny Elfman for the movie. Smith also contributed a new song, "Miss Misery", and three previously released tracks ("No Name #3", from Roman Candle, and "Angeles" and "Say Yes", from Either/Or). The film was a commercial and critical success, and Smith was nominated for an Academy Award for "Miss Misery". Not eager to step into the limelight, he agreed to perform the song at the ceremony only after the producers informed him that if he was unwilling to perform, they would choose someone else to play it.
On March 5, 1998, Smith made his network television debut on Late Night with Conan O'Brien performing "Miss Misery" solo on acoustic guitar. A few days later, wearing a white suit, he played an abridged version of the song at the Oscars, accompanied by the house orchestra. James Horner and Will Jennings won the award that night for best song with "My Heart Will Go On" (sung by Celine Dion) from the film Titanic. Smith did not voice disappointment about not winning the award.
Smith commented on the surrealism of the Oscars experience: "That's exactly what it was, surreal... I enjoy performing almost as much as I enjoy making up songs in the first place. But the Oscars was a very strange show, where the set was only one song cut down to less than two minutes, and the audience was a lot of people who didn't come to hear me play. I wouldn't want to live in that world, but it was fun to walk around on the moon for a day."
1998–2000: XO and Figure 8
In 1998, after the success of Either/Or and "Miss Misery", Smith signed to a bigger record label, DreamWorks Records. Around the same time, Smith fell into depression, speaking openly of considering suicide, and on at least one occasion made a serious attempt at ending his own life. While in North Carolina, he became severely intoxicated and ran off a cliff. He landed on a tree, which badly impaled him but broke his fall. When questioned about his suicide attempt, he told an interviewer, "Yeah, I jumped off a cliff, but let's talk about something else."
Christopher Cooper, head of Cavity Search Records (which released Roman Candle), said about this time in Smith's life, "I talked him out of thinking that he wanted to kill himself numerous times when he was in Portland. I kept telling him that he was a brilliant man, and that life was worth living, and that people loved him." Pete Krebs also agreed: "In Portland we got the brunt of Elliott's initial depression... Lots of people have stories of their own experiences of staying up with Elliott 'til five in the morning, holding his hand, telling him not to kill himself."
Smith's first release for DreamWorks was later that year. Titled XO, it was conceived and developed while Smith wrote it out over the winter of 1997/1998, night after night seated at the bar in Luna Lounge. It was produced by the team of Rob Schnapf and Tom Rothrock. XO also contained some instrumentation from Los Angeles musicians Joey Waronker and Jon Brion. It contained a more full-sounding, baroque pop sound than any of his previous efforts, with songs featuring a horn section, Chamberlins, elaborate string arrangements, and even a drum loop on the song "Independence Day". His familiar double-tracked vocal and acoustic guitar style were still apparent while his somewhat personal lyrical style survived. The album went on to peak at number 104 on the Billboard 200 and number 123 on the UK Album Charts, while selling 400,000 copies (more than double that of each of his two Kill Rock Stars releases), becoming the best-selling release of his career. Smith's backing band during most of this period was the Portland-based group Quasi, consisting of former bandmate Sam Coomes on bass guitar and Coomes's ex-wife Janet Weiss on drums. Quasi also performed as the opening act at many shows on the tour, with Smith sometimes contributing bass guitar, guitar, or backing vocals. On October 17, 1998, Smith appeared on Saturday Night Live and performed "Waltz No. 2 (XO)". His backing band for this appearance was John Moen, Jon Brion, Rob Schnapf, and Sam Coomes.
In response to whether the change to a bigger record label would influence his creative control, Smith said, "I think despite the fact that sometimes people look at major labels as simply money-making machines, they're actually composed of individuals who are real people, and there's a part of them that needs to feel that part of their job is to put out good music." Smith also claimed in another interview that he never read his reviews for fear that they would interfere with his songwriting. It was during this period that Smith appeared on Dutch television in 1998 and provided a candid interview in which he spoke of his assessment of his music career until that point:
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I mostly only know things are different because people ask me different questions, but I don't feel like things are very changed. I mean, I still, I do the same things that I did before … I think about the same things, so … I'm the wrong kind of person to be really big and famous.
As part of the Dutch television special, Smith played live versions of "Waltz No. 2 (XO)", "Miss Misery", and "I Didn't Understand"—the latter two songs were performed solely on piano, while the first song was cut short by Smith, as he explained: "I had to stop it because it's… you know, what's the point of playing a song badly? It'd be better to play it and mean it, than to just walk through it."
Smith relocated from Brooklyn to Los Angeles in 1999, taking up residence at a cabin in the Silver Lake section of town, where he would regularly play intimate, acoustic shows at local venues like Silverlake Lounge. He also performed in Toronto in April that year. In the fall, his cover of the Beatles' "Because" was featured in the end credits of DreamWorks' Oscar-winning drama American Beauty, and appeared on the film's soundtrack album.
The final album Smith completed, Figure 8, was released on April 18, 2000. It featured the return of Rothrock, Schnapf, Brion, and Waronker and was partially recorded at Abbey Road Studios in England, with an obvious Beatles influence in the songwriting and production. The album garnered favorable reviews, and peaked at number 99 on the Billboard 200 and 37 on the UK Album Charts. The album received praise for its power pop style and complex arrangements, described as creating a "sweeping kaleidoscope of layered instruments and sonic textures". However, some reviewers felt that Smith's trademark dark and melancholy songwriting had lost some of its subtlety, with one reviewer likening some of the lyrics to "the self-pitying complaints of an adolescent venting in his diary".
Album art and promotional pictures from the period showed Smith looking cleaned-up and put-together. An extensive tour in promotion of the record ensued, book-ended by television appearances on Late Night with Conan O'Brien and the Late Show with David Letterman. However, Smith's condition began to deteriorate as he had become addicted to heroin either towards the end of or just after the Figure 8 tour.
2001–2002: Addiction and scrapped recordings
Around the time he began recording his final album, Smith began to display signs of paranoia, often believing that a white van followed him wherever he went. He would have friends drop him off for recording sessions almost a mile away from the studio, and to reach the location, he would trudge through hundreds of yards of brush and cliffs. He started telling people that DreamWorks was out to get him: "Not long ago my house was broken into, and songs were stolen off my computer which have wound up in the hands of certain people who work at a certain label. I've also been followed around for months at a time. I wouldn't even want to necessarily say it's the people from that label who are following me around, but it was probably them who broke into my house." During this period, Smith hardly ate, subsisting primarily on ice cream. He would go without sleeping for several days and then sleep for an entire day.
A follow-up to Smith's 2000 album was originally planned to happen with Rob Schnapf, but their sessions were abandoned. Smith also began distancing himself from manager Margaret Mittleman, who had handled him since the Roman Candle days. He finally began recording a new album with only himself and Jon Brion as producers sometime during 2001. The pair had recorded a substantial amount of music for the album when Brion stopped the sessions because of Smith's struggle with substance use disorder. Their friendship promptly ended, and Smith scrapped all of their work until that point. He later said "There was even a little more than half of a record done before this new one that I just scrapped because of a blown friendship with someone that made me so depressed I didn't want to hear any of those songs. He was just helping me record the songs and stuff, and then the friendship kind of fell apart all of a sudden one day. It just made it kind of awkward being alone in the car listening to the songs."
When Brion sent a bill for the abandoned sessions to DreamWorks, executives Lenny Waronker and Luke Wood scheduled a meeting with Smith to determine what went wrong with the sessions. Smith complained of intrusion upon his personal life from the label, as well as poor promotion for the Figure 8 album. The talks proved fruitless, and soon after, Smith sent a message to the executives, stating that if they did not release him from his contract, he would take his own life. In May 2001, Smith set out to re-record the album, mostly on his own, but with some help from David McConnell of Goldenboy. McConnell told Spin that, during this time, Smith would smoke over $1,500 worth of heroin and crack per day, would often talk about suicide, and on numerous occasions tried to give himself an overdose. Steven Drozd of The Flaming Lips and Scott McPherson of Sense Field played a few drum tracks, Sam Coomes contributed some bass guitar and backing vocals, but almost every other instrument was recorded by Smith.
Smith's song "Needle in the Hay" was included in Wes Anderson's 2001 dark comedy film The Royal Tenenbaums during a suicide attempt scene. Smith was originally supposed to contribute a cover of The Beatles' "Hey Jude" for the film, but when he failed to do so in time, Anderson had to use The Mutato Muzika Orchestra's version of the track instead. Anderson would later say that Smith "was in a bad state" at the time.
Smith's live performances during 2001 and 2002 were infrequent, typically in the Pacific Northwest or Los Angeles. A review of his December 20, 2001, show at Portland's Crystal Ballroom expressed concern over his appearance and performance: his hair was uncharacteristically greasy and long, his face was bearded and gaunt, and during his songs he exhibited alarming signs of "memory-loss and butterfingers". At another performance in San Francisco that month, the audience began shouting out lyrics when Smith could not remember them.
In the first of only three concerts performed in 2002, Smith co-headlined Northwestern University's A&O Ball with Wilco on May 2 in Chicago. He was onstage for nearly an hour but failed to complete half of the songs. He claimed that his poor performance was due to his left hand having fallen asleep and told the audience it felt "like having stuff on your hand and you can't get it off". Smith's performance was reviewed as "undoubtedly one of the worst performances ever by a musician" and an "excruciating […] nightmare". A reporter for the online magazine Glorious Noise wrote, "It would not surprise me at all if Elliott Smith ends up dead within a year."
On November 25, 2002, Smith was involved in a brawl with the Los Angeles Police Department at a concert where The Flaming Lips and Beck were performing. Smith later said he was defending a man he thought the police were harassing. The officers allegedly beat and arrested him and girlfriend Jennifer Chiba. The two spent the night in jail. Smith's back was injured in the incident, causing him to cancel a number of shows. Wayne Coyne, lead singer of The Flaming Lips and a friend of Smith's, stated concern over Smith's appearance and actions, saying that he "saw a guy who had lost control of himself. He was needy, he was grumpy, he was everything you wouldn't want in a person. It's not like when you think of Keith Richards being pleasantly blissed out in the corner."
2003: Reemergence and From a Basement on the Hill
Smith had attempted to go to rehab several times, but found that he was unable to relate to the popular treatments for people with substance use disorder that used a twelve-step program basis for treatment. "I couldn't do the first step […] I couldn't say what you were supposed to say and mean it." In 2002, Smith went to the Neurotransmitter Restoration Center in Beverly Hills to start a course of treatment for substance use disorder. In one of his final interviews, he spoke about the center, "What they do is an IV treatment where they put a needle in your arm, and you're on a drip bag, but the only thing that's in the drip bag is amino acids and saline solution. I was coming off of a lot of psych meds and other things. I was even on an antipsychotic, although I'm not psychotic."
Two sold-out solo acoustic concerts at Hollywood's Henry Fonda Theater, on January 31 and February 1, 2003, saw Smith attempting to reestablish his credibility as a live performer. Before the show, Smith scrawled "Kali – The Destroyer" (the Hindu goddess associated with time and change) in large block letters with permanent ink on his left arm, which was visible to the crowd during the performance. On several songs, he was backed by a stripped-down drum kit played by Robin Peringer (of the band 764-HERO), and members of opening band Rilo Kiley contributed backing vocals to one song. Near the end of the first show, the musician responded for several minutes after a heckler (later identified as Smith's ex-girlfriend Valerie Deerin) yelled "Get a backbone." Smith played two more Los Angeles concerts during 2003, including The Derby in May and the L.A. Weekly Music Awards in June.
After his 34th birthday on August 6, 2003, he gave up alcohol. Director Mike Mills had been working with Smith during his final years and described Smith's troubles and apparent recovery: "I gave the script to him, then he dropped off the face of the earth […] he went through his whole crazy time, but by the time I was done with the film, he was making From a Basement on the Hill and I was shocked that he was actually making music."
With things improving for Smith after several troubled years, he began experimenting with noise music and worked on his girlfriend Jennifer Chiba's iMac with the intent of learning how to record with computers, noting that it was the only method with which he was still unfamiliar. Smith jokingly labeled his experimental way of recording "The California Frown" (a play on the Beach Boys' "California Sound"). He said of the songs, "They're kind of more noisy with the pitch all distorted. Some are more acoustic, but there aren't too many like that. Lately I've just been making up a lot of noise."
He was also in the process of recording songs for the Thumbsucker soundtrack, including Big Star's "Thirteen" and Cat Stevens's "Trouble". In August 2003, Suicide Squeeze Records put out a limited-edition vinyl single for "Pretty (Ugly Before)", a song that Smith had been playing since the Figure 8 tour.
Smith's final show was at Redfest at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City on September 19, 2003. The final song he played live was "Long, Long, Long" by The Beatles.
2004–present: Posthumous releases
From a Basement on the Hill, almost four years in production, was released on October 19, 2004, by ANTI- Records (a part of Epitaph Records). With Smith's family in control of his estate, they chose to bring in Rob Schnapf and Smith's ex-girlfriend Joanna Bolme to sort through the recordings and mix the album. Although Smith had voiced his desire for it to be a double album or a regular album with a bonus disc, it was not clear whether it would have been possible for him to release it that way had he completed it. As completed by Schnapf and Bolme, it was released as a 15-track single album. Many songs from the sessions (later leaked onto the Internet) were not included, such as "True Love", "Everything's OK", "Stickman", and "Suicide Machine" (a reworking of the Figure 8-era unreleased instrumental "Tiny Time Machine"). There has been unconfirmed speculation that Smith's family made the decision not to include some songs on the record due to their lyrical content, although songs such as "King's Crossing" that deal with darker subjects did make the album.
Elliott Smith and the Big Nothing, a biography by Benjamin Nugent, was rushed to publication shortly after From a Basement on the Hill, shortly after the first anniversary of his death. Smith's family, as well as Joanna Bolme, Jennifer Chiba, Neil Gust, Sam Coomes, and Janet Weiss, all declined to be interviewed. It contained interviews with Rob Schnapf, David McConnell, and Pete Krebs. The book received mixed reviews, with Publishers Weekly remarking that while "Nugent manages to patch together the major beats of Smith's life, he can offer little meaningful insight".
In 2005, a tribute album, A Tribute to Elliott Smith, was released. It featured various bands performing tributes to Smith.
On May 8, 2007, a posthumous two-disc compilation album entitled New Moon was released by Kill Rock Stars. The album contained 24 songs recorded by Smith between 1994 and 1997 during his tenure with the label, songs that were not included on albums, as well as a few early versions and previously released B-sides. In the United States, the album debuted at number 24 on the Billboard 200, selling about 24,000 copies in its first week. The record received favorable reviews and was Metacritic's 15th best-reviewed album of 2007. A portion of the proceeds from album sales were to go to Outside In, a social service agency for low-income adults and homeless youth in Portland, Oregon.
On October 25, 2007, a book titled Elliott Smith was released by Autumn de Wilde, which consists of photographs, handwritten lyrics, and "revealing talks with Smith's inner circle". De Wilde was responsible for the Figure 8 sleeve art, making a landmark and de facto Smith memorial of the Solutions Audio mural. A five-song CD featuring previously unreleased live recordings of Smith performing acoustically at Largo in Los Angeles was included in the release.
Following Smith's death, his estate licensed his songs for use in film and television projects such as One Tree Hill, The Girl Next Door, Georgia Rule, and Paranoid Park.
In a March 2009 interview, Larry Crane said that Smith's estate was defunct and all rights previously held by Smith are now in the control of his parents. Crane went on to say that his parents own the rights to Smith's high school recordings, some of the Heatmiser material, all solo songs recorded until his 1998 record deal with DreamWorks Records, and From a Basement on the Hill. DreamWorks Records was acquired by Universal Music Group in 2003, and Interscope Records currently "owns all studio and live recording from Jan 1998 to his passing, except for the songs on From a Basement on the Hill."
In December 2009, Kill Rock Stars announced that it had obtained the rights to re-release Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill, originally released by Cavity Search and ANTI-, respectively. Roman Candle would be remastered by Larry Crane. Along with the press release, Kill Rock Stars posted a previously unreleased track of Smith's, titled "Cecilia/Amanda", as a free download. Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill were re-released on April 6, 2010, in the US.
A greatest hits compilation titled An Introduction to... Elliott Smith was released in November 2010 by Domino Records (UK) and Kill Rock Stars (US).
In August 2013, there was a memorial concert in Portland, Oregon and three other cities. Attending the Portland show were several musicians Smith had performed with, friends, and an appearance by film director Gus Van Sant.
In 2014, director Paul Thomas Anderson posted a video of the pilot episode for a show called The Jon Brion Show, featuring an acoustic set by Smith including accompaniment by Brion and pianist Brad Mehldau.
On July 17, 2015, a documentary about Smith's life titled Heaven Adores You saw a limited theatrical release. The documentary enlisted a number of close friends and family members, as well as hours of audio interviews throughout Smith's short career. The film was directed by Nickolas Rossi and released through Eagle Rock Entertainment. Heaven Adores You received positive reviews from Consequence of Sound, The Guardian, and The Hollywood Reporter.
On August 6, 2019 (what would have been Smith's 50th birthday), UMe released digital deluxe editions of the two albums XO and Figure 8. The new edition of XO has nine added tracks, including Smith's Oscar-nominated Good Will Hunting song "Miss Misery." Seven tracks have been added to Figure 8. The digital deluxe edition includes "Figure 8"—Smith's cover of the "Schoolhouse Rock!" song—which was originally released only on the Japanese edition of the album. The final track on the new Figure 8 edition is Smith's cover of the Beatles’ "Because", originally featured on the 1999 American Beauty soundtrack.
In May 2021, Smith's life and work were the subject of BBC Radio 4's Great Lives.
Death
Smith died on October 21, 2003, at the age of 34 from two stab wounds to the chest. At the time of the stabbing, he was at his Lemoyne Street home in Echo Park, California, where he lived with his girlfriend, Jennifer Chiba. According to Chiba, the two were arguing, and she locked herself in the bathroom to take a shower. Chiba heard him scream and upon opening the door saw Smith standing with a knife in his chest. She pulled the knife out, after which he collapsed and she called 9-1-1 at 12:18 pm. Smith died in the hospital, with the time of death listed as 1:36 p.m. A possible suicide note, written on a sticky note, read: "I'm so sorry—love, Elliott. God forgive me." In the coroner's report of the note, the name "Elliott" is misspelled as "Elliot". While Smith's death was reported as a suicide, the official autopsy report released in December 2003 left open the question of homicide.
Smith's remains were cremated, and his ashes were divided between his mother, father, and half-sister Ashley. A small memorial service for family and friends was held at his father's home in Portland, although Smith's "ashes weren't on hand because the coroner wouldn't release them." The status or location of Smith's ashes has not been made public.
According to Pitchfork, record producer Larry Crane reported on his Tape Op message board that he had planned to help Smith mix his album in mid-November. Crane wrote, "I hadn't talked to Elliott in over a year. His girlfriend, Jennifer, called me [last week] and asked if I'd like to come to L.A. and help mix and finish [Smith's album]. I said 'yes, of course', and chatted with Elliott for the first time in ages. It seems surreal that he would call me to finish an album and then a week later kill himself. I talked to Jennifer this morning, who was obviously shattered and in tears, and she said, 'I don't understand, he was so healthy. The coroner reported that no traces of illegal substances or alcohol were found in Smith's system at the time of his death but did find prescribed levels of antidepressant, anxiolytic, and ADHD medications, including clonazepam, mirtazapine, atomoxetine, and amphetamine. There were no hesitation wounds, which are typically found on a victim of suicide by self-infliction. Due to the inconclusive autopsy ruling, the Los Angeles Police Department's investigation remains open.
Reaction
Shortly after Smith's death, a fan memorial was initiated outside Solutions Audio (4334 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, California), the site at which the cover of the Figure 8 album was shot. Farewell messages to Smith were written on the wall, and flowers, photos, candles, and empty bottles of alcohol mentioned in Smith's songs were left. Since then, the wall has been a regular target for graffiti but is regularly restored by fans.
Memorial concerts were held in several cities in the United States and the United Kingdom. A petition was soon put forth with intent to make part of the Silver Lake area a memorial park in Smith's honor. It received over 10,000 signatures, but no plans to establish the park have been announced. A memorial plaque located inside Smith's former high school, Lincoln High, was hung in July 2006. The plaque reads: "I'm never going to know you now, but I'm going to love you anyhow" referencing Smith's song "Waltz No. 2 (XO)".
Since Smith's death, many musical acts have paid him tribute. Songs in tribute to, or about, Smith have been released by Pearl Jam ("Can't Keep" on the Live at Benaroya Hall concert album); Sparta ("Bombs and Us"); Third Eye Blind ("There's No Hurry to Eternity", originally titled "Elliott Smith", on the Live from Nowhere Near You, Volume Two: Pacific Northwest compilation); 9 Horses (“listening to the Elliott Smith discography in reverse order”, on the album Perfectest Herald); Ben Folds ("Late" on Songs for Silverman); Brad Mehldau ("Sky Turning Grey (for Elliott Smith)" on Highway Rider); Rilo Kiley ("It Just Is", and "Ripchord" from the album More Adventurous); Lil B's 'The Worlds Ending'; Rhett Miller ("The Believer" on The Believer); Earlimart ("Heaven Adores You" on Treble and Tremble); Joan As Police Woman ("We Don't Own It" on Real Life); and Pete Yorn ("Bandstand in the Sky" on Nightcrawler, a song jointly dedicated to Jeff Buckley). Several tribute albums have also been released since his death, including Christopher O'Riley's 2006 Home to Oblivion: An Elliott Smith Tribute, with 18 instrumental covers, The Portland Cello Project's 2014 to e.s., covering six of his songs and To Elliott, from Portland containing covers by a number of Portland bands.
On July 30, 2004, Chiba filed a lawsuit against the Smith family for 15% of his earnings (over $1 million), claiming that she and Smith lived as "husband and wife", that Smith had pledged to take care of her financially for the rest of her life, and that she worked as his manager and agent from around 2000 until his death. A state labor commissioner ruled her claim as manager to be invalid, as she had worked as an "unlicensed talent agent" under California's Talent Agencies Act. The case made it to the California appellate court in October 2007, but the decision was affirmed 2–1.
In an October 2013 Spin magazine article—a reflection at the ten-year anniversary of Smith's death—drummer McPherson stated that Smith was "a sick man without his medicine" during the last 31 days of his life, when he was not only sober, but had also given up red meat and sugar. In the same article, Chiba recalls thinking, "Okay, you're asking a lot of yourself. You're giving up a lot at once." Chiba further explained that "anyone who understands drug abuse knows that you use drugs to hide from your past or sedate yourself from strong, overwhelming feelings. So when you're newly clean and coming off the medications that have been masking all those feelings, that's when you're the most vulnerable." Writing for Spin, Liam Gowing also encountered a local musician who claimed Smith had said to him: "The people who try to intervene, they're good people who genuinely care about you. But they don't know what you're going through. Do what you need to do." According to the musician, Smith had adamantly dissuaded him from suicide.
Musical style and influences
Smith respected and was inspired by many artists and styles, including the Beatles, Neil Young, Simon & Garfunkel, Big Star, the Clash, the Who, Led Zeppelin, the Kinks, Pink Floyd, Nick Drake, Rush, Bauhaus, Elvis Costello, Oasis, Television, Motown and flamenco records, AC/DC, Hank Williams, and Scorpions, Smith claimed to listen exclusively to selected albums (such as The Marble Index by Nico) for months. Sean Croghan, a former roommate of Smith's, said that Smith "listened almost exclusively to slow jams" in his senior year at college. Smith also took inspiration from novels, religion, and philosophy. He liked classic literature, especially Samuel Beckett, T. S. Eliot, and Russian novelists such as Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
Smith mentioned his admiration for Bob Dylan in several interviews, citing him as an early influence. He once commented: "My father taught me how to play 'Don't Think Twice, It's All Right'. I love Dylan's words, but even more than that, I love the fact that he loves words." Smith covered Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece" several times in concert. Smith has also been compared to folk singer Nick Drake, due to his fingerpicking style and vocals. Darryl Cater of AllMusic called references to "the definitive folk loner" Drake "inevitable", and Smith's lyrics have been compared to those in Drake's minimalist and haunting final album.
Smith was a dedicated fan of the Beatles (as well as their solo projects), once noting that he had been listening to them frequently since he was about "four years old" and also claimed that hearing The White Album was his original inspiration to become a musician. In 1998, Smith contributed a cover of the Beatles song "Because" to the closing credits and soundtrack of the film American Beauty. Although this was the only Beatles song that Smith ever officially released, he is known to have recorded many others, ("Revolution", "I'll Be Back" and "I'm So Tired") and played many songs by both the band and the members' solo projects at live concerts.
Smith said that transitions were his favorite part of songs and that he preferred to write broader, more impressionistic music closer to pop rather than folk music. Smith compared his songs to stories or dreams, not purely confessional pieces that people could relate to. When asked about the dark nature of his songwriting and the cult following he was gaining, Smith said he felt it was merely a product of his writing songs that were strongly meaningful to him rather than anything contrived. Larry Crane, Smith's posthumous archivist, has said that he was surprised at the amount of "recycling of musical ideas" he encountered while cataloging Smith's private tapes: "I found songs recorded in high school reworked 15 years on. Lyrics became more important to him as he became older, and more time was spent working on them."
Legacy
Since his death, Smith has been regarded as one of the most influential artists in indie music. Many artists have mentioned Smith as their influence, such as Frank Ocean, Beck, Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker, and Haim's lead vocalist Danielle Haim.
See also
List of unsolved deaths
Discography
Studio albums
Roman Candle (1994)
Elliott Smith (1995)
Either/Or (1997)
XO (1998)
Figure 8 (2000)
Posthumous studio albums
From a Basement on the Hill (2004)
Compilation albums
New Moon (2007)
References
Bibliography
External links
Official website
Official Cavity Search Records website
Official Kill Rock Stars website
Elliott Smith collection at the Internet Archive's live music archive
Keep the Things You Forgot: An Elliott Smith Oral History
1969 births
2003 deaths
Unsolved deaths
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American singers
20th-century American writers
21st-century American singers
21st-century American writers
Alternative rock guitarists
Alternative rock singers
American feminists
American indie rock musicians
American male guitarists
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
American tenors
Anti- (record label) artists
Caroline Records artists
Cavity Search Records artists
Deaths by stabbing in California
Domino Recording Company artists
DreamWorks Records artists
Feminist musicians
Fingerstyle guitarists
Guitarists from Los Angeles
Guitarists from Nebraska
Guitarists from New York City
Guitarists from Oklahoma
Guitarists from Oregon
Guitarists from Texas
Hampshire College alumni
Indie folk musicians
Kill Rock Stars artists
Lincoln High School (Portland, Oregon) alumni
Male feminists
Musicians from Brooklyn
Musicians from Omaha, Nebraska
Musicians from Portland, Oregon
People from Duncanville, Texas
People from Echo Park, Los Angeles
People with mood disorders
Singers from Los Angeles
Singers from New York City
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Suicide Squeeze Records artists
Virgin Records artists
20th-century American male singers
Singer-songwriters from California
Singer-songwriters from New York (state)
Singer-songwriters from Oklahoma
Singer-songwriters from Nebraska | true | [
"Air Commodore Charles Henry Elliott-Smith AFC (1889–1994) was a senior officer in the Royal Air Force who served in World War I and World War II. He was awarded the Air Force Cross in 1919, and was made a Commander of the Order of George I, by the King of Greece, in 1944.\n\nLife\nCharles Henry Elliott-Smith was born on 6 October 1889 and educated at Bedford Modern School.\n\nElliott-Smith joined the British Army as a Second Lieutenant in the Bedfordshire Regiment in 1915. He enrolled early in the Royal Flying Corps, where he was made Captain in 1916, Major in 1918, and was awarded the Air Force Cross in 1919. Elliott-Smith was made Group Captain in 1935 and later Air Commodore. \n\nElliott-Smith was made a Commander of the Order of George I by the King of Greece in 1944. He died on 14 January 1994 as one of the oldest surviving former members of the Royal Air Force.\n\nReferences\n\n1889 births\n1994 deaths\nRecipients of the Air Force Cross (United Kingdom)\nPeople educated at Bedford Modern School",
"Elliott Smith (1969–2003) was an American singer-songwriter and musician.\n\nElliott Smith, Elliott-Smith or Elliot Smith may also refer to:\n\nElliott Smith (album), a 1995 album by Elliott Smith\nElliott Smith (book), a 2007 biography about Elliott Smith\nElliott F. Smith (1931–1987), American politician in the New Jersey General Assembly\nBruce Elliott-Smith, British songwriter and producer\nCharles Henry Elliott-Smith (1889–1994), British air commodore\nGrafton Elliot Smith (1871–1937), Australian-British archaeologist and anatomist\nElliot Smith (American football) (born 1967), defensive back\nElliot Smith House, a historic house in Worcester, Massachusetts"
] |
[
"Elliott Smith",
"1991-96: Heatmiser",
"Who was Elliott Smith",
"While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust."
] | C_16dab7caf44f4fb980071052066a2132_1 | What was the number one song from that album | 2 | What was the number one song from Heatmiser's album? | Elliott Smith | Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory". While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996). Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees, and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant". Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to the release of Mic City Sons, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Steven Paul Smith (August 6, 1969 – October 21, 2003), known professionally as Elliott Smith, was an American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. Smith was born in Omaha, Nebraska, raised primarily in Texas, and lived much of his life in Portland, Oregon, where he first gained popularity. Smith's primary instrument was the guitar, though he also played piano, clarinet, bass guitar, drums, and harmonica. Smith had a distinctive vocal style, characterized by his "whispery, spiderweb-thin delivery", and often used multi-tracking to create vocal layers, textures, and harmonies.
After playing in the rock band Heatmiser for several years, Smith began his solo career in 1994, with releases on the independent record labels Cavity Search and Kill Rock Stars (KRS). In 1997, he signed a contract with DreamWorks Records, for which he recorded two albums. Smith rose to mainstream prominence when his song "Miss Misery"—included in the soundtrack for the film Good Will Hunting (1997)—was nominated for an Oscar in the Best Original Song category in 1998.
Smith was a heavy drinker and drug user at times throughout his life, and was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and depression. His struggles with drugs and mental illness affected his life and work, and often appeared in his lyrics. In 2003, aged 34, he died in Los Angeles, California, from two stab wounds to the chest. The autopsy evidence was inconclusive as to whether the wounds were self-inflicted or the result of homicide. At the time of his death, Smith was working on his sixth studio album, From a Basement on the Hill, which was posthumously produced and released in 2004.
Early life
Steven Paul Smith was born at the Methodist Hospital in Omaha, Nebraska, the only child of Gary Smith, a student at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, and Bunny Kay Berryman, an elementary school music teacher. His parents divorced when he was six months old, and Smith moved with his mother to Duncanville, Texas. Smith later had a tattoo of a map of Texas drawn on his upper arm and said: "I didn't get it because I like Texas, kind of the opposite. But I won't forget about it, although I'm tempted to because I don't like it there."
Smith endured a difficult childhood and a troubled relationship with his stepfather Charlie Welch. Smith stated he may have been sexually abused by Welch at a young age, an allegation that Welch has denied. He wrote about this part of his life in "Some Song". The name "Charlie" also appears in songs "Flowers for Charlie" and "No Confidence Man." In a 2004 interview, Jennifer Chiba, Smith's partner at the time of his death, said that Smith's difficult childhood was partly why he needed to sedate himself with drugs as an adult: "He was remembering traumatic things from his childhood – parts of things. It's not my place to say what."
For much of his childhood, Smith's family was a part of the Community of Christ but began attending services at a local Methodist church. Smith felt that going to church did little for him, except make him "really scared of Hell". In 2001, he said: "I don't necessarily buy into any officially structured version of spirituality. But I have my own version of it."
Smith began playing piano at age nine, and at ten began learning guitar on a small acoustic guitar bought for him by his father. At this age he composed an original piano piece, "Fantasy", which won him a prize at an arts festival. Many of the people on his mother's side of the family were non-professional musicians; his grandfather was a Dixieland drummer, and his grandmother sang in a glee club.
At fourteen, Smith left his mother's home in Texas and moved to Portland, Oregon, to live with his father, who was then working as a psychiatrist. It was around this time that Smith began using drugs, including alcohol, with friends. He also began experimenting with recording for the first time after borrowing a four-track recorder. At high school, Smith played clarinet in the school band and played guitar and piano; he also sang in the bands Stranger Than Fiction and A Murder of Crows, billed as either Steven Smith or "Johnny Panic". He graduated from Lincoln High School as a National Merit Scholar.
After graduation, Smith began calling himself "Elliott", saying that he thought "Steve" sounded too much like a "jock" name, and that "Steven" sounded "too bookish". According to friends, he had also used the pseudonym "Elliott Stillwater-Rotter" during his time in the band A Murder of Crows. Biographer S. R. Shutt speculates that the name was either inspired by Elliott Avenue, a street that Smith had lived on in Portland, or that it was suggested by his then-girlfriend. A junior high acquaintance of Smith speculates Smith changed his name so as not to be confused with Steve Smith, the drummer of Journey.
Career
1991–1996: Heatmiser
In 1991 Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory".
While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996).
Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees, and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant".
Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to the release of Mic City Sons, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO.
1994: Roman Candle
In the early 1990s, Smith's girlfriend at the time convinced him to send a tape of songs he had recently recorded on a borrowed four-track to Cavity Search Records. Cavity owner Christopher Cooper asked to release the entire album of songs, which surprised Smith, as he was expecting only a deal for a seven-inch record. The album became Smith's release, Roman Candle (1994).
Smith said: "I thought my head would be chopped off immediately when it came out because at the time it was so opposite to the grunge thing that was popular ... The thing is that album was really well received, which was a total shock, and it immediately eclipsed [Heatmiser], unfortunately." Smith felt his solo songs were not representative of the music Heatmiser was making: "The idea of playing [my music] for people didn't occur to me... because at the time it was the Northwest—Mudhoney and Nirvana—and going out to play an acoustic show was like crawling out on a limb and begging for it to be sawed off."
One of Smith's first solo performances was at the now-defunct Umbra Penumbra on September 17, 1994. Only three songs from Roman Candle were performed, with the majority of the ten-song set being B-sides, Heatmiser tunes and unreleased tracks. The same year, Smith released a split 7-inch record with Pete Krebs via Slo-Mo Records, contributing the track "No Confidence Man".
1995–1997: Elliott Smith and Either/Or
In 1995, Smith's self-titled album was released on Kill Rock Stars; the record featured a style of recording similar to Roman Candle, but with hints of growth and experimentation. Though the majority of the album was recorded by Smith alone, friend and The Spinanes vocalist Rebecca Gates sang harmony vocals on "St. Ides Heaven", and Heatmiser guitarist Neil Gust played guitar on "Single File". Several songs made reference to drugs, but Smith explained that he used the theme of drugs as a vehicle for conveying dependence rather than the songs being about drugs specifically. Looking back, Smith felt that the album's pervasive mood gave him "a reputation for being a really dark, depressed person" and said that he later made a conscious move toward more diverse moods in his music.
In 1996, filmmaker Jem Cohen recorded Smith playing acoustic songs for the short film Lucky Three: An Elliott Smith Portrait. Two of these songs would appear on his next album, Either/Or, which was another Kill Rock Stars release. Either/Or came out in 1997 to favorable reviews. The album found Smith venturing further into full instrumentation, with several songs containing bass guitar, drums, keyboards, and electric guitars, all played by Smith. The album title was derived from the two-volume book of the same name by Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, whose works generally deal with themes such as existential despair, angst, death, and God.
By this time, Smith's already-heavy drinking was being compounded with use of antidepressants. At the end of the Either/Or tour, some of his close friends staged an intervention in Chicago, but it proved ineffective. Shortly after, Smith relocated from Portland to Jersey City, New Jersey, and later Brooklyn, New York.
1997–98: "Miss Misery" and the Oscars
In 1997, Smith was selected by director and fellow Portland resident Gus Van Sant to be a part of the soundtrack to his film, Good Will Hunting. Smith recorded an orchestral version of "Between the Bars" with composer Danny Elfman for the movie. Smith also contributed a new song, "Miss Misery", and three previously released tracks ("No Name #3", from Roman Candle, and "Angeles" and "Say Yes", from Either/Or). The film was a commercial and critical success, and Smith was nominated for an Academy Award for "Miss Misery". Not eager to step into the limelight, he agreed to perform the song at the ceremony only after the producers informed him that if he was unwilling to perform, they would choose someone else to play it.
On March 5, 1998, Smith made his network television debut on Late Night with Conan O'Brien performing "Miss Misery" solo on acoustic guitar. A few days later, wearing a white suit, he played an abridged version of the song at the Oscars, accompanied by the house orchestra. James Horner and Will Jennings won the award that night for best song with "My Heart Will Go On" (sung by Celine Dion) from the film Titanic. Smith did not voice disappointment about not winning the award.
Smith commented on the surrealism of the Oscars experience: "That's exactly what it was, surreal... I enjoy performing almost as much as I enjoy making up songs in the first place. But the Oscars was a very strange show, where the set was only one song cut down to less than two minutes, and the audience was a lot of people who didn't come to hear me play. I wouldn't want to live in that world, but it was fun to walk around on the moon for a day."
1998–2000: XO and Figure 8
In 1998, after the success of Either/Or and "Miss Misery", Smith signed to a bigger record label, DreamWorks Records. Around the same time, Smith fell into depression, speaking openly of considering suicide, and on at least one occasion made a serious attempt at ending his own life. While in North Carolina, he became severely intoxicated and ran off a cliff. He landed on a tree, which badly impaled him but broke his fall. When questioned about his suicide attempt, he told an interviewer, "Yeah, I jumped off a cliff, but let's talk about something else."
Christopher Cooper, head of Cavity Search Records (which released Roman Candle), said about this time in Smith's life, "I talked him out of thinking that he wanted to kill himself numerous times when he was in Portland. I kept telling him that he was a brilliant man, and that life was worth living, and that people loved him." Pete Krebs also agreed: "In Portland we got the brunt of Elliott's initial depression... Lots of people have stories of their own experiences of staying up with Elliott 'til five in the morning, holding his hand, telling him not to kill himself."
Smith's first release for DreamWorks was later that year. Titled XO, it was conceived and developed while Smith wrote it out over the winter of 1997/1998, night after night seated at the bar in Luna Lounge. It was produced by the team of Rob Schnapf and Tom Rothrock. XO also contained some instrumentation from Los Angeles musicians Joey Waronker and Jon Brion. It contained a more full-sounding, baroque pop sound than any of his previous efforts, with songs featuring a horn section, Chamberlins, elaborate string arrangements, and even a drum loop on the song "Independence Day". His familiar double-tracked vocal and acoustic guitar style were still apparent while his somewhat personal lyrical style survived. The album went on to peak at number 104 on the Billboard 200 and number 123 on the UK Album Charts, while selling 400,000 copies (more than double that of each of his two Kill Rock Stars releases), becoming the best-selling release of his career. Smith's backing band during most of this period was the Portland-based group Quasi, consisting of former bandmate Sam Coomes on bass guitar and Coomes's ex-wife Janet Weiss on drums. Quasi also performed as the opening act at many shows on the tour, with Smith sometimes contributing bass guitar, guitar, or backing vocals. On October 17, 1998, Smith appeared on Saturday Night Live and performed "Waltz No. 2 (XO)". His backing band for this appearance was John Moen, Jon Brion, Rob Schnapf, and Sam Coomes.
In response to whether the change to a bigger record label would influence his creative control, Smith said, "I think despite the fact that sometimes people look at major labels as simply money-making machines, they're actually composed of individuals who are real people, and there's a part of them that needs to feel that part of their job is to put out good music." Smith also claimed in another interview that he never read his reviews for fear that they would interfere with his songwriting. It was during this period that Smith appeared on Dutch television in 1998 and provided a candid interview in which he spoke of his assessment of his music career until that point:
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I mostly only know things are different because people ask me different questions, but I don't feel like things are very changed. I mean, I still, I do the same things that I did before … I think about the same things, so … I'm the wrong kind of person to be really big and famous.
As part of the Dutch television special, Smith played live versions of "Waltz No. 2 (XO)", "Miss Misery", and "I Didn't Understand"—the latter two songs were performed solely on piano, while the first song was cut short by Smith, as he explained: "I had to stop it because it's… you know, what's the point of playing a song badly? It'd be better to play it and mean it, than to just walk through it."
Smith relocated from Brooklyn to Los Angeles in 1999, taking up residence at a cabin in the Silver Lake section of town, where he would regularly play intimate, acoustic shows at local venues like Silverlake Lounge. He also performed in Toronto in April that year. In the fall, his cover of the Beatles' "Because" was featured in the end credits of DreamWorks' Oscar-winning drama American Beauty, and appeared on the film's soundtrack album.
The final album Smith completed, Figure 8, was released on April 18, 2000. It featured the return of Rothrock, Schnapf, Brion, and Waronker and was partially recorded at Abbey Road Studios in England, with an obvious Beatles influence in the songwriting and production. The album garnered favorable reviews, and peaked at number 99 on the Billboard 200 and 37 on the UK Album Charts. The album received praise for its power pop style and complex arrangements, described as creating a "sweeping kaleidoscope of layered instruments and sonic textures". However, some reviewers felt that Smith's trademark dark and melancholy songwriting had lost some of its subtlety, with one reviewer likening some of the lyrics to "the self-pitying complaints of an adolescent venting in his diary".
Album art and promotional pictures from the period showed Smith looking cleaned-up and put-together. An extensive tour in promotion of the record ensued, book-ended by television appearances on Late Night with Conan O'Brien and the Late Show with David Letterman. However, Smith's condition began to deteriorate as he had become addicted to heroin either towards the end of or just after the Figure 8 tour.
2001–2002: Addiction and scrapped recordings
Around the time he began recording his final album, Smith began to display signs of paranoia, often believing that a white van followed him wherever he went. He would have friends drop him off for recording sessions almost a mile away from the studio, and to reach the location, he would trudge through hundreds of yards of brush and cliffs. He started telling people that DreamWorks was out to get him: "Not long ago my house was broken into, and songs were stolen off my computer which have wound up in the hands of certain people who work at a certain label. I've also been followed around for months at a time. I wouldn't even want to necessarily say it's the people from that label who are following me around, but it was probably them who broke into my house." During this period, Smith hardly ate, subsisting primarily on ice cream. He would go without sleeping for several days and then sleep for an entire day.
A follow-up to Smith's 2000 album was originally planned to happen with Rob Schnapf, but their sessions were abandoned. Smith also began distancing himself from manager Margaret Mittleman, who had handled him since the Roman Candle days. He finally began recording a new album with only himself and Jon Brion as producers sometime during 2001. The pair had recorded a substantial amount of music for the album when Brion stopped the sessions because of Smith's struggle with substance use disorder. Their friendship promptly ended, and Smith scrapped all of their work until that point. He later said "There was even a little more than half of a record done before this new one that I just scrapped because of a blown friendship with someone that made me so depressed I didn't want to hear any of those songs. He was just helping me record the songs and stuff, and then the friendship kind of fell apart all of a sudden one day. It just made it kind of awkward being alone in the car listening to the songs."
When Brion sent a bill for the abandoned sessions to DreamWorks, executives Lenny Waronker and Luke Wood scheduled a meeting with Smith to determine what went wrong with the sessions. Smith complained of intrusion upon his personal life from the label, as well as poor promotion for the Figure 8 album. The talks proved fruitless, and soon after, Smith sent a message to the executives, stating that if they did not release him from his contract, he would take his own life. In May 2001, Smith set out to re-record the album, mostly on his own, but with some help from David McConnell of Goldenboy. McConnell told Spin that, during this time, Smith would smoke over $1,500 worth of heroin and crack per day, would often talk about suicide, and on numerous occasions tried to give himself an overdose. Steven Drozd of The Flaming Lips and Scott McPherson of Sense Field played a few drum tracks, Sam Coomes contributed some bass guitar and backing vocals, but almost every other instrument was recorded by Smith.
Smith's song "Needle in the Hay" was included in Wes Anderson's 2001 dark comedy film The Royal Tenenbaums during a suicide attempt scene. Smith was originally supposed to contribute a cover of The Beatles' "Hey Jude" for the film, but when he failed to do so in time, Anderson had to use The Mutato Muzika Orchestra's version of the track instead. Anderson would later say that Smith "was in a bad state" at the time.
Smith's live performances during 2001 and 2002 were infrequent, typically in the Pacific Northwest or Los Angeles. A review of his December 20, 2001, show at Portland's Crystal Ballroom expressed concern over his appearance and performance: his hair was uncharacteristically greasy and long, his face was bearded and gaunt, and during his songs he exhibited alarming signs of "memory-loss and butterfingers". At another performance in San Francisco that month, the audience began shouting out lyrics when Smith could not remember them.
In the first of only three concerts performed in 2002, Smith co-headlined Northwestern University's A&O Ball with Wilco on May 2 in Chicago. He was onstage for nearly an hour but failed to complete half of the songs. He claimed that his poor performance was due to his left hand having fallen asleep and told the audience it felt "like having stuff on your hand and you can't get it off". Smith's performance was reviewed as "undoubtedly one of the worst performances ever by a musician" and an "excruciating […] nightmare". A reporter for the online magazine Glorious Noise wrote, "It would not surprise me at all if Elliott Smith ends up dead within a year."
On November 25, 2002, Smith was involved in a brawl with the Los Angeles Police Department at a concert where The Flaming Lips and Beck were performing. Smith later said he was defending a man he thought the police were harassing. The officers allegedly beat and arrested him and girlfriend Jennifer Chiba. The two spent the night in jail. Smith's back was injured in the incident, causing him to cancel a number of shows. Wayne Coyne, lead singer of The Flaming Lips and a friend of Smith's, stated concern over Smith's appearance and actions, saying that he "saw a guy who had lost control of himself. He was needy, he was grumpy, he was everything you wouldn't want in a person. It's not like when you think of Keith Richards being pleasantly blissed out in the corner."
2003: Reemergence and From a Basement on the Hill
Smith had attempted to go to rehab several times, but found that he was unable to relate to the popular treatments for people with substance use disorder that used a twelve-step program basis for treatment. "I couldn't do the first step […] I couldn't say what you were supposed to say and mean it." In 2002, Smith went to the Neurotransmitter Restoration Center in Beverly Hills to start a course of treatment for substance use disorder. In one of his final interviews, he spoke about the center, "What they do is an IV treatment where they put a needle in your arm, and you're on a drip bag, but the only thing that's in the drip bag is amino acids and saline solution. I was coming off of a lot of psych meds and other things. I was even on an antipsychotic, although I'm not psychotic."
Two sold-out solo acoustic concerts at Hollywood's Henry Fonda Theater, on January 31 and February 1, 2003, saw Smith attempting to reestablish his credibility as a live performer. Before the show, Smith scrawled "Kali – The Destroyer" (the Hindu goddess associated with time and change) in large block letters with permanent ink on his left arm, which was visible to the crowd during the performance. On several songs, he was backed by a stripped-down drum kit played by Robin Peringer (of the band 764-HERO), and members of opening band Rilo Kiley contributed backing vocals to one song. Near the end of the first show, the musician responded for several minutes after a heckler (later identified as Smith's ex-girlfriend Valerie Deerin) yelled "Get a backbone." Smith played two more Los Angeles concerts during 2003, including The Derby in May and the L.A. Weekly Music Awards in June.
After his 34th birthday on August 6, 2003, he gave up alcohol. Director Mike Mills had been working with Smith during his final years and described Smith's troubles and apparent recovery: "I gave the script to him, then he dropped off the face of the earth […] he went through his whole crazy time, but by the time I was done with the film, he was making From a Basement on the Hill and I was shocked that he was actually making music."
With things improving for Smith after several troubled years, he began experimenting with noise music and worked on his girlfriend Jennifer Chiba's iMac with the intent of learning how to record with computers, noting that it was the only method with which he was still unfamiliar. Smith jokingly labeled his experimental way of recording "The California Frown" (a play on the Beach Boys' "California Sound"). He said of the songs, "They're kind of more noisy with the pitch all distorted. Some are more acoustic, but there aren't too many like that. Lately I've just been making up a lot of noise."
He was also in the process of recording songs for the Thumbsucker soundtrack, including Big Star's "Thirteen" and Cat Stevens's "Trouble". In August 2003, Suicide Squeeze Records put out a limited-edition vinyl single for "Pretty (Ugly Before)", a song that Smith had been playing since the Figure 8 tour.
Smith's final show was at Redfest at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City on September 19, 2003. The final song he played live was "Long, Long, Long" by The Beatles.
2004–present: Posthumous releases
From a Basement on the Hill, almost four years in production, was released on October 19, 2004, by ANTI- Records (a part of Epitaph Records). With Smith's family in control of his estate, they chose to bring in Rob Schnapf and Smith's ex-girlfriend Joanna Bolme to sort through the recordings and mix the album. Although Smith had voiced his desire for it to be a double album or a regular album with a bonus disc, it was not clear whether it would have been possible for him to release it that way had he completed it. As completed by Schnapf and Bolme, it was released as a 15-track single album. Many songs from the sessions (later leaked onto the Internet) were not included, such as "True Love", "Everything's OK", "Stickman", and "Suicide Machine" (a reworking of the Figure 8-era unreleased instrumental "Tiny Time Machine"). There has been unconfirmed speculation that Smith's family made the decision not to include some songs on the record due to their lyrical content, although songs such as "King's Crossing" that deal with darker subjects did make the album.
Elliott Smith and the Big Nothing, a biography by Benjamin Nugent, was rushed to publication shortly after From a Basement on the Hill, shortly after the first anniversary of his death. Smith's family, as well as Joanna Bolme, Jennifer Chiba, Neil Gust, Sam Coomes, and Janet Weiss, all declined to be interviewed. It contained interviews with Rob Schnapf, David McConnell, and Pete Krebs. The book received mixed reviews, with Publishers Weekly remarking that while "Nugent manages to patch together the major beats of Smith's life, he can offer little meaningful insight".
In 2005, a tribute album, A Tribute to Elliott Smith, was released. It featured various bands performing tributes to Smith.
On May 8, 2007, a posthumous two-disc compilation album entitled New Moon was released by Kill Rock Stars. The album contained 24 songs recorded by Smith between 1994 and 1997 during his tenure with the label, songs that were not included on albums, as well as a few early versions and previously released B-sides. In the United States, the album debuted at number 24 on the Billboard 200, selling about 24,000 copies in its first week. The record received favorable reviews and was Metacritic's 15th best-reviewed album of 2007. A portion of the proceeds from album sales were to go to Outside In, a social service agency for low-income adults and homeless youth in Portland, Oregon.
On October 25, 2007, a book titled Elliott Smith was released by Autumn de Wilde, which consists of photographs, handwritten lyrics, and "revealing talks with Smith's inner circle". De Wilde was responsible for the Figure 8 sleeve art, making a landmark and de facto Smith memorial of the Solutions Audio mural. A five-song CD featuring previously unreleased live recordings of Smith performing acoustically at Largo in Los Angeles was included in the release.
Following Smith's death, his estate licensed his songs for use in film and television projects such as One Tree Hill, The Girl Next Door, Georgia Rule, and Paranoid Park.
In a March 2009 interview, Larry Crane said that Smith's estate was defunct and all rights previously held by Smith are now in the control of his parents. Crane went on to say that his parents own the rights to Smith's high school recordings, some of the Heatmiser material, all solo songs recorded until his 1998 record deal with DreamWorks Records, and From a Basement on the Hill. DreamWorks Records was acquired by Universal Music Group in 2003, and Interscope Records currently "owns all studio and live recording from Jan 1998 to his passing, except for the songs on From a Basement on the Hill."
In December 2009, Kill Rock Stars announced that it had obtained the rights to re-release Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill, originally released by Cavity Search and ANTI-, respectively. Roman Candle would be remastered by Larry Crane. Along with the press release, Kill Rock Stars posted a previously unreleased track of Smith's, titled "Cecilia/Amanda", as a free download. Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill were re-released on April 6, 2010, in the US.
A greatest hits compilation titled An Introduction to... Elliott Smith was released in November 2010 by Domino Records (UK) and Kill Rock Stars (US).
In August 2013, there was a memorial concert in Portland, Oregon and three other cities. Attending the Portland show were several musicians Smith had performed with, friends, and an appearance by film director Gus Van Sant.
In 2014, director Paul Thomas Anderson posted a video of the pilot episode for a show called The Jon Brion Show, featuring an acoustic set by Smith including accompaniment by Brion and pianist Brad Mehldau.
On July 17, 2015, a documentary about Smith's life titled Heaven Adores You saw a limited theatrical release. The documentary enlisted a number of close friends and family members, as well as hours of audio interviews throughout Smith's short career. The film was directed by Nickolas Rossi and released through Eagle Rock Entertainment. Heaven Adores You received positive reviews from Consequence of Sound, The Guardian, and The Hollywood Reporter.
On August 6, 2019 (what would have been Smith's 50th birthday), UMe released digital deluxe editions of the two albums XO and Figure 8. The new edition of XO has nine added tracks, including Smith's Oscar-nominated Good Will Hunting song "Miss Misery." Seven tracks have been added to Figure 8. The digital deluxe edition includes "Figure 8"—Smith's cover of the "Schoolhouse Rock!" song—which was originally released only on the Japanese edition of the album. The final track on the new Figure 8 edition is Smith's cover of the Beatles’ "Because", originally featured on the 1999 American Beauty soundtrack.
In May 2021, Smith's life and work were the subject of BBC Radio 4's Great Lives.
Death
Smith died on October 21, 2003, at the age of 34 from two stab wounds to the chest. At the time of the stabbing, he was at his Lemoyne Street home in Echo Park, California, where he lived with his girlfriend, Jennifer Chiba. According to Chiba, the two were arguing, and she locked herself in the bathroom to take a shower. Chiba heard him scream and upon opening the door saw Smith standing with a knife in his chest. She pulled the knife out, after which he collapsed and she called 9-1-1 at 12:18 pm. Smith died in the hospital, with the time of death listed as 1:36 p.m. A possible suicide note, written on a sticky note, read: "I'm so sorry—love, Elliott. God forgive me." In the coroner's report of the note, the name "Elliott" is misspelled as "Elliot". While Smith's death was reported as a suicide, the official autopsy report released in December 2003 left open the question of homicide.
Smith's remains were cremated, and his ashes were divided between his mother, father, and half-sister Ashley. A small memorial service for family and friends was held at his father's home in Portland, although Smith's "ashes weren't on hand because the coroner wouldn't release them." The status or location of Smith's ashes has not been made public.
According to Pitchfork, record producer Larry Crane reported on his Tape Op message board that he had planned to help Smith mix his album in mid-November. Crane wrote, "I hadn't talked to Elliott in over a year. His girlfriend, Jennifer, called me [last week] and asked if I'd like to come to L.A. and help mix and finish [Smith's album]. I said 'yes, of course', and chatted with Elliott for the first time in ages. It seems surreal that he would call me to finish an album and then a week later kill himself. I talked to Jennifer this morning, who was obviously shattered and in tears, and she said, 'I don't understand, he was so healthy. The coroner reported that no traces of illegal substances or alcohol were found in Smith's system at the time of his death but did find prescribed levels of antidepressant, anxiolytic, and ADHD medications, including clonazepam, mirtazapine, atomoxetine, and amphetamine. There were no hesitation wounds, which are typically found on a victim of suicide by self-infliction. Due to the inconclusive autopsy ruling, the Los Angeles Police Department's investigation remains open.
Reaction
Shortly after Smith's death, a fan memorial was initiated outside Solutions Audio (4334 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, California), the site at which the cover of the Figure 8 album was shot. Farewell messages to Smith were written on the wall, and flowers, photos, candles, and empty bottles of alcohol mentioned in Smith's songs were left. Since then, the wall has been a regular target for graffiti but is regularly restored by fans.
Memorial concerts were held in several cities in the United States and the United Kingdom. A petition was soon put forth with intent to make part of the Silver Lake area a memorial park in Smith's honor. It received over 10,000 signatures, but no plans to establish the park have been announced. A memorial plaque located inside Smith's former high school, Lincoln High, was hung in July 2006. The plaque reads: "I'm never going to know you now, but I'm going to love you anyhow" referencing Smith's song "Waltz No. 2 (XO)".
Since Smith's death, many musical acts have paid him tribute. Songs in tribute to, or about, Smith have been released by Pearl Jam ("Can't Keep" on the Live at Benaroya Hall concert album); Sparta ("Bombs and Us"); Third Eye Blind ("There's No Hurry to Eternity", originally titled "Elliott Smith", on the Live from Nowhere Near You, Volume Two: Pacific Northwest compilation); 9 Horses (“listening to the Elliott Smith discography in reverse order”, on the album Perfectest Herald); Ben Folds ("Late" on Songs for Silverman); Brad Mehldau ("Sky Turning Grey (for Elliott Smith)" on Highway Rider); Rilo Kiley ("It Just Is", and "Ripchord" from the album More Adventurous); Lil B's 'The Worlds Ending'; Rhett Miller ("The Believer" on The Believer); Earlimart ("Heaven Adores You" on Treble and Tremble); Joan As Police Woman ("We Don't Own It" on Real Life); and Pete Yorn ("Bandstand in the Sky" on Nightcrawler, a song jointly dedicated to Jeff Buckley). Several tribute albums have also been released since his death, including Christopher O'Riley's 2006 Home to Oblivion: An Elliott Smith Tribute, with 18 instrumental covers, The Portland Cello Project's 2014 to e.s., covering six of his songs and To Elliott, from Portland containing covers by a number of Portland bands.
On July 30, 2004, Chiba filed a lawsuit against the Smith family for 15% of his earnings (over $1 million), claiming that she and Smith lived as "husband and wife", that Smith had pledged to take care of her financially for the rest of her life, and that she worked as his manager and agent from around 2000 until his death. A state labor commissioner ruled her claim as manager to be invalid, as she had worked as an "unlicensed talent agent" under California's Talent Agencies Act. The case made it to the California appellate court in October 2007, but the decision was affirmed 2–1.
In an October 2013 Spin magazine article—a reflection at the ten-year anniversary of Smith's death—drummer McPherson stated that Smith was "a sick man without his medicine" during the last 31 days of his life, when he was not only sober, but had also given up red meat and sugar. In the same article, Chiba recalls thinking, "Okay, you're asking a lot of yourself. You're giving up a lot at once." Chiba further explained that "anyone who understands drug abuse knows that you use drugs to hide from your past or sedate yourself from strong, overwhelming feelings. So when you're newly clean and coming off the medications that have been masking all those feelings, that's when you're the most vulnerable." Writing for Spin, Liam Gowing also encountered a local musician who claimed Smith had said to him: "The people who try to intervene, they're good people who genuinely care about you. But they don't know what you're going through. Do what you need to do." According to the musician, Smith had adamantly dissuaded him from suicide.
Musical style and influences
Smith respected and was inspired by many artists and styles, including the Beatles, Neil Young, Simon & Garfunkel, Big Star, the Clash, the Who, Led Zeppelin, the Kinks, Pink Floyd, Nick Drake, Rush, Bauhaus, Elvis Costello, Oasis, Television, Motown and flamenco records, AC/DC, Hank Williams, and Scorpions, Smith claimed to listen exclusively to selected albums (such as The Marble Index by Nico) for months. Sean Croghan, a former roommate of Smith's, said that Smith "listened almost exclusively to slow jams" in his senior year at college. Smith also took inspiration from novels, religion, and philosophy. He liked classic literature, especially Samuel Beckett, T. S. Eliot, and Russian novelists such as Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
Smith mentioned his admiration for Bob Dylan in several interviews, citing him as an early influence. He once commented: "My father taught me how to play 'Don't Think Twice, It's All Right'. I love Dylan's words, but even more than that, I love the fact that he loves words." Smith covered Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece" several times in concert. Smith has also been compared to folk singer Nick Drake, due to his fingerpicking style and vocals. Darryl Cater of AllMusic called references to "the definitive folk loner" Drake "inevitable", and Smith's lyrics have been compared to those in Drake's minimalist and haunting final album.
Smith was a dedicated fan of the Beatles (as well as their solo projects), once noting that he had been listening to them frequently since he was about "four years old" and also claimed that hearing The White Album was his original inspiration to become a musician. In 1998, Smith contributed a cover of the Beatles song "Because" to the closing credits and soundtrack of the film American Beauty. Although this was the only Beatles song that Smith ever officially released, he is known to have recorded many others, ("Revolution", "I'll Be Back" and "I'm So Tired") and played many songs by both the band and the members' solo projects at live concerts.
Smith said that transitions were his favorite part of songs and that he preferred to write broader, more impressionistic music closer to pop rather than folk music. Smith compared his songs to stories or dreams, not purely confessional pieces that people could relate to. When asked about the dark nature of his songwriting and the cult following he was gaining, Smith said he felt it was merely a product of his writing songs that were strongly meaningful to him rather than anything contrived. Larry Crane, Smith's posthumous archivist, has said that he was surprised at the amount of "recycling of musical ideas" he encountered while cataloging Smith's private tapes: "I found songs recorded in high school reworked 15 years on. Lyrics became more important to him as he became older, and more time was spent working on them."
Legacy
Since his death, Smith has been regarded as one of the most influential artists in indie music. Many artists have mentioned Smith as their influence, such as Frank Ocean, Beck, Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker, and Haim's lead vocalist Danielle Haim.
See also
List of unsolved deaths
Discography
Studio albums
Roman Candle (1994)
Elliott Smith (1995)
Either/Or (1997)
XO (1998)
Figure 8 (2000)
Posthumous studio albums
From a Basement on the Hill (2004)
Compilation albums
New Moon (2007)
References
Bibliography
External links
Official website
Official Cavity Search Records website
Official Kill Rock Stars website
Elliott Smith collection at the Internet Archive's live music archive
Keep the Things You Forgot: An Elliott Smith Oral History
1969 births
2003 deaths
Unsolved deaths
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American singers
20th-century American writers
21st-century American singers
21st-century American writers
Alternative rock guitarists
Alternative rock singers
American feminists
American indie rock musicians
American male guitarists
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
American tenors
Anti- (record label) artists
Caroline Records artists
Cavity Search Records artists
Deaths by stabbing in California
Domino Recording Company artists
DreamWorks Records artists
Feminist musicians
Fingerstyle guitarists
Guitarists from Los Angeles
Guitarists from Nebraska
Guitarists from New York City
Guitarists from Oklahoma
Guitarists from Oregon
Guitarists from Texas
Hampshire College alumni
Indie folk musicians
Kill Rock Stars artists
Lincoln High School (Portland, Oregon) alumni
Male feminists
Musicians from Brooklyn
Musicians from Omaha, Nebraska
Musicians from Portland, Oregon
People from Duncanville, Texas
People from Echo Park, Los Angeles
People with mood disorders
Singers from Los Angeles
Singers from New York City
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Suicide Squeeze Records artists
Virgin Records artists
20th-century American male singers
Singer-songwriters from California
Singer-songwriters from New York (state)
Singer-songwriters from Oklahoma
Singer-songwriters from Nebraska | false | [
"We Created the World is the debut studio album by Finnish alternative rock band Softengine. It was released in Finland on 3 October 2014, through Sony Music Entertainment. The album has peaked to number 7 on the Finnish Albums Chart. The album includes the singles \"Something Better\", \"Yellow House\", \"The Sirens\" and \"What If I?\".\n\nSingles\n\"Something Better\" was released as the lead single from the album on 21 March 2014. The song was selected to represent Finland at the Eurovision Song Contest 2014 at the B&W Hallerne in Copenhagen, Denmark. The song qualified from the second semi-final to compete in the final. Finland placed 11th in the final, scoring 72 points. This was Finland's best placing in the contest since Lordi's victory in the Eurovision Song Contest 2006. \"Yellow House\" was released as the second single from the album on 13 June 2014. \"The Sirens\" was released as the third single from the album on 3 October 2014. \"What If I?\" was released as the fourth single from the album on 17 December 2014.\n\nTrack listing\n\nChart performance\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\n2014 debut albums",
"Together is the second album by Norwegian pop duo Marcus & Martinus. It is their first full-length studio album in English. The album was released by Sony Music Entertainment on 4 November 2016 and debuted at number 1 on both the Norwegian VG-lista official albums chart and the Swedish Sverigetopplistan albums chart.\n\nSingles\n\"Girls\" was released as the lead single from the album on 20 May 2016. The song has peaked at number 1 on the Norwegian Singles Chart and number 40 on the Swedish Singles Chart. \"Heartbeat\" was released as the second single from the album on 24 May 2016. The song has peaked at number 21 on the Norwegian Singles Chart and number 61 on the Swedish Singles Chart. \"I Don't Wanna Fall In Love\" was released as the third single from the album on 27 May 2016. The song has peaked at number 37 on the Norwegian Singles Chart. \"Light It Up\" was released as the fourth single from the album on 29 July 2016. The song has peaked at number 9 on the Norwegian Singles Chart and number 23 on the Swedish Singles Chart. \"One More Second\" was released as the fifth single from the album on 20 October 2016. The song has peaked at number 30 on the Norwegian Singles Chart and number 57 on the Swedish Singles Chart. \"Go Where You Go\" was released as the sixth single from the album on 28 October 2016. \"Without You\" was released as the seventh single from the album on 2 November 2016. \"Bae\" was released as the eighth single from the album on 4 March 2017. The song did not enter the Swedish Singles Chart, but peaked to number 1 on the Sweden Heatseeker Songs.\n\nTrack listing\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\n2016 albums"
] |
[
"Elliott Smith",
"1991-96: Heatmiser",
"Who was Elliott Smith",
"While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust.",
"What was the number one song from that album",
"I don't know."
] | C_16dab7caf44f4fb980071052066a2132_1 | What happen in 1991 | 3 | What happen to musician Elliott Smith in 1991? | Elliott Smith | Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory". While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996). Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees, and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant". Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to the release of Mic City Sons, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO. CANNOTANSWER | Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science. | Steven Paul Smith (August 6, 1969 – October 21, 2003), known professionally as Elliott Smith, was an American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. Smith was born in Omaha, Nebraska, raised primarily in Texas, and lived much of his life in Portland, Oregon, where he first gained popularity. Smith's primary instrument was the guitar, though he also played piano, clarinet, bass guitar, drums, and harmonica. Smith had a distinctive vocal style, characterized by his "whispery, spiderweb-thin delivery", and often used multi-tracking to create vocal layers, textures, and harmonies.
After playing in the rock band Heatmiser for several years, Smith began his solo career in 1994, with releases on the independent record labels Cavity Search and Kill Rock Stars (KRS). In 1997, he signed a contract with DreamWorks Records, for which he recorded two albums. Smith rose to mainstream prominence when his song "Miss Misery"—included in the soundtrack for the film Good Will Hunting (1997)—was nominated for an Oscar in the Best Original Song category in 1998.
Smith was a heavy drinker and drug user at times throughout his life, and was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and depression. His struggles with drugs and mental illness affected his life and work, and often appeared in his lyrics. In 2003, aged 34, he died in Los Angeles, California, from two stab wounds to the chest. The autopsy evidence was inconclusive as to whether the wounds were self-inflicted or the result of homicide. At the time of his death, Smith was working on his sixth studio album, From a Basement on the Hill, which was posthumously produced and released in 2004.
Early life
Steven Paul Smith was born at the Methodist Hospital in Omaha, Nebraska, the only child of Gary Smith, a student at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, and Bunny Kay Berryman, an elementary school music teacher. His parents divorced when he was six months old, and Smith moved with his mother to Duncanville, Texas. Smith later had a tattoo of a map of Texas drawn on his upper arm and said: "I didn't get it because I like Texas, kind of the opposite. But I won't forget about it, although I'm tempted to because I don't like it there."
Smith endured a difficult childhood and a troubled relationship with his stepfather Charlie Welch. Smith stated he may have been sexually abused by Welch at a young age, an allegation that Welch has denied. He wrote about this part of his life in "Some Song". The name "Charlie" also appears in songs "Flowers for Charlie" and "No Confidence Man." In a 2004 interview, Jennifer Chiba, Smith's partner at the time of his death, said that Smith's difficult childhood was partly why he needed to sedate himself with drugs as an adult: "He was remembering traumatic things from his childhood – parts of things. It's not my place to say what."
For much of his childhood, Smith's family was a part of the Community of Christ but began attending services at a local Methodist church. Smith felt that going to church did little for him, except make him "really scared of Hell". In 2001, he said: "I don't necessarily buy into any officially structured version of spirituality. But I have my own version of it."
Smith began playing piano at age nine, and at ten began learning guitar on a small acoustic guitar bought for him by his father. At this age he composed an original piano piece, "Fantasy", which won him a prize at an arts festival. Many of the people on his mother's side of the family were non-professional musicians; his grandfather was a Dixieland drummer, and his grandmother sang in a glee club.
At fourteen, Smith left his mother's home in Texas and moved to Portland, Oregon, to live with his father, who was then working as a psychiatrist. It was around this time that Smith began using drugs, including alcohol, with friends. He also began experimenting with recording for the first time after borrowing a four-track recorder. At high school, Smith played clarinet in the school band and played guitar and piano; he also sang in the bands Stranger Than Fiction and A Murder of Crows, billed as either Steven Smith or "Johnny Panic". He graduated from Lincoln High School as a National Merit Scholar.
After graduation, Smith began calling himself "Elliott", saying that he thought "Steve" sounded too much like a "jock" name, and that "Steven" sounded "too bookish". According to friends, he had also used the pseudonym "Elliott Stillwater-Rotter" during his time in the band A Murder of Crows. Biographer S. R. Shutt speculates that the name was either inspired by Elliott Avenue, a street that Smith had lived on in Portland, or that it was suggested by his then-girlfriend. A junior high acquaintance of Smith speculates Smith changed his name so as not to be confused with Steve Smith, the drummer of Journey.
Career
1991–1996: Heatmiser
In 1991 Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory".
While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996).
Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees, and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant".
Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to the release of Mic City Sons, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO.
1994: Roman Candle
In the early 1990s, Smith's girlfriend at the time convinced him to send a tape of songs he had recently recorded on a borrowed four-track to Cavity Search Records. Cavity owner Christopher Cooper asked to release the entire album of songs, which surprised Smith, as he was expecting only a deal for a seven-inch record. The album became Smith's release, Roman Candle (1994).
Smith said: "I thought my head would be chopped off immediately when it came out because at the time it was so opposite to the grunge thing that was popular ... The thing is that album was really well received, which was a total shock, and it immediately eclipsed [Heatmiser], unfortunately." Smith felt his solo songs were not representative of the music Heatmiser was making: "The idea of playing [my music] for people didn't occur to me... because at the time it was the Northwest—Mudhoney and Nirvana—and going out to play an acoustic show was like crawling out on a limb and begging for it to be sawed off."
One of Smith's first solo performances was at the now-defunct Umbra Penumbra on September 17, 1994. Only three songs from Roman Candle were performed, with the majority of the ten-song set being B-sides, Heatmiser tunes and unreleased tracks. The same year, Smith released a split 7-inch record with Pete Krebs via Slo-Mo Records, contributing the track "No Confidence Man".
1995–1997: Elliott Smith and Either/Or
In 1995, Smith's self-titled album was released on Kill Rock Stars; the record featured a style of recording similar to Roman Candle, but with hints of growth and experimentation. Though the majority of the album was recorded by Smith alone, friend and The Spinanes vocalist Rebecca Gates sang harmony vocals on "St. Ides Heaven", and Heatmiser guitarist Neil Gust played guitar on "Single File". Several songs made reference to drugs, but Smith explained that he used the theme of drugs as a vehicle for conveying dependence rather than the songs being about drugs specifically. Looking back, Smith felt that the album's pervasive mood gave him "a reputation for being a really dark, depressed person" and said that he later made a conscious move toward more diverse moods in his music.
In 1996, filmmaker Jem Cohen recorded Smith playing acoustic songs for the short film Lucky Three: An Elliott Smith Portrait. Two of these songs would appear on his next album, Either/Or, which was another Kill Rock Stars release. Either/Or came out in 1997 to favorable reviews. The album found Smith venturing further into full instrumentation, with several songs containing bass guitar, drums, keyboards, and electric guitars, all played by Smith. The album title was derived from the two-volume book of the same name by Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, whose works generally deal with themes such as existential despair, angst, death, and God.
By this time, Smith's already-heavy drinking was being compounded with use of antidepressants. At the end of the Either/Or tour, some of his close friends staged an intervention in Chicago, but it proved ineffective. Shortly after, Smith relocated from Portland to Jersey City, New Jersey, and later Brooklyn, New York.
1997–98: "Miss Misery" and the Oscars
In 1997, Smith was selected by director and fellow Portland resident Gus Van Sant to be a part of the soundtrack to his film, Good Will Hunting. Smith recorded an orchestral version of "Between the Bars" with composer Danny Elfman for the movie. Smith also contributed a new song, "Miss Misery", and three previously released tracks ("No Name #3", from Roman Candle, and "Angeles" and "Say Yes", from Either/Or). The film was a commercial and critical success, and Smith was nominated for an Academy Award for "Miss Misery". Not eager to step into the limelight, he agreed to perform the song at the ceremony only after the producers informed him that if he was unwilling to perform, they would choose someone else to play it.
On March 5, 1998, Smith made his network television debut on Late Night with Conan O'Brien performing "Miss Misery" solo on acoustic guitar. A few days later, wearing a white suit, he played an abridged version of the song at the Oscars, accompanied by the house orchestra. James Horner and Will Jennings won the award that night for best song with "My Heart Will Go On" (sung by Celine Dion) from the film Titanic. Smith did not voice disappointment about not winning the award.
Smith commented on the surrealism of the Oscars experience: "That's exactly what it was, surreal... I enjoy performing almost as much as I enjoy making up songs in the first place. But the Oscars was a very strange show, where the set was only one song cut down to less than two minutes, and the audience was a lot of people who didn't come to hear me play. I wouldn't want to live in that world, but it was fun to walk around on the moon for a day."
1998–2000: XO and Figure 8
In 1998, after the success of Either/Or and "Miss Misery", Smith signed to a bigger record label, DreamWorks Records. Around the same time, Smith fell into depression, speaking openly of considering suicide, and on at least one occasion made a serious attempt at ending his own life. While in North Carolina, he became severely intoxicated and ran off a cliff. He landed on a tree, which badly impaled him but broke his fall. When questioned about his suicide attempt, he told an interviewer, "Yeah, I jumped off a cliff, but let's talk about something else."
Christopher Cooper, head of Cavity Search Records (which released Roman Candle), said about this time in Smith's life, "I talked him out of thinking that he wanted to kill himself numerous times when he was in Portland. I kept telling him that he was a brilliant man, and that life was worth living, and that people loved him." Pete Krebs also agreed: "In Portland we got the brunt of Elliott's initial depression... Lots of people have stories of their own experiences of staying up with Elliott 'til five in the morning, holding his hand, telling him not to kill himself."
Smith's first release for DreamWorks was later that year. Titled XO, it was conceived and developed while Smith wrote it out over the winter of 1997/1998, night after night seated at the bar in Luna Lounge. It was produced by the team of Rob Schnapf and Tom Rothrock. XO also contained some instrumentation from Los Angeles musicians Joey Waronker and Jon Brion. It contained a more full-sounding, baroque pop sound than any of his previous efforts, with songs featuring a horn section, Chamberlins, elaborate string arrangements, and even a drum loop on the song "Independence Day". His familiar double-tracked vocal and acoustic guitar style were still apparent while his somewhat personal lyrical style survived. The album went on to peak at number 104 on the Billboard 200 and number 123 on the UK Album Charts, while selling 400,000 copies (more than double that of each of his two Kill Rock Stars releases), becoming the best-selling release of his career. Smith's backing band during most of this period was the Portland-based group Quasi, consisting of former bandmate Sam Coomes on bass guitar and Coomes's ex-wife Janet Weiss on drums. Quasi also performed as the opening act at many shows on the tour, with Smith sometimes contributing bass guitar, guitar, or backing vocals. On October 17, 1998, Smith appeared on Saturday Night Live and performed "Waltz No. 2 (XO)". His backing band for this appearance was John Moen, Jon Brion, Rob Schnapf, and Sam Coomes.
In response to whether the change to a bigger record label would influence his creative control, Smith said, "I think despite the fact that sometimes people look at major labels as simply money-making machines, they're actually composed of individuals who are real people, and there's a part of them that needs to feel that part of their job is to put out good music." Smith also claimed in another interview that he never read his reviews for fear that they would interfere with his songwriting. It was during this period that Smith appeared on Dutch television in 1998 and provided a candid interview in which he spoke of his assessment of his music career until that point:
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I mostly only know things are different because people ask me different questions, but I don't feel like things are very changed. I mean, I still, I do the same things that I did before … I think about the same things, so … I'm the wrong kind of person to be really big and famous.
As part of the Dutch television special, Smith played live versions of "Waltz No. 2 (XO)", "Miss Misery", and "I Didn't Understand"—the latter two songs were performed solely on piano, while the first song was cut short by Smith, as he explained: "I had to stop it because it's… you know, what's the point of playing a song badly? It'd be better to play it and mean it, than to just walk through it."
Smith relocated from Brooklyn to Los Angeles in 1999, taking up residence at a cabin in the Silver Lake section of town, where he would regularly play intimate, acoustic shows at local venues like Silverlake Lounge. He also performed in Toronto in April that year. In the fall, his cover of the Beatles' "Because" was featured in the end credits of DreamWorks' Oscar-winning drama American Beauty, and appeared on the film's soundtrack album.
The final album Smith completed, Figure 8, was released on April 18, 2000. It featured the return of Rothrock, Schnapf, Brion, and Waronker and was partially recorded at Abbey Road Studios in England, with an obvious Beatles influence in the songwriting and production. The album garnered favorable reviews, and peaked at number 99 on the Billboard 200 and 37 on the UK Album Charts. The album received praise for its power pop style and complex arrangements, described as creating a "sweeping kaleidoscope of layered instruments and sonic textures". However, some reviewers felt that Smith's trademark dark and melancholy songwriting had lost some of its subtlety, with one reviewer likening some of the lyrics to "the self-pitying complaints of an adolescent venting in his diary".
Album art and promotional pictures from the period showed Smith looking cleaned-up and put-together. An extensive tour in promotion of the record ensued, book-ended by television appearances on Late Night with Conan O'Brien and the Late Show with David Letterman. However, Smith's condition began to deteriorate as he had become addicted to heroin either towards the end of or just after the Figure 8 tour.
2001–2002: Addiction and scrapped recordings
Around the time he began recording his final album, Smith began to display signs of paranoia, often believing that a white van followed him wherever he went. He would have friends drop him off for recording sessions almost a mile away from the studio, and to reach the location, he would trudge through hundreds of yards of brush and cliffs. He started telling people that DreamWorks was out to get him: "Not long ago my house was broken into, and songs were stolen off my computer which have wound up in the hands of certain people who work at a certain label. I've also been followed around for months at a time. I wouldn't even want to necessarily say it's the people from that label who are following me around, but it was probably them who broke into my house." During this period, Smith hardly ate, subsisting primarily on ice cream. He would go without sleeping for several days and then sleep for an entire day.
A follow-up to Smith's 2000 album was originally planned to happen with Rob Schnapf, but their sessions were abandoned. Smith also began distancing himself from manager Margaret Mittleman, who had handled him since the Roman Candle days. He finally began recording a new album with only himself and Jon Brion as producers sometime during 2001. The pair had recorded a substantial amount of music for the album when Brion stopped the sessions because of Smith's struggle with substance use disorder. Their friendship promptly ended, and Smith scrapped all of their work until that point. He later said "There was even a little more than half of a record done before this new one that I just scrapped because of a blown friendship with someone that made me so depressed I didn't want to hear any of those songs. He was just helping me record the songs and stuff, and then the friendship kind of fell apart all of a sudden one day. It just made it kind of awkward being alone in the car listening to the songs."
When Brion sent a bill for the abandoned sessions to DreamWorks, executives Lenny Waronker and Luke Wood scheduled a meeting with Smith to determine what went wrong with the sessions. Smith complained of intrusion upon his personal life from the label, as well as poor promotion for the Figure 8 album. The talks proved fruitless, and soon after, Smith sent a message to the executives, stating that if they did not release him from his contract, he would take his own life. In May 2001, Smith set out to re-record the album, mostly on his own, but with some help from David McConnell of Goldenboy. McConnell told Spin that, during this time, Smith would smoke over $1,500 worth of heroin and crack per day, would often talk about suicide, and on numerous occasions tried to give himself an overdose. Steven Drozd of The Flaming Lips and Scott McPherson of Sense Field played a few drum tracks, Sam Coomes contributed some bass guitar and backing vocals, but almost every other instrument was recorded by Smith.
Smith's song "Needle in the Hay" was included in Wes Anderson's 2001 dark comedy film The Royal Tenenbaums during a suicide attempt scene. Smith was originally supposed to contribute a cover of The Beatles' "Hey Jude" for the film, but when he failed to do so in time, Anderson had to use The Mutato Muzika Orchestra's version of the track instead. Anderson would later say that Smith "was in a bad state" at the time.
Smith's live performances during 2001 and 2002 were infrequent, typically in the Pacific Northwest or Los Angeles. A review of his December 20, 2001, show at Portland's Crystal Ballroom expressed concern over his appearance and performance: his hair was uncharacteristically greasy and long, his face was bearded and gaunt, and during his songs he exhibited alarming signs of "memory-loss and butterfingers". At another performance in San Francisco that month, the audience began shouting out lyrics when Smith could not remember them.
In the first of only three concerts performed in 2002, Smith co-headlined Northwestern University's A&O Ball with Wilco on May 2 in Chicago. He was onstage for nearly an hour but failed to complete half of the songs. He claimed that his poor performance was due to his left hand having fallen asleep and told the audience it felt "like having stuff on your hand and you can't get it off". Smith's performance was reviewed as "undoubtedly one of the worst performances ever by a musician" and an "excruciating […] nightmare". A reporter for the online magazine Glorious Noise wrote, "It would not surprise me at all if Elliott Smith ends up dead within a year."
On November 25, 2002, Smith was involved in a brawl with the Los Angeles Police Department at a concert where The Flaming Lips and Beck were performing. Smith later said he was defending a man he thought the police were harassing. The officers allegedly beat and arrested him and girlfriend Jennifer Chiba. The two spent the night in jail. Smith's back was injured in the incident, causing him to cancel a number of shows. Wayne Coyne, lead singer of The Flaming Lips and a friend of Smith's, stated concern over Smith's appearance and actions, saying that he "saw a guy who had lost control of himself. He was needy, he was grumpy, he was everything you wouldn't want in a person. It's not like when you think of Keith Richards being pleasantly blissed out in the corner."
2003: Reemergence and From a Basement on the Hill
Smith had attempted to go to rehab several times, but found that he was unable to relate to the popular treatments for people with substance use disorder that used a twelve-step program basis for treatment. "I couldn't do the first step […] I couldn't say what you were supposed to say and mean it." In 2002, Smith went to the Neurotransmitter Restoration Center in Beverly Hills to start a course of treatment for substance use disorder. In one of his final interviews, he spoke about the center, "What they do is an IV treatment where they put a needle in your arm, and you're on a drip bag, but the only thing that's in the drip bag is amino acids and saline solution. I was coming off of a lot of psych meds and other things. I was even on an antipsychotic, although I'm not psychotic."
Two sold-out solo acoustic concerts at Hollywood's Henry Fonda Theater, on January 31 and February 1, 2003, saw Smith attempting to reestablish his credibility as a live performer. Before the show, Smith scrawled "Kali – The Destroyer" (the Hindu goddess associated with time and change) in large block letters with permanent ink on his left arm, which was visible to the crowd during the performance. On several songs, he was backed by a stripped-down drum kit played by Robin Peringer (of the band 764-HERO), and members of opening band Rilo Kiley contributed backing vocals to one song. Near the end of the first show, the musician responded for several minutes after a heckler (later identified as Smith's ex-girlfriend Valerie Deerin) yelled "Get a backbone." Smith played two more Los Angeles concerts during 2003, including The Derby in May and the L.A. Weekly Music Awards in June.
After his 34th birthday on August 6, 2003, he gave up alcohol. Director Mike Mills had been working with Smith during his final years and described Smith's troubles and apparent recovery: "I gave the script to him, then he dropped off the face of the earth […] he went through his whole crazy time, but by the time I was done with the film, he was making From a Basement on the Hill and I was shocked that he was actually making music."
With things improving for Smith after several troubled years, he began experimenting with noise music and worked on his girlfriend Jennifer Chiba's iMac with the intent of learning how to record with computers, noting that it was the only method with which he was still unfamiliar. Smith jokingly labeled his experimental way of recording "The California Frown" (a play on the Beach Boys' "California Sound"). He said of the songs, "They're kind of more noisy with the pitch all distorted. Some are more acoustic, but there aren't too many like that. Lately I've just been making up a lot of noise."
He was also in the process of recording songs for the Thumbsucker soundtrack, including Big Star's "Thirteen" and Cat Stevens's "Trouble". In August 2003, Suicide Squeeze Records put out a limited-edition vinyl single for "Pretty (Ugly Before)", a song that Smith had been playing since the Figure 8 tour.
Smith's final show was at Redfest at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City on September 19, 2003. The final song he played live was "Long, Long, Long" by The Beatles.
2004–present: Posthumous releases
From a Basement on the Hill, almost four years in production, was released on October 19, 2004, by ANTI- Records (a part of Epitaph Records). With Smith's family in control of his estate, they chose to bring in Rob Schnapf and Smith's ex-girlfriend Joanna Bolme to sort through the recordings and mix the album. Although Smith had voiced his desire for it to be a double album or a regular album with a bonus disc, it was not clear whether it would have been possible for him to release it that way had he completed it. As completed by Schnapf and Bolme, it was released as a 15-track single album. Many songs from the sessions (later leaked onto the Internet) were not included, such as "True Love", "Everything's OK", "Stickman", and "Suicide Machine" (a reworking of the Figure 8-era unreleased instrumental "Tiny Time Machine"). There has been unconfirmed speculation that Smith's family made the decision not to include some songs on the record due to their lyrical content, although songs such as "King's Crossing" that deal with darker subjects did make the album.
Elliott Smith and the Big Nothing, a biography by Benjamin Nugent, was rushed to publication shortly after From a Basement on the Hill, shortly after the first anniversary of his death. Smith's family, as well as Joanna Bolme, Jennifer Chiba, Neil Gust, Sam Coomes, and Janet Weiss, all declined to be interviewed. It contained interviews with Rob Schnapf, David McConnell, and Pete Krebs. The book received mixed reviews, with Publishers Weekly remarking that while "Nugent manages to patch together the major beats of Smith's life, he can offer little meaningful insight".
In 2005, a tribute album, A Tribute to Elliott Smith, was released. It featured various bands performing tributes to Smith.
On May 8, 2007, a posthumous two-disc compilation album entitled New Moon was released by Kill Rock Stars. The album contained 24 songs recorded by Smith between 1994 and 1997 during his tenure with the label, songs that were not included on albums, as well as a few early versions and previously released B-sides. In the United States, the album debuted at number 24 on the Billboard 200, selling about 24,000 copies in its first week. The record received favorable reviews and was Metacritic's 15th best-reviewed album of 2007. A portion of the proceeds from album sales were to go to Outside In, a social service agency for low-income adults and homeless youth in Portland, Oregon.
On October 25, 2007, a book titled Elliott Smith was released by Autumn de Wilde, which consists of photographs, handwritten lyrics, and "revealing talks with Smith's inner circle". De Wilde was responsible for the Figure 8 sleeve art, making a landmark and de facto Smith memorial of the Solutions Audio mural. A five-song CD featuring previously unreleased live recordings of Smith performing acoustically at Largo in Los Angeles was included in the release.
Following Smith's death, his estate licensed his songs for use in film and television projects such as One Tree Hill, The Girl Next Door, Georgia Rule, and Paranoid Park.
In a March 2009 interview, Larry Crane said that Smith's estate was defunct and all rights previously held by Smith are now in the control of his parents. Crane went on to say that his parents own the rights to Smith's high school recordings, some of the Heatmiser material, all solo songs recorded until his 1998 record deal with DreamWorks Records, and From a Basement on the Hill. DreamWorks Records was acquired by Universal Music Group in 2003, and Interscope Records currently "owns all studio and live recording from Jan 1998 to his passing, except for the songs on From a Basement on the Hill."
In December 2009, Kill Rock Stars announced that it had obtained the rights to re-release Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill, originally released by Cavity Search and ANTI-, respectively. Roman Candle would be remastered by Larry Crane. Along with the press release, Kill Rock Stars posted a previously unreleased track of Smith's, titled "Cecilia/Amanda", as a free download. Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill were re-released on April 6, 2010, in the US.
A greatest hits compilation titled An Introduction to... Elliott Smith was released in November 2010 by Domino Records (UK) and Kill Rock Stars (US).
In August 2013, there was a memorial concert in Portland, Oregon and three other cities. Attending the Portland show were several musicians Smith had performed with, friends, and an appearance by film director Gus Van Sant.
In 2014, director Paul Thomas Anderson posted a video of the pilot episode for a show called The Jon Brion Show, featuring an acoustic set by Smith including accompaniment by Brion and pianist Brad Mehldau.
On July 17, 2015, a documentary about Smith's life titled Heaven Adores You saw a limited theatrical release. The documentary enlisted a number of close friends and family members, as well as hours of audio interviews throughout Smith's short career. The film was directed by Nickolas Rossi and released through Eagle Rock Entertainment. Heaven Adores You received positive reviews from Consequence of Sound, The Guardian, and The Hollywood Reporter.
On August 6, 2019 (what would have been Smith's 50th birthday), UMe released digital deluxe editions of the two albums XO and Figure 8. The new edition of XO has nine added tracks, including Smith's Oscar-nominated Good Will Hunting song "Miss Misery." Seven tracks have been added to Figure 8. The digital deluxe edition includes "Figure 8"—Smith's cover of the "Schoolhouse Rock!" song—which was originally released only on the Japanese edition of the album. The final track on the new Figure 8 edition is Smith's cover of the Beatles’ "Because", originally featured on the 1999 American Beauty soundtrack.
In May 2021, Smith's life and work were the subject of BBC Radio 4's Great Lives.
Death
Smith died on October 21, 2003, at the age of 34 from two stab wounds to the chest. At the time of the stabbing, he was at his Lemoyne Street home in Echo Park, California, where he lived with his girlfriend, Jennifer Chiba. According to Chiba, the two were arguing, and she locked herself in the bathroom to take a shower. Chiba heard him scream and upon opening the door saw Smith standing with a knife in his chest. She pulled the knife out, after which he collapsed and she called 9-1-1 at 12:18 pm. Smith died in the hospital, with the time of death listed as 1:36 p.m. A possible suicide note, written on a sticky note, read: "I'm so sorry—love, Elliott. God forgive me." In the coroner's report of the note, the name "Elliott" is misspelled as "Elliot". While Smith's death was reported as a suicide, the official autopsy report released in December 2003 left open the question of homicide.
Smith's remains were cremated, and his ashes were divided between his mother, father, and half-sister Ashley. A small memorial service for family and friends was held at his father's home in Portland, although Smith's "ashes weren't on hand because the coroner wouldn't release them." The status or location of Smith's ashes has not been made public.
According to Pitchfork, record producer Larry Crane reported on his Tape Op message board that he had planned to help Smith mix his album in mid-November. Crane wrote, "I hadn't talked to Elliott in over a year. His girlfriend, Jennifer, called me [last week] and asked if I'd like to come to L.A. and help mix and finish [Smith's album]. I said 'yes, of course', and chatted with Elliott for the first time in ages. It seems surreal that he would call me to finish an album and then a week later kill himself. I talked to Jennifer this morning, who was obviously shattered and in tears, and she said, 'I don't understand, he was so healthy. The coroner reported that no traces of illegal substances or alcohol were found in Smith's system at the time of his death but did find prescribed levels of antidepressant, anxiolytic, and ADHD medications, including clonazepam, mirtazapine, atomoxetine, and amphetamine. There were no hesitation wounds, which are typically found on a victim of suicide by self-infliction. Due to the inconclusive autopsy ruling, the Los Angeles Police Department's investigation remains open.
Reaction
Shortly after Smith's death, a fan memorial was initiated outside Solutions Audio (4334 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, California), the site at which the cover of the Figure 8 album was shot. Farewell messages to Smith were written on the wall, and flowers, photos, candles, and empty bottles of alcohol mentioned in Smith's songs were left. Since then, the wall has been a regular target for graffiti but is regularly restored by fans.
Memorial concerts were held in several cities in the United States and the United Kingdom. A petition was soon put forth with intent to make part of the Silver Lake area a memorial park in Smith's honor. It received over 10,000 signatures, but no plans to establish the park have been announced. A memorial plaque located inside Smith's former high school, Lincoln High, was hung in July 2006. The plaque reads: "I'm never going to know you now, but I'm going to love you anyhow" referencing Smith's song "Waltz No. 2 (XO)".
Since Smith's death, many musical acts have paid him tribute. Songs in tribute to, or about, Smith have been released by Pearl Jam ("Can't Keep" on the Live at Benaroya Hall concert album); Sparta ("Bombs and Us"); Third Eye Blind ("There's No Hurry to Eternity", originally titled "Elliott Smith", on the Live from Nowhere Near You, Volume Two: Pacific Northwest compilation); 9 Horses (“listening to the Elliott Smith discography in reverse order”, on the album Perfectest Herald); Ben Folds ("Late" on Songs for Silverman); Brad Mehldau ("Sky Turning Grey (for Elliott Smith)" on Highway Rider); Rilo Kiley ("It Just Is", and "Ripchord" from the album More Adventurous); Lil B's 'The Worlds Ending'; Rhett Miller ("The Believer" on The Believer); Earlimart ("Heaven Adores You" on Treble and Tremble); Joan As Police Woman ("We Don't Own It" on Real Life); and Pete Yorn ("Bandstand in the Sky" on Nightcrawler, a song jointly dedicated to Jeff Buckley). Several tribute albums have also been released since his death, including Christopher O'Riley's 2006 Home to Oblivion: An Elliott Smith Tribute, with 18 instrumental covers, The Portland Cello Project's 2014 to e.s., covering six of his songs and To Elliott, from Portland containing covers by a number of Portland bands.
On July 30, 2004, Chiba filed a lawsuit against the Smith family for 15% of his earnings (over $1 million), claiming that she and Smith lived as "husband and wife", that Smith had pledged to take care of her financially for the rest of her life, and that she worked as his manager and agent from around 2000 until his death. A state labor commissioner ruled her claim as manager to be invalid, as she had worked as an "unlicensed talent agent" under California's Talent Agencies Act. The case made it to the California appellate court in October 2007, but the decision was affirmed 2–1.
In an October 2013 Spin magazine article—a reflection at the ten-year anniversary of Smith's death—drummer McPherson stated that Smith was "a sick man without his medicine" during the last 31 days of his life, when he was not only sober, but had also given up red meat and sugar. In the same article, Chiba recalls thinking, "Okay, you're asking a lot of yourself. You're giving up a lot at once." Chiba further explained that "anyone who understands drug abuse knows that you use drugs to hide from your past or sedate yourself from strong, overwhelming feelings. So when you're newly clean and coming off the medications that have been masking all those feelings, that's when you're the most vulnerable." Writing for Spin, Liam Gowing also encountered a local musician who claimed Smith had said to him: "The people who try to intervene, they're good people who genuinely care about you. But they don't know what you're going through. Do what you need to do." According to the musician, Smith had adamantly dissuaded him from suicide.
Musical style and influences
Smith respected and was inspired by many artists and styles, including the Beatles, Neil Young, Simon & Garfunkel, Big Star, the Clash, the Who, Led Zeppelin, the Kinks, Pink Floyd, Nick Drake, Rush, Bauhaus, Elvis Costello, Oasis, Television, Motown and flamenco records, AC/DC, Hank Williams, and Scorpions, Smith claimed to listen exclusively to selected albums (such as The Marble Index by Nico) for months. Sean Croghan, a former roommate of Smith's, said that Smith "listened almost exclusively to slow jams" in his senior year at college. Smith also took inspiration from novels, religion, and philosophy. He liked classic literature, especially Samuel Beckett, T. S. Eliot, and Russian novelists such as Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
Smith mentioned his admiration for Bob Dylan in several interviews, citing him as an early influence. He once commented: "My father taught me how to play 'Don't Think Twice, It's All Right'. I love Dylan's words, but even more than that, I love the fact that he loves words." Smith covered Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece" several times in concert. Smith has also been compared to folk singer Nick Drake, due to his fingerpicking style and vocals. Darryl Cater of AllMusic called references to "the definitive folk loner" Drake "inevitable", and Smith's lyrics have been compared to those in Drake's minimalist and haunting final album.
Smith was a dedicated fan of the Beatles (as well as their solo projects), once noting that he had been listening to them frequently since he was about "four years old" and also claimed that hearing The White Album was his original inspiration to become a musician. In 1998, Smith contributed a cover of the Beatles song "Because" to the closing credits and soundtrack of the film American Beauty. Although this was the only Beatles song that Smith ever officially released, he is known to have recorded many others, ("Revolution", "I'll Be Back" and "I'm So Tired") and played many songs by both the band and the members' solo projects at live concerts.
Smith said that transitions were his favorite part of songs and that he preferred to write broader, more impressionistic music closer to pop rather than folk music. Smith compared his songs to stories or dreams, not purely confessional pieces that people could relate to. When asked about the dark nature of his songwriting and the cult following he was gaining, Smith said he felt it was merely a product of his writing songs that were strongly meaningful to him rather than anything contrived. Larry Crane, Smith's posthumous archivist, has said that he was surprised at the amount of "recycling of musical ideas" he encountered while cataloging Smith's private tapes: "I found songs recorded in high school reworked 15 years on. Lyrics became more important to him as he became older, and more time was spent working on them."
Legacy
Since his death, Smith has been regarded as one of the most influential artists in indie music. Many artists have mentioned Smith as their influence, such as Frank Ocean, Beck, Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker, and Haim's lead vocalist Danielle Haim.
See also
List of unsolved deaths
Discography
Studio albums
Roman Candle (1994)
Elliott Smith (1995)
Either/Or (1997)
XO (1998)
Figure 8 (2000)
Posthumous studio albums
From a Basement on the Hill (2004)
Compilation albums
New Moon (2007)
References
Bibliography
External links
Official website
Official Cavity Search Records website
Official Kill Rock Stars website
Elliott Smith collection at the Internet Archive's live music archive
Keep the Things You Forgot: An Elliott Smith Oral History
1969 births
2003 deaths
Unsolved deaths
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American singers
20th-century American writers
21st-century American singers
21st-century American writers
Alternative rock guitarists
Alternative rock singers
American feminists
American indie rock musicians
American male guitarists
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
American tenors
Anti- (record label) artists
Caroline Records artists
Cavity Search Records artists
Deaths by stabbing in California
Domino Recording Company artists
DreamWorks Records artists
Feminist musicians
Fingerstyle guitarists
Guitarists from Los Angeles
Guitarists from Nebraska
Guitarists from New York City
Guitarists from Oklahoma
Guitarists from Oregon
Guitarists from Texas
Hampshire College alumni
Indie folk musicians
Kill Rock Stars artists
Lincoln High School (Portland, Oregon) alumni
Male feminists
Musicians from Brooklyn
Musicians from Omaha, Nebraska
Musicians from Portland, Oregon
People from Duncanville, Texas
People from Echo Park, Los Angeles
People with mood disorders
Singers from Los Angeles
Singers from New York City
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Suicide Squeeze Records artists
Virgin Records artists
20th-century American male singers
Singer-songwriters from California
Singer-songwriters from New York (state)
Singer-songwriters from Oklahoma
Singer-songwriters from Nebraska | false | [
"Jackson Rogow (born October 5, 1991) is an American actor. He is best known for starring in the Cartoon Network live action series Dude, What Would Happen?\n\nCareer\nRogow was on Dude, What Would Happen on Cartoon Network until it was cancelled in 2011. Rogow was also on the Lego Top Secret Project after The Yoda Chronicles on Cartoon Network.\n\nPersonal life\nRogow resides in Bel Air, Los Angeles, California.\n\nFilmography\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\nLiving people\n1991 births\nPeople from Kissimmee, Florida\nPeople from Bel Air, Los Angeles\nLos Angeles County High School for the Arts alumni\nAmerican male television actors",
"James P. Flynn (born February 5, 1934) is an American teamster and film actor. He was a reputed member of the famous Winter Hill Gang. He has been in films including Good Will Hunting, The Cider House Rules and What's the Worst That Could Happen?.\n\nBiography\nJames P. Flynn was born in Somerville, Massachusetts.\n\nIn 1982, Flynn was wrongly identified as a shooter in the murder of Winter Hill Gang mob associate Brian \"Balloonhead\" Halloran and attempted murder of Michael Donahue. He was tried and acquitted for the murder in 1986 after being framed by John Connolly and James J. Bulger.\n\nFlynn was a part of Boston's International Brotherhood of Teamsters Local 25 labor union where he later ran the organization's movie production crew. He has also been the Teamster Union's transportation coordinator and transportation captain in the transportation department on numerous films, including The Departed, Fever Pitch and Jumanji.\n\nFlynn appeared in many films shot in the New England area. In show business he goes by the name 'James P. Flynn'. Flynn was cast as a judge in the Boston-based film Good Will Hunting in 1997. Later, he acted in the 1999 film The Cider House Rules and What's the Worst That Could Happen? in 2001. He was also a truck driver for movie production equipment during the filming of My Best Friend's Girl in 2008. Boston actor Tom Kemp remarked: \"[The film The Departed] wouldn't be a Boston movie without me, a Wahlberg, and Jimmy Flynn from the teamsters.\"\n\nFilmography\nGood Will Hunting (1997) as Judge George H. Malone\nThe Cider House Rules (1999) as Vernon\nWhat's the Worst That Could Happen? (2001) as the Fire Captain\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\n1934 births\nLiving people\nMale actors from Boston\nWinter Hill Gang"
] |
[
"Elliott Smith",
"1991-96: Heatmiser",
"Who was Elliott Smith",
"While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust.",
"What was the number one song from that album",
"I don't know.",
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"Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science."
] | C_16dab7caf44f4fb980071052066a2132_1 | What else happen with the album | 4 | What else happen with the Heatmiser album, in addition to being formed by Elliot Smith? | Elliott Smith | Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory". While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996). Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees, and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant". Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to the release of Mic City Sons, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO. CANNOTANSWER | The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. | Steven Paul Smith (August 6, 1969 – October 21, 2003), known professionally as Elliott Smith, was an American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. Smith was born in Omaha, Nebraska, raised primarily in Texas, and lived much of his life in Portland, Oregon, where he first gained popularity. Smith's primary instrument was the guitar, though he also played piano, clarinet, bass guitar, drums, and harmonica. Smith had a distinctive vocal style, characterized by his "whispery, spiderweb-thin delivery", and often used multi-tracking to create vocal layers, textures, and harmonies.
After playing in the rock band Heatmiser for several years, Smith began his solo career in 1994, with releases on the independent record labels Cavity Search and Kill Rock Stars (KRS). In 1997, he signed a contract with DreamWorks Records, for which he recorded two albums. Smith rose to mainstream prominence when his song "Miss Misery"—included in the soundtrack for the film Good Will Hunting (1997)—was nominated for an Oscar in the Best Original Song category in 1998.
Smith was a heavy drinker and drug user at times throughout his life, and was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and depression. His struggles with drugs and mental illness affected his life and work, and often appeared in his lyrics. In 2003, aged 34, he died in Los Angeles, California, from two stab wounds to the chest. The autopsy evidence was inconclusive as to whether the wounds were self-inflicted or the result of homicide. At the time of his death, Smith was working on his sixth studio album, From a Basement on the Hill, which was posthumously produced and released in 2004.
Early life
Steven Paul Smith was born at the Methodist Hospital in Omaha, Nebraska, the only child of Gary Smith, a student at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, and Bunny Kay Berryman, an elementary school music teacher. His parents divorced when he was six months old, and Smith moved with his mother to Duncanville, Texas. Smith later had a tattoo of a map of Texas drawn on his upper arm and said: "I didn't get it because I like Texas, kind of the opposite. But I won't forget about it, although I'm tempted to because I don't like it there."
Smith endured a difficult childhood and a troubled relationship with his stepfather Charlie Welch. Smith stated he may have been sexually abused by Welch at a young age, an allegation that Welch has denied. He wrote about this part of his life in "Some Song". The name "Charlie" also appears in songs "Flowers for Charlie" and "No Confidence Man." In a 2004 interview, Jennifer Chiba, Smith's partner at the time of his death, said that Smith's difficult childhood was partly why he needed to sedate himself with drugs as an adult: "He was remembering traumatic things from his childhood – parts of things. It's not my place to say what."
For much of his childhood, Smith's family was a part of the Community of Christ but began attending services at a local Methodist church. Smith felt that going to church did little for him, except make him "really scared of Hell". In 2001, he said: "I don't necessarily buy into any officially structured version of spirituality. But I have my own version of it."
Smith began playing piano at age nine, and at ten began learning guitar on a small acoustic guitar bought for him by his father. At this age he composed an original piano piece, "Fantasy", which won him a prize at an arts festival. Many of the people on his mother's side of the family were non-professional musicians; his grandfather was a Dixieland drummer, and his grandmother sang in a glee club.
At fourteen, Smith left his mother's home in Texas and moved to Portland, Oregon, to live with his father, who was then working as a psychiatrist. It was around this time that Smith began using drugs, including alcohol, with friends. He also began experimenting with recording for the first time after borrowing a four-track recorder. At high school, Smith played clarinet in the school band and played guitar and piano; he also sang in the bands Stranger Than Fiction and A Murder of Crows, billed as either Steven Smith or "Johnny Panic". He graduated from Lincoln High School as a National Merit Scholar.
After graduation, Smith began calling himself "Elliott", saying that he thought "Steve" sounded too much like a "jock" name, and that "Steven" sounded "too bookish". According to friends, he had also used the pseudonym "Elliott Stillwater-Rotter" during his time in the band A Murder of Crows. Biographer S. R. Shutt speculates that the name was either inspired by Elliott Avenue, a street that Smith had lived on in Portland, or that it was suggested by his then-girlfriend. A junior high acquaintance of Smith speculates Smith changed his name so as not to be confused with Steve Smith, the drummer of Journey.
Career
1991–1996: Heatmiser
In 1991 Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory".
While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996).
Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees, and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant".
Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to the release of Mic City Sons, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO.
1994: Roman Candle
In the early 1990s, Smith's girlfriend at the time convinced him to send a tape of songs he had recently recorded on a borrowed four-track to Cavity Search Records. Cavity owner Christopher Cooper asked to release the entire album of songs, which surprised Smith, as he was expecting only a deal for a seven-inch record. The album became Smith's release, Roman Candle (1994).
Smith said: "I thought my head would be chopped off immediately when it came out because at the time it was so opposite to the grunge thing that was popular ... The thing is that album was really well received, which was a total shock, and it immediately eclipsed [Heatmiser], unfortunately." Smith felt his solo songs were not representative of the music Heatmiser was making: "The idea of playing [my music] for people didn't occur to me... because at the time it was the Northwest—Mudhoney and Nirvana—and going out to play an acoustic show was like crawling out on a limb and begging for it to be sawed off."
One of Smith's first solo performances was at the now-defunct Umbra Penumbra on September 17, 1994. Only three songs from Roman Candle were performed, with the majority of the ten-song set being B-sides, Heatmiser tunes and unreleased tracks. The same year, Smith released a split 7-inch record with Pete Krebs via Slo-Mo Records, contributing the track "No Confidence Man".
1995–1997: Elliott Smith and Either/Or
In 1995, Smith's self-titled album was released on Kill Rock Stars; the record featured a style of recording similar to Roman Candle, but with hints of growth and experimentation. Though the majority of the album was recorded by Smith alone, friend and The Spinanes vocalist Rebecca Gates sang harmony vocals on "St. Ides Heaven", and Heatmiser guitarist Neil Gust played guitar on "Single File". Several songs made reference to drugs, but Smith explained that he used the theme of drugs as a vehicle for conveying dependence rather than the songs being about drugs specifically. Looking back, Smith felt that the album's pervasive mood gave him "a reputation for being a really dark, depressed person" and said that he later made a conscious move toward more diverse moods in his music.
In 1996, filmmaker Jem Cohen recorded Smith playing acoustic songs for the short film Lucky Three: An Elliott Smith Portrait. Two of these songs would appear on his next album, Either/Or, which was another Kill Rock Stars release. Either/Or came out in 1997 to favorable reviews. The album found Smith venturing further into full instrumentation, with several songs containing bass guitar, drums, keyboards, and electric guitars, all played by Smith. The album title was derived from the two-volume book of the same name by Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, whose works generally deal with themes such as existential despair, angst, death, and God.
By this time, Smith's already-heavy drinking was being compounded with use of antidepressants. At the end of the Either/Or tour, some of his close friends staged an intervention in Chicago, but it proved ineffective. Shortly after, Smith relocated from Portland to Jersey City, New Jersey, and later Brooklyn, New York.
1997–98: "Miss Misery" and the Oscars
In 1997, Smith was selected by director and fellow Portland resident Gus Van Sant to be a part of the soundtrack to his film, Good Will Hunting. Smith recorded an orchestral version of "Between the Bars" with composer Danny Elfman for the movie. Smith also contributed a new song, "Miss Misery", and three previously released tracks ("No Name #3", from Roman Candle, and "Angeles" and "Say Yes", from Either/Or). The film was a commercial and critical success, and Smith was nominated for an Academy Award for "Miss Misery". Not eager to step into the limelight, he agreed to perform the song at the ceremony only after the producers informed him that if he was unwilling to perform, they would choose someone else to play it.
On March 5, 1998, Smith made his network television debut on Late Night with Conan O'Brien performing "Miss Misery" solo on acoustic guitar. A few days later, wearing a white suit, he played an abridged version of the song at the Oscars, accompanied by the house orchestra. James Horner and Will Jennings won the award that night for best song with "My Heart Will Go On" (sung by Celine Dion) from the film Titanic. Smith did not voice disappointment about not winning the award.
Smith commented on the surrealism of the Oscars experience: "That's exactly what it was, surreal... I enjoy performing almost as much as I enjoy making up songs in the first place. But the Oscars was a very strange show, where the set was only one song cut down to less than two minutes, and the audience was a lot of people who didn't come to hear me play. I wouldn't want to live in that world, but it was fun to walk around on the moon for a day."
1998–2000: XO and Figure 8
In 1998, after the success of Either/Or and "Miss Misery", Smith signed to a bigger record label, DreamWorks Records. Around the same time, Smith fell into depression, speaking openly of considering suicide, and on at least one occasion made a serious attempt at ending his own life. While in North Carolina, he became severely intoxicated and ran off a cliff. He landed on a tree, which badly impaled him but broke his fall. When questioned about his suicide attempt, he told an interviewer, "Yeah, I jumped off a cliff, but let's talk about something else."
Christopher Cooper, head of Cavity Search Records (which released Roman Candle), said about this time in Smith's life, "I talked him out of thinking that he wanted to kill himself numerous times when he was in Portland. I kept telling him that he was a brilliant man, and that life was worth living, and that people loved him." Pete Krebs also agreed: "In Portland we got the brunt of Elliott's initial depression... Lots of people have stories of their own experiences of staying up with Elliott 'til five in the morning, holding his hand, telling him not to kill himself."
Smith's first release for DreamWorks was later that year. Titled XO, it was conceived and developed while Smith wrote it out over the winter of 1997/1998, night after night seated at the bar in Luna Lounge. It was produced by the team of Rob Schnapf and Tom Rothrock. XO also contained some instrumentation from Los Angeles musicians Joey Waronker and Jon Brion. It contained a more full-sounding, baroque pop sound than any of his previous efforts, with songs featuring a horn section, Chamberlins, elaborate string arrangements, and even a drum loop on the song "Independence Day". His familiar double-tracked vocal and acoustic guitar style were still apparent while his somewhat personal lyrical style survived. The album went on to peak at number 104 on the Billboard 200 and number 123 on the UK Album Charts, while selling 400,000 copies (more than double that of each of his two Kill Rock Stars releases), becoming the best-selling release of his career. Smith's backing band during most of this period was the Portland-based group Quasi, consisting of former bandmate Sam Coomes on bass guitar and Coomes's ex-wife Janet Weiss on drums. Quasi also performed as the opening act at many shows on the tour, with Smith sometimes contributing bass guitar, guitar, or backing vocals. On October 17, 1998, Smith appeared on Saturday Night Live and performed "Waltz No. 2 (XO)". His backing band for this appearance was John Moen, Jon Brion, Rob Schnapf, and Sam Coomes.
In response to whether the change to a bigger record label would influence his creative control, Smith said, "I think despite the fact that sometimes people look at major labels as simply money-making machines, they're actually composed of individuals who are real people, and there's a part of them that needs to feel that part of their job is to put out good music." Smith also claimed in another interview that he never read his reviews for fear that they would interfere with his songwriting. It was during this period that Smith appeared on Dutch television in 1998 and provided a candid interview in which he spoke of his assessment of his music career until that point:
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I mostly only know things are different because people ask me different questions, but I don't feel like things are very changed. I mean, I still, I do the same things that I did before … I think about the same things, so … I'm the wrong kind of person to be really big and famous.
As part of the Dutch television special, Smith played live versions of "Waltz No. 2 (XO)", "Miss Misery", and "I Didn't Understand"—the latter two songs were performed solely on piano, while the first song was cut short by Smith, as he explained: "I had to stop it because it's… you know, what's the point of playing a song badly? It'd be better to play it and mean it, than to just walk through it."
Smith relocated from Brooklyn to Los Angeles in 1999, taking up residence at a cabin in the Silver Lake section of town, where he would regularly play intimate, acoustic shows at local venues like Silverlake Lounge. He also performed in Toronto in April that year. In the fall, his cover of the Beatles' "Because" was featured in the end credits of DreamWorks' Oscar-winning drama American Beauty, and appeared on the film's soundtrack album.
The final album Smith completed, Figure 8, was released on April 18, 2000. It featured the return of Rothrock, Schnapf, Brion, and Waronker and was partially recorded at Abbey Road Studios in England, with an obvious Beatles influence in the songwriting and production. The album garnered favorable reviews, and peaked at number 99 on the Billboard 200 and 37 on the UK Album Charts. The album received praise for its power pop style and complex arrangements, described as creating a "sweeping kaleidoscope of layered instruments and sonic textures". However, some reviewers felt that Smith's trademark dark and melancholy songwriting had lost some of its subtlety, with one reviewer likening some of the lyrics to "the self-pitying complaints of an adolescent venting in his diary".
Album art and promotional pictures from the period showed Smith looking cleaned-up and put-together. An extensive tour in promotion of the record ensued, book-ended by television appearances on Late Night with Conan O'Brien and the Late Show with David Letterman. However, Smith's condition began to deteriorate as he had become addicted to heroin either towards the end of or just after the Figure 8 tour.
2001–2002: Addiction and scrapped recordings
Around the time he began recording his final album, Smith began to display signs of paranoia, often believing that a white van followed him wherever he went. He would have friends drop him off for recording sessions almost a mile away from the studio, and to reach the location, he would trudge through hundreds of yards of brush and cliffs. He started telling people that DreamWorks was out to get him: "Not long ago my house was broken into, and songs were stolen off my computer which have wound up in the hands of certain people who work at a certain label. I've also been followed around for months at a time. I wouldn't even want to necessarily say it's the people from that label who are following me around, but it was probably them who broke into my house." During this period, Smith hardly ate, subsisting primarily on ice cream. He would go without sleeping for several days and then sleep for an entire day.
A follow-up to Smith's 2000 album was originally planned to happen with Rob Schnapf, but their sessions were abandoned. Smith also began distancing himself from manager Margaret Mittleman, who had handled him since the Roman Candle days. He finally began recording a new album with only himself and Jon Brion as producers sometime during 2001. The pair had recorded a substantial amount of music for the album when Brion stopped the sessions because of Smith's struggle with substance use disorder. Their friendship promptly ended, and Smith scrapped all of their work until that point. He later said "There was even a little more than half of a record done before this new one that I just scrapped because of a blown friendship with someone that made me so depressed I didn't want to hear any of those songs. He was just helping me record the songs and stuff, and then the friendship kind of fell apart all of a sudden one day. It just made it kind of awkward being alone in the car listening to the songs."
When Brion sent a bill for the abandoned sessions to DreamWorks, executives Lenny Waronker and Luke Wood scheduled a meeting with Smith to determine what went wrong with the sessions. Smith complained of intrusion upon his personal life from the label, as well as poor promotion for the Figure 8 album. The talks proved fruitless, and soon after, Smith sent a message to the executives, stating that if they did not release him from his contract, he would take his own life. In May 2001, Smith set out to re-record the album, mostly on his own, but with some help from David McConnell of Goldenboy. McConnell told Spin that, during this time, Smith would smoke over $1,500 worth of heroin and crack per day, would often talk about suicide, and on numerous occasions tried to give himself an overdose. Steven Drozd of The Flaming Lips and Scott McPherson of Sense Field played a few drum tracks, Sam Coomes contributed some bass guitar and backing vocals, but almost every other instrument was recorded by Smith.
Smith's song "Needle in the Hay" was included in Wes Anderson's 2001 dark comedy film The Royal Tenenbaums during a suicide attempt scene. Smith was originally supposed to contribute a cover of The Beatles' "Hey Jude" for the film, but when he failed to do so in time, Anderson had to use The Mutato Muzika Orchestra's version of the track instead. Anderson would later say that Smith "was in a bad state" at the time.
Smith's live performances during 2001 and 2002 were infrequent, typically in the Pacific Northwest or Los Angeles. A review of his December 20, 2001, show at Portland's Crystal Ballroom expressed concern over his appearance and performance: his hair was uncharacteristically greasy and long, his face was bearded and gaunt, and during his songs he exhibited alarming signs of "memory-loss and butterfingers". At another performance in San Francisco that month, the audience began shouting out lyrics when Smith could not remember them.
In the first of only three concerts performed in 2002, Smith co-headlined Northwestern University's A&O Ball with Wilco on May 2 in Chicago. He was onstage for nearly an hour but failed to complete half of the songs. He claimed that his poor performance was due to his left hand having fallen asleep and told the audience it felt "like having stuff on your hand and you can't get it off". Smith's performance was reviewed as "undoubtedly one of the worst performances ever by a musician" and an "excruciating […] nightmare". A reporter for the online magazine Glorious Noise wrote, "It would not surprise me at all if Elliott Smith ends up dead within a year."
On November 25, 2002, Smith was involved in a brawl with the Los Angeles Police Department at a concert where The Flaming Lips and Beck were performing. Smith later said he was defending a man he thought the police were harassing. The officers allegedly beat and arrested him and girlfriend Jennifer Chiba. The two spent the night in jail. Smith's back was injured in the incident, causing him to cancel a number of shows. Wayne Coyne, lead singer of The Flaming Lips and a friend of Smith's, stated concern over Smith's appearance and actions, saying that he "saw a guy who had lost control of himself. He was needy, he was grumpy, he was everything you wouldn't want in a person. It's not like when you think of Keith Richards being pleasantly blissed out in the corner."
2003: Reemergence and From a Basement on the Hill
Smith had attempted to go to rehab several times, but found that he was unable to relate to the popular treatments for people with substance use disorder that used a twelve-step program basis for treatment. "I couldn't do the first step […] I couldn't say what you were supposed to say and mean it." In 2002, Smith went to the Neurotransmitter Restoration Center in Beverly Hills to start a course of treatment for substance use disorder. In one of his final interviews, he spoke about the center, "What they do is an IV treatment where they put a needle in your arm, and you're on a drip bag, but the only thing that's in the drip bag is amino acids and saline solution. I was coming off of a lot of psych meds and other things. I was even on an antipsychotic, although I'm not psychotic."
Two sold-out solo acoustic concerts at Hollywood's Henry Fonda Theater, on January 31 and February 1, 2003, saw Smith attempting to reestablish his credibility as a live performer. Before the show, Smith scrawled "Kali – The Destroyer" (the Hindu goddess associated with time and change) in large block letters with permanent ink on his left arm, which was visible to the crowd during the performance. On several songs, he was backed by a stripped-down drum kit played by Robin Peringer (of the band 764-HERO), and members of opening band Rilo Kiley contributed backing vocals to one song. Near the end of the first show, the musician responded for several minutes after a heckler (later identified as Smith's ex-girlfriend Valerie Deerin) yelled "Get a backbone." Smith played two more Los Angeles concerts during 2003, including The Derby in May and the L.A. Weekly Music Awards in June.
After his 34th birthday on August 6, 2003, he gave up alcohol. Director Mike Mills had been working with Smith during his final years and described Smith's troubles and apparent recovery: "I gave the script to him, then he dropped off the face of the earth […] he went through his whole crazy time, but by the time I was done with the film, he was making From a Basement on the Hill and I was shocked that he was actually making music."
With things improving for Smith after several troubled years, he began experimenting with noise music and worked on his girlfriend Jennifer Chiba's iMac with the intent of learning how to record with computers, noting that it was the only method with which he was still unfamiliar. Smith jokingly labeled his experimental way of recording "The California Frown" (a play on the Beach Boys' "California Sound"). He said of the songs, "They're kind of more noisy with the pitch all distorted. Some are more acoustic, but there aren't too many like that. Lately I've just been making up a lot of noise."
He was also in the process of recording songs for the Thumbsucker soundtrack, including Big Star's "Thirteen" and Cat Stevens's "Trouble". In August 2003, Suicide Squeeze Records put out a limited-edition vinyl single for "Pretty (Ugly Before)", a song that Smith had been playing since the Figure 8 tour.
Smith's final show was at Redfest at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City on September 19, 2003. The final song he played live was "Long, Long, Long" by The Beatles.
2004–present: Posthumous releases
From a Basement on the Hill, almost four years in production, was released on October 19, 2004, by ANTI- Records (a part of Epitaph Records). With Smith's family in control of his estate, they chose to bring in Rob Schnapf and Smith's ex-girlfriend Joanna Bolme to sort through the recordings and mix the album. Although Smith had voiced his desire for it to be a double album or a regular album with a bonus disc, it was not clear whether it would have been possible for him to release it that way had he completed it. As completed by Schnapf and Bolme, it was released as a 15-track single album. Many songs from the sessions (later leaked onto the Internet) were not included, such as "True Love", "Everything's OK", "Stickman", and "Suicide Machine" (a reworking of the Figure 8-era unreleased instrumental "Tiny Time Machine"). There has been unconfirmed speculation that Smith's family made the decision not to include some songs on the record due to their lyrical content, although songs such as "King's Crossing" that deal with darker subjects did make the album.
Elliott Smith and the Big Nothing, a biography by Benjamin Nugent, was rushed to publication shortly after From a Basement on the Hill, shortly after the first anniversary of his death. Smith's family, as well as Joanna Bolme, Jennifer Chiba, Neil Gust, Sam Coomes, and Janet Weiss, all declined to be interviewed. It contained interviews with Rob Schnapf, David McConnell, and Pete Krebs. The book received mixed reviews, with Publishers Weekly remarking that while "Nugent manages to patch together the major beats of Smith's life, he can offer little meaningful insight".
In 2005, a tribute album, A Tribute to Elliott Smith, was released. It featured various bands performing tributes to Smith.
On May 8, 2007, a posthumous two-disc compilation album entitled New Moon was released by Kill Rock Stars. The album contained 24 songs recorded by Smith between 1994 and 1997 during his tenure with the label, songs that were not included on albums, as well as a few early versions and previously released B-sides. In the United States, the album debuted at number 24 on the Billboard 200, selling about 24,000 copies in its first week. The record received favorable reviews and was Metacritic's 15th best-reviewed album of 2007. A portion of the proceeds from album sales were to go to Outside In, a social service agency for low-income adults and homeless youth in Portland, Oregon.
On October 25, 2007, a book titled Elliott Smith was released by Autumn de Wilde, which consists of photographs, handwritten lyrics, and "revealing talks with Smith's inner circle". De Wilde was responsible for the Figure 8 sleeve art, making a landmark and de facto Smith memorial of the Solutions Audio mural. A five-song CD featuring previously unreleased live recordings of Smith performing acoustically at Largo in Los Angeles was included in the release.
Following Smith's death, his estate licensed his songs for use in film and television projects such as One Tree Hill, The Girl Next Door, Georgia Rule, and Paranoid Park.
In a March 2009 interview, Larry Crane said that Smith's estate was defunct and all rights previously held by Smith are now in the control of his parents. Crane went on to say that his parents own the rights to Smith's high school recordings, some of the Heatmiser material, all solo songs recorded until his 1998 record deal with DreamWorks Records, and From a Basement on the Hill. DreamWorks Records was acquired by Universal Music Group in 2003, and Interscope Records currently "owns all studio and live recording from Jan 1998 to his passing, except for the songs on From a Basement on the Hill."
In December 2009, Kill Rock Stars announced that it had obtained the rights to re-release Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill, originally released by Cavity Search and ANTI-, respectively. Roman Candle would be remastered by Larry Crane. Along with the press release, Kill Rock Stars posted a previously unreleased track of Smith's, titled "Cecilia/Amanda", as a free download. Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill were re-released on April 6, 2010, in the US.
A greatest hits compilation titled An Introduction to... Elliott Smith was released in November 2010 by Domino Records (UK) and Kill Rock Stars (US).
In August 2013, there was a memorial concert in Portland, Oregon and three other cities. Attending the Portland show were several musicians Smith had performed with, friends, and an appearance by film director Gus Van Sant.
In 2014, director Paul Thomas Anderson posted a video of the pilot episode for a show called The Jon Brion Show, featuring an acoustic set by Smith including accompaniment by Brion and pianist Brad Mehldau.
On July 17, 2015, a documentary about Smith's life titled Heaven Adores You saw a limited theatrical release. The documentary enlisted a number of close friends and family members, as well as hours of audio interviews throughout Smith's short career. The film was directed by Nickolas Rossi and released through Eagle Rock Entertainment. Heaven Adores You received positive reviews from Consequence of Sound, The Guardian, and The Hollywood Reporter.
On August 6, 2019 (what would have been Smith's 50th birthday), UMe released digital deluxe editions of the two albums XO and Figure 8. The new edition of XO has nine added tracks, including Smith's Oscar-nominated Good Will Hunting song "Miss Misery." Seven tracks have been added to Figure 8. The digital deluxe edition includes "Figure 8"—Smith's cover of the "Schoolhouse Rock!" song—which was originally released only on the Japanese edition of the album. The final track on the new Figure 8 edition is Smith's cover of the Beatles’ "Because", originally featured on the 1999 American Beauty soundtrack.
In May 2021, Smith's life and work were the subject of BBC Radio 4's Great Lives.
Death
Smith died on October 21, 2003, at the age of 34 from two stab wounds to the chest. At the time of the stabbing, he was at his Lemoyne Street home in Echo Park, California, where he lived with his girlfriend, Jennifer Chiba. According to Chiba, the two were arguing, and she locked herself in the bathroom to take a shower. Chiba heard him scream and upon opening the door saw Smith standing with a knife in his chest. She pulled the knife out, after which he collapsed and she called 9-1-1 at 12:18 pm. Smith died in the hospital, with the time of death listed as 1:36 p.m. A possible suicide note, written on a sticky note, read: "I'm so sorry—love, Elliott. God forgive me." In the coroner's report of the note, the name "Elliott" is misspelled as "Elliot". While Smith's death was reported as a suicide, the official autopsy report released in December 2003 left open the question of homicide.
Smith's remains were cremated, and his ashes were divided between his mother, father, and half-sister Ashley. A small memorial service for family and friends was held at his father's home in Portland, although Smith's "ashes weren't on hand because the coroner wouldn't release them." The status or location of Smith's ashes has not been made public.
According to Pitchfork, record producer Larry Crane reported on his Tape Op message board that he had planned to help Smith mix his album in mid-November. Crane wrote, "I hadn't talked to Elliott in over a year. His girlfriend, Jennifer, called me [last week] and asked if I'd like to come to L.A. and help mix and finish [Smith's album]. I said 'yes, of course', and chatted with Elliott for the first time in ages. It seems surreal that he would call me to finish an album and then a week later kill himself. I talked to Jennifer this morning, who was obviously shattered and in tears, and she said, 'I don't understand, he was so healthy. The coroner reported that no traces of illegal substances or alcohol were found in Smith's system at the time of his death but did find prescribed levels of antidepressant, anxiolytic, and ADHD medications, including clonazepam, mirtazapine, atomoxetine, and amphetamine. There were no hesitation wounds, which are typically found on a victim of suicide by self-infliction. Due to the inconclusive autopsy ruling, the Los Angeles Police Department's investigation remains open.
Reaction
Shortly after Smith's death, a fan memorial was initiated outside Solutions Audio (4334 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, California), the site at which the cover of the Figure 8 album was shot. Farewell messages to Smith were written on the wall, and flowers, photos, candles, and empty bottles of alcohol mentioned in Smith's songs were left. Since then, the wall has been a regular target for graffiti but is regularly restored by fans.
Memorial concerts were held in several cities in the United States and the United Kingdom. A petition was soon put forth with intent to make part of the Silver Lake area a memorial park in Smith's honor. It received over 10,000 signatures, but no plans to establish the park have been announced. A memorial plaque located inside Smith's former high school, Lincoln High, was hung in July 2006. The plaque reads: "I'm never going to know you now, but I'm going to love you anyhow" referencing Smith's song "Waltz No. 2 (XO)".
Since Smith's death, many musical acts have paid him tribute. Songs in tribute to, or about, Smith have been released by Pearl Jam ("Can't Keep" on the Live at Benaroya Hall concert album); Sparta ("Bombs and Us"); Third Eye Blind ("There's No Hurry to Eternity", originally titled "Elliott Smith", on the Live from Nowhere Near You, Volume Two: Pacific Northwest compilation); 9 Horses (“listening to the Elliott Smith discography in reverse order”, on the album Perfectest Herald); Ben Folds ("Late" on Songs for Silverman); Brad Mehldau ("Sky Turning Grey (for Elliott Smith)" on Highway Rider); Rilo Kiley ("It Just Is", and "Ripchord" from the album More Adventurous); Lil B's 'The Worlds Ending'; Rhett Miller ("The Believer" on The Believer); Earlimart ("Heaven Adores You" on Treble and Tremble); Joan As Police Woman ("We Don't Own It" on Real Life); and Pete Yorn ("Bandstand in the Sky" on Nightcrawler, a song jointly dedicated to Jeff Buckley). Several tribute albums have also been released since his death, including Christopher O'Riley's 2006 Home to Oblivion: An Elliott Smith Tribute, with 18 instrumental covers, The Portland Cello Project's 2014 to e.s., covering six of his songs and To Elliott, from Portland containing covers by a number of Portland bands.
On July 30, 2004, Chiba filed a lawsuit against the Smith family for 15% of his earnings (over $1 million), claiming that she and Smith lived as "husband and wife", that Smith had pledged to take care of her financially for the rest of her life, and that she worked as his manager and agent from around 2000 until his death. A state labor commissioner ruled her claim as manager to be invalid, as she had worked as an "unlicensed talent agent" under California's Talent Agencies Act. The case made it to the California appellate court in October 2007, but the decision was affirmed 2–1.
In an October 2013 Spin magazine article—a reflection at the ten-year anniversary of Smith's death—drummer McPherson stated that Smith was "a sick man without his medicine" during the last 31 days of his life, when he was not only sober, but had also given up red meat and sugar. In the same article, Chiba recalls thinking, "Okay, you're asking a lot of yourself. You're giving up a lot at once." Chiba further explained that "anyone who understands drug abuse knows that you use drugs to hide from your past or sedate yourself from strong, overwhelming feelings. So when you're newly clean and coming off the medications that have been masking all those feelings, that's when you're the most vulnerable." Writing for Spin, Liam Gowing also encountered a local musician who claimed Smith had said to him: "The people who try to intervene, they're good people who genuinely care about you. But they don't know what you're going through. Do what you need to do." According to the musician, Smith had adamantly dissuaded him from suicide.
Musical style and influences
Smith respected and was inspired by many artists and styles, including the Beatles, Neil Young, Simon & Garfunkel, Big Star, the Clash, the Who, Led Zeppelin, the Kinks, Pink Floyd, Nick Drake, Rush, Bauhaus, Elvis Costello, Oasis, Television, Motown and flamenco records, AC/DC, Hank Williams, and Scorpions, Smith claimed to listen exclusively to selected albums (such as The Marble Index by Nico) for months. Sean Croghan, a former roommate of Smith's, said that Smith "listened almost exclusively to slow jams" in his senior year at college. Smith also took inspiration from novels, religion, and philosophy. He liked classic literature, especially Samuel Beckett, T. S. Eliot, and Russian novelists such as Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
Smith mentioned his admiration for Bob Dylan in several interviews, citing him as an early influence. He once commented: "My father taught me how to play 'Don't Think Twice, It's All Right'. I love Dylan's words, but even more than that, I love the fact that he loves words." Smith covered Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece" several times in concert. Smith has also been compared to folk singer Nick Drake, due to his fingerpicking style and vocals. Darryl Cater of AllMusic called references to "the definitive folk loner" Drake "inevitable", and Smith's lyrics have been compared to those in Drake's minimalist and haunting final album.
Smith was a dedicated fan of the Beatles (as well as their solo projects), once noting that he had been listening to them frequently since he was about "four years old" and also claimed that hearing The White Album was his original inspiration to become a musician. In 1998, Smith contributed a cover of the Beatles song "Because" to the closing credits and soundtrack of the film American Beauty. Although this was the only Beatles song that Smith ever officially released, he is known to have recorded many others, ("Revolution", "I'll Be Back" and "I'm So Tired") and played many songs by both the band and the members' solo projects at live concerts.
Smith said that transitions were his favorite part of songs and that he preferred to write broader, more impressionistic music closer to pop rather than folk music. Smith compared his songs to stories or dreams, not purely confessional pieces that people could relate to. When asked about the dark nature of his songwriting and the cult following he was gaining, Smith said he felt it was merely a product of his writing songs that were strongly meaningful to him rather than anything contrived. Larry Crane, Smith's posthumous archivist, has said that he was surprised at the amount of "recycling of musical ideas" he encountered while cataloging Smith's private tapes: "I found songs recorded in high school reworked 15 years on. Lyrics became more important to him as he became older, and more time was spent working on them."
Legacy
Since his death, Smith has been regarded as one of the most influential artists in indie music. Many artists have mentioned Smith as their influence, such as Frank Ocean, Beck, Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker, and Haim's lead vocalist Danielle Haim.
See also
List of unsolved deaths
Discography
Studio albums
Roman Candle (1994)
Elliott Smith (1995)
Either/Or (1997)
XO (1998)
Figure 8 (2000)
Posthumous studio albums
From a Basement on the Hill (2004)
Compilation albums
New Moon (2007)
References
Bibliography
External links
Official website
Official Cavity Search Records website
Official Kill Rock Stars website
Elliott Smith collection at the Internet Archive's live music archive
Keep the Things You Forgot: An Elliott Smith Oral History
1969 births
2003 deaths
Unsolved deaths
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American singers
20th-century American writers
21st-century American singers
21st-century American writers
Alternative rock guitarists
Alternative rock singers
American feminists
American indie rock musicians
American male guitarists
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
American tenors
Anti- (record label) artists
Caroline Records artists
Cavity Search Records artists
Deaths by stabbing in California
Domino Recording Company artists
DreamWorks Records artists
Feminist musicians
Fingerstyle guitarists
Guitarists from Los Angeles
Guitarists from Nebraska
Guitarists from New York City
Guitarists from Oklahoma
Guitarists from Oregon
Guitarists from Texas
Hampshire College alumni
Indie folk musicians
Kill Rock Stars artists
Lincoln High School (Portland, Oregon) alumni
Male feminists
Musicians from Brooklyn
Musicians from Omaha, Nebraska
Musicians from Portland, Oregon
People from Duncanville, Texas
People from Echo Park, Los Angeles
People with mood disorders
Singers from Los Angeles
Singers from New York City
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Suicide Squeeze Records artists
Virgin Records artists
20th-century American male singers
Singer-songwriters from California
Singer-songwriters from New York (state)
Singer-songwriters from Oklahoma
Singer-songwriters from Nebraska | true | [
"\"Worst That Could Happen\" is a song with lyrics and music written by singer-songwriter Jimmy Webb. Originally recorded by the 5th Dimension on their 1967 album of nearly all-Jimmy Webb songs, The Magic Garden, \"Worst That Could Happen\" was later recorded by The Brooklyn Bridge and reached the Billboard Hot 100's top 40, at #38 on January 4, 1969, peaking at #3 on February 1-8, 1969.\n\nThe song tells about a man wishing well to a woman with whom he is still in love, but because the man was unwilling to settle down, she left him and is about to marry someone else who is more stable; the singer accepts the marriage but still feels that it is \"the worst (thing) that could happen to (him)\". It has been stated that, along with \"MacArthur Park\" and \"By the Time I Get to Phoenix\", \"Worst That Could Happen\" is about a relationship that Webb had had with a woman named Susan.\n\nThe song is noted for the quoting of Mendelssohn's \"Wedding March\" from the incidental music to A Midsummer Night's Dream, which is heard at the end.\n\nAccording to BMI (Broadcast Music Inc.) the legal title of the song is \"Worst That Could Happen.\"\n\nThe Brooklyn Bridge version appeared on the list of songs deemed inappropriate by Clear Channel following the September 11, 2001, attacks.\n\nChart history\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nOther cover versions\n B.J. Thomas on his 1969 LP, Young And In Love.\n The Lettermen in 1969 on their I Have Dreamed album.\n Hajji Alejandro recorded a Tagalog version titled “Panakip-Butas” in 1977 in his Hajji album. It was released as a single and was a big hit in the Philippines.\n Jimmy Webb on his 1996 album Ten Easy Pieces.\n\nSee also\n List of 1960s one-hit wonders in the United States\n\nReferences\n\n1967 songs\n1968 debut singles\nThe 5th Dimension songs\nJohnny Maestro songs\nSongs written by Jimmy Webb\nBuddah Records singles\nSongs about marriage",
"The discography of Ira Losco, a Maltese singer, contains five studio albums and forty-three singles. She represented Malta at the Eurovision Song Contest 2002 in Tallinn, Estonia with the song \"7th Wonder\", the song went on to finish second in the Final which was won by Marie N from Latvia with the song \"I Wanna\". She represented her country for the second time at Eurovision Song Contest 2016 in Stockholm, Sweden with the song \"Walk on Water\" and finished 11th (Ties with The Netherlands) in the grand final.\n\nHer debut studio album, Someone Else, was released in April 2004. The album includes the singles \"Love Me Or Hate Me\", \"Who I Am\", \"Someone Else\", \"Say Hey\", \"I'm In Love Again\" and \"Must've Been Good\". Her first Remix album, Blends & Remixes of Someone Else, was released in January 2005. Her second studio album, Accident Prone, was released in November 2005. The album includes the singles \"Everyday\", \"Get Out\", \"Don't Wanna Talk About It\", \"Driving One Of Your Cars\", \"Accident Prone\", \"Uh-Oh\" and \"Waking Up To The Light\". Her third studio album, Unmasked, was released in December 2006. The album includes the singles \"Winter Day\" and \"Arms Of The Ones...\". Her fourth studio album, Fortune Teller, was released in June 2008. The album includes the singles \"Something To Talk About\", \"Don't Look Down\", \"Idle Motion\", \"Promises\", \"Elvis Can You Hear Me?\", \"Shoulders of Giants\", \"What's The Matter With You?\" and \"Fortune Teller\". Her second Remix album, Mixed Beats, was released in August 2009. The album includes the singles \"What's The Matter With Your Cabrio\", \"Shoulders of Giants\" and \"Love Song\". Her fifth studio album, The Fire, was released in March 2013. The album includes the singles \"What I'd Give\", \"The Person I Am\", \"Me Luv U Long Time\" and \"The Way It's Meant To Be\".\n\nAlbums\n\nStudio albums\n\nRemix albums\n\nCompilation albums\n\nSingles\n\nAs lead artist\n\nOther appearances\n\nCovers & Re-Makes\n Ira re-made the track \"Say Hey\" featuring aspiring singer Caroline Stapley in 2004. The track was just a radio hit and is not featured in any album or single.\n Michelle Hunziker covered the tracks \"Get Out\", \"Love Me Or Hate Me\" and \"Someone Else\" for her debut album \"Lole\" in 2006.\n \"Accident Prone\" was remixed by DJ Ruby, Thomas Penton & Alex Armes, but wasn't featured in any album.\n Riffs from \"Uh Oh\" were sampled on Kelly Clarkson's track \"Don't Waste Your Time\".\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Official Website\n\nDiscographies of Maltese artists\nPop music discographies"
] |
[
"Elliott Smith",
"1991-96: Heatmiser",
"Who was Elliott Smith",
"While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust.",
"What was the number one song from that album",
"I don't know.",
"What happen in 1991",
"Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science.",
"What else happen with the album",
"The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records."
] | C_16dab7caf44f4fb980071052066a2132_1 | Did they hit the charts | 5 | Did Heatmiser hit the charts with Dead Air, Cop and Speeder or the Yellow No. 5 EP? | Elliott Smith | Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory". While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996). Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees, and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant". Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to the release of Mic City Sons, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Steven Paul Smith (August 6, 1969 – October 21, 2003), known professionally as Elliott Smith, was an American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. Smith was born in Omaha, Nebraska, raised primarily in Texas, and lived much of his life in Portland, Oregon, where he first gained popularity. Smith's primary instrument was the guitar, though he also played piano, clarinet, bass guitar, drums, and harmonica. Smith had a distinctive vocal style, characterized by his "whispery, spiderweb-thin delivery", and often used multi-tracking to create vocal layers, textures, and harmonies.
After playing in the rock band Heatmiser for several years, Smith began his solo career in 1994, with releases on the independent record labels Cavity Search and Kill Rock Stars (KRS). In 1997, he signed a contract with DreamWorks Records, for which he recorded two albums. Smith rose to mainstream prominence when his song "Miss Misery"—included in the soundtrack for the film Good Will Hunting (1997)—was nominated for an Oscar in the Best Original Song category in 1998.
Smith was a heavy drinker and drug user at times throughout his life, and was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and depression. His struggles with drugs and mental illness affected his life and work, and often appeared in his lyrics. In 2003, aged 34, he died in Los Angeles, California, from two stab wounds to the chest. The autopsy evidence was inconclusive as to whether the wounds were self-inflicted or the result of homicide. At the time of his death, Smith was working on his sixth studio album, From a Basement on the Hill, which was posthumously produced and released in 2004.
Early life
Steven Paul Smith was born at the Methodist Hospital in Omaha, Nebraska, the only child of Gary Smith, a student at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, and Bunny Kay Berryman, an elementary school music teacher. His parents divorced when he was six months old, and Smith moved with his mother to Duncanville, Texas. Smith later had a tattoo of a map of Texas drawn on his upper arm and said: "I didn't get it because I like Texas, kind of the opposite. But I won't forget about it, although I'm tempted to because I don't like it there."
Smith endured a difficult childhood and a troubled relationship with his stepfather Charlie Welch. Smith stated he may have been sexually abused by Welch at a young age, an allegation that Welch has denied. He wrote about this part of his life in "Some Song". The name "Charlie" also appears in songs "Flowers for Charlie" and "No Confidence Man." In a 2004 interview, Jennifer Chiba, Smith's partner at the time of his death, said that Smith's difficult childhood was partly why he needed to sedate himself with drugs as an adult: "He was remembering traumatic things from his childhood – parts of things. It's not my place to say what."
For much of his childhood, Smith's family was a part of the Community of Christ but began attending services at a local Methodist church. Smith felt that going to church did little for him, except make him "really scared of Hell". In 2001, he said: "I don't necessarily buy into any officially structured version of spirituality. But I have my own version of it."
Smith began playing piano at age nine, and at ten began learning guitar on a small acoustic guitar bought for him by his father. At this age he composed an original piano piece, "Fantasy", which won him a prize at an arts festival. Many of the people on his mother's side of the family were non-professional musicians; his grandfather was a Dixieland drummer, and his grandmother sang in a glee club.
At fourteen, Smith left his mother's home in Texas and moved to Portland, Oregon, to live with his father, who was then working as a psychiatrist. It was around this time that Smith began using drugs, including alcohol, with friends. He also began experimenting with recording for the first time after borrowing a four-track recorder. At high school, Smith played clarinet in the school band and played guitar and piano; he also sang in the bands Stranger Than Fiction and A Murder of Crows, billed as either Steven Smith or "Johnny Panic". He graduated from Lincoln High School as a National Merit Scholar.
After graduation, Smith began calling himself "Elliott", saying that he thought "Steve" sounded too much like a "jock" name, and that "Steven" sounded "too bookish". According to friends, he had also used the pseudonym "Elliott Stillwater-Rotter" during his time in the band A Murder of Crows. Biographer S. R. Shutt speculates that the name was either inspired by Elliott Avenue, a street that Smith had lived on in Portland, or that it was suggested by his then-girlfriend. A junior high acquaintance of Smith speculates Smith changed his name so as not to be confused with Steve Smith, the drummer of Journey.
Career
1991–1996: Heatmiser
In 1991 Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory".
While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996).
Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees, and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant".
Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to the release of Mic City Sons, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO.
1994: Roman Candle
In the early 1990s, Smith's girlfriend at the time convinced him to send a tape of songs he had recently recorded on a borrowed four-track to Cavity Search Records. Cavity owner Christopher Cooper asked to release the entire album of songs, which surprised Smith, as he was expecting only a deal for a seven-inch record. The album became Smith's release, Roman Candle (1994).
Smith said: "I thought my head would be chopped off immediately when it came out because at the time it was so opposite to the grunge thing that was popular ... The thing is that album was really well received, which was a total shock, and it immediately eclipsed [Heatmiser], unfortunately." Smith felt his solo songs were not representative of the music Heatmiser was making: "The idea of playing [my music] for people didn't occur to me... because at the time it was the Northwest—Mudhoney and Nirvana—and going out to play an acoustic show was like crawling out on a limb and begging for it to be sawed off."
One of Smith's first solo performances was at the now-defunct Umbra Penumbra on September 17, 1994. Only three songs from Roman Candle were performed, with the majority of the ten-song set being B-sides, Heatmiser tunes and unreleased tracks. The same year, Smith released a split 7-inch record with Pete Krebs via Slo-Mo Records, contributing the track "No Confidence Man".
1995–1997: Elliott Smith and Either/Or
In 1995, Smith's self-titled album was released on Kill Rock Stars; the record featured a style of recording similar to Roman Candle, but with hints of growth and experimentation. Though the majority of the album was recorded by Smith alone, friend and The Spinanes vocalist Rebecca Gates sang harmony vocals on "St. Ides Heaven", and Heatmiser guitarist Neil Gust played guitar on "Single File". Several songs made reference to drugs, but Smith explained that he used the theme of drugs as a vehicle for conveying dependence rather than the songs being about drugs specifically. Looking back, Smith felt that the album's pervasive mood gave him "a reputation for being a really dark, depressed person" and said that he later made a conscious move toward more diverse moods in his music.
In 1996, filmmaker Jem Cohen recorded Smith playing acoustic songs for the short film Lucky Three: An Elliott Smith Portrait. Two of these songs would appear on his next album, Either/Or, which was another Kill Rock Stars release. Either/Or came out in 1997 to favorable reviews. The album found Smith venturing further into full instrumentation, with several songs containing bass guitar, drums, keyboards, and electric guitars, all played by Smith. The album title was derived from the two-volume book of the same name by Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, whose works generally deal with themes such as existential despair, angst, death, and God.
By this time, Smith's already-heavy drinking was being compounded with use of antidepressants. At the end of the Either/Or tour, some of his close friends staged an intervention in Chicago, but it proved ineffective. Shortly after, Smith relocated from Portland to Jersey City, New Jersey, and later Brooklyn, New York.
1997–98: "Miss Misery" and the Oscars
In 1997, Smith was selected by director and fellow Portland resident Gus Van Sant to be a part of the soundtrack to his film, Good Will Hunting. Smith recorded an orchestral version of "Between the Bars" with composer Danny Elfman for the movie. Smith also contributed a new song, "Miss Misery", and three previously released tracks ("No Name #3", from Roman Candle, and "Angeles" and "Say Yes", from Either/Or). The film was a commercial and critical success, and Smith was nominated for an Academy Award for "Miss Misery". Not eager to step into the limelight, he agreed to perform the song at the ceremony only after the producers informed him that if he was unwilling to perform, they would choose someone else to play it.
On March 5, 1998, Smith made his network television debut on Late Night with Conan O'Brien performing "Miss Misery" solo on acoustic guitar. A few days later, wearing a white suit, he played an abridged version of the song at the Oscars, accompanied by the house orchestra. James Horner and Will Jennings won the award that night for best song with "My Heart Will Go On" (sung by Celine Dion) from the film Titanic. Smith did not voice disappointment about not winning the award.
Smith commented on the surrealism of the Oscars experience: "That's exactly what it was, surreal... I enjoy performing almost as much as I enjoy making up songs in the first place. But the Oscars was a very strange show, where the set was only one song cut down to less than two minutes, and the audience was a lot of people who didn't come to hear me play. I wouldn't want to live in that world, but it was fun to walk around on the moon for a day."
1998–2000: XO and Figure 8
In 1998, after the success of Either/Or and "Miss Misery", Smith signed to a bigger record label, DreamWorks Records. Around the same time, Smith fell into depression, speaking openly of considering suicide, and on at least one occasion made a serious attempt at ending his own life. While in North Carolina, he became severely intoxicated and ran off a cliff. He landed on a tree, which badly impaled him but broke his fall. When questioned about his suicide attempt, he told an interviewer, "Yeah, I jumped off a cliff, but let's talk about something else."
Christopher Cooper, head of Cavity Search Records (which released Roman Candle), said about this time in Smith's life, "I talked him out of thinking that he wanted to kill himself numerous times when he was in Portland. I kept telling him that he was a brilliant man, and that life was worth living, and that people loved him." Pete Krebs also agreed: "In Portland we got the brunt of Elliott's initial depression... Lots of people have stories of their own experiences of staying up with Elliott 'til five in the morning, holding his hand, telling him not to kill himself."
Smith's first release for DreamWorks was later that year. Titled XO, it was conceived and developed while Smith wrote it out over the winter of 1997/1998, night after night seated at the bar in Luna Lounge. It was produced by the team of Rob Schnapf and Tom Rothrock. XO also contained some instrumentation from Los Angeles musicians Joey Waronker and Jon Brion. It contained a more full-sounding, baroque pop sound than any of his previous efforts, with songs featuring a horn section, Chamberlins, elaborate string arrangements, and even a drum loop on the song "Independence Day". His familiar double-tracked vocal and acoustic guitar style were still apparent while his somewhat personal lyrical style survived. The album went on to peak at number 104 on the Billboard 200 and number 123 on the UK Album Charts, while selling 400,000 copies (more than double that of each of his two Kill Rock Stars releases), becoming the best-selling release of his career. Smith's backing band during most of this period was the Portland-based group Quasi, consisting of former bandmate Sam Coomes on bass guitar and Coomes's ex-wife Janet Weiss on drums. Quasi also performed as the opening act at many shows on the tour, with Smith sometimes contributing bass guitar, guitar, or backing vocals. On October 17, 1998, Smith appeared on Saturday Night Live and performed "Waltz No. 2 (XO)". His backing band for this appearance was John Moen, Jon Brion, Rob Schnapf, and Sam Coomes.
In response to whether the change to a bigger record label would influence his creative control, Smith said, "I think despite the fact that sometimes people look at major labels as simply money-making machines, they're actually composed of individuals who are real people, and there's a part of them that needs to feel that part of their job is to put out good music." Smith also claimed in another interview that he never read his reviews for fear that they would interfere with his songwriting. It was during this period that Smith appeared on Dutch television in 1998 and provided a candid interview in which he spoke of his assessment of his music career until that point:
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I mostly only know things are different because people ask me different questions, but I don't feel like things are very changed. I mean, I still, I do the same things that I did before … I think about the same things, so … I'm the wrong kind of person to be really big and famous.
As part of the Dutch television special, Smith played live versions of "Waltz No. 2 (XO)", "Miss Misery", and "I Didn't Understand"—the latter two songs were performed solely on piano, while the first song was cut short by Smith, as he explained: "I had to stop it because it's… you know, what's the point of playing a song badly? It'd be better to play it and mean it, than to just walk through it."
Smith relocated from Brooklyn to Los Angeles in 1999, taking up residence at a cabin in the Silver Lake section of town, where he would regularly play intimate, acoustic shows at local venues like Silverlake Lounge. He also performed in Toronto in April that year. In the fall, his cover of the Beatles' "Because" was featured in the end credits of DreamWorks' Oscar-winning drama American Beauty, and appeared on the film's soundtrack album.
The final album Smith completed, Figure 8, was released on April 18, 2000. It featured the return of Rothrock, Schnapf, Brion, and Waronker and was partially recorded at Abbey Road Studios in England, with an obvious Beatles influence in the songwriting and production. The album garnered favorable reviews, and peaked at number 99 on the Billboard 200 and 37 on the UK Album Charts. The album received praise for its power pop style and complex arrangements, described as creating a "sweeping kaleidoscope of layered instruments and sonic textures". However, some reviewers felt that Smith's trademark dark and melancholy songwriting had lost some of its subtlety, with one reviewer likening some of the lyrics to "the self-pitying complaints of an adolescent venting in his diary".
Album art and promotional pictures from the period showed Smith looking cleaned-up and put-together. An extensive tour in promotion of the record ensued, book-ended by television appearances on Late Night with Conan O'Brien and the Late Show with David Letterman. However, Smith's condition began to deteriorate as he had become addicted to heroin either towards the end of or just after the Figure 8 tour.
2001–2002: Addiction and scrapped recordings
Around the time he began recording his final album, Smith began to display signs of paranoia, often believing that a white van followed him wherever he went. He would have friends drop him off for recording sessions almost a mile away from the studio, and to reach the location, he would trudge through hundreds of yards of brush and cliffs. He started telling people that DreamWorks was out to get him: "Not long ago my house was broken into, and songs were stolen off my computer which have wound up in the hands of certain people who work at a certain label. I've also been followed around for months at a time. I wouldn't even want to necessarily say it's the people from that label who are following me around, but it was probably them who broke into my house." During this period, Smith hardly ate, subsisting primarily on ice cream. He would go without sleeping for several days and then sleep for an entire day.
A follow-up to Smith's 2000 album was originally planned to happen with Rob Schnapf, but their sessions were abandoned. Smith also began distancing himself from manager Margaret Mittleman, who had handled him since the Roman Candle days. He finally began recording a new album with only himself and Jon Brion as producers sometime during 2001. The pair had recorded a substantial amount of music for the album when Brion stopped the sessions because of Smith's struggle with substance use disorder. Their friendship promptly ended, and Smith scrapped all of their work until that point. He later said "There was even a little more than half of a record done before this new one that I just scrapped because of a blown friendship with someone that made me so depressed I didn't want to hear any of those songs. He was just helping me record the songs and stuff, and then the friendship kind of fell apart all of a sudden one day. It just made it kind of awkward being alone in the car listening to the songs."
When Brion sent a bill for the abandoned sessions to DreamWorks, executives Lenny Waronker and Luke Wood scheduled a meeting with Smith to determine what went wrong with the sessions. Smith complained of intrusion upon his personal life from the label, as well as poor promotion for the Figure 8 album. The talks proved fruitless, and soon after, Smith sent a message to the executives, stating that if they did not release him from his contract, he would take his own life. In May 2001, Smith set out to re-record the album, mostly on his own, but with some help from David McConnell of Goldenboy. McConnell told Spin that, during this time, Smith would smoke over $1,500 worth of heroin and crack per day, would often talk about suicide, and on numerous occasions tried to give himself an overdose. Steven Drozd of The Flaming Lips and Scott McPherson of Sense Field played a few drum tracks, Sam Coomes contributed some bass guitar and backing vocals, but almost every other instrument was recorded by Smith.
Smith's song "Needle in the Hay" was included in Wes Anderson's 2001 dark comedy film The Royal Tenenbaums during a suicide attempt scene. Smith was originally supposed to contribute a cover of The Beatles' "Hey Jude" for the film, but when he failed to do so in time, Anderson had to use The Mutato Muzika Orchestra's version of the track instead. Anderson would later say that Smith "was in a bad state" at the time.
Smith's live performances during 2001 and 2002 were infrequent, typically in the Pacific Northwest or Los Angeles. A review of his December 20, 2001, show at Portland's Crystal Ballroom expressed concern over his appearance and performance: his hair was uncharacteristically greasy and long, his face was bearded and gaunt, and during his songs he exhibited alarming signs of "memory-loss and butterfingers". At another performance in San Francisco that month, the audience began shouting out lyrics when Smith could not remember them.
In the first of only three concerts performed in 2002, Smith co-headlined Northwestern University's A&O Ball with Wilco on May 2 in Chicago. He was onstage for nearly an hour but failed to complete half of the songs. He claimed that his poor performance was due to his left hand having fallen asleep and told the audience it felt "like having stuff on your hand and you can't get it off". Smith's performance was reviewed as "undoubtedly one of the worst performances ever by a musician" and an "excruciating […] nightmare". A reporter for the online magazine Glorious Noise wrote, "It would not surprise me at all if Elliott Smith ends up dead within a year."
On November 25, 2002, Smith was involved in a brawl with the Los Angeles Police Department at a concert where The Flaming Lips and Beck were performing. Smith later said he was defending a man he thought the police were harassing. The officers allegedly beat and arrested him and girlfriend Jennifer Chiba. The two spent the night in jail. Smith's back was injured in the incident, causing him to cancel a number of shows. Wayne Coyne, lead singer of The Flaming Lips and a friend of Smith's, stated concern over Smith's appearance and actions, saying that he "saw a guy who had lost control of himself. He was needy, he was grumpy, he was everything you wouldn't want in a person. It's not like when you think of Keith Richards being pleasantly blissed out in the corner."
2003: Reemergence and From a Basement on the Hill
Smith had attempted to go to rehab several times, but found that he was unable to relate to the popular treatments for people with substance use disorder that used a twelve-step program basis for treatment. "I couldn't do the first step […] I couldn't say what you were supposed to say and mean it." In 2002, Smith went to the Neurotransmitter Restoration Center in Beverly Hills to start a course of treatment for substance use disorder. In one of his final interviews, he spoke about the center, "What they do is an IV treatment where they put a needle in your arm, and you're on a drip bag, but the only thing that's in the drip bag is amino acids and saline solution. I was coming off of a lot of psych meds and other things. I was even on an antipsychotic, although I'm not psychotic."
Two sold-out solo acoustic concerts at Hollywood's Henry Fonda Theater, on January 31 and February 1, 2003, saw Smith attempting to reestablish his credibility as a live performer. Before the show, Smith scrawled "Kali – The Destroyer" (the Hindu goddess associated with time and change) in large block letters with permanent ink on his left arm, which was visible to the crowd during the performance. On several songs, he was backed by a stripped-down drum kit played by Robin Peringer (of the band 764-HERO), and members of opening band Rilo Kiley contributed backing vocals to one song. Near the end of the first show, the musician responded for several minutes after a heckler (later identified as Smith's ex-girlfriend Valerie Deerin) yelled "Get a backbone." Smith played two more Los Angeles concerts during 2003, including The Derby in May and the L.A. Weekly Music Awards in June.
After his 34th birthday on August 6, 2003, he gave up alcohol. Director Mike Mills had been working with Smith during his final years and described Smith's troubles and apparent recovery: "I gave the script to him, then he dropped off the face of the earth […] he went through his whole crazy time, but by the time I was done with the film, he was making From a Basement on the Hill and I was shocked that he was actually making music."
With things improving for Smith after several troubled years, he began experimenting with noise music and worked on his girlfriend Jennifer Chiba's iMac with the intent of learning how to record with computers, noting that it was the only method with which he was still unfamiliar. Smith jokingly labeled his experimental way of recording "The California Frown" (a play on the Beach Boys' "California Sound"). He said of the songs, "They're kind of more noisy with the pitch all distorted. Some are more acoustic, but there aren't too many like that. Lately I've just been making up a lot of noise."
He was also in the process of recording songs for the Thumbsucker soundtrack, including Big Star's "Thirteen" and Cat Stevens's "Trouble". In August 2003, Suicide Squeeze Records put out a limited-edition vinyl single for "Pretty (Ugly Before)", a song that Smith had been playing since the Figure 8 tour.
Smith's final show was at Redfest at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City on September 19, 2003. The final song he played live was "Long, Long, Long" by The Beatles.
2004–present: Posthumous releases
From a Basement on the Hill, almost four years in production, was released on October 19, 2004, by ANTI- Records (a part of Epitaph Records). With Smith's family in control of his estate, they chose to bring in Rob Schnapf and Smith's ex-girlfriend Joanna Bolme to sort through the recordings and mix the album. Although Smith had voiced his desire for it to be a double album or a regular album with a bonus disc, it was not clear whether it would have been possible for him to release it that way had he completed it. As completed by Schnapf and Bolme, it was released as a 15-track single album. Many songs from the sessions (later leaked onto the Internet) were not included, such as "True Love", "Everything's OK", "Stickman", and "Suicide Machine" (a reworking of the Figure 8-era unreleased instrumental "Tiny Time Machine"). There has been unconfirmed speculation that Smith's family made the decision not to include some songs on the record due to their lyrical content, although songs such as "King's Crossing" that deal with darker subjects did make the album.
Elliott Smith and the Big Nothing, a biography by Benjamin Nugent, was rushed to publication shortly after From a Basement on the Hill, shortly after the first anniversary of his death. Smith's family, as well as Joanna Bolme, Jennifer Chiba, Neil Gust, Sam Coomes, and Janet Weiss, all declined to be interviewed. It contained interviews with Rob Schnapf, David McConnell, and Pete Krebs. The book received mixed reviews, with Publishers Weekly remarking that while "Nugent manages to patch together the major beats of Smith's life, he can offer little meaningful insight".
In 2005, a tribute album, A Tribute to Elliott Smith, was released. It featured various bands performing tributes to Smith.
On May 8, 2007, a posthumous two-disc compilation album entitled New Moon was released by Kill Rock Stars. The album contained 24 songs recorded by Smith between 1994 and 1997 during his tenure with the label, songs that were not included on albums, as well as a few early versions and previously released B-sides. In the United States, the album debuted at number 24 on the Billboard 200, selling about 24,000 copies in its first week. The record received favorable reviews and was Metacritic's 15th best-reviewed album of 2007. A portion of the proceeds from album sales were to go to Outside In, a social service agency for low-income adults and homeless youth in Portland, Oregon.
On October 25, 2007, a book titled Elliott Smith was released by Autumn de Wilde, which consists of photographs, handwritten lyrics, and "revealing talks with Smith's inner circle". De Wilde was responsible for the Figure 8 sleeve art, making a landmark and de facto Smith memorial of the Solutions Audio mural. A five-song CD featuring previously unreleased live recordings of Smith performing acoustically at Largo in Los Angeles was included in the release.
Following Smith's death, his estate licensed his songs for use in film and television projects such as One Tree Hill, The Girl Next Door, Georgia Rule, and Paranoid Park.
In a March 2009 interview, Larry Crane said that Smith's estate was defunct and all rights previously held by Smith are now in the control of his parents. Crane went on to say that his parents own the rights to Smith's high school recordings, some of the Heatmiser material, all solo songs recorded until his 1998 record deal with DreamWorks Records, and From a Basement on the Hill. DreamWorks Records was acquired by Universal Music Group in 2003, and Interscope Records currently "owns all studio and live recording from Jan 1998 to his passing, except for the songs on From a Basement on the Hill."
In December 2009, Kill Rock Stars announced that it had obtained the rights to re-release Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill, originally released by Cavity Search and ANTI-, respectively. Roman Candle would be remastered by Larry Crane. Along with the press release, Kill Rock Stars posted a previously unreleased track of Smith's, titled "Cecilia/Amanda", as a free download. Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill were re-released on April 6, 2010, in the US.
A greatest hits compilation titled An Introduction to... Elliott Smith was released in November 2010 by Domino Records (UK) and Kill Rock Stars (US).
In August 2013, there was a memorial concert in Portland, Oregon and three other cities. Attending the Portland show were several musicians Smith had performed with, friends, and an appearance by film director Gus Van Sant.
In 2014, director Paul Thomas Anderson posted a video of the pilot episode for a show called The Jon Brion Show, featuring an acoustic set by Smith including accompaniment by Brion and pianist Brad Mehldau.
On July 17, 2015, a documentary about Smith's life titled Heaven Adores You saw a limited theatrical release. The documentary enlisted a number of close friends and family members, as well as hours of audio interviews throughout Smith's short career. The film was directed by Nickolas Rossi and released through Eagle Rock Entertainment. Heaven Adores You received positive reviews from Consequence of Sound, The Guardian, and The Hollywood Reporter.
On August 6, 2019 (what would have been Smith's 50th birthday), UMe released digital deluxe editions of the two albums XO and Figure 8. The new edition of XO has nine added tracks, including Smith's Oscar-nominated Good Will Hunting song "Miss Misery." Seven tracks have been added to Figure 8. The digital deluxe edition includes "Figure 8"—Smith's cover of the "Schoolhouse Rock!" song—which was originally released only on the Japanese edition of the album. The final track on the new Figure 8 edition is Smith's cover of the Beatles’ "Because", originally featured on the 1999 American Beauty soundtrack.
In May 2021, Smith's life and work were the subject of BBC Radio 4's Great Lives.
Death
Smith died on October 21, 2003, at the age of 34 from two stab wounds to the chest. At the time of the stabbing, he was at his Lemoyne Street home in Echo Park, California, where he lived with his girlfriend, Jennifer Chiba. According to Chiba, the two were arguing, and she locked herself in the bathroom to take a shower. Chiba heard him scream and upon opening the door saw Smith standing with a knife in his chest. She pulled the knife out, after which he collapsed and she called 9-1-1 at 12:18 pm. Smith died in the hospital, with the time of death listed as 1:36 p.m. A possible suicide note, written on a sticky note, read: "I'm so sorry—love, Elliott. God forgive me." In the coroner's report of the note, the name "Elliott" is misspelled as "Elliot". While Smith's death was reported as a suicide, the official autopsy report released in December 2003 left open the question of homicide.
Smith's remains were cremated, and his ashes were divided between his mother, father, and half-sister Ashley. A small memorial service for family and friends was held at his father's home in Portland, although Smith's "ashes weren't on hand because the coroner wouldn't release them." The status or location of Smith's ashes has not been made public.
According to Pitchfork, record producer Larry Crane reported on his Tape Op message board that he had planned to help Smith mix his album in mid-November. Crane wrote, "I hadn't talked to Elliott in over a year. His girlfriend, Jennifer, called me [last week] and asked if I'd like to come to L.A. and help mix and finish [Smith's album]. I said 'yes, of course', and chatted with Elliott for the first time in ages. It seems surreal that he would call me to finish an album and then a week later kill himself. I talked to Jennifer this morning, who was obviously shattered and in tears, and she said, 'I don't understand, he was so healthy. The coroner reported that no traces of illegal substances or alcohol were found in Smith's system at the time of his death but did find prescribed levels of antidepressant, anxiolytic, and ADHD medications, including clonazepam, mirtazapine, atomoxetine, and amphetamine. There were no hesitation wounds, which are typically found on a victim of suicide by self-infliction. Due to the inconclusive autopsy ruling, the Los Angeles Police Department's investigation remains open.
Reaction
Shortly after Smith's death, a fan memorial was initiated outside Solutions Audio (4334 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, California), the site at which the cover of the Figure 8 album was shot. Farewell messages to Smith were written on the wall, and flowers, photos, candles, and empty bottles of alcohol mentioned in Smith's songs were left. Since then, the wall has been a regular target for graffiti but is regularly restored by fans.
Memorial concerts were held in several cities in the United States and the United Kingdom. A petition was soon put forth with intent to make part of the Silver Lake area a memorial park in Smith's honor. It received over 10,000 signatures, but no plans to establish the park have been announced. A memorial plaque located inside Smith's former high school, Lincoln High, was hung in July 2006. The plaque reads: "I'm never going to know you now, but I'm going to love you anyhow" referencing Smith's song "Waltz No. 2 (XO)".
Since Smith's death, many musical acts have paid him tribute. Songs in tribute to, or about, Smith have been released by Pearl Jam ("Can't Keep" on the Live at Benaroya Hall concert album); Sparta ("Bombs and Us"); Third Eye Blind ("There's No Hurry to Eternity", originally titled "Elliott Smith", on the Live from Nowhere Near You, Volume Two: Pacific Northwest compilation); 9 Horses (“listening to the Elliott Smith discography in reverse order”, on the album Perfectest Herald); Ben Folds ("Late" on Songs for Silverman); Brad Mehldau ("Sky Turning Grey (for Elliott Smith)" on Highway Rider); Rilo Kiley ("It Just Is", and "Ripchord" from the album More Adventurous); Lil B's 'The Worlds Ending'; Rhett Miller ("The Believer" on The Believer); Earlimart ("Heaven Adores You" on Treble and Tremble); Joan As Police Woman ("We Don't Own It" on Real Life); and Pete Yorn ("Bandstand in the Sky" on Nightcrawler, a song jointly dedicated to Jeff Buckley). Several tribute albums have also been released since his death, including Christopher O'Riley's 2006 Home to Oblivion: An Elliott Smith Tribute, with 18 instrumental covers, The Portland Cello Project's 2014 to e.s., covering six of his songs and To Elliott, from Portland containing covers by a number of Portland bands.
On July 30, 2004, Chiba filed a lawsuit against the Smith family for 15% of his earnings (over $1 million), claiming that she and Smith lived as "husband and wife", that Smith had pledged to take care of her financially for the rest of her life, and that she worked as his manager and agent from around 2000 until his death. A state labor commissioner ruled her claim as manager to be invalid, as she had worked as an "unlicensed talent agent" under California's Talent Agencies Act. The case made it to the California appellate court in October 2007, but the decision was affirmed 2–1.
In an October 2013 Spin magazine article—a reflection at the ten-year anniversary of Smith's death—drummer McPherson stated that Smith was "a sick man without his medicine" during the last 31 days of his life, when he was not only sober, but had also given up red meat and sugar. In the same article, Chiba recalls thinking, "Okay, you're asking a lot of yourself. You're giving up a lot at once." Chiba further explained that "anyone who understands drug abuse knows that you use drugs to hide from your past or sedate yourself from strong, overwhelming feelings. So when you're newly clean and coming off the medications that have been masking all those feelings, that's when you're the most vulnerable." Writing for Spin, Liam Gowing also encountered a local musician who claimed Smith had said to him: "The people who try to intervene, they're good people who genuinely care about you. But they don't know what you're going through. Do what you need to do." According to the musician, Smith had adamantly dissuaded him from suicide.
Musical style and influences
Smith respected and was inspired by many artists and styles, including the Beatles, Neil Young, Simon & Garfunkel, Big Star, the Clash, the Who, Led Zeppelin, the Kinks, Pink Floyd, Nick Drake, Rush, Bauhaus, Elvis Costello, Oasis, Television, Motown and flamenco records, AC/DC, Hank Williams, and Scorpions, Smith claimed to listen exclusively to selected albums (such as The Marble Index by Nico) for months. Sean Croghan, a former roommate of Smith's, said that Smith "listened almost exclusively to slow jams" in his senior year at college. Smith also took inspiration from novels, religion, and philosophy. He liked classic literature, especially Samuel Beckett, T. S. Eliot, and Russian novelists such as Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
Smith mentioned his admiration for Bob Dylan in several interviews, citing him as an early influence. He once commented: "My father taught me how to play 'Don't Think Twice, It's All Right'. I love Dylan's words, but even more than that, I love the fact that he loves words." Smith covered Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece" several times in concert. Smith has also been compared to folk singer Nick Drake, due to his fingerpicking style and vocals. Darryl Cater of AllMusic called references to "the definitive folk loner" Drake "inevitable", and Smith's lyrics have been compared to those in Drake's minimalist and haunting final album.
Smith was a dedicated fan of the Beatles (as well as their solo projects), once noting that he had been listening to them frequently since he was about "four years old" and also claimed that hearing The White Album was his original inspiration to become a musician. In 1998, Smith contributed a cover of the Beatles song "Because" to the closing credits and soundtrack of the film American Beauty. Although this was the only Beatles song that Smith ever officially released, he is known to have recorded many others, ("Revolution", "I'll Be Back" and "I'm So Tired") and played many songs by both the band and the members' solo projects at live concerts.
Smith said that transitions were his favorite part of songs and that he preferred to write broader, more impressionistic music closer to pop rather than folk music. Smith compared his songs to stories or dreams, not purely confessional pieces that people could relate to. When asked about the dark nature of his songwriting and the cult following he was gaining, Smith said he felt it was merely a product of his writing songs that were strongly meaningful to him rather than anything contrived. Larry Crane, Smith's posthumous archivist, has said that he was surprised at the amount of "recycling of musical ideas" he encountered while cataloging Smith's private tapes: "I found songs recorded in high school reworked 15 years on. Lyrics became more important to him as he became older, and more time was spent working on them."
Legacy
Since his death, Smith has been regarded as one of the most influential artists in indie music. Many artists have mentioned Smith as their influence, such as Frank Ocean, Beck, Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker, and Haim's lead vocalist Danielle Haim.
See also
List of unsolved deaths
Discography
Studio albums
Roman Candle (1994)
Elliott Smith (1995)
Either/Or (1997)
XO (1998)
Figure 8 (2000)
Posthumous studio albums
From a Basement on the Hill (2004)
Compilation albums
New Moon (2007)
References
Bibliography
External links
Official website
Official Cavity Search Records website
Official Kill Rock Stars website
Elliott Smith collection at the Internet Archive's live music archive
Keep the Things You Forgot: An Elliott Smith Oral History
1969 births
2003 deaths
Unsolved deaths
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American singers
20th-century American writers
21st-century American singers
21st-century American writers
Alternative rock guitarists
Alternative rock singers
American feminists
American indie rock musicians
American male guitarists
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
American tenors
Anti- (record label) artists
Caroline Records artists
Cavity Search Records artists
Deaths by stabbing in California
Domino Recording Company artists
DreamWorks Records artists
Feminist musicians
Fingerstyle guitarists
Guitarists from Los Angeles
Guitarists from Nebraska
Guitarists from New York City
Guitarists from Oklahoma
Guitarists from Oregon
Guitarists from Texas
Hampshire College alumni
Indie folk musicians
Kill Rock Stars artists
Lincoln High School (Portland, Oregon) alumni
Male feminists
Musicians from Brooklyn
Musicians from Omaha, Nebraska
Musicians from Portland, Oregon
People from Duncanville, Texas
People from Echo Park, Los Angeles
People with mood disorders
Singers from Los Angeles
Singers from New York City
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Suicide Squeeze Records artists
Virgin Records artists
20th-century American male singers
Singer-songwriters from California
Singer-songwriters from New York (state)
Singer-songwriters from Oklahoma
Singer-songwriters from Nebraska | false | [
"\"San Bernadino\" is a 1970 song by English band Christie. The song did not match the success of their previous single \"Yellow River\", but was still a top-ten hit in several countries and topped the charts in Switzerland. In the US, the song only managed to peak at number 100 on 30 January 1971. After the song became a hit, the band members admitted that they had never visited the city of San Bernardino, California.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n1970 singles\nChristie (band) songs\n1970 songs\nNumber-one singles in Switzerland",
"\"One Hell of a Woman\" is a 1974 song (see 1974 in music) by the American singer-songwriter Mac Davis. The song was written by Davis and Mark James. \n\nReleased as a single from his album Stop and Smell the Roses, the song became Davis' second Top 20 hit on the U.S. pop chart, where it peaked at No. 11 in the fall of 1974. The song remained in the Top 40 for ten weeks. It spent a total of 28 weeks on the national charts, 10 weeks longer than did his number-one hit, \"Baby, Don't Get Hooked on Me.\" Unusually for Davis, the song did not chart on the American country charts.\n\nChart performance\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\n1974 singles\nMac Davis songs\nSongs written by Mac Davis\nSongs written by Mark James (songwriter)\n1974 songs\nColumbia Records singles"
] |
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"While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust.",
"What was the number one song from that album",
"I don't know.",
"What happen in 1991",
"Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science.",
"What else happen with the album",
"The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records.",
"Did they hit the charts",
"I don't know."
] | C_16dab7caf44f4fb980071052066a2132_1 | What happen in 1996 | 6 | What happen to Elliot Smith and Heatmiser in 1996? | Elliott Smith | Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory". While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996). Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees, and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant". Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to the release of Mic City Sons, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO. CANNOTANSWER | They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996). | Steven Paul Smith (August 6, 1969 – October 21, 2003), known professionally as Elliott Smith, was an American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. Smith was born in Omaha, Nebraska, raised primarily in Texas, and lived much of his life in Portland, Oregon, where he first gained popularity. Smith's primary instrument was the guitar, though he also played piano, clarinet, bass guitar, drums, and harmonica. Smith had a distinctive vocal style, characterized by his "whispery, spiderweb-thin delivery", and often used multi-tracking to create vocal layers, textures, and harmonies.
After playing in the rock band Heatmiser for several years, Smith began his solo career in 1994, with releases on the independent record labels Cavity Search and Kill Rock Stars (KRS). In 1997, he signed a contract with DreamWorks Records, for which he recorded two albums. Smith rose to mainstream prominence when his song "Miss Misery"—included in the soundtrack for the film Good Will Hunting (1997)—was nominated for an Oscar in the Best Original Song category in 1998.
Smith was a heavy drinker and drug user at times throughout his life, and was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and depression. His struggles with drugs and mental illness affected his life and work, and often appeared in his lyrics. In 2003, aged 34, he died in Los Angeles, California, from two stab wounds to the chest. The autopsy evidence was inconclusive as to whether the wounds were self-inflicted or the result of homicide. At the time of his death, Smith was working on his sixth studio album, From a Basement on the Hill, which was posthumously produced and released in 2004.
Early life
Steven Paul Smith was born at the Methodist Hospital in Omaha, Nebraska, the only child of Gary Smith, a student at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, and Bunny Kay Berryman, an elementary school music teacher. His parents divorced when he was six months old, and Smith moved with his mother to Duncanville, Texas. Smith later had a tattoo of a map of Texas drawn on his upper arm and said: "I didn't get it because I like Texas, kind of the opposite. But I won't forget about it, although I'm tempted to because I don't like it there."
Smith endured a difficult childhood and a troubled relationship with his stepfather Charlie Welch. Smith stated he may have been sexually abused by Welch at a young age, an allegation that Welch has denied. He wrote about this part of his life in "Some Song". The name "Charlie" also appears in songs "Flowers for Charlie" and "No Confidence Man." In a 2004 interview, Jennifer Chiba, Smith's partner at the time of his death, said that Smith's difficult childhood was partly why he needed to sedate himself with drugs as an adult: "He was remembering traumatic things from his childhood – parts of things. It's not my place to say what."
For much of his childhood, Smith's family was a part of the Community of Christ but began attending services at a local Methodist church. Smith felt that going to church did little for him, except make him "really scared of Hell". In 2001, he said: "I don't necessarily buy into any officially structured version of spirituality. But I have my own version of it."
Smith began playing piano at age nine, and at ten began learning guitar on a small acoustic guitar bought for him by his father. At this age he composed an original piano piece, "Fantasy", which won him a prize at an arts festival. Many of the people on his mother's side of the family were non-professional musicians; his grandfather was a Dixieland drummer, and his grandmother sang in a glee club.
At fourteen, Smith left his mother's home in Texas and moved to Portland, Oregon, to live with his father, who was then working as a psychiatrist. It was around this time that Smith began using drugs, including alcohol, with friends. He also began experimenting with recording for the first time after borrowing a four-track recorder. At high school, Smith played clarinet in the school band and played guitar and piano; he also sang in the bands Stranger Than Fiction and A Murder of Crows, billed as either Steven Smith or "Johnny Panic". He graduated from Lincoln High School as a National Merit Scholar.
After graduation, Smith began calling himself "Elliott", saying that he thought "Steve" sounded too much like a "jock" name, and that "Steven" sounded "too bookish". According to friends, he had also used the pseudonym "Elliott Stillwater-Rotter" during his time in the band A Murder of Crows. Biographer S. R. Shutt speculates that the name was either inspired by Elliott Avenue, a street that Smith had lived on in Portland, or that it was suggested by his then-girlfriend. A junior high acquaintance of Smith speculates Smith changed his name so as not to be confused with Steve Smith, the drummer of Journey.
Career
1991–1996: Heatmiser
In 1991 Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory".
While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996).
Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees, and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant".
Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to the release of Mic City Sons, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO.
1994: Roman Candle
In the early 1990s, Smith's girlfriend at the time convinced him to send a tape of songs he had recently recorded on a borrowed four-track to Cavity Search Records. Cavity owner Christopher Cooper asked to release the entire album of songs, which surprised Smith, as he was expecting only a deal for a seven-inch record. The album became Smith's release, Roman Candle (1994).
Smith said: "I thought my head would be chopped off immediately when it came out because at the time it was so opposite to the grunge thing that was popular ... The thing is that album was really well received, which was a total shock, and it immediately eclipsed [Heatmiser], unfortunately." Smith felt his solo songs were not representative of the music Heatmiser was making: "The idea of playing [my music] for people didn't occur to me... because at the time it was the Northwest—Mudhoney and Nirvana—and going out to play an acoustic show was like crawling out on a limb and begging for it to be sawed off."
One of Smith's first solo performances was at the now-defunct Umbra Penumbra on September 17, 1994. Only three songs from Roman Candle were performed, with the majority of the ten-song set being B-sides, Heatmiser tunes and unreleased tracks. The same year, Smith released a split 7-inch record with Pete Krebs via Slo-Mo Records, contributing the track "No Confidence Man".
1995–1997: Elliott Smith and Either/Or
In 1995, Smith's self-titled album was released on Kill Rock Stars; the record featured a style of recording similar to Roman Candle, but with hints of growth and experimentation. Though the majority of the album was recorded by Smith alone, friend and The Spinanes vocalist Rebecca Gates sang harmony vocals on "St. Ides Heaven", and Heatmiser guitarist Neil Gust played guitar on "Single File". Several songs made reference to drugs, but Smith explained that he used the theme of drugs as a vehicle for conveying dependence rather than the songs being about drugs specifically. Looking back, Smith felt that the album's pervasive mood gave him "a reputation for being a really dark, depressed person" and said that he later made a conscious move toward more diverse moods in his music.
In 1996, filmmaker Jem Cohen recorded Smith playing acoustic songs for the short film Lucky Three: An Elliott Smith Portrait. Two of these songs would appear on his next album, Either/Or, which was another Kill Rock Stars release. Either/Or came out in 1997 to favorable reviews. The album found Smith venturing further into full instrumentation, with several songs containing bass guitar, drums, keyboards, and electric guitars, all played by Smith. The album title was derived from the two-volume book of the same name by Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, whose works generally deal with themes such as existential despair, angst, death, and God.
By this time, Smith's already-heavy drinking was being compounded with use of antidepressants. At the end of the Either/Or tour, some of his close friends staged an intervention in Chicago, but it proved ineffective. Shortly after, Smith relocated from Portland to Jersey City, New Jersey, and later Brooklyn, New York.
1997–98: "Miss Misery" and the Oscars
In 1997, Smith was selected by director and fellow Portland resident Gus Van Sant to be a part of the soundtrack to his film, Good Will Hunting. Smith recorded an orchestral version of "Between the Bars" with composer Danny Elfman for the movie. Smith also contributed a new song, "Miss Misery", and three previously released tracks ("No Name #3", from Roman Candle, and "Angeles" and "Say Yes", from Either/Or). The film was a commercial and critical success, and Smith was nominated for an Academy Award for "Miss Misery". Not eager to step into the limelight, he agreed to perform the song at the ceremony only after the producers informed him that if he was unwilling to perform, they would choose someone else to play it.
On March 5, 1998, Smith made his network television debut on Late Night with Conan O'Brien performing "Miss Misery" solo on acoustic guitar. A few days later, wearing a white suit, he played an abridged version of the song at the Oscars, accompanied by the house orchestra. James Horner and Will Jennings won the award that night for best song with "My Heart Will Go On" (sung by Celine Dion) from the film Titanic. Smith did not voice disappointment about not winning the award.
Smith commented on the surrealism of the Oscars experience: "That's exactly what it was, surreal... I enjoy performing almost as much as I enjoy making up songs in the first place. But the Oscars was a very strange show, where the set was only one song cut down to less than two minutes, and the audience was a lot of people who didn't come to hear me play. I wouldn't want to live in that world, but it was fun to walk around on the moon for a day."
1998–2000: XO and Figure 8
In 1998, after the success of Either/Or and "Miss Misery", Smith signed to a bigger record label, DreamWorks Records. Around the same time, Smith fell into depression, speaking openly of considering suicide, and on at least one occasion made a serious attempt at ending his own life. While in North Carolina, he became severely intoxicated and ran off a cliff. He landed on a tree, which badly impaled him but broke his fall. When questioned about his suicide attempt, he told an interviewer, "Yeah, I jumped off a cliff, but let's talk about something else."
Christopher Cooper, head of Cavity Search Records (which released Roman Candle), said about this time in Smith's life, "I talked him out of thinking that he wanted to kill himself numerous times when he was in Portland. I kept telling him that he was a brilliant man, and that life was worth living, and that people loved him." Pete Krebs also agreed: "In Portland we got the brunt of Elliott's initial depression... Lots of people have stories of their own experiences of staying up with Elliott 'til five in the morning, holding his hand, telling him not to kill himself."
Smith's first release for DreamWorks was later that year. Titled XO, it was conceived and developed while Smith wrote it out over the winter of 1997/1998, night after night seated at the bar in Luna Lounge. It was produced by the team of Rob Schnapf and Tom Rothrock. XO also contained some instrumentation from Los Angeles musicians Joey Waronker and Jon Brion. It contained a more full-sounding, baroque pop sound than any of his previous efforts, with songs featuring a horn section, Chamberlins, elaborate string arrangements, and even a drum loop on the song "Independence Day". His familiar double-tracked vocal and acoustic guitar style were still apparent while his somewhat personal lyrical style survived. The album went on to peak at number 104 on the Billboard 200 and number 123 on the UK Album Charts, while selling 400,000 copies (more than double that of each of his two Kill Rock Stars releases), becoming the best-selling release of his career. Smith's backing band during most of this period was the Portland-based group Quasi, consisting of former bandmate Sam Coomes on bass guitar and Coomes's ex-wife Janet Weiss on drums. Quasi also performed as the opening act at many shows on the tour, with Smith sometimes contributing bass guitar, guitar, or backing vocals. On October 17, 1998, Smith appeared on Saturday Night Live and performed "Waltz No. 2 (XO)". His backing band for this appearance was John Moen, Jon Brion, Rob Schnapf, and Sam Coomes.
In response to whether the change to a bigger record label would influence his creative control, Smith said, "I think despite the fact that sometimes people look at major labels as simply money-making machines, they're actually composed of individuals who are real people, and there's a part of them that needs to feel that part of their job is to put out good music." Smith also claimed in another interview that he never read his reviews for fear that they would interfere with his songwriting. It was during this period that Smith appeared on Dutch television in 1998 and provided a candid interview in which he spoke of his assessment of his music career until that point:
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I mostly only know things are different because people ask me different questions, but I don't feel like things are very changed. I mean, I still, I do the same things that I did before … I think about the same things, so … I'm the wrong kind of person to be really big and famous.
As part of the Dutch television special, Smith played live versions of "Waltz No. 2 (XO)", "Miss Misery", and "I Didn't Understand"—the latter two songs were performed solely on piano, while the first song was cut short by Smith, as he explained: "I had to stop it because it's… you know, what's the point of playing a song badly? It'd be better to play it and mean it, than to just walk through it."
Smith relocated from Brooklyn to Los Angeles in 1999, taking up residence at a cabin in the Silver Lake section of town, where he would regularly play intimate, acoustic shows at local venues like Silverlake Lounge. He also performed in Toronto in April that year. In the fall, his cover of the Beatles' "Because" was featured in the end credits of DreamWorks' Oscar-winning drama American Beauty, and appeared on the film's soundtrack album.
The final album Smith completed, Figure 8, was released on April 18, 2000. It featured the return of Rothrock, Schnapf, Brion, and Waronker and was partially recorded at Abbey Road Studios in England, with an obvious Beatles influence in the songwriting and production. The album garnered favorable reviews, and peaked at number 99 on the Billboard 200 and 37 on the UK Album Charts. The album received praise for its power pop style and complex arrangements, described as creating a "sweeping kaleidoscope of layered instruments and sonic textures". However, some reviewers felt that Smith's trademark dark and melancholy songwriting had lost some of its subtlety, with one reviewer likening some of the lyrics to "the self-pitying complaints of an adolescent venting in his diary".
Album art and promotional pictures from the period showed Smith looking cleaned-up and put-together. An extensive tour in promotion of the record ensued, book-ended by television appearances on Late Night with Conan O'Brien and the Late Show with David Letterman. However, Smith's condition began to deteriorate as he had become addicted to heroin either towards the end of or just after the Figure 8 tour.
2001–2002: Addiction and scrapped recordings
Around the time he began recording his final album, Smith began to display signs of paranoia, often believing that a white van followed him wherever he went. He would have friends drop him off for recording sessions almost a mile away from the studio, and to reach the location, he would trudge through hundreds of yards of brush and cliffs. He started telling people that DreamWorks was out to get him: "Not long ago my house was broken into, and songs were stolen off my computer which have wound up in the hands of certain people who work at a certain label. I've also been followed around for months at a time. I wouldn't even want to necessarily say it's the people from that label who are following me around, but it was probably them who broke into my house." During this period, Smith hardly ate, subsisting primarily on ice cream. He would go without sleeping for several days and then sleep for an entire day.
A follow-up to Smith's 2000 album was originally planned to happen with Rob Schnapf, but their sessions were abandoned. Smith also began distancing himself from manager Margaret Mittleman, who had handled him since the Roman Candle days. He finally began recording a new album with only himself and Jon Brion as producers sometime during 2001. The pair had recorded a substantial amount of music for the album when Brion stopped the sessions because of Smith's struggle with substance use disorder. Their friendship promptly ended, and Smith scrapped all of their work until that point. He later said "There was even a little more than half of a record done before this new one that I just scrapped because of a blown friendship with someone that made me so depressed I didn't want to hear any of those songs. He was just helping me record the songs and stuff, and then the friendship kind of fell apart all of a sudden one day. It just made it kind of awkward being alone in the car listening to the songs."
When Brion sent a bill for the abandoned sessions to DreamWorks, executives Lenny Waronker and Luke Wood scheduled a meeting with Smith to determine what went wrong with the sessions. Smith complained of intrusion upon his personal life from the label, as well as poor promotion for the Figure 8 album. The talks proved fruitless, and soon after, Smith sent a message to the executives, stating that if they did not release him from his contract, he would take his own life. In May 2001, Smith set out to re-record the album, mostly on his own, but with some help from David McConnell of Goldenboy. McConnell told Spin that, during this time, Smith would smoke over $1,500 worth of heroin and crack per day, would often talk about suicide, and on numerous occasions tried to give himself an overdose. Steven Drozd of The Flaming Lips and Scott McPherson of Sense Field played a few drum tracks, Sam Coomes contributed some bass guitar and backing vocals, but almost every other instrument was recorded by Smith.
Smith's song "Needle in the Hay" was included in Wes Anderson's 2001 dark comedy film The Royal Tenenbaums during a suicide attempt scene. Smith was originally supposed to contribute a cover of The Beatles' "Hey Jude" for the film, but when he failed to do so in time, Anderson had to use The Mutato Muzika Orchestra's version of the track instead. Anderson would later say that Smith "was in a bad state" at the time.
Smith's live performances during 2001 and 2002 were infrequent, typically in the Pacific Northwest or Los Angeles. A review of his December 20, 2001, show at Portland's Crystal Ballroom expressed concern over his appearance and performance: his hair was uncharacteristically greasy and long, his face was bearded and gaunt, and during his songs he exhibited alarming signs of "memory-loss and butterfingers". At another performance in San Francisco that month, the audience began shouting out lyrics when Smith could not remember them.
In the first of only three concerts performed in 2002, Smith co-headlined Northwestern University's A&O Ball with Wilco on May 2 in Chicago. He was onstage for nearly an hour but failed to complete half of the songs. He claimed that his poor performance was due to his left hand having fallen asleep and told the audience it felt "like having stuff on your hand and you can't get it off". Smith's performance was reviewed as "undoubtedly one of the worst performances ever by a musician" and an "excruciating […] nightmare". A reporter for the online magazine Glorious Noise wrote, "It would not surprise me at all if Elliott Smith ends up dead within a year."
On November 25, 2002, Smith was involved in a brawl with the Los Angeles Police Department at a concert where The Flaming Lips and Beck were performing. Smith later said he was defending a man he thought the police were harassing. The officers allegedly beat and arrested him and girlfriend Jennifer Chiba. The two spent the night in jail. Smith's back was injured in the incident, causing him to cancel a number of shows. Wayne Coyne, lead singer of The Flaming Lips and a friend of Smith's, stated concern over Smith's appearance and actions, saying that he "saw a guy who had lost control of himself. He was needy, he was grumpy, he was everything you wouldn't want in a person. It's not like when you think of Keith Richards being pleasantly blissed out in the corner."
2003: Reemergence and From a Basement on the Hill
Smith had attempted to go to rehab several times, but found that he was unable to relate to the popular treatments for people with substance use disorder that used a twelve-step program basis for treatment. "I couldn't do the first step […] I couldn't say what you were supposed to say and mean it." In 2002, Smith went to the Neurotransmitter Restoration Center in Beverly Hills to start a course of treatment for substance use disorder. In one of his final interviews, he spoke about the center, "What they do is an IV treatment where they put a needle in your arm, and you're on a drip bag, but the only thing that's in the drip bag is amino acids and saline solution. I was coming off of a lot of psych meds and other things. I was even on an antipsychotic, although I'm not psychotic."
Two sold-out solo acoustic concerts at Hollywood's Henry Fonda Theater, on January 31 and February 1, 2003, saw Smith attempting to reestablish his credibility as a live performer. Before the show, Smith scrawled "Kali – The Destroyer" (the Hindu goddess associated with time and change) in large block letters with permanent ink on his left arm, which was visible to the crowd during the performance. On several songs, he was backed by a stripped-down drum kit played by Robin Peringer (of the band 764-HERO), and members of opening band Rilo Kiley contributed backing vocals to one song. Near the end of the first show, the musician responded for several minutes after a heckler (later identified as Smith's ex-girlfriend Valerie Deerin) yelled "Get a backbone." Smith played two more Los Angeles concerts during 2003, including The Derby in May and the L.A. Weekly Music Awards in June.
After his 34th birthday on August 6, 2003, he gave up alcohol. Director Mike Mills had been working with Smith during his final years and described Smith's troubles and apparent recovery: "I gave the script to him, then he dropped off the face of the earth […] he went through his whole crazy time, but by the time I was done with the film, he was making From a Basement on the Hill and I was shocked that he was actually making music."
With things improving for Smith after several troubled years, he began experimenting with noise music and worked on his girlfriend Jennifer Chiba's iMac with the intent of learning how to record with computers, noting that it was the only method with which he was still unfamiliar. Smith jokingly labeled his experimental way of recording "The California Frown" (a play on the Beach Boys' "California Sound"). He said of the songs, "They're kind of more noisy with the pitch all distorted. Some are more acoustic, but there aren't too many like that. Lately I've just been making up a lot of noise."
He was also in the process of recording songs for the Thumbsucker soundtrack, including Big Star's "Thirteen" and Cat Stevens's "Trouble". In August 2003, Suicide Squeeze Records put out a limited-edition vinyl single for "Pretty (Ugly Before)", a song that Smith had been playing since the Figure 8 tour.
Smith's final show was at Redfest at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City on September 19, 2003. The final song he played live was "Long, Long, Long" by The Beatles.
2004–present: Posthumous releases
From a Basement on the Hill, almost four years in production, was released on October 19, 2004, by ANTI- Records (a part of Epitaph Records). With Smith's family in control of his estate, they chose to bring in Rob Schnapf and Smith's ex-girlfriend Joanna Bolme to sort through the recordings and mix the album. Although Smith had voiced his desire for it to be a double album or a regular album with a bonus disc, it was not clear whether it would have been possible for him to release it that way had he completed it. As completed by Schnapf and Bolme, it was released as a 15-track single album. Many songs from the sessions (later leaked onto the Internet) were not included, such as "True Love", "Everything's OK", "Stickman", and "Suicide Machine" (a reworking of the Figure 8-era unreleased instrumental "Tiny Time Machine"). There has been unconfirmed speculation that Smith's family made the decision not to include some songs on the record due to their lyrical content, although songs such as "King's Crossing" that deal with darker subjects did make the album.
Elliott Smith and the Big Nothing, a biography by Benjamin Nugent, was rushed to publication shortly after From a Basement on the Hill, shortly after the first anniversary of his death. Smith's family, as well as Joanna Bolme, Jennifer Chiba, Neil Gust, Sam Coomes, and Janet Weiss, all declined to be interviewed. It contained interviews with Rob Schnapf, David McConnell, and Pete Krebs. The book received mixed reviews, with Publishers Weekly remarking that while "Nugent manages to patch together the major beats of Smith's life, he can offer little meaningful insight".
In 2005, a tribute album, A Tribute to Elliott Smith, was released. It featured various bands performing tributes to Smith.
On May 8, 2007, a posthumous two-disc compilation album entitled New Moon was released by Kill Rock Stars. The album contained 24 songs recorded by Smith between 1994 and 1997 during his tenure with the label, songs that were not included on albums, as well as a few early versions and previously released B-sides. In the United States, the album debuted at number 24 on the Billboard 200, selling about 24,000 copies in its first week. The record received favorable reviews and was Metacritic's 15th best-reviewed album of 2007. A portion of the proceeds from album sales were to go to Outside In, a social service agency for low-income adults and homeless youth in Portland, Oregon.
On October 25, 2007, a book titled Elliott Smith was released by Autumn de Wilde, which consists of photographs, handwritten lyrics, and "revealing talks with Smith's inner circle". De Wilde was responsible for the Figure 8 sleeve art, making a landmark and de facto Smith memorial of the Solutions Audio mural. A five-song CD featuring previously unreleased live recordings of Smith performing acoustically at Largo in Los Angeles was included in the release.
Following Smith's death, his estate licensed his songs for use in film and television projects such as One Tree Hill, The Girl Next Door, Georgia Rule, and Paranoid Park.
In a March 2009 interview, Larry Crane said that Smith's estate was defunct and all rights previously held by Smith are now in the control of his parents. Crane went on to say that his parents own the rights to Smith's high school recordings, some of the Heatmiser material, all solo songs recorded until his 1998 record deal with DreamWorks Records, and From a Basement on the Hill. DreamWorks Records was acquired by Universal Music Group in 2003, and Interscope Records currently "owns all studio and live recording from Jan 1998 to his passing, except for the songs on From a Basement on the Hill."
In December 2009, Kill Rock Stars announced that it had obtained the rights to re-release Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill, originally released by Cavity Search and ANTI-, respectively. Roman Candle would be remastered by Larry Crane. Along with the press release, Kill Rock Stars posted a previously unreleased track of Smith's, titled "Cecilia/Amanda", as a free download. Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill were re-released on April 6, 2010, in the US.
A greatest hits compilation titled An Introduction to... Elliott Smith was released in November 2010 by Domino Records (UK) and Kill Rock Stars (US).
In August 2013, there was a memorial concert in Portland, Oregon and three other cities. Attending the Portland show were several musicians Smith had performed with, friends, and an appearance by film director Gus Van Sant.
In 2014, director Paul Thomas Anderson posted a video of the pilot episode for a show called The Jon Brion Show, featuring an acoustic set by Smith including accompaniment by Brion and pianist Brad Mehldau.
On July 17, 2015, a documentary about Smith's life titled Heaven Adores You saw a limited theatrical release. The documentary enlisted a number of close friends and family members, as well as hours of audio interviews throughout Smith's short career. The film was directed by Nickolas Rossi and released through Eagle Rock Entertainment. Heaven Adores You received positive reviews from Consequence of Sound, The Guardian, and The Hollywood Reporter.
On August 6, 2019 (what would have been Smith's 50th birthday), UMe released digital deluxe editions of the two albums XO and Figure 8. The new edition of XO has nine added tracks, including Smith's Oscar-nominated Good Will Hunting song "Miss Misery." Seven tracks have been added to Figure 8. The digital deluxe edition includes "Figure 8"—Smith's cover of the "Schoolhouse Rock!" song—which was originally released only on the Japanese edition of the album. The final track on the new Figure 8 edition is Smith's cover of the Beatles’ "Because", originally featured on the 1999 American Beauty soundtrack.
In May 2021, Smith's life and work were the subject of BBC Radio 4's Great Lives.
Death
Smith died on October 21, 2003, at the age of 34 from two stab wounds to the chest. At the time of the stabbing, he was at his Lemoyne Street home in Echo Park, California, where he lived with his girlfriend, Jennifer Chiba. According to Chiba, the two were arguing, and she locked herself in the bathroom to take a shower. Chiba heard him scream and upon opening the door saw Smith standing with a knife in his chest. She pulled the knife out, after which he collapsed and she called 9-1-1 at 12:18 pm. Smith died in the hospital, with the time of death listed as 1:36 p.m. A possible suicide note, written on a sticky note, read: "I'm so sorry—love, Elliott. God forgive me." In the coroner's report of the note, the name "Elliott" is misspelled as "Elliot". While Smith's death was reported as a suicide, the official autopsy report released in December 2003 left open the question of homicide.
Smith's remains were cremated, and his ashes were divided between his mother, father, and half-sister Ashley. A small memorial service for family and friends was held at his father's home in Portland, although Smith's "ashes weren't on hand because the coroner wouldn't release them." The status or location of Smith's ashes has not been made public.
According to Pitchfork, record producer Larry Crane reported on his Tape Op message board that he had planned to help Smith mix his album in mid-November. Crane wrote, "I hadn't talked to Elliott in over a year. His girlfriend, Jennifer, called me [last week] and asked if I'd like to come to L.A. and help mix and finish [Smith's album]. I said 'yes, of course', and chatted with Elliott for the first time in ages. It seems surreal that he would call me to finish an album and then a week later kill himself. I talked to Jennifer this morning, who was obviously shattered and in tears, and she said, 'I don't understand, he was so healthy. The coroner reported that no traces of illegal substances or alcohol were found in Smith's system at the time of his death but did find prescribed levels of antidepressant, anxiolytic, and ADHD medications, including clonazepam, mirtazapine, atomoxetine, and amphetamine. There were no hesitation wounds, which are typically found on a victim of suicide by self-infliction. Due to the inconclusive autopsy ruling, the Los Angeles Police Department's investigation remains open.
Reaction
Shortly after Smith's death, a fan memorial was initiated outside Solutions Audio (4334 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, California), the site at which the cover of the Figure 8 album was shot. Farewell messages to Smith were written on the wall, and flowers, photos, candles, and empty bottles of alcohol mentioned in Smith's songs were left. Since then, the wall has been a regular target for graffiti but is regularly restored by fans.
Memorial concerts were held in several cities in the United States and the United Kingdom. A petition was soon put forth with intent to make part of the Silver Lake area a memorial park in Smith's honor. It received over 10,000 signatures, but no plans to establish the park have been announced. A memorial plaque located inside Smith's former high school, Lincoln High, was hung in July 2006. The plaque reads: "I'm never going to know you now, but I'm going to love you anyhow" referencing Smith's song "Waltz No. 2 (XO)".
Since Smith's death, many musical acts have paid him tribute. Songs in tribute to, or about, Smith have been released by Pearl Jam ("Can't Keep" on the Live at Benaroya Hall concert album); Sparta ("Bombs and Us"); Third Eye Blind ("There's No Hurry to Eternity", originally titled "Elliott Smith", on the Live from Nowhere Near You, Volume Two: Pacific Northwest compilation); 9 Horses (“listening to the Elliott Smith discography in reverse order”, on the album Perfectest Herald); Ben Folds ("Late" on Songs for Silverman); Brad Mehldau ("Sky Turning Grey (for Elliott Smith)" on Highway Rider); Rilo Kiley ("It Just Is", and "Ripchord" from the album More Adventurous); Lil B's 'The Worlds Ending'; Rhett Miller ("The Believer" on The Believer); Earlimart ("Heaven Adores You" on Treble and Tremble); Joan As Police Woman ("We Don't Own It" on Real Life); and Pete Yorn ("Bandstand in the Sky" on Nightcrawler, a song jointly dedicated to Jeff Buckley). Several tribute albums have also been released since his death, including Christopher O'Riley's 2006 Home to Oblivion: An Elliott Smith Tribute, with 18 instrumental covers, The Portland Cello Project's 2014 to e.s., covering six of his songs and To Elliott, from Portland containing covers by a number of Portland bands.
On July 30, 2004, Chiba filed a lawsuit against the Smith family for 15% of his earnings (over $1 million), claiming that she and Smith lived as "husband and wife", that Smith had pledged to take care of her financially for the rest of her life, and that she worked as his manager and agent from around 2000 until his death. A state labor commissioner ruled her claim as manager to be invalid, as she had worked as an "unlicensed talent agent" under California's Talent Agencies Act. The case made it to the California appellate court in October 2007, but the decision was affirmed 2–1.
In an October 2013 Spin magazine article—a reflection at the ten-year anniversary of Smith's death—drummer McPherson stated that Smith was "a sick man without his medicine" during the last 31 days of his life, when he was not only sober, but had also given up red meat and sugar. In the same article, Chiba recalls thinking, "Okay, you're asking a lot of yourself. You're giving up a lot at once." Chiba further explained that "anyone who understands drug abuse knows that you use drugs to hide from your past or sedate yourself from strong, overwhelming feelings. So when you're newly clean and coming off the medications that have been masking all those feelings, that's when you're the most vulnerable." Writing for Spin, Liam Gowing also encountered a local musician who claimed Smith had said to him: "The people who try to intervene, they're good people who genuinely care about you. But they don't know what you're going through. Do what you need to do." According to the musician, Smith had adamantly dissuaded him from suicide.
Musical style and influences
Smith respected and was inspired by many artists and styles, including the Beatles, Neil Young, Simon & Garfunkel, Big Star, the Clash, the Who, Led Zeppelin, the Kinks, Pink Floyd, Nick Drake, Rush, Bauhaus, Elvis Costello, Oasis, Television, Motown and flamenco records, AC/DC, Hank Williams, and Scorpions, Smith claimed to listen exclusively to selected albums (such as The Marble Index by Nico) for months. Sean Croghan, a former roommate of Smith's, said that Smith "listened almost exclusively to slow jams" in his senior year at college. Smith also took inspiration from novels, religion, and philosophy. He liked classic literature, especially Samuel Beckett, T. S. Eliot, and Russian novelists such as Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
Smith mentioned his admiration for Bob Dylan in several interviews, citing him as an early influence. He once commented: "My father taught me how to play 'Don't Think Twice, It's All Right'. I love Dylan's words, but even more than that, I love the fact that he loves words." Smith covered Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece" several times in concert. Smith has also been compared to folk singer Nick Drake, due to his fingerpicking style and vocals. Darryl Cater of AllMusic called references to "the definitive folk loner" Drake "inevitable", and Smith's lyrics have been compared to those in Drake's minimalist and haunting final album.
Smith was a dedicated fan of the Beatles (as well as their solo projects), once noting that he had been listening to them frequently since he was about "four years old" and also claimed that hearing The White Album was his original inspiration to become a musician. In 1998, Smith contributed a cover of the Beatles song "Because" to the closing credits and soundtrack of the film American Beauty. Although this was the only Beatles song that Smith ever officially released, he is known to have recorded many others, ("Revolution", "I'll Be Back" and "I'm So Tired") and played many songs by both the band and the members' solo projects at live concerts.
Smith said that transitions were his favorite part of songs and that he preferred to write broader, more impressionistic music closer to pop rather than folk music. Smith compared his songs to stories or dreams, not purely confessional pieces that people could relate to. When asked about the dark nature of his songwriting and the cult following he was gaining, Smith said he felt it was merely a product of his writing songs that were strongly meaningful to him rather than anything contrived. Larry Crane, Smith's posthumous archivist, has said that he was surprised at the amount of "recycling of musical ideas" he encountered while cataloging Smith's private tapes: "I found songs recorded in high school reworked 15 years on. Lyrics became more important to him as he became older, and more time was spent working on them."
Legacy
Since his death, Smith has been regarded as one of the most influential artists in indie music. Many artists have mentioned Smith as their influence, such as Frank Ocean, Beck, Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker, and Haim's lead vocalist Danielle Haim.
See also
List of unsolved deaths
Discography
Studio albums
Roman Candle (1994)
Elliott Smith (1995)
Either/Or (1997)
XO (1998)
Figure 8 (2000)
Posthumous studio albums
From a Basement on the Hill (2004)
Compilation albums
New Moon (2007)
References
Bibliography
External links
Official website
Official Cavity Search Records website
Official Kill Rock Stars website
Elliott Smith collection at the Internet Archive's live music archive
Keep the Things You Forgot: An Elliott Smith Oral History
1969 births
2003 deaths
Unsolved deaths
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American singers
20th-century American writers
21st-century American singers
21st-century American writers
Alternative rock guitarists
Alternative rock singers
American feminists
American indie rock musicians
American male guitarists
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
American tenors
Anti- (record label) artists
Caroline Records artists
Cavity Search Records artists
Deaths by stabbing in California
Domino Recording Company artists
DreamWorks Records artists
Feminist musicians
Fingerstyle guitarists
Guitarists from Los Angeles
Guitarists from Nebraska
Guitarists from New York City
Guitarists from Oklahoma
Guitarists from Oregon
Guitarists from Texas
Hampshire College alumni
Indie folk musicians
Kill Rock Stars artists
Lincoln High School (Portland, Oregon) alumni
Male feminists
Musicians from Brooklyn
Musicians from Omaha, Nebraska
Musicians from Portland, Oregon
People from Duncanville, Texas
People from Echo Park, Los Angeles
People with mood disorders
Singers from Los Angeles
Singers from New York City
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Suicide Squeeze Records artists
Virgin Records artists
20th-century American male singers
Singer-songwriters from California
Singer-songwriters from New York (state)
Singer-songwriters from Oklahoma
Singer-songwriters from Nebraska | true | [
"Jackson Rogow (born October 5, 1991) is an American actor. He is best known for starring in the Cartoon Network live action series Dude, What Would Happen?\n\nCareer\nRogow was on Dude, What Would Happen on Cartoon Network until it was cancelled in 2011. Rogow was also on the Lego Top Secret Project after The Yoda Chronicles on Cartoon Network.\n\nPersonal life\nRogow resides in Bel Air, Los Angeles, California.\n\nFilmography\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\nLiving people\n1991 births\nPeople from Kissimmee, Florida\nPeople from Bel Air, Los Angeles\nLos Angeles County High School for the Arts alumni\nAmerican male television actors",
"James P. Flynn (born February 5, 1934) is an American teamster and film actor. He was a reputed member of the famous Winter Hill Gang. He has been in films including Good Will Hunting, The Cider House Rules and What's the Worst That Could Happen?.\n\nBiography\nJames P. Flynn was born in Somerville, Massachusetts.\n\nIn 1982, Flynn was wrongly identified as a shooter in the murder of Winter Hill Gang mob associate Brian \"Balloonhead\" Halloran and attempted murder of Michael Donahue. He was tried and acquitted for the murder in 1986 after being framed by John Connolly and James J. Bulger.\n\nFlynn was a part of Boston's International Brotherhood of Teamsters Local 25 labor union where he later ran the organization's movie production crew. He has also been the Teamster Union's transportation coordinator and transportation captain in the transportation department on numerous films, including The Departed, Fever Pitch and Jumanji.\n\nFlynn appeared in many films shot in the New England area. In show business he goes by the name 'James P. Flynn'. Flynn was cast as a judge in the Boston-based film Good Will Hunting in 1997. Later, he acted in the 1999 film The Cider House Rules and What's the Worst That Could Happen? in 2001. He was also a truck driver for movie production equipment during the filming of My Best Friend's Girl in 2008. Boston actor Tom Kemp remarked: \"[The film The Departed] wouldn't be a Boston movie without me, a Wahlberg, and Jimmy Flynn from the teamsters.\"\n\nFilmography\nGood Will Hunting (1997) as Judge George H. Malone\nThe Cider House Rules (1999) as Vernon\nWhat's the Worst That Could Happen? (2001) as the Fire Captain\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\n1934 births\nLiving people\nMale actors from Boston\nWinter Hill Gang"
] |
[
"Elliott Smith",
"1991-96: Heatmiser",
"Who was Elliott Smith",
"While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust.",
"What was the number one song from that album",
"I don't know.",
"What happen in 1991",
"Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science.",
"What else happen with the album",
"The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records.",
"Did they hit the charts",
"I don't know.",
"What happen in 1996",
"They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996)."
] | C_16dab7caf44f4fb980071052066a2132_1 | Did they win any awards | 7 | Did Heatmiser win any awards? | Elliott Smith | Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory". While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996). Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees, and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant". Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to the release of Mic City Sons, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Steven Paul Smith (August 6, 1969 – October 21, 2003), known professionally as Elliott Smith, was an American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. Smith was born in Omaha, Nebraska, raised primarily in Texas, and lived much of his life in Portland, Oregon, where he first gained popularity. Smith's primary instrument was the guitar, though he also played piano, clarinet, bass guitar, drums, and harmonica. Smith had a distinctive vocal style, characterized by his "whispery, spiderweb-thin delivery", and often used multi-tracking to create vocal layers, textures, and harmonies.
After playing in the rock band Heatmiser for several years, Smith began his solo career in 1994, with releases on the independent record labels Cavity Search and Kill Rock Stars (KRS). In 1997, he signed a contract with DreamWorks Records, for which he recorded two albums. Smith rose to mainstream prominence when his song "Miss Misery"—included in the soundtrack for the film Good Will Hunting (1997)—was nominated for an Oscar in the Best Original Song category in 1998.
Smith was a heavy drinker and drug user at times throughout his life, and was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and depression. His struggles with drugs and mental illness affected his life and work, and often appeared in his lyrics. In 2003, aged 34, he died in Los Angeles, California, from two stab wounds to the chest. The autopsy evidence was inconclusive as to whether the wounds were self-inflicted or the result of homicide. At the time of his death, Smith was working on his sixth studio album, From a Basement on the Hill, which was posthumously produced and released in 2004.
Early life
Steven Paul Smith was born at the Methodist Hospital in Omaha, Nebraska, the only child of Gary Smith, a student at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, and Bunny Kay Berryman, an elementary school music teacher. His parents divorced when he was six months old, and Smith moved with his mother to Duncanville, Texas. Smith later had a tattoo of a map of Texas drawn on his upper arm and said: "I didn't get it because I like Texas, kind of the opposite. But I won't forget about it, although I'm tempted to because I don't like it there."
Smith endured a difficult childhood and a troubled relationship with his stepfather Charlie Welch. Smith stated he may have been sexually abused by Welch at a young age, an allegation that Welch has denied. He wrote about this part of his life in "Some Song". The name "Charlie" also appears in songs "Flowers for Charlie" and "No Confidence Man." In a 2004 interview, Jennifer Chiba, Smith's partner at the time of his death, said that Smith's difficult childhood was partly why he needed to sedate himself with drugs as an adult: "He was remembering traumatic things from his childhood – parts of things. It's not my place to say what."
For much of his childhood, Smith's family was a part of the Community of Christ but began attending services at a local Methodist church. Smith felt that going to church did little for him, except make him "really scared of Hell". In 2001, he said: "I don't necessarily buy into any officially structured version of spirituality. But I have my own version of it."
Smith began playing piano at age nine, and at ten began learning guitar on a small acoustic guitar bought for him by his father. At this age he composed an original piano piece, "Fantasy", which won him a prize at an arts festival. Many of the people on his mother's side of the family were non-professional musicians; his grandfather was a Dixieland drummer, and his grandmother sang in a glee club.
At fourteen, Smith left his mother's home in Texas and moved to Portland, Oregon, to live with his father, who was then working as a psychiatrist. It was around this time that Smith began using drugs, including alcohol, with friends. He also began experimenting with recording for the first time after borrowing a four-track recorder. At high school, Smith played clarinet in the school band and played guitar and piano; he also sang in the bands Stranger Than Fiction and A Murder of Crows, billed as either Steven Smith or "Johnny Panic". He graduated from Lincoln High School as a National Merit Scholar.
After graduation, Smith began calling himself "Elliott", saying that he thought "Steve" sounded too much like a "jock" name, and that "Steven" sounded "too bookish". According to friends, he had also used the pseudonym "Elliott Stillwater-Rotter" during his time in the band A Murder of Crows. Biographer S. R. Shutt speculates that the name was either inspired by Elliott Avenue, a street that Smith had lived on in Portland, or that it was suggested by his then-girlfriend. A junior high acquaintance of Smith speculates Smith changed his name so as not to be confused with Steve Smith, the drummer of Journey.
Career
1991–1996: Heatmiser
In 1991 Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory".
While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust. After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records. They were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996).
Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees, and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant".
Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band. Heatmiser disbanded prior to the release of Mic City Sons, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO.
1994: Roman Candle
In the early 1990s, Smith's girlfriend at the time convinced him to send a tape of songs he had recently recorded on a borrowed four-track to Cavity Search Records. Cavity owner Christopher Cooper asked to release the entire album of songs, which surprised Smith, as he was expecting only a deal for a seven-inch record. The album became Smith's release, Roman Candle (1994).
Smith said: "I thought my head would be chopped off immediately when it came out because at the time it was so opposite to the grunge thing that was popular ... The thing is that album was really well received, which was a total shock, and it immediately eclipsed [Heatmiser], unfortunately." Smith felt his solo songs were not representative of the music Heatmiser was making: "The idea of playing [my music] for people didn't occur to me... because at the time it was the Northwest—Mudhoney and Nirvana—and going out to play an acoustic show was like crawling out on a limb and begging for it to be sawed off."
One of Smith's first solo performances was at the now-defunct Umbra Penumbra on September 17, 1994. Only three songs from Roman Candle were performed, with the majority of the ten-song set being B-sides, Heatmiser tunes and unreleased tracks. The same year, Smith released a split 7-inch record with Pete Krebs via Slo-Mo Records, contributing the track "No Confidence Man".
1995–1997: Elliott Smith and Either/Or
In 1995, Smith's self-titled album was released on Kill Rock Stars; the record featured a style of recording similar to Roman Candle, but with hints of growth and experimentation. Though the majority of the album was recorded by Smith alone, friend and The Spinanes vocalist Rebecca Gates sang harmony vocals on "St. Ides Heaven", and Heatmiser guitarist Neil Gust played guitar on "Single File". Several songs made reference to drugs, but Smith explained that he used the theme of drugs as a vehicle for conveying dependence rather than the songs being about drugs specifically. Looking back, Smith felt that the album's pervasive mood gave him "a reputation for being a really dark, depressed person" and said that he later made a conscious move toward more diverse moods in his music.
In 1996, filmmaker Jem Cohen recorded Smith playing acoustic songs for the short film Lucky Three: An Elliott Smith Portrait. Two of these songs would appear on his next album, Either/Or, which was another Kill Rock Stars release. Either/Or came out in 1997 to favorable reviews. The album found Smith venturing further into full instrumentation, with several songs containing bass guitar, drums, keyboards, and electric guitars, all played by Smith. The album title was derived from the two-volume book of the same name by Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, whose works generally deal with themes such as existential despair, angst, death, and God.
By this time, Smith's already-heavy drinking was being compounded with use of antidepressants. At the end of the Either/Or tour, some of his close friends staged an intervention in Chicago, but it proved ineffective. Shortly after, Smith relocated from Portland to Jersey City, New Jersey, and later Brooklyn, New York.
1997–98: "Miss Misery" and the Oscars
In 1997, Smith was selected by director and fellow Portland resident Gus Van Sant to be a part of the soundtrack to his film, Good Will Hunting. Smith recorded an orchestral version of "Between the Bars" with composer Danny Elfman for the movie. Smith also contributed a new song, "Miss Misery", and three previously released tracks ("No Name #3", from Roman Candle, and "Angeles" and "Say Yes", from Either/Or). The film was a commercial and critical success, and Smith was nominated for an Academy Award for "Miss Misery". Not eager to step into the limelight, he agreed to perform the song at the ceremony only after the producers informed him that if he was unwilling to perform, they would choose someone else to play it.
On March 5, 1998, Smith made his network television debut on Late Night with Conan O'Brien performing "Miss Misery" solo on acoustic guitar. A few days later, wearing a white suit, he played an abridged version of the song at the Oscars, accompanied by the house orchestra. James Horner and Will Jennings won the award that night for best song with "My Heart Will Go On" (sung by Celine Dion) from the film Titanic. Smith did not voice disappointment about not winning the award.
Smith commented on the surrealism of the Oscars experience: "That's exactly what it was, surreal... I enjoy performing almost as much as I enjoy making up songs in the first place. But the Oscars was a very strange show, where the set was only one song cut down to less than two minutes, and the audience was a lot of people who didn't come to hear me play. I wouldn't want to live in that world, but it was fun to walk around on the moon for a day."
1998–2000: XO and Figure 8
In 1998, after the success of Either/Or and "Miss Misery", Smith signed to a bigger record label, DreamWorks Records. Around the same time, Smith fell into depression, speaking openly of considering suicide, and on at least one occasion made a serious attempt at ending his own life. While in North Carolina, he became severely intoxicated and ran off a cliff. He landed on a tree, which badly impaled him but broke his fall. When questioned about his suicide attempt, he told an interviewer, "Yeah, I jumped off a cliff, but let's talk about something else."
Christopher Cooper, head of Cavity Search Records (which released Roman Candle), said about this time in Smith's life, "I talked him out of thinking that he wanted to kill himself numerous times when he was in Portland. I kept telling him that he was a brilliant man, and that life was worth living, and that people loved him." Pete Krebs also agreed: "In Portland we got the brunt of Elliott's initial depression... Lots of people have stories of their own experiences of staying up with Elliott 'til five in the morning, holding his hand, telling him not to kill himself."
Smith's first release for DreamWorks was later that year. Titled XO, it was conceived and developed while Smith wrote it out over the winter of 1997/1998, night after night seated at the bar in Luna Lounge. It was produced by the team of Rob Schnapf and Tom Rothrock. XO also contained some instrumentation from Los Angeles musicians Joey Waronker and Jon Brion. It contained a more full-sounding, baroque pop sound than any of his previous efforts, with songs featuring a horn section, Chamberlins, elaborate string arrangements, and even a drum loop on the song "Independence Day". His familiar double-tracked vocal and acoustic guitar style were still apparent while his somewhat personal lyrical style survived. The album went on to peak at number 104 on the Billboard 200 and number 123 on the UK Album Charts, while selling 400,000 copies (more than double that of each of his two Kill Rock Stars releases), becoming the best-selling release of his career. Smith's backing band during most of this period was the Portland-based group Quasi, consisting of former bandmate Sam Coomes on bass guitar and Coomes's ex-wife Janet Weiss on drums. Quasi also performed as the opening act at many shows on the tour, with Smith sometimes contributing bass guitar, guitar, or backing vocals. On October 17, 1998, Smith appeared on Saturday Night Live and performed "Waltz No. 2 (XO)". His backing band for this appearance was John Moen, Jon Brion, Rob Schnapf, and Sam Coomes.
In response to whether the change to a bigger record label would influence his creative control, Smith said, "I think despite the fact that sometimes people look at major labels as simply money-making machines, they're actually composed of individuals who are real people, and there's a part of them that needs to feel that part of their job is to put out good music." Smith also claimed in another interview that he never read his reviews for fear that they would interfere with his songwriting. It was during this period that Smith appeared on Dutch television in 1998 and provided a candid interview in which he spoke of his assessment of his music career until that point:
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I mostly only know things are different because people ask me different questions, but I don't feel like things are very changed. I mean, I still, I do the same things that I did before … I think about the same things, so … I'm the wrong kind of person to be really big and famous.
As part of the Dutch television special, Smith played live versions of "Waltz No. 2 (XO)", "Miss Misery", and "I Didn't Understand"—the latter two songs were performed solely on piano, while the first song was cut short by Smith, as he explained: "I had to stop it because it's… you know, what's the point of playing a song badly? It'd be better to play it and mean it, than to just walk through it."
Smith relocated from Brooklyn to Los Angeles in 1999, taking up residence at a cabin in the Silver Lake section of town, where he would regularly play intimate, acoustic shows at local venues like Silverlake Lounge. He also performed in Toronto in April that year. In the fall, his cover of the Beatles' "Because" was featured in the end credits of DreamWorks' Oscar-winning drama American Beauty, and appeared on the film's soundtrack album.
The final album Smith completed, Figure 8, was released on April 18, 2000. It featured the return of Rothrock, Schnapf, Brion, and Waronker and was partially recorded at Abbey Road Studios in England, with an obvious Beatles influence in the songwriting and production. The album garnered favorable reviews, and peaked at number 99 on the Billboard 200 and 37 on the UK Album Charts. The album received praise for its power pop style and complex arrangements, described as creating a "sweeping kaleidoscope of layered instruments and sonic textures". However, some reviewers felt that Smith's trademark dark and melancholy songwriting had lost some of its subtlety, with one reviewer likening some of the lyrics to "the self-pitying complaints of an adolescent venting in his diary".
Album art and promotional pictures from the period showed Smith looking cleaned-up and put-together. An extensive tour in promotion of the record ensued, book-ended by television appearances on Late Night with Conan O'Brien and the Late Show with David Letterman. However, Smith's condition began to deteriorate as he had become addicted to heroin either towards the end of or just after the Figure 8 tour.
2001–2002: Addiction and scrapped recordings
Around the time he began recording his final album, Smith began to display signs of paranoia, often believing that a white van followed him wherever he went. He would have friends drop him off for recording sessions almost a mile away from the studio, and to reach the location, he would trudge through hundreds of yards of brush and cliffs. He started telling people that DreamWorks was out to get him: "Not long ago my house was broken into, and songs were stolen off my computer which have wound up in the hands of certain people who work at a certain label. I've also been followed around for months at a time. I wouldn't even want to necessarily say it's the people from that label who are following me around, but it was probably them who broke into my house." During this period, Smith hardly ate, subsisting primarily on ice cream. He would go without sleeping for several days and then sleep for an entire day.
A follow-up to Smith's 2000 album was originally planned to happen with Rob Schnapf, but their sessions were abandoned. Smith also began distancing himself from manager Margaret Mittleman, who had handled him since the Roman Candle days. He finally began recording a new album with only himself and Jon Brion as producers sometime during 2001. The pair had recorded a substantial amount of music for the album when Brion stopped the sessions because of Smith's struggle with substance use disorder. Their friendship promptly ended, and Smith scrapped all of their work until that point. He later said "There was even a little more than half of a record done before this new one that I just scrapped because of a blown friendship with someone that made me so depressed I didn't want to hear any of those songs. He was just helping me record the songs and stuff, and then the friendship kind of fell apart all of a sudden one day. It just made it kind of awkward being alone in the car listening to the songs."
When Brion sent a bill for the abandoned sessions to DreamWorks, executives Lenny Waronker and Luke Wood scheduled a meeting with Smith to determine what went wrong with the sessions. Smith complained of intrusion upon his personal life from the label, as well as poor promotion for the Figure 8 album. The talks proved fruitless, and soon after, Smith sent a message to the executives, stating that if they did not release him from his contract, he would take his own life. In May 2001, Smith set out to re-record the album, mostly on his own, but with some help from David McConnell of Goldenboy. McConnell told Spin that, during this time, Smith would smoke over $1,500 worth of heroin and crack per day, would often talk about suicide, and on numerous occasions tried to give himself an overdose. Steven Drozd of The Flaming Lips and Scott McPherson of Sense Field played a few drum tracks, Sam Coomes contributed some bass guitar and backing vocals, but almost every other instrument was recorded by Smith.
Smith's song "Needle in the Hay" was included in Wes Anderson's 2001 dark comedy film The Royal Tenenbaums during a suicide attempt scene. Smith was originally supposed to contribute a cover of The Beatles' "Hey Jude" for the film, but when he failed to do so in time, Anderson had to use The Mutato Muzika Orchestra's version of the track instead. Anderson would later say that Smith "was in a bad state" at the time.
Smith's live performances during 2001 and 2002 were infrequent, typically in the Pacific Northwest or Los Angeles. A review of his December 20, 2001, show at Portland's Crystal Ballroom expressed concern over his appearance and performance: his hair was uncharacteristically greasy and long, his face was bearded and gaunt, and during his songs he exhibited alarming signs of "memory-loss and butterfingers". At another performance in San Francisco that month, the audience began shouting out lyrics when Smith could not remember them.
In the first of only three concerts performed in 2002, Smith co-headlined Northwestern University's A&O Ball with Wilco on May 2 in Chicago. He was onstage for nearly an hour but failed to complete half of the songs. He claimed that his poor performance was due to his left hand having fallen asleep and told the audience it felt "like having stuff on your hand and you can't get it off". Smith's performance was reviewed as "undoubtedly one of the worst performances ever by a musician" and an "excruciating […] nightmare". A reporter for the online magazine Glorious Noise wrote, "It would not surprise me at all if Elliott Smith ends up dead within a year."
On November 25, 2002, Smith was involved in a brawl with the Los Angeles Police Department at a concert where The Flaming Lips and Beck were performing. Smith later said he was defending a man he thought the police were harassing. The officers allegedly beat and arrested him and girlfriend Jennifer Chiba. The two spent the night in jail. Smith's back was injured in the incident, causing him to cancel a number of shows. Wayne Coyne, lead singer of The Flaming Lips and a friend of Smith's, stated concern over Smith's appearance and actions, saying that he "saw a guy who had lost control of himself. He was needy, he was grumpy, he was everything you wouldn't want in a person. It's not like when you think of Keith Richards being pleasantly blissed out in the corner."
2003: Reemergence and From a Basement on the Hill
Smith had attempted to go to rehab several times, but found that he was unable to relate to the popular treatments for people with substance use disorder that used a twelve-step program basis for treatment. "I couldn't do the first step […] I couldn't say what you were supposed to say and mean it." In 2002, Smith went to the Neurotransmitter Restoration Center in Beverly Hills to start a course of treatment for substance use disorder. In one of his final interviews, he spoke about the center, "What they do is an IV treatment where they put a needle in your arm, and you're on a drip bag, but the only thing that's in the drip bag is amino acids and saline solution. I was coming off of a lot of psych meds and other things. I was even on an antipsychotic, although I'm not psychotic."
Two sold-out solo acoustic concerts at Hollywood's Henry Fonda Theater, on January 31 and February 1, 2003, saw Smith attempting to reestablish his credibility as a live performer. Before the show, Smith scrawled "Kali – The Destroyer" (the Hindu goddess associated with time and change) in large block letters with permanent ink on his left arm, which was visible to the crowd during the performance. On several songs, he was backed by a stripped-down drum kit played by Robin Peringer (of the band 764-HERO), and members of opening band Rilo Kiley contributed backing vocals to one song. Near the end of the first show, the musician responded for several minutes after a heckler (later identified as Smith's ex-girlfriend Valerie Deerin) yelled "Get a backbone." Smith played two more Los Angeles concerts during 2003, including The Derby in May and the L.A. Weekly Music Awards in June.
After his 34th birthday on August 6, 2003, he gave up alcohol. Director Mike Mills had been working with Smith during his final years and described Smith's troubles and apparent recovery: "I gave the script to him, then he dropped off the face of the earth […] he went through his whole crazy time, but by the time I was done with the film, he was making From a Basement on the Hill and I was shocked that he was actually making music."
With things improving for Smith after several troubled years, he began experimenting with noise music and worked on his girlfriend Jennifer Chiba's iMac with the intent of learning how to record with computers, noting that it was the only method with which he was still unfamiliar. Smith jokingly labeled his experimental way of recording "The California Frown" (a play on the Beach Boys' "California Sound"). He said of the songs, "They're kind of more noisy with the pitch all distorted. Some are more acoustic, but there aren't too many like that. Lately I've just been making up a lot of noise."
He was also in the process of recording songs for the Thumbsucker soundtrack, including Big Star's "Thirteen" and Cat Stevens's "Trouble". In August 2003, Suicide Squeeze Records put out a limited-edition vinyl single for "Pretty (Ugly Before)", a song that Smith had been playing since the Figure 8 tour.
Smith's final show was at Redfest at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City on September 19, 2003. The final song he played live was "Long, Long, Long" by The Beatles.
2004–present: Posthumous releases
From a Basement on the Hill, almost four years in production, was released on October 19, 2004, by ANTI- Records (a part of Epitaph Records). With Smith's family in control of his estate, they chose to bring in Rob Schnapf and Smith's ex-girlfriend Joanna Bolme to sort through the recordings and mix the album. Although Smith had voiced his desire for it to be a double album or a regular album with a bonus disc, it was not clear whether it would have been possible for him to release it that way had he completed it. As completed by Schnapf and Bolme, it was released as a 15-track single album. Many songs from the sessions (later leaked onto the Internet) were not included, such as "True Love", "Everything's OK", "Stickman", and "Suicide Machine" (a reworking of the Figure 8-era unreleased instrumental "Tiny Time Machine"). There has been unconfirmed speculation that Smith's family made the decision not to include some songs on the record due to their lyrical content, although songs such as "King's Crossing" that deal with darker subjects did make the album.
Elliott Smith and the Big Nothing, a biography by Benjamin Nugent, was rushed to publication shortly after From a Basement on the Hill, shortly after the first anniversary of his death. Smith's family, as well as Joanna Bolme, Jennifer Chiba, Neil Gust, Sam Coomes, and Janet Weiss, all declined to be interviewed. It contained interviews with Rob Schnapf, David McConnell, and Pete Krebs. The book received mixed reviews, with Publishers Weekly remarking that while "Nugent manages to patch together the major beats of Smith's life, he can offer little meaningful insight".
In 2005, a tribute album, A Tribute to Elliott Smith, was released. It featured various bands performing tributes to Smith.
On May 8, 2007, a posthumous two-disc compilation album entitled New Moon was released by Kill Rock Stars. The album contained 24 songs recorded by Smith between 1994 and 1997 during his tenure with the label, songs that were not included on albums, as well as a few early versions and previously released B-sides. In the United States, the album debuted at number 24 on the Billboard 200, selling about 24,000 copies in its first week. The record received favorable reviews and was Metacritic's 15th best-reviewed album of 2007. A portion of the proceeds from album sales were to go to Outside In, a social service agency for low-income adults and homeless youth in Portland, Oregon.
On October 25, 2007, a book titled Elliott Smith was released by Autumn de Wilde, which consists of photographs, handwritten lyrics, and "revealing talks with Smith's inner circle". De Wilde was responsible for the Figure 8 sleeve art, making a landmark and de facto Smith memorial of the Solutions Audio mural. A five-song CD featuring previously unreleased live recordings of Smith performing acoustically at Largo in Los Angeles was included in the release.
Following Smith's death, his estate licensed his songs for use in film and television projects such as One Tree Hill, The Girl Next Door, Georgia Rule, and Paranoid Park.
In a March 2009 interview, Larry Crane said that Smith's estate was defunct and all rights previously held by Smith are now in the control of his parents. Crane went on to say that his parents own the rights to Smith's high school recordings, some of the Heatmiser material, all solo songs recorded until his 1998 record deal with DreamWorks Records, and From a Basement on the Hill. DreamWorks Records was acquired by Universal Music Group in 2003, and Interscope Records currently "owns all studio and live recording from Jan 1998 to his passing, except for the songs on From a Basement on the Hill."
In December 2009, Kill Rock Stars announced that it had obtained the rights to re-release Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill, originally released by Cavity Search and ANTI-, respectively. Roman Candle would be remastered by Larry Crane. Along with the press release, Kill Rock Stars posted a previously unreleased track of Smith's, titled "Cecilia/Amanda", as a free download. Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill were re-released on April 6, 2010, in the US.
A greatest hits compilation titled An Introduction to... Elliott Smith was released in November 2010 by Domino Records (UK) and Kill Rock Stars (US).
In August 2013, there was a memorial concert in Portland, Oregon and three other cities. Attending the Portland show were several musicians Smith had performed with, friends, and an appearance by film director Gus Van Sant.
In 2014, director Paul Thomas Anderson posted a video of the pilot episode for a show called The Jon Brion Show, featuring an acoustic set by Smith including accompaniment by Brion and pianist Brad Mehldau.
On July 17, 2015, a documentary about Smith's life titled Heaven Adores You saw a limited theatrical release. The documentary enlisted a number of close friends and family members, as well as hours of audio interviews throughout Smith's short career. The film was directed by Nickolas Rossi and released through Eagle Rock Entertainment. Heaven Adores You received positive reviews from Consequence of Sound, The Guardian, and The Hollywood Reporter.
On August 6, 2019 (what would have been Smith's 50th birthday), UMe released digital deluxe editions of the two albums XO and Figure 8. The new edition of XO has nine added tracks, including Smith's Oscar-nominated Good Will Hunting song "Miss Misery." Seven tracks have been added to Figure 8. The digital deluxe edition includes "Figure 8"—Smith's cover of the "Schoolhouse Rock!" song—which was originally released only on the Japanese edition of the album. The final track on the new Figure 8 edition is Smith's cover of the Beatles’ "Because", originally featured on the 1999 American Beauty soundtrack.
In May 2021, Smith's life and work were the subject of BBC Radio 4's Great Lives.
Death
Smith died on October 21, 2003, at the age of 34 from two stab wounds to the chest. At the time of the stabbing, he was at his Lemoyne Street home in Echo Park, California, where he lived with his girlfriend, Jennifer Chiba. According to Chiba, the two were arguing, and she locked herself in the bathroom to take a shower. Chiba heard him scream and upon opening the door saw Smith standing with a knife in his chest. She pulled the knife out, after which he collapsed and she called 9-1-1 at 12:18 pm. Smith died in the hospital, with the time of death listed as 1:36 p.m. A possible suicide note, written on a sticky note, read: "I'm so sorry—love, Elliott. God forgive me." In the coroner's report of the note, the name "Elliott" is misspelled as "Elliot". While Smith's death was reported as a suicide, the official autopsy report released in December 2003 left open the question of homicide.
Smith's remains were cremated, and his ashes were divided between his mother, father, and half-sister Ashley. A small memorial service for family and friends was held at his father's home in Portland, although Smith's "ashes weren't on hand because the coroner wouldn't release them." The status or location of Smith's ashes has not been made public.
According to Pitchfork, record producer Larry Crane reported on his Tape Op message board that he had planned to help Smith mix his album in mid-November. Crane wrote, "I hadn't talked to Elliott in over a year. His girlfriend, Jennifer, called me [last week] and asked if I'd like to come to L.A. and help mix and finish [Smith's album]. I said 'yes, of course', and chatted with Elliott for the first time in ages. It seems surreal that he would call me to finish an album and then a week later kill himself. I talked to Jennifer this morning, who was obviously shattered and in tears, and she said, 'I don't understand, he was so healthy. The coroner reported that no traces of illegal substances or alcohol were found in Smith's system at the time of his death but did find prescribed levels of antidepressant, anxiolytic, and ADHD medications, including clonazepam, mirtazapine, atomoxetine, and amphetamine. There were no hesitation wounds, which are typically found on a victim of suicide by self-infliction. Due to the inconclusive autopsy ruling, the Los Angeles Police Department's investigation remains open.
Reaction
Shortly after Smith's death, a fan memorial was initiated outside Solutions Audio (4334 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, California), the site at which the cover of the Figure 8 album was shot. Farewell messages to Smith were written on the wall, and flowers, photos, candles, and empty bottles of alcohol mentioned in Smith's songs were left. Since then, the wall has been a regular target for graffiti but is regularly restored by fans.
Memorial concerts were held in several cities in the United States and the United Kingdom. A petition was soon put forth with intent to make part of the Silver Lake area a memorial park in Smith's honor. It received over 10,000 signatures, but no plans to establish the park have been announced. A memorial plaque located inside Smith's former high school, Lincoln High, was hung in July 2006. The plaque reads: "I'm never going to know you now, but I'm going to love you anyhow" referencing Smith's song "Waltz No. 2 (XO)".
Since Smith's death, many musical acts have paid him tribute. Songs in tribute to, or about, Smith have been released by Pearl Jam ("Can't Keep" on the Live at Benaroya Hall concert album); Sparta ("Bombs and Us"); Third Eye Blind ("There's No Hurry to Eternity", originally titled "Elliott Smith", on the Live from Nowhere Near You, Volume Two: Pacific Northwest compilation); 9 Horses (“listening to the Elliott Smith discography in reverse order”, on the album Perfectest Herald); Ben Folds ("Late" on Songs for Silverman); Brad Mehldau ("Sky Turning Grey (for Elliott Smith)" on Highway Rider); Rilo Kiley ("It Just Is", and "Ripchord" from the album More Adventurous); Lil B's 'The Worlds Ending'; Rhett Miller ("The Believer" on The Believer); Earlimart ("Heaven Adores You" on Treble and Tremble); Joan As Police Woman ("We Don't Own It" on Real Life); and Pete Yorn ("Bandstand in the Sky" on Nightcrawler, a song jointly dedicated to Jeff Buckley). Several tribute albums have also been released since his death, including Christopher O'Riley's 2006 Home to Oblivion: An Elliott Smith Tribute, with 18 instrumental covers, The Portland Cello Project's 2014 to e.s., covering six of his songs and To Elliott, from Portland containing covers by a number of Portland bands.
On July 30, 2004, Chiba filed a lawsuit against the Smith family for 15% of his earnings (over $1 million), claiming that she and Smith lived as "husband and wife", that Smith had pledged to take care of her financially for the rest of her life, and that she worked as his manager and agent from around 2000 until his death. A state labor commissioner ruled her claim as manager to be invalid, as she had worked as an "unlicensed talent agent" under California's Talent Agencies Act. The case made it to the California appellate court in October 2007, but the decision was affirmed 2–1.
In an October 2013 Spin magazine article—a reflection at the ten-year anniversary of Smith's death—drummer McPherson stated that Smith was "a sick man without his medicine" during the last 31 days of his life, when he was not only sober, but had also given up red meat and sugar. In the same article, Chiba recalls thinking, "Okay, you're asking a lot of yourself. You're giving up a lot at once." Chiba further explained that "anyone who understands drug abuse knows that you use drugs to hide from your past or sedate yourself from strong, overwhelming feelings. So when you're newly clean and coming off the medications that have been masking all those feelings, that's when you're the most vulnerable." Writing for Spin, Liam Gowing also encountered a local musician who claimed Smith had said to him: "The people who try to intervene, they're good people who genuinely care about you. But they don't know what you're going through. Do what you need to do." According to the musician, Smith had adamantly dissuaded him from suicide.
Musical style and influences
Smith respected and was inspired by many artists and styles, including the Beatles, Neil Young, Simon & Garfunkel, Big Star, the Clash, the Who, Led Zeppelin, the Kinks, Pink Floyd, Nick Drake, Rush, Bauhaus, Elvis Costello, Oasis, Television, Motown and flamenco records, AC/DC, Hank Williams, and Scorpions, Smith claimed to listen exclusively to selected albums (such as The Marble Index by Nico) for months. Sean Croghan, a former roommate of Smith's, said that Smith "listened almost exclusively to slow jams" in his senior year at college. Smith also took inspiration from novels, religion, and philosophy. He liked classic literature, especially Samuel Beckett, T. S. Eliot, and Russian novelists such as Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
Smith mentioned his admiration for Bob Dylan in several interviews, citing him as an early influence. He once commented: "My father taught me how to play 'Don't Think Twice, It's All Right'. I love Dylan's words, but even more than that, I love the fact that he loves words." Smith covered Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece" several times in concert. Smith has also been compared to folk singer Nick Drake, due to his fingerpicking style and vocals. Darryl Cater of AllMusic called references to "the definitive folk loner" Drake "inevitable", and Smith's lyrics have been compared to those in Drake's minimalist and haunting final album.
Smith was a dedicated fan of the Beatles (as well as their solo projects), once noting that he had been listening to them frequently since he was about "four years old" and also claimed that hearing The White Album was his original inspiration to become a musician. In 1998, Smith contributed a cover of the Beatles song "Because" to the closing credits and soundtrack of the film American Beauty. Although this was the only Beatles song that Smith ever officially released, he is known to have recorded many others, ("Revolution", "I'll Be Back" and "I'm So Tired") and played many songs by both the band and the members' solo projects at live concerts.
Smith said that transitions were his favorite part of songs and that he preferred to write broader, more impressionistic music closer to pop rather than folk music. Smith compared his songs to stories or dreams, not purely confessional pieces that people could relate to. When asked about the dark nature of his songwriting and the cult following he was gaining, Smith said he felt it was merely a product of his writing songs that were strongly meaningful to him rather than anything contrived. Larry Crane, Smith's posthumous archivist, has said that he was surprised at the amount of "recycling of musical ideas" he encountered while cataloging Smith's private tapes: "I found songs recorded in high school reworked 15 years on. Lyrics became more important to him as he became older, and more time was spent working on them."
Legacy
Since his death, Smith has been regarded as one of the most influential artists in indie music. Many artists have mentioned Smith as their influence, such as Frank Ocean, Beck, Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker, and Haim's lead vocalist Danielle Haim.
See also
List of unsolved deaths
Discography
Studio albums
Roman Candle (1994)
Elliott Smith (1995)
Either/Or (1997)
XO (1998)
Figure 8 (2000)
Posthumous studio albums
From a Basement on the Hill (2004)
Compilation albums
New Moon (2007)
References
Bibliography
External links
Official website
Official Cavity Search Records website
Official Kill Rock Stars website
Elliott Smith collection at the Internet Archive's live music archive
Keep the Things You Forgot: An Elliott Smith Oral History
1969 births
2003 deaths
Unsolved deaths
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American singers
20th-century American writers
21st-century American singers
21st-century American writers
Alternative rock guitarists
Alternative rock singers
American feminists
American indie rock musicians
American male guitarists
American male singer-songwriters
American rock guitarists
American tenors
Anti- (record label) artists
Caroline Records artists
Cavity Search Records artists
Deaths by stabbing in California
Domino Recording Company artists
DreamWorks Records artists
Feminist musicians
Fingerstyle guitarists
Guitarists from Los Angeles
Guitarists from Nebraska
Guitarists from New York City
Guitarists from Oklahoma
Guitarists from Oregon
Guitarists from Texas
Hampshire College alumni
Indie folk musicians
Kill Rock Stars artists
Lincoln High School (Portland, Oregon) alumni
Male feminists
Musicians from Brooklyn
Musicians from Omaha, Nebraska
Musicians from Portland, Oregon
People from Duncanville, Texas
People from Echo Park, Los Angeles
People with mood disorders
Singers from Los Angeles
Singers from New York City
Singer-songwriters from Texas
Suicide Squeeze Records artists
Virgin Records artists
20th-century American male singers
Singer-songwriters from California
Singer-songwriters from New York (state)
Singer-songwriters from Oklahoma
Singer-songwriters from Nebraska | false | [
"Le Cousin is a 1997 French film directed by Alain Corneau.\n\nPlot \nThe film deals with the relationship of the police and an informant in the drug scene.\n\nAwards and nominations\nLe Cousin was nominated for 5 César Awards but did not win in any category.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1997 films\n1997 crime films\nFilms about drugs\nFilms directed by Alain Corneau\nFrench crime films\nFrench films\nFrench-language films",
"The African National Congress was a political party in Trinidad and Tobago. The party first contested national elections in 1961, when it received just 0.5% of the vote and failed to win a seat. They did not put forward any candidates for the 1966 elections, but returned for the 1971 elections, in which they received 2.4% of the vote, but again failed to win a seat as the People's National Movement won all 36. The party did not contest any further elections.\n\nReferences\n\nDefunct political parties in Trinidad and Tobago"
] |
[
"Cyndi Lauper",
"1953-1979: Early life"
] | C_6d9e251df9a9430da20f2ad84e941620_1 | when was she born? | 1 | when was Cyndi Lauper born? | Cyndi Lauper | Lauper was born at Boulevard Hospital in Astoria, Queens, New York City, to a Catholic family. Her father, Fred, was of German and Swiss descent. Her mother, Catrine (nee Gallo), is Italian American (from Sicily). Lauper's siblings are younger brother Fred (nicknamed Butch), and older sister, Ellen. Lauper's parents divorced when she was five. Her mother remarried and divorced again. Lauper grew up in the Ozone Park neighborhood of Queens and, as a child, listened to such artists as The Beatles, Ella Fitzgerald, Judy Garland and Billie Holiday. At age 12, she began writing songs and playing an acoustic guitar given to her by her sister. Lauper expressed herself with a variety of hair colors, eccentric clothing and even took a friend's advice to spell her name as "Cyndi" rather than "Cindy". Lauper went to Richmond Hill High School, but was expelled, although she later earned her GED. She left home at 17, to escape her abusive stepfather, intending to study art. Her journey took her to Canada, where she spent two weeks in the woods with her dog Sparkle, trying to find herself. She eventually traveled to Vermont, where she took art classes at Johnson State College and supported herself working odd jobs. In the early 1970s, Lauper performed as a vocalist with various cover bands. One, called Doc West, covered disco songs as well as Janis Joplin. A later band, Flyer, was active in the New York metropolitan area, singing hits by bands including Bad Company, Jefferson Airplane and Led Zeppelin. Although Lauper was performing on stage, she was not happy singing covers. In 1977, Lauper damaged her vocal cords and took a year off from singing. She was told by doctors that she would never sing again, but regained her voice with the help of vocal coach Katie Agresta. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Cynthia Ann Stephanie Lauper Thornton (born June 22, 1953) is an American singer, songwriter, actress, and activist. Her career has spanned over 40 years. Her album She's So Unusual (1983) was the first debut album by a female artist to achieve four top-five hits on the Billboard Hot 100—"Girls Just Want to Have Fun", "Time After Time", "She Bop", and "All Through the Night"—and earned Lauper the Best New Artist award at the 27th Annual Grammy Awards in 1985. Her success continued with the soundtrack for the motion picture The Goonies and her second record True Colors (1986). This album included the number one single "True Colors" and "Change of Heart", which peaked at number three. In 1989, she had a hit with "I Drove All Night".
Since 1983, Lauper has released eleven studio albums and participated in many other projects. In 2010, Memphis Blues became Billboard most successful blues album of the year, remaining at number one on the Billboard Blues Albums chart for 13 consecutive weeks. In 2013, she won the Tony Award for best original score for composing the Broadway musical Kinky Boots, making her the first woman to win the category by herself. The musical was awarded five other Tonys including Tony Award for Best New Musical. In 2014, Lauper was awarded the Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album for the cast recording. In 2016, the West End production won Best New Musical at the Olivier Awards.
Lauper has sold over 50 million records worldwide. She has won awards at the Grammys, Emmys, Tonys, the New York's Outer Critics Circle, MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs), Billboard Awards, and American Music Awards (AMAs). An inductee into both the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Lauper is one of the few singers to win three of the four major American entertainment awards (EGOT). She won the inaugural Best Female Video prize at the 1984 VMAs for "Girls Just Want to Have Fun". This music video is recognized by MTV, VH1 and Rolling Stone as one of the greatest music videos of the era. She is featured in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's Women Who Rock exhibit. Her debut album is included in Rolling Stone list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, while "Time After Time" is included in VH1's list of the 100 Best Songs of the Past 25 years. VH1 has ranked Lauper No. 58 of the 100 Greatest Women of Rock & Roll.
Lauper is known for her distinctive image, featuring a variety of hair colors and eccentric clothing, and for her powerful and distinctive four-octave singing range. She has been celebrated for her humanitarian work, particularly as an advocate for LGBT rights in the United States. Her charitable efforts were acknowledged in 2013 when she was invited as a special guest to attend U.S. President Barack Obama's second-term inauguration.
Life and career
1953–1979: Early life
Lauper was born in Brooklyn, New York City, to a Catholic family. Her father, Fred, was of German and Swiss descent. Her mother, Catrine (née Gallo), is of Italian descent (from Sicily). Lauper's siblings are younger brother Fred (nicknamed Butch), and older sister, Ellen. Lauper's parents divorced when she was five. Her mother remarried and divorced again.
Lauper grew up in the Ozone Park neighborhood of Queens and, as a child, listened to such artists as The Beatles and Judy Garland. At age 12, she began writing songs and playing an acoustic guitar given to her by her sister.
Lauper expressed herself with a variety of hair colors and eccentric clothing, and took a friend's advice to spell her name as "Cyndi" rather than "Cindy". Her unconventional sense of style led to classmates bullying and throwing stones at her.
Lauper went to Richmond Hill High School, but was expelled, although she later earned her GED. She left home at 17, to escape her abusive stepfather, intending to study art. Her journey took her to Canada, where she spent two weeks in the woods with her dog Sparkle, trying to find herself. She eventually traveled to Vermont, where she took art classes at Johnson State College and supported herself working odd jobs. In 2019, Lauper gave the commencement address at Northern Vermont University - Johnson, the academic institution that now includes Johnson State. At this event, NVU awarded her the honorary degree of Doctor of Letters.
In the early 1970s, Lauper performed as a vocalist with various cover bands. One, called Doc West, covered disco songs as well as Janis Joplin. A later band, Flyer, was active in the New York metropolitan area, singing hits by bands including Bad Company, Jefferson Airplane and Led Zeppelin. Although Lauper was performing on stage, she was not happy singing covers. In 1977, Lauper damaged her vocal cords and took a year off from singing. She was told by doctors that she would never sing again, but regained her voice with the help of vocal coach Katie Agresta.
1980–1982: Blue Angel
In 1978, Lauper met saxophone player John Turi through her manager Ted Rosenblatt. Turi and Lauper formed a band named Blue Angel and recorded a demo tape of original music. Steve Massarsky, manager of The Allman Brothers Band, heard the tape and liked Lauper's voice. He bought Blue Angel's contract for $5,000 and became their manager.
Lauper received recording offers as a solo artist, but held out, wanting the band to be included in any deal she made. Blue Angel was eventually signed by Polydor Records and released a self-titled album on the label in 1980. Lauper hated the album cover, saying that it made her look like Big Bird, but Rolling Stone magazine later included it as one of the 100 best new wave album covers (2003). Despite critical acclaim, the album sold poorly ("It went lead", as Lauper later joked) and the band broke up. The members of Blue Angel had a falling-out with Massarsky and fired him as their manager. He later filed an $80,000 suit against them, which forced Lauper into bankruptcy. After this Lauper temporarily lost her voice due to an inverted cyst in her vocal cord.
After Blue Angel broke up, Lauper spent time, due to her financial problems, working in retail stores, waitressing at IHOP (which she quit after being demoted to hostess when the manager sexually harassed her), and singing in local clubs. Her most frequent gigs were at El Sombrero. Music critics who saw Lauper perform with Blue Angel believed she had star potential due to her four-octave singing range. In 1981, while singing in a local New York bar, Lauper met David Wolff, who took over as her manager and had her sign a recording contract with Portrait Records, a subsidiary of Epic Records.
1983–1985: She's So Unusual
On October 14, 1983, Lauper released her first solo album, She's So Unusual. The album became a worldwide hit, peaking at No. 4 in the U.S. and reaching the top five in eight other countries. The primary studio musicians were Eric Bazilian and Rob Hyman (of The Hooters), Rick Chertoff, Richard Termini and Peter Wood. Lauper became popular with teenagers and critics, in part due to her hybrid punk image, which was crafted by stylist Patrick Lucas.
Lauper co-wrote four songs on She's So Unusual, including the hits "Time After Time" and "She Bop". On the songs she did not write, Lauper sometimes changed the lyrics. Such is the case with "Girls Just Want to Have Fun". Lauper found the original lyrics to be misogynistic, so she rewrote the song as an anthem for young women.
The album includes five cover songs, including The Brains' new wave track "Money Changes Everything" (No. 27 on the Billboard Hot 100) and Prince's "When You Were Mine". The album made Lauper the first female artist to have four consecutive Billboard Hot 100 top five hits from one album. The LP stayed in the Top 200 charts for more than 65 weeks, and since has sold 32 million copies worldwide.
Cyndi won Best New Artist at the 1985 Grammy Awards. She's So Unusual also received nominations for Album of the Year, Record of the Year, Best Female Pop Vocal Performance (for "Girls Just Want to Have Fun"), and Song of the Year (for "Time After Time"). She wore almost a pound of necklaces at her award ceremony. It also won the Grammy for Best Album Package, which went to the art director, Janet Perr.
The video for "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" won the inaugural award for Best Female Video at the 1984 MTV Video Music Awards, and made Lauper an MTV staple. The video featured professional wrestling manager "Captain" Lou Albano as Lauper's father, and her real-life mother, Catrine, as her mother, and also featured her attorney, her manager, her brother Butch, and her dog Sparkle. In 1984–85, Lauper appeared on the covers of Rolling Stone magazine, Time, and Newsweek. She appeared twice on the cover of People, and was named a Ms. magazine Woman of the Year in 1985.
In 1985, Lauper participated in USA for Africa's famine-relief fund-raising single "We Are the World", which sold more than 20 million copies since then.
Lauper appeared with professional wrestler Hulk Hogan, who played her "bodyguard" and would also later make many appearances as herself in a number of the World Wrestling Federation's "Rock 'n' Wrestling Connection" events, and played Wendi Richter's manager in the inaugural WrestleMania event. Dave Wolff, Lauper's boyfriend and manager at the time, was a wrestling fan as a boy, and engineered the rock and wrestling connection.
In 1985, Lauper released the single "The Goonies 'R' Good Enough", from the soundtrack to the movie The Goonies, and an accompanying video which featured several wrestling stars. The song reached number 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.
1986–1988: True Colors and Vibes
Lauper received two nominations at the 1986 Grammy Awards: Best Female Rock Vocal Performance for "What a Thrill" and Best Long Form Music Video for Cyndi Lauper in Paris.
Lauper released her second album, True Colors in 1986. It entered the Billboard 200 at No. 42.
In 1986, Lauper appeared on the Billy Joel album The Bridge, with a song called "Code of Silence". She is credited as having written the lyrics with Joel and she sings a duet with him. In the same year, Lauper also sang the theme song for the series Pee-wee's Playhouse, credited as "Ellen Shaw". In 1987, David Wolff produced a concert film for Lauper called Cyndi Lauper in Paris. The concert was broadcast on HBO.
Lauper made her film debut in August 1988 in the quirky comedy Vibes, alongside Jeff Goldblum, Peter Falk, and Julian Sands. Lauper played a psychic in search of a city of gold in South America. Deborah Blum and Tony Ganz produced the film, with David Wolff as associate producer. To prepare for the role, Lauper took a few classes in finger waving and hair setting at the Robert Fiancé School of Beauty in New York, and studied with a few Manhattan psychics. The film flopped and was poorly received by critics, but would later be considered a cult classic.
Lauper contributed a track called "Hole in My Heart (All the Way to China)" for the Vibes soundtrack, but the song was not included. A music video was released, a high energy, comic action/adventure romp through a Chinese laundry. The song reached No. 54 on the US charts, but fared better in Australia, reaching No. 8.
1989–1992: A Night to Remember and marriage
A Night to Remember – Lauper's third album – was released in the spring of 1989. The album had one hit, the No. 6 single "I Drove All Night", originally recorded by Roy Orbison, three years before his death on December 6, 1988. Lauper received a Grammy nomination for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance at the 1990 Grammy Awards for "I Drove All Night", but overall album sales for A Night to Remember were down. The music video for the album's song "My First Night Without You" was one of the first to be closed-captioned for the hearing impaired.
Because of a friendship with Yoko Ono, Lauper took part in the May 1990 John Lennon tribute concert in Liverpool, performing the Beatles song "Hey Bulldog", and the John Lennon song "Working Class Hero". She also took part in Ono and Lennon's son Sean's project called "The Peace Choir", performing a new version of Lennon's "Give Peace a Chance".
On November 24, 1991, Lauper married actor David Thornton.
1993–1995: Hat Full of Stars and Twelve Deadly Cyns
Lauper's fourth album Hat Full of Stars was released in June 1993 and was met with critical acclaim, but failed commercially, unsupported by her label. The album, which tackled such topics as homophobia, spousal abuse, racism, and abortion sold fewer than 120,000 copies in the United States and peaked at No. 112 on the Billboard charts. The video for the album's song "Sally's Pigeons" features the then-unknown Julia Stiles as the young Cyndi.
In 1993, Lauper returned to acting, playing Michael J. Fox's ditzy secretary in Life with Mikey. She also won an Emmy Award for her role as Marianne Lugasso in the sitcom Mad About You.
1996–2000: Motherhood and Sisters of Avalon
On November 19, 1997, Lauper gave birth to her son, Declyn Wallace Lauper Thornton. Her fifth album, Sisters of Avalon, was released in Japan in 1996, and elsewhere in 1997. The album was written and produced with the help of Jan Pulsford (Lauper's keyboard player) and producer Mark Saunders. As in Hat Full of Stars, some of the songs in Sisters of Avalon addressed dark themes. The song "Ballad of Cleo and Joe" addressed the complications of a drag queen's double life. The song "Say a Prayer" was written for a friend of hers who had died from AIDS. "Unhook the Stars" was used in the movie of the same name. Again without support from her label, the release failed in America, spending a single week on the Billboard album chart at No. 188. This album also met with much critical praise, including People magazine, which declared it "'90s nourishment for body and soul. Lauper sets a scene, makes us care, gives us hope."
On January 17, 1999, Lauper appeared as an animated version of herself in The Simpsons episode "Wild Barts Can't Be Broken", singing the National Anthem to the melody of "Girls Just Want to Have Fun". That same year, Lauper opened for Cher's Do You Believe? Tour alongside Wild Orchid. She also appeared in the films Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle and The Opportunists.
2001–2004: Shine and At Last
On October 12, 2000, Lauper took part in the television show Women in Rock, Girls with Guitars performing with Ann Wilson of Heart and with the girl group, Destiny's Child. A CD of the songs performed was released exclusively to Sears stores from September 30 to October 31, 2001, and was marketed as a fundraiser for breast cancer.
In 2002, Sony issued a best-of CD, The Essential Cyndi Lauper. Lauper also released a cover album with Sony/Epic Records entitled At Last (formerly Naked City), which was released in 2003. At Last received one nomination at the 2005 Grammy Awards: Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocalist(s), for "Unchained Melody". The effort was also a commercial hit, selling 4.5 million records
In April 2004, Lauper performed during the VH1's benefit concert Divas Live 2004 alongside Ashanti, Gladys Knight, Jessica Simpson, Joss Stone and Patti LaBelle, in support of the Save the Music Foundation.
2005–2007: The Body Acoustic
She made appearances on Showtime's hit show Queer as Folk in 2005, directed a commercial for Totally 80s edition of the board game Trivial Pursuit in 2006, served as a judge on the 6th Annual Independent Music Awards and made her Broadway debut in the Tony-nominated The Threepenny Opera as Jenny. She performed with Shaggy, Scott Weiland of Velvet Revolver/Stone Temple Pilots, Pat Monahan of Train, Ani DiFranco, and The Hooters in the VH1 Classics special Decades Rock Live. In 2006, she sang "Message To Michael" with Dionne Warwick and "Beecharmer" with Nellie McKay on McKay's Pretty Little Head album.
On October 16, 2006, Lauper was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame.
2008–2009: Bring Ya to the Brink
Lauper's sixth studio album, Bring Ya to the Brink was released in the United States on May 27, 2008.
Other projects for 2008 included the True Colors Tour and a Christmas duet with Swedish band The Hives, entitled "A Christmas Duel". The song was released as a CD single and a 7" vinyl in Sweden. Lauper also performed on the "Girls Night Out", headlining it with Rosie O'Donnell in the US.
On November 17, 2009, Lauper performed a collaborative work with Wyclef Jean called "Slumdog Millionaire", performing it on the Late Show with David Letterman.
2010–2012: The Celebrity Apprentice, Memphis Blues, memoir
In January 2010, Mattel released a Cyndi Lauper Barbie doll as part of their "Ladies of the 80s" series.
In March 2010, Lauper appeared on NBC's The Celebrity Apprentice, coming in sixth place.
Memphis Blues—Lauper's 7th studio album—was released on June 22, 2010, and debuted on the Billboard Blues Albums chart at No. 1, and at No. 26 on the Billboard Top 200. The album remained No. 1 on the Blues Albums chart for 14 consecutive weeks; Memphis Blues was nominated for Best Traditional Blues Album at the 2011 Grammy Awards.
Lauper made international news in March 2011 for an impromptu performance of "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" while waiting for a delayed flight at Aeroparque Jorge Newbery in Buenos Aires. A video was later posted on YouTube.
In November 2011, she released two Christmas singles exclusive to iTunes. The first release was a Blues-inspired cover of Elvis Presley's classic "Blue Christmas", and the second was a new version of "Home for the holidays", a duet with Norah Jones. In June 2012, Lauper made her first appearance for WWE in 27 years, to promote WWE Raw's 1000th episode to memorialize "Captain" Lou Albano.
In September 2012, Lauper performed at fashion designer Betsey Johnson's 40 year Retrospective Fashion show. She also released a New York Times Best Selling memoir that detailed her struggle with child abuse and depression.
2013–2015: Kinky Boots and touring
Lauper composed music and lyrics for the Broadway musical Kinky Boots, with Harvey Fierstein writing the book. The musical was based on the 2006 independent film Kinky Boots. It opened in Chicago in October 2012 and on Broadway at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre on April 4, 2013. In May, she won Best Score for Kinky Boots at the 63rd annual Outer Critics Circle Awards. The musical led the 2013 Tony Awards, with 13 nominations and six wins including Best Musical and Best Actor. She won the award for Best Original Score. Lauper was the first woman to win solo in this category. After a six-year run and 2,507 regular shows, Kinky Boots ended its Broadway run on April 7, 2019. It is the 25th-longest-running Broadway musical in history. It grossed $297 million on Broadway.
In the summer of 2013, in celebration of the 30th anniversary of her debut album She's So Unusual, Lauper embarked on an international tour covering America and Australia. The show consisted of a mix of fan favorites and the entirety of the She's So Unusual record. She was a guest on 36 dates of Cher's Dressed to Kill Tour, starting April 23, 2014. A new album was confirmed by Lauper on a website interview.
Lauper hosted the Grammy Pre-Telecast at the Nokia Theatre, L.A. on Jan 26, where she later accepted a Grammy for Kinky Boots (Best Musical Theater Album).
On April 1 (March 1 in Europe), Lauper released the 30th Anniversary edition of She's So Unusual through Epic Records It featured a remastered version of the original album plus three new remixes. The Deluxe Edition featured bonus tracks such as demos and a live recording as well as a 3D cut-out of the bedroom featured in the 'Girls Just Want to Have Fun' music video with a reusable sticker set.
On September 17, 2014, Lauper sang on the finale of America's Got Talent. On September 25, as part of the Today Show's Shine a Light series, Lauper re-recorded "True Colors" in a mashup with Sara Bareilles' "Brave" to raise awareness and money for children battling cancer. By October the project had raised over $300,000.
The Songwriters Hall of Fame included Lauper in its nomination list in October 2014. Also during October, Lauper's fourth consecutive 'Home for the Holidays' benefit concert for homeless gay youth was announced. Acts included 50 Cent and Laverne Cox with 100% of the net proceeds going to True Colors United
In March 2015, Lauper once again guest starred on the crime show Bones as Avalon Harmonia.
Lauper promoted her work with Novartis and the National Psoriasis Foundation, and discussed her own five years with psoriasis, on The Today Show in July 2015. She also announced a project with producer Seymour Stein, which she later told Rolling Stone was a country album coproduced by Tony Brown.
On September 15, 2015, Kinky Boots opened at the Adelphi Theatre in London's West End.
On August 30, 2017, songwriters Benny Mardones and Robert Tepper sued Lauper for lifting elements from their song "Into the Night" for Kinky Boots’ final song "Raise You Up". In August 2019, a filed letter by Mardones' lawyer stated that all parties involved have agreed in principle to settle the case. No more details were given at the time.
2016–present: Detour and more
In January 2016, Lauper announced she would release a new album on May 6, 2016. This was composed of her interpretations of early country classics entitled Detour. The announcement was supported by a release of her version of Harlan Howard's "Heartaches by the Number" and a performance on Skyville Live with Kelsea Ballerini and Ingrid Michaelson. On February 17, 2016, she released her version of Wanda Jackson's "Funnel of Love".
In February 2016, Lauper was nominated for an Olivier Award for her contribution to the UK production of Kinky Boots along with Stephen Oremus, the man responsible for the arrangements. In January 2017, this production's album was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album.
In May 2016, Lauper was featured on "Swipe to the Right" from Electronica 2: The Heart of Noise by French producer Jean-Michel Jarre. This second album of the Electronica project is based on collaborations with artists related to electronic music (Tangerine Dream, Moby, Pet Shop Boys, etc.).
In October 2016, her son Dex Lauper was the opening act for her Scottsdale, Arizona and Las Vegas, Nevada dates on her Detour Tour.
In January 2017, Lauper was featured on Austin City Limits 42nd season performing some of her classic songs alongside country tunes from Detour. The episode aired on PBS.
In March 2018, it was announced that Lauper together with co-'Time after time' songwriter Rob Hyman is going to compose the score for the musical version of the 1988 film 'Working Girl' which starred Melanie Griffith and Sigourney Weaver. She teamed up with Hyman because she wanted "the music to sound like the 80s". The musical will be staged by Tony Award winner Christopher Ashley. A developmental production premiere of the musical is planned for the 2021/2022 season.
For Grandin Road, Lauper exclusively designed her own Christmas collection, 'Cyndi Lauper Loves Christmas', available from September 2018. "I've always loved Christmas, it reminds me to find some happiness in the little things," said Lauper.
Her annual Home For The Holidays concert at the Beacon Theatre in New York was held on December 8, 2018.
Lauper guest starred playing a lawyer in an episode of the reboot of the television series Magnum P.I.. The episode, titled "Sudden Death", aired on October 22, 2018.
On November 15, 2018, it was announced that Lauper would receive the Icon Award at the Billboard's 13th annual Women in Music Event on December 6 in New York City. According to Jason Lipshutz, Billboard's editorial director, "The entire world recognizes the power of Cyndi Lauper's pop music, and just as crucially, she has used her undeniable talent to soar beyond music, create positive change in modern society and become a true icon."
The song "Together" was featured in the Canadian computer-animated film "Racetime" released in January 2019. Originally written and performed in French by Dumas, Lauper performed the English translation in the English version of the film originally titled "La Course des tuques".
On June 26, 2019, Lauper performed at the opening ceremony of Stonewall 50 – WorldPride NYC 2019. Backed by the Hollywood Bowl orchestra, conducted by Thomas Wilkins, Lauper played two concerts on July 12 and 13, 2019 at the iconic Hollywood Bowl.
"Japanese Singles Collection – Greatest Hits" is a 2-disc greatest hits album that includes all of Laupers' singles released in Japan from 1983 to 1995 in chronological order. The second disc contains 26 music videos. Nine of these are available for the first time on DVD. The album was released on September 6, 2019, nine days after its original Japanese release.
In September 2019, it was announced that Lauper would star alongside Jane Lynch in the new Netflix comedy series described as "kind of The Golden Girls for today". As of March 2021, there had not been any updates on this project.
On January 26, 2020, Lauper sang a chorus from the song "I sing the Body Electric" of the soundtrack from the 1980 movie Fame at the 62nd annual Grammy Awards Show held in Los Angeles. Other performers were Ben Platt, Camila Cabello, Debbie Allen, who starred in the original movie, and more. It was a sendoff to long time Grammy Awards television producer Ken Erhlich. He retired after a four-decade run of producing the show.
On April 23, 2020, Lauper participated in an online fundraising concert to raise money for LGBTQ nightlife workers who struggled financially because of the coronavirus pandemic. Lauper ended the concert performing "True Colors". The concert was initiated by the Stonewall Inn Gives Back nonprofit organization of the historic Greenwich Village gay bar. Other performing artists were Kate Pierson, Our Lady J, Rufus Wainwright and Darren Hayes amongst others.
In November 2020, Lauper dueted with former top ten "American Idol" finalist Casey Abrams on a cover version of the song 'Eve of Destruction'.
In November 2021 Lauper featured as guest vocalist on the track 'Blame it on Christmas' by Shea Diamond. An official video was released the following month.
Personal life
Lauper was in a relationship from 1982 to 1988 with her then manager, Dave Wolff.
Lauper has been married to actor David Thornton since 1991. They have one son, Declyn Wallace Thornton Lauper (born on November 19, 1997).
Lauper has openly discussed her psoriasis, including in advertisements for Cosentyx.
Activism
Lauper has been an LGBT rights supporter throughout her career, campaigning for equality through various charities and gay pride events around the world. Lauper stated that she became involved in gay rights advocacy because her sister Ellen is a lesbian and because Lauper herself was passionate about equality. Lauper cites her sister Ellen as a role model.
Her song "Above the Clouds" celebrates the memory of Matthew Shepard, a young gay man beaten to death in Wyoming. As a member of the Matthew Shepard Foundation Board, Lauper devoted a concert tour in 2005 to promoting the Foundation's message.
She co-founded the True Colors tour for Human Rights throughout the United States and Canada in June 2007. One dollar from each ticket was earmarked for the Human Rights Campaign, which advocates equal rights for LGBT individuals.
In 2008, Lauper started True Colors United (TCU) after learning that, while 10% of American youth identify themselves as LGBT, up to 40% of American homeless youths do so. The organization works to end youth homelessness, focusing on the experiences of LGBT youth. She set up the True Colors Residence in New York City for LGBT homeless youths. The 30-bed facility offers temporary shelter and job placement help. In April 2010, TCU launched the Give a Damn campaign, to help get straight people more involved in LGBT rights.
In August 2008, she contributed an article titled "Hope" to The Huffington Post, encouraging Americans to vote for Barack Obama in the upcoming United States presidential election. Lauper performed at the 2008 Democratic National Convention.
Legacy
Lauper was described by AllMusic's Lindsay Planer as "an iconoclastic vocalist who revolutionized the role of women in rock and roll". Over her 40-year career, she influenced multiple recording artists including Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, Vanessa Paradis, Tegan and Sara, and Yelle. Due to her success and influence Lauper has been inducted into both the Hollywood and Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Stephen Thomas Erlewine of Spotify said She's So Unusual and Lauper's distinctive idiosyncratic appearance "helped popularize the image of punk and new wave for America, making it an acceptable part of the pop landscape". Rolling Stone magazine stated that her debut was "arguably the first time explicitly punk-influenced elements were front-and-center on the pop landscape, both musically and via Lauper's Patrick Lucas-styled ensembles, dressing up the droll Reagan decade in feminist chutzpah." The album ranked at No. 487 on Rolling Stones list of 500 Greatest Albums of All Time in 2003. The album ranked at No. 41 on Rolling Stones list of Women Who Rock: The 50 Greatest Albums of All Time in 2012. Rolling Stone's review stated, "A wild and wonderful skyrocket of a voice... Lauper's extraordinary pipes connect with the right material, the results sound like the beginning of a whole new golden age." Thirty years after its release, Entertainment Weekly called it an "everlastingly saucy supersmash".
Sheila Moeschen argued that "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" "embodied a different kind of feminine aesthetic that ran counter to the raw sensuality and edginess of her contemporaries like Madonna or veteran rockers Joan Jett and Pat Benatar", that introduced "a nation of women to a new kind of female role model, one that celebrated difference and encouraged playfulness in self-expression". John Rockwell wrote that the song was "a giddily upbeat attestation to female pleasure that simultaneously made a feminist statement, fulfilled male fantasies and—especially in its often-played video version—evoked the warmth of family and friends". Its music video won the first-ever Best Female Video prize at the 1984 VMAs. It featured a multicultural cast of women with teased, sideways hair and neon eye shadow, singing alongside Lauper.
"Time After Time" has been covered by over a hundred artists and was ranked at No. 22 on Rolling Stones 100 Best Songs of the Past 25 Years and at No. 19 on VH1's 100 Greatest Songs of the 80s.
"She Bop", the third single from She's So Unusual, is the first and only top ten song to directly mention a gay porn magazine. An ode to masturbation, it was included in the PMRC's "Filthy Fifteen" list that led to the parental advisory sticker appearing on recordings thought to be unsuitable for young listeners. In a retrospective, Rolling Stone ranked it the 36th best song of 1984, praising its unusual playfulness regarding sexuality.
"True Colors" is a gay anthem, after which True Colors United, which advocates for runaway and homeless LGBT youth, is named.
Discography
She's So Unusual (1983)
True Colors (1986)
A Night to Remember (1989)
Hat Full of Stars (1993)
Sisters of Avalon (1996)
Merry Christmas ... Have a Nice Life (1998)
At Last (2003)
Shine (2004)
Bring Ya to the Brink (2008)
Memphis Blues (2010)
Detour (2016)
Filmography
Tours
Headlining
Co-headlining
Guest
Awards and nominations
Grammy Awards
The Grammy Awards are awarded annually by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. Lauper has won two awards from 16 nominations.
|-
|rowspan="5"|1985
|Cyndi Lauper
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|She's So Unusual
|Album of the Year
|
|-
|"Time After Time"
|Song of the Year
|
|-
|rowspan="2"|"Girls Just Want to Have Fun"
|Record of the Year
|
|-
|Best Female Pop Vocal Performance
|
|-
|1986
|"What a Thrill"
|Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
|
|-
|rowspan="2"|1987
|"True Colors"
|Best Female Pop Vocal Performance
|
|-
|"911"
|Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
|
|-
|1988
|"Cyndi Lauper in Paris"
|Best Performance Music Video
|
|-
|1990
|"I Drove All Night"
|Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
|
|-
|1999
|"Disco Inferno"
|Best Dance Recording
|
|-
|2005
|"Unchained Melody"
|Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocalist(s)
|
|-
|2009
|Bring Ya to the Brink
|Best Electronic/Dance Album
|
|-
|2011
|Memphis Blues
|Best Traditional Blues Album
|
|-
|2014
|Kinky Boots
|Best Musical Theater Album
|
|-
|2017
|Kinky Boots (Original West End Cast)
|Best Musical Theater Album
|
|}
Tony Awards
The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre, more commonly known informally as the Tony Award, recognizes achievement in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by The Broadway League at an annual ceremony in New York City. Lauper is the first woman to win a Tony solo for Best Score.
Emmy Awards
An Emmy Award recognizes excellence in the television industry.
MTV Video Music Award
The MTV Video Music Awards were established in 1984 by MTV to celebrate the top music videos of the year. Lauper won one award from 14 nominations, the first Best Female Video.
|-
|rowspan="9"|1984
|rowspan="6"|"Girls Just Want to Have Fun"
|Video of the Year
|
|-
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|Best Female Video
|
|-
|Best Concept Video
|
|-
|Viewer's Choice
|
|-
|Best Overall Performance
|
|-
|rowspan="3"|"Time After Time"
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|Best Female Video
|
|-
|Best Direction
|
|-
|rowspan="2"|1987
|"True Colors"
|Best Female Video
|
|-
|"What's Going On"
|Best Cinematography
|
Other recognition
See also
List of artists who reached number one in the United States
List of awards and nominations received by Cyndi Lauper
List of number-one dance hits (United States)
List of number-one hits (United States)
References
External links
"Cyndi Lauper" the song, by Mat Shearer
Cyndi Lauper Fansite
Paul Burston, "Cyndi Lauper is Back, and the Girl still wants to Have Fun" (interview), The Times, August 2, 2008
NYTimes feature, 2010
1953 births
20th-century American actresses
20th-century American singers
20th-century American women singers
21st-century American actresses
21st-century American singers
21st-century American women singers
Activists from New York City
Actresses from New York City
American dance musicians
American women pop singers
American women rock singers
American women singer-songwriters
American film actresses
American freestyle musicians
American humanitarians
American people of German descent
American people of Swiss descent
American people of Italian descent
American rock songwriters
American sopranos
American soul singers
American television actresses
American voice actresses
American women activists
Dance-pop musicians
Downtown Records artists
Women new wave singers
Feminist musicians
Grammy Award winners
Johnson State College alumni
LGBT rights activists from the United States
Living people
New York (state) Democrats
Participants in American reality television series
People from Ozone Park, Queens
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Professional wrestling managers and valets
Singers from New York City
Singers with a four-octave vocal range
Sire Records artists
Synth-pop new wave musicians
The Apprentice (franchise) contestants
Tony Award winners
Women humanitarians
Sony BMG artists
Singer-songwriters from New York (state) | false | [
"This is a list of notable books by young authors and of books written by notable writers in their early years. These books were written, or substantially completed, before the author's twentieth birthday. \n\nAlexandra Adornetto (born 18 April 1994) wrote her debut novel, The Shadow Thief, when she was 13. It was published in 2007. Other books written by her as a teenager are: The Lampo Circus (2008), Von Gobstopper's Arcade (2009), Halo (2010) and Hades (2011).\nMargery Allingham (1904–1966) had her first novel, Blackkerchief Dick, about smugglers in 17th century Essex, published in 1923, when she was 19.\nJorge Amado (1912–2001) had his debut novel, The Country of Carnival, published in 1931, when he was 18.\nPrateek Arora wrote his debut novel Village 1104 at the age of 16. It was published in 2010.\nDaisy Ashford (1881–1972) wrote The Young Visiters while aged nine. This novella was first published in 1919, preserving her juvenile punctuation and spelling. An earlier work, The Life of Father McSwiney, was dictated to her father when she was four. It was published almost a century later in 1983.\nAmelia Atwater-Rhodes (born 1984) had her first novel, In the Forests of the Night, published in 1999. Subsequent novels include Demon in My View (2000), Shattered Mirror (2001), Midnight Predator (2002), Hawksong (2003) and Snakecharm (2004).\nJane Austen (1775–1817) wrote Lady Susan, a short epistolary novel, between 1793 and 1795 when she was aged 18-20.\nRuskin Bond (born 1934) wrote his semi-autobiographical novel The Room on the Roof when he was 17. It was published in 1955.\nMarjorie Bowen (1885–1952) wrote the historical novel The Viper of Milan when she was 16. Published in 1906 after several rejections, it became a bestseller.\nOliver Madox Brown (1855–1874) finished his novel Gabriel Denver in early 1872, when he was 17. It was published the following year.\nPamela Brown (1924–1989) finished her children's novel about an amateur theatre company, The Swish of the Curtain (1941), when she was 16 and later wrote other books about the stage.\nCeleste and Carmel Buckingham wrote The Lost Princess when they were 11 and 9.\nFlavia Bujor (born 8 August 1988) wrote The Prophecy of the Stones (2002) when she was 13.\nLord Byron (1788–1824) published two volumes of poetry in his teens, Fugitive Pieces and Hours of Idleness.\nTaylor Caldwell's The Romance of Atlantis was written when she was 12.\n (1956–1976), Le Don de Vorace, was published in 1974.\nHilda Conkling (1910–1986) had her poems published in Poems by a Little Girl (1920), Shoes of the Wind (1922) and Silverhorn (1924).\nAbraham Cowley (1618–1667), Tragicall History of Piramus and Thisbe (1628), Poetical Blossoms (published 1633).\nMaureen Daly (1921–2006) completed Seventeenth Summer before she was 20. It was published in 1942.\nJuliette Davies (born 2000) wrote the first book in the JJ Halo series when she was eight years old. The series was published the following year.\nSamuel R. Delany (born 1 April 1942) published his The Jewels of Aptor in 1962.\nPatricia Finney's A Shadow of Gulls was published in 1977 when she was 18. Its sequel, The Crow Goddess, was published in 1978.\nBarbara Newhall Follett (1914–1939) wrote her first novel The House Without Windows at the age of eight. The manuscript was destroyed in a house fire and she later retyped her manuscript at the age of 12. The novel was published by Knopf publishing house in January 1927.\nFord Madox Ford (né Hueffer) (1873–1939) published in 1892 two children's stories, The Brown Owl and The Feather, and a novel, The Shifting of the Fire.\nAnne Frank (1929–1945) wrote her diary for two-and-a-half years starting on her 13th birthday. It was published posthumously as Het Achterhuis in 1947 and then in English translation in 1952 as Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl. An unabridged translation followed in 1996.\nMiles Franklin wrote My Brilliant Career (1901) when she was a teenager.\nAlec Greven's How to Talk to Girls was published in 2008 when he was nine years old. Subsequently he has published How to Talk to Moms, How to Talk to Dads and How to Talk to Santa.\nFaïza Guène (born 1985) had Kiffe kiffe demain published in 2004, when she was 19. It has since been translated into 22 languages, including English (as Kiffe Kiffe Tomorrow).\nSonya Hartnett (born 1968) was thirteen years old when she wrote her first novel, Trouble All the Way, which was published in Australia in 1984.\nAlex and Brett Harris wrote the best-selling book Do Hard Things (2008), a non-fiction book challenging teenagers to \"rebel against low expectations\", at age 19. Two years later came a follow-up book called Start Here (2010).\nGeorgette Heyer (1902–1974) wrote The Black Moth when she was 17 and received a publishing contract when she was 18. It was published just after she turned 19.\nSusan Hill (born 1942), The Enclosure, published in 1961.\nS. E. Hinton (born 1948), The Outsiders, first published in 1967.\nPalle Huld (1912–2010) wrote A Boy Scout Around the World (Jorden Rundt i 44 dage) when he was 15, following a sponsored journey around the world.\nGeorge Vernon Hudson (1867–1946) completed An Elementary Manual of New Zealand Entomology at the end of 1886, when he was 19, but not published until 1892.\nKatharine Hull (1921–1977) and Pamela Whitlock (1920–1982) wrote the children's outdoor adventure novel The Far-Distant Oxus in 1937. It was followed in 1938 by Escape to Persia and in 1939 by Oxus in Summer.\nLeigh Hunt (1784–1859) published Juvenilia; or, a Collection of Poems Written between the ages of Twelve and Sixteen by J. H. L. Hunt, Late of the Grammar School of Christ's Hospital in March 1801.\nKody Keplinger (born 1991) wrote her debut novel The DUFF when she was 17.\nGordon Korman (born 1963), This Can't Be Happening at Macdonald Hall (1978), three sequels, and I Want to Go Home (1981).\nMatthew Gregory Lewis (1775–1818) wrote the Gothic novel The Monk, now regarded as a classic of the genre, before he was twenty. It was published in 1796.\nNina Lugovskaya (1918–1993), a painter, theater director and Gulag survivor, kept a diary in 1932–37, which shows strong social sensitivities. It was found in the Russian State Archives and published 2003. It appeared in English in the same year.\nJoyce Maynard (born 1953) completed Looking Back while she was 19. It was first published in 1973.\nMargaret Mitchell (1900–1949) wrote her novella Lost Laysen at the age of fifteen and gave the two notebooks containing the manuscript to her boyfriend, Henry Love Angel. The novel was published posthumously in 1996.\nBen Okri, the Nigerian poet and novelist, (born 1959) wrote his first book Flowers and Shadows while he was 19.\nAlice Oseman(born 1994) wrote the novel Solitaire when she was 17 and it was published in 2014.\nHelen Oyeyemi (born 1984) completed The Icarus Girl while still 18. First published in 2005.\nChristopher Paolini (born 1983) had Eragon, the first novel of the Inheritance Cycle, first published 2002.\nEmily Pepys (1833–1877), daughter of a bishop, wrote a vivid private journal over six months of 1844–45, aged ten. It was discovered much later and published in 1984.\nAnya Reiss (born 1991) wrote her play Spur of the Moment when she was 17. It was both performed and published in 2010, when she was 18.\nArthur Rimbaud (1854–1891) wrote almost all his prose and poetry while still a teenager, for example Le Soleil était encore chaud (1866), Le Bateau ivre (1871) and Une Saison en Enfer (1873).\nJohn Thomas Romney Robinson (1792–1882) saw his juvenile poems published in 1806, when he was 13.\nFrançoise Sagan (1935–2004) had Bonjour tristesse published in 1954, when she was 18.\nMary Shelley (1797–1851) completed Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus during May 1817, when she was 19. It was first published in the following year.\nMattie Stepanek (1990–2004), an American poet, published seven best-selling books of poetry.\nJohn Steptoe (1950–1989), author and illustrator, began his picture book Stevie at 16. It was published in 1969 in Life.\nAnna Stothard (born 1983) saw her Isabel and Rocco published when she was 19.\nDorothy Straight (born 1958) in 1962 wrote How the World Began, which was published by Pantheon Books in 1964. She holds the Guinness world record for the youngest female published author.\nJalaluddin Al-Suyuti (c. 1445–1505) wrote his first book, Sharh Al-Isti'aadha wal-Basmalah, at the age of 17.\nF. J. Thwaites (1908–1979) wrote his bestselling novel The Broken Melody when he was 19.\nJohn Kennedy Toole (1937–1969) wrote The Neon Bible in 1954 when he was 16. It was not published until 1989.\nAlec Waugh (1898–1981) wrote his novel about school life, The Loom of Youth, after leaving school. It was published in 1917.\nCatherine Webb (born 1986) had five young adult books published before she was 20: Mirror Dreams (2002), Mirror Wakes (2003), Waywalkers (2003), Timekeepers (2004) and The Extraordinary and Unusual Adventures of Horatio Lyle (February 2006).\nNancy Yi Fan (born 1993) published her debut Swordbird when she was 12. Other books she published as a teenager include Sword Quest (2008) and Sword Mountain (2012).\nKat Zhang (born 1991) was 20 when she sold, in a three-book deal, her entire Hybrid Chronicles trilogy. The first book, What's Left of Me, was published 2012.\n\nSee also \nLists of books\n\nReferences \n\nBooks Written By Children and Teenagers\nbooks\nChildren And Teenagers, Written By\nChi",
"Alannah Yip (born October 26, 1993) is a Canadian engineer and sport climber. She was a national champion for her age when she was twelve. She won a gold medal at the American Climbing Championships 2020 in Los Angeles, which qualified her for the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo.\n\nLife\nYip was born and raised in North Vancouver. She began climbing when she was nine when her godparent's children became interested in climbing. She won her first National Climbing Championship when she was twelve. She trained to be an engineer, specialising in mechatronics. She tried giving up climbing to concentrate on her university studies, but she realised that sport was essential. In 2015 she was able to visit Switzerland as part of her studies and she was able to practice climbing in her spare time with the Swiss national team. When she returned to Canada she began training with the \"Climb Base 5\" in preparation for the following years World Cup climbing events.\n\nYip graduated from the University of British Columbia in 2018.\n\nHer coach was Andrew Wilson in 2018 and she has been supported by Petro-Canada. She qualified for a place in sport climbing at the 2020 Summer Olympics by winning the 2020 IFSC Pan-American Championships.\n\nResults\n\nWorld championships\n\nPan American championships\n\nReferences\n\n1993 births\nLiving people\nPeople from North Vancouver\nCanadian engineers\nCanadian rock climbers\nSport climbers at the 2020 Summer Olympics\nOlympic sport climbers of Canada"
] |
[
"Cyndi Lauper",
"1953-1979: Early life",
"when was she born?",
"I don't know."
] | C_6d9e251df9a9430da20f2ad84e941620_1 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | 2 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article aside from Cyndi Lauper's early life? | Cyndi Lauper | Lauper was born at Boulevard Hospital in Astoria, Queens, New York City, to a Catholic family. Her father, Fred, was of German and Swiss descent. Her mother, Catrine (nee Gallo), is Italian American (from Sicily). Lauper's siblings are younger brother Fred (nicknamed Butch), and older sister, Ellen. Lauper's parents divorced when she was five. Her mother remarried and divorced again. Lauper grew up in the Ozone Park neighborhood of Queens and, as a child, listened to such artists as The Beatles, Ella Fitzgerald, Judy Garland and Billie Holiday. At age 12, she began writing songs and playing an acoustic guitar given to her by her sister. Lauper expressed herself with a variety of hair colors, eccentric clothing and even took a friend's advice to spell her name as "Cyndi" rather than "Cindy". Lauper went to Richmond Hill High School, but was expelled, although she later earned her GED. She left home at 17, to escape her abusive stepfather, intending to study art. Her journey took her to Canada, where she spent two weeks in the woods with her dog Sparkle, trying to find herself. She eventually traveled to Vermont, where she took art classes at Johnson State College and supported herself working odd jobs. In the early 1970s, Lauper performed as a vocalist with various cover bands. One, called Doc West, covered disco songs as well as Janis Joplin. A later band, Flyer, was active in the New York metropolitan area, singing hits by bands including Bad Company, Jefferson Airplane and Led Zeppelin. Although Lauper was performing on stage, she was not happy singing covers. In 1977, Lauper damaged her vocal cords and took a year off from singing. She was told by doctors that she would never sing again, but regained her voice with the help of vocal coach Katie Agresta. CANNOTANSWER | Her father, Fred, was of German and Swiss descent. Her mother, Catrine (nee Gallo), is Italian American ( | Cynthia Ann Stephanie Lauper Thornton (born June 22, 1953) is an American singer, songwriter, actress, and activist. Her career has spanned over 40 years. Her album She's So Unusual (1983) was the first debut album by a female artist to achieve four top-five hits on the Billboard Hot 100—"Girls Just Want to Have Fun", "Time After Time", "She Bop", and "All Through the Night"—and earned Lauper the Best New Artist award at the 27th Annual Grammy Awards in 1985. Her success continued with the soundtrack for the motion picture The Goonies and her second record True Colors (1986). This album included the number one single "True Colors" and "Change of Heart", which peaked at number three. In 1989, she had a hit with "I Drove All Night".
Since 1983, Lauper has released eleven studio albums and participated in many other projects. In 2010, Memphis Blues became Billboard most successful blues album of the year, remaining at number one on the Billboard Blues Albums chart for 13 consecutive weeks. In 2013, she won the Tony Award for best original score for composing the Broadway musical Kinky Boots, making her the first woman to win the category by herself. The musical was awarded five other Tonys including Tony Award for Best New Musical. In 2014, Lauper was awarded the Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album for the cast recording. In 2016, the West End production won Best New Musical at the Olivier Awards.
Lauper has sold over 50 million records worldwide. She has won awards at the Grammys, Emmys, Tonys, the New York's Outer Critics Circle, MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs), Billboard Awards, and American Music Awards (AMAs). An inductee into both the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Lauper is one of the few singers to win three of the four major American entertainment awards (EGOT). She won the inaugural Best Female Video prize at the 1984 VMAs for "Girls Just Want to Have Fun". This music video is recognized by MTV, VH1 and Rolling Stone as one of the greatest music videos of the era. She is featured in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's Women Who Rock exhibit. Her debut album is included in Rolling Stone list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, while "Time After Time" is included in VH1's list of the 100 Best Songs of the Past 25 years. VH1 has ranked Lauper No. 58 of the 100 Greatest Women of Rock & Roll.
Lauper is known for her distinctive image, featuring a variety of hair colors and eccentric clothing, and for her powerful and distinctive four-octave singing range. She has been celebrated for her humanitarian work, particularly as an advocate for LGBT rights in the United States. Her charitable efforts were acknowledged in 2013 when she was invited as a special guest to attend U.S. President Barack Obama's second-term inauguration.
Life and career
1953–1979: Early life
Lauper was born in Brooklyn, New York City, to a Catholic family. Her father, Fred, was of German and Swiss descent. Her mother, Catrine (née Gallo), is of Italian descent (from Sicily). Lauper's siblings are younger brother Fred (nicknamed Butch), and older sister, Ellen. Lauper's parents divorced when she was five. Her mother remarried and divorced again.
Lauper grew up in the Ozone Park neighborhood of Queens and, as a child, listened to such artists as The Beatles and Judy Garland. At age 12, she began writing songs and playing an acoustic guitar given to her by her sister.
Lauper expressed herself with a variety of hair colors and eccentric clothing, and took a friend's advice to spell her name as "Cyndi" rather than "Cindy". Her unconventional sense of style led to classmates bullying and throwing stones at her.
Lauper went to Richmond Hill High School, but was expelled, although she later earned her GED. She left home at 17, to escape her abusive stepfather, intending to study art. Her journey took her to Canada, where she spent two weeks in the woods with her dog Sparkle, trying to find herself. She eventually traveled to Vermont, where she took art classes at Johnson State College and supported herself working odd jobs. In 2019, Lauper gave the commencement address at Northern Vermont University - Johnson, the academic institution that now includes Johnson State. At this event, NVU awarded her the honorary degree of Doctor of Letters.
In the early 1970s, Lauper performed as a vocalist with various cover bands. One, called Doc West, covered disco songs as well as Janis Joplin. A later band, Flyer, was active in the New York metropolitan area, singing hits by bands including Bad Company, Jefferson Airplane and Led Zeppelin. Although Lauper was performing on stage, she was not happy singing covers. In 1977, Lauper damaged her vocal cords and took a year off from singing. She was told by doctors that she would never sing again, but regained her voice with the help of vocal coach Katie Agresta.
1980–1982: Blue Angel
In 1978, Lauper met saxophone player John Turi through her manager Ted Rosenblatt. Turi and Lauper formed a band named Blue Angel and recorded a demo tape of original music. Steve Massarsky, manager of The Allman Brothers Band, heard the tape and liked Lauper's voice. He bought Blue Angel's contract for $5,000 and became their manager.
Lauper received recording offers as a solo artist, but held out, wanting the band to be included in any deal she made. Blue Angel was eventually signed by Polydor Records and released a self-titled album on the label in 1980. Lauper hated the album cover, saying that it made her look like Big Bird, but Rolling Stone magazine later included it as one of the 100 best new wave album covers (2003). Despite critical acclaim, the album sold poorly ("It went lead", as Lauper later joked) and the band broke up. The members of Blue Angel had a falling-out with Massarsky and fired him as their manager. He later filed an $80,000 suit against them, which forced Lauper into bankruptcy. After this Lauper temporarily lost her voice due to an inverted cyst in her vocal cord.
After Blue Angel broke up, Lauper spent time, due to her financial problems, working in retail stores, waitressing at IHOP (which she quit after being demoted to hostess when the manager sexually harassed her), and singing in local clubs. Her most frequent gigs were at El Sombrero. Music critics who saw Lauper perform with Blue Angel believed she had star potential due to her four-octave singing range. In 1981, while singing in a local New York bar, Lauper met David Wolff, who took over as her manager and had her sign a recording contract with Portrait Records, a subsidiary of Epic Records.
1983–1985: She's So Unusual
On October 14, 1983, Lauper released her first solo album, She's So Unusual. The album became a worldwide hit, peaking at No. 4 in the U.S. and reaching the top five in eight other countries. The primary studio musicians were Eric Bazilian and Rob Hyman (of The Hooters), Rick Chertoff, Richard Termini and Peter Wood. Lauper became popular with teenagers and critics, in part due to her hybrid punk image, which was crafted by stylist Patrick Lucas.
Lauper co-wrote four songs on She's So Unusual, including the hits "Time After Time" and "She Bop". On the songs she did not write, Lauper sometimes changed the lyrics. Such is the case with "Girls Just Want to Have Fun". Lauper found the original lyrics to be misogynistic, so she rewrote the song as an anthem for young women.
The album includes five cover songs, including The Brains' new wave track "Money Changes Everything" (No. 27 on the Billboard Hot 100) and Prince's "When You Were Mine". The album made Lauper the first female artist to have four consecutive Billboard Hot 100 top five hits from one album. The LP stayed in the Top 200 charts for more than 65 weeks, and since has sold 32 million copies worldwide.
Cyndi won Best New Artist at the 1985 Grammy Awards. She's So Unusual also received nominations for Album of the Year, Record of the Year, Best Female Pop Vocal Performance (for "Girls Just Want to Have Fun"), and Song of the Year (for "Time After Time"). She wore almost a pound of necklaces at her award ceremony. It also won the Grammy for Best Album Package, which went to the art director, Janet Perr.
The video for "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" won the inaugural award for Best Female Video at the 1984 MTV Video Music Awards, and made Lauper an MTV staple. The video featured professional wrestling manager "Captain" Lou Albano as Lauper's father, and her real-life mother, Catrine, as her mother, and also featured her attorney, her manager, her brother Butch, and her dog Sparkle. In 1984–85, Lauper appeared on the covers of Rolling Stone magazine, Time, and Newsweek. She appeared twice on the cover of People, and was named a Ms. magazine Woman of the Year in 1985.
In 1985, Lauper participated in USA for Africa's famine-relief fund-raising single "We Are the World", which sold more than 20 million copies since then.
Lauper appeared with professional wrestler Hulk Hogan, who played her "bodyguard" and would also later make many appearances as herself in a number of the World Wrestling Federation's "Rock 'n' Wrestling Connection" events, and played Wendi Richter's manager in the inaugural WrestleMania event. Dave Wolff, Lauper's boyfriend and manager at the time, was a wrestling fan as a boy, and engineered the rock and wrestling connection.
In 1985, Lauper released the single "The Goonies 'R' Good Enough", from the soundtrack to the movie The Goonies, and an accompanying video which featured several wrestling stars. The song reached number 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.
1986–1988: True Colors and Vibes
Lauper received two nominations at the 1986 Grammy Awards: Best Female Rock Vocal Performance for "What a Thrill" and Best Long Form Music Video for Cyndi Lauper in Paris.
Lauper released her second album, True Colors in 1986. It entered the Billboard 200 at No. 42.
In 1986, Lauper appeared on the Billy Joel album The Bridge, with a song called "Code of Silence". She is credited as having written the lyrics with Joel and she sings a duet with him. In the same year, Lauper also sang the theme song for the series Pee-wee's Playhouse, credited as "Ellen Shaw". In 1987, David Wolff produced a concert film for Lauper called Cyndi Lauper in Paris. The concert was broadcast on HBO.
Lauper made her film debut in August 1988 in the quirky comedy Vibes, alongside Jeff Goldblum, Peter Falk, and Julian Sands. Lauper played a psychic in search of a city of gold in South America. Deborah Blum and Tony Ganz produced the film, with David Wolff as associate producer. To prepare for the role, Lauper took a few classes in finger waving and hair setting at the Robert Fiancé School of Beauty in New York, and studied with a few Manhattan psychics. The film flopped and was poorly received by critics, but would later be considered a cult classic.
Lauper contributed a track called "Hole in My Heart (All the Way to China)" for the Vibes soundtrack, but the song was not included. A music video was released, a high energy, comic action/adventure romp through a Chinese laundry. The song reached No. 54 on the US charts, but fared better in Australia, reaching No. 8.
1989–1992: A Night to Remember and marriage
A Night to Remember – Lauper's third album – was released in the spring of 1989. The album had one hit, the No. 6 single "I Drove All Night", originally recorded by Roy Orbison, three years before his death on December 6, 1988. Lauper received a Grammy nomination for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance at the 1990 Grammy Awards for "I Drove All Night", but overall album sales for A Night to Remember were down. The music video for the album's song "My First Night Without You" was one of the first to be closed-captioned for the hearing impaired.
Because of a friendship with Yoko Ono, Lauper took part in the May 1990 John Lennon tribute concert in Liverpool, performing the Beatles song "Hey Bulldog", and the John Lennon song "Working Class Hero". She also took part in Ono and Lennon's son Sean's project called "The Peace Choir", performing a new version of Lennon's "Give Peace a Chance".
On November 24, 1991, Lauper married actor David Thornton.
1993–1995: Hat Full of Stars and Twelve Deadly Cyns
Lauper's fourth album Hat Full of Stars was released in June 1993 and was met with critical acclaim, but failed commercially, unsupported by her label. The album, which tackled such topics as homophobia, spousal abuse, racism, and abortion sold fewer than 120,000 copies in the United States and peaked at No. 112 on the Billboard charts. The video for the album's song "Sally's Pigeons" features the then-unknown Julia Stiles as the young Cyndi.
In 1993, Lauper returned to acting, playing Michael J. Fox's ditzy secretary in Life with Mikey. She also won an Emmy Award for her role as Marianne Lugasso in the sitcom Mad About You.
1996–2000: Motherhood and Sisters of Avalon
On November 19, 1997, Lauper gave birth to her son, Declyn Wallace Lauper Thornton. Her fifth album, Sisters of Avalon, was released in Japan in 1996, and elsewhere in 1997. The album was written and produced with the help of Jan Pulsford (Lauper's keyboard player) and producer Mark Saunders. As in Hat Full of Stars, some of the songs in Sisters of Avalon addressed dark themes. The song "Ballad of Cleo and Joe" addressed the complications of a drag queen's double life. The song "Say a Prayer" was written for a friend of hers who had died from AIDS. "Unhook the Stars" was used in the movie of the same name. Again without support from her label, the release failed in America, spending a single week on the Billboard album chart at No. 188. This album also met with much critical praise, including People magazine, which declared it "'90s nourishment for body and soul. Lauper sets a scene, makes us care, gives us hope."
On January 17, 1999, Lauper appeared as an animated version of herself in The Simpsons episode "Wild Barts Can't Be Broken", singing the National Anthem to the melody of "Girls Just Want to Have Fun". That same year, Lauper opened for Cher's Do You Believe? Tour alongside Wild Orchid. She also appeared in the films Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle and The Opportunists.
2001–2004: Shine and At Last
On October 12, 2000, Lauper took part in the television show Women in Rock, Girls with Guitars performing with Ann Wilson of Heart and with the girl group, Destiny's Child. A CD of the songs performed was released exclusively to Sears stores from September 30 to October 31, 2001, and was marketed as a fundraiser for breast cancer.
In 2002, Sony issued a best-of CD, The Essential Cyndi Lauper. Lauper also released a cover album with Sony/Epic Records entitled At Last (formerly Naked City), which was released in 2003. At Last received one nomination at the 2005 Grammy Awards: Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocalist(s), for "Unchained Melody". The effort was also a commercial hit, selling 4.5 million records
In April 2004, Lauper performed during the VH1's benefit concert Divas Live 2004 alongside Ashanti, Gladys Knight, Jessica Simpson, Joss Stone and Patti LaBelle, in support of the Save the Music Foundation.
2005–2007: The Body Acoustic
She made appearances on Showtime's hit show Queer as Folk in 2005, directed a commercial for Totally 80s edition of the board game Trivial Pursuit in 2006, served as a judge on the 6th Annual Independent Music Awards and made her Broadway debut in the Tony-nominated The Threepenny Opera as Jenny. She performed with Shaggy, Scott Weiland of Velvet Revolver/Stone Temple Pilots, Pat Monahan of Train, Ani DiFranco, and The Hooters in the VH1 Classics special Decades Rock Live. In 2006, she sang "Message To Michael" with Dionne Warwick and "Beecharmer" with Nellie McKay on McKay's Pretty Little Head album.
On October 16, 2006, Lauper was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame.
2008–2009: Bring Ya to the Brink
Lauper's sixth studio album, Bring Ya to the Brink was released in the United States on May 27, 2008.
Other projects for 2008 included the True Colors Tour and a Christmas duet with Swedish band The Hives, entitled "A Christmas Duel". The song was released as a CD single and a 7" vinyl in Sweden. Lauper also performed on the "Girls Night Out", headlining it with Rosie O'Donnell in the US.
On November 17, 2009, Lauper performed a collaborative work with Wyclef Jean called "Slumdog Millionaire", performing it on the Late Show with David Letterman.
2010–2012: The Celebrity Apprentice, Memphis Blues, memoir
In January 2010, Mattel released a Cyndi Lauper Barbie doll as part of their "Ladies of the 80s" series.
In March 2010, Lauper appeared on NBC's The Celebrity Apprentice, coming in sixth place.
Memphis Blues—Lauper's 7th studio album—was released on June 22, 2010, and debuted on the Billboard Blues Albums chart at No. 1, and at No. 26 on the Billboard Top 200. The album remained No. 1 on the Blues Albums chart for 14 consecutive weeks; Memphis Blues was nominated for Best Traditional Blues Album at the 2011 Grammy Awards.
Lauper made international news in March 2011 for an impromptu performance of "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" while waiting for a delayed flight at Aeroparque Jorge Newbery in Buenos Aires. A video was later posted on YouTube.
In November 2011, she released two Christmas singles exclusive to iTunes. The first release was a Blues-inspired cover of Elvis Presley's classic "Blue Christmas", and the second was a new version of "Home for the holidays", a duet with Norah Jones. In June 2012, Lauper made her first appearance for WWE in 27 years, to promote WWE Raw's 1000th episode to memorialize "Captain" Lou Albano.
In September 2012, Lauper performed at fashion designer Betsey Johnson's 40 year Retrospective Fashion show. She also released a New York Times Best Selling memoir that detailed her struggle with child abuse and depression.
2013–2015: Kinky Boots and touring
Lauper composed music and lyrics for the Broadway musical Kinky Boots, with Harvey Fierstein writing the book. The musical was based on the 2006 independent film Kinky Boots. It opened in Chicago in October 2012 and on Broadway at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre on April 4, 2013. In May, she won Best Score for Kinky Boots at the 63rd annual Outer Critics Circle Awards. The musical led the 2013 Tony Awards, with 13 nominations and six wins including Best Musical and Best Actor. She won the award for Best Original Score. Lauper was the first woman to win solo in this category. After a six-year run and 2,507 regular shows, Kinky Boots ended its Broadway run on April 7, 2019. It is the 25th-longest-running Broadway musical in history. It grossed $297 million on Broadway.
In the summer of 2013, in celebration of the 30th anniversary of her debut album She's So Unusual, Lauper embarked on an international tour covering America and Australia. The show consisted of a mix of fan favorites and the entirety of the She's So Unusual record. She was a guest on 36 dates of Cher's Dressed to Kill Tour, starting April 23, 2014. A new album was confirmed by Lauper on a website interview.
Lauper hosted the Grammy Pre-Telecast at the Nokia Theatre, L.A. on Jan 26, where she later accepted a Grammy for Kinky Boots (Best Musical Theater Album).
On April 1 (March 1 in Europe), Lauper released the 30th Anniversary edition of She's So Unusual through Epic Records It featured a remastered version of the original album plus three new remixes. The Deluxe Edition featured bonus tracks such as demos and a live recording as well as a 3D cut-out of the bedroom featured in the 'Girls Just Want to Have Fun' music video with a reusable sticker set.
On September 17, 2014, Lauper sang on the finale of America's Got Talent. On September 25, as part of the Today Show's Shine a Light series, Lauper re-recorded "True Colors" in a mashup with Sara Bareilles' "Brave" to raise awareness and money for children battling cancer. By October the project had raised over $300,000.
The Songwriters Hall of Fame included Lauper in its nomination list in October 2014. Also during October, Lauper's fourth consecutive 'Home for the Holidays' benefit concert for homeless gay youth was announced. Acts included 50 Cent and Laverne Cox with 100% of the net proceeds going to True Colors United
In March 2015, Lauper once again guest starred on the crime show Bones as Avalon Harmonia.
Lauper promoted her work with Novartis and the National Psoriasis Foundation, and discussed her own five years with psoriasis, on The Today Show in July 2015. She also announced a project with producer Seymour Stein, which she later told Rolling Stone was a country album coproduced by Tony Brown.
On September 15, 2015, Kinky Boots opened at the Adelphi Theatre in London's West End.
On August 30, 2017, songwriters Benny Mardones and Robert Tepper sued Lauper for lifting elements from their song "Into the Night" for Kinky Boots’ final song "Raise You Up". In August 2019, a filed letter by Mardones' lawyer stated that all parties involved have agreed in principle to settle the case. No more details were given at the time.
2016–present: Detour and more
In January 2016, Lauper announced she would release a new album on May 6, 2016. This was composed of her interpretations of early country classics entitled Detour. The announcement was supported by a release of her version of Harlan Howard's "Heartaches by the Number" and a performance on Skyville Live with Kelsea Ballerini and Ingrid Michaelson. On February 17, 2016, she released her version of Wanda Jackson's "Funnel of Love".
In February 2016, Lauper was nominated for an Olivier Award for her contribution to the UK production of Kinky Boots along with Stephen Oremus, the man responsible for the arrangements. In January 2017, this production's album was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album.
In May 2016, Lauper was featured on "Swipe to the Right" from Electronica 2: The Heart of Noise by French producer Jean-Michel Jarre. This second album of the Electronica project is based on collaborations with artists related to electronic music (Tangerine Dream, Moby, Pet Shop Boys, etc.).
In October 2016, her son Dex Lauper was the opening act for her Scottsdale, Arizona and Las Vegas, Nevada dates on her Detour Tour.
In January 2017, Lauper was featured on Austin City Limits 42nd season performing some of her classic songs alongside country tunes from Detour. The episode aired on PBS.
In March 2018, it was announced that Lauper together with co-'Time after time' songwriter Rob Hyman is going to compose the score for the musical version of the 1988 film 'Working Girl' which starred Melanie Griffith and Sigourney Weaver. She teamed up with Hyman because she wanted "the music to sound like the 80s". The musical will be staged by Tony Award winner Christopher Ashley. A developmental production premiere of the musical is planned for the 2021/2022 season.
For Grandin Road, Lauper exclusively designed her own Christmas collection, 'Cyndi Lauper Loves Christmas', available from September 2018. "I've always loved Christmas, it reminds me to find some happiness in the little things," said Lauper.
Her annual Home For The Holidays concert at the Beacon Theatre in New York was held on December 8, 2018.
Lauper guest starred playing a lawyer in an episode of the reboot of the television series Magnum P.I.. The episode, titled "Sudden Death", aired on October 22, 2018.
On November 15, 2018, it was announced that Lauper would receive the Icon Award at the Billboard's 13th annual Women in Music Event on December 6 in New York City. According to Jason Lipshutz, Billboard's editorial director, "The entire world recognizes the power of Cyndi Lauper's pop music, and just as crucially, she has used her undeniable talent to soar beyond music, create positive change in modern society and become a true icon."
The song "Together" was featured in the Canadian computer-animated film "Racetime" released in January 2019. Originally written and performed in French by Dumas, Lauper performed the English translation in the English version of the film originally titled "La Course des tuques".
On June 26, 2019, Lauper performed at the opening ceremony of Stonewall 50 – WorldPride NYC 2019. Backed by the Hollywood Bowl orchestra, conducted by Thomas Wilkins, Lauper played two concerts on July 12 and 13, 2019 at the iconic Hollywood Bowl.
"Japanese Singles Collection – Greatest Hits" is a 2-disc greatest hits album that includes all of Laupers' singles released in Japan from 1983 to 1995 in chronological order. The second disc contains 26 music videos. Nine of these are available for the first time on DVD. The album was released on September 6, 2019, nine days after its original Japanese release.
In September 2019, it was announced that Lauper would star alongside Jane Lynch in the new Netflix comedy series described as "kind of The Golden Girls for today". As of March 2021, there had not been any updates on this project.
On January 26, 2020, Lauper sang a chorus from the song "I sing the Body Electric" of the soundtrack from the 1980 movie Fame at the 62nd annual Grammy Awards Show held in Los Angeles. Other performers were Ben Platt, Camila Cabello, Debbie Allen, who starred in the original movie, and more. It was a sendoff to long time Grammy Awards television producer Ken Erhlich. He retired after a four-decade run of producing the show.
On April 23, 2020, Lauper participated in an online fundraising concert to raise money for LGBTQ nightlife workers who struggled financially because of the coronavirus pandemic. Lauper ended the concert performing "True Colors". The concert was initiated by the Stonewall Inn Gives Back nonprofit organization of the historic Greenwich Village gay bar. Other performing artists were Kate Pierson, Our Lady J, Rufus Wainwright and Darren Hayes amongst others.
In November 2020, Lauper dueted with former top ten "American Idol" finalist Casey Abrams on a cover version of the song 'Eve of Destruction'.
In November 2021 Lauper featured as guest vocalist on the track 'Blame it on Christmas' by Shea Diamond. An official video was released the following month.
Personal life
Lauper was in a relationship from 1982 to 1988 with her then manager, Dave Wolff.
Lauper has been married to actor David Thornton since 1991. They have one son, Declyn Wallace Thornton Lauper (born on November 19, 1997).
Lauper has openly discussed her psoriasis, including in advertisements for Cosentyx.
Activism
Lauper has been an LGBT rights supporter throughout her career, campaigning for equality through various charities and gay pride events around the world. Lauper stated that she became involved in gay rights advocacy because her sister Ellen is a lesbian and because Lauper herself was passionate about equality. Lauper cites her sister Ellen as a role model.
Her song "Above the Clouds" celebrates the memory of Matthew Shepard, a young gay man beaten to death in Wyoming. As a member of the Matthew Shepard Foundation Board, Lauper devoted a concert tour in 2005 to promoting the Foundation's message.
She co-founded the True Colors tour for Human Rights throughout the United States and Canada in June 2007. One dollar from each ticket was earmarked for the Human Rights Campaign, which advocates equal rights for LGBT individuals.
In 2008, Lauper started True Colors United (TCU) after learning that, while 10% of American youth identify themselves as LGBT, up to 40% of American homeless youths do so. The organization works to end youth homelessness, focusing on the experiences of LGBT youth. She set up the True Colors Residence in New York City for LGBT homeless youths. The 30-bed facility offers temporary shelter and job placement help. In April 2010, TCU launched the Give a Damn campaign, to help get straight people more involved in LGBT rights.
In August 2008, she contributed an article titled "Hope" to The Huffington Post, encouraging Americans to vote for Barack Obama in the upcoming United States presidential election. Lauper performed at the 2008 Democratic National Convention.
Legacy
Lauper was described by AllMusic's Lindsay Planer as "an iconoclastic vocalist who revolutionized the role of women in rock and roll". Over her 40-year career, she influenced multiple recording artists including Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, Vanessa Paradis, Tegan and Sara, and Yelle. Due to her success and influence Lauper has been inducted into both the Hollywood and Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Stephen Thomas Erlewine of Spotify said She's So Unusual and Lauper's distinctive idiosyncratic appearance "helped popularize the image of punk and new wave for America, making it an acceptable part of the pop landscape". Rolling Stone magazine stated that her debut was "arguably the first time explicitly punk-influenced elements were front-and-center on the pop landscape, both musically and via Lauper's Patrick Lucas-styled ensembles, dressing up the droll Reagan decade in feminist chutzpah." The album ranked at No. 487 on Rolling Stones list of 500 Greatest Albums of All Time in 2003. The album ranked at No. 41 on Rolling Stones list of Women Who Rock: The 50 Greatest Albums of All Time in 2012. Rolling Stone's review stated, "A wild and wonderful skyrocket of a voice... Lauper's extraordinary pipes connect with the right material, the results sound like the beginning of a whole new golden age." Thirty years after its release, Entertainment Weekly called it an "everlastingly saucy supersmash".
Sheila Moeschen argued that "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" "embodied a different kind of feminine aesthetic that ran counter to the raw sensuality and edginess of her contemporaries like Madonna or veteran rockers Joan Jett and Pat Benatar", that introduced "a nation of women to a new kind of female role model, one that celebrated difference and encouraged playfulness in self-expression". John Rockwell wrote that the song was "a giddily upbeat attestation to female pleasure that simultaneously made a feminist statement, fulfilled male fantasies and—especially in its often-played video version—evoked the warmth of family and friends". Its music video won the first-ever Best Female Video prize at the 1984 VMAs. It featured a multicultural cast of women with teased, sideways hair and neon eye shadow, singing alongside Lauper.
"Time After Time" has been covered by over a hundred artists and was ranked at No. 22 on Rolling Stones 100 Best Songs of the Past 25 Years and at No. 19 on VH1's 100 Greatest Songs of the 80s.
"She Bop", the third single from She's So Unusual, is the first and only top ten song to directly mention a gay porn magazine. An ode to masturbation, it was included in the PMRC's "Filthy Fifteen" list that led to the parental advisory sticker appearing on recordings thought to be unsuitable for young listeners. In a retrospective, Rolling Stone ranked it the 36th best song of 1984, praising its unusual playfulness regarding sexuality.
"True Colors" is a gay anthem, after which True Colors United, which advocates for runaway and homeless LGBT youth, is named.
Discography
She's So Unusual (1983)
True Colors (1986)
A Night to Remember (1989)
Hat Full of Stars (1993)
Sisters of Avalon (1996)
Merry Christmas ... Have a Nice Life (1998)
At Last (2003)
Shine (2004)
Bring Ya to the Brink (2008)
Memphis Blues (2010)
Detour (2016)
Filmography
Tours
Headlining
Co-headlining
Guest
Awards and nominations
Grammy Awards
The Grammy Awards are awarded annually by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. Lauper has won two awards from 16 nominations.
|-
|rowspan="5"|1985
|Cyndi Lauper
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|She's So Unusual
|Album of the Year
|
|-
|"Time After Time"
|Song of the Year
|
|-
|rowspan="2"|"Girls Just Want to Have Fun"
|Record of the Year
|
|-
|Best Female Pop Vocal Performance
|
|-
|1986
|"What a Thrill"
|Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
|
|-
|rowspan="2"|1987
|"True Colors"
|Best Female Pop Vocal Performance
|
|-
|"911"
|Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
|
|-
|1988
|"Cyndi Lauper in Paris"
|Best Performance Music Video
|
|-
|1990
|"I Drove All Night"
|Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
|
|-
|1999
|"Disco Inferno"
|Best Dance Recording
|
|-
|2005
|"Unchained Melody"
|Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocalist(s)
|
|-
|2009
|Bring Ya to the Brink
|Best Electronic/Dance Album
|
|-
|2011
|Memphis Blues
|Best Traditional Blues Album
|
|-
|2014
|Kinky Boots
|Best Musical Theater Album
|
|-
|2017
|Kinky Boots (Original West End Cast)
|Best Musical Theater Album
|
|}
Tony Awards
The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre, more commonly known informally as the Tony Award, recognizes achievement in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by The Broadway League at an annual ceremony in New York City. Lauper is the first woman to win a Tony solo for Best Score.
Emmy Awards
An Emmy Award recognizes excellence in the television industry.
MTV Video Music Award
The MTV Video Music Awards were established in 1984 by MTV to celebrate the top music videos of the year. Lauper won one award from 14 nominations, the first Best Female Video.
|-
|rowspan="9"|1984
|rowspan="6"|"Girls Just Want to Have Fun"
|Video of the Year
|
|-
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|Best Female Video
|
|-
|Best Concept Video
|
|-
|Viewer's Choice
|
|-
|Best Overall Performance
|
|-
|rowspan="3"|"Time After Time"
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|Best Female Video
|
|-
|Best Direction
|
|-
|rowspan="2"|1987
|"True Colors"
|Best Female Video
|
|-
|"What's Going On"
|Best Cinematography
|
Other recognition
See also
List of artists who reached number one in the United States
List of awards and nominations received by Cyndi Lauper
List of number-one dance hits (United States)
List of number-one hits (United States)
References
External links
"Cyndi Lauper" the song, by Mat Shearer
Cyndi Lauper Fansite
Paul Burston, "Cyndi Lauper is Back, and the Girl still wants to Have Fun" (interview), The Times, August 2, 2008
NYTimes feature, 2010
1953 births
20th-century American actresses
20th-century American singers
20th-century American women singers
21st-century American actresses
21st-century American singers
21st-century American women singers
Activists from New York City
Actresses from New York City
American dance musicians
American women pop singers
American women rock singers
American women singer-songwriters
American film actresses
American freestyle musicians
American humanitarians
American people of German descent
American people of Swiss descent
American people of Italian descent
American rock songwriters
American sopranos
American soul singers
American television actresses
American voice actresses
American women activists
Dance-pop musicians
Downtown Records artists
Women new wave singers
Feminist musicians
Grammy Award winners
Johnson State College alumni
LGBT rights activists from the United States
Living people
New York (state) Democrats
Participants in American reality television series
People from Ozone Park, Queens
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Professional wrestling managers and valets
Singers from New York City
Singers with a four-octave vocal range
Sire Records artists
Synth-pop new wave musicians
The Apprentice (franchise) contestants
Tony Award winners
Women humanitarians
Sony BMG artists
Singer-songwriters from New York (state) | 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"
] |
[
"Cyndi Lauper",
"1953-1979: Early life",
"when was she born?",
"I don't know.",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"Her father, Fred, was of German and Swiss descent. Her mother, Catrine (nee Gallo), is Italian American ("
] | C_6d9e251df9a9430da20f2ad84e941620_1 | was she married? | 3 | was Cyndi Lauper married? | Cyndi Lauper | Lauper was born at Boulevard Hospital in Astoria, Queens, New York City, to a Catholic family. Her father, Fred, was of German and Swiss descent. Her mother, Catrine (nee Gallo), is Italian American (from Sicily). Lauper's siblings are younger brother Fred (nicknamed Butch), and older sister, Ellen. Lauper's parents divorced when she was five. Her mother remarried and divorced again. Lauper grew up in the Ozone Park neighborhood of Queens and, as a child, listened to such artists as The Beatles, Ella Fitzgerald, Judy Garland and Billie Holiday. At age 12, she began writing songs and playing an acoustic guitar given to her by her sister. Lauper expressed herself with a variety of hair colors, eccentric clothing and even took a friend's advice to spell her name as "Cyndi" rather than "Cindy". Lauper went to Richmond Hill High School, but was expelled, although she later earned her GED. She left home at 17, to escape her abusive stepfather, intending to study art. Her journey took her to Canada, where she spent two weeks in the woods with her dog Sparkle, trying to find herself. She eventually traveled to Vermont, where she took art classes at Johnson State College and supported herself working odd jobs. In the early 1970s, Lauper performed as a vocalist with various cover bands. One, called Doc West, covered disco songs as well as Janis Joplin. A later band, Flyer, was active in the New York metropolitan area, singing hits by bands including Bad Company, Jefferson Airplane and Led Zeppelin. Although Lauper was performing on stage, she was not happy singing covers. In 1977, Lauper damaged her vocal cords and took a year off from singing. She was told by doctors that she would never sing again, but regained her voice with the help of vocal coach Katie Agresta. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Cynthia Ann Stephanie Lauper Thornton (born June 22, 1953) is an American singer, songwriter, actress, and activist. Her career has spanned over 40 years. Her album She's So Unusual (1983) was the first debut album by a female artist to achieve four top-five hits on the Billboard Hot 100—"Girls Just Want to Have Fun", "Time After Time", "She Bop", and "All Through the Night"—and earned Lauper the Best New Artist award at the 27th Annual Grammy Awards in 1985. Her success continued with the soundtrack for the motion picture The Goonies and her second record True Colors (1986). This album included the number one single "True Colors" and "Change of Heart", which peaked at number three. In 1989, she had a hit with "I Drove All Night".
Since 1983, Lauper has released eleven studio albums and participated in many other projects. In 2010, Memphis Blues became Billboard most successful blues album of the year, remaining at number one on the Billboard Blues Albums chart for 13 consecutive weeks. In 2013, she won the Tony Award for best original score for composing the Broadway musical Kinky Boots, making her the first woman to win the category by herself. The musical was awarded five other Tonys including Tony Award for Best New Musical. In 2014, Lauper was awarded the Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album for the cast recording. In 2016, the West End production won Best New Musical at the Olivier Awards.
Lauper has sold over 50 million records worldwide. She has won awards at the Grammys, Emmys, Tonys, the New York's Outer Critics Circle, MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs), Billboard Awards, and American Music Awards (AMAs). An inductee into both the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Lauper is one of the few singers to win three of the four major American entertainment awards (EGOT). She won the inaugural Best Female Video prize at the 1984 VMAs for "Girls Just Want to Have Fun". This music video is recognized by MTV, VH1 and Rolling Stone as one of the greatest music videos of the era. She is featured in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's Women Who Rock exhibit. Her debut album is included in Rolling Stone list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, while "Time After Time" is included in VH1's list of the 100 Best Songs of the Past 25 years. VH1 has ranked Lauper No. 58 of the 100 Greatest Women of Rock & Roll.
Lauper is known for her distinctive image, featuring a variety of hair colors and eccentric clothing, and for her powerful and distinctive four-octave singing range. She has been celebrated for her humanitarian work, particularly as an advocate for LGBT rights in the United States. Her charitable efforts were acknowledged in 2013 when she was invited as a special guest to attend U.S. President Barack Obama's second-term inauguration.
Life and career
1953–1979: Early life
Lauper was born in Brooklyn, New York City, to a Catholic family. Her father, Fred, was of German and Swiss descent. Her mother, Catrine (née Gallo), is of Italian descent (from Sicily). Lauper's siblings are younger brother Fred (nicknamed Butch), and older sister, Ellen. Lauper's parents divorced when she was five. Her mother remarried and divorced again.
Lauper grew up in the Ozone Park neighborhood of Queens and, as a child, listened to such artists as The Beatles and Judy Garland. At age 12, she began writing songs and playing an acoustic guitar given to her by her sister.
Lauper expressed herself with a variety of hair colors and eccentric clothing, and took a friend's advice to spell her name as "Cyndi" rather than "Cindy". Her unconventional sense of style led to classmates bullying and throwing stones at her.
Lauper went to Richmond Hill High School, but was expelled, although she later earned her GED. She left home at 17, to escape her abusive stepfather, intending to study art. Her journey took her to Canada, where she spent two weeks in the woods with her dog Sparkle, trying to find herself. She eventually traveled to Vermont, where she took art classes at Johnson State College and supported herself working odd jobs. In 2019, Lauper gave the commencement address at Northern Vermont University - Johnson, the academic institution that now includes Johnson State. At this event, NVU awarded her the honorary degree of Doctor of Letters.
In the early 1970s, Lauper performed as a vocalist with various cover bands. One, called Doc West, covered disco songs as well as Janis Joplin. A later band, Flyer, was active in the New York metropolitan area, singing hits by bands including Bad Company, Jefferson Airplane and Led Zeppelin. Although Lauper was performing on stage, she was not happy singing covers. In 1977, Lauper damaged her vocal cords and took a year off from singing. She was told by doctors that she would never sing again, but regained her voice with the help of vocal coach Katie Agresta.
1980–1982: Blue Angel
In 1978, Lauper met saxophone player John Turi through her manager Ted Rosenblatt. Turi and Lauper formed a band named Blue Angel and recorded a demo tape of original music. Steve Massarsky, manager of The Allman Brothers Band, heard the tape and liked Lauper's voice. He bought Blue Angel's contract for $5,000 and became their manager.
Lauper received recording offers as a solo artist, but held out, wanting the band to be included in any deal she made. Blue Angel was eventually signed by Polydor Records and released a self-titled album on the label in 1980. Lauper hated the album cover, saying that it made her look like Big Bird, but Rolling Stone magazine later included it as one of the 100 best new wave album covers (2003). Despite critical acclaim, the album sold poorly ("It went lead", as Lauper later joked) and the band broke up. The members of Blue Angel had a falling-out with Massarsky and fired him as their manager. He later filed an $80,000 suit against them, which forced Lauper into bankruptcy. After this Lauper temporarily lost her voice due to an inverted cyst in her vocal cord.
After Blue Angel broke up, Lauper spent time, due to her financial problems, working in retail stores, waitressing at IHOP (which she quit after being demoted to hostess when the manager sexually harassed her), and singing in local clubs. Her most frequent gigs were at El Sombrero. Music critics who saw Lauper perform with Blue Angel believed she had star potential due to her four-octave singing range. In 1981, while singing in a local New York bar, Lauper met David Wolff, who took over as her manager and had her sign a recording contract with Portrait Records, a subsidiary of Epic Records.
1983–1985: She's So Unusual
On October 14, 1983, Lauper released her first solo album, She's So Unusual. The album became a worldwide hit, peaking at No. 4 in the U.S. and reaching the top five in eight other countries. The primary studio musicians were Eric Bazilian and Rob Hyman (of The Hooters), Rick Chertoff, Richard Termini and Peter Wood. Lauper became popular with teenagers and critics, in part due to her hybrid punk image, which was crafted by stylist Patrick Lucas.
Lauper co-wrote four songs on She's So Unusual, including the hits "Time After Time" and "She Bop". On the songs she did not write, Lauper sometimes changed the lyrics. Such is the case with "Girls Just Want to Have Fun". Lauper found the original lyrics to be misogynistic, so she rewrote the song as an anthem for young women.
The album includes five cover songs, including The Brains' new wave track "Money Changes Everything" (No. 27 on the Billboard Hot 100) and Prince's "When You Were Mine". The album made Lauper the first female artist to have four consecutive Billboard Hot 100 top five hits from one album. The LP stayed in the Top 200 charts for more than 65 weeks, and since has sold 32 million copies worldwide.
Cyndi won Best New Artist at the 1985 Grammy Awards. She's So Unusual also received nominations for Album of the Year, Record of the Year, Best Female Pop Vocal Performance (for "Girls Just Want to Have Fun"), and Song of the Year (for "Time After Time"). She wore almost a pound of necklaces at her award ceremony. It also won the Grammy for Best Album Package, which went to the art director, Janet Perr.
The video for "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" won the inaugural award for Best Female Video at the 1984 MTV Video Music Awards, and made Lauper an MTV staple. The video featured professional wrestling manager "Captain" Lou Albano as Lauper's father, and her real-life mother, Catrine, as her mother, and also featured her attorney, her manager, her brother Butch, and her dog Sparkle. In 1984–85, Lauper appeared on the covers of Rolling Stone magazine, Time, and Newsweek. She appeared twice on the cover of People, and was named a Ms. magazine Woman of the Year in 1985.
In 1985, Lauper participated in USA for Africa's famine-relief fund-raising single "We Are the World", which sold more than 20 million copies since then.
Lauper appeared with professional wrestler Hulk Hogan, who played her "bodyguard" and would also later make many appearances as herself in a number of the World Wrestling Federation's "Rock 'n' Wrestling Connection" events, and played Wendi Richter's manager in the inaugural WrestleMania event. Dave Wolff, Lauper's boyfriend and manager at the time, was a wrestling fan as a boy, and engineered the rock and wrestling connection.
In 1985, Lauper released the single "The Goonies 'R' Good Enough", from the soundtrack to the movie The Goonies, and an accompanying video which featured several wrestling stars. The song reached number 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.
1986–1988: True Colors and Vibes
Lauper received two nominations at the 1986 Grammy Awards: Best Female Rock Vocal Performance for "What a Thrill" and Best Long Form Music Video for Cyndi Lauper in Paris.
Lauper released her second album, True Colors in 1986. It entered the Billboard 200 at No. 42.
In 1986, Lauper appeared on the Billy Joel album The Bridge, with a song called "Code of Silence". She is credited as having written the lyrics with Joel and she sings a duet with him. In the same year, Lauper also sang the theme song for the series Pee-wee's Playhouse, credited as "Ellen Shaw". In 1987, David Wolff produced a concert film for Lauper called Cyndi Lauper in Paris. The concert was broadcast on HBO.
Lauper made her film debut in August 1988 in the quirky comedy Vibes, alongside Jeff Goldblum, Peter Falk, and Julian Sands. Lauper played a psychic in search of a city of gold in South America. Deborah Blum and Tony Ganz produced the film, with David Wolff as associate producer. To prepare for the role, Lauper took a few classes in finger waving and hair setting at the Robert Fiancé School of Beauty in New York, and studied with a few Manhattan psychics. The film flopped and was poorly received by critics, but would later be considered a cult classic.
Lauper contributed a track called "Hole in My Heart (All the Way to China)" for the Vibes soundtrack, but the song was not included. A music video was released, a high energy, comic action/adventure romp through a Chinese laundry. The song reached No. 54 on the US charts, but fared better in Australia, reaching No. 8.
1989–1992: A Night to Remember and marriage
A Night to Remember – Lauper's third album – was released in the spring of 1989. The album had one hit, the No. 6 single "I Drove All Night", originally recorded by Roy Orbison, three years before his death on December 6, 1988. Lauper received a Grammy nomination for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance at the 1990 Grammy Awards for "I Drove All Night", but overall album sales for A Night to Remember were down. The music video for the album's song "My First Night Without You" was one of the first to be closed-captioned for the hearing impaired.
Because of a friendship with Yoko Ono, Lauper took part in the May 1990 John Lennon tribute concert in Liverpool, performing the Beatles song "Hey Bulldog", and the John Lennon song "Working Class Hero". She also took part in Ono and Lennon's son Sean's project called "The Peace Choir", performing a new version of Lennon's "Give Peace a Chance".
On November 24, 1991, Lauper married actor David Thornton.
1993–1995: Hat Full of Stars and Twelve Deadly Cyns
Lauper's fourth album Hat Full of Stars was released in June 1993 and was met with critical acclaim, but failed commercially, unsupported by her label. The album, which tackled such topics as homophobia, spousal abuse, racism, and abortion sold fewer than 120,000 copies in the United States and peaked at No. 112 on the Billboard charts. The video for the album's song "Sally's Pigeons" features the then-unknown Julia Stiles as the young Cyndi.
In 1993, Lauper returned to acting, playing Michael J. Fox's ditzy secretary in Life with Mikey. She also won an Emmy Award for her role as Marianne Lugasso in the sitcom Mad About You.
1996–2000: Motherhood and Sisters of Avalon
On November 19, 1997, Lauper gave birth to her son, Declyn Wallace Lauper Thornton. Her fifth album, Sisters of Avalon, was released in Japan in 1996, and elsewhere in 1997. The album was written and produced with the help of Jan Pulsford (Lauper's keyboard player) and producer Mark Saunders. As in Hat Full of Stars, some of the songs in Sisters of Avalon addressed dark themes. The song "Ballad of Cleo and Joe" addressed the complications of a drag queen's double life. The song "Say a Prayer" was written for a friend of hers who had died from AIDS. "Unhook the Stars" was used in the movie of the same name. Again without support from her label, the release failed in America, spending a single week on the Billboard album chart at No. 188. This album also met with much critical praise, including People magazine, which declared it "'90s nourishment for body and soul. Lauper sets a scene, makes us care, gives us hope."
On January 17, 1999, Lauper appeared as an animated version of herself in The Simpsons episode "Wild Barts Can't Be Broken", singing the National Anthem to the melody of "Girls Just Want to Have Fun". That same year, Lauper opened for Cher's Do You Believe? Tour alongside Wild Orchid. She also appeared in the films Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle and The Opportunists.
2001–2004: Shine and At Last
On October 12, 2000, Lauper took part in the television show Women in Rock, Girls with Guitars performing with Ann Wilson of Heart and with the girl group, Destiny's Child. A CD of the songs performed was released exclusively to Sears stores from September 30 to October 31, 2001, and was marketed as a fundraiser for breast cancer.
In 2002, Sony issued a best-of CD, The Essential Cyndi Lauper. Lauper also released a cover album with Sony/Epic Records entitled At Last (formerly Naked City), which was released in 2003. At Last received one nomination at the 2005 Grammy Awards: Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocalist(s), for "Unchained Melody". The effort was also a commercial hit, selling 4.5 million records
In April 2004, Lauper performed during the VH1's benefit concert Divas Live 2004 alongside Ashanti, Gladys Knight, Jessica Simpson, Joss Stone and Patti LaBelle, in support of the Save the Music Foundation.
2005–2007: The Body Acoustic
She made appearances on Showtime's hit show Queer as Folk in 2005, directed a commercial for Totally 80s edition of the board game Trivial Pursuit in 2006, served as a judge on the 6th Annual Independent Music Awards and made her Broadway debut in the Tony-nominated The Threepenny Opera as Jenny. She performed with Shaggy, Scott Weiland of Velvet Revolver/Stone Temple Pilots, Pat Monahan of Train, Ani DiFranco, and The Hooters in the VH1 Classics special Decades Rock Live. In 2006, she sang "Message To Michael" with Dionne Warwick and "Beecharmer" with Nellie McKay on McKay's Pretty Little Head album.
On October 16, 2006, Lauper was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame.
2008–2009: Bring Ya to the Brink
Lauper's sixth studio album, Bring Ya to the Brink was released in the United States on May 27, 2008.
Other projects for 2008 included the True Colors Tour and a Christmas duet with Swedish band The Hives, entitled "A Christmas Duel". The song was released as a CD single and a 7" vinyl in Sweden. Lauper also performed on the "Girls Night Out", headlining it with Rosie O'Donnell in the US.
On November 17, 2009, Lauper performed a collaborative work with Wyclef Jean called "Slumdog Millionaire", performing it on the Late Show with David Letterman.
2010–2012: The Celebrity Apprentice, Memphis Blues, memoir
In January 2010, Mattel released a Cyndi Lauper Barbie doll as part of their "Ladies of the 80s" series.
In March 2010, Lauper appeared on NBC's The Celebrity Apprentice, coming in sixth place.
Memphis Blues—Lauper's 7th studio album—was released on June 22, 2010, and debuted on the Billboard Blues Albums chart at No. 1, and at No. 26 on the Billboard Top 200. The album remained No. 1 on the Blues Albums chart for 14 consecutive weeks; Memphis Blues was nominated for Best Traditional Blues Album at the 2011 Grammy Awards.
Lauper made international news in March 2011 for an impromptu performance of "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" while waiting for a delayed flight at Aeroparque Jorge Newbery in Buenos Aires. A video was later posted on YouTube.
In November 2011, she released two Christmas singles exclusive to iTunes. The first release was a Blues-inspired cover of Elvis Presley's classic "Blue Christmas", and the second was a new version of "Home for the holidays", a duet with Norah Jones. In June 2012, Lauper made her first appearance for WWE in 27 years, to promote WWE Raw's 1000th episode to memorialize "Captain" Lou Albano.
In September 2012, Lauper performed at fashion designer Betsey Johnson's 40 year Retrospective Fashion show. She also released a New York Times Best Selling memoir that detailed her struggle with child abuse and depression.
2013–2015: Kinky Boots and touring
Lauper composed music and lyrics for the Broadway musical Kinky Boots, with Harvey Fierstein writing the book. The musical was based on the 2006 independent film Kinky Boots. It opened in Chicago in October 2012 and on Broadway at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre on April 4, 2013. In May, she won Best Score for Kinky Boots at the 63rd annual Outer Critics Circle Awards. The musical led the 2013 Tony Awards, with 13 nominations and six wins including Best Musical and Best Actor. She won the award for Best Original Score. Lauper was the first woman to win solo in this category. After a six-year run and 2,507 regular shows, Kinky Boots ended its Broadway run on April 7, 2019. It is the 25th-longest-running Broadway musical in history. It grossed $297 million on Broadway.
In the summer of 2013, in celebration of the 30th anniversary of her debut album She's So Unusual, Lauper embarked on an international tour covering America and Australia. The show consisted of a mix of fan favorites and the entirety of the She's So Unusual record. She was a guest on 36 dates of Cher's Dressed to Kill Tour, starting April 23, 2014. A new album was confirmed by Lauper on a website interview.
Lauper hosted the Grammy Pre-Telecast at the Nokia Theatre, L.A. on Jan 26, where she later accepted a Grammy for Kinky Boots (Best Musical Theater Album).
On April 1 (March 1 in Europe), Lauper released the 30th Anniversary edition of She's So Unusual through Epic Records It featured a remastered version of the original album plus three new remixes. The Deluxe Edition featured bonus tracks such as demos and a live recording as well as a 3D cut-out of the bedroom featured in the 'Girls Just Want to Have Fun' music video with a reusable sticker set.
On September 17, 2014, Lauper sang on the finale of America's Got Talent. On September 25, as part of the Today Show's Shine a Light series, Lauper re-recorded "True Colors" in a mashup with Sara Bareilles' "Brave" to raise awareness and money for children battling cancer. By October the project had raised over $300,000.
The Songwriters Hall of Fame included Lauper in its nomination list in October 2014. Also during October, Lauper's fourth consecutive 'Home for the Holidays' benefit concert for homeless gay youth was announced. Acts included 50 Cent and Laverne Cox with 100% of the net proceeds going to True Colors United
In March 2015, Lauper once again guest starred on the crime show Bones as Avalon Harmonia.
Lauper promoted her work with Novartis and the National Psoriasis Foundation, and discussed her own five years with psoriasis, on The Today Show in July 2015. She also announced a project with producer Seymour Stein, which she later told Rolling Stone was a country album coproduced by Tony Brown.
On September 15, 2015, Kinky Boots opened at the Adelphi Theatre in London's West End.
On August 30, 2017, songwriters Benny Mardones and Robert Tepper sued Lauper for lifting elements from their song "Into the Night" for Kinky Boots’ final song "Raise You Up". In August 2019, a filed letter by Mardones' lawyer stated that all parties involved have agreed in principle to settle the case. No more details were given at the time.
2016–present: Detour and more
In January 2016, Lauper announced she would release a new album on May 6, 2016. This was composed of her interpretations of early country classics entitled Detour. The announcement was supported by a release of her version of Harlan Howard's "Heartaches by the Number" and a performance on Skyville Live with Kelsea Ballerini and Ingrid Michaelson. On February 17, 2016, she released her version of Wanda Jackson's "Funnel of Love".
In February 2016, Lauper was nominated for an Olivier Award for her contribution to the UK production of Kinky Boots along with Stephen Oremus, the man responsible for the arrangements. In January 2017, this production's album was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album.
In May 2016, Lauper was featured on "Swipe to the Right" from Electronica 2: The Heart of Noise by French producer Jean-Michel Jarre. This second album of the Electronica project is based on collaborations with artists related to electronic music (Tangerine Dream, Moby, Pet Shop Boys, etc.).
In October 2016, her son Dex Lauper was the opening act for her Scottsdale, Arizona and Las Vegas, Nevada dates on her Detour Tour.
In January 2017, Lauper was featured on Austin City Limits 42nd season performing some of her classic songs alongside country tunes from Detour. The episode aired on PBS.
In March 2018, it was announced that Lauper together with co-'Time after time' songwriter Rob Hyman is going to compose the score for the musical version of the 1988 film 'Working Girl' which starred Melanie Griffith and Sigourney Weaver. She teamed up with Hyman because she wanted "the music to sound like the 80s". The musical will be staged by Tony Award winner Christopher Ashley. A developmental production premiere of the musical is planned for the 2021/2022 season.
For Grandin Road, Lauper exclusively designed her own Christmas collection, 'Cyndi Lauper Loves Christmas', available from September 2018. "I've always loved Christmas, it reminds me to find some happiness in the little things," said Lauper.
Her annual Home For The Holidays concert at the Beacon Theatre in New York was held on December 8, 2018.
Lauper guest starred playing a lawyer in an episode of the reboot of the television series Magnum P.I.. The episode, titled "Sudden Death", aired on October 22, 2018.
On November 15, 2018, it was announced that Lauper would receive the Icon Award at the Billboard's 13th annual Women in Music Event on December 6 in New York City. According to Jason Lipshutz, Billboard's editorial director, "The entire world recognizes the power of Cyndi Lauper's pop music, and just as crucially, she has used her undeniable talent to soar beyond music, create positive change in modern society and become a true icon."
The song "Together" was featured in the Canadian computer-animated film "Racetime" released in January 2019. Originally written and performed in French by Dumas, Lauper performed the English translation in the English version of the film originally titled "La Course des tuques".
On June 26, 2019, Lauper performed at the opening ceremony of Stonewall 50 – WorldPride NYC 2019. Backed by the Hollywood Bowl orchestra, conducted by Thomas Wilkins, Lauper played two concerts on July 12 and 13, 2019 at the iconic Hollywood Bowl.
"Japanese Singles Collection – Greatest Hits" is a 2-disc greatest hits album that includes all of Laupers' singles released in Japan from 1983 to 1995 in chronological order. The second disc contains 26 music videos. Nine of these are available for the first time on DVD. The album was released on September 6, 2019, nine days after its original Japanese release.
In September 2019, it was announced that Lauper would star alongside Jane Lynch in the new Netflix comedy series described as "kind of The Golden Girls for today". As of March 2021, there had not been any updates on this project.
On January 26, 2020, Lauper sang a chorus from the song "I sing the Body Electric" of the soundtrack from the 1980 movie Fame at the 62nd annual Grammy Awards Show held in Los Angeles. Other performers were Ben Platt, Camila Cabello, Debbie Allen, who starred in the original movie, and more. It was a sendoff to long time Grammy Awards television producer Ken Erhlich. He retired after a four-decade run of producing the show.
On April 23, 2020, Lauper participated in an online fundraising concert to raise money for LGBTQ nightlife workers who struggled financially because of the coronavirus pandemic. Lauper ended the concert performing "True Colors". The concert was initiated by the Stonewall Inn Gives Back nonprofit organization of the historic Greenwich Village gay bar. Other performing artists were Kate Pierson, Our Lady J, Rufus Wainwright and Darren Hayes amongst others.
In November 2020, Lauper dueted with former top ten "American Idol" finalist Casey Abrams on a cover version of the song 'Eve of Destruction'.
In November 2021 Lauper featured as guest vocalist on the track 'Blame it on Christmas' by Shea Diamond. An official video was released the following month.
Personal life
Lauper was in a relationship from 1982 to 1988 with her then manager, Dave Wolff.
Lauper has been married to actor David Thornton since 1991. They have one son, Declyn Wallace Thornton Lauper (born on November 19, 1997).
Lauper has openly discussed her psoriasis, including in advertisements for Cosentyx.
Activism
Lauper has been an LGBT rights supporter throughout her career, campaigning for equality through various charities and gay pride events around the world. Lauper stated that she became involved in gay rights advocacy because her sister Ellen is a lesbian and because Lauper herself was passionate about equality. Lauper cites her sister Ellen as a role model.
Her song "Above the Clouds" celebrates the memory of Matthew Shepard, a young gay man beaten to death in Wyoming. As a member of the Matthew Shepard Foundation Board, Lauper devoted a concert tour in 2005 to promoting the Foundation's message.
She co-founded the True Colors tour for Human Rights throughout the United States and Canada in June 2007. One dollar from each ticket was earmarked for the Human Rights Campaign, which advocates equal rights for LGBT individuals.
In 2008, Lauper started True Colors United (TCU) after learning that, while 10% of American youth identify themselves as LGBT, up to 40% of American homeless youths do so. The organization works to end youth homelessness, focusing on the experiences of LGBT youth. She set up the True Colors Residence in New York City for LGBT homeless youths. The 30-bed facility offers temporary shelter and job placement help. In April 2010, TCU launched the Give a Damn campaign, to help get straight people more involved in LGBT rights.
In August 2008, she contributed an article titled "Hope" to The Huffington Post, encouraging Americans to vote for Barack Obama in the upcoming United States presidential election. Lauper performed at the 2008 Democratic National Convention.
Legacy
Lauper was described by AllMusic's Lindsay Planer as "an iconoclastic vocalist who revolutionized the role of women in rock and roll". Over her 40-year career, she influenced multiple recording artists including Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, Vanessa Paradis, Tegan and Sara, and Yelle. Due to her success and influence Lauper has been inducted into both the Hollywood and Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Stephen Thomas Erlewine of Spotify said She's So Unusual and Lauper's distinctive idiosyncratic appearance "helped popularize the image of punk and new wave for America, making it an acceptable part of the pop landscape". Rolling Stone magazine stated that her debut was "arguably the first time explicitly punk-influenced elements were front-and-center on the pop landscape, both musically and via Lauper's Patrick Lucas-styled ensembles, dressing up the droll Reagan decade in feminist chutzpah." The album ranked at No. 487 on Rolling Stones list of 500 Greatest Albums of All Time in 2003. The album ranked at No. 41 on Rolling Stones list of Women Who Rock: The 50 Greatest Albums of All Time in 2012. Rolling Stone's review stated, "A wild and wonderful skyrocket of a voice... Lauper's extraordinary pipes connect with the right material, the results sound like the beginning of a whole new golden age." Thirty years after its release, Entertainment Weekly called it an "everlastingly saucy supersmash".
Sheila Moeschen argued that "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" "embodied a different kind of feminine aesthetic that ran counter to the raw sensuality and edginess of her contemporaries like Madonna or veteran rockers Joan Jett and Pat Benatar", that introduced "a nation of women to a new kind of female role model, one that celebrated difference and encouraged playfulness in self-expression". John Rockwell wrote that the song was "a giddily upbeat attestation to female pleasure that simultaneously made a feminist statement, fulfilled male fantasies and—especially in its often-played video version—evoked the warmth of family and friends". Its music video won the first-ever Best Female Video prize at the 1984 VMAs. It featured a multicultural cast of women with teased, sideways hair and neon eye shadow, singing alongside Lauper.
"Time After Time" has been covered by over a hundred artists and was ranked at No. 22 on Rolling Stones 100 Best Songs of the Past 25 Years and at No. 19 on VH1's 100 Greatest Songs of the 80s.
"She Bop", the third single from She's So Unusual, is the first and only top ten song to directly mention a gay porn magazine. An ode to masturbation, it was included in the PMRC's "Filthy Fifteen" list that led to the parental advisory sticker appearing on recordings thought to be unsuitable for young listeners. In a retrospective, Rolling Stone ranked it the 36th best song of 1984, praising its unusual playfulness regarding sexuality.
"True Colors" is a gay anthem, after which True Colors United, which advocates for runaway and homeless LGBT youth, is named.
Discography
She's So Unusual (1983)
True Colors (1986)
A Night to Remember (1989)
Hat Full of Stars (1993)
Sisters of Avalon (1996)
Merry Christmas ... Have a Nice Life (1998)
At Last (2003)
Shine (2004)
Bring Ya to the Brink (2008)
Memphis Blues (2010)
Detour (2016)
Filmography
Tours
Headlining
Co-headlining
Guest
Awards and nominations
Grammy Awards
The Grammy Awards are awarded annually by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. Lauper has won two awards from 16 nominations.
|-
|rowspan="5"|1985
|Cyndi Lauper
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|She's So Unusual
|Album of the Year
|
|-
|"Time After Time"
|Song of the Year
|
|-
|rowspan="2"|"Girls Just Want to Have Fun"
|Record of the Year
|
|-
|Best Female Pop Vocal Performance
|
|-
|1986
|"What a Thrill"
|Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
|
|-
|rowspan="2"|1987
|"True Colors"
|Best Female Pop Vocal Performance
|
|-
|"911"
|Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
|
|-
|1988
|"Cyndi Lauper in Paris"
|Best Performance Music Video
|
|-
|1990
|"I Drove All Night"
|Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
|
|-
|1999
|"Disco Inferno"
|Best Dance Recording
|
|-
|2005
|"Unchained Melody"
|Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocalist(s)
|
|-
|2009
|Bring Ya to the Brink
|Best Electronic/Dance Album
|
|-
|2011
|Memphis Blues
|Best Traditional Blues Album
|
|-
|2014
|Kinky Boots
|Best Musical Theater Album
|
|-
|2017
|Kinky Boots (Original West End Cast)
|Best Musical Theater Album
|
|}
Tony Awards
The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre, more commonly known informally as the Tony Award, recognizes achievement in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by The Broadway League at an annual ceremony in New York City. Lauper is the first woman to win a Tony solo for Best Score.
Emmy Awards
An Emmy Award recognizes excellence in the television industry.
MTV Video Music Award
The MTV Video Music Awards were established in 1984 by MTV to celebrate the top music videos of the year. Lauper won one award from 14 nominations, the first Best Female Video.
|-
|rowspan="9"|1984
|rowspan="6"|"Girls Just Want to Have Fun"
|Video of the Year
|
|-
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|Best Female Video
|
|-
|Best Concept Video
|
|-
|Viewer's Choice
|
|-
|Best Overall Performance
|
|-
|rowspan="3"|"Time After Time"
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|Best Female Video
|
|-
|Best Direction
|
|-
|rowspan="2"|1987
|"True Colors"
|Best Female Video
|
|-
|"What's Going On"
|Best Cinematography
|
Other recognition
See also
List of artists who reached number one in the United States
List of awards and nominations received by Cyndi Lauper
List of number-one dance hits (United States)
List of number-one hits (United States)
References
External links
"Cyndi Lauper" the song, by Mat Shearer
Cyndi Lauper Fansite
Paul Burston, "Cyndi Lauper is Back, and the Girl still wants to Have Fun" (interview), The Times, August 2, 2008
NYTimes feature, 2010
1953 births
20th-century American actresses
20th-century American singers
20th-century American women singers
21st-century American actresses
21st-century American singers
21st-century American women singers
Activists from New York City
Actresses from New York City
American dance musicians
American women pop singers
American women rock singers
American women singer-songwriters
American film actresses
American freestyle musicians
American humanitarians
American people of German descent
American people of Swiss descent
American people of Italian descent
American rock songwriters
American sopranos
American soul singers
American television actresses
American voice actresses
American women activists
Dance-pop musicians
Downtown Records artists
Women new wave singers
Feminist musicians
Grammy Award winners
Johnson State College alumni
LGBT rights activists from the United States
Living people
New York (state) Democrats
Participants in American reality television series
People from Ozone Park, Queens
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Professional wrestling managers and valets
Singers from New York City
Singers with a four-octave vocal range
Sire Records artists
Synth-pop new wave musicians
The Apprentice (franchise) contestants
Tony Award winners
Women humanitarians
Sony BMG artists
Singer-songwriters from New York (state) | false | [
"Hafize Sultan was daughter of Selim I and Ayşe Hafsa Sultan.\n\nBiography\nIn some sources she was called Hafsa. According to some sources, she was married to bostancıbaşı Fülân Ağa, who was executed by orders of Selim I in 1520.\nIt is often claimed in most sources that Hafize was married to Dukakinzade Mehmed Pasha, however he was married to Gevherşah Sultan, granddaughter of Bayezid II.\nShe was married again in 1522 to Çoban Mustafa Pasha, until he died in April 1629. With him she had son Kara Osman Şah(D. 1567/68).\n\nDeath\nHafize Sultan died on 10 July 1538, of unknown causes. She was buried in Mausoleum of her father.\n\nReferences\n\nOttoman Empire",
"Al-Mu'ayyad Shaykh (; 1369 – 13 January 1421) was a Mamluk sultan of Egypt from 6 November 1412 to 13 January 1421.\n\nFamily\nShaykh's first wife was Khawand Khadija, whom he married before his accession to the throne. Another wife was Khawand Zaynab, the daughter of Sultan Barquq. She died in February–March 1423, and was buried in the mausoleum of her father. Another wife was Khawand Sa'adat. She was the daughter of Sirgitmish, and was the mother of his son Sultan Al-Muzaffar Ahmad. After Shaykh's death, she married Sultan Sayf ad-Din Tatar. She died in 1430. One of his concubines was Qutlubay, a Circassian. She was the mother of his son Sidi Ibrahim. After Shaykh's death she married Amir Inal al-Jakami. Ibrahim married Satita, daughter of Sultan An-Nasir Faraj. His only daughter was Khawand Asiya. She died in 1486.\n\nArchitecture\n\nHe has built the Mosque of Sultan al-Muayyad and Maristan of al-Mu'ayyad.\n\nSee also\nMosque of Sultan al-Muayyad\n\nReferences\n\nBurji sultans\n15th-century Mamluk sultans\n1369 births\n1421 deaths"
] |
[
"Cyndi Lauper",
"1953-1979: Early life",
"when was she born?",
"I don't know.",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"Her father, Fred, was of German and Swiss descent. Her mother, Catrine (nee Gallo), is Italian American (",
"was she married?",
"I don't know."
] | C_6d9e251df9a9430da20f2ad84e941620_1 | did she have children? | 4 | did Cyndi Lauper have children? | Cyndi Lauper | Lauper was born at Boulevard Hospital in Astoria, Queens, New York City, to a Catholic family. Her father, Fred, was of German and Swiss descent. Her mother, Catrine (nee Gallo), is Italian American (from Sicily). Lauper's siblings are younger brother Fred (nicknamed Butch), and older sister, Ellen. Lauper's parents divorced when she was five. Her mother remarried and divorced again. Lauper grew up in the Ozone Park neighborhood of Queens and, as a child, listened to such artists as The Beatles, Ella Fitzgerald, Judy Garland and Billie Holiday. At age 12, she began writing songs and playing an acoustic guitar given to her by her sister. Lauper expressed herself with a variety of hair colors, eccentric clothing and even took a friend's advice to spell her name as "Cyndi" rather than "Cindy". Lauper went to Richmond Hill High School, but was expelled, although she later earned her GED. She left home at 17, to escape her abusive stepfather, intending to study art. Her journey took her to Canada, where she spent two weeks in the woods with her dog Sparkle, trying to find herself. She eventually traveled to Vermont, where she took art classes at Johnson State College and supported herself working odd jobs. In the early 1970s, Lauper performed as a vocalist with various cover bands. One, called Doc West, covered disco songs as well as Janis Joplin. A later band, Flyer, was active in the New York metropolitan area, singing hits by bands including Bad Company, Jefferson Airplane and Led Zeppelin. Although Lauper was performing on stage, she was not happy singing covers. In 1977, Lauper damaged her vocal cords and took a year off from singing. She was told by doctors that she would never sing again, but regained her voice with the help of vocal coach Katie Agresta. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Cynthia Ann Stephanie Lauper Thornton (born June 22, 1953) is an American singer, songwriter, actress, and activist. Her career has spanned over 40 years. Her album She's So Unusual (1983) was the first debut album by a female artist to achieve four top-five hits on the Billboard Hot 100—"Girls Just Want to Have Fun", "Time After Time", "She Bop", and "All Through the Night"—and earned Lauper the Best New Artist award at the 27th Annual Grammy Awards in 1985. Her success continued with the soundtrack for the motion picture The Goonies and her second record True Colors (1986). This album included the number one single "True Colors" and "Change of Heart", which peaked at number three. In 1989, she had a hit with "I Drove All Night".
Since 1983, Lauper has released eleven studio albums and participated in many other projects. In 2010, Memphis Blues became Billboard most successful blues album of the year, remaining at number one on the Billboard Blues Albums chart for 13 consecutive weeks. In 2013, she won the Tony Award for best original score for composing the Broadway musical Kinky Boots, making her the first woman to win the category by herself. The musical was awarded five other Tonys including Tony Award for Best New Musical. In 2014, Lauper was awarded the Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album for the cast recording. In 2016, the West End production won Best New Musical at the Olivier Awards.
Lauper has sold over 50 million records worldwide. She has won awards at the Grammys, Emmys, Tonys, the New York's Outer Critics Circle, MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs), Billboard Awards, and American Music Awards (AMAs). An inductee into both the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Lauper is one of the few singers to win three of the four major American entertainment awards (EGOT). She won the inaugural Best Female Video prize at the 1984 VMAs for "Girls Just Want to Have Fun". This music video is recognized by MTV, VH1 and Rolling Stone as one of the greatest music videos of the era. She is featured in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's Women Who Rock exhibit. Her debut album is included in Rolling Stone list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, while "Time After Time" is included in VH1's list of the 100 Best Songs of the Past 25 years. VH1 has ranked Lauper No. 58 of the 100 Greatest Women of Rock & Roll.
Lauper is known for her distinctive image, featuring a variety of hair colors and eccentric clothing, and for her powerful and distinctive four-octave singing range. She has been celebrated for her humanitarian work, particularly as an advocate for LGBT rights in the United States. Her charitable efforts were acknowledged in 2013 when she was invited as a special guest to attend U.S. President Barack Obama's second-term inauguration.
Life and career
1953–1979: Early life
Lauper was born in Brooklyn, New York City, to a Catholic family. Her father, Fred, was of German and Swiss descent. Her mother, Catrine (née Gallo), is of Italian descent (from Sicily). Lauper's siblings are younger brother Fred (nicknamed Butch), and older sister, Ellen. Lauper's parents divorced when she was five. Her mother remarried and divorced again.
Lauper grew up in the Ozone Park neighborhood of Queens and, as a child, listened to such artists as The Beatles and Judy Garland. At age 12, she began writing songs and playing an acoustic guitar given to her by her sister.
Lauper expressed herself with a variety of hair colors and eccentric clothing, and took a friend's advice to spell her name as "Cyndi" rather than "Cindy". Her unconventional sense of style led to classmates bullying and throwing stones at her.
Lauper went to Richmond Hill High School, but was expelled, although she later earned her GED. She left home at 17, to escape her abusive stepfather, intending to study art. Her journey took her to Canada, where she spent two weeks in the woods with her dog Sparkle, trying to find herself. She eventually traveled to Vermont, where she took art classes at Johnson State College and supported herself working odd jobs. In 2019, Lauper gave the commencement address at Northern Vermont University - Johnson, the academic institution that now includes Johnson State. At this event, NVU awarded her the honorary degree of Doctor of Letters.
In the early 1970s, Lauper performed as a vocalist with various cover bands. One, called Doc West, covered disco songs as well as Janis Joplin. A later band, Flyer, was active in the New York metropolitan area, singing hits by bands including Bad Company, Jefferson Airplane and Led Zeppelin. Although Lauper was performing on stage, she was not happy singing covers. In 1977, Lauper damaged her vocal cords and took a year off from singing. She was told by doctors that she would never sing again, but regained her voice with the help of vocal coach Katie Agresta.
1980–1982: Blue Angel
In 1978, Lauper met saxophone player John Turi through her manager Ted Rosenblatt. Turi and Lauper formed a band named Blue Angel and recorded a demo tape of original music. Steve Massarsky, manager of The Allman Brothers Band, heard the tape and liked Lauper's voice. He bought Blue Angel's contract for $5,000 and became their manager.
Lauper received recording offers as a solo artist, but held out, wanting the band to be included in any deal she made. Blue Angel was eventually signed by Polydor Records and released a self-titled album on the label in 1980. Lauper hated the album cover, saying that it made her look like Big Bird, but Rolling Stone magazine later included it as one of the 100 best new wave album covers (2003). Despite critical acclaim, the album sold poorly ("It went lead", as Lauper later joked) and the band broke up. The members of Blue Angel had a falling-out with Massarsky and fired him as their manager. He later filed an $80,000 suit against them, which forced Lauper into bankruptcy. After this Lauper temporarily lost her voice due to an inverted cyst in her vocal cord.
After Blue Angel broke up, Lauper spent time, due to her financial problems, working in retail stores, waitressing at IHOP (which she quit after being demoted to hostess when the manager sexually harassed her), and singing in local clubs. Her most frequent gigs were at El Sombrero. Music critics who saw Lauper perform with Blue Angel believed she had star potential due to her four-octave singing range. In 1981, while singing in a local New York bar, Lauper met David Wolff, who took over as her manager and had her sign a recording contract with Portrait Records, a subsidiary of Epic Records.
1983–1985: She's So Unusual
On October 14, 1983, Lauper released her first solo album, She's So Unusual. The album became a worldwide hit, peaking at No. 4 in the U.S. and reaching the top five in eight other countries. The primary studio musicians were Eric Bazilian and Rob Hyman (of The Hooters), Rick Chertoff, Richard Termini and Peter Wood. Lauper became popular with teenagers and critics, in part due to her hybrid punk image, which was crafted by stylist Patrick Lucas.
Lauper co-wrote four songs on She's So Unusual, including the hits "Time After Time" and "She Bop". On the songs she did not write, Lauper sometimes changed the lyrics. Such is the case with "Girls Just Want to Have Fun". Lauper found the original lyrics to be misogynistic, so she rewrote the song as an anthem for young women.
The album includes five cover songs, including The Brains' new wave track "Money Changes Everything" (No. 27 on the Billboard Hot 100) and Prince's "When You Were Mine". The album made Lauper the first female artist to have four consecutive Billboard Hot 100 top five hits from one album. The LP stayed in the Top 200 charts for more than 65 weeks, and since has sold 32 million copies worldwide.
Cyndi won Best New Artist at the 1985 Grammy Awards. She's So Unusual also received nominations for Album of the Year, Record of the Year, Best Female Pop Vocal Performance (for "Girls Just Want to Have Fun"), and Song of the Year (for "Time After Time"). She wore almost a pound of necklaces at her award ceremony. It also won the Grammy for Best Album Package, which went to the art director, Janet Perr.
The video for "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" won the inaugural award for Best Female Video at the 1984 MTV Video Music Awards, and made Lauper an MTV staple. The video featured professional wrestling manager "Captain" Lou Albano as Lauper's father, and her real-life mother, Catrine, as her mother, and also featured her attorney, her manager, her brother Butch, and her dog Sparkle. In 1984–85, Lauper appeared on the covers of Rolling Stone magazine, Time, and Newsweek. She appeared twice on the cover of People, and was named a Ms. magazine Woman of the Year in 1985.
In 1985, Lauper participated in USA for Africa's famine-relief fund-raising single "We Are the World", which sold more than 20 million copies since then.
Lauper appeared with professional wrestler Hulk Hogan, who played her "bodyguard" and would also later make many appearances as herself in a number of the World Wrestling Federation's "Rock 'n' Wrestling Connection" events, and played Wendi Richter's manager in the inaugural WrestleMania event. Dave Wolff, Lauper's boyfriend and manager at the time, was a wrestling fan as a boy, and engineered the rock and wrestling connection.
In 1985, Lauper released the single "The Goonies 'R' Good Enough", from the soundtrack to the movie The Goonies, and an accompanying video which featured several wrestling stars. The song reached number 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.
1986–1988: True Colors and Vibes
Lauper received two nominations at the 1986 Grammy Awards: Best Female Rock Vocal Performance for "What a Thrill" and Best Long Form Music Video for Cyndi Lauper in Paris.
Lauper released her second album, True Colors in 1986. It entered the Billboard 200 at No. 42.
In 1986, Lauper appeared on the Billy Joel album The Bridge, with a song called "Code of Silence". She is credited as having written the lyrics with Joel and she sings a duet with him. In the same year, Lauper also sang the theme song for the series Pee-wee's Playhouse, credited as "Ellen Shaw". In 1987, David Wolff produced a concert film for Lauper called Cyndi Lauper in Paris. The concert was broadcast on HBO.
Lauper made her film debut in August 1988 in the quirky comedy Vibes, alongside Jeff Goldblum, Peter Falk, and Julian Sands. Lauper played a psychic in search of a city of gold in South America. Deborah Blum and Tony Ganz produced the film, with David Wolff as associate producer. To prepare for the role, Lauper took a few classes in finger waving and hair setting at the Robert Fiancé School of Beauty in New York, and studied with a few Manhattan psychics. The film flopped and was poorly received by critics, but would later be considered a cult classic.
Lauper contributed a track called "Hole in My Heart (All the Way to China)" for the Vibes soundtrack, but the song was not included. A music video was released, a high energy, comic action/adventure romp through a Chinese laundry. The song reached No. 54 on the US charts, but fared better in Australia, reaching No. 8.
1989–1992: A Night to Remember and marriage
A Night to Remember – Lauper's third album – was released in the spring of 1989. The album had one hit, the No. 6 single "I Drove All Night", originally recorded by Roy Orbison, three years before his death on December 6, 1988. Lauper received a Grammy nomination for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance at the 1990 Grammy Awards for "I Drove All Night", but overall album sales for A Night to Remember were down. The music video for the album's song "My First Night Without You" was one of the first to be closed-captioned for the hearing impaired.
Because of a friendship with Yoko Ono, Lauper took part in the May 1990 John Lennon tribute concert in Liverpool, performing the Beatles song "Hey Bulldog", and the John Lennon song "Working Class Hero". She also took part in Ono and Lennon's son Sean's project called "The Peace Choir", performing a new version of Lennon's "Give Peace a Chance".
On November 24, 1991, Lauper married actor David Thornton.
1993–1995: Hat Full of Stars and Twelve Deadly Cyns
Lauper's fourth album Hat Full of Stars was released in June 1993 and was met with critical acclaim, but failed commercially, unsupported by her label. The album, which tackled such topics as homophobia, spousal abuse, racism, and abortion sold fewer than 120,000 copies in the United States and peaked at No. 112 on the Billboard charts. The video for the album's song "Sally's Pigeons" features the then-unknown Julia Stiles as the young Cyndi.
In 1993, Lauper returned to acting, playing Michael J. Fox's ditzy secretary in Life with Mikey. She also won an Emmy Award for her role as Marianne Lugasso in the sitcom Mad About You.
1996–2000: Motherhood and Sisters of Avalon
On November 19, 1997, Lauper gave birth to her son, Declyn Wallace Lauper Thornton. Her fifth album, Sisters of Avalon, was released in Japan in 1996, and elsewhere in 1997. The album was written and produced with the help of Jan Pulsford (Lauper's keyboard player) and producer Mark Saunders. As in Hat Full of Stars, some of the songs in Sisters of Avalon addressed dark themes. The song "Ballad of Cleo and Joe" addressed the complications of a drag queen's double life. The song "Say a Prayer" was written for a friend of hers who had died from AIDS. "Unhook the Stars" was used in the movie of the same name. Again without support from her label, the release failed in America, spending a single week on the Billboard album chart at No. 188. This album also met with much critical praise, including People magazine, which declared it "'90s nourishment for body and soul. Lauper sets a scene, makes us care, gives us hope."
On January 17, 1999, Lauper appeared as an animated version of herself in The Simpsons episode "Wild Barts Can't Be Broken", singing the National Anthem to the melody of "Girls Just Want to Have Fun". That same year, Lauper opened for Cher's Do You Believe? Tour alongside Wild Orchid. She also appeared in the films Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle and The Opportunists.
2001–2004: Shine and At Last
On October 12, 2000, Lauper took part in the television show Women in Rock, Girls with Guitars performing with Ann Wilson of Heart and with the girl group, Destiny's Child. A CD of the songs performed was released exclusively to Sears stores from September 30 to October 31, 2001, and was marketed as a fundraiser for breast cancer.
In 2002, Sony issued a best-of CD, The Essential Cyndi Lauper. Lauper also released a cover album with Sony/Epic Records entitled At Last (formerly Naked City), which was released in 2003. At Last received one nomination at the 2005 Grammy Awards: Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocalist(s), for "Unchained Melody". The effort was also a commercial hit, selling 4.5 million records
In April 2004, Lauper performed during the VH1's benefit concert Divas Live 2004 alongside Ashanti, Gladys Knight, Jessica Simpson, Joss Stone and Patti LaBelle, in support of the Save the Music Foundation.
2005–2007: The Body Acoustic
She made appearances on Showtime's hit show Queer as Folk in 2005, directed a commercial for Totally 80s edition of the board game Trivial Pursuit in 2006, served as a judge on the 6th Annual Independent Music Awards and made her Broadway debut in the Tony-nominated The Threepenny Opera as Jenny. She performed with Shaggy, Scott Weiland of Velvet Revolver/Stone Temple Pilots, Pat Monahan of Train, Ani DiFranco, and The Hooters in the VH1 Classics special Decades Rock Live. In 2006, she sang "Message To Michael" with Dionne Warwick and "Beecharmer" with Nellie McKay on McKay's Pretty Little Head album.
On October 16, 2006, Lauper was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame.
2008–2009: Bring Ya to the Brink
Lauper's sixth studio album, Bring Ya to the Brink was released in the United States on May 27, 2008.
Other projects for 2008 included the True Colors Tour and a Christmas duet with Swedish band The Hives, entitled "A Christmas Duel". The song was released as a CD single and a 7" vinyl in Sweden. Lauper also performed on the "Girls Night Out", headlining it with Rosie O'Donnell in the US.
On November 17, 2009, Lauper performed a collaborative work with Wyclef Jean called "Slumdog Millionaire", performing it on the Late Show with David Letterman.
2010–2012: The Celebrity Apprentice, Memphis Blues, memoir
In January 2010, Mattel released a Cyndi Lauper Barbie doll as part of their "Ladies of the 80s" series.
In March 2010, Lauper appeared on NBC's The Celebrity Apprentice, coming in sixth place.
Memphis Blues—Lauper's 7th studio album—was released on June 22, 2010, and debuted on the Billboard Blues Albums chart at No. 1, and at No. 26 on the Billboard Top 200. The album remained No. 1 on the Blues Albums chart for 14 consecutive weeks; Memphis Blues was nominated for Best Traditional Blues Album at the 2011 Grammy Awards.
Lauper made international news in March 2011 for an impromptu performance of "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" while waiting for a delayed flight at Aeroparque Jorge Newbery in Buenos Aires. A video was later posted on YouTube.
In November 2011, she released two Christmas singles exclusive to iTunes. The first release was a Blues-inspired cover of Elvis Presley's classic "Blue Christmas", and the second was a new version of "Home for the holidays", a duet with Norah Jones. In June 2012, Lauper made her first appearance for WWE in 27 years, to promote WWE Raw's 1000th episode to memorialize "Captain" Lou Albano.
In September 2012, Lauper performed at fashion designer Betsey Johnson's 40 year Retrospective Fashion show. She also released a New York Times Best Selling memoir that detailed her struggle with child abuse and depression.
2013–2015: Kinky Boots and touring
Lauper composed music and lyrics for the Broadway musical Kinky Boots, with Harvey Fierstein writing the book. The musical was based on the 2006 independent film Kinky Boots. It opened in Chicago in October 2012 and on Broadway at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre on April 4, 2013. In May, she won Best Score for Kinky Boots at the 63rd annual Outer Critics Circle Awards. The musical led the 2013 Tony Awards, with 13 nominations and six wins including Best Musical and Best Actor. She won the award for Best Original Score. Lauper was the first woman to win solo in this category. After a six-year run and 2,507 regular shows, Kinky Boots ended its Broadway run on April 7, 2019. It is the 25th-longest-running Broadway musical in history. It grossed $297 million on Broadway.
In the summer of 2013, in celebration of the 30th anniversary of her debut album She's So Unusual, Lauper embarked on an international tour covering America and Australia. The show consisted of a mix of fan favorites and the entirety of the She's So Unusual record. She was a guest on 36 dates of Cher's Dressed to Kill Tour, starting April 23, 2014. A new album was confirmed by Lauper on a website interview.
Lauper hosted the Grammy Pre-Telecast at the Nokia Theatre, L.A. on Jan 26, where she later accepted a Grammy for Kinky Boots (Best Musical Theater Album).
On April 1 (March 1 in Europe), Lauper released the 30th Anniversary edition of She's So Unusual through Epic Records It featured a remastered version of the original album plus three new remixes. The Deluxe Edition featured bonus tracks such as demos and a live recording as well as a 3D cut-out of the bedroom featured in the 'Girls Just Want to Have Fun' music video with a reusable sticker set.
On September 17, 2014, Lauper sang on the finale of America's Got Talent. On September 25, as part of the Today Show's Shine a Light series, Lauper re-recorded "True Colors" in a mashup with Sara Bareilles' "Brave" to raise awareness and money for children battling cancer. By October the project had raised over $300,000.
The Songwriters Hall of Fame included Lauper in its nomination list in October 2014. Also during October, Lauper's fourth consecutive 'Home for the Holidays' benefit concert for homeless gay youth was announced. Acts included 50 Cent and Laverne Cox with 100% of the net proceeds going to True Colors United
In March 2015, Lauper once again guest starred on the crime show Bones as Avalon Harmonia.
Lauper promoted her work with Novartis and the National Psoriasis Foundation, and discussed her own five years with psoriasis, on The Today Show in July 2015. She also announced a project with producer Seymour Stein, which she later told Rolling Stone was a country album coproduced by Tony Brown.
On September 15, 2015, Kinky Boots opened at the Adelphi Theatre in London's West End.
On August 30, 2017, songwriters Benny Mardones and Robert Tepper sued Lauper for lifting elements from their song "Into the Night" for Kinky Boots’ final song "Raise You Up". In August 2019, a filed letter by Mardones' lawyer stated that all parties involved have agreed in principle to settle the case. No more details were given at the time.
2016–present: Detour and more
In January 2016, Lauper announced she would release a new album on May 6, 2016. This was composed of her interpretations of early country classics entitled Detour. The announcement was supported by a release of her version of Harlan Howard's "Heartaches by the Number" and a performance on Skyville Live with Kelsea Ballerini and Ingrid Michaelson. On February 17, 2016, she released her version of Wanda Jackson's "Funnel of Love".
In February 2016, Lauper was nominated for an Olivier Award for her contribution to the UK production of Kinky Boots along with Stephen Oremus, the man responsible for the arrangements. In January 2017, this production's album was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album.
In May 2016, Lauper was featured on "Swipe to the Right" from Electronica 2: The Heart of Noise by French producer Jean-Michel Jarre. This second album of the Electronica project is based on collaborations with artists related to electronic music (Tangerine Dream, Moby, Pet Shop Boys, etc.).
In October 2016, her son Dex Lauper was the opening act for her Scottsdale, Arizona and Las Vegas, Nevada dates on her Detour Tour.
In January 2017, Lauper was featured on Austin City Limits 42nd season performing some of her classic songs alongside country tunes from Detour. The episode aired on PBS.
In March 2018, it was announced that Lauper together with co-'Time after time' songwriter Rob Hyman is going to compose the score for the musical version of the 1988 film 'Working Girl' which starred Melanie Griffith and Sigourney Weaver. She teamed up with Hyman because she wanted "the music to sound like the 80s". The musical will be staged by Tony Award winner Christopher Ashley. A developmental production premiere of the musical is planned for the 2021/2022 season.
For Grandin Road, Lauper exclusively designed her own Christmas collection, 'Cyndi Lauper Loves Christmas', available from September 2018. "I've always loved Christmas, it reminds me to find some happiness in the little things," said Lauper.
Her annual Home For The Holidays concert at the Beacon Theatre in New York was held on December 8, 2018.
Lauper guest starred playing a lawyer in an episode of the reboot of the television series Magnum P.I.. The episode, titled "Sudden Death", aired on October 22, 2018.
On November 15, 2018, it was announced that Lauper would receive the Icon Award at the Billboard's 13th annual Women in Music Event on December 6 in New York City. According to Jason Lipshutz, Billboard's editorial director, "The entire world recognizes the power of Cyndi Lauper's pop music, and just as crucially, she has used her undeniable talent to soar beyond music, create positive change in modern society and become a true icon."
The song "Together" was featured in the Canadian computer-animated film "Racetime" released in January 2019. Originally written and performed in French by Dumas, Lauper performed the English translation in the English version of the film originally titled "La Course des tuques".
On June 26, 2019, Lauper performed at the opening ceremony of Stonewall 50 – WorldPride NYC 2019. Backed by the Hollywood Bowl orchestra, conducted by Thomas Wilkins, Lauper played two concerts on July 12 and 13, 2019 at the iconic Hollywood Bowl.
"Japanese Singles Collection – Greatest Hits" is a 2-disc greatest hits album that includes all of Laupers' singles released in Japan from 1983 to 1995 in chronological order. The second disc contains 26 music videos. Nine of these are available for the first time on DVD. The album was released on September 6, 2019, nine days after its original Japanese release.
In September 2019, it was announced that Lauper would star alongside Jane Lynch in the new Netflix comedy series described as "kind of The Golden Girls for today". As of March 2021, there had not been any updates on this project.
On January 26, 2020, Lauper sang a chorus from the song "I sing the Body Electric" of the soundtrack from the 1980 movie Fame at the 62nd annual Grammy Awards Show held in Los Angeles. Other performers were Ben Platt, Camila Cabello, Debbie Allen, who starred in the original movie, and more. It was a sendoff to long time Grammy Awards television producer Ken Erhlich. He retired after a four-decade run of producing the show.
On April 23, 2020, Lauper participated in an online fundraising concert to raise money for LGBTQ nightlife workers who struggled financially because of the coronavirus pandemic. Lauper ended the concert performing "True Colors". The concert was initiated by the Stonewall Inn Gives Back nonprofit organization of the historic Greenwich Village gay bar. Other performing artists were Kate Pierson, Our Lady J, Rufus Wainwright and Darren Hayes amongst others.
In November 2020, Lauper dueted with former top ten "American Idol" finalist Casey Abrams on a cover version of the song 'Eve of Destruction'.
In November 2021 Lauper featured as guest vocalist on the track 'Blame it on Christmas' by Shea Diamond. An official video was released the following month.
Personal life
Lauper was in a relationship from 1982 to 1988 with her then manager, Dave Wolff.
Lauper has been married to actor David Thornton since 1991. They have one son, Declyn Wallace Thornton Lauper (born on November 19, 1997).
Lauper has openly discussed her psoriasis, including in advertisements for Cosentyx.
Activism
Lauper has been an LGBT rights supporter throughout her career, campaigning for equality through various charities and gay pride events around the world. Lauper stated that she became involved in gay rights advocacy because her sister Ellen is a lesbian and because Lauper herself was passionate about equality. Lauper cites her sister Ellen as a role model.
Her song "Above the Clouds" celebrates the memory of Matthew Shepard, a young gay man beaten to death in Wyoming. As a member of the Matthew Shepard Foundation Board, Lauper devoted a concert tour in 2005 to promoting the Foundation's message.
She co-founded the True Colors tour for Human Rights throughout the United States and Canada in June 2007. One dollar from each ticket was earmarked for the Human Rights Campaign, which advocates equal rights for LGBT individuals.
In 2008, Lauper started True Colors United (TCU) after learning that, while 10% of American youth identify themselves as LGBT, up to 40% of American homeless youths do so. The organization works to end youth homelessness, focusing on the experiences of LGBT youth. She set up the True Colors Residence in New York City for LGBT homeless youths. The 30-bed facility offers temporary shelter and job placement help. In April 2010, TCU launched the Give a Damn campaign, to help get straight people more involved in LGBT rights.
In August 2008, she contributed an article titled "Hope" to The Huffington Post, encouraging Americans to vote for Barack Obama in the upcoming United States presidential election. Lauper performed at the 2008 Democratic National Convention.
Legacy
Lauper was described by AllMusic's Lindsay Planer as "an iconoclastic vocalist who revolutionized the role of women in rock and roll". Over her 40-year career, she influenced multiple recording artists including Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, Vanessa Paradis, Tegan and Sara, and Yelle. Due to her success and influence Lauper has been inducted into both the Hollywood and Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Stephen Thomas Erlewine of Spotify said She's So Unusual and Lauper's distinctive idiosyncratic appearance "helped popularize the image of punk and new wave for America, making it an acceptable part of the pop landscape". Rolling Stone magazine stated that her debut was "arguably the first time explicitly punk-influenced elements were front-and-center on the pop landscape, both musically and via Lauper's Patrick Lucas-styled ensembles, dressing up the droll Reagan decade in feminist chutzpah." The album ranked at No. 487 on Rolling Stones list of 500 Greatest Albums of All Time in 2003. The album ranked at No. 41 on Rolling Stones list of Women Who Rock: The 50 Greatest Albums of All Time in 2012. Rolling Stone's review stated, "A wild and wonderful skyrocket of a voice... Lauper's extraordinary pipes connect with the right material, the results sound like the beginning of a whole new golden age." Thirty years after its release, Entertainment Weekly called it an "everlastingly saucy supersmash".
Sheila Moeschen argued that "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" "embodied a different kind of feminine aesthetic that ran counter to the raw sensuality and edginess of her contemporaries like Madonna or veteran rockers Joan Jett and Pat Benatar", that introduced "a nation of women to a new kind of female role model, one that celebrated difference and encouraged playfulness in self-expression". John Rockwell wrote that the song was "a giddily upbeat attestation to female pleasure that simultaneously made a feminist statement, fulfilled male fantasies and—especially in its often-played video version—evoked the warmth of family and friends". Its music video won the first-ever Best Female Video prize at the 1984 VMAs. It featured a multicultural cast of women with teased, sideways hair and neon eye shadow, singing alongside Lauper.
"Time After Time" has been covered by over a hundred artists and was ranked at No. 22 on Rolling Stones 100 Best Songs of the Past 25 Years and at No. 19 on VH1's 100 Greatest Songs of the 80s.
"She Bop", the third single from She's So Unusual, is the first and only top ten song to directly mention a gay porn magazine. An ode to masturbation, it was included in the PMRC's "Filthy Fifteen" list that led to the parental advisory sticker appearing on recordings thought to be unsuitable for young listeners. In a retrospective, Rolling Stone ranked it the 36th best song of 1984, praising its unusual playfulness regarding sexuality.
"True Colors" is a gay anthem, after which True Colors United, which advocates for runaway and homeless LGBT youth, is named.
Discography
She's So Unusual (1983)
True Colors (1986)
A Night to Remember (1989)
Hat Full of Stars (1993)
Sisters of Avalon (1996)
Merry Christmas ... Have a Nice Life (1998)
At Last (2003)
Shine (2004)
Bring Ya to the Brink (2008)
Memphis Blues (2010)
Detour (2016)
Filmography
Tours
Headlining
Co-headlining
Guest
Awards and nominations
Grammy Awards
The Grammy Awards are awarded annually by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. Lauper has won two awards from 16 nominations.
|-
|rowspan="5"|1985
|Cyndi Lauper
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|She's So Unusual
|Album of the Year
|
|-
|"Time After Time"
|Song of the Year
|
|-
|rowspan="2"|"Girls Just Want to Have Fun"
|Record of the Year
|
|-
|Best Female Pop Vocal Performance
|
|-
|1986
|"What a Thrill"
|Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
|
|-
|rowspan="2"|1987
|"True Colors"
|Best Female Pop Vocal Performance
|
|-
|"911"
|Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
|
|-
|1988
|"Cyndi Lauper in Paris"
|Best Performance Music Video
|
|-
|1990
|"I Drove All Night"
|Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
|
|-
|1999
|"Disco Inferno"
|Best Dance Recording
|
|-
|2005
|"Unchained Melody"
|Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocalist(s)
|
|-
|2009
|Bring Ya to the Brink
|Best Electronic/Dance Album
|
|-
|2011
|Memphis Blues
|Best Traditional Blues Album
|
|-
|2014
|Kinky Boots
|Best Musical Theater Album
|
|-
|2017
|Kinky Boots (Original West End Cast)
|Best Musical Theater Album
|
|}
Tony Awards
The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre, more commonly known informally as the Tony Award, recognizes achievement in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by The Broadway League at an annual ceremony in New York City. Lauper is the first woman to win a Tony solo for Best Score.
Emmy Awards
An Emmy Award recognizes excellence in the television industry.
MTV Video Music Award
The MTV Video Music Awards were established in 1984 by MTV to celebrate the top music videos of the year. Lauper won one award from 14 nominations, the first Best Female Video.
|-
|rowspan="9"|1984
|rowspan="6"|"Girls Just Want to Have Fun"
|Video of the Year
|
|-
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|Best Female Video
|
|-
|Best Concept Video
|
|-
|Viewer's Choice
|
|-
|Best Overall Performance
|
|-
|rowspan="3"|"Time After Time"
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|Best Female Video
|
|-
|Best Direction
|
|-
|rowspan="2"|1987
|"True Colors"
|Best Female Video
|
|-
|"What's Going On"
|Best Cinematography
|
Other recognition
See also
List of artists who reached number one in the United States
List of awards and nominations received by Cyndi Lauper
List of number-one dance hits (United States)
List of number-one hits (United States)
References
External links
"Cyndi Lauper" the song, by Mat Shearer
Cyndi Lauper Fansite
Paul Burston, "Cyndi Lauper is Back, and the Girl still wants to Have Fun" (interview), The Times, August 2, 2008
NYTimes feature, 2010
1953 births
20th-century American actresses
20th-century American singers
20th-century American women singers
21st-century American actresses
21st-century American singers
21st-century American women singers
Activists from New York City
Actresses from New York City
American dance musicians
American women pop singers
American women rock singers
American women singer-songwriters
American film actresses
American freestyle musicians
American humanitarians
American people of German descent
American people of Swiss descent
American people of Italian descent
American rock songwriters
American sopranos
American soul singers
American television actresses
American voice actresses
American women activists
Dance-pop musicians
Downtown Records artists
Women new wave singers
Feminist musicians
Grammy Award winners
Johnson State College alumni
LGBT rights activists from the United States
Living people
New York (state) Democrats
Participants in American reality television series
People from Ozone Park, Queens
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Professional wrestling managers and valets
Singers from New York City
Singers with a four-octave vocal range
Sire Records artists
Synth-pop new wave musicians
The Apprentice (franchise) contestants
Tony Award winners
Women humanitarians
Sony BMG artists
Singer-songwriters from New York (state) | false | [
"Jane Webb, also known as Jane Williams was an indentured servant in Northampton County of the Colony of Virginia. She entered a seven-year contract with Thomas Savage so that she could marry an enslave man named Left. It allowed for children born during those seven years to be bound over to Savage, but after she was free, Webb expected her children to be free. Savage used the courts to his advantage and also used stall tactics to prevent the case from being settled. In the end, Left and their children were enslaved to Savage and his heirs.\n\nEarly life\nJane Webb, born free, was a mixed-race daughter of a white woman. She worked as an indentured servant.\n\nMarriage and children\nWebb wanted to marry a black enslaved man named Left in 1703 or 1704. To do so, she entered into a signed contract with Left's enslaver, Thomas Savage, who was a slaveholder and planter. In order to marry Left, she agreed to work for Savage for seven years. During that time, if she had any children, they would serve Savage. The period of the children's servitude was not clear. At the end of the seven years, her contract would be complete, Left would be freed, and Savage would not have a claim to children born after the seven year period. While indentured to Savage, she and Left had three children, Diana or Dinah, Daniel, and Francis Webb. Under Partus sequitur ventrem, the children took their status from their mother, so they should be free. Although it was quite unusual for an enslaved person to marry, their marriage was legally valid.\n\nBackground\nFree blacks made up 10% of the population of Northampton County, Virginia. To ensure their rights, it was common for blacks to file cases in court. Unusual for the time, Webb was the head of the family household, since Left was enslaved.\n\nLegal battle\nIn 1711, Webb expected to leave Savage with Left and their children. They disagreed about the arrangement for the children and Savage would not allow Left or the children to be freed. He submitted a letter to the county court of Northampton to have the children bound to him and his heirs. The court agreed with him.\n\nWebb went to court in 1722 to have her children freed. She contented that since she was married when she had the children, they should not be enslaved. Savage did not show up in court. He said he was sick and the case was continued a term. That happened several more times. Then the case was dismissed, claiming that Webb filed a frivolous case.\n\nSavage then wanted two more children—Lisha and Abimelech—born after Webb completed of her contract. Savage contended that since she was unable to financially support the children, Savage was best suited to take care of them and to prevent them from being \"induced to take ill courses\", but their arrangement did not allow for the two children to be bound over to Savage. He could not produce the contract, but he brought witnesses who stated that the agreement with Webb was to be able to have all children born to Webb.\n\nWebb tried to free her children and Left at the chancery court in March 1725. She argued that since Webb would not produce the contract, she did not have a way to prove their arrangement. She asked that he be brought into court. On July 12, 1726, the court ruled that Lisha and Abimilech were both to Savage and Webb was arrested for allegedly stating that \"if all Virginia Negroes had as a good as heart as she had they would all be free.\" She was ordered to receive 10 lashes of the whip. In November 1726, the court told Webb that she needed to provide proof to get her children and husband; Savage claimed he never agreed to free Left. She brought African American witnesses to court in December 1726, but they were not considered admissible and were not heard. After a couple more attempts in 1727, she realized she would not win. Left, her children, and now her children remained bound to Savage and his heirs.\n\nReferences\n\nYear of birth unknown\nYear of death unknown\nPeople from Northampton County, Virginia",
"Usiququmadevu or Isiququmadevu is a creature from Zulu mythology. She is a bearded, bloated monster who eats every living thing she comes across. \n\nUsiququmadevu is said to have a husband of the same name.\n\nLegend\nAccording to legend, one day she came upon the children of a chief. As they were unguarded, she quickly swallowed them. The chief discovered what had happened and instantly set out to find her. Soon he did and killed her by stabbing her in the hump; his children emerged unscathed from her mouth.\n\nReferences\n\nZulu legendary creatures"
] |
[
"John O. Brennan",
"Career highlights"
] | C_e87bf3024ef84bcbaf1fc0aca35fc6a4_1 | What were his career highlights? | 1 | What were John O. Brennan's career highlights? | John O. Brennan | Brennan began his CIA career as an analyst and spent 25 years with the agency. He was a daily intelligence briefer for President Bill Clinton. In 1996, he was CIA station chief in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia when the Khobar Towers bombing killed 19 U.S. servicemen. In 1999, he was appointed chief of staff to George Tenet, then-Director of the CIA. Brennan became deputy executive director of the CIA in March 2001. He was director of the newly created Terrorist Threat Integration Center from 2003 to 2004, an office that sifted through and compiled information for President Bush's daily top secret intelligence briefings and employed the services of analysts from a dozen U.S. agencies and entities. One of the controversies in his career involves the distribution of intelligence to the Bush White House that helped lead to an "Orange Terror Alert", in late 2003. The intelligence, which purported to list terror targets, was highly controversial within the CIA and was later discredited. An Obama administration official does not dispute that Brennan distributed the intelligence during the Bush era but said Brennan passed it along because that was his job. His last post within the Intelligence Community was as director of the National Counterterrorism Center in 2004 and 2005, which incorporated information on terrorist activities across U.S. agencies. Brennan then left government service for a few years, becoming Chairman of the Intelligence and National Security Alliance (INSA) and the CEO of The Analysis Corporation (TAC). He continued to lead TAC after its acquisition by Global Strategies Group in 2007 and its growth as the Global Intelligence Solutions division of Global's North American technology business GTEC, before returning to government service with the Obama administration as Homeland Security Advisor on January 20, 2009. On January 7, 2013, Brennan was nominated by President Barack Obama to be director of the Central Intelligence Agency. In September 2017, Brennan was named a Distinguished Non-Resident Scholar at The University of Texas at Austin, where he also acts as a Senior Advisor to the University's Intelligence Studies Project. CANNOTANSWER | Brennan began his CIA career as an analyst and spent 25 years with the agency. | false | [
"BET Presents Chris Brown is a DVD released by the American R&B singer-songwriter Chris Brown. The DVD was originally packaged with Exclusive, exclusively at Wal-mart. The release features BET highlights, performance highlights, and music videos from throughout Brown's career. Brown gives a candid interview as he talks about the production of Exclusive. The DVD also features BET highlights, performance highlights, and music videos from throughout Brown's career.\n\nRelease\nIn collaboration with Jive and Zomba Records, BET Official created BET Presents Chris Brown to help celebrate the release Brown's sophomore effort and gives his fans a chance to experience highlights from his career.\nThe DVD was originally packaged with Brown's second album, Exclusive, exclusively at Walmart. However, it is now available for individual purchase at online shopping sites such as Amazon.com.\n\nDVD features\tBET Highlights\n2006 BET Hip Hop Awards Performances\nInterview with Chris Brown\n106 and Park Performances & Interviews\n\nMusic videos\n\n\"Run It!\"\n\"Say Goodbye\"\n\"Gimme That\"\n\"Yo (Excuse Me Miss)\"\n\"Wall to Wall\"\n\"Kiss Kiss\" (Sneak Peek)\n\nExternal links\nBrown BET Presents DVD OOP Features Music Videos, Live Performances, and More!\n\nChris Brown albums\n2007 video albums\n2007 compilation albums\nJive Records video albums\nMusic video compilation albums",
"Highlights for Children, often referred to simply as Highlights, is an American children's magazine. It began publication in June 1946, started by Garry Cleveland Myers and his wife Caroline Clark Myers in Honesdale, Pennsylvania (the present location of its editorial office). They both worked for another children's magazine, Children's Activities, for twelve years before leaving to start Highlights. Since its inception Highlights has carried the slogan \"Fun with a Purpose\".\n\nThe company is now based in Columbus, Ohio, and owns book publishers Zaner-Bloser, Stenhouse Publishers, and Staff Development for Educators. Its Boyds Mills Press division was sold to Kane Press in 2019. Highlights has surpassed one billion copies in print. Highlights, High Five, and Hello magazines do not carry any third-party advertising or commercial messages.\n\nThe Highlights Foundation, in Pennsylvania, is a public, not-for-profit 501(c)(3) organization supported by individuals, several publishing companies, and writers' organizations that are committed to improving the quality of children's literature by helping authors and illustrators hone their craft. Its location is the former home of the founders of Highlights for Children.\n\nBefore Highlights\nGarry Myers earned a PhD in psychology from Columbia University before World War I, providing a basis for the teaching he would do the rest of his life. He and Caroline Myers taught illiterate soldiers for the US Army, with Caroline becoming the first female teacher employed by the Army. This experience led to their pioneering of elementary education. They taught educators and parents for a time at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, during which Garry Myers wrote a nationally syndicated column entitled Parent Problems, and the couple co-authored several books.\n\nThey had become nationally well known in education and wished to share their knowledge so they began to work for Children's Activities. Lecturing across the nation, they informed, discovered, and refined what they knew. Certain business endeavors kept them from publishing what they thought was ideal for a children's magazine. Their travels also led to long discussions on what would be appropriate for children, and after finishing with Children's Activities instead of retiring they decided to start their own magazine. Their experience, knowledge and uncompromising methods led to a success for Highlights. Later, they would buy Children's Activities and incorporate it in Highlights.\n\nGarry and Caroline Myers tragically lost their son Garry and his wife Mary along with Highlights company vice-president Cyril Ewart, who were all passengers on TWA Flight 266, which collided over New York Harbor with United Flight 826 on December 16, 1960, while the three were on the trip to discuss distribution plans for Highlights magazine. There was only one survivor on either plane, who died the following day.\n\nHighlights Magazine for Children\nHighlights is geared mainly to elementary school students; it contains stories and puzzles for children ages six to twelve years old. One aim of the magazine is to encourage kids to read and has something for preschoolers in every issue. Highlights illustrations feature people of all colors and its stories also cover diverse communities. Its February 2017 issue included a family with two dads, the first depiction of a same-sex relationship in the magazine's 70-year history.\n\nIn June 1946, the first issue of Highlights sold fewer than 20,000 copies. Forty years later, Highlights was the most popular children's magazine in the United States, having close to two million subscribers, with 95 percent of the copies mailed to homes. The magazine accepted no advertising and eschewed single-issue sales, but could be found in most doctors' and dentists' offices in the United States.\n\nBy 1995, Highlights circulation had grown to 2.8 million, with most subscribers still being families. In 2006, the United States Postal Service delivered the one-billionth copy of Highlights magazine to a young subscriber in Dallas, Texas. \n\nHighlights circulation numbers declined to about 2 million copies a month by 2015, and the magazine announced that it would move some content onto tablets and mobile devices with the help of San Francisco startup, Fingerprint Digital, led by former LeapFrog Enterprises executive Nancy MacIntyre. The magazine launched a new mobile app Highlights Every Day, in April 2017.\n\nHighlights High Five Magazine for PreschoolersHighlights High Five is a younger children's counterpart to Highlights, first published with the January 2007 issue. This children's magazine is for preschoolers ages two through six. The goal of High Five is to help children develop and to give parent and child a fun and meaningful activity to do together each month. Every issue is 40 pages and includes poems and stories, crafts, easy recipes, games, puzzles and other activities that encourage children to be lifelong learners.\n\nHighlights Hello Magazine for ToddlersHighlights Hello Magazine was introduced in December 2012. This magazine for babies and toddlers targets children ages 0–2 years old. Highlights announced that this magazine, which is offered in several subscription packages is designed specifically for babies.\n\nRegular featuresAsk ArizonaAppearing in the magazine since 2005, \"Ask Arizona\" is a story series featuring a girl named Arizona who writes an advice column for other children, similar to Dear Abby or Ask Ann Landers. The article depicts real-life experiences and appears in every issue.Hidden Pictures\"Hidden Pictures\", published in every issue of Highlights since the magazine's inception, is now found on page 14 of each issue. Children find the smaller hidden pictures within the larger picture.Goofus and GallantFirst appearing in Highlights in 1948, Goofus and Gallant is a cartoon feature created by Garry Cleveland Myers and drawn by Anni Matsick. The strip features two contrasting boys, Goofus and Gallant. In each cartoon, it is shown how each boy would respond to the same situation. Goofus chooses an irresponsible and immature path, while Gallant chooses a responsible, mature and kind path. Often the panels would provide a description, such as on a school bus: Goofus hogs his seat – Gallant makes space for someone else to sit down. Sometimes the situations would show the boys talking, such as phone courtesy when parents are away: Goofus: \"Someone called but I forgot their name.\" Gallant: \"Someone called for you. I wrote down their name and number\". Goofus and Gallant's primary function is to teach children basic social skills. Originally drawn in black and white, Goofus and Gallant changed to colored pencils in 1994 and later changed to colored computer graphics in December 2005.The TimbertoesCreated for a 1932 book of the same name (published by The Harter Publishing Company) by writers Edna M. Aldredge and Jessie F. McKee along with illustrator John Gee, The Timbertoes has appeared in Highlights magazine for more than 50 years. The first Highlights incarnation was a full-page black and white comic strip featuring line-drawn characters, later switching to digital color in 2003. The Timbertoes family consists of parents Ma and Pa and their children Tommy and Mabel. The characters, including their dog Spot, cat Splinter, goat Butter, and horse Troy are depicted as being constructed from wood. Upon Gee's death, Highlights Senior Editor Marileta Robinson took over writing the strip, with illustrations done by Judith Hunt. Since 2003, the Timbertoes have appeared in color with Ron Zalme as the illustrator. Rich Wallace is the current writer.JokesAppearing in every issue is a series of 10 jokes of various kinds. A knock-knock joke is always included as a part of this feature.RiddlesA series of ten riddles. The punchlines appear upside-down at the bottom of the column.Your Own Pages\"Your Own Pages\" is a feature that prints drawings, poems, and stories by readers who submit them to the magazine.What's Wrong?Featured on the back cover, \"What's Wrong?\" is a large drawing of a typical scene of children playing, but unusual objects take the place of normal things throughout the picture. The page instructs the reader to find the various objects that are wrong.CraftsThis is a section where kids can make different crafts, such as puzzles, puppets and cards.Brain PlayThis section comprises a list of several simple questions for children.ContestsSometimes Highlights would have an illustration of something and would ask if a reader could submit a short story to accompany this. Other times it could be an unfinished story and the contest would ask if the readers could submit a few paragraphs to complete it. Several ideas would be chosen as winners and featured in a future issue.Dear Highlights\"Dear Highlights\" is an advice column from real children appearing at the back of each issue.Puzzles, Short Stories, and PoemsEvery issue of Highlights features puzzles, short stories, and poems throughout the issue. A puzzle is always featured at the front side of the back cover.Your Best Self\"Your Best Self\" is a one-panel comic showing kids doing the right thing that appeared until February 2015.The Bear Family'''This was a cartoon created by Garry Cleveland Myers. It focuses on a family of bears consisting of Father Bear, Mother Bear, daughter Woozy, and sons Poozy and Piddy. They learned about everything from name-calling to discipline.\n\nFormer features\n\nAloysius\nThe Aloysius stories were written by Sydney K. Davis. They centralized on an anthropomorphic wolf named Aloysius, who would get into a situation and have to be rescued by the other characters in the story, a male named Samuel Samuel and a female named Wanda. These appeared until 1993.\n\n Digital media \nIn 2010, Highlights released a series of educational mobile apps on the iOS App Store.\n\nIn September 2015, Highlights announced a partnership with Fingerprint—a San Francisco–based startup company involved in the development of edutainment apps, in launching apps that would serve as a complement to the printed Highlights magazine, including an upcoming service that would offer daily content drawing upon the resources and back catalog of Highlights and its recurring features, and a full digital version of the magazine that will feature a \"personalized\" experience and integrated multimedia content. The subscription service, Highlights Every Day, officially launched in April 2016.\n\nOn June 25, 2019, Highlights for Childrens Twitter account denounced the practice of family separation at the Mexico–United States border.\n\n See also \n \n \n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Official site\n \"Highlights for Children 1 Billion Strong\". Business First of Columbus'', June 12, 2006.\n\nAdvertising-free magazines\nChildren's magazines published in the United States\nHonesdale, Pennsylvania\nMagazines established in 1946\nMagazines published in Ohio\nMagazines published in Pennsylvania\nMass media in Columbus, Ohio\nMonthly magazines published in the United States",
"Bo Knows Bo is the autobiography of Bo Jackson, who excelled in both professional football and professional baseball, before injuries ended his careers.\n\nCo-authored with Dick Schaap, Bo Knows Bo covers Bo Jackson's life from his childhood in Bessemer, Alabama to the peak of his athletic abilities in 1990. Late in 1990, Jackson suffered a hip dislocation injury that ended his NFL career, and eventually led to the end of his MLB career also. The postscript to the book, written soon after the initial injury, gives Jackson's account of what happened, as well as his hopes for a comeback.\n\nHighlights of the book include Jackson's account of growing up largely without a source of authority in his life, Jackson's love for running and jumping while hating organized practices, and how Jackson dealt with all the hype and expectations that came with winning the Heisman trophy in 1985 (\"I picked baseball.\")\n\nSports autobiographies\n1990 non-fiction books\nBessemer, Alabama\nBo Jackson\nDoubleday (publisher) books\nBaseball books\nAmerican football books\nCollaborative autobiographies"
] |
|
[
"John O. Brennan",
"Career highlights",
"What were his career highlights?",
"Brennan began his CIA career as an analyst and spent 25 years with the agency."
] | C_e87bf3024ef84bcbaf1fc0aca35fc6a4_1 | What is notable about his time at the CIA? | 2 | What is notable about John O. Brennan's time at the CIA? | John O. Brennan | Brennan began his CIA career as an analyst and spent 25 years with the agency. He was a daily intelligence briefer for President Bill Clinton. In 1996, he was CIA station chief in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia when the Khobar Towers bombing killed 19 U.S. servicemen. In 1999, he was appointed chief of staff to George Tenet, then-Director of the CIA. Brennan became deputy executive director of the CIA in March 2001. He was director of the newly created Terrorist Threat Integration Center from 2003 to 2004, an office that sifted through and compiled information for President Bush's daily top secret intelligence briefings and employed the services of analysts from a dozen U.S. agencies and entities. One of the controversies in his career involves the distribution of intelligence to the Bush White House that helped lead to an "Orange Terror Alert", in late 2003. The intelligence, which purported to list terror targets, was highly controversial within the CIA and was later discredited. An Obama administration official does not dispute that Brennan distributed the intelligence during the Bush era but said Brennan passed it along because that was his job. His last post within the Intelligence Community was as director of the National Counterterrorism Center in 2004 and 2005, which incorporated information on terrorist activities across U.S. agencies. Brennan then left government service for a few years, becoming Chairman of the Intelligence and National Security Alliance (INSA) and the CEO of The Analysis Corporation (TAC). He continued to lead TAC after its acquisition by Global Strategies Group in 2007 and its growth as the Global Intelligence Solutions division of Global's North American technology business GTEC, before returning to government service with the Obama administration as Homeland Security Advisor on January 20, 2009. On January 7, 2013, Brennan was nominated by President Barack Obama to be director of the Central Intelligence Agency. In September 2017, Brennan was named a Distinguished Non-Resident Scholar at The University of Texas at Austin, where he also acts as a Senior Advisor to the University's Intelligence Studies Project. CANNOTANSWER | He was a daily intelligence briefer for President Bill Clinton. | false | [
"Jeffrey W. Castelli is a CIA officer who served as CIA station chief in Rome at the time of the Niger uranium forgeries. His subsequent involvement in the CIA-led kidnapping of Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr would lead to his subsequent sentencing to seven years in prison, by an Italian court, in 2013.\n\nConvicted to seven years in prison in the Imam Rapito affair \n\nCastelli was CIA station chief in Rome at the time of the kidnapping of Egyptian cleric Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr on February 17, 2003, and was among 26 U.S. nationals (and one of the few with confirmed identities) subsequently indicted by Italian authorities for their involvement in what in the Italian press is referred to as the Imam Rapito (or \"kidnapped cleric\") affair.\n\nOn February 4, 2013, Castelli was convicted to seven years in prison, by a Milan court., along with three other CIA officials. None of the convicted US officials were present at the trial and none of them have been extradited to Italy later.\n\nSee also \n Extraordinary rendition by the United States\n\nExternal links \nJeff Castelli at CooperativeResearch\n\nFurther reading \n Kunhanandan Nair, Berlin \"Devil and His Dart: How the CIA is Plotting in the Third World\" Sterling Publishers, New Delhi, 1986 (117)\n Barton Gellman, \"A Leak, then a Deluge\", The Washington Post, October 25, 2005\n\nReferences \n\nPeople of the Central Intelligence Agency\nLiving people\nYear of birth missing (living people)",
"The Unexpected Spy: From the CIA to the FBI, My Secret Life Taking Down Some of the World's Most Notorious Terrorists is a 2019 memoir by Tracy Walder about her work in the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Jessica Anya Blau assisted with the book, and it was published by St. Martin's Press.\n\nJeff Rowe of the Associated Press (AP) stated that the book \"is more a diary of the author’s journey\" instead of \"an exploration of decision-making at the highest levels of government\".\n\nBackground\nThe author, born Tracy Schandler, grew up in the Van Nuys neighborhood of Los Angeles. An alumna of University of Southern California and a member of the Delta Gamma sorority, first decided to work for the CIA when she encountered a CIA recruiting table at USC in 2000. She previously initially planned to be a history teacher. She printed out her resume and gave a copy to the staffer at the booth.\n\nShe worked for both the CIA and FBI, with her book showing a preference for employment at the former. In the CIA she entered the Weapons of Mass Destruction office and gained the post of \"staff operations officer\". Her task was to manage the Al Qaeda threat. She enjoyed her work but decided she did not want to do as much travel anymore.\n\nIn May 2004 she began working for the FBI after leaving the CIA, and she was employed by the agency for 14 months. There she worked on the Chi Mak counter-intelligence case. She stated that sexism was an issue at the FBI, and while she believed it would go away when she was promoted to higher levels, it continued to affect her; she stated that sexism was not as much of an issue at the CIA.\n\nShe left the FBI circa July 2005, and she taught history at the Hockaday School in Dallas, at the high school level. By 2020 she planned to end her time teaching and had joined the board of the organization Girl Security. She married a man and had a child with him.\n\nBlau is a novelist. She stated in an interview with Zac Crain of D Magazine that Walder is \"obviously brilliant, but she doesn’t have a sense of what about her is interesting\".\n\nContents\nPublishers Weekly stated that the book has \"rapid prose\".\n\nThe book shows paragraphs and sentences that are blacked over as Walder had to have her book reviewed by the CIA before publishing. Kirkus Reviews wrote that, including in regards to the Iraq War, the author \"fiercely defends the CIA\". Rowe also described her as \"a CIA loyalist\". She wrote text defending the CIA's role in regards to 9/11 Commission Report and torture in the George W. Bush administration.\n\nReception\nPublishers Weekly gave the book a star, and stated that the book is \"fast-paced and intense\".\n\nKirkus describes it as \"A mostly breezy read through some undeniably challenging and threatening circumstances.\"\n\nRowe stated that \"some insight into how the two agencies communicate would have been illuminating.\"\n\nAdaptations\n there were plans for a television series for ABC. Ellen Pompeo had purchased the story rights.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\n2019 non-fiction books\nAmerican memoirs\nBooks about the Central Intelligence Agency\nBooks about the Federal Bureau of Investigation",
"Bill Harlow (born May 30, 1950) is a retired U.S. Navy captain, author, and public relations specialist. He has been the top spokesperson for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and worked in the White House dealing with National Security Media issues.\n\nPublications\n\nCircle William \nCircle William is a novel about two brothers. One brother, Jim, is the White House Press Secretary and his younger brother, Bill, is the captain of the USS Winston Churchill. When the United States' Government learns of Libya's plan to drop chemical weapons on the Israeli Knesset, they must work together. Their first step is to prepare for a chemical, nuclear, or germ attack otherwise known as to set a \"Circle William.\" What complicates their mission is Washington Post journalist, Sue O'Dell, who plants to write a feature on Bill.\n\nHard Measures: How Aggressive CIA Actions After 9/11 Saved American Lives \nHarlow co-authored this book with Jose A. Rodriguez, Jr, a former CIA undercover officer before he joined the CIA Counterterrorism Center. The book goes in-depth into Rodriquez's experience. The authors claim that aggressive measures such as enhanced interrogation saved American lives after the September 11th attacks\n\nAt the Center of the Storm: My Years at the CIA \nHarlow co-authored this book with George Tenet. This book is the narration of Tenet's time at the CIA particularly the time surrounding the September 11th attacks. According to the authors, the book demonstrates the CIA's attempts to prepare the United States against numerous threats, understand the events that led to 9/11, and explain and offer information that led to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Tenet and Harlow offer their interpretations on President George W. Bush's \"sixteen words\" in his 2003 State of the Union Address and Tenet's true context of his \"slam dunk\" comment.\n\nThe Great War of Our Time: The CIA's Fight Against Terrorism: From al Qa'ida to ISIS \nHarlow co-authored this book with Michael Morell, a former acting director and deputy director of the CIA.\n\nProfessional life \nHarlow retired from the Navy with the rank of captain in 1997. He then became the chief of public affairs for the CIA. Additionally, Harlow has been the Navy's depute spokesperson in Europe, special assistant to the Secretary of the Navy and as an assistant White House Press Secretary for national security and foreign affairs.\n\nPersonal life \nHarlow's parents are both U.S. Navy veterans. Currently, he lives in northern Virginia.\n\nReferences \n\n1950 births\nLiving people\nWriters from Virginia\n21st-century American historians\n21st-century American male writers\nPlace of birth missing (living people)\nUnited States Navy officers\nAmerican public relations people\nPeople of the Central Intelligence Agency\nAmerican male non-fiction writers"
] |
|
[
"John O. Brennan",
"Career highlights",
"What were his career highlights?",
"Brennan began his CIA career as an analyst and spent 25 years with the agency.",
"What is notable about his time at the CIA?",
"He was a daily intelligence briefer for President Bill Clinton."
] | C_e87bf3024ef84bcbaf1fc0aca35fc6a4_1 | What did he do under President Bush? | 3 | What did John O. Brennan do under President Bush? | John O. Brennan | Brennan began his CIA career as an analyst and spent 25 years with the agency. He was a daily intelligence briefer for President Bill Clinton. In 1996, he was CIA station chief in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia when the Khobar Towers bombing killed 19 U.S. servicemen. In 1999, he was appointed chief of staff to George Tenet, then-Director of the CIA. Brennan became deputy executive director of the CIA in March 2001. He was director of the newly created Terrorist Threat Integration Center from 2003 to 2004, an office that sifted through and compiled information for President Bush's daily top secret intelligence briefings and employed the services of analysts from a dozen U.S. agencies and entities. One of the controversies in his career involves the distribution of intelligence to the Bush White House that helped lead to an "Orange Terror Alert", in late 2003. The intelligence, which purported to list terror targets, was highly controversial within the CIA and was later discredited. An Obama administration official does not dispute that Brennan distributed the intelligence during the Bush era but said Brennan passed it along because that was his job. His last post within the Intelligence Community was as director of the National Counterterrorism Center in 2004 and 2005, which incorporated information on terrorist activities across U.S. agencies. Brennan then left government service for a few years, becoming Chairman of the Intelligence and National Security Alliance (INSA) and the CEO of The Analysis Corporation (TAC). He continued to lead TAC after its acquisition by Global Strategies Group in 2007 and its growth as the Global Intelligence Solutions division of Global's North American technology business GTEC, before returning to government service with the Obama administration as Homeland Security Advisor on January 20, 2009. On January 7, 2013, Brennan was nominated by President Barack Obama to be director of the Central Intelligence Agency. In September 2017, Brennan was named a Distinguished Non-Resident Scholar at The University of Texas at Austin, where he also acts as a Senior Advisor to the University's Intelligence Studies Project. CANNOTANSWER | He was director of the newly created Terrorist Threat Integration Center from 2003 to 2004, | false | [
"\"The Pet Goat\" (often erroneously called \"My Pet Goat\") is a grade-school level reading exercise composed by American educationalist Siegfried \"Zig\" Engelmann. It achieved notoriety for being read by US President George W. Bush with a class of second-graders on the morning of September 11, 2001. After being discreetly informed of the September 11 attacks midway through the reading by White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card, Bush waited quietly for the reading to finish before dealing with the unfolding crisis. The episode figures prominently in the retrospective assessment of Bush's response to the September 11 attacks.\n\nReading exercise\n\"The Pet Goat\" was composed by Siegfried \"Zig\" Engelmann, who had written over a thousand similar instructional exercises since the 1970s. It was anthologized in the classroom workbook Reading Mastery: Rainbow Edition, Level 2, Storybook 1. \"The Pet Goat\" is designed to teach student about words ending in the letter E, using the Direct Instruction (DI) teaching method. The exercise tells a story about a girl's pet goat, which her parents want to get rid of because it eats everything; the parents relent after it foils a robbery by butting the intruder, who is now \"sore\" (that word ending in e).\n\nGeorge W. Bush during the September 11 attacks\n\nOn September 11, 2001, US President George W. Bush went to Emma E. Booker Elementary School to meet students and staff and to bring attention to his plans for education reform. Upon arriving at the Sarasota, Florida school, the president was informed of the first plane crash into One World Trade Center, though he was briefed that it was probably just a small propeller plane. While President Bush sat in Kay Daniels' classroom, and her students read \"The Pet Goat\", White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card interrupted the president to whisper in his ear: \"A second plane hit the second tower. America is under attack.\"\n\nAfterwards, the children continued to read and President Bush sat while—as described by The Wall Street Journal—\"trying to keep under tight control.\" Despite the president's efforts, students knew something was wrong; they later said that the president's face became red and serious, and his expression was \"flabbergasted, shocked, [and] horrified\".\n\nAccording to Bill Sammon's book Fighting Back, Bush's gaze flitted about the room—the children, the press, the floor, his staff—while his mind raced about everything he did not yet know. After receiving cue-card advice from his press secretary, Ari Fleischer (\"DON'T SAY ANYTHING YET\"), the \"notoriously punctual\" president lingered in the classroom after the reading exercise was finished: he adamantly did not want to give an appearance of panic. After chatting with the students and their teacher, Bush deflected a Trade Center-related question from a reporter, and began to learn about the magnitude of the attacks.\n\nPublic attention to \"The Pet Goat\" first came to the fore with Michael Moore's 2004 documentary Fahrenheit 9/11, though the film incorrectly gave the title as \"My Pet Goat\" and called it a book. Within a few weeks, a blogger named Peter Smith tracked down the correct name and origin as a reading exercise by Engelmann.\n\nReactions\nThe New Yorker described a seven-minute video of President Bush holding Reading Mastery while \"staring blankly into space\" as the most memorable bit in Fahrenheit 9/11; the film presents the president as faltering in the face of the crisis.\n\nThe commander-in-chief's supporters argued that there was nothing for Bush to do but wait for more information while not alarming the pupils. On his own behalf, Bush said that \"his instinct was to project calm, not to have the country see an excited reaction at a moment of crisis. The national press corps was standing behind the children in the classroom; he saw their phones and pagers start to ring. The president felt he should project strength and calm until he could better understand what was happening.\" Booker Elementary Principal Tose-Rigell supported the president's reactions at her school—\"I don't think anyone could have handled it better. What would it have served if [Bush] had jumped out of his chair and ran out of the room?\"—as did Daniels' students, who later said that Bush's actions were the right ones.\n\nA year after the attacks, Kay Daniels' classroom still had the chair in which the president sat; it was festooned with a purple ribbon. By 2004, Engelmann (then a retired professor) was surprised at the attention \"The Pet Goat\" received: \"It hasn't brought me any fame, […] It's fascinating that anyone would even be interested in something like this.\"\n\nEditions\n\nReferences\n\nanimal tales\nchildren's short stories\nfiction about goats\nGeorge W. Bush\nSeptember 11 attacks",
"Jonathan James Bush (May 6, 1931 – May 5, 2021) was an American banker who was the fourth child and third son of U. S. Senator Prescott Bush and his wife Dorothy Bush. He was the brother of former Congressman, CIA Director, Vice President and President George H. W. Bush. He was also the uncle of former Texas Governor and President George W. Bush, and former Florida Secretary of Commerce and Governor Jeb Bush. He died in Florida, hours before his ninetieth birthday.\n\nEarly life\nBush was born in Greenwich, Connecticut, to Prescott Sheldon Bush, a politician, and Dorothy Walker Bush. He graduated from The Hotchkiss School and Yale University, where he was a member of Skull and Bones. The fourth child in the family, he was the brother of Prescott \"Pressy\" Bush, Jr. (1922–2010), the 41st President of the United States George H. W. Bush (1924–2018), Nancy Bush Ellis (1926–2021), and William \"Bucky\" Bush (1938–2018). He was the uncle of the 43rd President George W. Bush. Like his brother George H. W. Bush, he was a member of Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity at Yale.\n\nBush and his wife Josephine are the parents of former NBC entertainment reporter Billy Bush and health care executive Jonathan S. Bush.\n\nCareer\nAs of December 31, 2018, Jonathan Bush had retired from Fairfield, Bush & Co., an Investment Advisory Firm in New Haven, Connecticut.\n\nJonathan Bush founded J. Bush & Co., which provided discreet banking services for the Washington, D.C., embassies of foreign governments for many years. In 1997, Riggs Bank bought J. Bush & Co. and made Bush CEO & President of Riggs Investment, a firm based in New Haven, Connecticut.\n\nIn the early 1980s, Jonathan Bush helped organize investors for George W. Bush's first oil venture, Arbusto Energy, later called Bush Explorations.\n\nDuring the 2000 presidential campaign, Bush was a major contributor and fundraiser to his nephew's election and was named a \"Bush Pioneer\" for raising more than $100,000 for the campaign.\n\nBush died on May 5, 2021, the day before his 90th birthday. At the time of his death, he was the last surviving child of Prescott Bush and Dorothy Walker Bush.\n\nControversy\nOn May 15, 2004, The Washington Post published an article that said, \"A political Web site written by a Democratic operative drew attention yesterday to the fact that President Bush's uncle, Jonathan J. Bush, is a top executive at Riggs Bank, which this week agreed to pay a record $25 million in civil fines for violations of law intended to thwart money laundering.\"\n\nThe bank accounts under investigation may have been Saudi, though the article did not say so. It did, however, go on to say: \"a source familiar with the multiple federal investigations of the bank's Saudi accounts and other embassy accounts say Jonathan Bush's investment advice unit has 'no relationship whatsoever' with any of the Riggs's Saudi accounts.\" Moreover, the newspaper quoted a spokesman for the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency as saying \"any suggestion of political influence in the Riggs situation is 'preposterous.'\"\n\nIn 1991, Bush was fined $30,000 in Massachusetts and several thousand dollars in Connecticut for violating registration laws governing securities sales. He was barred from securities brokerage with the general public in Massachusetts for one year.\n\nReferences\n\n1931 births\n2021 deaths\nAmerican bankers\nAmerican political fundraisers\nBush family\nBusinesspeople from Maine\nBusinesspeople from Greenwich, Connecticut\nConnecticut Republicans\nMaine Republicans\nHotchkiss School alumni\nYale University alumni\nPeople from North Haven, Maine",
"George Bush most commonly refers to:\n George H. W. Bush (1924–2018), 41st president of the United States and father of the 43rd president\n George W. Bush (born 1946), 43rd president of the United States and son of the 41st president\n\nGeorge Bush may also refer to:\n George Bush (biblical scholar) (1796–1859), American pastor, abolitionist, academic and Zionist\n George Bush (footballer) (1883–1936), English footballer who played as a winger\n George Bush (racing driver) (1911–1967), American NASCAR driver\n George H. Bush (1857–1898), New York state legislator\n George P. Bush (born 1976), American attorney and politician; member of the Bush family\n George Bush (pioneer) (1779–1863), first African-American settler in what is now Washington State\n USS George H.W. Bush, an aircraft carrier named after the former president\n George H.W. Bush (film), a 2008 two-part biographical television film\n George W. Bush (film), a 2020 biographical film\n\nSee also\n \n \n \n Bush family\n Presidency of George Bush (disambiguation)\n George Brush (disambiguation)\n Bush (disambiguation)"
] |
|
[
"John O. Brennan",
"Career highlights",
"What were his career highlights?",
"Brennan began his CIA career as an analyst and spent 25 years with the agency.",
"What is notable about his time at the CIA?",
"He was a daily intelligence briefer for President Bill Clinton.",
"What did he do under President Bush?",
"He was director of the newly created Terrorist Threat Integration Center from 2003 to 2004,"
] | C_e87bf3024ef84bcbaf1fc0aca35fc6a4_1 | What was his job in this position? | 4 | What was John O. Brennan's job as director of the Terrorist Threat Integration Center | John O. Brennan | Brennan began his CIA career as an analyst and spent 25 years with the agency. He was a daily intelligence briefer for President Bill Clinton. In 1996, he was CIA station chief in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia when the Khobar Towers bombing killed 19 U.S. servicemen. In 1999, he was appointed chief of staff to George Tenet, then-Director of the CIA. Brennan became deputy executive director of the CIA in March 2001. He was director of the newly created Terrorist Threat Integration Center from 2003 to 2004, an office that sifted through and compiled information for President Bush's daily top secret intelligence briefings and employed the services of analysts from a dozen U.S. agencies and entities. One of the controversies in his career involves the distribution of intelligence to the Bush White House that helped lead to an "Orange Terror Alert", in late 2003. The intelligence, which purported to list terror targets, was highly controversial within the CIA and was later discredited. An Obama administration official does not dispute that Brennan distributed the intelligence during the Bush era but said Brennan passed it along because that was his job. His last post within the Intelligence Community was as director of the National Counterterrorism Center in 2004 and 2005, which incorporated information on terrorist activities across U.S. agencies. Brennan then left government service for a few years, becoming Chairman of the Intelligence and National Security Alliance (INSA) and the CEO of The Analysis Corporation (TAC). He continued to lead TAC after its acquisition by Global Strategies Group in 2007 and its growth as the Global Intelligence Solutions division of Global's North American technology business GTEC, before returning to government service with the Obama administration as Homeland Security Advisor on January 20, 2009. On January 7, 2013, Brennan was nominated by President Barack Obama to be director of the Central Intelligence Agency. In September 2017, Brennan was named a Distinguished Non-Resident Scholar at The University of Texas at Austin, where he also acts as a Senior Advisor to the University's Intelligence Studies Project. CANNOTANSWER | an office that sifted through and compiled information for President Bush's daily top secret intelligence briefings and employed the services of analysts | false | [
"Eliphaz ( ’Ělīp̄āz, \"El is pure gold\") is called a Temanite (). He is one of the friends or comforters of Job in the Book of Job in the Hebrew Bible.\n\nThe first of the three visitors to Job (), he was said to have come from Teman, an important city of Edom (; ; ). Thus Eliphaz appears as the representative of the wisdom of the Edomites, which, according to , , and , was famous in antiquity.\n\nAs an alternative to the interpretation \"El is pure gold\", or \"My God is pure gold\", it has also been suggested that the name might mean something along the lines of \"My God is separate\" or \"My God is remote\".\n\nName\nThe name \"Eliphaz\" for the spokesman of Edomite wisdom may have been suggested to the author of Job by the tradition which gave the name Eliphaz to Esau's eldest son, the father of Teman (; ).\n\nBook of Job\nIn the arguments that pass between Job and his friends, it is Eliphaz who opens each of the three series of discussions:\nChapters 4-5, with Job's reply in chapters 6-7\nChapter 15, with Job's reply in chapters 16-17\nChapter 22, with Job's reply in chapters 23-24.\n\nAmerican theologian Albert Barnes suggests that, because he spoke first each time, Eliphaz may have been the eldest of the friends. Eliphaz appears mild and modest. In his first reply to Job's complaints, he argues that those who are truly good are never entirely forsaken by Providence, but that punishment may justly be inflicted for secret sins. He denies that any man is innocent and censures Job for asserting his freedom from guilt. Eliphaz exhorts Job to confess any concealed iniquities to alleviate his punishment. His arguments are well supported but God declares at the end of the book that Eliphaz has made a serious error in his speaking. Job offers a sacrifice to God for Eliphaz's error.\n\nHis primary belief was that the righteous do not perish; the wicked alone suffer, and in measure as they have sinned ().\n\nEliphaz' dream\nEliphaz' argument is, in part, rooted in what he believes to have been a personal revelation which he received through a dream (Job 4:12-16): \"an elusive word [stealed] past, quiet like a whisper\", and after a silence he heard a voice saying: Eliphaz feels empowered to confront Job because of his dream. Crenshaw notes that he missed \"the irony of this reference to God's lack of trust in his servants\".Some authors consider that Job's words in are a response to this \"revelation\" of Eliphaz: Albert Barnes refers to one of the Rosenmüllers as taking this approach. However, the words are different and form part of Job's reply to Bildad, the second friend: Barnes notes that \"it seems more probable that it is [a reply] to the general position which had been laid down and defended, that God was just and holy, and that his proceedings were marked with equity\".\n\nEliphaz refers to the content of his dream again for emphasis in :\n\nBildad also refers to Eliphaz' revelation in chapter 25, although he presents the concept as his own. Job rebukes him for it: \"What a help you are to the weak! How you have saved the arm without strength! What counsel you have given to one without wisdom! What helpful insight you have abundantly provided! To whom have you uttered words? And whose spirit was expressed through you?\" Job pokes fun at Bildad asking him what spirit revealed it to him because he recognizes the argument as Eliphaz's spiritual revelation.\n\nEliphaz' final speech\nAlthough quick-witted, and quick to respond, Eliphaz loses his composure in chapter 22, in the third and final round of speeches, accusing Job of specific faults, \"sins against justice and charity towards others\": oppressing widows and orphans, refusing bread to the hungry: a far cry from how he had originally described Job in his first address to him:\n\nEliphaz also misconstrues Job's message as he scrambles to summarize Job's thoughts from chapter 21:\n\nJob did not argue that God could not prevent evil. Job was observing that in this life God often chooses not to prevent evil. Conventional wisdom told Eliphaz that God should immediately punish the wicked as that would be the just thing to do. Job, however, saw it differently, and in 24:1, Job laments\n\nJob yearns for the justice Eliphaz claims exists – an immediate punishment of the wicked. However, that simply did not hold true according to Job's observations. Nevertheless, Job does not question God's ultimate justice. He knows justice will eventually be served. Job asks, \"For what hope have the godless when they are cut off, when God takes away their life? Does God listen to their cry when distress comes upon them?\"\n\nSee also \nBildad\nElihu\nZophar\n\nReferences \n\nHebrew Bible people\nBook of Job",
"Bildad ( Bildaḏ), the Shuhite, was one of Job's three friends who visited the patriarch in the Hebrew Bible's Book of Job. He was a descendant of Shuah, son of Abraham and Keturah (Genesis 25:1 - 25:2), whose family lived in the deserts of Arabia, or a resident of the district. In speaking with Job, his intent was consolation, but he became an accuser, asking Job what he has done to deserve God's wrath.\n\nSpeeches\nThe three speeches of Bildad are contained in Job 8, Job 18 and Job 25. In substance, they were largely an echo of what had been maintained by Eliphaz the Temanite, the first of Job's friends to speak, but charged with somewhat increased vehemence because he deemed Job's words so impious and wrathful. Bildad was the first to attribute Job's calamity to actual wickedness, albeit indirectly, by accusing his children (who were destroyed, Job 1:19) of sin to warrant their punishment (Job 8:4). His brief third speech, just five verses in length, marked the silencing of the friends.\n\nSee also \nEliphaz\nZophar\n Elihu\n Bildad is also the name of one of the owners of the Pequod in Herman Melville's Moby-Dick.\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nHebrew Bible people\nBook of Job",
"Alice Holford (died 1455) was an English bailiff of London Bridge for 25 years. She was a rare example of a woman in authority in the fifteenth century.\n\nLife\nHolford was married to Nicholas Holford, who was the bailiff of London Bridge. When he died in 1433 she took over the job. She had the task of gathering the toll from boats that sailed under the bridge and from the wagons that passed over it into London. The task was complicated because the fee depended on what was being carried. A woman having a position of authority and responsibility in the fifteenth century was unusual. This came about because she inherited her husband's business. She died in office in 1455, twenty-two years later.\n\nReferences\n\n1455 deaths\nYear of birth unknown\nBailiffs"
] |
|
[
"John O. Brennan",
"Career highlights",
"What were his career highlights?",
"Brennan began his CIA career as an analyst and spent 25 years with the agency.",
"What is notable about his time at the CIA?",
"He was a daily intelligence briefer for President Bill Clinton.",
"What did he do under President Bush?",
"He was director of the newly created Terrorist Threat Integration Center from 2003 to 2004,",
"What was his job in this position?",
"an office that sifted through and compiled information for President Bush's daily top secret intelligence briefings and employed the services of analysts"
] | C_e87bf3024ef84bcbaf1fc0aca35fc6a4_1 | What else has he done in his career? | 5 | Other than working in the CIA and Terrorist Threat Integration Center, what else has John O. Brennan done in his career? | John O. Brennan | Brennan began his CIA career as an analyst and spent 25 years with the agency. He was a daily intelligence briefer for President Bill Clinton. In 1996, he was CIA station chief in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia when the Khobar Towers bombing killed 19 U.S. servicemen. In 1999, he was appointed chief of staff to George Tenet, then-Director of the CIA. Brennan became deputy executive director of the CIA in March 2001. He was director of the newly created Terrorist Threat Integration Center from 2003 to 2004, an office that sifted through and compiled information for President Bush's daily top secret intelligence briefings and employed the services of analysts from a dozen U.S. agencies and entities. One of the controversies in his career involves the distribution of intelligence to the Bush White House that helped lead to an "Orange Terror Alert", in late 2003. The intelligence, which purported to list terror targets, was highly controversial within the CIA and was later discredited. An Obama administration official does not dispute that Brennan distributed the intelligence during the Bush era but said Brennan passed it along because that was his job. His last post within the Intelligence Community was as director of the National Counterterrorism Center in 2004 and 2005, which incorporated information on terrorist activities across U.S. agencies. Brennan then left government service for a few years, becoming Chairman of the Intelligence and National Security Alliance (INSA) and the CEO of The Analysis Corporation (TAC). He continued to lead TAC after its acquisition by Global Strategies Group in 2007 and its growth as the Global Intelligence Solutions division of Global's North American technology business GTEC, before returning to government service with the Obama administration as Homeland Security Advisor on January 20, 2009. On January 7, 2013, Brennan was nominated by President Barack Obama to be director of the Central Intelligence Agency. In September 2017, Brennan was named a Distinguished Non-Resident Scholar at The University of Texas at Austin, where he also acts as a Senior Advisor to the University's Intelligence Studies Project. CANNOTANSWER | One of the controversies in his career involves the distribution of intelligence to the Bush White House that helped lead to an "Orange Terror Alert", | false | [
"Seyyed Mohsen Shah Ebrahimi (in Persian: سید محسن شاه ابراهیمی) is an art director, costume designer and actor. Born in 1954, Iran. Studied art directing in the Faculty of Fine Arts in Florence, Italy (1980). He started his career with By the Ponds (1986, Y. Noasri), received the prize in FFF for The 'Night Nurse' (1987, M.-A. Najafi). As well as being a prominent art director, he has two films as actor in his career.\n\nWorks \n In the Wind's Eye, 1988\n Avinar (co)\n What Else Is New? (co), 1991\n The Snowman, 1994 (screened in 1997)\n Iran Is My Land\n Mummy 3, 1998 (Iranian made)\n Traveler of Rey , 2000\n\nExternal links\n \n\nIranian art directors\nPeople from Khorramshahr\n1954 births\nLiving people",
"Sub-Lieutenant Ronald David Scott (born 17 October 1917) is an Argentine Naval aviator who flew for the Royal Navy’s Fleet Air Arm in the Second World War.\n\nHe was featured in the short film Buena Onda: The Tale of Ronny Scott in 2021.\n\nCareer\nI was born in Villa Devoto, certainly, but what else could I do but go to war? When someone like Hitler kills the number of people he ended up massacring, I think something has to be done. That's what I felt. Beyond coming from a family of British origin, I felt it was my obligation as a human being.\n\nSon of a veteran soldier from Scotland and a nurse from England, in 1942 at the age of 25, Scott signed up to the Royal Navy at the British Embassy in Buenos Aires, where he fought as a volunteer until the end of the Second World War, where he was awarded the 1939-1945 Star.\n\nLater life\nScott later returned to Argentina where he flew as a commercial pilot for Aeroposta Argentina, flying Douglas DC-3 aircraft to Patagonia. When Aeroposta merged with Aerolineas Argentinas, he continued to fly, captaining a Douglas DC4, a Comet 4 before culminating his career flying the Boeing 747. He retired with over 23000 flight hours under his belt.\n\nHe now lives in the Buenos Aires suburb of San Isidro, as the last surviving Spitfire pilot in Latin America. In 2021 he was made a life member of the Fleet Air Arm Officer's Association by Vice-Admiral Sir Adrian Johns, the former Second Sea Lord.\n\nReferences\n\nFleet Air Arm aviators\nFleet Air Arm personnel of World War II\nMilitary personnel from Buenos Aires\n1917 births\nLiving people\nArgentine people of English descent\nArgentine people of Scottish descent\nRoyal Navy officers\n\nes:Ronald Scott",
"Fredrick Else (31 March 193320 July 2015) was an English footballer, who played as a goalkeeper. Else gained over 600 professional appearances in his career playing for three clubs, Preston North End, Blackburn Rovers and Barrow.\n\nClub career\nElse was born in Golborne near Wigan on 31 March 1933. Whilst on national service in the north-east he played for amateur club Axwell Park Colliery Welfare in the Derwent Valley League. He attracted the attention of Football League teams and signed as a junior for Preston North End in 1951, and as a professional in 1953. He made his debut for Preston against Manchester City in 1954, but was restricted to 14 appearances over his first three seasons. He eventually became first choice, displacing George Thompson, and played 238 times for North End. During this time Preston's most successful season came in 1957–58, when the club finished as runners up in Division One.\n\nThe 1960–61 season ended in relegation for Preston and Else was sold to neighbours Blackburn Rovers for £20,000. Else became a first choice for Blackburn straight away and played 221 times for the club. A collarbone injury in 1964–65 resulted in a period out of the game, though Else returned to regain the goalkeeper's jersey at Blackburn. Nonetheless the team were relegated the following season and Else was released. During the summer of 1966 Else signed with Barrow of the Fourth Division. Else became part of Barrow's most successful team, with the side winning promotion to the Third Division in his first season there. Else was Barrow's first choice keeper for the entire period that they were in the third division, and played 148 league matches for the club. He retired from football after Barrow's relegation in 1970 following a leg infection. His final season included a brief stint as caretaker manager at Barrow.\n\nHonours\n Football League Division One Runner-up 1957–1958\n Football League Division Four Promotion 1966–1967\n\nInternational career\nElse has been described by fans of the clubs that he played for as one of the best English goalkeepers never to win a full international cap. He did, however, make one appearance for the England B team in 1957 against Scotland B, as well as participating in a Football Association touring side of 1961.\n\nPersonal life and death\nElse met his wife Marjorie in 1949 in Douglas on the Isle of Man. They married when Else was 22 and Marjorie 20, on 29 October 1955, a Saturday morning. The wedding was held in Marjorie's home town of Blackpool and the date was chosen so that the couple could marry in the morning and Else could then travel either to Deepdale, to play for Preston North End's reserve team, or to Bloomfield Road where Preston's first team was due to be playing Blackpool F.C. In the event Else was selected for the reserves and the couple had to travel by bus to Preston.\n\nAfter retiring from football, Else remained in Barrow-in-Furness, becoming a geography and maths teacher at a local secondary school. He retired from teaching in 1999 and moved to Cyprus, though still attended some Barrow matches. Else died in Barrow-in-Furness on 20 July 2015, aged 82.\n\nReferences\n\n2015 deaths\n1933 births\nBarrow A.F.C. managers\nBarrow A.F.C. players\nBlackburn Rovers F.C. players\nPreston North End F.C. players\nPeople from Golborne\nEnglish footballers\nAssociation football goalkeepers\nSchoolteachers from Cumbria\nEnglish Football League players\nEngland B international footballers\nEnglish football managers"
] |
|
[
"John O. Brennan",
"Career highlights",
"What were his career highlights?",
"Brennan began his CIA career as an analyst and spent 25 years with the agency.",
"What is notable about his time at the CIA?",
"He was a daily intelligence briefer for President Bill Clinton.",
"What did he do under President Bush?",
"He was director of the newly created Terrorist Threat Integration Center from 2003 to 2004,",
"What was his job in this position?",
"an office that sifted through and compiled information for President Bush's daily top secret intelligence briefings and employed the services of analysts",
"What else has he done in his career?",
"One of the controversies in his career involves the distribution of intelligence to the Bush White House that helped lead to an \"Orange Terror Alert\","
] | C_e87bf3024ef84bcbaf1fc0aca35fc6a4_1 | What intelligence that was distributed? | 6 | What intelligence was distributed to the Bush White House by John O. Brennan? | John O. Brennan | Brennan began his CIA career as an analyst and spent 25 years with the agency. He was a daily intelligence briefer for President Bill Clinton. In 1996, he was CIA station chief in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia when the Khobar Towers bombing killed 19 U.S. servicemen. In 1999, he was appointed chief of staff to George Tenet, then-Director of the CIA. Brennan became deputy executive director of the CIA in March 2001. He was director of the newly created Terrorist Threat Integration Center from 2003 to 2004, an office that sifted through and compiled information for President Bush's daily top secret intelligence briefings and employed the services of analysts from a dozen U.S. agencies and entities. One of the controversies in his career involves the distribution of intelligence to the Bush White House that helped lead to an "Orange Terror Alert", in late 2003. The intelligence, which purported to list terror targets, was highly controversial within the CIA and was later discredited. An Obama administration official does not dispute that Brennan distributed the intelligence during the Bush era but said Brennan passed it along because that was his job. His last post within the Intelligence Community was as director of the National Counterterrorism Center in 2004 and 2005, which incorporated information on terrorist activities across U.S. agencies. Brennan then left government service for a few years, becoming Chairman of the Intelligence and National Security Alliance (INSA) and the CEO of The Analysis Corporation (TAC). He continued to lead TAC after its acquisition by Global Strategies Group in 2007 and its growth as the Global Intelligence Solutions division of Global's North American technology business GTEC, before returning to government service with the Obama administration as Homeland Security Advisor on January 20, 2009. On January 7, 2013, Brennan was nominated by President Barack Obama to be director of the Central Intelligence Agency. In September 2017, Brennan was named a Distinguished Non-Resident Scholar at The University of Texas at Austin, where he also acts as a Senior Advisor to the University's Intelligence Studies Project. CANNOTANSWER | The intelligence, which purported to list terror targets, was highly controversial within the CIA and was later discredited. | false | [
"MoneyBee was a distributed computing project in the fields of economics, finance and stock markets, that generated stock forecasts by application of artificial intelligence with the aid of artificial neural networks. MoneyBee acted as a screensaver. The project was run by i42 Informationsmanagement GmbH, a consulting private company from Mannheim, Germany. The project was suspended with a standing invitation for any interested in joining the MoneyBee2 project, but MoneyBee2 seems to have been abandoned in early 2010.\n\nHistory\nThe idea was first conceived in an economics thesis on stock forecasts with the aid of artificial neural networks at the University of Heidelberg. The MoneyBee system was then developed by i42 GmbH, Mannheim, who added some innovative features to the original idea.\n\nSince starting in September 2000, many users downloaded the German version. By 2001, about 12,000 users were generating 0.1 Teraflops of computing capacity – comparable to an average university mainframe computer at the time.\n\nSee also\n List of distributed computing projects\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Moneybee - an example of distributed computing\n MoneyBee: A new product to predict stock market developments using artificial intelligence and increased calculation capacitiy\n Innovative Kooperation zwischen MoneyBee und Zeitungssuchdienst Paperball\n\nDistributed computing projects\nArtificial neural networks\nStock market",
"In artificial intelligence, the distributed multi-agent reasoning system (dMARS) was a platform for intelligent software agents developed at the AAII that makes uses of the belief–desire–intention software model (BDI). The design for dMARS was an extension of the intelligent agent cognitive architecture developed at SRI International called procedural reasoning system (PRS). The most recent incarnation of this framework is the JACK Intelligent Agents platform.\n\nOverview\ndMARS was an agent-oriented development and implementation environment written in C++ for building complex, distributed, time-critical systems.\n\nSee also\n Australian Artificial Intelligence Institute\n Intelligent agent\n JACK Intelligent Agents\n AgentSpeak\n\nReferences\n d'Inverno, M., Luck, M., Georgeff, M., Kinny, D. and Wooldridge, M. (2004) \"The dMARS Architecture: A Specification of the Distributed Multi-Agent Reasoning System\". Journal of Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems. pp. 5–53.\n Mark d'Inverno, David Kinny, Michael Luck, and Michael Wooldridge. \"A Formal Specification of dMARS\". In Proceedings of the Fourth International Workshop on Agent Theories, Architectures, and Languages, ATAL'97 appears in Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence, volume 1365, pages 155–76, 1997.\n Michael Peter Georgeff, Anand S. Rao, \"A profile of the Australian Artificial Intelligence Institute,\" IEEE Intelligent Systems, vol. 11, no. 6, pp. 89–92, December 1996.\n\nExternal links\n dMARS Product Brief on the AAII website via the Internet Archive\n\nAgent-based software\nMulti-agent systems\nSRI International software",
"LIFER/LADDER was one of the first database natural language processing systems. It was designed as a natural language interface to a database of information about US Navy ships. This system, as described in a paper by Hendrix (1978), used a semantic grammar to parse questions and query a distributed database. \n\nThe LIFER/LADDER system could only support simple one-table queries or multiple table queries with easy join conditions.\n\nSome examples of queries it could accept:\nWhat are the length, width, and draft of the Kitty Hawk?\nWhen will Reeves achieve readiness rating C2?\nWhat is the nearest ship to Naples with a doctor on board?\nWhat ships are carrying cargo for the United States?\nWhere are they going?\nPrint the American cruisers’ current positions and states of readiness?\n\nReferences\n\nHistory of artificial intelligence\nUnited States Navy"
] |
|
[
"Gary Cooper",
"Silent films, 1925-28"
] | C_6ec0895035fd4dbda1785cd7d1c7b5d7_1 | what silent films were made in 1925? | 1 | What silent films were made by Gary Cooper in 1925? | Gary Cooper | In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, including Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt work--which sometimes injured horses and riders--"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name. Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week. Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal--finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings, the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada--both films directed by John Waters. In 1928, Paramount paired Cooper with a youthful Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss--advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride. That year, Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928. CANNOTANSWER | In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, | Gary Cooper (born Frank James Cooper; May 7, 1901 – May 13, 1961) was an American actor known for his strong, silent, and understated acting style. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor twice and had a further three nominations, as well as receiving an Academy Honorary Award for his career achievements in 1961. He was one of the top 10 film personalities for 23 consecutive years, and one of the top money-making stars for 18 years. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper at No. 11 on its list of the 25 greatest male stars of classic Hollywood cinema.
Cooper's career spanned 36 years, from 1925 to 1961, and included leading roles in 84 feature films. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era through to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His screen persona appealed strongly to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major film genres. His ability to project his own personality onto the characters he played contributed to his natural and authentic appearance on screen. Throughout his career, he sustained a screen persona that represented the ideal American hero.
Cooper began his career as a film extra and stunt rider, but soon landed acting roles. After establishing himself as a Western hero in his early silent films, he appeared as the Virginian and became a movie star in 1929 with his first sound picture, The Virginian. In the early 1930s, he expanded his heroic image to include more cautious characters in adventure films and dramas such as A Farewell to Arms (1932) and The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935). During the height of his career, Cooper portrayed a new type of hero—a champion of the common man—in films such as Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), Meet John Doe (1941), Sergeant York (1941), The Pride of the Yankees (1942), and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943). He later portrayed more mature characters at odds with the world in films such as The Fountainhead (1949) and High Noon (1952). In his final films, he played non-violent characters searching for redemption in films such as Friendly Persuasion (1956) and Man of the West (1958).
Early life
Frank James Cooper was born in Helena, Montana, on May 7, 1901, the younger of two sons of English parents Alice (née Brazier; 1873–1967) and Charles Henry Cooper (1865–1946). His brother, Arthur, was six years his senior. Cooper's father came from Houghton Regis, Bedfordshire, and became a prominent lawyer, rancher, and Montana Supreme Court justice. His mother hailed from Gillingham, Kent, and married Charles in Montana. In 1906, Charles purchased the Seven-Bar-Nine cattle ranch, about north of Helena near Craig, Montana. Cooper and Arthur spent their summers at the ranch and learned to ride horses, hunt, and fish. Cooper attended Central Grade School in Helena.
Alice wanted her sons to have an English education, so she took them back to England in 1909 to enroll them in Dunstable Grammar School in Dunstable, Bedfordshire. While there, Cooper and his brother lived with their father's cousins, William and Emily Barton, at their home in Houghton Regis. Cooper studied Latin, French, and English history at Dunstable until 1912. While he adapted to English school discipline and learned the requisite social graces, he never adjusted to the rigid class structure and formal Eton collars he was required to wear. He received his confirmation in the Church of England at the Church of All Saints in Houghton Regis on December 3, 1911. His mother accompanied her sons back to the U.S. in August 1912, and Cooper resumed his education at Johnson Grammar School in Helena.
When Cooper was 15, he injured his hip in a car accident. On his doctor's recommendation, he returned to the Seven-Bar-Nine ranch to recuperate by horseback riding. The misguided therapy left him with his characteristic stiff, off-balanced walk and slightly angled horse-riding style. He left Helena High School after two years in 1918, and returned to the family ranch to work full-time as a cowboy. In 1919, his father arranged for him to attend Gallatin County High School in Bozeman, Montana, where English teacher Ida Davis encouraged him to focus on academics and participate in debating and dramatics. Cooper later called Davis "the woman partly responsible for [him] giving up cowboy-ing and going to college".
Cooper was still attending high school in 1920 when he took three art courses at Montana Agricultural College in Bozeman. His interest in art was inspired years earlier by the Western paintings of Charles Marion Russell and Frederic Remington. Cooper especially admired and studied Russell's Lewis and Clark Meeting Indians at Ross' Hole (1910), which still hangs in the state capitol building in Helena. In 1922, to continue his art education, he enrolled in Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa. He did well academically in most of his courses, but was not accepted into the school's drama club. His drawings and watercolor paintings were exhibited throughout the dormitory, and he was named art editor for the college yearbook. During the summers of 1922 and 1923, Cooper worked at Yellowstone National Park as a tour guide driving the yellow open-top buses. Despite a promising first 18 months at Grinnell, he left college suddenly in February 1924, spent a month in Chicago looking for work as an artist, and then returned to Helena, where he sold editorial cartoons to the local Independent newspaper.
In autumn 1924, Cooper's father left the Montana Supreme Court bench and moved with his wife to Los Angeles to administer the estates of two relatives, and Cooper joined his parents there in November at his father's request. After briefly working a series of unpromising jobs, he met two friends from Montana who were working as film extras and stunt riders in low-budget Western films for the small movie studios on Poverty Row. They introduced him to another Montana cowboy, rodeo champion Jay "Slim" Talbot, who took him to see a casting director. Wanting money for a professional art course, Cooper worked as a film extra for $5 a day, and as a stunt rider for $10. Cooper and Talbot became close friends and hunting companions, and Talbot later worked as Cooper's stuntman and stand-in for over three decades.
Career
Silent films, 1925–1928
In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, but also the already emergent major studios, Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt workwhich sometimes injured horses and riders"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name.
Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week.
Cooper's first important film role was a supporting part in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) starring Ronald Colman and Vilma Bánky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal—finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings (both 1927), the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada—both films directed by John Waters.
Paramount paired Cooper with Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss (both 1928)—advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride (also both 1928). Around the same time, Cooper made Lilac Time (1928) with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928.
Hollywood stardom, 1929–1935
Cooper became a major movie star in 1929 with the release of his first talking picture, The Virginian (1929), which was directed by Victor Fleming and co-starred Mary Brian and Walter Huston. Based on the popular novel by Owen Wister, The Virginian was one of the first sound films to define the Western code of honor and helped establish many of the conventions of the Western movie genre that persist to the present day. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, the romantic image of the tall, handsome, and shy cowboy hero who embodied male freedom, courage, and honor was created in large part by Cooper in the film. Unlike some silent film actors who had trouble adapting to the new sound medium, Cooper transitioned naturally, with his "deep and clear" and "pleasantly drawling" voice, which was perfectly suited for the characters he portrayed on screen, also according to Meyers. Looking to capitalize on Cooper's growing popularity, Paramount cast him in several Westerns and wartime dramas, including Only the Brave, The Texan, Seven Days' Leave, A Man from Wyoming, and The Spoilers (all released in 1930). Norman Rockwell depicted Cooper in his role as The Texan for the cover of The Saturday Evening Post on May 24, 1930.
One of the more important performances in Cooper's early career was his portrayal of a sullen legionnaire in Josef von Sternberg's film Morocco (also 1930) with Marlene Dietrich in her introduction to American audiences. During production, von Sternberg focused his energies on Dietrich and treated Cooper dismissively. Tensions came to a head after von Sternberg yelled directions at Cooper in German. The actor approached the director, picked him up by the collar, and said, "If you expect to work in this country you'd better get on to the language we use here." Despite the tensions on the set, Cooper produced "one of his best performances", according to Thornton Delehanty of the New York Evening Post.
After returning to the Western genre in Zane Grey's Fighting Caravans (1931) with French actress Lili Damita, Cooper appeared in the Dashiell Hammett crime film City Streets (also 1931), co-starring Sylvia Sidney and Paul Lukas, playing a westerner who gets involved with big-city gangsters in order to save the woman he loves. Cooper concluded the year with appearances in two unsuccessful films: I Take This Woman (also 1931) with Carole Lombard, and His Woman with Claudette Colbert. The demands and pressures of making ten films in two years left Cooper exhausted and in poor health, suffering from anemia and jaundice. He had lost during that period, and felt lonely, isolated, and depressed by his sudden fame and wealth. In May 1931, Cooper left Hollywood and sailed to Algiers and then Italy, where he lived for the next year.
During his time abroad, Cooper stayed with the Countess Dorothy di Frasso at the Villa Madama in Rome, where she taught him about good food and vintage wines, how to read Italian and French menus, and how to socialize among Europe's nobility and upper classes. After guiding him through the great art museums and galleries of Italy, she accompanied him on a ten-week big-game hunting safari on the slopes of Mount Kenya in East Africa, where he was credited with over sixty kills, including two lions, a rhinoceros, and various antelopes. His safari experience in Africa had a profound influence on Cooper and intensified his love of the wilderness. After returning to Europe, he and the countess set off on a Mediterranean cruise of the Italian and French Rivieras. Rested and rejuvenated by his year-long exile, a healthy Cooper returned to Hollywood in April 1932 and negotiated a new contract with Paramount for two films per year, a salary of $4,000 a week, and director and script approval.
In 1932, after completing Devil and the Deep with Tallulah Bankhead to fulfill his old contract, Cooper appeared in A Farewell to Arms, the first film adaptation of an Ernest Hemingway novel. Co-starring Helen Hayes, a leading New York theatre star and Academy Award winner, and Adolphe Menjou, the film presented Cooper with one of his most ambitious and challenging dramatic roles, playing an American ambulance driver wounded in Italy who falls in love with an English nurse during World War I. Critics praised his highly intense and emotional performance, and the film became one of the year's most commercially successful pictures. In 1933, after making Today We Live with Joan Crawford and One Sunday Afternoon with Fay Wray, Cooper appeared in the Ernst Lubitsch comedy film Design for Living, based on the successful Noël Coward play. Co-starring Miriam Hopkins and Fredric March, the film was a box office success, ranking as one of the top ten highest-grossing films of 1933. All three of the lead actors—March, Cooper, and Hopkins—received attention from this film as they were all at the peak of their careers. Cooper's performance — playing an American artist in Europe competing with his playwright friend for the affections of a beautiful woman — was singled out for its versatility and revealed his genuine ability to do light comedy. Cooper changed his name legally to "Gary Cooper" in August 1933.
In 1934, Cooper was loaned out to MGM for the Civil War drama film Operator 13 with Marion Davies, about a beautiful Union spy who falls in love with a Confederate soldier. Despite Richard Boleslawski's imaginative direction and George J. Folsey's lavish cinematography, the film did poorly at the box office.
Back at Paramount, Cooper appeared in his first of seven films by director Henry Hathaway, Now and Forever, with Carole Lombard and Shirley Temple. In the film, he plays a confidence man who tries to sell his daughter to the relatives who raised her, but is eventually won over by the adorable girl. Impressed by Temple's intelligence and charm, Cooper developed a close rapport with her, both on and off screen. The film was a box-office success.
The following year, Cooper was loaned out to Samuel Goldwyn Productions to appear in King Vidor's romance film The Wedding Night with Anna Sten, who was being groomed as "another Garbo". In the film, Cooper plays an alcoholic novelist who retreats to his family's New England farm where he meets and falls in love with a beautiful Polish neighbor. Cooper delivered a performance of surprising range and depth, according to biographer Larry Swindell. Despite receiving generally favorable reviews, the film was not popular with American audiences, who may have been offended by the film's depiction of an extramarital affair and its tragic ending.
That same year, Cooper appeared in two Henry Hathaway films: the melodrama Peter Ibbetson with Ann Harding, about a man caught up in a dream world created by his love for a childhood sweetheart, and the adventure film The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, about a daring British officer and his men who defend their stronghold at Bengal against rebellious local tribes. While the former, championed by the surrealists became more successful in Europe than in the United States, the latter was nominated for seven Academy Awards and became one of Cooper's most popular and successful adventure films. Hathaway had the highest respect for Cooper's acting ability, calling him "the best actor of all of them".
American folk hero, 1936–1943
From Mr. Deeds to The Real Glory, 1936–1939
Cooper's career took an important turn in 1936. After making Frank Borzage's romantic comedy film Desire with Marlene Dietrich at Paramount—in which he delivered a performance considered by some contemporary critics as one of his finest—Cooper returned to Poverty Row for the first time since his early silent film days to make Frank Capra's Mr. Deeds Goes to Town with Jean Arthur for Columbia Pictures. In the film, Cooper plays the character of Longfellow Deeds, a quiet, innocent writer of greeting cards who inherits a fortune, leaves behind his idyllic life in Vermont, and travels to New York where he faces a world of corruption and deceit. Capra and screenwriter Robert Riskin were able to use Cooper's well-established screen persona as the "quintessential American hero"—a symbol of honesty, courage, and goodness—to create a new type of "folk hero" for the common man. Commenting on Cooper's impact on the character and the film, Capra observed:
Both Desire and Mr. Deeds opened in April 1936 to critical praise and were major box-office successes. In his review in The New York Times, Frank Nugent wrote that Cooper was "proving himself one of the best light comedians in Hollywood". For his performance in Mr. Deeds, Cooper received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.
Cooper appeared in two other Paramount films in 1936. In Lewis Milestone's adventure film The General Died at Dawn with Madeleine Carroll, he plays an American soldier of fortune in China who helps the peasants defend themselves against the oppression of a cruel warlord. Written by playwright Clifford Odets, the film was a critical and commercial success.
In Cecil B. DeMille's sprawling frontier epic The Plainsman—his first of four films with the director—Cooper portrays Wild Bill Hickok in a highly fictionalized version of the opening of the American western frontier. The film was an even greater box-office hit than its predecessor, due in large part to Jean Arthur's definitive depiction of Calamity Jane and Cooper's inspired portrayal of Hickock as an enigmatic figure of "deepening mythic substance". That year, Cooper appeared for the first time on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities, where he would remain for the next twenty-three years.
In late 1936, Paramount was preparing a new contract for Cooper that would raise his salary to $8,000 a week when Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn for six films over six years with a minimum guarantee of $150,000 per picture. Paramount brought suit against Goldwyn and Cooper, and the court ruled that Cooper's new Goldwyn contract afforded the actor sufficient time to also honor his Paramount agreement. Cooper continued to make films with both studios, and by 1939 the United States Treasury reported that Cooper was the country's highest wage earner, at $482,819 (equivalent to $ million in ).
In contrast to his output the previous year, Cooper appeared in only one picture in 1937, Henry Hathaway's adventure film Souls at Sea. A critical and box-office failure, Cooper referred to it as his "almost picture", saying, "It was almost exciting, and almost interesting. And I was almost good." In 1938, he appeared in Archie Mayo's biographical film The Adventures of Marco Polo. Plagued by production problems and a weak screenplay, the film became Goldwyn's biggest failure to that date, losing $700,000. During this period, Cooper turned down several important roles, including the role of Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind. Cooper was producer David O. Selznick's first choice for the part. He made several overtures to the actor, but Cooper had doubts about the project, and did not feel suited to the role. Cooper later admitted, "It was one of the best roles ever offered in Hollywood ... But I said no. I didn't see myself as quite that dashing, and later, when I saw Clark Gable play the role to perfection, I knew I was right."
Back at Paramount, Cooper returned to a more comfortable genre in Ernst Lubitsch's romantic comedy Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938) with Claudette Colbert. In the film, Cooper plays a wealthy American businessman in France who falls in love with an impoverished aristocrat's daughter and persuades her to become his eighth wife. Despite the clever screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder, and solid performances by Cooper and Colbert, American audiences had trouble accepting Cooper in the role of a shallow philanderer. It succeeded only at the European box office market.
In the fall of 1938, Cooper appeared in H. C. Potter's romantic comedy The Cowboy and the Lady with Merle Oberon, about a sweet-natured rodeo cowboy who falls in love with the wealthy daughter of a presidential hopeful, believing her to be a poor, hard-working lady's maid. The efforts of three directors and several eminent screenwriters could not salvage what could have been a fine vehicle for Cooper. While more successful than its predecessor, the film was Cooper's fourth consecutive box-office failure in the American market.
In the next two years, Cooper was more discerning about the roles he accepted and made four successful large-scale adventure and cowboy films. In William A. Wellman's adventure film Beau Geste (1939), he plays one of three daring English brothers who join the French Foreign Legion in the Sahara to fight local tribes. Filmed in the same Mojave Desert locations as the original 1926 version with Ronald Colman, Beau Geste provided Cooper with magnificent sets, exotic settings, high-spirited action, and a role tailored to his personality and screen persona. This was the last film in Cooper's contract with Paramount.
In Henry Hathaway's The Real Glory (1939), he plays a military doctor who accompanies a small group of American Army officers to the Philippines to help the Christian Filipinos defend themselves against Muslim radicals. Many film critics praised Cooper's performance, including author and film critic Graham Greene, who recognized that he "never acted better".
From The Westerner to For Whom the Bell Tolls, 1940–1943
Cooper returned to the Western genre in William Wyler's The Westerner (1940) with Walter Brennan and Doris Davenport, about a drifting cowboy who defends homesteaders against Roy Bean, a corrupt judge known as the "law west of the Pecos". Screenwriter Niven Busch relied on Cooper's extensive knowledge of Western history while working on the script. The film received positive reviews and did well at the box-office, with reviewers praising the performances of the two lead actors. That same year, Cooper appeared in his first all-Technicolor feature, Cecil B. DeMille's adventure film North West Mounted Police (1940). In the film, Cooper plays a Texas Ranger who pursues an outlaw into western Canada where he joins forces with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who are after the same man, a leader of the North-West Rebellion. While not as popular with critics as its predecessor, the film was another box-office success—the sixth-highest-grossing film of 1940.
The early 1940s were Cooper's prime years as an actor. In a relatively short period, he appeared in five critically successful and popular films that produced some of his finest performances. When Frank Capra offered him the lead role in Meet John Doe before Robert Riskin even developed the script, Cooper accepted his friend's offer, saying, "It's okay, Frank, I don't need a script." In the film, Cooper plays Long John Willoughby, a down-and-out bush-league pitcher hired by a newspaper to pretend to be a man who promises to commit suicide on Christmas Eve to protest all the hypocrisy and corruption in the country. Considered by some critics to be Capra's best film at the time, Meet John Doe was received as a "national event" with Cooper appearing on the front cover of Time magazine on March 3, 1941. In his review in the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes called Cooper's performance a "splendid and utterly persuasive portrayal" and praised his "utterly realistic acting which comes through with such authority". Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote, "Gary Cooper, of course, is 'John Doe' to the life and in the whole—shy, bewildered, non-aggressive, but a veritable tiger when aroused."
That same year, Cooper made two films with director and good friend Howard Hawks. In the biographical film Sergeant York, Cooper portrays war hero Alvin C. York, one of the most decorated American soldiers in World War I. The film chronicles York's early backwoods days in Tennessee, his religious conversion and subsequent piety, his stand as a conscientious objector, and finally his heroic actions at the Battle of the Argonne Forest, which earned him the Medal of Honor. Initially, Cooper was nervous and uncertain about playing a living hero, so he traveled to Tennessee to visit York at his home, and the two quiet men established an immediate rapport and discovered they had much in common. Inspired by York's encouragement, Cooper delivered a performance that Howard Barnes of the New York Herald Tribune called "one of extraordinary conviction and versatility", and that Archer Winston of the New York Post called "one of his best". After the film's release, Cooper was awarded the Distinguished Citizenship Medal by the Veterans of Foreign Wars for his "powerful contribution to the promotion of patriotism and loyalty". York admired Cooper's performance and helped promote the film for Warner Bros. Sergeant York became the top-grossing film of the year and was nominated for eleven Academy Awards. Accepting his first Academy Award for Best Actor from his friend James Stewart, Cooper said, "It was Sergeant Alvin York who won this award. Shucks, I've been in the business sixteen years and sometimes dreamed I might get one of these. That's all I can say ... Funny when I was dreaming I always made a better speech."
Cooper concluded the year back at Goldwyn with Howard Hawks to make the romantic comedy Ball of Fire with Barbara Stanwyck. In the film, Cooper plays a shy linguistics professor who leads a team of seven scholars who are writing an encyclopedia. While researching slang, he meets Stanwyck's flirtatious burlesque stripper Sugarpuss O'Shea who blows the dust off their staid life of books. The screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder provided Cooper the opportunity to exercise the full range of his light comedy skills. In his review for the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes wrote that Cooper handled the role with "great skill and comic emphasis" and that his performance was "utterly delightful". Though small in scale, Ball of Fire was one of the top-grossing films of the year—Cooper's fourth consecutive picture to make the top twenty.
Cooper's only film appearance in 1942 was also his last under his Goldwyn contract. In Sam Wood's biographical film The Pride of the Yankees, Cooper portrays baseball star Lou Gehrig who established a record with the New York Yankees for playing in 2,130 consecutive games. Cooper was reluctant to play the seven-time All-Star, who only died the previous year from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) — now commonly called "Lou Gehrig's disease". Beyond the challenges of effectively portraying such a popular and nationally recognized figure, Cooper knew very little about baseball and was not left-handed like Gehrig.
After Gehrig's widow visited the actor and expressed her desire that he portray her husband, Cooper accepted the role that covered a twenty-year span of Gehrig's life—his early love of baseball, his rise to greatness, his loving marriage, and his struggle with illness, culminating in his farewell speech at Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939 before 62,000 fans. Cooper quickly learned the physical movements of a baseball player and developed a fluid, believable swing. The handedness issue was solved by reversing the print for certain batting scenes. The film was one of the year's top ten pictures and received eleven Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's third).
Soon after the publication of Ernest Hemingway's novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, Paramount paid $150,000 for the film rights with the express intent of casting Cooper in the lead role of Robert Jordan, an American explosives expert who fights alongside the Republican loyalists during the Spanish Civil War. The original director, Cecil B. DeMille, was replaced by Sam Wood who brought in Dudley Nichols for the screenplay. After the start of principal photography in the Sierra Nevada in late 1942, Ingrid Bergman was brought in to replace ballerina Vera Zorina as the female lead—a change supported by Cooper and Hemingway. The love scenes between Bergman and Cooper were "rapturous" and passionate. Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune wrote that both actors performed with "the true stature and authority of stars". While the film distorted the novel's original political themes and meaning, For Whom the Bell Tolls was a critical and commercial success and received ten Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's fourth).
World War II related activities
Due to his age and health, Cooper did not serve in the military during World War II, but like many of his colleagues, he got involved in the war effort by entertaining the troops. In June 1943, he visited military hospitals in San Diego, and often appeared at the Hollywood Canteen serving food to the servicemen. In late 1943, Cooper undertook a tour of the South West Pacific with actresses Una Merkel and Phyllis Brooks, and accordionist Andy Arcari.
Traveling on a B-24A Liberator bomber, the group toured the Cook Islands, Fiji, New Caledonia, Queensland, Brisbane—where General Douglas MacArthur told Cooper he was watching Sergeant York in a Manila theater when Japanese bombs began falling—New Guinea, Jayapura, and throughout the Solomon Islands.
The group often shared the same sparse living conditions and K-rations as the troops. Cooper met with the servicemen and women, visited military hospitals, introduced his attractive colleagues, and participated in occasional skits. The shows concluded with Cooper's moving recitation of Lou Gehrig's farewell speech. When he returned to the United States, he visited military hospitals throughout the country. Cooper later called his time with the troops the "greatest emotional experience" of his life.
Mature roles, 1944–1952
In 1944, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's wartime adventure film The Story of Dr. Wassell with Laraine Day — his third movie with the director. In the film, Cooper plays American doctor and missionary Corydon M. Wassell, who leads a group of wounded sailors through the jungles of Java to safety. Despite receiving poor reviews, Dr. Wassell was one of the top-grossing films of the year. With his Goldwyn and Paramount contracts now concluded, Cooper decided to remain independent and formed his own production company, International Pictures, with Leo Spitz, William Goetz, and Nunnally Johnson. The fledgling studio's first offering was Sam Wood's romantic comedy Casanova Brown with Teresa Wright, about a man who learns his soon-to-be ex-wife is pregnant with his child, just as he is about to marry another woman. The film received poor reviews, with the New York Daily News calling it "delightful nonsense", and Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, criticizing Cooper's "somewhat obvious and ridiculous clowning". The film was barely profitable.
In 1945, Cooper starred in and produced Stuart Heisler's Western comedy Along Came Jones with Loretta Young for International. In this lighthearted parody of his past heroic image, Cooper plays comically inept cowboy Melody Jones who is mistaken for a ruthless killer. Audiences embraced Cooper's character, and the film was one of the top box-office pictures of the year—a testament to Cooper's still vital audience appeal. It was also International's biggest financial success during its brief history before being sold off to Universal Studios in 1946.
Cooper's career during the post-war years drifted in new directions as American society was changing. While he still played conventional heroic roles, his films now relied less on his heroic screen persona and more on novel stories and exotic settings. In November 1945, Cooper appeared in Sam Wood's nineteenth-century period drama Saratoga Trunk with Ingrid Bergman, about a Texas cowboy and his relationship with a beautiful fortune-hunter. Filmed in early 1943, the movie's release was delayed for two years due to the increased demand for war movies. Despite poor reviews, Saratoga Trunk did well at the box office and became one of the top money-makers of the year for Warner Bros. Cooper's only film in 1946 was Fritz Lang's romantic thriller Cloak and Dagger, about a mild-mannered physics professor recruited by the OSS during the last years of World War II to investigate the German atomic bomb program. Playing a part loosely based on physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, Cooper was uneasy with the role and unable to convey the "inner sense" of the character. The film received poor reviews and was a box-office failure. In 1947, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's epic adventure film Unconquered with Paulette Goddard, about a Virginia militiaman who defends settlers against an unscrupulous gun trader and hostile Indians on the Western frontier during the eighteenth century. The film received mixed reviews, but even long-time DeMille critic James Agee acknowledged the picture had "some authentic flavor of the period". This last of four films made with DeMille was Cooper's most lucrative, earning the actor over $300,000 (equal to $ today) in salary and percentage of profits. Unconquered would be his last unqualified box-office success for the next five years.
In 1948, after making Leo McCarey's romantic comedy Good Sam, Cooper sold his company to Universal Studios and signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros. that gave him script and director approval and a guaranteed $295,000 (equal to $ today) per picture. His first film under the new contract was King Vidor's drama The Fountainhead (1949) with Patricia Neal and Raymond Massey. In the film, Cooper plays an idealistic and uncompromising architect who struggles to maintain his integrity and individualism in the face of societal pressures to conform to popular standards. Based on the novel by Ayn Rand who also wrote the screenplay, the film reflects her philosophy and attacks the concepts of collectivism while promoting the virtues of individualism. For most critics, Cooper was hopelessly miscast in the role of Howard Roark. In his review for The New York Times, Bosley Crowther concluded he was "Mr. Deeds out of his element". Cooper returned to his element in Delmer Daves' war drama Task Force (1949), about a retiring rear admiral who reminisces about his long career as a naval aviator and his role in the development of aircraft carriers. Cooper's performance and the Technicolor newsreel footage supplied by the United States Navy made the film one of Cooper's most popular during this period. In the next two years, Cooper made four poorly received films: Michael Curtiz' period drama Bright Leaf (1950), Stuart Heisler's Western melodrama Dallas (1950), Henry Hathaway's wartime comedy You're in the Navy Now (1951), and Raoul Walsh's Western action film Distant Drums (1951).
Cooper's most important film during the post-war years was Fred Zinnemann's Western drama High Noon (1952) with Grace Kelly and Katy Jurado for United Artists. In the film, Cooper plays retiring sheriff Will Kane who is preparing to leave town on his honeymoon when he learns that an outlaw he helped put away and his three henchmen are returning to seek their revenge. Unable to gain the support of the frightened townspeople, and abandoned by his young bride, Kane nevertheless stays to face the outlaws alone. During the filming, Cooper was in poor health and in considerable pain from stomach ulcers. His ravaged face and discomfort in some scenes "photographed as self-doubt", according to biographer Hector Arce, and contributed to the effectiveness of his performance. Considered one of the first "adult" Westerns for its theme of moral courage, High Noon received enthusiastic reviews for its artistry, with Time magazine placing it in the ranks of Stagecoach and The Gunfighter. Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote that Cooper was "at the top of his form", and John McCarten, in The New Yorker, wrote that Cooper was never more effective. The film earned $3.75 million in the United States and $18 million worldwide. Following the example of his friend James Stewart, Cooper accepted a lower salary in exchange for a percent of the profits, and ended up making $600,000. Cooper's understated performance was widely praised, and earned him his second Academy Award for Best Actor.
Later films, 1953–1961
After appearing in André de Toth's Civil War drama Springfield Rifle (1952)—a standard Warner Bros. film that was overshadowed by the success of its predecessor—Cooper made four films outside the United States. In Mark Robson's drama Return to Paradise (1953), Cooper plays an American wanderer who liberates the inhabitants of a Polynesian island from the puritanical rule of a misguided pastor. Cooper endured spartan living conditions, long hours, and ill health during the three-month location shoot on the island of Upolu in Western Samoa. Despite its beautiful cinematography, the film received poor reviews. Cooper's next three films were shot in Mexico. In Hugo Fregonese's action adventure film Blowing Wild (1953) with Barbara Stanwyck, he plays a wildcatter in Mexico who gets involved with an oil company executive and his unscrupulous wife with whom he once had an affair.
In 1954, Cooper appeared in Henry Hathaway's Western drama Garden of Evil, with Susan Hayward, about three soldiers of fortune in Mexico hired to rescue a woman's husband. That same year, he appeared in Robert Aldrich's Western adventure Vera Cruz with Burt Lancaster. In the film, Cooper plays an American adventurer hired by Emperor Maximilian I to escort a countess to Vera Cruz during the Mexican Rebellion of 1866. All of these films received poor reviews but did well at the box-office. For his work in Vera Cruz, Cooper earned $1.4 million in salary and percent of the gross.
During this period, Cooper struggled with health problems. As well as his ongoing treatment for ulcers, he suffered a severe shoulder injury during the filming of Blowing Wild when he was hit by metal fragments from a dynamited oil well. During the filming of Vera Cruz, he reinjured his hip falling from a horse, and was burned when Lancaster fired his rifle too close and the wadding from the blank shell pierced his clothing.
In 1955, he appeared in Otto Preminger's biographical war drama The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell, about the World War I general who tried to convince government officials of the importance of air power, and was court-martialed after blaming the War Department for a series of air disasters. Some critics felt that Cooper was miscast, and that his dull, tight-lipped performance did not reflect Mitchell's dynamic and caustic personality. In 1956, Cooper was more effective playing a gentle Indiana Quaker in William Wyler's Civil War drama Friendly Persuasion with Dorothy McGuire. Like Sergeant York and High Noon, the film addresses the conflict between religious pacifism and civic duty. For his performance, Cooper received his second Golden Globe nomination for Best Motion Picture Actor. The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, was awarded the Palme d'Or at the 1957 Cannes Film Festival, and went on to earn $8 million worldwide.
In 1956, Cooper traveled to France to make Billy Wilder's romantic comedy Love in the Afternoon with Audrey Hepburn and Maurice Chevalier. In the film, Cooper plays a middle-aged American playboy in Paris who pursues and eventually falls in love with a much younger woman. Despite receiving some positive reviews—including from Bosley Crowther who praised the film's "charming performances"—most reviewers concluded that Cooper was simply too old for the part. While audiences may not have welcomed seeing Cooper's heroic screen image tarnished by his playing an aging roué trying to seduce an innocent young girl, the film was still a box-office success. The following year, Cooper appeared in Philip Dunne's romantic drama Ten North Frederick. In the film, which was based on the novel by John O'Hara, Cooper plays an attorney whose life is ruined by a double-crossing politician and his own secret affair with his daughter's young roommate. While Cooper brought "conviction and controlled anguish" to his performance, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, it was not enough to save what Bosley Crowther called a "hapless film".
Despite his ongoing health problems and several operations for ulcers and hernias, Cooper continued to work in action films. In 1958, he appeared in Anthony Mann's Western drama Man of the West (1958) with Julie London and Lee J. Cobb, about a reformed outlaw and killer who is forced to confront his violent past when the train he is riding in is held up by his former gang members. The film has been called Cooper's "most pathological Western", with its themes of impotent rage, sexual humiliation, and sadism. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, Cooper, who struggled with moral conflicts in his personal life, "understood the anguish of a character striving to retain his integrity ... [and] brought authentic feeling to the role of a tempted and tormented, yet essentially decent man". Mostly ignored by critics at the time, the film is now well-regarded by film scholars and is considered Cooper's last great film.
After his Warner Bros. contract ended, Cooper formed his own production company, Baroda Productions, and made three unusual films in 1959 about redemption. In Delmer Daves' Western drama The Hanging Tree, Cooper plays a frontier doctor who saves a criminal from a lynch mob, and later tries to exploit his sordid past. Cooper delivered a "powerful and persuasive" performance of an emotionally scarred man whose need to dominate others is transformed by the love and sacrifice of a woman. In Robert Rossen's historical adventure They Came to Cordura with Rita Hayworth, he plays an army officer who is found guilty of cowardice and assigned the degrading task of recommending soldiers for the Medal of Honor during the Pancho Villa Expedition of 1916.
While Cooper received positive reviews, Variety and Films in Review felt he was too old for the part. In Michael Anderson's action drama The Wreck of the Mary Deare with Charlton Heston, Cooper plays a disgraced merchant marine officer who decides to stay aboard his sinking cargo ship in order to prove the vessel was deliberately scuttled and to redeem his good name. Like its two predecessors, the film was physically demanding. Cooper, who was a trained scuba diver, did most of his own underwater scenes. Biographer Jeffrey Meyers observed that in all three roles, Cooper effectively conveyed the sense of lost honor and desire for redemption—what Joseph Conrad in Lord Jim called the "struggles of an individual trying to save from the fire his idea of what his moral identity should be".
Personal life
Marriage and family
Cooper was formally introduced to his future wife, 20-year-old New York debutante Veronica Balfe, on Easter Sunday 1933 at a party given by her uncle, art director Cedric Gibbons. Called "Rocky" by her family and friends, she grew up on Park Avenue and attended finishing schools. Her stepfather was Wall Street tycoon Paul Shields. Cooper and Rocky were quietly married at her parents' Park Avenue residence on December 15, 1933. According to his friends, the marriage had a positive impact on Cooper, who turned away from past indiscretions and took control of his life. Athletic and a lover of the outdoors, Rocky shared many of Cooper's interests, including riding, skiing, and skeet-shooting. She organized their social life, and her wealth and social connections provided Cooper access to New York high society. Cooper and his wife owned homes in the Los Angeles area in Encino (1933–36), Brentwood (1936–53), and Holmby Hills (1954–61), and owned a vacation home in Aspen, Colorado (1949–53).
Gary and Veronica Cooper's daughter, Maria Veronica Cooper, was born on September 15, 1937. By all accounts, he was a patient and affectionate father, teaching Maria to ride a bicycle, play tennis, ski, and ride horses. Sharing many of her parents' interests, she accompanied them on their travels and was often photographed with them. Like her father, she developed a love for art and drawing. As a family they vacationed together in Sun Valley, Idaho, spent time at Rocky's parents' country house in Southampton, New York, and took frequent trips to Europe. Cooper and Rocky were legally separated on May 16, 1951, when Cooper moved out of their home. For over two years, they maintained a fragile and uneasy family life with their daughter. Cooper moved back into their home in November 1953, and their formal reconciliation occurred in February 1954.
Romantic relationships
Prior to his marriage, Cooper had a series of romantic relationships with leading actresses, beginning in 1927 with Clara Bow, who advanced his career by helping him get one of his first leading roles in Children of Divorce. Bow was also responsible for getting Cooper a role in Wings, which generated an enormous amount of fan mail for the young actor. In 1928, he had a relationship with another experienced actress, Evelyn Brent, whom he met while filming Beau Sabreur. In 1929, while filming The Wolf Song, Cooper began an intense affair with Lupe Vélez, which was the most important romance of his early life. During their two years together, Cooper also had brief affairs with Marlene Dietrich while filming Morocco in 1930 and with Carole Lombard while making I Take This Woman in 1931. During his year abroad in 1931–32, Cooper had an affair with the married Countess Dorothy di Frasso, while staying at her Villa Madama near Rome.
After he was married in December 1933, Cooper remained faithful to his wife until the summer of 1942, when he began an affair with Ingrid Bergman during the production of For Whom the Bell Tolls. Their relationship lasted through the completion of filming Saratoga Trunk in June 1943. In 1948, after finishing work on The Fountainhead, Cooper began an affair with actress Patricia Neal, his co-star. At first they kept their affair discreet, but eventually it became an open secret in Hollywood, and Cooper's wife confronted him with the rumors, which he admitted were true. He also confessed that he was in love with Neal, and continued to see her. Cooper and his wife were legally separated in May 1951, but he did not seek a divorce. Neal later claimed that Cooper hit her after she went on a date with Kirk Douglas, and that he arranged for her to have an abortion when she became pregnant with Cooper's child. Neal ended their relationship in late December 1951. During his three-year separation from his wife, Cooper was rumored to have had affairs with Grace Kelly, Lorraine Chanel, and Gisèle Pascal.
Cooper biographers have explored his friendship in the late twenties with the actor Anderson Lawler, with whom Cooper shared a house on and off for a year, while at the same time seeing Clara Bow, Evelyn Brent and Lupe Vélez. Lupe Vélez once told Hedda Hopper of Vélez' affair with Cooper; whenever he would come home after seeing Lawler, she would sniff for Lawler's cologne. Vélez' biographer Michelle Vogel has reported that Vélez consented to Cooper's sexual behavior with Lawler, but only as long as she, too, could participate. In later life, he became involved in a relationship with the costume designer Irene, and was, according to Irene, "the only man she ever loved". A year after his death in 1961, Irene committed suicide by jumping from the 11th floor of the Knickerbocker Hotel, after telling Doris Day of her grief over Cooper's death.
Friendships, interests, and character
Cooper's twenty-year friendship with Ernest Hemingway began at Sun Valley in October 1940. The previous year, Hemingway drew upon Cooper's image when he created the character of Robert Jordan for the novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. The two shared a passion for the outdoors, and for years they hunted duck and pheasant, and skied together in Sun Valley. Both men admired the work of Rudyard Kipling—Cooper kept a copy of the poem "If—" in his dressing room—and retained as adults Kipling's sense of boyish adventure.
As well as admiring Cooper's hunting skills and knowledge of the outdoors, Hemingway believed his character matched his screen persona, once telling a friend, "If you made up a character like Coop, nobody would believe it. He's just too good to be true." They saw each other often, and their friendship remained strong through the years.
Cooper's social life generally centered on sports, outdoor activities, and dinner parties with his family and friends from the film industry, including directors Henry Hathaway, Howard Hawks, William Wellman, and Fred Zinnemann, and actors Joel McCrea, James Stewart, Barbara Stanwyck, and Robert Taylor. As well as hunting, Cooper enjoyed riding, fishing, skiing, and later in life, scuba diving. He never abandoned his early love for art and drawing, and over the years, he and his wife acquired a private collection of modern paintings, including works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Gauguin, and Georgia O'Keeffe. Cooper owned several works by Pablo Picasso, whom he met in 1956. Cooper also had a lifelong passion for automobiles, with a collection that included a 1930 Duesenberg.
Cooper was naturally reserved and introspective, and loved the solitude of outdoor activities. Not unlike his screen persona, his communication style frequently consisted of long silences with an occasional "yup" and "shucks". He once said, "If others have more interesting things to say than I have, I keep quiet." According to his friends, Cooper could also be an articulate, well-informed conversationalist on topics ranging from horses, guns, and Western history to film production, sports cars, and modern art. He was modest and unpretentious, frequently downplaying his acting abilities and career accomplishments. His friends and colleagues described him as charming, well-mannered, and thoughtful, with a lively boyish sense of humor. Cooper maintained a sense of propriety throughout his career and never misused his movie star status—never sought special treatment or refused to work with a director or leading lady. His close friend Joel McCrea recalled, "Coop never fought, he never got mad, he never told anybody off that I know of; everybody that worked with him liked him."
Political views
Like his father, Cooper was a conservative Republican; he voted for Calvin Coolidge in 1924, Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1932, and campaigned for Wendell Willkie in 1940. When Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for an unprecedented fourth presidential term in 1944, Cooper campaigned for Thomas E. Dewey and criticized Roosevelt for being dishonest and adopting "foreign" ideas. In a radio address that he paid for himself just prior to the election, Cooper said, "I disagree with the New Deal belief that the America all of us love is old and worn-out and finished—and has to borrow foreign notions that don't even seem to work any too well where they come from ... Our country is a young country that just has to make up its mind to be itself again." He also attended a Republican rally at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum that drew 93,000 Dewey supporters.
Cooper was one of the founding members of the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, a conservative organization dedicated, according to its statement of principles, to preserving the "American way of life" and opposing communism and fascism. The organization — whose membership included Walter Brennan, Laraine Day, Walt Disney, Clark Gable, Hedda Hopper, Ronald Reagan, Barbara Stanwyck, and John Wayne — advised the United States Congress to investigate communist influence in the motion picture industry. On October 23, 1947, Cooper was subpoenaed to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and was asked if he had observed any "communistic influence" in Hollywood.
Cooper recounted statements he'd heard suggesting that the Constitution was out of date and that Congress was an unnecessary institution—comments that Cooper said he found to be "very un-American" and testified that he had rejected several scripts because he thought they were "tinged with communist ideas". Unlike some other witnesses, Cooper did not name any individuals, nor did he name any scripts, during his testimony.
In 1951, while making High Noon, Cooper became friends with the film's screenwriter, Carl Foreman, who had been a member of the Communist Party. When Foreman was subpoenaed by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Cooper put his career on the line to defend Foreman. When John Wayne and others threatened Cooper with blacklisting himself and the loss of his passport if he did not walk off the film, Cooper gave a statement to the press in support of Foreman, calling him "the finest kind of American". When producer Stanley Kramer removed Foreman's name as screenwriter, Cooper and director Fred Zinnemann threatened to walk off the film if Foreman's name was not restored. Foreman later said that, of all his friends and allies and colleagues in Hollywood, "Cooper was the only big one who tried to help. The only one." Cooper even offered to testify in Foreman's behalf before the committee, but character witnesses were not allowed. Foreman always sent future scripts to Cooper for first refusal, including The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Key and The Guns of Navarone. Cooper had to turn them down because of his age.
Religion
Cooper was baptized in the Anglican Church in December 1911 in Britain, and was raised in the Episcopal Church in the United States. While he was not an observant Christian for most of his adult life, many of his friends believed he had a deeply spiritual side.
On June 26, 1953, Cooper accompanied his wife and daughter, who were devout Catholics, to Rome, where they had an audience with Pope Pius XII. Cooper and his wife were still separated at the time, but the papal visit marked the beginning of their gradual reconciliation. In the coming years, Cooper contemplated his mortality and his personal behavior, and started discussing Catholicism with his family. He began attending church with them regularly, and met with their parish priest, who offered Cooper spiritual guidance. After several months of study, Cooper was baptized as a Roman Catholic on April 9, 1959, before a small group of family and friends at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills.
Final years and death
On April 14, 1960, Cooper underwent surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston for an aggressive form of prostate cancer that had metastasized to his colon. He fell ill again on May 31 and underwent further surgery at Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles in early June to remove a malignant tumor from his large intestine. After recuperating over the summer, Cooper took his family on vacation to the south of France before traveling to the UK in the fall to star in The Naked Edge. In December 1960, he worked on the NBC television documentary The Real West, which was part of the company's Project 20 series.
On December 27, his wife learned from their family doctor that Cooper's cancer had spread to his lungs and bones and was inoperable. His family decided not to tell him immediately.
On January 9, 1961, Cooper attended a dinner that was given in his honor and hosted by Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin at the Friars Club. The dinner was attended by many of his industry friends and concluded with a brief speech by Cooper who said, "The only achievement I'm proud of is the friends I've made in this community."
In mid-January, Cooper took his family to Sun Valley for their last vacation together. Cooper and Hemingway hiked through the snow together for the last time. On February 27, after returning to Los Angeles, Cooper learned that he was dying. He later told his family, "We'll pray for a miracle; but if not, and that's God's will, that's all right too." On April 17, Cooper watched the Academy Awards ceremony on television and saw his good friend James Stewart, who had presented Cooper with his first Oscar years earlier, accept on Cooper's behalf an honorary award for lifetime achievement—his third Oscar. Holding back tears, Stewart said, "Coop, I'll get this to you right away. And Coop, I want you to know this, that with this goes all the warm friendship and the affection and the admiration and the deep, the deep respect of all of us. We're very, very proud of you, Coop. All of us are tremendously proud." The following day, newspapers around the world announced the news that Cooper was dying. In the coming days he received numerous messages of appreciation and encouragement, including telegrams from Pope John XXIII and Queen Elizabeth II, and a telephone call from President John F. Kennedy.
In his last public statement on May 4, Cooper said, "I know that what is happening is God's will. I am not afraid of the future." He received the last rites on May 12. Cooper died quietly the following day, Saturday, May 13, 1961, at 12:47 P.M.
A requiem mass was held on May 18 at the Church of the Good Shepherd, attended by many of Cooper's friends, including James Stewart, Jack Benny, Henry Hathaway, Joel McCrea, Audrey Hepburn, Jack L. Warner, John Ford, John Wayne, Edward G. Robinson, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Fred Astaire, Randolph Scott, Walter Pidgeon, Bob Hope and Marlene Dietrich. Cooper was buried in the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes in Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California. In May 1974, after his family relocated to New York, Cooper's remains were exhumed and reburied in Sacred Hearts Cemetery in Southampton. His grave is marked by a three-ton boulder from a Montauk quarry.
Acting style and reputation
Cooper's acting style consisted of three essential characteristics: his ability to project elements of his own personality onto the characters he portrayed, to appear natural and authentic in his roles, and to underplay and deliver restrained performances calibrated for the camera and the screen. Acting teacher Lee Strasberg once observed: "The simplest examples of Stanislavsky's ideas are actors such as Gary Cooper, John Wayne, and Spencer Tracy. They try not to act but to be themselves, to respond or react. They refuse to say or do anything they feel not to be consonant with their own characters." Film director François Truffaut ranked Cooper among "the greatest actors" because of his ability to deliver great performances "without direction". This ability to project elements of his own personality onto his characters produced a continuity across his performances to the extent that critics and audiences were convinced that he was simply "playing himself".
Cooper's ability to project his personality onto his characters played an important part in his appearing natural and authentic on screen. Actor John Barrymore said of Cooper, "This fellow is the world's greatest actor. He does without effort what the rest of us spend our lives trying to learn—namely, to be natural." Charles Laughton, who played opposite Cooper in Devil and the Deep agreed, "In truth, that boy hasn't the least idea how well he acts ... He gets at it from the inside, from his own clear way of looking at life." William Wyler, who directed Cooper in two films, called him a "superb actor, a master of movie acting".
In his review of Cooper's performance in The Real Glory, Graham Greene wrote, "Sometimes his lean photogenic face seems to leave everything to the lens, but there is no question here of his not acting. Watch him inoculate the girl against cholera—the casual jab of the needle, and the dressing slapped on while he talks, as though a thousand arms had taught him where to stab and he doesn't have to think anymore."
Cooper's style of underplaying before the camera surprised many of his directors and fellow actors. Even in his earliest feature films, he recognized the camera's ability to pick up slight gestures and facial movements. Commenting on Cooper's performance in Sergeant York, director Howard Hawks observed, "He worked very hard and yet he didn't seem to be working. He was a strange actor because you'd look at him during a scene and you'd think ... this isn't going to be any good. But when you saw the rushes in the projection room the next day you could read in his face all the things he'd been thinking." Sam Wood, who directed Cooper in four films, had similar observations about Cooper's performance in Pride of the Yankees, noting, "What I thought was underplaying turned out to be just the right approach. On the screen he's perfect, yet on the set you'd swear it's the worst job of acting in the history of motion pictures."
Fellow actors admired his abilities as an actor. Commenting on her two films playing opposite Cooper, actress Ingrid Bergman concluded, "The personality of this man was so enormous, so overpowering—and that expression in his eyes and his face, it was so delicate and so underplayed. You just didn't notice it until you saw it on the screen. I thought he was marvelous; the most underplaying and the most natural actor I ever worked with."
Tom Hanks declared, "In only one scene in the first film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture, we see the future of screen acting in the form of Gary Cooper. He is quiet and natural, somehow different from the other cast members. He does something mysterious with his eyes and shoulders that is much more like 'being' than 'acting'."
Daniel Day-Lewis said, "I don't particularly like westerns as a genre, but I do love certain westerns. 'High Noon' means a lot to me – I love the purity and the honesty, I love Gary Cooper in that film, the idea of the last man standing."
Chris Pratt stated, "I started watching Westerns when I was shooting in London about four or five years ago. I really fell in love with Gary Cooper, and his stuff. That sucked me into the Westerns. Before, I never got engrossed in the story. I'd just dip in, and there were guys in horses in black and white. High Noon's later Gary Cooper, I liked that. But I liked 'The Westerner'. That's my favorite one. I have that poster hung up in my house because I really like that one."
To Al Pacino, "Gary Cooper was a phenomenon—his ability to take some thing and elevate it, give it such dignity. One of the great presences."
Mylène Demongeot first got with Gary Cooper for the opening of the first escalator to be installed in a cinema, at the Rex Theatre in Paris, on June 7, 1957. She declared in a 2015 filmed interview: "Gary Cooper ... il est sublime ! Aaahhh (Mylène pushing a cry of love not to say ecstasy) il est sublime ... Ah ! Ah ! Ah ! Là je dois dire que ça fait partie des stars, y'a Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, ces grands Américains que j'ai rencontrés comme ça, c'est vraiment des mecs incroyables. Y'en a plus des comme ça ! Euh non. (Gary Cooper was sublime, there I have to say, now he, was part of the stars, Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, those great americans who I've met really were unbelievable guys, there aren't any like them anymore)."
Career assessment and legacy
Cooper's career spanned thirty-six years, from 1925 to 1961. During that time, he appeared in eighty-four feature films in a leading role. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His natural and authentic acting style appealed powerfully to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major movie genres, including Westerns, war films, adventure films, drama films, crime films, romance films, comedy films, and romantic comedy films. He appeared on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities for twenty-three consecutive years, from 1936 to 1958. According to Quigley's annual poll, Cooper was one of the top money-making stars for eighteen years, appearing in the top ten in 1936–37, 1941–49, and 1951–57. He topped the list in 1953. In Quigley's list of all-time money-making stars, Cooper is listed fourth, after John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and Tom Cruise. At the time of his death, it was estimated that his films grossed well over $200 million (equivalent to $ billion in ).
In over half of his feature films, Cooper portrayed Westerners, soldiers, pilots, sailors, and explorers—all men of action. In the rest he played a wide range of characters, included doctors, professors, artists, architects, clerks, and baseball players. Cooper's heroic screen image changed with each period of his career. In his early films, he played the young naive hero sure of his moral position and trusting in the triumph of simple virtues (The Virginian). After becoming a major star, his Western screen persona was replaced by a more cautious hero in adventure films and dramas (A Farewell to Arms). During the height of his career, from 1936 to 1943, he played a new type of hero—a champion of the common man willing to sacrifice himself for others (Mr. Deeds, Meet John Doe, and For Whom the Bell Tolls).
In the post-war years, Cooper attempted broader variations on his screen image, which now reflected a hero increasingly at odds with the world who must face adversity alone (The Fountainhead and High Noon). In his final films, Cooper's hero rejects the violence of the past, and seeks to reclaim lost honor and find redemption (Friendly Persuasion and Man of the West). The screen persona he developed and sustained throughout his career represented the ideal American hero—a tall, handsome, and sincere man of steadfast integrity who emphasized action over intellect, and combined the heroic qualities of the romantic lover, the adventurer, and the common man.
On February 6, 1960, Cooper was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6243 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to the film industry. He was awarded a star on the sidewalk outside the Ellen Theater in Bozeman, Montana.
On May 6, 1961, he was awarded the French Order of Arts and Letters in recognition of his significant contribution to the arts. On July 30, 1961, he was posthumously awarded the David di Donatello Special Award in Italy for his career achievements.
In 1966, he was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. In 2015, he was inducted into the Utah Cowboy and Western Heritage Hall of Fame. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper eleventh on its list of the 25 male stars of classic Hollywood. Three of his characters—Will Kane, Lou Gehrig, and Sergeant York—made AFI's list of the one hundred greatest heroes and villains, all of them as heroes. His Lou Gehrig line, "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.", is ranked by AFI as the thirty-eighth greatest movie quote of all time.
More than a half century after his death, Cooper's enduring legacy, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, is his image of the ideal American hero preserved in his film performances. Charlton Heston once observed, "He projected the kind of man Americans would like to be, probably more than any actor that's ever lived."
In the TV series Justified, based on works and characters created by Elmore Leonard, Gary Cooper is used throughout the six seasons as the man whom U.S. Marshall Raylan Givens, played by Timothy Olyphant, aspires to be. When his colleague asks Marshall Givens how he thinks his dangerous plan to bring down a villain can possibly work, he replies: "Why not? Worked for Gary Cooper."
Gary Cooper is referenced several times in the critically acclaimed television series The Sopranos, with protagonist Tony Soprano asking "What ever happened to Gary Cooper? The strong, silent type." while complaining about his problems to his therapist.
In the 1930s hit song "Puttin' On the Ritz", Cooper is referenced in the line "dress up like a million dollar trooper/Tryin' hard to look like Gary Cooper, Super duper!" More than two decades after Cooper's death a new version of the song was released in 1983 by Taco; the original lyrics were kept, including the references to Cooper.
In J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye, Cooper is "spotted" by Holden Caulfield to distract a woman he is dancing with.
Awards and nominations
Filmography
The following is a list of feature films in which Cooper appeared in a leading role.
The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926)
Children of Divorce (1927)
Arizona Bound (1927)
Wings (1927)
Nevada (1927)
It (1927)
The Last Outlaw (1927)
Beau Sabreur (1928)
The Legion of the Condemned (1928)
Doomsday (1928)
Half a Bride (1928)
Lilac Time (1928)
The First Kiss (1928)
The Shopworn Angel (1928)
Wolf Song (1929)
Betrayal (1929)
The Virginian (1929)
Only the Brave (1930)
The Texan (1930)
Seven Days' Leave (1930)
A Man from Wyoming (1930)
The Spoilers (1930)
Morocco (1930)
Fighting Caravans (1931)
City Streets (1931)
I Take This Woman (1931)
His Woman (1931)
Devil and the Deep (1932)
If I Had a Million (1932)
A Farewell to Arms (1932)
Today We Live (1933)
One Sunday Afternoon (1933)
Design for Living (1933)
Alice in Wonderland (1933)
Operator 13 (1934)
Now and Forever (1934)
The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935)
The Wedding Night (1935)
Peter Ibbetson (1935)
Desire (1936)
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)
The General Died at Dawn (1936)
The Plainsman (1936)
Souls at Sea (1937)
The Adventures of Marco Polo (1938)
Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938)
The Cowboy and the Lady (1938)
Beau Geste (1939)
The Real Glory (1939)
The Westerner (1940)
North West Mounted Police (1940)
Meet John Doe (1941)
Sergeant York (1941)
Ball of Fire (1941)
The Pride of the Yankees (1942)
For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)
The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944)
Casanova Brown (1944)
Along Came Jones (1945)
Saratoga Trunk (1945)
Cloak and Dagger (1946)
Unconquered (1947)
Good Sam (1948)
The Fountainhead (1949)
Task Force (1949)
Bright Leaf (1950)
Dallas (1950)
You're in the Navy Now (1951)
It's a Big Country (1951)
Distant Drums (1951)
High Noon (1952)
Springfield Rifle (1952)
Return to Paradise (1953)
Blowing Wild (1953)
Garden of Evil (1954)
Vera Cruz (1954)
The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (1955)
Friendly Persuasion (1956)
Love in the Afternoon (1957)
Ten North Frederick (1958)
Man of the West (1958)
The Hanging Tree (1959)
They Came to Cordura (1959)
The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959)
The Naked Edge (1961)
Radio appearances
References
Notes
Citations
Bibliography
Adrien Le Bihan, Gary Cooper, le prince des acteurs, LettMotif, 2021, 358p.()
External links
1901 births
1961 deaths
20th-century American male actors
Academy Honorary Award recipients
American expatriates in England
American male film actors
American male silent film actors
American male television actors
American people of English descent
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
California Republicans
Catholics from Montana
Conservatism in the United States
Converts to Roman Catholicism from Anglicanism
Deaths from cancer in California
Deaths from prostate cancer
Grinnell College people
Male Western (genre) film actors
Male actors from Montana
Paramount Pictures contract players
People educated at Dunstable Grammar School
People from Brentwood, Los Angeles
People from Dunstable
People from Helena, Montana
People from Holmby Hills, Los Angeles | true | [
"Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is a 10-minute black-and-white silent film made in the United States in 1910, and is based on Lewis Carroll's 1865 book of the same name.\n\nMade by the Edison Manufacturing Company and directed by Edwin S. Porter, the film starred Gladys Hulette as Alice. Being a silent film, naturally all of Lewis Carroll's nonsensical prose could not be used, and, being only a one-reel picture, most of Carroll's memorable characters in his original 1865 novel similarly could not be included. What was used in the film was faithful in spirit to Carroll, and in design to the original John Tenniel illustrations. Variety complimented the picture by comparing it favorably to the \"foreign\" film fantasies then flooding American cinemas.\n\nGallery\n\nSee also\n List of American films of 1910\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nAlice's Adventures in Wonderland at the Internet Movie Database\nAlice's Adventures in Wonderland on Comic Vine\nAlice's Adventures in Wonderland on Complete Index to World Cinema\n\n1910 films\n1910s fantasy films\n1910 short films\nFilms based on Alice in Wonderland\nAmerican black-and-white films\nAmerican films\nAmerican silent short films\nFilms based on multiple works\nAmerican fantasy films",
"The Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum is located in what is now the historic district of Niles in the city of Fremont, CA. The museum is housed in the Edison Theater, a century-old Nickelodeon movie theater, just half a block from the former site of the Niles Essanay Studios where Broncho Billy and Charlie Chaplin made films in the 1910s. It is dedicated to preserving and showing silent films and their history. The silent film historical work of one of the members of its staff, David Kiehn, was featured on 60 Minutes for demonstrating that a film shot in San Francisco titled A Trip Down Market Street was actually made a few days before the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Additionally, when Google made a Google Doodle for April 16, 2011, in celebration of Chaplin's 122nd birthday, they collaborated with the Niles Silent Film Museum to produce the short.\n\nThe museum houses a large collection of Motion Picture equipment and related artifacts, as well as about 10,000 Silent Films in their archive.\n\nReferences\n http://www.nilesfilmmuseum.org/\n https://web.archive.org/web/20090318093744/http://www.nilesfilmmuseum.org/S%26A_story.htm\n http://www.nilesfilmmuseum.org/mission1.htm\n http://www.nilesfilmmuseum.org/60_minutes-promo.htm\n http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=6966797n&tag=contentMain;contentBody\n http://news.cnet.com/8301-13772_3-20054449-52.html\nhttps://abc7chicago.com/niles-essanay-silent-film-museum-movies-charlie-chaplin-films/5707166/\n\nMuseums in Alameda County, California\nCinema museums in California\nCinema of the San Francisco Bay Area"
] |
[
"Gary Cooper",
"Silent films, 1925-28",
"what silent films were made in 1925?",
"In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt,"
] | C_6ec0895035fd4dbda1785cd7d1c7b5d7_1 | what other silent films? | 2 | Other than The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, what other silent films did Gary Cooper make? | Gary Cooper | In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, including Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt work--which sometimes injured horses and riders--"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name. Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week. Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal--finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings, the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada--both films directed by John Waters. In 1928, Paramount paired Cooper with a youthful Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss--advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride. That year, Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928. CANNOTANSWER | Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. | Gary Cooper (born Frank James Cooper; May 7, 1901 – May 13, 1961) was an American actor known for his strong, silent, and understated acting style. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor twice and had a further three nominations, as well as receiving an Academy Honorary Award for his career achievements in 1961. He was one of the top 10 film personalities for 23 consecutive years, and one of the top money-making stars for 18 years. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper at No. 11 on its list of the 25 greatest male stars of classic Hollywood cinema.
Cooper's career spanned 36 years, from 1925 to 1961, and included leading roles in 84 feature films. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era through to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His screen persona appealed strongly to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major film genres. His ability to project his own personality onto the characters he played contributed to his natural and authentic appearance on screen. Throughout his career, he sustained a screen persona that represented the ideal American hero.
Cooper began his career as a film extra and stunt rider, but soon landed acting roles. After establishing himself as a Western hero in his early silent films, he appeared as the Virginian and became a movie star in 1929 with his first sound picture, The Virginian. In the early 1930s, he expanded his heroic image to include more cautious characters in adventure films and dramas such as A Farewell to Arms (1932) and The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935). During the height of his career, Cooper portrayed a new type of hero—a champion of the common man—in films such as Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), Meet John Doe (1941), Sergeant York (1941), The Pride of the Yankees (1942), and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943). He later portrayed more mature characters at odds with the world in films such as The Fountainhead (1949) and High Noon (1952). In his final films, he played non-violent characters searching for redemption in films such as Friendly Persuasion (1956) and Man of the West (1958).
Early life
Frank James Cooper was born in Helena, Montana, on May 7, 1901, the younger of two sons of English parents Alice (née Brazier; 1873–1967) and Charles Henry Cooper (1865–1946). His brother, Arthur, was six years his senior. Cooper's father came from Houghton Regis, Bedfordshire, and became a prominent lawyer, rancher, and Montana Supreme Court justice. His mother hailed from Gillingham, Kent, and married Charles in Montana. In 1906, Charles purchased the Seven-Bar-Nine cattle ranch, about north of Helena near Craig, Montana. Cooper and Arthur spent their summers at the ranch and learned to ride horses, hunt, and fish. Cooper attended Central Grade School in Helena.
Alice wanted her sons to have an English education, so she took them back to England in 1909 to enroll them in Dunstable Grammar School in Dunstable, Bedfordshire. While there, Cooper and his brother lived with their father's cousins, William and Emily Barton, at their home in Houghton Regis. Cooper studied Latin, French, and English history at Dunstable until 1912. While he adapted to English school discipline and learned the requisite social graces, he never adjusted to the rigid class structure and formal Eton collars he was required to wear. He received his confirmation in the Church of England at the Church of All Saints in Houghton Regis on December 3, 1911. His mother accompanied her sons back to the U.S. in August 1912, and Cooper resumed his education at Johnson Grammar School in Helena.
When Cooper was 15, he injured his hip in a car accident. On his doctor's recommendation, he returned to the Seven-Bar-Nine ranch to recuperate by horseback riding. The misguided therapy left him with his characteristic stiff, off-balanced walk and slightly angled horse-riding style. He left Helena High School after two years in 1918, and returned to the family ranch to work full-time as a cowboy. In 1919, his father arranged for him to attend Gallatin County High School in Bozeman, Montana, where English teacher Ida Davis encouraged him to focus on academics and participate in debating and dramatics. Cooper later called Davis "the woman partly responsible for [him] giving up cowboy-ing and going to college".
Cooper was still attending high school in 1920 when he took three art courses at Montana Agricultural College in Bozeman. His interest in art was inspired years earlier by the Western paintings of Charles Marion Russell and Frederic Remington. Cooper especially admired and studied Russell's Lewis and Clark Meeting Indians at Ross' Hole (1910), which still hangs in the state capitol building in Helena. In 1922, to continue his art education, he enrolled in Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa. He did well academically in most of his courses, but was not accepted into the school's drama club. His drawings and watercolor paintings were exhibited throughout the dormitory, and he was named art editor for the college yearbook. During the summers of 1922 and 1923, Cooper worked at Yellowstone National Park as a tour guide driving the yellow open-top buses. Despite a promising first 18 months at Grinnell, he left college suddenly in February 1924, spent a month in Chicago looking for work as an artist, and then returned to Helena, where he sold editorial cartoons to the local Independent newspaper.
In autumn 1924, Cooper's father left the Montana Supreme Court bench and moved with his wife to Los Angeles to administer the estates of two relatives, and Cooper joined his parents there in November at his father's request. After briefly working a series of unpromising jobs, he met two friends from Montana who were working as film extras and stunt riders in low-budget Western films for the small movie studios on Poverty Row. They introduced him to another Montana cowboy, rodeo champion Jay "Slim" Talbot, who took him to see a casting director. Wanting money for a professional art course, Cooper worked as a film extra for $5 a day, and as a stunt rider for $10. Cooper and Talbot became close friends and hunting companions, and Talbot later worked as Cooper's stuntman and stand-in for over three decades.
Career
Silent films, 1925–1928
In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, but also the already emergent major studios, Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt workwhich sometimes injured horses and riders"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name.
Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week.
Cooper's first important film role was a supporting part in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) starring Ronald Colman and Vilma Bánky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal—finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings (both 1927), the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada—both films directed by John Waters.
Paramount paired Cooper with Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss (both 1928)—advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride (also both 1928). Around the same time, Cooper made Lilac Time (1928) with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928.
Hollywood stardom, 1929–1935
Cooper became a major movie star in 1929 with the release of his first talking picture, The Virginian (1929), which was directed by Victor Fleming and co-starred Mary Brian and Walter Huston. Based on the popular novel by Owen Wister, The Virginian was one of the first sound films to define the Western code of honor and helped establish many of the conventions of the Western movie genre that persist to the present day. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, the romantic image of the tall, handsome, and shy cowboy hero who embodied male freedom, courage, and honor was created in large part by Cooper in the film. Unlike some silent film actors who had trouble adapting to the new sound medium, Cooper transitioned naturally, with his "deep and clear" and "pleasantly drawling" voice, which was perfectly suited for the characters he portrayed on screen, also according to Meyers. Looking to capitalize on Cooper's growing popularity, Paramount cast him in several Westerns and wartime dramas, including Only the Brave, The Texan, Seven Days' Leave, A Man from Wyoming, and The Spoilers (all released in 1930). Norman Rockwell depicted Cooper in his role as The Texan for the cover of The Saturday Evening Post on May 24, 1930.
One of the more important performances in Cooper's early career was his portrayal of a sullen legionnaire in Josef von Sternberg's film Morocco (also 1930) with Marlene Dietrich in her introduction to American audiences. During production, von Sternberg focused his energies on Dietrich and treated Cooper dismissively. Tensions came to a head after von Sternberg yelled directions at Cooper in German. The actor approached the director, picked him up by the collar, and said, "If you expect to work in this country you'd better get on to the language we use here." Despite the tensions on the set, Cooper produced "one of his best performances", according to Thornton Delehanty of the New York Evening Post.
After returning to the Western genre in Zane Grey's Fighting Caravans (1931) with French actress Lili Damita, Cooper appeared in the Dashiell Hammett crime film City Streets (also 1931), co-starring Sylvia Sidney and Paul Lukas, playing a westerner who gets involved with big-city gangsters in order to save the woman he loves. Cooper concluded the year with appearances in two unsuccessful films: I Take This Woman (also 1931) with Carole Lombard, and His Woman with Claudette Colbert. The demands and pressures of making ten films in two years left Cooper exhausted and in poor health, suffering from anemia and jaundice. He had lost during that period, and felt lonely, isolated, and depressed by his sudden fame and wealth. In May 1931, Cooper left Hollywood and sailed to Algiers and then Italy, where he lived for the next year.
During his time abroad, Cooper stayed with the Countess Dorothy di Frasso at the Villa Madama in Rome, where she taught him about good food and vintage wines, how to read Italian and French menus, and how to socialize among Europe's nobility and upper classes. After guiding him through the great art museums and galleries of Italy, she accompanied him on a ten-week big-game hunting safari on the slopes of Mount Kenya in East Africa, where he was credited with over sixty kills, including two lions, a rhinoceros, and various antelopes. His safari experience in Africa had a profound influence on Cooper and intensified his love of the wilderness. After returning to Europe, he and the countess set off on a Mediterranean cruise of the Italian and French Rivieras. Rested and rejuvenated by his year-long exile, a healthy Cooper returned to Hollywood in April 1932 and negotiated a new contract with Paramount for two films per year, a salary of $4,000 a week, and director and script approval.
In 1932, after completing Devil and the Deep with Tallulah Bankhead to fulfill his old contract, Cooper appeared in A Farewell to Arms, the first film adaptation of an Ernest Hemingway novel. Co-starring Helen Hayes, a leading New York theatre star and Academy Award winner, and Adolphe Menjou, the film presented Cooper with one of his most ambitious and challenging dramatic roles, playing an American ambulance driver wounded in Italy who falls in love with an English nurse during World War I. Critics praised his highly intense and emotional performance, and the film became one of the year's most commercially successful pictures. In 1933, after making Today We Live with Joan Crawford and One Sunday Afternoon with Fay Wray, Cooper appeared in the Ernst Lubitsch comedy film Design for Living, based on the successful Noël Coward play. Co-starring Miriam Hopkins and Fredric March, the film was a box office success, ranking as one of the top ten highest-grossing films of 1933. All three of the lead actors—March, Cooper, and Hopkins—received attention from this film as they were all at the peak of their careers. Cooper's performance — playing an American artist in Europe competing with his playwright friend for the affections of a beautiful woman — was singled out for its versatility and revealed his genuine ability to do light comedy. Cooper changed his name legally to "Gary Cooper" in August 1933.
In 1934, Cooper was loaned out to MGM for the Civil War drama film Operator 13 with Marion Davies, about a beautiful Union spy who falls in love with a Confederate soldier. Despite Richard Boleslawski's imaginative direction and George J. Folsey's lavish cinematography, the film did poorly at the box office.
Back at Paramount, Cooper appeared in his first of seven films by director Henry Hathaway, Now and Forever, with Carole Lombard and Shirley Temple. In the film, he plays a confidence man who tries to sell his daughter to the relatives who raised her, but is eventually won over by the adorable girl. Impressed by Temple's intelligence and charm, Cooper developed a close rapport with her, both on and off screen. The film was a box-office success.
The following year, Cooper was loaned out to Samuel Goldwyn Productions to appear in King Vidor's romance film The Wedding Night with Anna Sten, who was being groomed as "another Garbo". In the film, Cooper plays an alcoholic novelist who retreats to his family's New England farm where he meets and falls in love with a beautiful Polish neighbor. Cooper delivered a performance of surprising range and depth, according to biographer Larry Swindell. Despite receiving generally favorable reviews, the film was not popular with American audiences, who may have been offended by the film's depiction of an extramarital affair and its tragic ending.
That same year, Cooper appeared in two Henry Hathaway films: the melodrama Peter Ibbetson with Ann Harding, about a man caught up in a dream world created by his love for a childhood sweetheart, and the adventure film The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, about a daring British officer and his men who defend their stronghold at Bengal against rebellious local tribes. While the former, championed by the surrealists became more successful in Europe than in the United States, the latter was nominated for seven Academy Awards and became one of Cooper's most popular and successful adventure films. Hathaway had the highest respect for Cooper's acting ability, calling him "the best actor of all of them".
American folk hero, 1936–1943
From Mr. Deeds to The Real Glory, 1936–1939
Cooper's career took an important turn in 1936. After making Frank Borzage's romantic comedy film Desire with Marlene Dietrich at Paramount—in which he delivered a performance considered by some contemporary critics as one of his finest—Cooper returned to Poverty Row for the first time since his early silent film days to make Frank Capra's Mr. Deeds Goes to Town with Jean Arthur for Columbia Pictures. In the film, Cooper plays the character of Longfellow Deeds, a quiet, innocent writer of greeting cards who inherits a fortune, leaves behind his idyllic life in Vermont, and travels to New York where he faces a world of corruption and deceit. Capra and screenwriter Robert Riskin were able to use Cooper's well-established screen persona as the "quintessential American hero"—a symbol of honesty, courage, and goodness—to create a new type of "folk hero" for the common man. Commenting on Cooper's impact on the character and the film, Capra observed:
Both Desire and Mr. Deeds opened in April 1936 to critical praise and were major box-office successes. In his review in The New York Times, Frank Nugent wrote that Cooper was "proving himself one of the best light comedians in Hollywood". For his performance in Mr. Deeds, Cooper received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.
Cooper appeared in two other Paramount films in 1936. In Lewis Milestone's adventure film The General Died at Dawn with Madeleine Carroll, he plays an American soldier of fortune in China who helps the peasants defend themselves against the oppression of a cruel warlord. Written by playwright Clifford Odets, the film was a critical and commercial success.
In Cecil B. DeMille's sprawling frontier epic The Plainsman—his first of four films with the director—Cooper portrays Wild Bill Hickok in a highly fictionalized version of the opening of the American western frontier. The film was an even greater box-office hit than its predecessor, due in large part to Jean Arthur's definitive depiction of Calamity Jane and Cooper's inspired portrayal of Hickock as an enigmatic figure of "deepening mythic substance". That year, Cooper appeared for the first time on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities, where he would remain for the next twenty-three years.
In late 1936, Paramount was preparing a new contract for Cooper that would raise his salary to $8,000 a week when Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn for six films over six years with a minimum guarantee of $150,000 per picture. Paramount brought suit against Goldwyn and Cooper, and the court ruled that Cooper's new Goldwyn contract afforded the actor sufficient time to also honor his Paramount agreement. Cooper continued to make films with both studios, and by 1939 the United States Treasury reported that Cooper was the country's highest wage earner, at $482,819 (equivalent to $ million in ).
In contrast to his output the previous year, Cooper appeared in only one picture in 1937, Henry Hathaway's adventure film Souls at Sea. A critical and box-office failure, Cooper referred to it as his "almost picture", saying, "It was almost exciting, and almost interesting. And I was almost good." In 1938, he appeared in Archie Mayo's biographical film The Adventures of Marco Polo. Plagued by production problems and a weak screenplay, the film became Goldwyn's biggest failure to that date, losing $700,000. During this period, Cooper turned down several important roles, including the role of Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind. Cooper was producer David O. Selznick's first choice for the part. He made several overtures to the actor, but Cooper had doubts about the project, and did not feel suited to the role. Cooper later admitted, "It was one of the best roles ever offered in Hollywood ... But I said no. I didn't see myself as quite that dashing, and later, when I saw Clark Gable play the role to perfection, I knew I was right."
Back at Paramount, Cooper returned to a more comfortable genre in Ernst Lubitsch's romantic comedy Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938) with Claudette Colbert. In the film, Cooper plays a wealthy American businessman in France who falls in love with an impoverished aristocrat's daughter and persuades her to become his eighth wife. Despite the clever screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder, and solid performances by Cooper and Colbert, American audiences had trouble accepting Cooper in the role of a shallow philanderer. It succeeded only at the European box office market.
In the fall of 1938, Cooper appeared in H. C. Potter's romantic comedy The Cowboy and the Lady with Merle Oberon, about a sweet-natured rodeo cowboy who falls in love with the wealthy daughter of a presidential hopeful, believing her to be a poor, hard-working lady's maid. The efforts of three directors and several eminent screenwriters could not salvage what could have been a fine vehicle for Cooper. While more successful than its predecessor, the film was Cooper's fourth consecutive box-office failure in the American market.
In the next two years, Cooper was more discerning about the roles he accepted and made four successful large-scale adventure and cowboy films. In William A. Wellman's adventure film Beau Geste (1939), he plays one of three daring English brothers who join the French Foreign Legion in the Sahara to fight local tribes. Filmed in the same Mojave Desert locations as the original 1926 version with Ronald Colman, Beau Geste provided Cooper with magnificent sets, exotic settings, high-spirited action, and a role tailored to his personality and screen persona. This was the last film in Cooper's contract with Paramount.
In Henry Hathaway's The Real Glory (1939), he plays a military doctor who accompanies a small group of American Army officers to the Philippines to help the Christian Filipinos defend themselves against Muslim radicals. Many film critics praised Cooper's performance, including author and film critic Graham Greene, who recognized that he "never acted better".
From The Westerner to For Whom the Bell Tolls, 1940–1943
Cooper returned to the Western genre in William Wyler's The Westerner (1940) with Walter Brennan and Doris Davenport, about a drifting cowboy who defends homesteaders against Roy Bean, a corrupt judge known as the "law west of the Pecos". Screenwriter Niven Busch relied on Cooper's extensive knowledge of Western history while working on the script. The film received positive reviews and did well at the box-office, with reviewers praising the performances of the two lead actors. That same year, Cooper appeared in his first all-Technicolor feature, Cecil B. DeMille's adventure film North West Mounted Police (1940). In the film, Cooper plays a Texas Ranger who pursues an outlaw into western Canada where he joins forces with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who are after the same man, a leader of the North-West Rebellion. While not as popular with critics as its predecessor, the film was another box-office success—the sixth-highest-grossing film of 1940.
The early 1940s were Cooper's prime years as an actor. In a relatively short period, he appeared in five critically successful and popular films that produced some of his finest performances. When Frank Capra offered him the lead role in Meet John Doe before Robert Riskin even developed the script, Cooper accepted his friend's offer, saying, "It's okay, Frank, I don't need a script." In the film, Cooper plays Long John Willoughby, a down-and-out bush-league pitcher hired by a newspaper to pretend to be a man who promises to commit suicide on Christmas Eve to protest all the hypocrisy and corruption in the country. Considered by some critics to be Capra's best film at the time, Meet John Doe was received as a "national event" with Cooper appearing on the front cover of Time magazine on March 3, 1941. In his review in the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes called Cooper's performance a "splendid and utterly persuasive portrayal" and praised his "utterly realistic acting which comes through with such authority". Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote, "Gary Cooper, of course, is 'John Doe' to the life and in the whole—shy, bewildered, non-aggressive, but a veritable tiger when aroused."
That same year, Cooper made two films with director and good friend Howard Hawks. In the biographical film Sergeant York, Cooper portrays war hero Alvin C. York, one of the most decorated American soldiers in World War I. The film chronicles York's early backwoods days in Tennessee, his religious conversion and subsequent piety, his stand as a conscientious objector, and finally his heroic actions at the Battle of the Argonne Forest, which earned him the Medal of Honor. Initially, Cooper was nervous and uncertain about playing a living hero, so he traveled to Tennessee to visit York at his home, and the two quiet men established an immediate rapport and discovered they had much in common. Inspired by York's encouragement, Cooper delivered a performance that Howard Barnes of the New York Herald Tribune called "one of extraordinary conviction and versatility", and that Archer Winston of the New York Post called "one of his best". After the film's release, Cooper was awarded the Distinguished Citizenship Medal by the Veterans of Foreign Wars for his "powerful contribution to the promotion of patriotism and loyalty". York admired Cooper's performance and helped promote the film for Warner Bros. Sergeant York became the top-grossing film of the year and was nominated for eleven Academy Awards. Accepting his first Academy Award for Best Actor from his friend James Stewart, Cooper said, "It was Sergeant Alvin York who won this award. Shucks, I've been in the business sixteen years and sometimes dreamed I might get one of these. That's all I can say ... Funny when I was dreaming I always made a better speech."
Cooper concluded the year back at Goldwyn with Howard Hawks to make the romantic comedy Ball of Fire with Barbara Stanwyck. In the film, Cooper plays a shy linguistics professor who leads a team of seven scholars who are writing an encyclopedia. While researching slang, he meets Stanwyck's flirtatious burlesque stripper Sugarpuss O'Shea who blows the dust off their staid life of books. The screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder provided Cooper the opportunity to exercise the full range of his light comedy skills. In his review for the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes wrote that Cooper handled the role with "great skill and comic emphasis" and that his performance was "utterly delightful". Though small in scale, Ball of Fire was one of the top-grossing films of the year—Cooper's fourth consecutive picture to make the top twenty.
Cooper's only film appearance in 1942 was also his last under his Goldwyn contract. In Sam Wood's biographical film The Pride of the Yankees, Cooper portrays baseball star Lou Gehrig who established a record with the New York Yankees for playing in 2,130 consecutive games. Cooper was reluctant to play the seven-time All-Star, who only died the previous year from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) — now commonly called "Lou Gehrig's disease". Beyond the challenges of effectively portraying such a popular and nationally recognized figure, Cooper knew very little about baseball and was not left-handed like Gehrig.
After Gehrig's widow visited the actor and expressed her desire that he portray her husband, Cooper accepted the role that covered a twenty-year span of Gehrig's life—his early love of baseball, his rise to greatness, his loving marriage, and his struggle with illness, culminating in his farewell speech at Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939 before 62,000 fans. Cooper quickly learned the physical movements of a baseball player and developed a fluid, believable swing. The handedness issue was solved by reversing the print for certain batting scenes. The film was one of the year's top ten pictures and received eleven Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's third).
Soon after the publication of Ernest Hemingway's novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, Paramount paid $150,000 for the film rights with the express intent of casting Cooper in the lead role of Robert Jordan, an American explosives expert who fights alongside the Republican loyalists during the Spanish Civil War. The original director, Cecil B. DeMille, was replaced by Sam Wood who brought in Dudley Nichols for the screenplay. After the start of principal photography in the Sierra Nevada in late 1942, Ingrid Bergman was brought in to replace ballerina Vera Zorina as the female lead—a change supported by Cooper and Hemingway. The love scenes between Bergman and Cooper were "rapturous" and passionate. Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune wrote that both actors performed with "the true stature and authority of stars". While the film distorted the novel's original political themes and meaning, For Whom the Bell Tolls was a critical and commercial success and received ten Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's fourth).
World War II related activities
Due to his age and health, Cooper did not serve in the military during World War II, but like many of his colleagues, he got involved in the war effort by entertaining the troops. In June 1943, he visited military hospitals in San Diego, and often appeared at the Hollywood Canteen serving food to the servicemen. In late 1943, Cooper undertook a tour of the South West Pacific with actresses Una Merkel and Phyllis Brooks, and accordionist Andy Arcari.
Traveling on a B-24A Liberator bomber, the group toured the Cook Islands, Fiji, New Caledonia, Queensland, Brisbane—where General Douglas MacArthur told Cooper he was watching Sergeant York in a Manila theater when Japanese bombs began falling—New Guinea, Jayapura, and throughout the Solomon Islands.
The group often shared the same sparse living conditions and K-rations as the troops. Cooper met with the servicemen and women, visited military hospitals, introduced his attractive colleagues, and participated in occasional skits. The shows concluded with Cooper's moving recitation of Lou Gehrig's farewell speech. When he returned to the United States, he visited military hospitals throughout the country. Cooper later called his time with the troops the "greatest emotional experience" of his life.
Mature roles, 1944–1952
In 1944, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's wartime adventure film The Story of Dr. Wassell with Laraine Day — his third movie with the director. In the film, Cooper plays American doctor and missionary Corydon M. Wassell, who leads a group of wounded sailors through the jungles of Java to safety. Despite receiving poor reviews, Dr. Wassell was one of the top-grossing films of the year. With his Goldwyn and Paramount contracts now concluded, Cooper decided to remain independent and formed his own production company, International Pictures, with Leo Spitz, William Goetz, and Nunnally Johnson. The fledgling studio's first offering was Sam Wood's romantic comedy Casanova Brown with Teresa Wright, about a man who learns his soon-to-be ex-wife is pregnant with his child, just as he is about to marry another woman. The film received poor reviews, with the New York Daily News calling it "delightful nonsense", and Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, criticizing Cooper's "somewhat obvious and ridiculous clowning". The film was barely profitable.
In 1945, Cooper starred in and produced Stuart Heisler's Western comedy Along Came Jones with Loretta Young for International. In this lighthearted parody of his past heroic image, Cooper plays comically inept cowboy Melody Jones who is mistaken for a ruthless killer. Audiences embraced Cooper's character, and the film was one of the top box-office pictures of the year—a testament to Cooper's still vital audience appeal. It was also International's biggest financial success during its brief history before being sold off to Universal Studios in 1946.
Cooper's career during the post-war years drifted in new directions as American society was changing. While he still played conventional heroic roles, his films now relied less on his heroic screen persona and more on novel stories and exotic settings. In November 1945, Cooper appeared in Sam Wood's nineteenth-century period drama Saratoga Trunk with Ingrid Bergman, about a Texas cowboy and his relationship with a beautiful fortune-hunter. Filmed in early 1943, the movie's release was delayed for two years due to the increased demand for war movies. Despite poor reviews, Saratoga Trunk did well at the box office and became one of the top money-makers of the year for Warner Bros. Cooper's only film in 1946 was Fritz Lang's romantic thriller Cloak and Dagger, about a mild-mannered physics professor recruited by the OSS during the last years of World War II to investigate the German atomic bomb program. Playing a part loosely based on physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, Cooper was uneasy with the role and unable to convey the "inner sense" of the character. The film received poor reviews and was a box-office failure. In 1947, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's epic adventure film Unconquered with Paulette Goddard, about a Virginia militiaman who defends settlers against an unscrupulous gun trader and hostile Indians on the Western frontier during the eighteenth century. The film received mixed reviews, but even long-time DeMille critic James Agee acknowledged the picture had "some authentic flavor of the period". This last of four films made with DeMille was Cooper's most lucrative, earning the actor over $300,000 (equal to $ today) in salary and percentage of profits. Unconquered would be his last unqualified box-office success for the next five years.
In 1948, after making Leo McCarey's romantic comedy Good Sam, Cooper sold his company to Universal Studios and signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros. that gave him script and director approval and a guaranteed $295,000 (equal to $ today) per picture. His first film under the new contract was King Vidor's drama The Fountainhead (1949) with Patricia Neal and Raymond Massey. In the film, Cooper plays an idealistic and uncompromising architect who struggles to maintain his integrity and individualism in the face of societal pressures to conform to popular standards. Based on the novel by Ayn Rand who also wrote the screenplay, the film reflects her philosophy and attacks the concepts of collectivism while promoting the virtues of individualism. For most critics, Cooper was hopelessly miscast in the role of Howard Roark. In his review for The New York Times, Bosley Crowther concluded he was "Mr. Deeds out of his element". Cooper returned to his element in Delmer Daves' war drama Task Force (1949), about a retiring rear admiral who reminisces about his long career as a naval aviator and his role in the development of aircraft carriers. Cooper's performance and the Technicolor newsreel footage supplied by the United States Navy made the film one of Cooper's most popular during this period. In the next two years, Cooper made four poorly received films: Michael Curtiz' period drama Bright Leaf (1950), Stuart Heisler's Western melodrama Dallas (1950), Henry Hathaway's wartime comedy You're in the Navy Now (1951), and Raoul Walsh's Western action film Distant Drums (1951).
Cooper's most important film during the post-war years was Fred Zinnemann's Western drama High Noon (1952) with Grace Kelly and Katy Jurado for United Artists. In the film, Cooper plays retiring sheriff Will Kane who is preparing to leave town on his honeymoon when he learns that an outlaw he helped put away and his three henchmen are returning to seek their revenge. Unable to gain the support of the frightened townspeople, and abandoned by his young bride, Kane nevertheless stays to face the outlaws alone. During the filming, Cooper was in poor health and in considerable pain from stomach ulcers. His ravaged face and discomfort in some scenes "photographed as self-doubt", according to biographer Hector Arce, and contributed to the effectiveness of his performance. Considered one of the first "adult" Westerns for its theme of moral courage, High Noon received enthusiastic reviews for its artistry, with Time magazine placing it in the ranks of Stagecoach and The Gunfighter. Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote that Cooper was "at the top of his form", and John McCarten, in The New Yorker, wrote that Cooper was never more effective. The film earned $3.75 million in the United States and $18 million worldwide. Following the example of his friend James Stewart, Cooper accepted a lower salary in exchange for a percent of the profits, and ended up making $600,000. Cooper's understated performance was widely praised, and earned him his second Academy Award for Best Actor.
Later films, 1953–1961
After appearing in André de Toth's Civil War drama Springfield Rifle (1952)—a standard Warner Bros. film that was overshadowed by the success of its predecessor—Cooper made four films outside the United States. In Mark Robson's drama Return to Paradise (1953), Cooper plays an American wanderer who liberates the inhabitants of a Polynesian island from the puritanical rule of a misguided pastor. Cooper endured spartan living conditions, long hours, and ill health during the three-month location shoot on the island of Upolu in Western Samoa. Despite its beautiful cinematography, the film received poor reviews. Cooper's next three films were shot in Mexico. In Hugo Fregonese's action adventure film Blowing Wild (1953) with Barbara Stanwyck, he plays a wildcatter in Mexico who gets involved with an oil company executive and his unscrupulous wife with whom he once had an affair.
In 1954, Cooper appeared in Henry Hathaway's Western drama Garden of Evil, with Susan Hayward, about three soldiers of fortune in Mexico hired to rescue a woman's husband. That same year, he appeared in Robert Aldrich's Western adventure Vera Cruz with Burt Lancaster. In the film, Cooper plays an American adventurer hired by Emperor Maximilian I to escort a countess to Vera Cruz during the Mexican Rebellion of 1866. All of these films received poor reviews but did well at the box-office. For his work in Vera Cruz, Cooper earned $1.4 million in salary and percent of the gross.
During this period, Cooper struggled with health problems. As well as his ongoing treatment for ulcers, he suffered a severe shoulder injury during the filming of Blowing Wild when he was hit by metal fragments from a dynamited oil well. During the filming of Vera Cruz, he reinjured his hip falling from a horse, and was burned when Lancaster fired his rifle too close and the wadding from the blank shell pierced his clothing.
In 1955, he appeared in Otto Preminger's biographical war drama The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell, about the World War I general who tried to convince government officials of the importance of air power, and was court-martialed after blaming the War Department for a series of air disasters. Some critics felt that Cooper was miscast, and that his dull, tight-lipped performance did not reflect Mitchell's dynamic and caustic personality. In 1956, Cooper was more effective playing a gentle Indiana Quaker in William Wyler's Civil War drama Friendly Persuasion with Dorothy McGuire. Like Sergeant York and High Noon, the film addresses the conflict between religious pacifism and civic duty. For his performance, Cooper received his second Golden Globe nomination for Best Motion Picture Actor. The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, was awarded the Palme d'Or at the 1957 Cannes Film Festival, and went on to earn $8 million worldwide.
In 1956, Cooper traveled to France to make Billy Wilder's romantic comedy Love in the Afternoon with Audrey Hepburn and Maurice Chevalier. In the film, Cooper plays a middle-aged American playboy in Paris who pursues and eventually falls in love with a much younger woman. Despite receiving some positive reviews—including from Bosley Crowther who praised the film's "charming performances"—most reviewers concluded that Cooper was simply too old for the part. While audiences may not have welcomed seeing Cooper's heroic screen image tarnished by his playing an aging roué trying to seduce an innocent young girl, the film was still a box-office success. The following year, Cooper appeared in Philip Dunne's romantic drama Ten North Frederick. In the film, which was based on the novel by John O'Hara, Cooper plays an attorney whose life is ruined by a double-crossing politician and his own secret affair with his daughter's young roommate. While Cooper brought "conviction and controlled anguish" to his performance, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, it was not enough to save what Bosley Crowther called a "hapless film".
Despite his ongoing health problems and several operations for ulcers and hernias, Cooper continued to work in action films. In 1958, he appeared in Anthony Mann's Western drama Man of the West (1958) with Julie London and Lee J. Cobb, about a reformed outlaw and killer who is forced to confront his violent past when the train he is riding in is held up by his former gang members. The film has been called Cooper's "most pathological Western", with its themes of impotent rage, sexual humiliation, and sadism. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, Cooper, who struggled with moral conflicts in his personal life, "understood the anguish of a character striving to retain his integrity ... [and] brought authentic feeling to the role of a tempted and tormented, yet essentially decent man". Mostly ignored by critics at the time, the film is now well-regarded by film scholars and is considered Cooper's last great film.
After his Warner Bros. contract ended, Cooper formed his own production company, Baroda Productions, and made three unusual films in 1959 about redemption. In Delmer Daves' Western drama The Hanging Tree, Cooper plays a frontier doctor who saves a criminal from a lynch mob, and later tries to exploit his sordid past. Cooper delivered a "powerful and persuasive" performance of an emotionally scarred man whose need to dominate others is transformed by the love and sacrifice of a woman. In Robert Rossen's historical adventure They Came to Cordura with Rita Hayworth, he plays an army officer who is found guilty of cowardice and assigned the degrading task of recommending soldiers for the Medal of Honor during the Pancho Villa Expedition of 1916.
While Cooper received positive reviews, Variety and Films in Review felt he was too old for the part. In Michael Anderson's action drama The Wreck of the Mary Deare with Charlton Heston, Cooper plays a disgraced merchant marine officer who decides to stay aboard his sinking cargo ship in order to prove the vessel was deliberately scuttled and to redeem his good name. Like its two predecessors, the film was physically demanding. Cooper, who was a trained scuba diver, did most of his own underwater scenes. Biographer Jeffrey Meyers observed that in all three roles, Cooper effectively conveyed the sense of lost honor and desire for redemption—what Joseph Conrad in Lord Jim called the "struggles of an individual trying to save from the fire his idea of what his moral identity should be".
Personal life
Marriage and family
Cooper was formally introduced to his future wife, 20-year-old New York debutante Veronica Balfe, on Easter Sunday 1933 at a party given by her uncle, art director Cedric Gibbons. Called "Rocky" by her family and friends, she grew up on Park Avenue and attended finishing schools. Her stepfather was Wall Street tycoon Paul Shields. Cooper and Rocky were quietly married at her parents' Park Avenue residence on December 15, 1933. According to his friends, the marriage had a positive impact on Cooper, who turned away from past indiscretions and took control of his life. Athletic and a lover of the outdoors, Rocky shared many of Cooper's interests, including riding, skiing, and skeet-shooting. She organized their social life, and her wealth and social connections provided Cooper access to New York high society. Cooper and his wife owned homes in the Los Angeles area in Encino (1933–36), Brentwood (1936–53), and Holmby Hills (1954–61), and owned a vacation home in Aspen, Colorado (1949–53).
Gary and Veronica Cooper's daughter, Maria Veronica Cooper, was born on September 15, 1937. By all accounts, he was a patient and affectionate father, teaching Maria to ride a bicycle, play tennis, ski, and ride horses. Sharing many of her parents' interests, she accompanied them on their travels and was often photographed with them. Like her father, she developed a love for art and drawing. As a family they vacationed together in Sun Valley, Idaho, spent time at Rocky's parents' country house in Southampton, New York, and took frequent trips to Europe. Cooper and Rocky were legally separated on May 16, 1951, when Cooper moved out of their home. For over two years, they maintained a fragile and uneasy family life with their daughter. Cooper moved back into their home in November 1953, and their formal reconciliation occurred in February 1954.
Romantic relationships
Prior to his marriage, Cooper had a series of romantic relationships with leading actresses, beginning in 1927 with Clara Bow, who advanced his career by helping him get one of his first leading roles in Children of Divorce. Bow was also responsible for getting Cooper a role in Wings, which generated an enormous amount of fan mail for the young actor. In 1928, he had a relationship with another experienced actress, Evelyn Brent, whom he met while filming Beau Sabreur. In 1929, while filming The Wolf Song, Cooper began an intense affair with Lupe Vélez, which was the most important romance of his early life. During their two years together, Cooper also had brief affairs with Marlene Dietrich while filming Morocco in 1930 and with Carole Lombard while making I Take This Woman in 1931. During his year abroad in 1931–32, Cooper had an affair with the married Countess Dorothy di Frasso, while staying at her Villa Madama near Rome.
After he was married in December 1933, Cooper remained faithful to his wife until the summer of 1942, when he began an affair with Ingrid Bergman during the production of For Whom the Bell Tolls. Their relationship lasted through the completion of filming Saratoga Trunk in June 1943. In 1948, after finishing work on The Fountainhead, Cooper began an affair with actress Patricia Neal, his co-star. At first they kept their affair discreet, but eventually it became an open secret in Hollywood, and Cooper's wife confronted him with the rumors, which he admitted were true. He also confessed that he was in love with Neal, and continued to see her. Cooper and his wife were legally separated in May 1951, but he did not seek a divorce. Neal later claimed that Cooper hit her after she went on a date with Kirk Douglas, and that he arranged for her to have an abortion when she became pregnant with Cooper's child. Neal ended their relationship in late December 1951. During his three-year separation from his wife, Cooper was rumored to have had affairs with Grace Kelly, Lorraine Chanel, and Gisèle Pascal.
Cooper biographers have explored his friendship in the late twenties with the actor Anderson Lawler, with whom Cooper shared a house on and off for a year, while at the same time seeing Clara Bow, Evelyn Brent and Lupe Vélez. Lupe Vélez once told Hedda Hopper of Vélez' affair with Cooper; whenever he would come home after seeing Lawler, she would sniff for Lawler's cologne. Vélez' biographer Michelle Vogel has reported that Vélez consented to Cooper's sexual behavior with Lawler, but only as long as she, too, could participate. In later life, he became involved in a relationship with the costume designer Irene, and was, according to Irene, "the only man she ever loved". A year after his death in 1961, Irene committed suicide by jumping from the 11th floor of the Knickerbocker Hotel, after telling Doris Day of her grief over Cooper's death.
Friendships, interests, and character
Cooper's twenty-year friendship with Ernest Hemingway began at Sun Valley in October 1940. The previous year, Hemingway drew upon Cooper's image when he created the character of Robert Jordan for the novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. The two shared a passion for the outdoors, and for years they hunted duck and pheasant, and skied together in Sun Valley. Both men admired the work of Rudyard Kipling—Cooper kept a copy of the poem "If—" in his dressing room—and retained as adults Kipling's sense of boyish adventure.
As well as admiring Cooper's hunting skills and knowledge of the outdoors, Hemingway believed his character matched his screen persona, once telling a friend, "If you made up a character like Coop, nobody would believe it. He's just too good to be true." They saw each other often, and their friendship remained strong through the years.
Cooper's social life generally centered on sports, outdoor activities, and dinner parties with his family and friends from the film industry, including directors Henry Hathaway, Howard Hawks, William Wellman, and Fred Zinnemann, and actors Joel McCrea, James Stewart, Barbara Stanwyck, and Robert Taylor. As well as hunting, Cooper enjoyed riding, fishing, skiing, and later in life, scuba diving. He never abandoned his early love for art and drawing, and over the years, he and his wife acquired a private collection of modern paintings, including works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Gauguin, and Georgia O'Keeffe. Cooper owned several works by Pablo Picasso, whom he met in 1956. Cooper also had a lifelong passion for automobiles, with a collection that included a 1930 Duesenberg.
Cooper was naturally reserved and introspective, and loved the solitude of outdoor activities. Not unlike his screen persona, his communication style frequently consisted of long silences with an occasional "yup" and "shucks". He once said, "If others have more interesting things to say than I have, I keep quiet." According to his friends, Cooper could also be an articulate, well-informed conversationalist on topics ranging from horses, guns, and Western history to film production, sports cars, and modern art. He was modest and unpretentious, frequently downplaying his acting abilities and career accomplishments. His friends and colleagues described him as charming, well-mannered, and thoughtful, with a lively boyish sense of humor. Cooper maintained a sense of propriety throughout his career and never misused his movie star status—never sought special treatment or refused to work with a director or leading lady. His close friend Joel McCrea recalled, "Coop never fought, he never got mad, he never told anybody off that I know of; everybody that worked with him liked him."
Political views
Like his father, Cooper was a conservative Republican; he voted for Calvin Coolidge in 1924, Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1932, and campaigned for Wendell Willkie in 1940. When Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for an unprecedented fourth presidential term in 1944, Cooper campaigned for Thomas E. Dewey and criticized Roosevelt for being dishonest and adopting "foreign" ideas. In a radio address that he paid for himself just prior to the election, Cooper said, "I disagree with the New Deal belief that the America all of us love is old and worn-out and finished—and has to borrow foreign notions that don't even seem to work any too well where they come from ... Our country is a young country that just has to make up its mind to be itself again." He also attended a Republican rally at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum that drew 93,000 Dewey supporters.
Cooper was one of the founding members of the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, a conservative organization dedicated, according to its statement of principles, to preserving the "American way of life" and opposing communism and fascism. The organization — whose membership included Walter Brennan, Laraine Day, Walt Disney, Clark Gable, Hedda Hopper, Ronald Reagan, Barbara Stanwyck, and John Wayne — advised the United States Congress to investigate communist influence in the motion picture industry. On October 23, 1947, Cooper was subpoenaed to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and was asked if he had observed any "communistic influence" in Hollywood.
Cooper recounted statements he'd heard suggesting that the Constitution was out of date and that Congress was an unnecessary institution—comments that Cooper said he found to be "very un-American" and testified that he had rejected several scripts because he thought they were "tinged with communist ideas". Unlike some other witnesses, Cooper did not name any individuals, nor did he name any scripts, during his testimony.
In 1951, while making High Noon, Cooper became friends with the film's screenwriter, Carl Foreman, who had been a member of the Communist Party. When Foreman was subpoenaed by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Cooper put his career on the line to defend Foreman. When John Wayne and others threatened Cooper with blacklisting himself and the loss of his passport if he did not walk off the film, Cooper gave a statement to the press in support of Foreman, calling him "the finest kind of American". When producer Stanley Kramer removed Foreman's name as screenwriter, Cooper and director Fred Zinnemann threatened to walk off the film if Foreman's name was not restored. Foreman later said that, of all his friends and allies and colleagues in Hollywood, "Cooper was the only big one who tried to help. The only one." Cooper even offered to testify in Foreman's behalf before the committee, but character witnesses were not allowed. Foreman always sent future scripts to Cooper for first refusal, including The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Key and The Guns of Navarone. Cooper had to turn them down because of his age.
Religion
Cooper was baptized in the Anglican Church in December 1911 in Britain, and was raised in the Episcopal Church in the United States. While he was not an observant Christian for most of his adult life, many of his friends believed he had a deeply spiritual side.
On June 26, 1953, Cooper accompanied his wife and daughter, who were devout Catholics, to Rome, where they had an audience with Pope Pius XII. Cooper and his wife were still separated at the time, but the papal visit marked the beginning of their gradual reconciliation. In the coming years, Cooper contemplated his mortality and his personal behavior, and started discussing Catholicism with his family. He began attending church with them regularly, and met with their parish priest, who offered Cooper spiritual guidance. After several months of study, Cooper was baptized as a Roman Catholic on April 9, 1959, before a small group of family and friends at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills.
Final years and death
On April 14, 1960, Cooper underwent surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston for an aggressive form of prostate cancer that had metastasized to his colon. He fell ill again on May 31 and underwent further surgery at Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles in early June to remove a malignant tumor from his large intestine. After recuperating over the summer, Cooper took his family on vacation to the south of France before traveling to the UK in the fall to star in The Naked Edge. In December 1960, he worked on the NBC television documentary The Real West, which was part of the company's Project 20 series.
On December 27, his wife learned from their family doctor that Cooper's cancer had spread to his lungs and bones and was inoperable. His family decided not to tell him immediately.
On January 9, 1961, Cooper attended a dinner that was given in his honor and hosted by Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin at the Friars Club. The dinner was attended by many of his industry friends and concluded with a brief speech by Cooper who said, "The only achievement I'm proud of is the friends I've made in this community."
In mid-January, Cooper took his family to Sun Valley for their last vacation together. Cooper and Hemingway hiked through the snow together for the last time. On February 27, after returning to Los Angeles, Cooper learned that he was dying. He later told his family, "We'll pray for a miracle; but if not, and that's God's will, that's all right too." On April 17, Cooper watched the Academy Awards ceremony on television and saw his good friend James Stewart, who had presented Cooper with his first Oscar years earlier, accept on Cooper's behalf an honorary award for lifetime achievement—his third Oscar. Holding back tears, Stewart said, "Coop, I'll get this to you right away. And Coop, I want you to know this, that with this goes all the warm friendship and the affection and the admiration and the deep, the deep respect of all of us. We're very, very proud of you, Coop. All of us are tremendously proud." The following day, newspapers around the world announced the news that Cooper was dying. In the coming days he received numerous messages of appreciation and encouragement, including telegrams from Pope John XXIII and Queen Elizabeth II, and a telephone call from President John F. Kennedy.
In his last public statement on May 4, Cooper said, "I know that what is happening is God's will. I am not afraid of the future." He received the last rites on May 12. Cooper died quietly the following day, Saturday, May 13, 1961, at 12:47 P.M.
A requiem mass was held on May 18 at the Church of the Good Shepherd, attended by many of Cooper's friends, including James Stewart, Jack Benny, Henry Hathaway, Joel McCrea, Audrey Hepburn, Jack L. Warner, John Ford, John Wayne, Edward G. Robinson, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Fred Astaire, Randolph Scott, Walter Pidgeon, Bob Hope and Marlene Dietrich. Cooper was buried in the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes in Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California. In May 1974, after his family relocated to New York, Cooper's remains were exhumed and reburied in Sacred Hearts Cemetery in Southampton. His grave is marked by a three-ton boulder from a Montauk quarry.
Acting style and reputation
Cooper's acting style consisted of three essential characteristics: his ability to project elements of his own personality onto the characters he portrayed, to appear natural and authentic in his roles, and to underplay and deliver restrained performances calibrated for the camera and the screen. Acting teacher Lee Strasberg once observed: "The simplest examples of Stanislavsky's ideas are actors such as Gary Cooper, John Wayne, and Spencer Tracy. They try not to act but to be themselves, to respond or react. They refuse to say or do anything they feel not to be consonant with their own characters." Film director François Truffaut ranked Cooper among "the greatest actors" because of his ability to deliver great performances "without direction". This ability to project elements of his own personality onto his characters produced a continuity across his performances to the extent that critics and audiences were convinced that he was simply "playing himself".
Cooper's ability to project his personality onto his characters played an important part in his appearing natural and authentic on screen. Actor John Barrymore said of Cooper, "This fellow is the world's greatest actor. He does without effort what the rest of us spend our lives trying to learn—namely, to be natural." Charles Laughton, who played opposite Cooper in Devil and the Deep agreed, "In truth, that boy hasn't the least idea how well he acts ... He gets at it from the inside, from his own clear way of looking at life." William Wyler, who directed Cooper in two films, called him a "superb actor, a master of movie acting".
In his review of Cooper's performance in The Real Glory, Graham Greene wrote, "Sometimes his lean photogenic face seems to leave everything to the lens, but there is no question here of his not acting. Watch him inoculate the girl against cholera—the casual jab of the needle, and the dressing slapped on while he talks, as though a thousand arms had taught him where to stab and he doesn't have to think anymore."
Cooper's style of underplaying before the camera surprised many of his directors and fellow actors. Even in his earliest feature films, he recognized the camera's ability to pick up slight gestures and facial movements. Commenting on Cooper's performance in Sergeant York, director Howard Hawks observed, "He worked very hard and yet he didn't seem to be working. He was a strange actor because you'd look at him during a scene and you'd think ... this isn't going to be any good. But when you saw the rushes in the projection room the next day you could read in his face all the things he'd been thinking." Sam Wood, who directed Cooper in four films, had similar observations about Cooper's performance in Pride of the Yankees, noting, "What I thought was underplaying turned out to be just the right approach. On the screen he's perfect, yet on the set you'd swear it's the worst job of acting in the history of motion pictures."
Fellow actors admired his abilities as an actor. Commenting on her two films playing opposite Cooper, actress Ingrid Bergman concluded, "The personality of this man was so enormous, so overpowering—and that expression in his eyes and his face, it was so delicate and so underplayed. You just didn't notice it until you saw it on the screen. I thought he was marvelous; the most underplaying and the most natural actor I ever worked with."
Tom Hanks declared, "In only one scene in the first film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture, we see the future of screen acting in the form of Gary Cooper. He is quiet and natural, somehow different from the other cast members. He does something mysterious with his eyes and shoulders that is much more like 'being' than 'acting'."
Daniel Day-Lewis said, "I don't particularly like westerns as a genre, but I do love certain westerns. 'High Noon' means a lot to me – I love the purity and the honesty, I love Gary Cooper in that film, the idea of the last man standing."
Chris Pratt stated, "I started watching Westerns when I was shooting in London about four or five years ago. I really fell in love with Gary Cooper, and his stuff. That sucked me into the Westerns. Before, I never got engrossed in the story. I'd just dip in, and there were guys in horses in black and white. High Noon's later Gary Cooper, I liked that. But I liked 'The Westerner'. That's my favorite one. I have that poster hung up in my house because I really like that one."
To Al Pacino, "Gary Cooper was a phenomenon—his ability to take some thing and elevate it, give it such dignity. One of the great presences."
Mylène Demongeot first got with Gary Cooper for the opening of the first escalator to be installed in a cinema, at the Rex Theatre in Paris, on June 7, 1957. She declared in a 2015 filmed interview: "Gary Cooper ... il est sublime ! Aaahhh (Mylène pushing a cry of love not to say ecstasy) il est sublime ... Ah ! Ah ! Ah ! Là je dois dire que ça fait partie des stars, y'a Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, ces grands Américains que j'ai rencontrés comme ça, c'est vraiment des mecs incroyables. Y'en a plus des comme ça ! Euh non. (Gary Cooper was sublime, there I have to say, now he, was part of the stars, Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, those great americans who I've met really were unbelievable guys, there aren't any like them anymore)."
Career assessment and legacy
Cooper's career spanned thirty-six years, from 1925 to 1961. During that time, he appeared in eighty-four feature films in a leading role. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His natural and authentic acting style appealed powerfully to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major movie genres, including Westerns, war films, adventure films, drama films, crime films, romance films, comedy films, and romantic comedy films. He appeared on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities for twenty-three consecutive years, from 1936 to 1958. According to Quigley's annual poll, Cooper was one of the top money-making stars for eighteen years, appearing in the top ten in 1936–37, 1941–49, and 1951–57. He topped the list in 1953. In Quigley's list of all-time money-making stars, Cooper is listed fourth, after John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and Tom Cruise. At the time of his death, it was estimated that his films grossed well over $200 million (equivalent to $ billion in ).
In over half of his feature films, Cooper portrayed Westerners, soldiers, pilots, sailors, and explorers—all men of action. In the rest he played a wide range of characters, included doctors, professors, artists, architects, clerks, and baseball players. Cooper's heroic screen image changed with each period of his career. In his early films, he played the young naive hero sure of his moral position and trusting in the triumph of simple virtues (The Virginian). After becoming a major star, his Western screen persona was replaced by a more cautious hero in adventure films and dramas (A Farewell to Arms). During the height of his career, from 1936 to 1943, he played a new type of hero—a champion of the common man willing to sacrifice himself for others (Mr. Deeds, Meet John Doe, and For Whom the Bell Tolls).
In the post-war years, Cooper attempted broader variations on his screen image, which now reflected a hero increasingly at odds with the world who must face adversity alone (The Fountainhead and High Noon). In his final films, Cooper's hero rejects the violence of the past, and seeks to reclaim lost honor and find redemption (Friendly Persuasion and Man of the West). The screen persona he developed and sustained throughout his career represented the ideal American hero—a tall, handsome, and sincere man of steadfast integrity who emphasized action over intellect, and combined the heroic qualities of the romantic lover, the adventurer, and the common man.
On February 6, 1960, Cooper was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6243 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to the film industry. He was awarded a star on the sidewalk outside the Ellen Theater in Bozeman, Montana.
On May 6, 1961, he was awarded the French Order of Arts and Letters in recognition of his significant contribution to the arts. On July 30, 1961, he was posthumously awarded the David di Donatello Special Award in Italy for his career achievements.
In 1966, he was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. In 2015, he was inducted into the Utah Cowboy and Western Heritage Hall of Fame. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper eleventh on its list of the 25 male stars of classic Hollywood. Three of his characters—Will Kane, Lou Gehrig, and Sergeant York—made AFI's list of the one hundred greatest heroes and villains, all of them as heroes. His Lou Gehrig line, "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.", is ranked by AFI as the thirty-eighth greatest movie quote of all time.
More than a half century after his death, Cooper's enduring legacy, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, is his image of the ideal American hero preserved in his film performances. Charlton Heston once observed, "He projected the kind of man Americans would like to be, probably more than any actor that's ever lived."
In the TV series Justified, based on works and characters created by Elmore Leonard, Gary Cooper is used throughout the six seasons as the man whom U.S. Marshall Raylan Givens, played by Timothy Olyphant, aspires to be. When his colleague asks Marshall Givens how he thinks his dangerous plan to bring down a villain can possibly work, he replies: "Why not? Worked for Gary Cooper."
Gary Cooper is referenced several times in the critically acclaimed television series The Sopranos, with protagonist Tony Soprano asking "What ever happened to Gary Cooper? The strong, silent type." while complaining about his problems to his therapist.
In the 1930s hit song "Puttin' On the Ritz", Cooper is referenced in the line "dress up like a million dollar trooper/Tryin' hard to look like Gary Cooper, Super duper!" More than two decades after Cooper's death a new version of the song was released in 1983 by Taco; the original lyrics were kept, including the references to Cooper.
In J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye, Cooper is "spotted" by Holden Caulfield to distract a woman he is dancing with.
Awards and nominations
Filmography
The following is a list of feature films in which Cooper appeared in a leading role.
The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926)
Children of Divorce (1927)
Arizona Bound (1927)
Wings (1927)
Nevada (1927)
It (1927)
The Last Outlaw (1927)
Beau Sabreur (1928)
The Legion of the Condemned (1928)
Doomsday (1928)
Half a Bride (1928)
Lilac Time (1928)
The First Kiss (1928)
The Shopworn Angel (1928)
Wolf Song (1929)
Betrayal (1929)
The Virginian (1929)
Only the Brave (1930)
The Texan (1930)
Seven Days' Leave (1930)
A Man from Wyoming (1930)
The Spoilers (1930)
Morocco (1930)
Fighting Caravans (1931)
City Streets (1931)
I Take This Woman (1931)
His Woman (1931)
Devil and the Deep (1932)
If I Had a Million (1932)
A Farewell to Arms (1932)
Today We Live (1933)
One Sunday Afternoon (1933)
Design for Living (1933)
Alice in Wonderland (1933)
Operator 13 (1934)
Now and Forever (1934)
The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935)
The Wedding Night (1935)
Peter Ibbetson (1935)
Desire (1936)
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)
The General Died at Dawn (1936)
The Plainsman (1936)
Souls at Sea (1937)
The Adventures of Marco Polo (1938)
Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938)
The Cowboy and the Lady (1938)
Beau Geste (1939)
The Real Glory (1939)
The Westerner (1940)
North West Mounted Police (1940)
Meet John Doe (1941)
Sergeant York (1941)
Ball of Fire (1941)
The Pride of the Yankees (1942)
For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)
The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944)
Casanova Brown (1944)
Along Came Jones (1945)
Saratoga Trunk (1945)
Cloak and Dagger (1946)
Unconquered (1947)
Good Sam (1948)
The Fountainhead (1949)
Task Force (1949)
Bright Leaf (1950)
Dallas (1950)
You're in the Navy Now (1951)
It's a Big Country (1951)
Distant Drums (1951)
High Noon (1952)
Springfield Rifle (1952)
Return to Paradise (1953)
Blowing Wild (1953)
Garden of Evil (1954)
Vera Cruz (1954)
The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (1955)
Friendly Persuasion (1956)
Love in the Afternoon (1957)
Ten North Frederick (1958)
Man of the West (1958)
The Hanging Tree (1959)
They Came to Cordura (1959)
The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959)
The Naked Edge (1961)
Radio appearances
References
Notes
Citations
Bibliography
Adrien Le Bihan, Gary Cooper, le prince des acteurs, LettMotif, 2021, 358p.()
External links
1901 births
1961 deaths
20th-century American male actors
Academy Honorary Award recipients
American expatriates in England
American male film actors
American male silent film actors
American male television actors
American people of English descent
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
California Republicans
Catholics from Montana
Conservatism in the United States
Converts to Roman Catholicism from Anglicanism
Deaths from cancer in California
Deaths from prostate cancer
Grinnell College people
Male Western (genre) film actors
Male actors from Montana
Paramount Pictures contract players
People educated at Dunstable Grammar School
People from Brentwood, Los Angeles
People from Dunstable
People from Helena, Montana
People from Holmby Hills, Los Angeles | true | [
"What Fools Men is a 1925 American silent drama film directed by George Archainbaud and starring Lewis Stone, Shirley Mason, and Ethel Grey Terry.\n\nCast\n\nPreservation\nWith no prints of What Fools Men located in any film archives, it is a lost film.\n\nReferences\n\nBibliography\nJacobs, Lea. The Decline of Sentiment: American Film in the 1920s. University of California Press, 2008.\n\nExternal links\n\n1925 films\n1925 drama films\nAmerican films\nAmerican drama films\nFilms directed by George Archainbaud\nAmerican silent feature films\nEnglish-language films\nFirst National Pictures films\nAmerican black-and-white films\nLost American films\n1925 lost films\nLost drama films",
"What Women Want is a surviving 1920 silent film drama directed by George Archainbaud and starring Louise Huff.\n\nA print is preserved in the Library of Congress collection.\n\nCast\nLouise Huff - Francine D'Espard\nVan Dyke Brooke - William Holliday Sr.\nRobert Ames - William Holliday Jr.\nClara Beyers - Countess de Chevigny\nHoward Truesdale - Ezekiel Bates\nBetty Brown - Susan\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nWhat Women Want at IMDB.com\n\n1920 films\nAmerican silent feature films\nAmerican films\nFilms directed by George Archainbaud\nAmerican black-and-white films\nAmerican drama films\n1920 drama films"
] |
[
"Gary Cooper",
"Silent films, 1925-28",
"what silent films were made in 1925?",
"In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt,",
"what other silent films?",
"Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones."
] | C_6ec0895035fd4dbda1785cd7d1c7b5d7_1 | did he win any awards for these films? | 3 | Did Gary Cooper win any awards for The Thundering Herd, Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage, The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, or The Trail Rider with Buck Jones? | Gary Cooper | In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, including Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt work--which sometimes injured horses and riders--"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name. Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week. Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal--finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings, the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada--both films directed by John Waters. In 1928, Paramount paired Cooper with a youthful Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss--advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride. That year, Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Gary Cooper (born Frank James Cooper; May 7, 1901 – May 13, 1961) was an American actor known for his strong, silent, and understated acting style. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor twice and had a further three nominations, as well as receiving an Academy Honorary Award for his career achievements in 1961. He was one of the top 10 film personalities for 23 consecutive years, and one of the top money-making stars for 18 years. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper at No. 11 on its list of the 25 greatest male stars of classic Hollywood cinema.
Cooper's career spanned 36 years, from 1925 to 1961, and included leading roles in 84 feature films. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era through to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His screen persona appealed strongly to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major film genres. His ability to project his own personality onto the characters he played contributed to his natural and authentic appearance on screen. Throughout his career, he sustained a screen persona that represented the ideal American hero.
Cooper began his career as a film extra and stunt rider, but soon landed acting roles. After establishing himself as a Western hero in his early silent films, he appeared as the Virginian and became a movie star in 1929 with his first sound picture, The Virginian. In the early 1930s, he expanded his heroic image to include more cautious characters in adventure films and dramas such as A Farewell to Arms (1932) and The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935). During the height of his career, Cooper portrayed a new type of hero—a champion of the common man—in films such as Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), Meet John Doe (1941), Sergeant York (1941), The Pride of the Yankees (1942), and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943). He later portrayed more mature characters at odds with the world in films such as The Fountainhead (1949) and High Noon (1952). In his final films, he played non-violent characters searching for redemption in films such as Friendly Persuasion (1956) and Man of the West (1958).
Early life
Frank James Cooper was born in Helena, Montana, on May 7, 1901, the younger of two sons of English parents Alice (née Brazier; 1873–1967) and Charles Henry Cooper (1865–1946). His brother, Arthur, was six years his senior. Cooper's father came from Houghton Regis, Bedfordshire, and became a prominent lawyer, rancher, and Montana Supreme Court justice. His mother hailed from Gillingham, Kent, and married Charles in Montana. In 1906, Charles purchased the Seven-Bar-Nine cattle ranch, about north of Helena near Craig, Montana. Cooper and Arthur spent their summers at the ranch and learned to ride horses, hunt, and fish. Cooper attended Central Grade School in Helena.
Alice wanted her sons to have an English education, so she took them back to England in 1909 to enroll them in Dunstable Grammar School in Dunstable, Bedfordshire. While there, Cooper and his brother lived with their father's cousins, William and Emily Barton, at their home in Houghton Regis. Cooper studied Latin, French, and English history at Dunstable until 1912. While he adapted to English school discipline and learned the requisite social graces, he never adjusted to the rigid class structure and formal Eton collars he was required to wear. He received his confirmation in the Church of England at the Church of All Saints in Houghton Regis on December 3, 1911. His mother accompanied her sons back to the U.S. in August 1912, and Cooper resumed his education at Johnson Grammar School in Helena.
When Cooper was 15, he injured his hip in a car accident. On his doctor's recommendation, he returned to the Seven-Bar-Nine ranch to recuperate by horseback riding. The misguided therapy left him with his characteristic stiff, off-balanced walk and slightly angled horse-riding style. He left Helena High School after two years in 1918, and returned to the family ranch to work full-time as a cowboy. In 1919, his father arranged for him to attend Gallatin County High School in Bozeman, Montana, where English teacher Ida Davis encouraged him to focus on academics and participate in debating and dramatics. Cooper later called Davis "the woman partly responsible for [him] giving up cowboy-ing and going to college".
Cooper was still attending high school in 1920 when he took three art courses at Montana Agricultural College in Bozeman. His interest in art was inspired years earlier by the Western paintings of Charles Marion Russell and Frederic Remington. Cooper especially admired and studied Russell's Lewis and Clark Meeting Indians at Ross' Hole (1910), which still hangs in the state capitol building in Helena. In 1922, to continue his art education, he enrolled in Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa. He did well academically in most of his courses, but was not accepted into the school's drama club. His drawings and watercolor paintings were exhibited throughout the dormitory, and he was named art editor for the college yearbook. During the summers of 1922 and 1923, Cooper worked at Yellowstone National Park as a tour guide driving the yellow open-top buses. Despite a promising first 18 months at Grinnell, he left college suddenly in February 1924, spent a month in Chicago looking for work as an artist, and then returned to Helena, where he sold editorial cartoons to the local Independent newspaper.
In autumn 1924, Cooper's father left the Montana Supreme Court bench and moved with his wife to Los Angeles to administer the estates of two relatives, and Cooper joined his parents there in November at his father's request. After briefly working a series of unpromising jobs, he met two friends from Montana who were working as film extras and stunt riders in low-budget Western films for the small movie studios on Poverty Row. They introduced him to another Montana cowboy, rodeo champion Jay "Slim" Talbot, who took him to see a casting director. Wanting money for a professional art course, Cooper worked as a film extra for $5 a day, and as a stunt rider for $10. Cooper and Talbot became close friends and hunting companions, and Talbot later worked as Cooper's stuntman and stand-in for over three decades.
Career
Silent films, 1925–1928
In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, but also the already emergent major studios, Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt workwhich sometimes injured horses and riders"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name.
Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week.
Cooper's first important film role was a supporting part in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) starring Ronald Colman and Vilma Bánky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal—finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings (both 1927), the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada—both films directed by John Waters.
Paramount paired Cooper with Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss (both 1928)—advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride (also both 1928). Around the same time, Cooper made Lilac Time (1928) with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928.
Hollywood stardom, 1929–1935
Cooper became a major movie star in 1929 with the release of his first talking picture, The Virginian (1929), which was directed by Victor Fleming and co-starred Mary Brian and Walter Huston. Based on the popular novel by Owen Wister, The Virginian was one of the first sound films to define the Western code of honor and helped establish many of the conventions of the Western movie genre that persist to the present day. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, the romantic image of the tall, handsome, and shy cowboy hero who embodied male freedom, courage, and honor was created in large part by Cooper in the film. Unlike some silent film actors who had trouble adapting to the new sound medium, Cooper transitioned naturally, with his "deep and clear" and "pleasantly drawling" voice, which was perfectly suited for the characters he portrayed on screen, also according to Meyers. Looking to capitalize on Cooper's growing popularity, Paramount cast him in several Westerns and wartime dramas, including Only the Brave, The Texan, Seven Days' Leave, A Man from Wyoming, and The Spoilers (all released in 1930). Norman Rockwell depicted Cooper in his role as The Texan for the cover of The Saturday Evening Post on May 24, 1930.
One of the more important performances in Cooper's early career was his portrayal of a sullen legionnaire in Josef von Sternberg's film Morocco (also 1930) with Marlene Dietrich in her introduction to American audiences. During production, von Sternberg focused his energies on Dietrich and treated Cooper dismissively. Tensions came to a head after von Sternberg yelled directions at Cooper in German. The actor approached the director, picked him up by the collar, and said, "If you expect to work in this country you'd better get on to the language we use here." Despite the tensions on the set, Cooper produced "one of his best performances", according to Thornton Delehanty of the New York Evening Post.
After returning to the Western genre in Zane Grey's Fighting Caravans (1931) with French actress Lili Damita, Cooper appeared in the Dashiell Hammett crime film City Streets (also 1931), co-starring Sylvia Sidney and Paul Lukas, playing a westerner who gets involved with big-city gangsters in order to save the woman he loves. Cooper concluded the year with appearances in two unsuccessful films: I Take This Woman (also 1931) with Carole Lombard, and His Woman with Claudette Colbert. The demands and pressures of making ten films in two years left Cooper exhausted and in poor health, suffering from anemia and jaundice. He had lost during that period, and felt lonely, isolated, and depressed by his sudden fame and wealth. In May 1931, Cooper left Hollywood and sailed to Algiers and then Italy, where he lived for the next year.
During his time abroad, Cooper stayed with the Countess Dorothy di Frasso at the Villa Madama in Rome, where she taught him about good food and vintage wines, how to read Italian and French menus, and how to socialize among Europe's nobility and upper classes. After guiding him through the great art museums and galleries of Italy, she accompanied him on a ten-week big-game hunting safari on the slopes of Mount Kenya in East Africa, where he was credited with over sixty kills, including two lions, a rhinoceros, and various antelopes. His safari experience in Africa had a profound influence on Cooper and intensified his love of the wilderness. After returning to Europe, he and the countess set off on a Mediterranean cruise of the Italian and French Rivieras. Rested and rejuvenated by his year-long exile, a healthy Cooper returned to Hollywood in April 1932 and negotiated a new contract with Paramount for two films per year, a salary of $4,000 a week, and director and script approval.
In 1932, after completing Devil and the Deep with Tallulah Bankhead to fulfill his old contract, Cooper appeared in A Farewell to Arms, the first film adaptation of an Ernest Hemingway novel. Co-starring Helen Hayes, a leading New York theatre star and Academy Award winner, and Adolphe Menjou, the film presented Cooper with one of his most ambitious and challenging dramatic roles, playing an American ambulance driver wounded in Italy who falls in love with an English nurse during World War I. Critics praised his highly intense and emotional performance, and the film became one of the year's most commercially successful pictures. In 1933, after making Today We Live with Joan Crawford and One Sunday Afternoon with Fay Wray, Cooper appeared in the Ernst Lubitsch comedy film Design for Living, based on the successful Noël Coward play. Co-starring Miriam Hopkins and Fredric March, the film was a box office success, ranking as one of the top ten highest-grossing films of 1933. All three of the lead actors—March, Cooper, and Hopkins—received attention from this film as they were all at the peak of their careers. Cooper's performance — playing an American artist in Europe competing with his playwright friend for the affections of a beautiful woman — was singled out for its versatility and revealed his genuine ability to do light comedy. Cooper changed his name legally to "Gary Cooper" in August 1933.
In 1934, Cooper was loaned out to MGM for the Civil War drama film Operator 13 with Marion Davies, about a beautiful Union spy who falls in love with a Confederate soldier. Despite Richard Boleslawski's imaginative direction and George J. Folsey's lavish cinematography, the film did poorly at the box office.
Back at Paramount, Cooper appeared in his first of seven films by director Henry Hathaway, Now and Forever, with Carole Lombard and Shirley Temple. In the film, he plays a confidence man who tries to sell his daughter to the relatives who raised her, but is eventually won over by the adorable girl. Impressed by Temple's intelligence and charm, Cooper developed a close rapport with her, both on and off screen. The film was a box-office success.
The following year, Cooper was loaned out to Samuel Goldwyn Productions to appear in King Vidor's romance film The Wedding Night with Anna Sten, who was being groomed as "another Garbo". In the film, Cooper plays an alcoholic novelist who retreats to his family's New England farm where he meets and falls in love with a beautiful Polish neighbor. Cooper delivered a performance of surprising range and depth, according to biographer Larry Swindell. Despite receiving generally favorable reviews, the film was not popular with American audiences, who may have been offended by the film's depiction of an extramarital affair and its tragic ending.
That same year, Cooper appeared in two Henry Hathaway films: the melodrama Peter Ibbetson with Ann Harding, about a man caught up in a dream world created by his love for a childhood sweetheart, and the adventure film The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, about a daring British officer and his men who defend their stronghold at Bengal against rebellious local tribes. While the former, championed by the surrealists became more successful in Europe than in the United States, the latter was nominated for seven Academy Awards and became one of Cooper's most popular and successful adventure films. Hathaway had the highest respect for Cooper's acting ability, calling him "the best actor of all of them".
American folk hero, 1936–1943
From Mr. Deeds to The Real Glory, 1936–1939
Cooper's career took an important turn in 1936. After making Frank Borzage's romantic comedy film Desire with Marlene Dietrich at Paramount—in which he delivered a performance considered by some contemporary critics as one of his finest—Cooper returned to Poverty Row for the first time since his early silent film days to make Frank Capra's Mr. Deeds Goes to Town with Jean Arthur for Columbia Pictures. In the film, Cooper plays the character of Longfellow Deeds, a quiet, innocent writer of greeting cards who inherits a fortune, leaves behind his idyllic life in Vermont, and travels to New York where he faces a world of corruption and deceit. Capra and screenwriter Robert Riskin were able to use Cooper's well-established screen persona as the "quintessential American hero"—a symbol of honesty, courage, and goodness—to create a new type of "folk hero" for the common man. Commenting on Cooper's impact on the character and the film, Capra observed:
Both Desire and Mr. Deeds opened in April 1936 to critical praise and were major box-office successes. In his review in The New York Times, Frank Nugent wrote that Cooper was "proving himself one of the best light comedians in Hollywood". For his performance in Mr. Deeds, Cooper received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.
Cooper appeared in two other Paramount films in 1936. In Lewis Milestone's adventure film The General Died at Dawn with Madeleine Carroll, he plays an American soldier of fortune in China who helps the peasants defend themselves against the oppression of a cruel warlord. Written by playwright Clifford Odets, the film was a critical and commercial success.
In Cecil B. DeMille's sprawling frontier epic The Plainsman—his first of four films with the director—Cooper portrays Wild Bill Hickok in a highly fictionalized version of the opening of the American western frontier. The film was an even greater box-office hit than its predecessor, due in large part to Jean Arthur's definitive depiction of Calamity Jane and Cooper's inspired portrayal of Hickock as an enigmatic figure of "deepening mythic substance". That year, Cooper appeared for the first time on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities, where he would remain for the next twenty-three years.
In late 1936, Paramount was preparing a new contract for Cooper that would raise his salary to $8,000 a week when Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn for six films over six years with a minimum guarantee of $150,000 per picture. Paramount brought suit against Goldwyn and Cooper, and the court ruled that Cooper's new Goldwyn contract afforded the actor sufficient time to also honor his Paramount agreement. Cooper continued to make films with both studios, and by 1939 the United States Treasury reported that Cooper was the country's highest wage earner, at $482,819 (equivalent to $ million in ).
In contrast to his output the previous year, Cooper appeared in only one picture in 1937, Henry Hathaway's adventure film Souls at Sea. A critical and box-office failure, Cooper referred to it as his "almost picture", saying, "It was almost exciting, and almost interesting. And I was almost good." In 1938, he appeared in Archie Mayo's biographical film The Adventures of Marco Polo. Plagued by production problems and a weak screenplay, the film became Goldwyn's biggest failure to that date, losing $700,000. During this period, Cooper turned down several important roles, including the role of Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind. Cooper was producer David O. Selznick's first choice for the part. He made several overtures to the actor, but Cooper had doubts about the project, and did not feel suited to the role. Cooper later admitted, "It was one of the best roles ever offered in Hollywood ... But I said no. I didn't see myself as quite that dashing, and later, when I saw Clark Gable play the role to perfection, I knew I was right."
Back at Paramount, Cooper returned to a more comfortable genre in Ernst Lubitsch's romantic comedy Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938) with Claudette Colbert. In the film, Cooper plays a wealthy American businessman in France who falls in love with an impoverished aristocrat's daughter and persuades her to become his eighth wife. Despite the clever screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder, and solid performances by Cooper and Colbert, American audiences had trouble accepting Cooper in the role of a shallow philanderer. It succeeded only at the European box office market.
In the fall of 1938, Cooper appeared in H. C. Potter's romantic comedy The Cowboy and the Lady with Merle Oberon, about a sweet-natured rodeo cowboy who falls in love with the wealthy daughter of a presidential hopeful, believing her to be a poor, hard-working lady's maid. The efforts of three directors and several eminent screenwriters could not salvage what could have been a fine vehicle for Cooper. While more successful than its predecessor, the film was Cooper's fourth consecutive box-office failure in the American market.
In the next two years, Cooper was more discerning about the roles he accepted and made four successful large-scale adventure and cowboy films. In William A. Wellman's adventure film Beau Geste (1939), he plays one of three daring English brothers who join the French Foreign Legion in the Sahara to fight local tribes. Filmed in the same Mojave Desert locations as the original 1926 version with Ronald Colman, Beau Geste provided Cooper with magnificent sets, exotic settings, high-spirited action, and a role tailored to his personality and screen persona. This was the last film in Cooper's contract with Paramount.
In Henry Hathaway's The Real Glory (1939), he plays a military doctor who accompanies a small group of American Army officers to the Philippines to help the Christian Filipinos defend themselves against Muslim radicals. Many film critics praised Cooper's performance, including author and film critic Graham Greene, who recognized that he "never acted better".
From The Westerner to For Whom the Bell Tolls, 1940–1943
Cooper returned to the Western genre in William Wyler's The Westerner (1940) with Walter Brennan and Doris Davenport, about a drifting cowboy who defends homesteaders against Roy Bean, a corrupt judge known as the "law west of the Pecos". Screenwriter Niven Busch relied on Cooper's extensive knowledge of Western history while working on the script. The film received positive reviews and did well at the box-office, with reviewers praising the performances of the two lead actors. That same year, Cooper appeared in his first all-Technicolor feature, Cecil B. DeMille's adventure film North West Mounted Police (1940). In the film, Cooper plays a Texas Ranger who pursues an outlaw into western Canada where he joins forces with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who are after the same man, a leader of the North-West Rebellion. While not as popular with critics as its predecessor, the film was another box-office success—the sixth-highest-grossing film of 1940.
The early 1940s were Cooper's prime years as an actor. In a relatively short period, he appeared in five critically successful and popular films that produced some of his finest performances. When Frank Capra offered him the lead role in Meet John Doe before Robert Riskin even developed the script, Cooper accepted his friend's offer, saying, "It's okay, Frank, I don't need a script." In the film, Cooper plays Long John Willoughby, a down-and-out bush-league pitcher hired by a newspaper to pretend to be a man who promises to commit suicide on Christmas Eve to protest all the hypocrisy and corruption in the country. Considered by some critics to be Capra's best film at the time, Meet John Doe was received as a "national event" with Cooper appearing on the front cover of Time magazine on March 3, 1941. In his review in the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes called Cooper's performance a "splendid and utterly persuasive portrayal" and praised his "utterly realistic acting which comes through with such authority". Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote, "Gary Cooper, of course, is 'John Doe' to the life and in the whole—shy, bewildered, non-aggressive, but a veritable tiger when aroused."
That same year, Cooper made two films with director and good friend Howard Hawks. In the biographical film Sergeant York, Cooper portrays war hero Alvin C. York, one of the most decorated American soldiers in World War I. The film chronicles York's early backwoods days in Tennessee, his religious conversion and subsequent piety, his stand as a conscientious objector, and finally his heroic actions at the Battle of the Argonne Forest, which earned him the Medal of Honor. Initially, Cooper was nervous and uncertain about playing a living hero, so he traveled to Tennessee to visit York at his home, and the two quiet men established an immediate rapport and discovered they had much in common. Inspired by York's encouragement, Cooper delivered a performance that Howard Barnes of the New York Herald Tribune called "one of extraordinary conviction and versatility", and that Archer Winston of the New York Post called "one of his best". After the film's release, Cooper was awarded the Distinguished Citizenship Medal by the Veterans of Foreign Wars for his "powerful contribution to the promotion of patriotism and loyalty". York admired Cooper's performance and helped promote the film for Warner Bros. Sergeant York became the top-grossing film of the year and was nominated for eleven Academy Awards. Accepting his first Academy Award for Best Actor from his friend James Stewart, Cooper said, "It was Sergeant Alvin York who won this award. Shucks, I've been in the business sixteen years and sometimes dreamed I might get one of these. That's all I can say ... Funny when I was dreaming I always made a better speech."
Cooper concluded the year back at Goldwyn with Howard Hawks to make the romantic comedy Ball of Fire with Barbara Stanwyck. In the film, Cooper plays a shy linguistics professor who leads a team of seven scholars who are writing an encyclopedia. While researching slang, he meets Stanwyck's flirtatious burlesque stripper Sugarpuss O'Shea who blows the dust off their staid life of books. The screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder provided Cooper the opportunity to exercise the full range of his light comedy skills. In his review for the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes wrote that Cooper handled the role with "great skill and comic emphasis" and that his performance was "utterly delightful". Though small in scale, Ball of Fire was one of the top-grossing films of the year—Cooper's fourth consecutive picture to make the top twenty.
Cooper's only film appearance in 1942 was also his last under his Goldwyn contract. In Sam Wood's biographical film The Pride of the Yankees, Cooper portrays baseball star Lou Gehrig who established a record with the New York Yankees for playing in 2,130 consecutive games. Cooper was reluctant to play the seven-time All-Star, who only died the previous year from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) — now commonly called "Lou Gehrig's disease". Beyond the challenges of effectively portraying such a popular and nationally recognized figure, Cooper knew very little about baseball and was not left-handed like Gehrig.
After Gehrig's widow visited the actor and expressed her desire that he portray her husband, Cooper accepted the role that covered a twenty-year span of Gehrig's life—his early love of baseball, his rise to greatness, his loving marriage, and his struggle with illness, culminating in his farewell speech at Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939 before 62,000 fans. Cooper quickly learned the physical movements of a baseball player and developed a fluid, believable swing. The handedness issue was solved by reversing the print for certain batting scenes. The film was one of the year's top ten pictures and received eleven Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's third).
Soon after the publication of Ernest Hemingway's novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, Paramount paid $150,000 for the film rights with the express intent of casting Cooper in the lead role of Robert Jordan, an American explosives expert who fights alongside the Republican loyalists during the Spanish Civil War. The original director, Cecil B. DeMille, was replaced by Sam Wood who brought in Dudley Nichols for the screenplay. After the start of principal photography in the Sierra Nevada in late 1942, Ingrid Bergman was brought in to replace ballerina Vera Zorina as the female lead—a change supported by Cooper and Hemingway. The love scenes between Bergman and Cooper were "rapturous" and passionate. Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune wrote that both actors performed with "the true stature and authority of stars". While the film distorted the novel's original political themes and meaning, For Whom the Bell Tolls was a critical and commercial success and received ten Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's fourth).
World War II related activities
Due to his age and health, Cooper did not serve in the military during World War II, but like many of his colleagues, he got involved in the war effort by entertaining the troops. In June 1943, he visited military hospitals in San Diego, and often appeared at the Hollywood Canteen serving food to the servicemen. In late 1943, Cooper undertook a tour of the South West Pacific with actresses Una Merkel and Phyllis Brooks, and accordionist Andy Arcari.
Traveling on a B-24A Liberator bomber, the group toured the Cook Islands, Fiji, New Caledonia, Queensland, Brisbane—where General Douglas MacArthur told Cooper he was watching Sergeant York in a Manila theater when Japanese bombs began falling—New Guinea, Jayapura, and throughout the Solomon Islands.
The group often shared the same sparse living conditions and K-rations as the troops. Cooper met with the servicemen and women, visited military hospitals, introduced his attractive colleagues, and participated in occasional skits. The shows concluded with Cooper's moving recitation of Lou Gehrig's farewell speech. When he returned to the United States, he visited military hospitals throughout the country. Cooper later called his time with the troops the "greatest emotional experience" of his life.
Mature roles, 1944–1952
In 1944, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's wartime adventure film The Story of Dr. Wassell with Laraine Day — his third movie with the director. In the film, Cooper plays American doctor and missionary Corydon M. Wassell, who leads a group of wounded sailors through the jungles of Java to safety. Despite receiving poor reviews, Dr. Wassell was one of the top-grossing films of the year. With his Goldwyn and Paramount contracts now concluded, Cooper decided to remain independent and formed his own production company, International Pictures, with Leo Spitz, William Goetz, and Nunnally Johnson. The fledgling studio's first offering was Sam Wood's romantic comedy Casanova Brown with Teresa Wright, about a man who learns his soon-to-be ex-wife is pregnant with his child, just as he is about to marry another woman. The film received poor reviews, with the New York Daily News calling it "delightful nonsense", and Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, criticizing Cooper's "somewhat obvious and ridiculous clowning". The film was barely profitable.
In 1945, Cooper starred in and produced Stuart Heisler's Western comedy Along Came Jones with Loretta Young for International. In this lighthearted parody of his past heroic image, Cooper plays comically inept cowboy Melody Jones who is mistaken for a ruthless killer. Audiences embraced Cooper's character, and the film was one of the top box-office pictures of the year—a testament to Cooper's still vital audience appeal. It was also International's biggest financial success during its brief history before being sold off to Universal Studios in 1946.
Cooper's career during the post-war years drifted in new directions as American society was changing. While he still played conventional heroic roles, his films now relied less on his heroic screen persona and more on novel stories and exotic settings. In November 1945, Cooper appeared in Sam Wood's nineteenth-century period drama Saratoga Trunk with Ingrid Bergman, about a Texas cowboy and his relationship with a beautiful fortune-hunter. Filmed in early 1943, the movie's release was delayed for two years due to the increased demand for war movies. Despite poor reviews, Saratoga Trunk did well at the box office and became one of the top money-makers of the year for Warner Bros. Cooper's only film in 1946 was Fritz Lang's romantic thriller Cloak and Dagger, about a mild-mannered physics professor recruited by the OSS during the last years of World War II to investigate the German atomic bomb program. Playing a part loosely based on physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, Cooper was uneasy with the role and unable to convey the "inner sense" of the character. The film received poor reviews and was a box-office failure. In 1947, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's epic adventure film Unconquered with Paulette Goddard, about a Virginia militiaman who defends settlers against an unscrupulous gun trader and hostile Indians on the Western frontier during the eighteenth century. The film received mixed reviews, but even long-time DeMille critic James Agee acknowledged the picture had "some authentic flavor of the period". This last of four films made with DeMille was Cooper's most lucrative, earning the actor over $300,000 (equal to $ today) in salary and percentage of profits. Unconquered would be his last unqualified box-office success for the next five years.
In 1948, after making Leo McCarey's romantic comedy Good Sam, Cooper sold his company to Universal Studios and signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros. that gave him script and director approval and a guaranteed $295,000 (equal to $ today) per picture. His first film under the new contract was King Vidor's drama The Fountainhead (1949) with Patricia Neal and Raymond Massey. In the film, Cooper plays an idealistic and uncompromising architect who struggles to maintain his integrity and individualism in the face of societal pressures to conform to popular standards. Based on the novel by Ayn Rand who also wrote the screenplay, the film reflects her philosophy and attacks the concepts of collectivism while promoting the virtues of individualism. For most critics, Cooper was hopelessly miscast in the role of Howard Roark. In his review for The New York Times, Bosley Crowther concluded he was "Mr. Deeds out of his element". Cooper returned to his element in Delmer Daves' war drama Task Force (1949), about a retiring rear admiral who reminisces about his long career as a naval aviator and his role in the development of aircraft carriers. Cooper's performance and the Technicolor newsreel footage supplied by the United States Navy made the film one of Cooper's most popular during this period. In the next two years, Cooper made four poorly received films: Michael Curtiz' period drama Bright Leaf (1950), Stuart Heisler's Western melodrama Dallas (1950), Henry Hathaway's wartime comedy You're in the Navy Now (1951), and Raoul Walsh's Western action film Distant Drums (1951).
Cooper's most important film during the post-war years was Fred Zinnemann's Western drama High Noon (1952) with Grace Kelly and Katy Jurado for United Artists. In the film, Cooper plays retiring sheriff Will Kane who is preparing to leave town on his honeymoon when he learns that an outlaw he helped put away and his three henchmen are returning to seek their revenge. Unable to gain the support of the frightened townspeople, and abandoned by his young bride, Kane nevertheless stays to face the outlaws alone. During the filming, Cooper was in poor health and in considerable pain from stomach ulcers. His ravaged face and discomfort in some scenes "photographed as self-doubt", according to biographer Hector Arce, and contributed to the effectiveness of his performance. Considered one of the first "adult" Westerns for its theme of moral courage, High Noon received enthusiastic reviews for its artistry, with Time magazine placing it in the ranks of Stagecoach and The Gunfighter. Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote that Cooper was "at the top of his form", and John McCarten, in The New Yorker, wrote that Cooper was never more effective. The film earned $3.75 million in the United States and $18 million worldwide. Following the example of his friend James Stewart, Cooper accepted a lower salary in exchange for a percent of the profits, and ended up making $600,000. Cooper's understated performance was widely praised, and earned him his second Academy Award for Best Actor.
Later films, 1953–1961
After appearing in André de Toth's Civil War drama Springfield Rifle (1952)—a standard Warner Bros. film that was overshadowed by the success of its predecessor—Cooper made four films outside the United States. In Mark Robson's drama Return to Paradise (1953), Cooper plays an American wanderer who liberates the inhabitants of a Polynesian island from the puritanical rule of a misguided pastor. Cooper endured spartan living conditions, long hours, and ill health during the three-month location shoot on the island of Upolu in Western Samoa. Despite its beautiful cinematography, the film received poor reviews. Cooper's next three films were shot in Mexico. In Hugo Fregonese's action adventure film Blowing Wild (1953) with Barbara Stanwyck, he plays a wildcatter in Mexico who gets involved with an oil company executive and his unscrupulous wife with whom he once had an affair.
In 1954, Cooper appeared in Henry Hathaway's Western drama Garden of Evil, with Susan Hayward, about three soldiers of fortune in Mexico hired to rescue a woman's husband. That same year, he appeared in Robert Aldrich's Western adventure Vera Cruz with Burt Lancaster. In the film, Cooper plays an American adventurer hired by Emperor Maximilian I to escort a countess to Vera Cruz during the Mexican Rebellion of 1866. All of these films received poor reviews but did well at the box-office. For his work in Vera Cruz, Cooper earned $1.4 million in salary and percent of the gross.
During this period, Cooper struggled with health problems. As well as his ongoing treatment for ulcers, he suffered a severe shoulder injury during the filming of Blowing Wild when he was hit by metal fragments from a dynamited oil well. During the filming of Vera Cruz, he reinjured his hip falling from a horse, and was burned when Lancaster fired his rifle too close and the wadding from the blank shell pierced his clothing.
In 1955, he appeared in Otto Preminger's biographical war drama The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell, about the World War I general who tried to convince government officials of the importance of air power, and was court-martialed after blaming the War Department for a series of air disasters. Some critics felt that Cooper was miscast, and that his dull, tight-lipped performance did not reflect Mitchell's dynamic and caustic personality. In 1956, Cooper was more effective playing a gentle Indiana Quaker in William Wyler's Civil War drama Friendly Persuasion with Dorothy McGuire. Like Sergeant York and High Noon, the film addresses the conflict between religious pacifism and civic duty. For his performance, Cooper received his second Golden Globe nomination for Best Motion Picture Actor. The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, was awarded the Palme d'Or at the 1957 Cannes Film Festival, and went on to earn $8 million worldwide.
In 1956, Cooper traveled to France to make Billy Wilder's romantic comedy Love in the Afternoon with Audrey Hepburn and Maurice Chevalier. In the film, Cooper plays a middle-aged American playboy in Paris who pursues and eventually falls in love with a much younger woman. Despite receiving some positive reviews—including from Bosley Crowther who praised the film's "charming performances"—most reviewers concluded that Cooper was simply too old for the part. While audiences may not have welcomed seeing Cooper's heroic screen image tarnished by his playing an aging roué trying to seduce an innocent young girl, the film was still a box-office success. The following year, Cooper appeared in Philip Dunne's romantic drama Ten North Frederick. In the film, which was based on the novel by John O'Hara, Cooper plays an attorney whose life is ruined by a double-crossing politician and his own secret affair with his daughter's young roommate. While Cooper brought "conviction and controlled anguish" to his performance, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, it was not enough to save what Bosley Crowther called a "hapless film".
Despite his ongoing health problems and several operations for ulcers and hernias, Cooper continued to work in action films. In 1958, he appeared in Anthony Mann's Western drama Man of the West (1958) with Julie London and Lee J. Cobb, about a reformed outlaw and killer who is forced to confront his violent past when the train he is riding in is held up by his former gang members. The film has been called Cooper's "most pathological Western", with its themes of impotent rage, sexual humiliation, and sadism. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, Cooper, who struggled with moral conflicts in his personal life, "understood the anguish of a character striving to retain his integrity ... [and] brought authentic feeling to the role of a tempted and tormented, yet essentially decent man". Mostly ignored by critics at the time, the film is now well-regarded by film scholars and is considered Cooper's last great film.
After his Warner Bros. contract ended, Cooper formed his own production company, Baroda Productions, and made three unusual films in 1959 about redemption. In Delmer Daves' Western drama The Hanging Tree, Cooper plays a frontier doctor who saves a criminal from a lynch mob, and later tries to exploit his sordid past. Cooper delivered a "powerful and persuasive" performance of an emotionally scarred man whose need to dominate others is transformed by the love and sacrifice of a woman. In Robert Rossen's historical adventure They Came to Cordura with Rita Hayworth, he plays an army officer who is found guilty of cowardice and assigned the degrading task of recommending soldiers for the Medal of Honor during the Pancho Villa Expedition of 1916.
While Cooper received positive reviews, Variety and Films in Review felt he was too old for the part. In Michael Anderson's action drama The Wreck of the Mary Deare with Charlton Heston, Cooper plays a disgraced merchant marine officer who decides to stay aboard his sinking cargo ship in order to prove the vessel was deliberately scuttled and to redeem his good name. Like its two predecessors, the film was physically demanding. Cooper, who was a trained scuba diver, did most of his own underwater scenes. Biographer Jeffrey Meyers observed that in all three roles, Cooper effectively conveyed the sense of lost honor and desire for redemption—what Joseph Conrad in Lord Jim called the "struggles of an individual trying to save from the fire his idea of what his moral identity should be".
Personal life
Marriage and family
Cooper was formally introduced to his future wife, 20-year-old New York debutante Veronica Balfe, on Easter Sunday 1933 at a party given by her uncle, art director Cedric Gibbons. Called "Rocky" by her family and friends, she grew up on Park Avenue and attended finishing schools. Her stepfather was Wall Street tycoon Paul Shields. Cooper and Rocky were quietly married at her parents' Park Avenue residence on December 15, 1933. According to his friends, the marriage had a positive impact on Cooper, who turned away from past indiscretions and took control of his life. Athletic and a lover of the outdoors, Rocky shared many of Cooper's interests, including riding, skiing, and skeet-shooting. She organized their social life, and her wealth and social connections provided Cooper access to New York high society. Cooper and his wife owned homes in the Los Angeles area in Encino (1933–36), Brentwood (1936–53), and Holmby Hills (1954–61), and owned a vacation home in Aspen, Colorado (1949–53).
Gary and Veronica Cooper's daughter, Maria Veronica Cooper, was born on September 15, 1937. By all accounts, he was a patient and affectionate father, teaching Maria to ride a bicycle, play tennis, ski, and ride horses. Sharing many of her parents' interests, she accompanied them on their travels and was often photographed with them. Like her father, she developed a love for art and drawing. As a family they vacationed together in Sun Valley, Idaho, spent time at Rocky's parents' country house in Southampton, New York, and took frequent trips to Europe. Cooper and Rocky were legally separated on May 16, 1951, when Cooper moved out of their home. For over two years, they maintained a fragile and uneasy family life with their daughter. Cooper moved back into their home in November 1953, and their formal reconciliation occurred in February 1954.
Romantic relationships
Prior to his marriage, Cooper had a series of romantic relationships with leading actresses, beginning in 1927 with Clara Bow, who advanced his career by helping him get one of his first leading roles in Children of Divorce. Bow was also responsible for getting Cooper a role in Wings, which generated an enormous amount of fan mail for the young actor. In 1928, he had a relationship with another experienced actress, Evelyn Brent, whom he met while filming Beau Sabreur. In 1929, while filming The Wolf Song, Cooper began an intense affair with Lupe Vélez, which was the most important romance of his early life. During their two years together, Cooper also had brief affairs with Marlene Dietrich while filming Morocco in 1930 and with Carole Lombard while making I Take This Woman in 1931. During his year abroad in 1931–32, Cooper had an affair with the married Countess Dorothy di Frasso, while staying at her Villa Madama near Rome.
After he was married in December 1933, Cooper remained faithful to his wife until the summer of 1942, when he began an affair with Ingrid Bergman during the production of For Whom the Bell Tolls. Their relationship lasted through the completion of filming Saratoga Trunk in June 1943. In 1948, after finishing work on The Fountainhead, Cooper began an affair with actress Patricia Neal, his co-star. At first they kept their affair discreet, but eventually it became an open secret in Hollywood, and Cooper's wife confronted him with the rumors, which he admitted were true. He also confessed that he was in love with Neal, and continued to see her. Cooper and his wife were legally separated in May 1951, but he did not seek a divorce. Neal later claimed that Cooper hit her after she went on a date with Kirk Douglas, and that he arranged for her to have an abortion when she became pregnant with Cooper's child. Neal ended their relationship in late December 1951. During his three-year separation from his wife, Cooper was rumored to have had affairs with Grace Kelly, Lorraine Chanel, and Gisèle Pascal.
Cooper biographers have explored his friendship in the late twenties with the actor Anderson Lawler, with whom Cooper shared a house on and off for a year, while at the same time seeing Clara Bow, Evelyn Brent and Lupe Vélez. Lupe Vélez once told Hedda Hopper of Vélez' affair with Cooper; whenever he would come home after seeing Lawler, she would sniff for Lawler's cologne. Vélez' biographer Michelle Vogel has reported that Vélez consented to Cooper's sexual behavior with Lawler, but only as long as she, too, could participate. In later life, he became involved in a relationship with the costume designer Irene, and was, according to Irene, "the only man she ever loved". A year after his death in 1961, Irene committed suicide by jumping from the 11th floor of the Knickerbocker Hotel, after telling Doris Day of her grief over Cooper's death.
Friendships, interests, and character
Cooper's twenty-year friendship with Ernest Hemingway began at Sun Valley in October 1940. The previous year, Hemingway drew upon Cooper's image when he created the character of Robert Jordan for the novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. The two shared a passion for the outdoors, and for years they hunted duck and pheasant, and skied together in Sun Valley. Both men admired the work of Rudyard Kipling—Cooper kept a copy of the poem "If—" in his dressing room—and retained as adults Kipling's sense of boyish adventure.
As well as admiring Cooper's hunting skills and knowledge of the outdoors, Hemingway believed his character matched his screen persona, once telling a friend, "If you made up a character like Coop, nobody would believe it. He's just too good to be true." They saw each other often, and their friendship remained strong through the years.
Cooper's social life generally centered on sports, outdoor activities, and dinner parties with his family and friends from the film industry, including directors Henry Hathaway, Howard Hawks, William Wellman, and Fred Zinnemann, and actors Joel McCrea, James Stewart, Barbara Stanwyck, and Robert Taylor. As well as hunting, Cooper enjoyed riding, fishing, skiing, and later in life, scuba diving. He never abandoned his early love for art and drawing, and over the years, he and his wife acquired a private collection of modern paintings, including works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Gauguin, and Georgia O'Keeffe. Cooper owned several works by Pablo Picasso, whom he met in 1956. Cooper also had a lifelong passion for automobiles, with a collection that included a 1930 Duesenberg.
Cooper was naturally reserved and introspective, and loved the solitude of outdoor activities. Not unlike his screen persona, his communication style frequently consisted of long silences with an occasional "yup" and "shucks". He once said, "If others have more interesting things to say than I have, I keep quiet." According to his friends, Cooper could also be an articulate, well-informed conversationalist on topics ranging from horses, guns, and Western history to film production, sports cars, and modern art. He was modest and unpretentious, frequently downplaying his acting abilities and career accomplishments. His friends and colleagues described him as charming, well-mannered, and thoughtful, with a lively boyish sense of humor. Cooper maintained a sense of propriety throughout his career and never misused his movie star status—never sought special treatment or refused to work with a director or leading lady. His close friend Joel McCrea recalled, "Coop never fought, he never got mad, he never told anybody off that I know of; everybody that worked with him liked him."
Political views
Like his father, Cooper was a conservative Republican; he voted for Calvin Coolidge in 1924, Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1932, and campaigned for Wendell Willkie in 1940. When Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for an unprecedented fourth presidential term in 1944, Cooper campaigned for Thomas E. Dewey and criticized Roosevelt for being dishonest and adopting "foreign" ideas. In a radio address that he paid for himself just prior to the election, Cooper said, "I disagree with the New Deal belief that the America all of us love is old and worn-out and finished—and has to borrow foreign notions that don't even seem to work any too well where they come from ... Our country is a young country that just has to make up its mind to be itself again." He also attended a Republican rally at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum that drew 93,000 Dewey supporters.
Cooper was one of the founding members of the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, a conservative organization dedicated, according to its statement of principles, to preserving the "American way of life" and opposing communism and fascism. The organization — whose membership included Walter Brennan, Laraine Day, Walt Disney, Clark Gable, Hedda Hopper, Ronald Reagan, Barbara Stanwyck, and John Wayne — advised the United States Congress to investigate communist influence in the motion picture industry. On October 23, 1947, Cooper was subpoenaed to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and was asked if he had observed any "communistic influence" in Hollywood.
Cooper recounted statements he'd heard suggesting that the Constitution was out of date and that Congress was an unnecessary institution—comments that Cooper said he found to be "very un-American" and testified that he had rejected several scripts because he thought they were "tinged with communist ideas". Unlike some other witnesses, Cooper did not name any individuals, nor did he name any scripts, during his testimony.
In 1951, while making High Noon, Cooper became friends with the film's screenwriter, Carl Foreman, who had been a member of the Communist Party. When Foreman was subpoenaed by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Cooper put his career on the line to defend Foreman. When John Wayne and others threatened Cooper with blacklisting himself and the loss of his passport if he did not walk off the film, Cooper gave a statement to the press in support of Foreman, calling him "the finest kind of American". When producer Stanley Kramer removed Foreman's name as screenwriter, Cooper and director Fred Zinnemann threatened to walk off the film if Foreman's name was not restored. Foreman later said that, of all his friends and allies and colleagues in Hollywood, "Cooper was the only big one who tried to help. The only one." Cooper even offered to testify in Foreman's behalf before the committee, but character witnesses were not allowed. Foreman always sent future scripts to Cooper for first refusal, including The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Key and The Guns of Navarone. Cooper had to turn them down because of his age.
Religion
Cooper was baptized in the Anglican Church in December 1911 in Britain, and was raised in the Episcopal Church in the United States. While he was not an observant Christian for most of his adult life, many of his friends believed he had a deeply spiritual side.
On June 26, 1953, Cooper accompanied his wife and daughter, who were devout Catholics, to Rome, where they had an audience with Pope Pius XII. Cooper and his wife were still separated at the time, but the papal visit marked the beginning of their gradual reconciliation. In the coming years, Cooper contemplated his mortality and his personal behavior, and started discussing Catholicism with his family. He began attending church with them regularly, and met with their parish priest, who offered Cooper spiritual guidance. After several months of study, Cooper was baptized as a Roman Catholic on April 9, 1959, before a small group of family and friends at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills.
Final years and death
On April 14, 1960, Cooper underwent surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston for an aggressive form of prostate cancer that had metastasized to his colon. He fell ill again on May 31 and underwent further surgery at Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles in early June to remove a malignant tumor from his large intestine. After recuperating over the summer, Cooper took his family on vacation to the south of France before traveling to the UK in the fall to star in The Naked Edge. In December 1960, he worked on the NBC television documentary The Real West, which was part of the company's Project 20 series.
On December 27, his wife learned from their family doctor that Cooper's cancer had spread to his lungs and bones and was inoperable. His family decided not to tell him immediately.
On January 9, 1961, Cooper attended a dinner that was given in his honor and hosted by Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin at the Friars Club. The dinner was attended by many of his industry friends and concluded with a brief speech by Cooper who said, "The only achievement I'm proud of is the friends I've made in this community."
In mid-January, Cooper took his family to Sun Valley for their last vacation together. Cooper and Hemingway hiked through the snow together for the last time. On February 27, after returning to Los Angeles, Cooper learned that he was dying. He later told his family, "We'll pray for a miracle; but if not, and that's God's will, that's all right too." On April 17, Cooper watched the Academy Awards ceremony on television and saw his good friend James Stewart, who had presented Cooper with his first Oscar years earlier, accept on Cooper's behalf an honorary award for lifetime achievement—his third Oscar. Holding back tears, Stewart said, "Coop, I'll get this to you right away. And Coop, I want you to know this, that with this goes all the warm friendship and the affection and the admiration and the deep, the deep respect of all of us. We're very, very proud of you, Coop. All of us are tremendously proud." The following day, newspapers around the world announced the news that Cooper was dying. In the coming days he received numerous messages of appreciation and encouragement, including telegrams from Pope John XXIII and Queen Elizabeth II, and a telephone call from President John F. Kennedy.
In his last public statement on May 4, Cooper said, "I know that what is happening is God's will. I am not afraid of the future." He received the last rites on May 12. Cooper died quietly the following day, Saturday, May 13, 1961, at 12:47 P.M.
A requiem mass was held on May 18 at the Church of the Good Shepherd, attended by many of Cooper's friends, including James Stewart, Jack Benny, Henry Hathaway, Joel McCrea, Audrey Hepburn, Jack L. Warner, John Ford, John Wayne, Edward G. Robinson, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Fred Astaire, Randolph Scott, Walter Pidgeon, Bob Hope and Marlene Dietrich. Cooper was buried in the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes in Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California. In May 1974, after his family relocated to New York, Cooper's remains were exhumed and reburied in Sacred Hearts Cemetery in Southampton. His grave is marked by a three-ton boulder from a Montauk quarry.
Acting style and reputation
Cooper's acting style consisted of three essential characteristics: his ability to project elements of his own personality onto the characters he portrayed, to appear natural and authentic in his roles, and to underplay and deliver restrained performances calibrated for the camera and the screen. Acting teacher Lee Strasberg once observed: "The simplest examples of Stanislavsky's ideas are actors such as Gary Cooper, John Wayne, and Spencer Tracy. They try not to act but to be themselves, to respond or react. They refuse to say or do anything they feel not to be consonant with their own characters." Film director François Truffaut ranked Cooper among "the greatest actors" because of his ability to deliver great performances "without direction". This ability to project elements of his own personality onto his characters produced a continuity across his performances to the extent that critics and audiences were convinced that he was simply "playing himself".
Cooper's ability to project his personality onto his characters played an important part in his appearing natural and authentic on screen. Actor John Barrymore said of Cooper, "This fellow is the world's greatest actor. He does without effort what the rest of us spend our lives trying to learn—namely, to be natural." Charles Laughton, who played opposite Cooper in Devil and the Deep agreed, "In truth, that boy hasn't the least idea how well he acts ... He gets at it from the inside, from his own clear way of looking at life." William Wyler, who directed Cooper in two films, called him a "superb actor, a master of movie acting".
In his review of Cooper's performance in The Real Glory, Graham Greene wrote, "Sometimes his lean photogenic face seems to leave everything to the lens, but there is no question here of his not acting. Watch him inoculate the girl against cholera—the casual jab of the needle, and the dressing slapped on while he talks, as though a thousand arms had taught him where to stab and he doesn't have to think anymore."
Cooper's style of underplaying before the camera surprised many of his directors and fellow actors. Even in his earliest feature films, he recognized the camera's ability to pick up slight gestures and facial movements. Commenting on Cooper's performance in Sergeant York, director Howard Hawks observed, "He worked very hard and yet he didn't seem to be working. He was a strange actor because you'd look at him during a scene and you'd think ... this isn't going to be any good. But when you saw the rushes in the projection room the next day you could read in his face all the things he'd been thinking." Sam Wood, who directed Cooper in four films, had similar observations about Cooper's performance in Pride of the Yankees, noting, "What I thought was underplaying turned out to be just the right approach. On the screen he's perfect, yet on the set you'd swear it's the worst job of acting in the history of motion pictures."
Fellow actors admired his abilities as an actor. Commenting on her two films playing opposite Cooper, actress Ingrid Bergman concluded, "The personality of this man was so enormous, so overpowering—and that expression in his eyes and his face, it was so delicate and so underplayed. You just didn't notice it until you saw it on the screen. I thought he was marvelous; the most underplaying and the most natural actor I ever worked with."
Tom Hanks declared, "In only one scene in the first film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture, we see the future of screen acting in the form of Gary Cooper. He is quiet and natural, somehow different from the other cast members. He does something mysterious with his eyes and shoulders that is much more like 'being' than 'acting'."
Daniel Day-Lewis said, "I don't particularly like westerns as a genre, but I do love certain westerns. 'High Noon' means a lot to me – I love the purity and the honesty, I love Gary Cooper in that film, the idea of the last man standing."
Chris Pratt stated, "I started watching Westerns when I was shooting in London about four or five years ago. I really fell in love with Gary Cooper, and his stuff. That sucked me into the Westerns. Before, I never got engrossed in the story. I'd just dip in, and there were guys in horses in black and white. High Noon's later Gary Cooper, I liked that. But I liked 'The Westerner'. That's my favorite one. I have that poster hung up in my house because I really like that one."
To Al Pacino, "Gary Cooper was a phenomenon—his ability to take some thing and elevate it, give it such dignity. One of the great presences."
Mylène Demongeot first got with Gary Cooper for the opening of the first escalator to be installed in a cinema, at the Rex Theatre in Paris, on June 7, 1957. She declared in a 2015 filmed interview: "Gary Cooper ... il est sublime ! Aaahhh (Mylène pushing a cry of love not to say ecstasy) il est sublime ... Ah ! Ah ! Ah ! Là je dois dire que ça fait partie des stars, y'a Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, ces grands Américains que j'ai rencontrés comme ça, c'est vraiment des mecs incroyables. Y'en a plus des comme ça ! Euh non. (Gary Cooper was sublime, there I have to say, now he, was part of the stars, Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, those great americans who I've met really were unbelievable guys, there aren't any like them anymore)."
Career assessment and legacy
Cooper's career spanned thirty-six years, from 1925 to 1961. During that time, he appeared in eighty-four feature films in a leading role. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His natural and authentic acting style appealed powerfully to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major movie genres, including Westerns, war films, adventure films, drama films, crime films, romance films, comedy films, and romantic comedy films. He appeared on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities for twenty-three consecutive years, from 1936 to 1958. According to Quigley's annual poll, Cooper was one of the top money-making stars for eighteen years, appearing in the top ten in 1936–37, 1941–49, and 1951–57. He topped the list in 1953. In Quigley's list of all-time money-making stars, Cooper is listed fourth, after John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and Tom Cruise. At the time of his death, it was estimated that his films grossed well over $200 million (equivalent to $ billion in ).
In over half of his feature films, Cooper portrayed Westerners, soldiers, pilots, sailors, and explorers—all men of action. In the rest he played a wide range of characters, included doctors, professors, artists, architects, clerks, and baseball players. Cooper's heroic screen image changed with each period of his career. In his early films, he played the young naive hero sure of his moral position and trusting in the triumph of simple virtues (The Virginian). After becoming a major star, his Western screen persona was replaced by a more cautious hero in adventure films and dramas (A Farewell to Arms). During the height of his career, from 1936 to 1943, he played a new type of hero—a champion of the common man willing to sacrifice himself for others (Mr. Deeds, Meet John Doe, and For Whom the Bell Tolls).
In the post-war years, Cooper attempted broader variations on his screen image, which now reflected a hero increasingly at odds with the world who must face adversity alone (The Fountainhead and High Noon). In his final films, Cooper's hero rejects the violence of the past, and seeks to reclaim lost honor and find redemption (Friendly Persuasion and Man of the West). The screen persona he developed and sustained throughout his career represented the ideal American hero—a tall, handsome, and sincere man of steadfast integrity who emphasized action over intellect, and combined the heroic qualities of the romantic lover, the adventurer, and the common man.
On February 6, 1960, Cooper was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6243 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to the film industry. He was awarded a star on the sidewalk outside the Ellen Theater in Bozeman, Montana.
On May 6, 1961, he was awarded the French Order of Arts and Letters in recognition of his significant contribution to the arts. On July 30, 1961, he was posthumously awarded the David di Donatello Special Award in Italy for his career achievements.
In 1966, he was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. In 2015, he was inducted into the Utah Cowboy and Western Heritage Hall of Fame. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper eleventh on its list of the 25 male stars of classic Hollywood. Three of his characters—Will Kane, Lou Gehrig, and Sergeant York—made AFI's list of the one hundred greatest heroes and villains, all of them as heroes. His Lou Gehrig line, "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.", is ranked by AFI as the thirty-eighth greatest movie quote of all time.
More than a half century after his death, Cooper's enduring legacy, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, is his image of the ideal American hero preserved in his film performances. Charlton Heston once observed, "He projected the kind of man Americans would like to be, probably more than any actor that's ever lived."
In the TV series Justified, based on works and characters created by Elmore Leonard, Gary Cooper is used throughout the six seasons as the man whom U.S. Marshall Raylan Givens, played by Timothy Olyphant, aspires to be. When his colleague asks Marshall Givens how he thinks his dangerous plan to bring down a villain can possibly work, he replies: "Why not? Worked for Gary Cooper."
Gary Cooper is referenced several times in the critically acclaimed television series The Sopranos, with protagonist Tony Soprano asking "What ever happened to Gary Cooper? The strong, silent type." while complaining about his problems to his therapist.
In the 1930s hit song "Puttin' On the Ritz", Cooper is referenced in the line "dress up like a million dollar trooper/Tryin' hard to look like Gary Cooper, Super duper!" More than two decades after Cooper's death a new version of the song was released in 1983 by Taco; the original lyrics were kept, including the references to Cooper.
In J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye, Cooper is "spotted" by Holden Caulfield to distract a woman he is dancing with.
Awards and nominations
Filmography
The following is a list of feature films in which Cooper appeared in a leading role.
The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926)
Children of Divorce (1927)
Arizona Bound (1927)
Wings (1927)
Nevada (1927)
It (1927)
The Last Outlaw (1927)
Beau Sabreur (1928)
The Legion of the Condemned (1928)
Doomsday (1928)
Half a Bride (1928)
Lilac Time (1928)
The First Kiss (1928)
The Shopworn Angel (1928)
Wolf Song (1929)
Betrayal (1929)
The Virginian (1929)
Only the Brave (1930)
The Texan (1930)
Seven Days' Leave (1930)
A Man from Wyoming (1930)
The Spoilers (1930)
Morocco (1930)
Fighting Caravans (1931)
City Streets (1931)
I Take This Woman (1931)
His Woman (1931)
Devil and the Deep (1932)
If I Had a Million (1932)
A Farewell to Arms (1932)
Today We Live (1933)
One Sunday Afternoon (1933)
Design for Living (1933)
Alice in Wonderland (1933)
Operator 13 (1934)
Now and Forever (1934)
The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935)
The Wedding Night (1935)
Peter Ibbetson (1935)
Desire (1936)
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)
The General Died at Dawn (1936)
The Plainsman (1936)
Souls at Sea (1937)
The Adventures of Marco Polo (1938)
Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938)
The Cowboy and the Lady (1938)
Beau Geste (1939)
The Real Glory (1939)
The Westerner (1940)
North West Mounted Police (1940)
Meet John Doe (1941)
Sergeant York (1941)
Ball of Fire (1941)
The Pride of the Yankees (1942)
For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)
The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944)
Casanova Brown (1944)
Along Came Jones (1945)
Saratoga Trunk (1945)
Cloak and Dagger (1946)
Unconquered (1947)
Good Sam (1948)
The Fountainhead (1949)
Task Force (1949)
Bright Leaf (1950)
Dallas (1950)
You're in the Navy Now (1951)
It's a Big Country (1951)
Distant Drums (1951)
High Noon (1952)
Springfield Rifle (1952)
Return to Paradise (1953)
Blowing Wild (1953)
Garden of Evil (1954)
Vera Cruz (1954)
The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (1955)
Friendly Persuasion (1956)
Love in the Afternoon (1957)
Ten North Frederick (1958)
Man of the West (1958)
The Hanging Tree (1959)
They Came to Cordura (1959)
The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959)
The Naked Edge (1961)
Radio appearances
References
Notes
Citations
Bibliography
Adrien Le Bihan, Gary Cooper, le prince des acteurs, LettMotif, 2021, 358p.()
External links
1901 births
1961 deaths
20th-century American male actors
Academy Honorary Award recipients
American expatriates in England
American male film actors
American male silent film actors
American male television actors
American people of English descent
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
California Republicans
Catholics from Montana
Conservatism in the United States
Converts to Roman Catholicism from Anglicanism
Deaths from cancer in California
Deaths from prostate cancer
Grinnell College people
Male Western (genre) film actors
Male actors from Montana
Paramount Pictures contract players
People educated at Dunstable Grammar School
People from Brentwood, Los Angeles
People from Dunstable
People from Helena, Montana
People from Holmby Hills, Los Angeles | false | [
"Le Cousin is a 1997 French film directed by Alain Corneau.\n\nPlot \nThe film deals with the relationship of the police and an informant in the drug scene.\n\nAwards and nominations\nLe Cousin was nominated for 5 César Awards but did not win in any category.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1997 films\n1997 crime films\nFilms about drugs\nFilms directed by Alain Corneau\nFrench crime films\nFrench films\nFrench-language films",
"This is a list of films with performances that have been nominated in all of the Academy Award acting categories.\n\nThe Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences annually bestows Academy Awards for acting performances in the following four categories: Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor, and Best Supporting Actress.\n\nFilms \n\nAs of the 93rd Academy Awards (2020), there have been fifteen films containing at least one nominated performance in each of the four Academy Award acting categories. \n\nIn the following list, award winners are listed in bold with gold background; others listed are nominees who did not win. No film has ever won all four awards.\n\nSuperlatives \n\nNo film has won all four awards.\n\nTwo films won three awards: \n\n A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) \n Network (1976)\n\nFour films hold a total of five nominations, each with an additional nomination within one of the four categories:\n\n Mrs. Miniver (1942) – two nominations for Best Supporting Actress\n From Here to Eternity (1953) – two nominations for Best Actor\n Bonnie and Clyde (1968) – two nominations for Best Supporting Actor\n Network (1976) – two nominations for Best Actor\n\nThree of the nominated films failed to win any of the four awards: \n\n My Man Godfrey (1936) – also failed to win any other Academy Awards\n Sunset Boulevard (1950)\n American Hustle (2013) – also failed to win any other Academy Awards\n\nOnly two of the nominated films won Best Picture:\n\n Mrs. Miniver (1942)\n From Here to Eternity (1953)\n\nOnly one of the nominated films was not nominated for Best Picture:\n\n My Man Godfrey (1936)\n\nFive performers were nominated for their work in two different films that received nominations in all acting categories (winners in bold):\n\n William Holden (Sunset Boulevard, Network)\n Warren Beatty (Bonnie and Clyde, Reds)\n Faye Dunaway (Bonnie and Clyde, Network)\n Bradley Cooper (Silver Linings Playbook, American Hustle)\n Jennifer Lawrence (Silver Linings Playbook, American Hustle)\n\nOnly one director has directed two films that received nominations in all four categories:\n\n David O. Russell (Silver Linings Playbook, American Hustle)\n\nThe 40th Academy Awards (1967) was the only ceremony in which multiple films held at least one nomination in all four acting categories:\n\n Bonnie and Clyde\n Guess Who's Coming to Dinner\n\nAll of the films, except My Man Godfrey and For Whom the Bell Tolls, were also nominated for the \"Big Five\" categories (Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress and Best Screenplay (Original or Adapted)).\n\nSee also \n\n List of Big Five Academy Award winners and nominees\n List of films with two or more Academy Awards in an acting category\n\nActing nom"
] |
[
"Gary Cooper",
"Silent films, 1925-28",
"what silent films were made in 1925?",
"In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt,",
"what other silent films?",
"Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones.",
"did he win any awards for these films?",
"I don't know."
] | C_6ec0895035fd4dbda1785cd7d1c7b5d7_1 | what was his greatest accomplishment? | 4 | What was Gary Cooper's greatest accomplishment? | Gary Cooper | In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, including Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt work--which sometimes injured horses and riders--"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name. Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week. Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal--finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings, the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada--both films directed by John Waters. In 1928, Paramount paired Cooper with a youthful Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss--advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride. That year, Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928. CANNOTANSWER | Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. | Gary Cooper (born Frank James Cooper; May 7, 1901 – May 13, 1961) was an American actor known for his strong, silent, and understated acting style. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor twice and had a further three nominations, as well as receiving an Academy Honorary Award for his career achievements in 1961. He was one of the top 10 film personalities for 23 consecutive years, and one of the top money-making stars for 18 years. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper at No. 11 on its list of the 25 greatest male stars of classic Hollywood cinema.
Cooper's career spanned 36 years, from 1925 to 1961, and included leading roles in 84 feature films. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era through to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His screen persona appealed strongly to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major film genres. His ability to project his own personality onto the characters he played contributed to his natural and authentic appearance on screen. Throughout his career, he sustained a screen persona that represented the ideal American hero.
Cooper began his career as a film extra and stunt rider, but soon landed acting roles. After establishing himself as a Western hero in his early silent films, he appeared as the Virginian and became a movie star in 1929 with his first sound picture, The Virginian. In the early 1930s, he expanded his heroic image to include more cautious characters in adventure films and dramas such as A Farewell to Arms (1932) and The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935). During the height of his career, Cooper portrayed a new type of hero—a champion of the common man—in films such as Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), Meet John Doe (1941), Sergeant York (1941), The Pride of the Yankees (1942), and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943). He later portrayed more mature characters at odds with the world in films such as The Fountainhead (1949) and High Noon (1952). In his final films, he played non-violent characters searching for redemption in films such as Friendly Persuasion (1956) and Man of the West (1958).
Early life
Frank James Cooper was born in Helena, Montana, on May 7, 1901, the younger of two sons of English parents Alice (née Brazier; 1873–1967) and Charles Henry Cooper (1865–1946). His brother, Arthur, was six years his senior. Cooper's father came from Houghton Regis, Bedfordshire, and became a prominent lawyer, rancher, and Montana Supreme Court justice. His mother hailed from Gillingham, Kent, and married Charles in Montana. In 1906, Charles purchased the Seven-Bar-Nine cattle ranch, about north of Helena near Craig, Montana. Cooper and Arthur spent their summers at the ranch and learned to ride horses, hunt, and fish. Cooper attended Central Grade School in Helena.
Alice wanted her sons to have an English education, so she took them back to England in 1909 to enroll them in Dunstable Grammar School in Dunstable, Bedfordshire. While there, Cooper and his brother lived with their father's cousins, William and Emily Barton, at their home in Houghton Regis. Cooper studied Latin, French, and English history at Dunstable until 1912. While he adapted to English school discipline and learned the requisite social graces, he never adjusted to the rigid class structure and formal Eton collars he was required to wear. He received his confirmation in the Church of England at the Church of All Saints in Houghton Regis on December 3, 1911. His mother accompanied her sons back to the U.S. in August 1912, and Cooper resumed his education at Johnson Grammar School in Helena.
When Cooper was 15, he injured his hip in a car accident. On his doctor's recommendation, he returned to the Seven-Bar-Nine ranch to recuperate by horseback riding. The misguided therapy left him with his characteristic stiff, off-balanced walk and slightly angled horse-riding style. He left Helena High School after two years in 1918, and returned to the family ranch to work full-time as a cowboy. In 1919, his father arranged for him to attend Gallatin County High School in Bozeman, Montana, where English teacher Ida Davis encouraged him to focus on academics and participate in debating and dramatics. Cooper later called Davis "the woman partly responsible for [him] giving up cowboy-ing and going to college".
Cooper was still attending high school in 1920 when he took three art courses at Montana Agricultural College in Bozeman. His interest in art was inspired years earlier by the Western paintings of Charles Marion Russell and Frederic Remington. Cooper especially admired and studied Russell's Lewis and Clark Meeting Indians at Ross' Hole (1910), which still hangs in the state capitol building in Helena. In 1922, to continue his art education, he enrolled in Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa. He did well academically in most of his courses, but was not accepted into the school's drama club. His drawings and watercolor paintings were exhibited throughout the dormitory, and he was named art editor for the college yearbook. During the summers of 1922 and 1923, Cooper worked at Yellowstone National Park as a tour guide driving the yellow open-top buses. Despite a promising first 18 months at Grinnell, he left college suddenly in February 1924, spent a month in Chicago looking for work as an artist, and then returned to Helena, where he sold editorial cartoons to the local Independent newspaper.
In autumn 1924, Cooper's father left the Montana Supreme Court bench and moved with his wife to Los Angeles to administer the estates of two relatives, and Cooper joined his parents there in November at his father's request. After briefly working a series of unpromising jobs, he met two friends from Montana who were working as film extras and stunt riders in low-budget Western films for the small movie studios on Poverty Row. They introduced him to another Montana cowboy, rodeo champion Jay "Slim" Talbot, who took him to see a casting director. Wanting money for a professional art course, Cooper worked as a film extra for $5 a day, and as a stunt rider for $10. Cooper and Talbot became close friends and hunting companions, and Talbot later worked as Cooper's stuntman and stand-in for over three decades.
Career
Silent films, 1925–1928
In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, but also the already emergent major studios, Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt workwhich sometimes injured horses and riders"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name.
Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week.
Cooper's first important film role was a supporting part in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) starring Ronald Colman and Vilma Bánky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal—finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings (both 1927), the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada—both films directed by John Waters.
Paramount paired Cooper with Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss (both 1928)—advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride (also both 1928). Around the same time, Cooper made Lilac Time (1928) with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928.
Hollywood stardom, 1929–1935
Cooper became a major movie star in 1929 with the release of his first talking picture, The Virginian (1929), which was directed by Victor Fleming and co-starred Mary Brian and Walter Huston. Based on the popular novel by Owen Wister, The Virginian was one of the first sound films to define the Western code of honor and helped establish many of the conventions of the Western movie genre that persist to the present day. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, the romantic image of the tall, handsome, and shy cowboy hero who embodied male freedom, courage, and honor was created in large part by Cooper in the film. Unlike some silent film actors who had trouble adapting to the new sound medium, Cooper transitioned naturally, with his "deep and clear" and "pleasantly drawling" voice, which was perfectly suited for the characters he portrayed on screen, also according to Meyers. Looking to capitalize on Cooper's growing popularity, Paramount cast him in several Westerns and wartime dramas, including Only the Brave, The Texan, Seven Days' Leave, A Man from Wyoming, and The Spoilers (all released in 1930). Norman Rockwell depicted Cooper in his role as The Texan for the cover of The Saturday Evening Post on May 24, 1930.
One of the more important performances in Cooper's early career was his portrayal of a sullen legionnaire in Josef von Sternberg's film Morocco (also 1930) with Marlene Dietrich in her introduction to American audiences. During production, von Sternberg focused his energies on Dietrich and treated Cooper dismissively. Tensions came to a head after von Sternberg yelled directions at Cooper in German. The actor approached the director, picked him up by the collar, and said, "If you expect to work in this country you'd better get on to the language we use here." Despite the tensions on the set, Cooper produced "one of his best performances", according to Thornton Delehanty of the New York Evening Post.
After returning to the Western genre in Zane Grey's Fighting Caravans (1931) with French actress Lili Damita, Cooper appeared in the Dashiell Hammett crime film City Streets (also 1931), co-starring Sylvia Sidney and Paul Lukas, playing a westerner who gets involved with big-city gangsters in order to save the woman he loves. Cooper concluded the year with appearances in two unsuccessful films: I Take This Woman (also 1931) with Carole Lombard, and His Woman with Claudette Colbert. The demands and pressures of making ten films in two years left Cooper exhausted and in poor health, suffering from anemia and jaundice. He had lost during that period, and felt lonely, isolated, and depressed by his sudden fame and wealth. In May 1931, Cooper left Hollywood and sailed to Algiers and then Italy, where he lived for the next year.
During his time abroad, Cooper stayed with the Countess Dorothy di Frasso at the Villa Madama in Rome, where she taught him about good food and vintage wines, how to read Italian and French menus, and how to socialize among Europe's nobility and upper classes. After guiding him through the great art museums and galleries of Italy, she accompanied him on a ten-week big-game hunting safari on the slopes of Mount Kenya in East Africa, where he was credited with over sixty kills, including two lions, a rhinoceros, and various antelopes. His safari experience in Africa had a profound influence on Cooper and intensified his love of the wilderness. After returning to Europe, he and the countess set off on a Mediterranean cruise of the Italian and French Rivieras. Rested and rejuvenated by his year-long exile, a healthy Cooper returned to Hollywood in April 1932 and negotiated a new contract with Paramount for two films per year, a salary of $4,000 a week, and director and script approval.
In 1932, after completing Devil and the Deep with Tallulah Bankhead to fulfill his old contract, Cooper appeared in A Farewell to Arms, the first film adaptation of an Ernest Hemingway novel. Co-starring Helen Hayes, a leading New York theatre star and Academy Award winner, and Adolphe Menjou, the film presented Cooper with one of his most ambitious and challenging dramatic roles, playing an American ambulance driver wounded in Italy who falls in love with an English nurse during World War I. Critics praised his highly intense and emotional performance, and the film became one of the year's most commercially successful pictures. In 1933, after making Today We Live with Joan Crawford and One Sunday Afternoon with Fay Wray, Cooper appeared in the Ernst Lubitsch comedy film Design for Living, based on the successful Noël Coward play. Co-starring Miriam Hopkins and Fredric March, the film was a box office success, ranking as one of the top ten highest-grossing films of 1933. All three of the lead actors—March, Cooper, and Hopkins—received attention from this film as they were all at the peak of their careers. Cooper's performance — playing an American artist in Europe competing with his playwright friend for the affections of a beautiful woman — was singled out for its versatility and revealed his genuine ability to do light comedy. Cooper changed his name legally to "Gary Cooper" in August 1933.
In 1934, Cooper was loaned out to MGM for the Civil War drama film Operator 13 with Marion Davies, about a beautiful Union spy who falls in love with a Confederate soldier. Despite Richard Boleslawski's imaginative direction and George J. Folsey's lavish cinematography, the film did poorly at the box office.
Back at Paramount, Cooper appeared in his first of seven films by director Henry Hathaway, Now and Forever, with Carole Lombard and Shirley Temple. In the film, he plays a confidence man who tries to sell his daughter to the relatives who raised her, but is eventually won over by the adorable girl. Impressed by Temple's intelligence and charm, Cooper developed a close rapport with her, both on and off screen. The film was a box-office success.
The following year, Cooper was loaned out to Samuel Goldwyn Productions to appear in King Vidor's romance film The Wedding Night with Anna Sten, who was being groomed as "another Garbo". In the film, Cooper plays an alcoholic novelist who retreats to his family's New England farm where he meets and falls in love with a beautiful Polish neighbor. Cooper delivered a performance of surprising range and depth, according to biographer Larry Swindell. Despite receiving generally favorable reviews, the film was not popular with American audiences, who may have been offended by the film's depiction of an extramarital affair and its tragic ending.
That same year, Cooper appeared in two Henry Hathaway films: the melodrama Peter Ibbetson with Ann Harding, about a man caught up in a dream world created by his love for a childhood sweetheart, and the adventure film The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, about a daring British officer and his men who defend their stronghold at Bengal against rebellious local tribes. While the former, championed by the surrealists became more successful in Europe than in the United States, the latter was nominated for seven Academy Awards and became one of Cooper's most popular and successful adventure films. Hathaway had the highest respect for Cooper's acting ability, calling him "the best actor of all of them".
American folk hero, 1936–1943
From Mr. Deeds to The Real Glory, 1936–1939
Cooper's career took an important turn in 1936. After making Frank Borzage's romantic comedy film Desire with Marlene Dietrich at Paramount—in which he delivered a performance considered by some contemporary critics as one of his finest—Cooper returned to Poverty Row for the first time since his early silent film days to make Frank Capra's Mr. Deeds Goes to Town with Jean Arthur for Columbia Pictures. In the film, Cooper plays the character of Longfellow Deeds, a quiet, innocent writer of greeting cards who inherits a fortune, leaves behind his idyllic life in Vermont, and travels to New York where he faces a world of corruption and deceit. Capra and screenwriter Robert Riskin were able to use Cooper's well-established screen persona as the "quintessential American hero"—a symbol of honesty, courage, and goodness—to create a new type of "folk hero" for the common man. Commenting on Cooper's impact on the character and the film, Capra observed:
Both Desire and Mr. Deeds opened in April 1936 to critical praise and were major box-office successes. In his review in The New York Times, Frank Nugent wrote that Cooper was "proving himself one of the best light comedians in Hollywood". For his performance in Mr. Deeds, Cooper received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.
Cooper appeared in two other Paramount films in 1936. In Lewis Milestone's adventure film The General Died at Dawn with Madeleine Carroll, he plays an American soldier of fortune in China who helps the peasants defend themselves against the oppression of a cruel warlord. Written by playwright Clifford Odets, the film was a critical and commercial success.
In Cecil B. DeMille's sprawling frontier epic The Plainsman—his first of four films with the director—Cooper portrays Wild Bill Hickok in a highly fictionalized version of the opening of the American western frontier. The film was an even greater box-office hit than its predecessor, due in large part to Jean Arthur's definitive depiction of Calamity Jane and Cooper's inspired portrayal of Hickock as an enigmatic figure of "deepening mythic substance". That year, Cooper appeared for the first time on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities, where he would remain for the next twenty-three years.
In late 1936, Paramount was preparing a new contract for Cooper that would raise his salary to $8,000 a week when Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn for six films over six years with a minimum guarantee of $150,000 per picture. Paramount brought suit against Goldwyn and Cooper, and the court ruled that Cooper's new Goldwyn contract afforded the actor sufficient time to also honor his Paramount agreement. Cooper continued to make films with both studios, and by 1939 the United States Treasury reported that Cooper was the country's highest wage earner, at $482,819 (equivalent to $ million in ).
In contrast to his output the previous year, Cooper appeared in only one picture in 1937, Henry Hathaway's adventure film Souls at Sea. A critical and box-office failure, Cooper referred to it as his "almost picture", saying, "It was almost exciting, and almost interesting. And I was almost good." In 1938, he appeared in Archie Mayo's biographical film The Adventures of Marco Polo. Plagued by production problems and a weak screenplay, the film became Goldwyn's biggest failure to that date, losing $700,000. During this period, Cooper turned down several important roles, including the role of Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind. Cooper was producer David O. Selznick's first choice for the part. He made several overtures to the actor, but Cooper had doubts about the project, and did not feel suited to the role. Cooper later admitted, "It was one of the best roles ever offered in Hollywood ... But I said no. I didn't see myself as quite that dashing, and later, when I saw Clark Gable play the role to perfection, I knew I was right."
Back at Paramount, Cooper returned to a more comfortable genre in Ernst Lubitsch's romantic comedy Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938) with Claudette Colbert. In the film, Cooper plays a wealthy American businessman in France who falls in love with an impoverished aristocrat's daughter and persuades her to become his eighth wife. Despite the clever screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder, and solid performances by Cooper and Colbert, American audiences had trouble accepting Cooper in the role of a shallow philanderer. It succeeded only at the European box office market.
In the fall of 1938, Cooper appeared in H. C. Potter's romantic comedy The Cowboy and the Lady with Merle Oberon, about a sweet-natured rodeo cowboy who falls in love with the wealthy daughter of a presidential hopeful, believing her to be a poor, hard-working lady's maid. The efforts of three directors and several eminent screenwriters could not salvage what could have been a fine vehicle for Cooper. While more successful than its predecessor, the film was Cooper's fourth consecutive box-office failure in the American market.
In the next two years, Cooper was more discerning about the roles he accepted and made four successful large-scale adventure and cowboy films. In William A. Wellman's adventure film Beau Geste (1939), he plays one of three daring English brothers who join the French Foreign Legion in the Sahara to fight local tribes. Filmed in the same Mojave Desert locations as the original 1926 version with Ronald Colman, Beau Geste provided Cooper with magnificent sets, exotic settings, high-spirited action, and a role tailored to his personality and screen persona. This was the last film in Cooper's contract with Paramount.
In Henry Hathaway's The Real Glory (1939), he plays a military doctor who accompanies a small group of American Army officers to the Philippines to help the Christian Filipinos defend themselves against Muslim radicals. Many film critics praised Cooper's performance, including author and film critic Graham Greene, who recognized that he "never acted better".
From The Westerner to For Whom the Bell Tolls, 1940–1943
Cooper returned to the Western genre in William Wyler's The Westerner (1940) with Walter Brennan and Doris Davenport, about a drifting cowboy who defends homesteaders against Roy Bean, a corrupt judge known as the "law west of the Pecos". Screenwriter Niven Busch relied on Cooper's extensive knowledge of Western history while working on the script. The film received positive reviews and did well at the box-office, with reviewers praising the performances of the two lead actors. That same year, Cooper appeared in his first all-Technicolor feature, Cecil B. DeMille's adventure film North West Mounted Police (1940). In the film, Cooper plays a Texas Ranger who pursues an outlaw into western Canada where he joins forces with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who are after the same man, a leader of the North-West Rebellion. While not as popular with critics as its predecessor, the film was another box-office success—the sixth-highest-grossing film of 1940.
The early 1940s were Cooper's prime years as an actor. In a relatively short period, he appeared in five critically successful and popular films that produced some of his finest performances. When Frank Capra offered him the lead role in Meet John Doe before Robert Riskin even developed the script, Cooper accepted his friend's offer, saying, "It's okay, Frank, I don't need a script." In the film, Cooper plays Long John Willoughby, a down-and-out bush-league pitcher hired by a newspaper to pretend to be a man who promises to commit suicide on Christmas Eve to protest all the hypocrisy and corruption in the country. Considered by some critics to be Capra's best film at the time, Meet John Doe was received as a "national event" with Cooper appearing on the front cover of Time magazine on March 3, 1941. In his review in the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes called Cooper's performance a "splendid and utterly persuasive portrayal" and praised his "utterly realistic acting which comes through with such authority". Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote, "Gary Cooper, of course, is 'John Doe' to the life and in the whole—shy, bewildered, non-aggressive, but a veritable tiger when aroused."
That same year, Cooper made two films with director and good friend Howard Hawks. In the biographical film Sergeant York, Cooper portrays war hero Alvin C. York, one of the most decorated American soldiers in World War I. The film chronicles York's early backwoods days in Tennessee, his religious conversion and subsequent piety, his stand as a conscientious objector, and finally his heroic actions at the Battle of the Argonne Forest, which earned him the Medal of Honor. Initially, Cooper was nervous and uncertain about playing a living hero, so he traveled to Tennessee to visit York at his home, and the two quiet men established an immediate rapport and discovered they had much in common. Inspired by York's encouragement, Cooper delivered a performance that Howard Barnes of the New York Herald Tribune called "one of extraordinary conviction and versatility", and that Archer Winston of the New York Post called "one of his best". After the film's release, Cooper was awarded the Distinguished Citizenship Medal by the Veterans of Foreign Wars for his "powerful contribution to the promotion of patriotism and loyalty". York admired Cooper's performance and helped promote the film for Warner Bros. Sergeant York became the top-grossing film of the year and was nominated for eleven Academy Awards. Accepting his first Academy Award for Best Actor from his friend James Stewart, Cooper said, "It was Sergeant Alvin York who won this award. Shucks, I've been in the business sixteen years and sometimes dreamed I might get one of these. That's all I can say ... Funny when I was dreaming I always made a better speech."
Cooper concluded the year back at Goldwyn with Howard Hawks to make the romantic comedy Ball of Fire with Barbara Stanwyck. In the film, Cooper plays a shy linguistics professor who leads a team of seven scholars who are writing an encyclopedia. While researching slang, he meets Stanwyck's flirtatious burlesque stripper Sugarpuss O'Shea who blows the dust off their staid life of books. The screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder provided Cooper the opportunity to exercise the full range of his light comedy skills. In his review for the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes wrote that Cooper handled the role with "great skill and comic emphasis" and that his performance was "utterly delightful". Though small in scale, Ball of Fire was one of the top-grossing films of the year—Cooper's fourth consecutive picture to make the top twenty.
Cooper's only film appearance in 1942 was also his last under his Goldwyn contract. In Sam Wood's biographical film The Pride of the Yankees, Cooper portrays baseball star Lou Gehrig who established a record with the New York Yankees for playing in 2,130 consecutive games. Cooper was reluctant to play the seven-time All-Star, who only died the previous year from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) — now commonly called "Lou Gehrig's disease". Beyond the challenges of effectively portraying such a popular and nationally recognized figure, Cooper knew very little about baseball and was not left-handed like Gehrig.
After Gehrig's widow visited the actor and expressed her desire that he portray her husband, Cooper accepted the role that covered a twenty-year span of Gehrig's life—his early love of baseball, his rise to greatness, his loving marriage, and his struggle with illness, culminating in his farewell speech at Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939 before 62,000 fans. Cooper quickly learned the physical movements of a baseball player and developed a fluid, believable swing. The handedness issue was solved by reversing the print for certain batting scenes. The film was one of the year's top ten pictures and received eleven Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's third).
Soon after the publication of Ernest Hemingway's novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, Paramount paid $150,000 for the film rights with the express intent of casting Cooper in the lead role of Robert Jordan, an American explosives expert who fights alongside the Republican loyalists during the Spanish Civil War. The original director, Cecil B. DeMille, was replaced by Sam Wood who brought in Dudley Nichols for the screenplay. After the start of principal photography in the Sierra Nevada in late 1942, Ingrid Bergman was brought in to replace ballerina Vera Zorina as the female lead—a change supported by Cooper and Hemingway. The love scenes between Bergman and Cooper were "rapturous" and passionate. Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune wrote that both actors performed with "the true stature and authority of stars". While the film distorted the novel's original political themes and meaning, For Whom the Bell Tolls was a critical and commercial success and received ten Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's fourth).
World War II related activities
Due to his age and health, Cooper did not serve in the military during World War II, but like many of his colleagues, he got involved in the war effort by entertaining the troops. In June 1943, he visited military hospitals in San Diego, and often appeared at the Hollywood Canteen serving food to the servicemen. In late 1943, Cooper undertook a tour of the South West Pacific with actresses Una Merkel and Phyllis Brooks, and accordionist Andy Arcari.
Traveling on a B-24A Liberator bomber, the group toured the Cook Islands, Fiji, New Caledonia, Queensland, Brisbane—where General Douglas MacArthur told Cooper he was watching Sergeant York in a Manila theater when Japanese bombs began falling—New Guinea, Jayapura, and throughout the Solomon Islands.
The group often shared the same sparse living conditions and K-rations as the troops. Cooper met with the servicemen and women, visited military hospitals, introduced his attractive colleagues, and participated in occasional skits. The shows concluded with Cooper's moving recitation of Lou Gehrig's farewell speech. When he returned to the United States, he visited military hospitals throughout the country. Cooper later called his time with the troops the "greatest emotional experience" of his life.
Mature roles, 1944–1952
In 1944, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's wartime adventure film The Story of Dr. Wassell with Laraine Day — his third movie with the director. In the film, Cooper plays American doctor and missionary Corydon M. Wassell, who leads a group of wounded sailors through the jungles of Java to safety. Despite receiving poor reviews, Dr. Wassell was one of the top-grossing films of the year. With his Goldwyn and Paramount contracts now concluded, Cooper decided to remain independent and formed his own production company, International Pictures, with Leo Spitz, William Goetz, and Nunnally Johnson. The fledgling studio's first offering was Sam Wood's romantic comedy Casanova Brown with Teresa Wright, about a man who learns his soon-to-be ex-wife is pregnant with his child, just as he is about to marry another woman. The film received poor reviews, with the New York Daily News calling it "delightful nonsense", and Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, criticizing Cooper's "somewhat obvious and ridiculous clowning". The film was barely profitable.
In 1945, Cooper starred in and produced Stuart Heisler's Western comedy Along Came Jones with Loretta Young for International. In this lighthearted parody of his past heroic image, Cooper plays comically inept cowboy Melody Jones who is mistaken for a ruthless killer. Audiences embraced Cooper's character, and the film was one of the top box-office pictures of the year—a testament to Cooper's still vital audience appeal. It was also International's biggest financial success during its brief history before being sold off to Universal Studios in 1946.
Cooper's career during the post-war years drifted in new directions as American society was changing. While he still played conventional heroic roles, his films now relied less on his heroic screen persona and more on novel stories and exotic settings. In November 1945, Cooper appeared in Sam Wood's nineteenth-century period drama Saratoga Trunk with Ingrid Bergman, about a Texas cowboy and his relationship with a beautiful fortune-hunter. Filmed in early 1943, the movie's release was delayed for two years due to the increased demand for war movies. Despite poor reviews, Saratoga Trunk did well at the box office and became one of the top money-makers of the year for Warner Bros. Cooper's only film in 1946 was Fritz Lang's romantic thriller Cloak and Dagger, about a mild-mannered physics professor recruited by the OSS during the last years of World War II to investigate the German atomic bomb program. Playing a part loosely based on physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, Cooper was uneasy with the role and unable to convey the "inner sense" of the character. The film received poor reviews and was a box-office failure. In 1947, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's epic adventure film Unconquered with Paulette Goddard, about a Virginia militiaman who defends settlers against an unscrupulous gun trader and hostile Indians on the Western frontier during the eighteenth century. The film received mixed reviews, but even long-time DeMille critic James Agee acknowledged the picture had "some authentic flavor of the period". This last of four films made with DeMille was Cooper's most lucrative, earning the actor over $300,000 (equal to $ today) in salary and percentage of profits. Unconquered would be his last unqualified box-office success for the next five years.
In 1948, after making Leo McCarey's romantic comedy Good Sam, Cooper sold his company to Universal Studios and signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros. that gave him script and director approval and a guaranteed $295,000 (equal to $ today) per picture. His first film under the new contract was King Vidor's drama The Fountainhead (1949) with Patricia Neal and Raymond Massey. In the film, Cooper plays an idealistic and uncompromising architect who struggles to maintain his integrity and individualism in the face of societal pressures to conform to popular standards. Based on the novel by Ayn Rand who also wrote the screenplay, the film reflects her philosophy and attacks the concepts of collectivism while promoting the virtues of individualism. For most critics, Cooper was hopelessly miscast in the role of Howard Roark. In his review for The New York Times, Bosley Crowther concluded he was "Mr. Deeds out of his element". Cooper returned to his element in Delmer Daves' war drama Task Force (1949), about a retiring rear admiral who reminisces about his long career as a naval aviator and his role in the development of aircraft carriers. Cooper's performance and the Technicolor newsreel footage supplied by the United States Navy made the film one of Cooper's most popular during this period. In the next two years, Cooper made four poorly received films: Michael Curtiz' period drama Bright Leaf (1950), Stuart Heisler's Western melodrama Dallas (1950), Henry Hathaway's wartime comedy You're in the Navy Now (1951), and Raoul Walsh's Western action film Distant Drums (1951).
Cooper's most important film during the post-war years was Fred Zinnemann's Western drama High Noon (1952) with Grace Kelly and Katy Jurado for United Artists. In the film, Cooper plays retiring sheriff Will Kane who is preparing to leave town on his honeymoon when he learns that an outlaw he helped put away and his three henchmen are returning to seek their revenge. Unable to gain the support of the frightened townspeople, and abandoned by his young bride, Kane nevertheless stays to face the outlaws alone. During the filming, Cooper was in poor health and in considerable pain from stomach ulcers. His ravaged face and discomfort in some scenes "photographed as self-doubt", according to biographer Hector Arce, and contributed to the effectiveness of his performance. Considered one of the first "adult" Westerns for its theme of moral courage, High Noon received enthusiastic reviews for its artistry, with Time magazine placing it in the ranks of Stagecoach and The Gunfighter. Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote that Cooper was "at the top of his form", and John McCarten, in The New Yorker, wrote that Cooper was never more effective. The film earned $3.75 million in the United States and $18 million worldwide. Following the example of his friend James Stewart, Cooper accepted a lower salary in exchange for a percent of the profits, and ended up making $600,000. Cooper's understated performance was widely praised, and earned him his second Academy Award for Best Actor.
Later films, 1953–1961
After appearing in André de Toth's Civil War drama Springfield Rifle (1952)—a standard Warner Bros. film that was overshadowed by the success of its predecessor—Cooper made four films outside the United States. In Mark Robson's drama Return to Paradise (1953), Cooper plays an American wanderer who liberates the inhabitants of a Polynesian island from the puritanical rule of a misguided pastor. Cooper endured spartan living conditions, long hours, and ill health during the three-month location shoot on the island of Upolu in Western Samoa. Despite its beautiful cinematography, the film received poor reviews. Cooper's next three films were shot in Mexico. In Hugo Fregonese's action adventure film Blowing Wild (1953) with Barbara Stanwyck, he plays a wildcatter in Mexico who gets involved with an oil company executive and his unscrupulous wife with whom he once had an affair.
In 1954, Cooper appeared in Henry Hathaway's Western drama Garden of Evil, with Susan Hayward, about three soldiers of fortune in Mexico hired to rescue a woman's husband. That same year, he appeared in Robert Aldrich's Western adventure Vera Cruz with Burt Lancaster. In the film, Cooper plays an American adventurer hired by Emperor Maximilian I to escort a countess to Vera Cruz during the Mexican Rebellion of 1866. All of these films received poor reviews but did well at the box-office. For his work in Vera Cruz, Cooper earned $1.4 million in salary and percent of the gross.
During this period, Cooper struggled with health problems. As well as his ongoing treatment for ulcers, he suffered a severe shoulder injury during the filming of Blowing Wild when he was hit by metal fragments from a dynamited oil well. During the filming of Vera Cruz, he reinjured his hip falling from a horse, and was burned when Lancaster fired his rifle too close and the wadding from the blank shell pierced his clothing.
In 1955, he appeared in Otto Preminger's biographical war drama The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell, about the World War I general who tried to convince government officials of the importance of air power, and was court-martialed after blaming the War Department for a series of air disasters. Some critics felt that Cooper was miscast, and that his dull, tight-lipped performance did not reflect Mitchell's dynamic and caustic personality. In 1956, Cooper was more effective playing a gentle Indiana Quaker in William Wyler's Civil War drama Friendly Persuasion with Dorothy McGuire. Like Sergeant York and High Noon, the film addresses the conflict between religious pacifism and civic duty. For his performance, Cooper received his second Golden Globe nomination for Best Motion Picture Actor. The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, was awarded the Palme d'Or at the 1957 Cannes Film Festival, and went on to earn $8 million worldwide.
In 1956, Cooper traveled to France to make Billy Wilder's romantic comedy Love in the Afternoon with Audrey Hepburn and Maurice Chevalier. In the film, Cooper plays a middle-aged American playboy in Paris who pursues and eventually falls in love with a much younger woman. Despite receiving some positive reviews—including from Bosley Crowther who praised the film's "charming performances"—most reviewers concluded that Cooper was simply too old for the part. While audiences may not have welcomed seeing Cooper's heroic screen image tarnished by his playing an aging roué trying to seduce an innocent young girl, the film was still a box-office success. The following year, Cooper appeared in Philip Dunne's romantic drama Ten North Frederick. In the film, which was based on the novel by John O'Hara, Cooper plays an attorney whose life is ruined by a double-crossing politician and his own secret affair with his daughter's young roommate. While Cooper brought "conviction and controlled anguish" to his performance, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, it was not enough to save what Bosley Crowther called a "hapless film".
Despite his ongoing health problems and several operations for ulcers and hernias, Cooper continued to work in action films. In 1958, he appeared in Anthony Mann's Western drama Man of the West (1958) with Julie London and Lee J. Cobb, about a reformed outlaw and killer who is forced to confront his violent past when the train he is riding in is held up by his former gang members. The film has been called Cooper's "most pathological Western", with its themes of impotent rage, sexual humiliation, and sadism. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, Cooper, who struggled with moral conflicts in his personal life, "understood the anguish of a character striving to retain his integrity ... [and] brought authentic feeling to the role of a tempted and tormented, yet essentially decent man". Mostly ignored by critics at the time, the film is now well-regarded by film scholars and is considered Cooper's last great film.
After his Warner Bros. contract ended, Cooper formed his own production company, Baroda Productions, and made three unusual films in 1959 about redemption. In Delmer Daves' Western drama The Hanging Tree, Cooper plays a frontier doctor who saves a criminal from a lynch mob, and later tries to exploit his sordid past. Cooper delivered a "powerful and persuasive" performance of an emotionally scarred man whose need to dominate others is transformed by the love and sacrifice of a woman. In Robert Rossen's historical adventure They Came to Cordura with Rita Hayworth, he plays an army officer who is found guilty of cowardice and assigned the degrading task of recommending soldiers for the Medal of Honor during the Pancho Villa Expedition of 1916.
While Cooper received positive reviews, Variety and Films in Review felt he was too old for the part. In Michael Anderson's action drama The Wreck of the Mary Deare with Charlton Heston, Cooper plays a disgraced merchant marine officer who decides to stay aboard his sinking cargo ship in order to prove the vessel was deliberately scuttled and to redeem his good name. Like its two predecessors, the film was physically demanding. Cooper, who was a trained scuba diver, did most of his own underwater scenes. Biographer Jeffrey Meyers observed that in all three roles, Cooper effectively conveyed the sense of lost honor and desire for redemption—what Joseph Conrad in Lord Jim called the "struggles of an individual trying to save from the fire his idea of what his moral identity should be".
Personal life
Marriage and family
Cooper was formally introduced to his future wife, 20-year-old New York debutante Veronica Balfe, on Easter Sunday 1933 at a party given by her uncle, art director Cedric Gibbons. Called "Rocky" by her family and friends, she grew up on Park Avenue and attended finishing schools. Her stepfather was Wall Street tycoon Paul Shields. Cooper and Rocky were quietly married at her parents' Park Avenue residence on December 15, 1933. According to his friends, the marriage had a positive impact on Cooper, who turned away from past indiscretions and took control of his life. Athletic and a lover of the outdoors, Rocky shared many of Cooper's interests, including riding, skiing, and skeet-shooting. She organized their social life, and her wealth and social connections provided Cooper access to New York high society. Cooper and his wife owned homes in the Los Angeles area in Encino (1933–36), Brentwood (1936–53), and Holmby Hills (1954–61), and owned a vacation home in Aspen, Colorado (1949–53).
Gary and Veronica Cooper's daughter, Maria Veronica Cooper, was born on September 15, 1937. By all accounts, he was a patient and affectionate father, teaching Maria to ride a bicycle, play tennis, ski, and ride horses. Sharing many of her parents' interests, she accompanied them on their travels and was often photographed with them. Like her father, she developed a love for art and drawing. As a family they vacationed together in Sun Valley, Idaho, spent time at Rocky's parents' country house in Southampton, New York, and took frequent trips to Europe. Cooper and Rocky were legally separated on May 16, 1951, when Cooper moved out of their home. For over two years, they maintained a fragile and uneasy family life with their daughter. Cooper moved back into their home in November 1953, and their formal reconciliation occurred in February 1954.
Romantic relationships
Prior to his marriage, Cooper had a series of romantic relationships with leading actresses, beginning in 1927 with Clara Bow, who advanced his career by helping him get one of his first leading roles in Children of Divorce. Bow was also responsible for getting Cooper a role in Wings, which generated an enormous amount of fan mail for the young actor. In 1928, he had a relationship with another experienced actress, Evelyn Brent, whom he met while filming Beau Sabreur. In 1929, while filming The Wolf Song, Cooper began an intense affair with Lupe Vélez, which was the most important romance of his early life. During their two years together, Cooper also had brief affairs with Marlene Dietrich while filming Morocco in 1930 and with Carole Lombard while making I Take This Woman in 1931. During his year abroad in 1931–32, Cooper had an affair with the married Countess Dorothy di Frasso, while staying at her Villa Madama near Rome.
After he was married in December 1933, Cooper remained faithful to his wife until the summer of 1942, when he began an affair with Ingrid Bergman during the production of For Whom the Bell Tolls. Their relationship lasted through the completion of filming Saratoga Trunk in June 1943. In 1948, after finishing work on The Fountainhead, Cooper began an affair with actress Patricia Neal, his co-star. At first they kept their affair discreet, but eventually it became an open secret in Hollywood, and Cooper's wife confronted him with the rumors, which he admitted were true. He also confessed that he was in love with Neal, and continued to see her. Cooper and his wife were legally separated in May 1951, but he did not seek a divorce. Neal later claimed that Cooper hit her after she went on a date with Kirk Douglas, and that he arranged for her to have an abortion when she became pregnant with Cooper's child. Neal ended their relationship in late December 1951. During his three-year separation from his wife, Cooper was rumored to have had affairs with Grace Kelly, Lorraine Chanel, and Gisèle Pascal.
Cooper biographers have explored his friendship in the late twenties with the actor Anderson Lawler, with whom Cooper shared a house on and off for a year, while at the same time seeing Clara Bow, Evelyn Brent and Lupe Vélez. Lupe Vélez once told Hedda Hopper of Vélez' affair with Cooper; whenever he would come home after seeing Lawler, she would sniff for Lawler's cologne. Vélez' biographer Michelle Vogel has reported that Vélez consented to Cooper's sexual behavior with Lawler, but only as long as she, too, could participate. In later life, he became involved in a relationship with the costume designer Irene, and was, according to Irene, "the only man she ever loved". A year after his death in 1961, Irene committed suicide by jumping from the 11th floor of the Knickerbocker Hotel, after telling Doris Day of her grief over Cooper's death.
Friendships, interests, and character
Cooper's twenty-year friendship with Ernest Hemingway began at Sun Valley in October 1940. The previous year, Hemingway drew upon Cooper's image when he created the character of Robert Jordan for the novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. The two shared a passion for the outdoors, and for years they hunted duck and pheasant, and skied together in Sun Valley. Both men admired the work of Rudyard Kipling—Cooper kept a copy of the poem "If—" in his dressing room—and retained as adults Kipling's sense of boyish adventure.
As well as admiring Cooper's hunting skills and knowledge of the outdoors, Hemingway believed his character matched his screen persona, once telling a friend, "If you made up a character like Coop, nobody would believe it. He's just too good to be true." They saw each other often, and their friendship remained strong through the years.
Cooper's social life generally centered on sports, outdoor activities, and dinner parties with his family and friends from the film industry, including directors Henry Hathaway, Howard Hawks, William Wellman, and Fred Zinnemann, and actors Joel McCrea, James Stewart, Barbara Stanwyck, and Robert Taylor. As well as hunting, Cooper enjoyed riding, fishing, skiing, and later in life, scuba diving. He never abandoned his early love for art and drawing, and over the years, he and his wife acquired a private collection of modern paintings, including works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Gauguin, and Georgia O'Keeffe. Cooper owned several works by Pablo Picasso, whom he met in 1956. Cooper also had a lifelong passion for automobiles, with a collection that included a 1930 Duesenberg.
Cooper was naturally reserved and introspective, and loved the solitude of outdoor activities. Not unlike his screen persona, his communication style frequently consisted of long silences with an occasional "yup" and "shucks". He once said, "If others have more interesting things to say than I have, I keep quiet." According to his friends, Cooper could also be an articulate, well-informed conversationalist on topics ranging from horses, guns, and Western history to film production, sports cars, and modern art. He was modest and unpretentious, frequently downplaying his acting abilities and career accomplishments. His friends and colleagues described him as charming, well-mannered, and thoughtful, with a lively boyish sense of humor. Cooper maintained a sense of propriety throughout his career and never misused his movie star status—never sought special treatment or refused to work with a director or leading lady. His close friend Joel McCrea recalled, "Coop never fought, he never got mad, he never told anybody off that I know of; everybody that worked with him liked him."
Political views
Like his father, Cooper was a conservative Republican; he voted for Calvin Coolidge in 1924, Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1932, and campaigned for Wendell Willkie in 1940. When Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for an unprecedented fourth presidential term in 1944, Cooper campaigned for Thomas E. Dewey and criticized Roosevelt for being dishonest and adopting "foreign" ideas. In a radio address that he paid for himself just prior to the election, Cooper said, "I disagree with the New Deal belief that the America all of us love is old and worn-out and finished—and has to borrow foreign notions that don't even seem to work any too well where they come from ... Our country is a young country that just has to make up its mind to be itself again." He also attended a Republican rally at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum that drew 93,000 Dewey supporters.
Cooper was one of the founding members of the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, a conservative organization dedicated, according to its statement of principles, to preserving the "American way of life" and opposing communism and fascism. The organization — whose membership included Walter Brennan, Laraine Day, Walt Disney, Clark Gable, Hedda Hopper, Ronald Reagan, Barbara Stanwyck, and John Wayne — advised the United States Congress to investigate communist influence in the motion picture industry. On October 23, 1947, Cooper was subpoenaed to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and was asked if he had observed any "communistic influence" in Hollywood.
Cooper recounted statements he'd heard suggesting that the Constitution was out of date and that Congress was an unnecessary institution—comments that Cooper said he found to be "very un-American" and testified that he had rejected several scripts because he thought they were "tinged with communist ideas". Unlike some other witnesses, Cooper did not name any individuals, nor did he name any scripts, during his testimony.
In 1951, while making High Noon, Cooper became friends with the film's screenwriter, Carl Foreman, who had been a member of the Communist Party. When Foreman was subpoenaed by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Cooper put his career on the line to defend Foreman. When John Wayne and others threatened Cooper with blacklisting himself and the loss of his passport if he did not walk off the film, Cooper gave a statement to the press in support of Foreman, calling him "the finest kind of American". When producer Stanley Kramer removed Foreman's name as screenwriter, Cooper and director Fred Zinnemann threatened to walk off the film if Foreman's name was not restored. Foreman later said that, of all his friends and allies and colleagues in Hollywood, "Cooper was the only big one who tried to help. The only one." Cooper even offered to testify in Foreman's behalf before the committee, but character witnesses were not allowed. Foreman always sent future scripts to Cooper for first refusal, including The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Key and The Guns of Navarone. Cooper had to turn them down because of his age.
Religion
Cooper was baptized in the Anglican Church in December 1911 in Britain, and was raised in the Episcopal Church in the United States. While he was not an observant Christian for most of his adult life, many of his friends believed he had a deeply spiritual side.
On June 26, 1953, Cooper accompanied his wife and daughter, who were devout Catholics, to Rome, where they had an audience with Pope Pius XII. Cooper and his wife were still separated at the time, but the papal visit marked the beginning of their gradual reconciliation. In the coming years, Cooper contemplated his mortality and his personal behavior, and started discussing Catholicism with his family. He began attending church with them regularly, and met with their parish priest, who offered Cooper spiritual guidance. After several months of study, Cooper was baptized as a Roman Catholic on April 9, 1959, before a small group of family and friends at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills.
Final years and death
On April 14, 1960, Cooper underwent surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston for an aggressive form of prostate cancer that had metastasized to his colon. He fell ill again on May 31 and underwent further surgery at Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles in early June to remove a malignant tumor from his large intestine. After recuperating over the summer, Cooper took his family on vacation to the south of France before traveling to the UK in the fall to star in The Naked Edge. In December 1960, he worked on the NBC television documentary The Real West, which was part of the company's Project 20 series.
On December 27, his wife learned from their family doctor that Cooper's cancer had spread to his lungs and bones and was inoperable. His family decided not to tell him immediately.
On January 9, 1961, Cooper attended a dinner that was given in his honor and hosted by Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin at the Friars Club. The dinner was attended by many of his industry friends and concluded with a brief speech by Cooper who said, "The only achievement I'm proud of is the friends I've made in this community."
In mid-January, Cooper took his family to Sun Valley for their last vacation together. Cooper and Hemingway hiked through the snow together for the last time. On February 27, after returning to Los Angeles, Cooper learned that he was dying. He later told his family, "We'll pray for a miracle; but if not, and that's God's will, that's all right too." On April 17, Cooper watched the Academy Awards ceremony on television and saw his good friend James Stewart, who had presented Cooper with his first Oscar years earlier, accept on Cooper's behalf an honorary award for lifetime achievement—his third Oscar. Holding back tears, Stewart said, "Coop, I'll get this to you right away. And Coop, I want you to know this, that with this goes all the warm friendship and the affection and the admiration and the deep, the deep respect of all of us. We're very, very proud of you, Coop. All of us are tremendously proud." The following day, newspapers around the world announced the news that Cooper was dying. In the coming days he received numerous messages of appreciation and encouragement, including telegrams from Pope John XXIII and Queen Elizabeth II, and a telephone call from President John F. Kennedy.
In his last public statement on May 4, Cooper said, "I know that what is happening is God's will. I am not afraid of the future." He received the last rites on May 12. Cooper died quietly the following day, Saturday, May 13, 1961, at 12:47 P.M.
A requiem mass was held on May 18 at the Church of the Good Shepherd, attended by many of Cooper's friends, including James Stewart, Jack Benny, Henry Hathaway, Joel McCrea, Audrey Hepburn, Jack L. Warner, John Ford, John Wayne, Edward G. Robinson, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Fred Astaire, Randolph Scott, Walter Pidgeon, Bob Hope and Marlene Dietrich. Cooper was buried in the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes in Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California. In May 1974, after his family relocated to New York, Cooper's remains were exhumed and reburied in Sacred Hearts Cemetery in Southampton. His grave is marked by a three-ton boulder from a Montauk quarry.
Acting style and reputation
Cooper's acting style consisted of three essential characteristics: his ability to project elements of his own personality onto the characters he portrayed, to appear natural and authentic in his roles, and to underplay and deliver restrained performances calibrated for the camera and the screen. Acting teacher Lee Strasberg once observed: "The simplest examples of Stanislavsky's ideas are actors such as Gary Cooper, John Wayne, and Spencer Tracy. They try not to act but to be themselves, to respond or react. They refuse to say or do anything they feel not to be consonant with their own characters." Film director François Truffaut ranked Cooper among "the greatest actors" because of his ability to deliver great performances "without direction". This ability to project elements of his own personality onto his characters produced a continuity across his performances to the extent that critics and audiences were convinced that he was simply "playing himself".
Cooper's ability to project his personality onto his characters played an important part in his appearing natural and authentic on screen. Actor John Barrymore said of Cooper, "This fellow is the world's greatest actor. He does without effort what the rest of us spend our lives trying to learn—namely, to be natural." Charles Laughton, who played opposite Cooper in Devil and the Deep agreed, "In truth, that boy hasn't the least idea how well he acts ... He gets at it from the inside, from his own clear way of looking at life." William Wyler, who directed Cooper in two films, called him a "superb actor, a master of movie acting".
In his review of Cooper's performance in The Real Glory, Graham Greene wrote, "Sometimes his lean photogenic face seems to leave everything to the lens, but there is no question here of his not acting. Watch him inoculate the girl against cholera—the casual jab of the needle, and the dressing slapped on while he talks, as though a thousand arms had taught him where to stab and he doesn't have to think anymore."
Cooper's style of underplaying before the camera surprised many of his directors and fellow actors. Even in his earliest feature films, he recognized the camera's ability to pick up slight gestures and facial movements. Commenting on Cooper's performance in Sergeant York, director Howard Hawks observed, "He worked very hard and yet he didn't seem to be working. He was a strange actor because you'd look at him during a scene and you'd think ... this isn't going to be any good. But when you saw the rushes in the projection room the next day you could read in his face all the things he'd been thinking." Sam Wood, who directed Cooper in four films, had similar observations about Cooper's performance in Pride of the Yankees, noting, "What I thought was underplaying turned out to be just the right approach. On the screen he's perfect, yet on the set you'd swear it's the worst job of acting in the history of motion pictures."
Fellow actors admired his abilities as an actor. Commenting on her two films playing opposite Cooper, actress Ingrid Bergman concluded, "The personality of this man was so enormous, so overpowering—and that expression in his eyes and his face, it was so delicate and so underplayed. You just didn't notice it until you saw it on the screen. I thought he was marvelous; the most underplaying and the most natural actor I ever worked with."
Tom Hanks declared, "In only one scene in the first film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture, we see the future of screen acting in the form of Gary Cooper. He is quiet and natural, somehow different from the other cast members. He does something mysterious with his eyes and shoulders that is much more like 'being' than 'acting'."
Daniel Day-Lewis said, "I don't particularly like westerns as a genre, but I do love certain westerns. 'High Noon' means a lot to me – I love the purity and the honesty, I love Gary Cooper in that film, the idea of the last man standing."
Chris Pratt stated, "I started watching Westerns when I was shooting in London about four or five years ago. I really fell in love with Gary Cooper, and his stuff. That sucked me into the Westerns. Before, I never got engrossed in the story. I'd just dip in, and there were guys in horses in black and white. High Noon's later Gary Cooper, I liked that. But I liked 'The Westerner'. That's my favorite one. I have that poster hung up in my house because I really like that one."
To Al Pacino, "Gary Cooper was a phenomenon—his ability to take some thing and elevate it, give it such dignity. One of the great presences."
Mylène Demongeot first got with Gary Cooper for the opening of the first escalator to be installed in a cinema, at the Rex Theatre in Paris, on June 7, 1957. She declared in a 2015 filmed interview: "Gary Cooper ... il est sublime ! Aaahhh (Mylène pushing a cry of love not to say ecstasy) il est sublime ... Ah ! Ah ! Ah ! Là je dois dire que ça fait partie des stars, y'a Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, ces grands Américains que j'ai rencontrés comme ça, c'est vraiment des mecs incroyables. Y'en a plus des comme ça ! Euh non. (Gary Cooper was sublime, there I have to say, now he, was part of the stars, Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, those great americans who I've met really were unbelievable guys, there aren't any like them anymore)."
Career assessment and legacy
Cooper's career spanned thirty-six years, from 1925 to 1961. During that time, he appeared in eighty-four feature films in a leading role. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His natural and authentic acting style appealed powerfully to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major movie genres, including Westerns, war films, adventure films, drama films, crime films, romance films, comedy films, and romantic comedy films. He appeared on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities for twenty-three consecutive years, from 1936 to 1958. According to Quigley's annual poll, Cooper was one of the top money-making stars for eighteen years, appearing in the top ten in 1936–37, 1941–49, and 1951–57. He topped the list in 1953. In Quigley's list of all-time money-making stars, Cooper is listed fourth, after John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and Tom Cruise. At the time of his death, it was estimated that his films grossed well over $200 million (equivalent to $ billion in ).
In over half of his feature films, Cooper portrayed Westerners, soldiers, pilots, sailors, and explorers—all men of action. In the rest he played a wide range of characters, included doctors, professors, artists, architects, clerks, and baseball players. Cooper's heroic screen image changed with each period of his career. In his early films, he played the young naive hero sure of his moral position and trusting in the triumph of simple virtues (The Virginian). After becoming a major star, his Western screen persona was replaced by a more cautious hero in adventure films and dramas (A Farewell to Arms). During the height of his career, from 1936 to 1943, he played a new type of hero—a champion of the common man willing to sacrifice himself for others (Mr. Deeds, Meet John Doe, and For Whom the Bell Tolls).
In the post-war years, Cooper attempted broader variations on his screen image, which now reflected a hero increasingly at odds with the world who must face adversity alone (The Fountainhead and High Noon). In his final films, Cooper's hero rejects the violence of the past, and seeks to reclaim lost honor and find redemption (Friendly Persuasion and Man of the West). The screen persona he developed and sustained throughout his career represented the ideal American hero—a tall, handsome, and sincere man of steadfast integrity who emphasized action over intellect, and combined the heroic qualities of the romantic lover, the adventurer, and the common man.
On February 6, 1960, Cooper was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6243 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to the film industry. He was awarded a star on the sidewalk outside the Ellen Theater in Bozeman, Montana.
On May 6, 1961, he was awarded the French Order of Arts and Letters in recognition of his significant contribution to the arts. On July 30, 1961, he was posthumously awarded the David di Donatello Special Award in Italy for his career achievements.
In 1966, he was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. In 2015, he was inducted into the Utah Cowboy and Western Heritage Hall of Fame. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper eleventh on its list of the 25 male stars of classic Hollywood. Three of his characters—Will Kane, Lou Gehrig, and Sergeant York—made AFI's list of the one hundred greatest heroes and villains, all of them as heroes. His Lou Gehrig line, "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.", is ranked by AFI as the thirty-eighth greatest movie quote of all time.
More than a half century after his death, Cooper's enduring legacy, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, is his image of the ideal American hero preserved in his film performances. Charlton Heston once observed, "He projected the kind of man Americans would like to be, probably more than any actor that's ever lived."
In the TV series Justified, based on works and characters created by Elmore Leonard, Gary Cooper is used throughout the six seasons as the man whom U.S. Marshall Raylan Givens, played by Timothy Olyphant, aspires to be. When his colleague asks Marshall Givens how he thinks his dangerous plan to bring down a villain can possibly work, he replies: "Why not? Worked for Gary Cooper."
Gary Cooper is referenced several times in the critically acclaimed television series The Sopranos, with protagonist Tony Soprano asking "What ever happened to Gary Cooper? The strong, silent type." while complaining about his problems to his therapist.
In the 1930s hit song "Puttin' On the Ritz", Cooper is referenced in the line "dress up like a million dollar trooper/Tryin' hard to look like Gary Cooper, Super duper!" More than two decades after Cooper's death a new version of the song was released in 1983 by Taco; the original lyrics were kept, including the references to Cooper.
In J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye, Cooper is "spotted" by Holden Caulfield to distract a woman he is dancing with.
Awards and nominations
Filmography
The following is a list of feature films in which Cooper appeared in a leading role.
The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926)
Children of Divorce (1927)
Arizona Bound (1927)
Wings (1927)
Nevada (1927)
It (1927)
The Last Outlaw (1927)
Beau Sabreur (1928)
The Legion of the Condemned (1928)
Doomsday (1928)
Half a Bride (1928)
Lilac Time (1928)
The First Kiss (1928)
The Shopworn Angel (1928)
Wolf Song (1929)
Betrayal (1929)
The Virginian (1929)
Only the Brave (1930)
The Texan (1930)
Seven Days' Leave (1930)
A Man from Wyoming (1930)
The Spoilers (1930)
Morocco (1930)
Fighting Caravans (1931)
City Streets (1931)
I Take This Woman (1931)
His Woman (1931)
Devil and the Deep (1932)
If I Had a Million (1932)
A Farewell to Arms (1932)
Today We Live (1933)
One Sunday Afternoon (1933)
Design for Living (1933)
Alice in Wonderland (1933)
Operator 13 (1934)
Now and Forever (1934)
The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935)
The Wedding Night (1935)
Peter Ibbetson (1935)
Desire (1936)
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)
The General Died at Dawn (1936)
The Plainsman (1936)
Souls at Sea (1937)
The Adventures of Marco Polo (1938)
Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938)
The Cowboy and the Lady (1938)
Beau Geste (1939)
The Real Glory (1939)
The Westerner (1940)
North West Mounted Police (1940)
Meet John Doe (1941)
Sergeant York (1941)
Ball of Fire (1941)
The Pride of the Yankees (1942)
For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)
The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944)
Casanova Brown (1944)
Along Came Jones (1945)
Saratoga Trunk (1945)
Cloak and Dagger (1946)
Unconquered (1947)
Good Sam (1948)
The Fountainhead (1949)
Task Force (1949)
Bright Leaf (1950)
Dallas (1950)
You're in the Navy Now (1951)
It's a Big Country (1951)
Distant Drums (1951)
High Noon (1952)
Springfield Rifle (1952)
Return to Paradise (1953)
Blowing Wild (1953)
Garden of Evil (1954)
Vera Cruz (1954)
The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (1955)
Friendly Persuasion (1956)
Love in the Afternoon (1957)
Ten North Frederick (1958)
Man of the West (1958)
The Hanging Tree (1959)
They Came to Cordura (1959)
The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959)
The Naked Edge (1961)
Radio appearances
References
Notes
Citations
Bibliography
Adrien Le Bihan, Gary Cooper, le prince des acteurs, LettMotif, 2021, 358p.()
External links
1901 births
1961 deaths
20th-century American male actors
Academy Honorary Award recipients
American expatriates in England
American male film actors
American male silent film actors
American male television actors
American people of English descent
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
California Republicans
Catholics from Montana
Conservatism in the United States
Converts to Roman Catholicism from Anglicanism
Deaths from cancer in California
Deaths from prostate cancer
Grinnell College people
Male Western (genre) film actors
Male actors from Montana
Paramount Pictures contract players
People educated at Dunstable Grammar School
People from Brentwood, Los Angeles
People from Dunstable
People from Helena, Montana
People from Holmby Hills, Los Angeles | false | [
"was a professional Go player.\n\nHe is well known in the Western go world for his book Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go.\n\nBiography \nKageyama was born in Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan. In 1948, he won the biggest amateur Go tournament in Japan, the All-Amateur Honinbo. The year after that, he passed the pro exam. \n\nFor two years straight, Kageyama was runner up for the Prime Minister Cup. First, against Otake Hideo, then Hoshino Toshi. His style was a very calm one with deep calculations, similar to what Ishida Yoshio would use later on. The greatest accomplishment of his life, in his own opinion, was beating Rin Kaiho in the Prime Minister Cup semi-finals. At the time, Rin was the Meijin, the top player in Japan. Kageyama gave a commentary on this game in his book \"Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go\", where he wrote\n\nPromotion record\n\nRunners-up\n\nAwards\nTakamatsu-no-miya Prize once (1967)\n\nBibliography \nLessons in the Fundamentals of Go \nKage's Secret Chronicles of Handicap Go\n\nReferences\n\n1926 births\n1990 deaths\nJapanese Go players\nGo writers",
"Hans Christian Harald Tegner, known as Hans Tegner (30 November 1853 – 2 April 1932), was a Danish artist and illustrator. He is primarily known for his illustrations of literary works by Hans Christian Andersen and Ludvig Holberg and for his work for the Bing & Grøndahl porcelain factory.\n\nEarly life and education\nSon of lithographer Isac Wilhelm Tegner, Hans studied at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts from 1869 to 1878.\n\nCareer\nHis first art exhibition was in 1882, featuring watercolour illustrations of Hans Christian Andersen's story The Tinderbox. His second, and last, exhibition in 1889 was a watercolour painting celebrating the 50-year jubilee of the Constitution of Denmark, and was bought by king Christian IX of Denmark. From 1883 to 1888, Tegner painted a series of illustrations for the works of Ludvig Holberg, his greatest artistic accomplishment. The second great accomplishment of Tegner, was his exquisite illustrations produced for the so-called international selection () of Andersen's fairy tales, finished in 1901.\n\nTegner was made professor at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in 1897. He illustrated a number of other books, as well as postal stamps, and the first 5-Danish krone note in 1898. He was the leader of Kunsthåndværkerskolen (a part of what is now Danmarks Designskole) from 1901 to 1917, and chief designer at porcelain manufacturer Bing & Grøndahl from 1907 to 1932. He died on April 2, 1932, in Fredensborg.\n\npersonal life\n\nTegner married Helga Byberg (13 January 1862 - 26 February 1945), a daughter of merchant Ole Strib Hansen Byberg (1812–82) and Karen Møller (1821–89), on 24 November 1896 in Sundby.\n\nHe died on 2 April 1932 and is buried in Asminderød Cemetery\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1853 births\n1932 deaths\nDanish artists\nRoyal Danish Academy of Fine Arts faculty\nRoyal Danish Academy of Fine Arts alumni\n19th-century illustrators of fairy tales\n20th-century illustrators of fairy tales"
] |
[
"Gary Cooper",
"Silent films, 1925-28",
"what silent films were made in 1925?",
"In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt,",
"what other silent films?",
"Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones.",
"did he win any awards for these films?",
"I don't know.",
"what was his greatest accomplishment?",
"Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects."
] | C_6ec0895035fd4dbda1785cd7d1c7b5d7_1 | did Lilac Time succeed? | 5 | Did the film Lilac Time succeed? | Gary Cooper | In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, including Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt work--which sometimes injured horses and riders--"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name. Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week. Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal--finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings, the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada--both films directed by John Waters. In 1928, Paramount paired Cooper with a youthful Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss--advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride. That year, Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928. CANNOTANSWER | It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928. | Gary Cooper (born Frank James Cooper; May 7, 1901 – May 13, 1961) was an American actor known for his strong, silent, and understated acting style. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor twice and had a further three nominations, as well as receiving an Academy Honorary Award for his career achievements in 1961. He was one of the top 10 film personalities for 23 consecutive years, and one of the top money-making stars for 18 years. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper at No. 11 on its list of the 25 greatest male stars of classic Hollywood cinema.
Cooper's career spanned 36 years, from 1925 to 1961, and included leading roles in 84 feature films. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era through to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His screen persona appealed strongly to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major film genres. His ability to project his own personality onto the characters he played contributed to his natural and authentic appearance on screen. Throughout his career, he sustained a screen persona that represented the ideal American hero.
Cooper began his career as a film extra and stunt rider, but soon landed acting roles. After establishing himself as a Western hero in his early silent films, he appeared as the Virginian and became a movie star in 1929 with his first sound picture, The Virginian. In the early 1930s, he expanded his heroic image to include more cautious characters in adventure films and dramas such as A Farewell to Arms (1932) and The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935). During the height of his career, Cooper portrayed a new type of hero—a champion of the common man—in films such as Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), Meet John Doe (1941), Sergeant York (1941), The Pride of the Yankees (1942), and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943). He later portrayed more mature characters at odds with the world in films such as The Fountainhead (1949) and High Noon (1952). In his final films, he played non-violent characters searching for redemption in films such as Friendly Persuasion (1956) and Man of the West (1958).
Early life
Frank James Cooper was born in Helena, Montana, on May 7, 1901, the younger of two sons of English parents Alice (née Brazier; 1873–1967) and Charles Henry Cooper (1865–1946). His brother, Arthur, was six years his senior. Cooper's father came from Houghton Regis, Bedfordshire, and became a prominent lawyer, rancher, and Montana Supreme Court justice. His mother hailed from Gillingham, Kent, and married Charles in Montana. In 1906, Charles purchased the Seven-Bar-Nine cattle ranch, about north of Helena near Craig, Montana. Cooper and Arthur spent their summers at the ranch and learned to ride horses, hunt, and fish. Cooper attended Central Grade School in Helena.
Alice wanted her sons to have an English education, so she took them back to England in 1909 to enroll them in Dunstable Grammar School in Dunstable, Bedfordshire. While there, Cooper and his brother lived with their father's cousins, William and Emily Barton, at their home in Houghton Regis. Cooper studied Latin, French, and English history at Dunstable until 1912. While he adapted to English school discipline and learned the requisite social graces, he never adjusted to the rigid class structure and formal Eton collars he was required to wear. He received his confirmation in the Church of England at the Church of All Saints in Houghton Regis on December 3, 1911. His mother accompanied her sons back to the U.S. in August 1912, and Cooper resumed his education at Johnson Grammar School in Helena.
When Cooper was 15, he injured his hip in a car accident. On his doctor's recommendation, he returned to the Seven-Bar-Nine ranch to recuperate by horseback riding. The misguided therapy left him with his characteristic stiff, off-balanced walk and slightly angled horse-riding style. He left Helena High School after two years in 1918, and returned to the family ranch to work full-time as a cowboy. In 1919, his father arranged for him to attend Gallatin County High School in Bozeman, Montana, where English teacher Ida Davis encouraged him to focus on academics and participate in debating and dramatics. Cooper later called Davis "the woman partly responsible for [him] giving up cowboy-ing and going to college".
Cooper was still attending high school in 1920 when he took three art courses at Montana Agricultural College in Bozeman. His interest in art was inspired years earlier by the Western paintings of Charles Marion Russell and Frederic Remington. Cooper especially admired and studied Russell's Lewis and Clark Meeting Indians at Ross' Hole (1910), which still hangs in the state capitol building in Helena. In 1922, to continue his art education, he enrolled in Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa. He did well academically in most of his courses, but was not accepted into the school's drama club. His drawings and watercolor paintings were exhibited throughout the dormitory, and he was named art editor for the college yearbook. During the summers of 1922 and 1923, Cooper worked at Yellowstone National Park as a tour guide driving the yellow open-top buses. Despite a promising first 18 months at Grinnell, he left college suddenly in February 1924, spent a month in Chicago looking for work as an artist, and then returned to Helena, where he sold editorial cartoons to the local Independent newspaper.
In autumn 1924, Cooper's father left the Montana Supreme Court bench and moved with his wife to Los Angeles to administer the estates of two relatives, and Cooper joined his parents there in November at his father's request. After briefly working a series of unpromising jobs, he met two friends from Montana who were working as film extras and stunt riders in low-budget Western films for the small movie studios on Poverty Row. They introduced him to another Montana cowboy, rodeo champion Jay "Slim" Talbot, who took him to see a casting director. Wanting money for a professional art course, Cooper worked as a film extra for $5 a day, and as a stunt rider for $10. Cooper and Talbot became close friends and hunting companions, and Talbot later worked as Cooper's stuntman and stand-in for over three decades.
Career
Silent films, 1925–1928
In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, but also the already emergent major studios, Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt workwhich sometimes injured horses and riders"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name.
Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week.
Cooper's first important film role was a supporting part in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) starring Ronald Colman and Vilma Bánky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal—finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings (both 1927), the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada—both films directed by John Waters.
Paramount paired Cooper with Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss (both 1928)—advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride (also both 1928). Around the same time, Cooper made Lilac Time (1928) with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928.
Hollywood stardom, 1929–1935
Cooper became a major movie star in 1929 with the release of his first talking picture, The Virginian (1929), which was directed by Victor Fleming and co-starred Mary Brian and Walter Huston. Based on the popular novel by Owen Wister, The Virginian was one of the first sound films to define the Western code of honor and helped establish many of the conventions of the Western movie genre that persist to the present day. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, the romantic image of the tall, handsome, and shy cowboy hero who embodied male freedom, courage, and honor was created in large part by Cooper in the film. Unlike some silent film actors who had trouble adapting to the new sound medium, Cooper transitioned naturally, with his "deep and clear" and "pleasantly drawling" voice, which was perfectly suited for the characters he portrayed on screen, also according to Meyers. Looking to capitalize on Cooper's growing popularity, Paramount cast him in several Westerns and wartime dramas, including Only the Brave, The Texan, Seven Days' Leave, A Man from Wyoming, and The Spoilers (all released in 1930). Norman Rockwell depicted Cooper in his role as The Texan for the cover of The Saturday Evening Post on May 24, 1930.
One of the more important performances in Cooper's early career was his portrayal of a sullen legionnaire in Josef von Sternberg's film Morocco (also 1930) with Marlene Dietrich in her introduction to American audiences. During production, von Sternberg focused his energies on Dietrich and treated Cooper dismissively. Tensions came to a head after von Sternberg yelled directions at Cooper in German. The actor approached the director, picked him up by the collar, and said, "If you expect to work in this country you'd better get on to the language we use here." Despite the tensions on the set, Cooper produced "one of his best performances", according to Thornton Delehanty of the New York Evening Post.
After returning to the Western genre in Zane Grey's Fighting Caravans (1931) with French actress Lili Damita, Cooper appeared in the Dashiell Hammett crime film City Streets (also 1931), co-starring Sylvia Sidney and Paul Lukas, playing a westerner who gets involved with big-city gangsters in order to save the woman he loves. Cooper concluded the year with appearances in two unsuccessful films: I Take This Woman (also 1931) with Carole Lombard, and His Woman with Claudette Colbert. The demands and pressures of making ten films in two years left Cooper exhausted and in poor health, suffering from anemia and jaundice. He had lost during that period, and felt lonely, isolated, and depressed by his sudden fame and wealth. In May 1931, Cooper left Hollywood and sailed to Algiers and then Italy, where he lived for the next year.
During his time abroad, Cooper stayed with the Countess Dorothy di Frasso at the Villa Madama in Rome, where she taught him about good food and vintage wines, how to read Italian and French menus, and how to socialize among Europe's nobility and upper classes. After guiding him through the great art museums and galleries of Italy, she accompanied him on a ten-week big-game hunting safari on the slopes of Mount Kenya in East Africa, where he was credited with over sixty kills, including two lions, a rhinoceros, and various antelopes. His safari experience in Africa had a profound influence on Cooper and intensified his love of the wilderness. After returning to Europe, he and the countess set off on a Mediterranean cruise of the Italian and French Rivieras. Rested and rejuvenated by his year-long exile, a healthy Cooper returned to Hollywood in April 1932 and negotiated a new contract with Paramount for two films per year, a salary of $4,000 a week, and director and script approval.
In 1932, after completing Devil and the Deep with Tallulah Bankhead to fulfill his old contract, Cooper appeared in A Farewell to Arms, the first film adaptation of an Ernest Hemingway novel. Co-starring Helen Hayes, a leading New York theatre star and Academy Award winner, and Adolphe Menjou, the film presented Cooper with one of his most ambitious and challenging dramatic roles, playing an American ambulance driver wounded in Italy who falls in love with an English nurse during World War I. Critics praised his highly intense and emotional performance, and the film became one of the year's most commercially successful pictures. In 1933, after making Today We Live with Joan Crawford and One Sunday Afternoon with Fay Wray, Cooper appeared in the Ernst Lubitsch comedy film Design for Living, based on the successful Noël Coward play. Co-starring Miriam Hopkins and Fredric March, the film was a box office success, ranking as one of the top ten highest-grossing films of 1933. All three of the lead actors—March, Cooper, and Hopkins—received attention from this film as they were all at the peak of their careers. Cooper's performance — playing an American artist in Europe competing with his playwright friend for the affections of a beautiful woman — was singled out for its versatility and revealed his genuine ability to do light comedy. Cooper changed his name legally to "Gary Cooper" in August 1933.
In 1934, Cooper was loaned out to MGM for the Civil War drama film Operator 13 with Marion Davies, about a beautiful Union spy who falls in love with a Confederate soldier. Despite Richard Boleslawski's imaginative direction and George J. Folsey's lavish cinematography, the film did poorly at the box office.
Back at Paramount, Cooper appeared in his first of seven films by director Henry Hathaway, Now and Forever, with Carole Lombard and Shirley Temple. In the film, he plays a confidence man who tries to sell his daughter to the relatives who raised her, but is eventually won over by the adorable girl. Impressed by Temple's intelligence and charm, Cooper developed a close rapport with her, both on and off screen. The film was a box-office success.
The following year, Cooper was loaned out to Samuel Goldwyn Productions to appear in King Vidor's romance film The Wedding Night with Anna Sten, who was being groomed as "another Garbo". In the film, Cooper plays an alcoholic novelist who retreats to his family's New England farm where he meets and falls in love with a beautiful Polish neighbor. Cooper delivered a performance of surprising range and depth, according to biographer Larry Swindell. Despite receiving generally favorable reviews, the film was not popular with American audiences, who may have been offended by the film's depiction of an extramarital affair and its tragic ending.
That same year, Cooper appeared in two Henry Hathaway films: the melodrama Peter Ibbetson with Ann Harding, about a man caught up in a dream world created by his love for a childhood sweetheart, and the adventure film The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, about a daring British officer and his men who defend their stronghold at Bengal against rebellious local tribes. While the former, championed by the surrealists became more successful in Europe than in the United States, the latter was nominated for seven Academy Awards and became one of Cooper's most popular and successful adventure films. Hathaway had the highest respect for Cooper's acting ability, calling him "the best actor of all of them".
American folk hero, 1936–1943
From Mr. Deeds to The Real Glory, 1936–1939
Cooper's career took an important turn in 1936. After making Frank Borzage's romantic comedy film Desire with Marlene Dietrich at Paramount—in which he delivered a performance considered by some contemporary critics as one of his finest—Cooper returned to Poverty Row for the first time since his early silent film days to make Frank Capra's Mr. Deeds Goes to Town with Jean Arthur for Columbia Pictures. In the film, Cooper plays the character of Longfellow Deeds, a quiet, innocent writer of greeting cards who inherits a fortune, leaves behind his idyllic life in Vermont, and travels to New York where he faces a world of corruption and deceit. Capra and screenwriter Robert Riskin were able to use Cooper's well-established screen persona as the "quintessential American hero"—a symbol of honesty, courage, and goodness—to create a new type of "folk hero" for the common man. Commenting on Cooper's impact on the character and the film, Capra observed:
Both Desire and Mr. Deeds opened in April 1936 to critical praise and were major box-office successes. In his review in The New York Times, Frank Nugent wrote that Cooper was "proving himself one of the best light comedians in Hollywood". For his performance in Mr. Deeds, Cooper received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.
Cooper appeared in two other Paramount films in 1936. In Lewis Milestone's adventure film The General Died at Dawn with Madeleine Carroll, he plays an American soldier of fortune in China who helps the peasants defend themselves against the oppression of a cruel warlord. Written by playwright Clifford Odets, the film was a critical and commercial success.
In Cecil B. DeMille's sprawling frontier epic The Plainsman—his first of four films with the director—Cooper portrays Wild Bill Hickok in a highly fictionalized version of the opening of the American western frontier. The film was an even greater box-office hit than its predecessor, due in large part to Jean Arthur's definitive depiction of Calamity Jane and Cooper's inspired portrayal of Hickock as an enigmatic figure of "deepening mythic substance". That year, Cooper appeared for the first time on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities, where he would remain for the next twenty-three years.
In late 1936, Paramount was preparing a new contract for Cooper that would raise his salary to $8,000 a week when Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn for six films over six years with a minimum guarantee of $150,000 per picture. Paramount brought suit against Goldwyn and Cooper, and the court ruled that Cooper's new Goldwyn contract afforded the actor sufficient time to also honor his Paramount agreement. Cooper continued to make films with both studios, and by 1939 the United States Treasury reported that Cooper was the country's highest wage earner, at $482,819 (equivalent to $ million in ).
In contrast to his output the previous year, Cooper appeared in only one picture in 1937, Henry Hathaway's adventure film Souls at Sea. A critical and box-office failure, Cooper referred to it as his "almost picture", saying, "It was almost exciting, and almost interesting. And I was almost good." In 1938, he appeared in Archie Mayo's biographical film The Adventures of Marco Polo. Plagued by production problems and a weak screenplay, the film became Goldwyn's biggest failure to that date, losing $700,000. During this period, Cooper turned down several important roles, including the role of Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind. Cooper was producer David O. Selznick's first choice for the part. He made several overtures to the actor, but Cooper had doubts about the project, and did not feel suited to the role. Cooper later admitted, "It was one of the best roles ever offered in Hollywood ... But I said no. I didn't see myself as quite that dashing, and later, when I saw Clark Gable play the role to perfection, I knew I was right."
Back at Paramount, Cooper returned to a more comfortable genre in Ernst Lubitsch's romantic comedy Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938) with Claudette Colbert. In the film, Cooper plays a wealthy American businessman in France who falls in love with an impoverished aristocrat's daughter and persuades her to become his eighth wife. Despite the clever screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder, and solid performances by Cooper and Colbert, American audiences had trouble accepting Cooper in the role of a shallow philanderer. It succeeded only at the European box office market.
In the fall of 1938, Cooper appeared in H. C. Potter's romantic comedy The Cowboy and the Lady with Merle Oberon, about a sweet-natured rodeo cowboy who falls in love with the wealthy daughter of a presidential hopeful, believing her to be a poor, hard-working lady's maid. The efforts of three directors and several eminent screenwriters could not salvage what could have been a fine vehicle for Cooper. While more successful than its predecessor, the film was Cooper's fourth consecutive box-office failure in the American market.
In the next two years, Cooper was more discerning about the roles he accepted and made four successful large-scale adventure and cowboy films. In William A. Wellman's adventure film Beau Geste (1939), he plays one of three daring English brothers who join the French Foreign Legion in the Sahara to fight local tribes. Filmed in the same Mojave Desert locations as the original 1926 version with Ronald Colman, Beau Geste provided Cooper with magnificent sets, exotic settings, high-spirited action, and a role tailored to his personality and screen persona. This was the last film in Cooper's contract with Paramount.
In Henry Hathaway's The Real Glory (1939), he plays a military doctor who accompanies a small group of American Army officers to the Philippines to help the Christian Filipinos defend themselves against Muslim radicals. Many film critics praised Cooper's performance, including author and film critic Graham Greene, who recognized that he "never acted better".
From The Westerner to For Whom the Bell Tolls, 1940–1943
Cooper returned to the Western genre in William Wyler's The Westerner (1940) with Walter Brennan and Doris Davenport, about a drifting cowboy who defends homesteaders against Roy Bean, a corrupt judge known as the "law west of the Pecos". Screenwriter Niven Busch relied on Cooper's extensive knowledge of Western history while working on the script. The film received positive reviews and did well at the box-office, with reviewers praising the performances of the two lead actors. That same year, Cooper appeared in his first all-Technicolor feature, Cecil B. DeMille's adventure film North West Mounted Police (1940). In the film, Cooper plays a Texas Ranger who pursues an outlaw into western Canada where he joins forces with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who are after the same man, a leader of the North-West Rebellion. While not as popular with critics as its predecessor, the film was another box-office success—the sixth-highest-grossing film of 1940.
The early 1940s were Cooper's prime years as an actor. In a relatively short period, he appeared in five critically successful and popular films that produced some of his finest performances. When Frank Capra offered him the lead role in Meet John Doe before Robert Riskin even developed the script, Cooper accepted his friend's offer, saying, "It's okay, Frank, I don't need a script." In the film, Cooper plays Long John Willoughby, a down-and-out bush-league pitcher hired by a newspaper to pretend to be a man who promises to commit suicide on Christmas Eve to protest all the hypocrisy and corruption in the country. Considered by some critics to be Capra's best film at the time, Meet John Doe was received as a "national event" with Cooper appearing on the front cover of Time magazine on March 3, 1941. In his review in the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes called Cooper's performance a "splendid and utterly persuasive portrayal" and praised his "utterly realistic acting which comes through with such authority". Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote, "Gary Cooper, of course, is 'John Doe' to the life and in the whole—shy, bewildered, non-aggressive, but a veritable tiger when aroused."
That same year, Cooper made two films with director and good friend Howard Hawks. In the biographical film Sergeant York, Cooper portrays war hero Alvin C. York, one of the most decorated American soldiers in World War I. The film chronicles York's early backwoods days in Tennessee, his religious conversion and subsequent piety, his stand as a conscientious objector, and finally his heroic actions at the Battle of the Argonne Forest, which earned him the Medal of Honor. Initially, Cooper was nervous and uncertain about playing a living hero, so he traveled to Tennessee to visit York at his home, and the two quiet men established an immediate rapport and discovered they had much in common. Inspired by York's encouragement, Cooper delivered a performance that Howard Barnes of the New York Herald Tribune called "one of extraordinary conviction and versatility", and that Archer Winston of the New York Post called "one of his best". After the film's release, Cooper was awarded the Distinguished Citizenship Medal by the Veterans of Foreign Wars for his "powerful contribution to the promotion of patriotism and loyalty". York admired Cooper's performance and helped promote the film for Warner Bros. Sergeant York became the top-grossing film of the year and was nominated for eleven Academy Awards. Accepting his first Academy Award for Best Actor from his friend James Stewart, Cooper said, "It was Sergeant Alvin York who won this award. Shucks, I've been in the business sixteen years and sometimes dreamed I might get one of these. That's all I can say ... Funny when I was dreaming I always made a better speech."
Cooper concluded the year back at Goldwyn with Howard Hawks to make the romantic comedy Ball of Fire with Barbara Stanwyck. In the film, Cooper plays a shy linguistics professor who leads a team of seven scholars who are writing an encyclopedia. While researching slang, he meets Stanwyck's flirtatious burlesque stripper Sugarpuss O'Shea who blows the dust off their staid life of books. The screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder provided Cooper the opportunity to exercise the full range of his light comedy skills. In his review for the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes wrote that Cooper handled the role with "great skill and comic emphasis" and that his performance was "utterly delightful". Though small in scale, Ball of Fire was one of the top-grossing films of the year—Cooper's fourth consecutive picture to make the top twenty.
Cooper's only film appearance in 1942 was also his last under his Goldwyn contract. In Sam Wood's biographical film The Pride of the Yankees, Cooper portrays baseball star Lou Gehrig who established a record with the New York Yankees for playing in 2,130 consecutive games. Cooper was reluctant to play the seven-time All-Star, who only died the previous year from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) — now commonly called "Lou Gehrig's disease". Beyond the challenges of effectively portraying such a popular and nationally recognized figure, Cooper knew very little about baseball and was not left-handed like Gehrig.
After Gehrig's widow visited the actor and expressed her desire that he portray her husband, Cooper accepted the role that covered a twenty-year span of Gehrig's life—his early love of baseball, his rise to greatness, his loving marriage, and his struggle with illness, culminating in his farewell speech at Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939 before 62,000 fans. Cooper quickly learned the physical movements of a baseball player and developed a fluid, believable swing. The handedness issue was solved by reversing the print for certain batting scenes. The film was one of the year's top ten pictures and received eleven Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's third).
Soon after the publication of Ernest Hemingway's novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, Paramount paid $150,000 for the film rights with the express intent of casting Cooper in the lead role of Robert Jordan, an American explosives expert who fights alongside the Republican loyalists during the Spanish Civil War. The original director, Cecil B. DeMille, was replaced by Sam Wood who brought in Dudley Nichols for the screenplay. After the start of principal photography in the Sierra Nevada in late 1942, Ingrid Bergman was brought in to replace ballerina Vera Zorina as the female lead—a change supported by Cooper and Hemingway. The love scenes between Bergman and Cooper were "rapturous" and passionate. Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune wrote that both actors performed with "the true stature and authority of stars". While the film distorted the novel's original political themes and meaning, For Whom the Bell Tolls was a critical and commercial success and received ten Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's fourth).
World War II related activities
Due to his age and health, Cooper did not serve in the military during World War II, but like many of his colleagues, he got involved in the war effort by entertaining the troops. In June 1943, he visited military hospitals in San Diego, and often appeared at the Hollywood Canteen serving food to the servicemen. In late 1943, Cooper undertook a tour of the South West Pacific with actresses Una Merkel and Phyllis Brooks, and accordionist Andy Arcari.
Traveling on a B-24A Liberator bomber, the group toured the Cook Islands, Fiji, New Caledonia, Queensland, Brisbane—where General Douglas MacArthur told Cooper he was watching Sergeant York in a Manila theater when Japanese bombs began falling—New Guinea, Jayapura, and throughout the Solomon Islands.
The group often shared the same sparse living conditions and K-rations as the troops. Cooper met with the servicemen and women, visited military hospitals, introduced his attractive colleagues, and participated in occasional skits. The shows concluded with Cooper's moving recitation of Lou Gehrig's farewell speech. When he returned to the United States, he visited military hospitals throughout the country. Cooper later called his time with the troops the "greatest emotional experience" of his life.
Mature roles, 1944–1952
In 1944, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's wartime adventure film The Story of Dr. Wassell with Laraine Day — his third movie with the director. In the film, Cooper plays American doctor and missionary Corydon M. Wassell, who leads a group of wounded sailors through the jungles of Java to safety. Despite receiving poor reviews, Dr. Wassell was one of the top-grossing films of the year. With his Goldwyn and Paramount contracts now concluded, Cooper decided to remain independent and formed his own production company, International Pictures, with Leo Spitz, William Goetz, and Nunnally Johnson. The fledgling studio's first offering was Sam Wood's romantic comedy Casanova Brown with Teresa Wright, about a man who learns his soon-to-be ex-wife is pregnant with his child, just as he is about to marry another woman. The film received poor reviews, with the New York Daily News calling it "delightful nonsense", and Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, criticizing Cooper's "somewhat obvious and ridiculous clowning". The film was barely profitable.
In 1945, Cooper starred in and produced Stuart Heisler's Western comedy Along Came Jones with Loretta Young for International. In this lighthearted parody of his past heroic image, Cooper plays comically inept cowboy Melody Jones who is mistaken for a ruthless killer. Audiences embraced Cooper's character, and the film was one of the top box-office pictures of the year—a testament to Cooper's still vital audience appeal. It was also International's biggest financial success during its brief history before being sold off to Universal Studios in 1946.
Cooper's career during the post-war years drifted in new directions as American society was changing. While he still played conventional heroic roles, his films now relied less on his heroic screen persona and more on novel stories and exotic settings. In November 1945, Cooper appeared in Sam Wood's nineteenth-century period drama Saratoga Trunk with Ingrid Bergman, about a Texas cowboy and his relationship with a beautiful fortune-hunter. Filmed in early 1943, the movie's release was delayed for two years due to the increased demand for war movies. Despite poor reviews, Saratoga Trunk did well at the box office and became one of the top money-makers of the year for Warner Bros. Cooper's only film in 1946 was Fritz Lang's romantic thriller Cloak and Dagger, about a mild-mannered physics professor recruited by the OSS during the last years of World War II to investigate the German atomic bomb program. Playing a part loosely based on physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, Cooper was uneasy with the role and unable to convey the "inner sense" of the character. The film received poor reviews and was a box-office failure. In 1947, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's epic adventure film Unconquered with Paulette Goddard, about a Virginia militiaman who defends settlers against an unscrupulous gun trader and hostile Indians on the Western frontier during the eighteenth century. The film received mixed reviews, but even long-time DeMille critic James Agee acknowledged the picture had "some authentic flavor of the period". This last of four films made with DeMille was Cooper's most lucrative, earning the actor over $300,000 (equal to $ today) in salary and percentage of profits. Unconquered would be his last unqualified box-office success for the next five years.
In 1948, after making Leo McCarey's romantic comedy Good Sam, Cooper sold his company to Universal Studios and signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros. that gave him script and director approval and a guaranteed $295,000 (equal to $ today) per picture. His first film under the new contract was King Vidor's drama The Fountainhead (1949) with Patricia Neal and Raymond Massey. In the film, Cooper plays an idealistic and uncompromising architect who struggles to maintain his integrity and individualism in the face of societal pressures to conform to popular standards. Based on the novel by Ayn Rand who also wrote the screenplay, the film reflects her philosophy and attacks the concepts of collectivism while promoting the virtues of individualism. For most critics, Cooper was hopelessly miscast in the role of Howard Roark. In his review for The New York Times, Bosley Crowther concluded he was "Mr. Deeds out of his element". Cooper returned to his element in Delmer Daves' war drama Task Force (1949), about a retiring rear admiral who reminisces about his long career as a naval aviator and his role in the development of aircraft carriers. Cooper's performance and the Technicolor newsreel footage supplied by the United States Navy made the film one of Cooper's most popular during this period. In the next two years, Cooper made four poorly received films: Michael Curtiz' period drama Bright Leaf (1950), Stuart Heisler's Western melodrama Dallas (1950), Henry Hathaway's wartime comedy You're in the Navy Now (1951), and Raoul Walsh's Western action film Distant Drums (1951).
Cooper's most important film during the post-war years was Fred Zinnemann's Western drama High Noon (1952) with Grace Kelly and Katy Jurado for United Artists. In the film, Cooper plays retiring sheriff Will Kane who is preparing to leave town on his honeymoon when he learns that an outlaw he helped put away and his three henchmen are returning to seek their revenge. Unable to gain the support of the frightened townspeople, and abandoned by his young bride, Kane nevertheless stays to face the outlaws alone. During the filming, Cooper was in poor health and in considerable pain from stomach ulcers. His ravaged face and discomfort in some scenes "photographed as self-doubt", according to biographer Hector Arce, and contributed to the effectiveness of his performance. Considered one of the first "adult" Westerns for its theme of moral courage, High Noon received enthusiastic reviews for its artistry, with Time magazine placing it in the ranks of Stagecoach and The Gunfighter. Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote that Cooper was "at the top of his form", and John McCarten, in The New Yorker, wrote that Cooper was never more effective. The film earned $3.75 million in the United States and $18 million worldwide. Following the example of his friend James Stewart, Cooper accepted a lower salary in exchange for a percent of the profits, and ended up making $600,000. Cooper's understated performance was widely praised, and earned him his second Academy Award for Best Actor.
Later films, 1953–1961
After appearing in André de Toth's Civil War drama Springfield Rifle (1952)—a standard Warner Bros. film that was overshadowed by the success of its predecessor—Cooper made four films outside the United States. In Mark Robson's drama Return to Paradise (1953), Cooper plays an American wanderer who liberates the inhabitants of a Polynesian island from the puritanical rule of a misguided pastor. Cooper endured spartan living conditions, long hours, and ill health during the three-month location shoot on the island of Upolu in Western Samoa. Despite its beautiful cinematography, the film received poor reviews. Cooper's next three films were shot in Mexico. In Hugo Fregonese's action adventure film Blowing Wild (1953) with Barbara Stanwyck, he plays a wildcatter in Mexico who gets involved with an oil company executive and his unscrupulous wife with whom he once had an affair.
In 1954, Cooper appeared in Henry Hathaway's Western drama Garden of Evil, with Susan Hayward, about three soldiers of fortune in Mexico hired to rescue a woman's husband. That same year, he appeared in Robert Aldrich's Western adventure Vera Cruz with Burt Lancaster. In the film, Cooper plays an American adventurer hired by Emperor Maximilian I to escort a countess to Vera Cruz during the Mexican Rebellion of 1866. All of these films received poor reviews but did well at the box-office. For his work in Vera Cruz, Cooper earned $1.4 million in salary and percent of the gross.
During this period, Cooper struggled with health problems. As well as his ongoing treatment for ulcers, he suffered a severe shoulder injury during the filming of Blowing Wild when he was hit by metal fragments from a dynamited oil well. During the filming of Vera Cruz, he reinjured his hip falling from a horse, and was burned when Lancaster fired his rifle too close and the wadding from the blank shell pierced his clothing.
In 1955, he appeared in Otto Preminger's biographical war drama The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell, about the World War I general who tried to convince government officials of the importance of air power, and was court-martialed after blaming the War Department for a series of air disasters. Some critics felt that Cooper was miscast, and that his dull, tight-lipped performance did not reflect Mitchell's dynamic and caustic personality. In 1956, Cooper was more effective playing a gentle Indiana Quaker in William Wyler's Civil War drama Friendly Persuasion with Dorothy McGuire. Like Sergeant York and High Noon, the film addresses the conflict between religious pacifism and civic duty. For his performance, Cooper received his second Golden Globe nomination for Best Motion Picture Actor. The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, was awarded the Palme d'Or at the 1957 Cannes Film Festival, and went on to earn $8 million worldwide.
In 1956, Cooper traveled to France to make Billy Wilder's romantic comedy Love in the Afternoon with Audrey Hepburn and Maurice Chevalier. In the film, Cooper plays a middle-aged American playboy in Paris who pursues and eventually falls in love with a much younger woman. Despite receiving some positive reviews—including from Bosley Crowther who praised the film's "charming performances"—most reviewers concluded that Cooper was simply too old for the part. While audiences may not have welcomed seeing Cooper's heroic screen image tarnished by his playing an aging roué trying to seduce an innocent young girl, the film was still a box-office success. The following year, Cooper appeared in Philip Dunne's romantic drama Ten North Frederick. In the film, which was based on the novel by John O'Hara, Cooper plays an attorney whose life is ruined by a double-crossing politician and his own secret affair with his daughter's young roommate. While Cooper brought "conviction and controlled anguish" to his performance, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, it was not enough to save what Bosley Crowther called a "hapless film".
Despite his ongoing health problems and several operations for ulcers and hernias, Cooper continued to work in action films. In 1958, he appeared in Anthony Mann's Western drama Man of the West (1958) with Julie London and Lee J. Cobb, about a reformed outlaw and killer who is forced to confront his violent past when the train he is riding in is held up by his former gang members. The film has been called Cooper's "most pathological Western", with its themes of impotent rage, sexual humiliation, and sadism. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, Cooper, who struggled with moral conflicts in his personal life, "understood the anguish of a character striving to retain his integrity ... [and] brought authentic feeling to the role of a tempted and tormented, yet essentially decent man". Mostly ignored by critics at the time, the film is now well-regarded by film scholars and is considered Cooper's last great film.
After his Warner Bros. contract ended, Cooper formed his own production company, Baroda Productions, and made three unusual films in 1959 about redemption. In Delmer Daves' Western drama The Hanging Tree, Cooper plays a frontier doctor who saves a criminal from a lynch mob, and later tries to exploit his sordid past. Cooper delivered a "powerful and persuasive" performance of an emotionally scarred man whose need to dominate others is transformed by the love and sacrifice of a woman. In Robert Rossen's historical adventure They Came to Cordura with Rita Hayworth, he plays an army officer who is found guilty of cowardice and assigned the degrading task of recommending soldiers for the Medal of Honor during the Pancho Villa Expedition of 1916.
While Cooper received positive reviews, Variety and Films in Review felt he was too old for the part. In Michael Anderson's action drama The Wreck of the Mary Deare with Charlton Heston, Cooper plays a disgraced merchant marine officer who decides to stay aboard his sinking cargo ship in order to prove the vessel was deliberately scuttled and to redeem his good name. Like its two predecessors, the film was physically demanding. Cooper, who was a trained scuba diver, did most of his own underwater scenes. Biographer Jeffrey Meyers observed that in all three roles, Cooper effectively conveyed the sense of lost honor and desire for redemption—what Joseph Conrad in Lord Jim called the "struggles of an individual trying to save from the fire his idea of what his moral identity should be".
Personal life
Marriage and family
Cooper was formally introduced to his future wife, 20-year-old New York debutante Veronica Balfe, on Easter Sunday 1933 at a party given by her uncle, art director Cedric Gibbons. Called "Rocky" by her family and friends, she grew up on Park Avenue and attended finishing schools. Her stepfather was Wall Street tycoon Paul Shields. Cooper and Rocky were quietly married at her parents' Park Avenue residence on December 15, 1933. According to his friends, the marriage had a positive impact on Cooper, who turned away from past indiscretions and took control of his life. Athletic and a lover of the outdoors, Rocky shared many of Cooper's interests, including riding, skiing, and skeet-shooting. She organized their social life, and her wealth and social connections provided Cooper access to New York high society. Cooper and his wife owned homes in the Los Angeles area in Encino (1933–36), Brentwood (1936–53), and Holmby Hills (1954–61), and owned a vacation home in Aspen, Colorado (1949–53).
Gary and Veronica Cooper's daughter, Maria Veronica Cooper, was born on September 15, 1937. By all accounts, he was a patient and affectionate father, teaching Maria to ride a bicycle, play tennis, ski, and ride horses. Sharing many of her parents' interests, she accompanied them on their travels and was often photographed with them. Like her father, she developed a love for art and drawing. As a family they vacationed together in Sun Valley, Idaho, spent time at Rocky's parents' country house in Southampton, New York, and took frequent trips to Europe. Cooper and Rocky were legally separated on May 16, 1951, when Cooper moved out of their home. For over two years, they maintained a fragile and uneasy family life with their daughter. Cooper moved back into their home in November 1953, and their formal reconciliation occurred in February 1954.
Romantic relationships
Prior to his marriage, Cooper had a series of romantic relationships with leading actresses, beginning in 1927 with Clara Bow, who advanced his career by helping him get one of his first leading roles in Children of Divorce. Bow was also responsible for getting Cooper a role in Wings, which generated an enormous amount of fan mail for the young actor. In 1928, he had a relationship with another experienced actress, Evelyn Brent, whom he met while filming Beau Sabreur. In 1929, while filming The Wolf Song, Cooper began an intense affair with Lupe Vélez, which was the most important romance of his early life. During their two years together, Cooper also had brief affairs with Marlene Dietrich while filming Morocco in 1930 and with Carole Lombard while making I Take This Woman in 1931. During his year abroad in 1931–32, Cooper had an affair with the married Countess Dorothy di Frasso, while staying at her Villa Madama near Rome.
After he was married in December 1933, Cooper remained faithful to his wife until the summer of 1942, when he began an affair with Ingrid Bergman during the production of For Whom the Bell Tolls. Their relationship lasted through the completion of filming Saratoga Trunk in June 1943. In 1948, after finishing work on The Fountainhead, Cooper began an affair with actress Patricia Neal, his co-star. At first they kept their affair discreet, but eventually it became an open secret in Hollywood, and Cooper's wife confronted him with the rumors, which he admitted were true. He also confessed that he was in love with Neal, and continued to see her. Cooper and his wife were legally separated in May 1951, but he did not seek a divorce. Neal later claimed that Cooper hit her after she went on a date with Kirk Douglas, and that he arranged for her to have an abortion when she became pregnant with Cooper's child. Neal ended their relationship in late December 1951. During his three-year separation from his wife, Cooper was rumored to have had affairs with Grace Kelly, Lorraine Chanel, and Gisèle Pascal.
Cooper biographers have explored his friendship in the late twenties with the actor Anderson Lawler, with whom Cooper shared a house on and off for a year, while at the same time seeing Clara Bow, Evelyn Brent and Lupe Vélez. Lupe Vélez once told Hedda Hopper of Vélez' affair with Cooper; whenever he would come home after seeing Lawler, she would sniff for Lawler's cologne. Vélez' biographer Michelle Vogel has reported that Vélez consented to Cooper's sexual behavior with Lawler, but only as long as she, too, could participate. In later life, he became involved in a relationship with the costume designer Irene, and was, according to Irene, "the only man she ever loved". A year after his death in 1961, Irene committed suicide by jumping from the 11th floor of the Knickerbocker Hotel, after telling Doris Day of her grief over Cooper's death.
Friendships, interests, and character
Cooper's twenty-year friendship with Ernest Hemingway began at Sun Valley in October 1940. The previous year, Hemingway drew upon Cooper's image when he created the character of Robert Jordan for the novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. The two shared a passion for the outdoors, and for years they hunted duck and pheasant, and skied together in Sun Valley. Both men admired the work of Rudyard Kipling—Cooper kept a copy of the poem "If—" in his dressing room—and retained as adults Kipling's sense of boyish adventure.
As well as admiring Cooper's hunting skills and knowledge of the outdoors, Hemingway believed his character matched his screen persona, once telling a friend, "If you made up a character like Coop, nobody would believe it. He's just too good to be true." They saw each other often, and their friendship remained strong through the years.
Cooper's social life generally centered on sports, outdoor activities, and dinner parties with his family and friends from the film industry, including directors Henry Hathaway, Howard Hawks, William Wellman, and Fred Zinnemann, and actors Joel McCrea, James Stewart, Barbara Stanwyck, and Robert Taylor. As well as hunting, Cooper enjoyed riding, fishing, skiing, and later in life, scuba diving. He never abandoned his early love for art and drawing, and over the years, he and his wife acquired a private collection of modern paintings, including works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Gauguin, and Georgia O'Keeffe. Cooper owned several works by Pablo Picasso, whom he met in 1956. Cooper also had a lifelong passion for automobiles, with a collection that included a 1930 Duesenberg.
Cooper was naturally reserved and introspective, and loved the solitude of outdoor activities. Not unlike his screen persona, his communication style frequently consisted of long silences with an occasional "yup" and "shucks". He once said, "If others have more interesting things to say than I have, I keep quiet." According to his friends, Cooper could also be an articulate, well-informed conversationalist on topics ranging from horses, guns, and Western history to film production, sports cars, and modern art. He was modest and unpretentious, frequently downplaying his acting abilities and career accomplishments. His friends and colleagues described him as charming, well-mannered, and thoughtful, with a lively boyish sense of humor. Cooper maintained a sense of propriety throughout his career and never misused his movie star status—never sought special treatment or refused to work with a director or leading lady. His close friend Joel McCrea recalled, "Coop never fought, he never got mad, he never told anybody off that I know of; everybody that worked with him liked him."
Political views
Like his father, Cooper was a conservative Republican; he voted for Calvin Coolidge in 1924, Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1932, and campaigned for Wendell Willkie in 1940. When Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for an unprecedented fourth presidential term in 1944, Cooper campaigned for Thomas E. Dewey and criticized Roosevelt for being dishonest and adopting "foreign" ideas. In a radio address that he paid for himself just prior to the election, Cooper said, "I disagree with the New Deal belief that the America all of us love is old and worn-out and finished—and has to borrow foreign notions that don't even seem to work any too well where they come from ... Our country is a young country that just has to make up its mind to be itself again." He also attended a Republican rally at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum that drew 93,000 Dewey supporters.
Cooper was one of the founding members of the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, a conservative organization dedicated, according to its statement of principles, to preserving the "American way of life" and opposing communism and fascism. The organization — whose membership included Walter Brennan, Laraine Day, Walt Disney, Clark Gable, Hedda Hopper, Ronald Reagan, Barbara Stanwyck, and John Wayne — advised the United States Congress to investigate communist influence in the motion picture industry. On October 23, 1947, Cooper was subpoenaed to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and was asked if he had observed any "communistic influence" in Hollywood.
Cooper recounted statements he'd heard suggesting that the Constitution was out of date and that Congress was an unnecessary institution—comments that Cooper said he found to be "very un-American" and testified that he had rejected several scripts because he thought they were "tinged with communist ideas". Unlike some other witnesses, Cooper did not name any individuals, nor did he name any scripts, during his testimony.
In 1951, while making High Noon, Cooper became friends with the film's screenwriter, Carl Foreman, who had been a member of the Communist Party. When Foreman was subpoenaed by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Cooper put his career on the line to defend Foreman. When John Wayne and others threatened Cooper with blacklisting himself and the loss of his passport if he did not walk off the film, Cooper gave a statement to the press in support of Foreman, calling him "the finest kind of American". When producer Stanley Kramer removed Foreman's name as screenwriter, Cooper and director Fred Zinnemann threatened to walk off the film if Foreman's name was not restored. Foreman later said that, of all his friends and allies and colleagues in Hollywood, "Cooper was the only big one who tried to help. The only one." Cooper even offered to testify in Foreman's behalf before the committee, but character witnesses were not allowed. Foreman always sent future scripts to Cooper for first refusal, including The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Key and The Guns of Navarone. Cooper had to turn them down because of his age.
Religion
Cooper was baptized in the Anglican Church in December 1911 in Britain, and was raised in the Episcopal Church in the United States. While he was not an observant Christian for most of his adult life, many of his friends believed he had a deeply spiritual side.
On June 26, 1953, Cooper accompanied his wife and daughter, who were devout Catholics, to Rome, where they had an audience with Pope Pius XII. Cooper and his wife were still separated at the time, but the papal visit marked the beginning of their gradual reconciliation. In the coming years, Cooper contemplated his mortality and his personal behavior, and started discussing Catholicism with his family. He began attending church with them regularly, and met with their parish priest, who offered Cooper spiritual guidance. After several months of study, Cooper was baptized as a Roman Catholic on April 9, 1959, before a small group of family and friends at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills.
Final years and death
On April 14, 1960, Cooper underwent surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston for an aggressive form of prostate cancer that had metastasized to his colon. He fell ill again on May 31 and underwent further surgery at Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles in early June to remove a malignant tumor from his large intestine. After recuperating over the summer, Cooper took his family on vacation to the south of France before traveling to the UK in the fall to star in The Naked Edge. In December 1960, he worked on the NBC television documentary The Real West, which was part of the company's Project 20 series.
On December 27, his wife learned from their family doctor that Cooper's cancer had spread to his lungs and bones and was inoperable. His family decided not to tell him immediately.
On January 9, 1961, Cooper attended a dinner that was given in his honor and hosted by Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin at the Friars Club. The dinner was attended by many of his industry friends and concluded with a brief speech by Cooper who said, "The only achievement I'm proud of is the friends I've made in this community."
In mid-January, Cooper took his family to Sun Valley for their last vacation together. Cooper and Hemingway hiked through the snow together for the last time. On February 27, after returning to Los Angeles, Cooper learned that he was dying. He later told his family, "We'll pray for a miracle; but if not, and that's God's will, that's all right too." On April 17, Cooper watched the Academy Awards ceremony on television and saw his good friend James Stewart, who had presented Cooper with his first Oscar years earlier, accept on Cooper's behalf an honorary award for lifetime achievement—his third Oscar. Holding back tears, Stewart said, "Coop, I'll get this to you right away. And Coop, I want you to know this, that with this goes all the warm friendship and the affection and the admiration and the deep, the deep respect of all of us. We're very, very proud of you, Coop. All of us are tremendously proud." The following day, newspapers around the world announced the news that Cooper was dying. In the coming days he received numerous messages of appreciation and encouragement, including telegrams from Pope John XXIII and Queen Elizabeth II, and a telephone call from President John F. Kennedy.
In his last public statement on May 4, Cooper said, "I know that what is happening is God's will. I am not afraid of the future." He received the last rites on May 12. Cooper died quietly the following day, Saturday, May 13, 1961, at 12:47 P.M.
A requiem mass was held on May 18 at the Church of the Good Shepherd, attended by many of Cooper's friends, including James Stewart, Jack Benny, Henry Hathaway, Joel McCrea, Audrey Hepburn, Jack L. Warner, John Ford, John Wayne, Edward G. Robinson, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Fred Astaire, Randolph Scott, Walter Pidgeon, Bob Hope and Marlene Dietrich. Cooper was buried in the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes in Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California. In May 1974, after his family relocated to New York, Cooper's remains were exhumed and reburied in Sacred Hearts Cemetery in Southampton. His grave is marked by a three-ton boulder from a Montauk quarry.
Acting style and reputation
Cooper's acting style consisted of three essential characteristics: his ability to project elements of his own personality onto the characters he portrayed, to appear natural and authentic in his roles, and to underplay and deliver restrained performances calibrated for the camera and the screen. Acting teacher Lee Strasberg once observed: "The simplest examples of Stanislavsky's ideas are actors such as Gary Cooper, John Wayne, and Spencer Tracy. They try not to act but to be themselves, to respond or react. They refuse to say or do anything they feel not to be consonant with their own characters." Film director François Truffaut ranked Cooper among "the greatest actors" because of his ability to deliver great performances "without direction". This ability to project elements of his own personality onto his characters produced a continuity across his performances to the extent that critics and audiences were convinced that he was simply "playing himself".
Cooper's ability to project his personality onto his characters played an important part in his appearing natural and authentic on screen. Actor John Barrymore said of Cooper, "This fellow is the world's greatest actor. He does without effort what the rest of us spend our lives trying to learn—namely, to be natural." Charles Laughton, who played opposite Cooper in Devil and the Deep agreed, "In truth, that boy hasn't the least idea how well he acts ... He gets at it from the inside, from his own clear way of looking at life." William Wyler, who directed Cooper in two films, called him a "superb actor, a master of movie acting".
In his review of Cooper's performance in The Real Glory, Graham Greene wrote, "Sometimes his lean photogenic face seems to leave everything to the lens, but there is no question here of his not acting. Watch him inoculate the girl against cholera—the casual jab of the needle, and the dressing slapped on while he talks, as though a thousand arms had taught him where to stab and he doesn't have to think anymore."
Cooper's style of underplaying before the camera surprised many of his directors and fellow actors. Even in his earliest feature films, he recognized the camera's ability to pick up slight gestures and facial movements. Commenting on Cooper's performance in Sergeant York, director Howard Hawks observed, "He worked very hard and yet he didn't seem to be working. He was a strange actor because you'd look at him during a scene and you'd think ... this isn't going to be any good. But when you saw the rushes in the projection room the next day you could read in his face all the things he'd been thinking." Sam Wood, who directed Cooper in four films, had similar observations about Cooper's performance in Pride of the Yankees, noting, "What I thought was underplaying turned out to be just the right approach. On the screen he's perfect, yet on the set you'd swear it's the worst job of acting in the history of motion pictures."
Fellow actors admired his abilities as an actor. Commenting on her two films playing opposite Cooper, actress Ingrid Bergman concluded, "The personality of this man was so enormous, so overpowering—and that expression in his eyes and his face, it was so delicate and so underplayed. You just didn't notice it until you saw it on the screen. I thought he was marvelous; the most underplaying and the most natural actor I ever worked with."
Tom Hanks declared, "In only one scene in the first film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture, we see the future of screen acting in the form of Gary Cooper. He is quiet and natural, somehow different from the other cast members. He does something mysterious with his eyes and shoulders that is much more like 'being' than 'acting'."
Daniel Day-Lewis said, "I don't particularly like westerns as a genre, but I do love certain westerns. 'High Noon' means a lot to me – I love the purity and the honesty, I love Gary Cooper in that film, the idea of the last man standing."
Chris Pratt stated, "I started watching Westerns when I was shooting in London about four or five years ago. I really fell in love with Gary Cooper, and his stuff. That sucked me into the Westerns. Before, I never got engrossed in the story. I'd just dip in, and there were guys in horses in black and white. High Noon's later Gary Cooper, I liked that. But I liked 'The Westerner'. That's my favorite one. I have that poster hung up in my house because I really like that one."
To Al Pacino, "Gary Cooper was a phenomenon—his ability to take some thing and elevate it, give it such dignity. One of the great presences."
Mylène Demongeot first got with Gary Cooper for the opening of the first escalator to be installed in a cinema, at the Rex Theatre in Paris, on June 7, 1957. She declared in a 2015 filmed interview: "Gary Cooper ... il est sublime ! Aaahhh (Mylène pushing a cry of love not to say ecstasy) il est sublime ... Ah ! Ah ! Ah ! Là je dois dire que ça fait partie des stars, y'a Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, ces grands Américains que j'ai rencontrés comme ça, c'est vraiment des mecs incroyables. Y'en a plus des comme ça ! Euh non. (Gary Cooper was sublime, there I have to say, now he, was part of the stars, Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, those great americans who I've met really were unbelievable guys, there aren't any like them anymore)."
Career assessment and legacy
Cooper's career spanned thirty-six years, from 1925 to 1961. During that time, he appeared in eighty-four feature films in a leading role. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His natural and authentic acting style appealed powerfully to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major movie genres, including Westerns, war films, adventure films, drama films, crime films, romance films, comedy films, and romantic comedy films. He appeared on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities for twenty-three consecutive years, from 1936 to 1958. According to Quigley's annual poll, Cooper was one of the top money-making stars for eighteen years, appearing in the top ten in 1936–37, 1941–49, and 1951–57. He topped the list in 1953. In Quigley's list of all-time money-making stars, Cooper is listed fourth, after John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and Tom Cruise. At the time of his death, it was estimated that his films grossed well over $200 million (equivalent to $ billion in ).
In over half of his feature films, Cooper portrayed Westerners, soldiers, pilots, sailors, and explorers—all men of action. In the rest he played a wide range of characters, included doctors, professors, artists, architects, clerks, and baseball players. Cooper's heroic screen image changed with each period of his career. In his early films, he played the young naive hero sure of his moral position and trusting in the triumph of simple virtues (The Virginian). After becoming a major star, his Western screen persona was replaced by a more cautious hero in adventure films and dramas (A Farewell to Arms). During the height of his career, from 1936 to 1943, he played a new type of hero—a champion of the common man willing to sacrifice himself for others (Mr. Deeds, Meet John Doe, and For Whom the Bell Tolls).
In the post-war years, Cooper attempted broader variations on his screen image, which now reflected a hero increasingly at odds with the world who must face adversity alone (The Fountainhead and High Noon). In his final films, Cooper's hero rejects the violence of the past, and seeks to reclaim lost honor and find redemption (Friendly Persuasion and Man of the West). The screen persona he developed and sustained throughout his career represented the ideal American hero—a tall, handsome, and sincere man of steadfast integrity who emphasized action over intellect, and combined the heroic qualities of the romantic lover, the adventurer, and the common man.
On February 6, 1960, Cooper was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6243 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to the film industry. He was awarded a star on the sidewalk outside the Ellen Theater in Bozeman, Montana.
On May 6, 1961, he was awarded the French Order of Arts and Letters in recognition of his significant contribution to the arts. On July 30, 1961, he was posthumously awarded the David di Donatello Special Award in Italy for his career achievements.
In 1966, he was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. In 2015, he was inducted into the Utah Cowboy and Western Heritage Hall of Fame. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper eleventh on its list of the 25 male stars of classic Hollywood. Three of his characters—Will Kane, Lou Gehrig, and Sergeant York—made AFI's list of the one hundred greatest heroes and villains, all of them as heroes. His Lou Gehrig line, "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.", is ranked by AFI as the thirty-eighth greatest movie quote of all time.
More than a half century after his death, Cooper's enduring legacy, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, is his image of the ideal American hero preserved in his film performances. Charlton Heston once observed, "He projected the kind of man Americans would like to be, probably more than any actor that's ever lived."
In the TV series Justified, based on works and characters created by Elmore Leonard, Gary Cooper is used throughout the six seasons as the man whom U.S. Marshall Raylan Givens, played by Timothy Olyphant, aspires to be. When his colleague asks Marshall Givens how he thinks his dangerous plan to bring down a villain can possibly work, he replies: "Why not? Worked for Gary Cooper."
Gary Cooper is referenced several times in the critically acclaimed television series The Sopranos, with protagonist Tony Soprano asking "What ever happened to Gary Cooper? The strong, silent type." while complaining about his problems to his therapist.
In the 1930s hit song "Puttin' On the Ritz", Cooper is referenced in the line "dress up like a million dollar trooper/Tryin' hard to look like Gary Cooper, Super duper!" More than two decades after Cooper's death a new version of the song was released in 1983 by Taco; the original lyrics were kept, including the references to Cooper.
In J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye, Cooper is "spotted" by Holden Caulfield to distract a woman he is dancing with.
Awards and nominations
Filmography
The following is a list of feature films in which Cooper appeared in a leading role.
The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926)
Children of Divorce (1927)
Arizona Bound (1927)
Wings (1927)
Nevada (1927)
It (1927)
The Last Outlaw (1927)
Beau Sabreur (1928)
The Legion of the Condemned (1928)
Doomsday (1928)
Half a Bride (1928)
Lilac Time (1928)
The First Kiss (1928)
The Shopworn Angel (1928)
Wolf Song (1929)
Betrayal (1929)
The Virginian (1929)
Only the Brave (1930)
The Texan (1930)
Seven Days' Leave (1930)
A Man from Wyoming (1930)
The Spoilers (1930)
Morocco (1930)
Fighting Caravans (1931)
City Streets (1931)
I Take This Woman (1931)
His Woman (1931)
Devil and the Deep (1932)
If I Had a Million (1932)
A Farewell to Arms (1932)
Today We Live (1933)
One Sunday Afternoon (1933)
Design for Living (1933)
Alice in Wonderland (1933)
Operator 13 (1934)
Now and Forever (1934)
The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935)
The Wedding Night (1935)
Peter Ibbetson (1935)
Desire (1936)
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)
The General Died at Dawn (1936)
The Plainsman (1936)
Souls at Sea (1937)
The Adventures of Marco Polo (1938)
Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938)
The Cowboy and the Lady (1938)
Beau Geste (1939)
The Real Glory (1939)
The Westerner (1940)
North West Mounted Police (1940)
Meet John Doe (1941)
Sergeant York (1941)
Ball of Fire (1941)
The Pride of the Yankees (1942)
For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)
The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944)
Casanova Brown (1944)
Along Came Jones (1945)
Saratoga Trunk (1945)
Cloak and Dagger (1946)
Unconquered (1947)
Good Sam (1948)
The Fountainhead (1949)
Task Force (1949)
Bright Leaf (1950)
Dallas (1950)
You're in the Navy Now (1951)
It's a Big Country (1951)
Distant Drums (1951)
High Noon (1952)
Springfield Rifle (1952)
Return to Paradise (1953)
Blowing Wild (1953)
Garden of Evil (1954)
Vera Cruz (1954)
The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (1955)
Friendly Persuasion (1956)
Love in the Afternoon (1957)
Ten North Frederick (1958)
Man of the West (1958)
The Hanging Tree (1959)
They Came to Cordura (1959)
The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959)
The Naked Edge (1961)
Radio appearances
References
Notes
Citations
Bibliography
Adrien Le Bihan, Gary Cooper, le prince des acteurs, LettMotif, 2021, 358p.()
External links
1901 births
1961 deaths
20th-century American male actors
Academy Honorary Award recipients
American expatriates in England
American male film actors
American male silent film actors
American male television actors
American people of English descent
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
California Republicans
Catholics from Montana
Conservatism in the United States
Converts to Roman Catholicism from Anglicanism
Deaths from cancer in California
Deaths from prostate cancer
Grinnell College people
Male Western (genre) film actors
Male actors from Montana
Paramount Pictures contract players
People educated at Dunstable Grammar School
People from Brentwood, Los Angeles
People from Dunstable
People from Helena, Montana
People from Holmby Hills, Los Angeles | true | [
"Lilac Time may refer to:\n\nLilac Time (operetta) or Das Dreimäderlhaus, a 1922 operetta\nLilac Time (film), a 1928 American silent romantic war film\nLilac Time, a 1917 play by Jane Cowl and Jane Murfin; basis for the film\nThe Lilac Time, a British alternative rock band\nThe Lilac Time (album), a 1987 album by the band\nThe Lilac Time, a 2008 album by Pelle Carlberg\n\nSee also\n\"Jeannine, I Dream of Lilac Time\", theme song for the 1928 film\nLilac Time in Lombard, an annual festival in Lombard, Illinois, US",
"Lilac Festival is the name of various festivals which celebrate the Lilac (Syringa).\n\nCanada\n Lilac Festival (Calgary) - since 1989 in Calgary, Alberta, Canada\n Lilac Festival (Franktown) - since 1995 in the Lilac Capital of Ontario, Franktown, Ontario, Canada\n\nUnited States\n Lilac Festival (Rochester) - since 1898 in Rochester, New York\n Lilac Festival (Spokane) - since 1938 in Spokane, Washington\n Lilac Festival (Mackinac Island) - since 1949 on Mackinac Island, Michigan\n Lilac Festival (Lombard, Illinois)- since 1929 in Lombard, Illinois, known as The Lilac Village. Its \"Lilacia Park\", landscaped by Jens Jensen, features 1,200 lilacs on 3.4 hectares. Every May since 1929, Lombard has hosted Lilac Time featuring a number of events for lilac enthusiasts."
] |
[
"Gary Cooper",
"Silent films, 1925-28",
"what silent films were made in 1925?",
"In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt,",
"what other silent films?",
"Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones.",
"did he win any awards for these films?",
"I don't know.",
"what was his greatest accomplishment?",
"Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects.",
"did Lilac Time succeed?",
"It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928."
] | C_6ec0895035fd4dbda1785cd7d1c7b5d7_1 | what is the most important fact in this article? | 6 | What is the most important fact in this article about Gary Cooper's silent films from 1925 to 1928? | Gary Cooper | In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, including Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt work--which sometimes injured horses and riders--"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name. Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week. Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal--finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings, the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada--both films directed by John Waters. In 1928, Paramount paired Cooper with a youthful Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss--advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride. That year, Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928. CANNOTANSWER | Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky, | Gary Cooper (born Frank James Cooper; May 7, 1901 – May 13, 1961) was an American actor known for his strong, silent, and understated acting style. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor twice and had a further three nominations, as well as receiving an Academy Honorary Award for his career achievements in 1961. He was one of the top 10 film personalities for 23 consecutive years, and one of the top money-making stars for 18 years. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper at No. 11 on its list of the 25 greatest male stars of classic Hollywood cinema.
Cooper's career spanned 36 years, from 1925 to 1961, and included leading roles in 84 feature films. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era through to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His screen persona appealed strongly to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major film genres. His ability to project his own personality onto the characters he played contributed to his natural and authentic appearance on screen. Throughout his career, he sustained a screen persona that represented the ideal American hero.
Cooper began his career as a film extra and stunt rider, but soon landed acting roles. After establishing himself as a Western hero in his early silent films, he appeared as the Virginian and became a movie star in 1929 with his first sound picture, The Virginian. In the early 1930s, he expanded his heroic image to include more cautious characters in adventure films and dramas such as A Farewell to Arms (1932) and The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935). During the height of his career, Cooper portrayed a new type of hero—a champion of the common man—in films such as Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), Meet John Doe (1941), Sergeant York (1941), The Pride of the Yankees (1942), and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943). He later portrayed more mature characters at odds with the world in films such as The Fountainhead (1949) and High Noon (1952). In his final films, he played non-violent characters searching for redemption in films such as Friendly Persuasion (1956) and Man of the West (1958).
Early life
Frank James Cooper was born in Helena, Montana, on May 7, 1901, the younger of two sons of English parents Alice (née Brazier; 1873–1967) and Charles Henry Cooper (1865–1946). His brother, Arthur, was six years his senior. Cooper's father came from Houghton Regis, Bedfordshire, and became a prominent lawyer, rancher, and Montana Supreme Court justice. His mother hailed from Gillingham, Kent, and married Charles in Montana. In 1906, Charles purchased the Seven-Bar-Nine cattle ranch, about north of Helena near Craig, Montana. Cooper and Arthur spent their summers at the ranch and learned to ride horses, hunt, and fish. Cooper attended Central Grade School in Helena.
Alice wanted her sons to have an English education, so she took them back to England in 1909 to enroll them in Dunstable Grammar School in Dunstable, Bedfordshire. While there, Cooper and his brother lived with their father's cousins, William and Emily Barton, at their home in Houghton Regis. Cooper studied Latin, French, and English history at Dunstable until 1912. While he adapted to English school discipline and learned the requisite social graces, he never adjusted to the rigid class structure and formal Eton collars he was required to wear. He received his confirmation in the Church of England at the Church of All Saints in Houghton Regis on December 3, 1911. His mother accompanied her sons back to the U.S. in August 1912, and Cooper resumed his education at Johnson Grammar School in Helena.
When Cooper was 15, he injured his hip in a car accident. On his doctor's recommendation, he returned to the Seven-Bar-Nine ranch to recuperate by horseback riding. The misguided therapy left him with his characteristic stiff, off-balanced walk and slightly angled horse-riding style. He left Helena High School after two years in 1918, and returned to the family ranch to work full-time as a cowboy. In 1919, his father arranged for him to attend Gallatin County High School in Bozeman, Montana, where English teacher Ida Davis encouraged him to focus on academics and participate in debating and dramatics. Cooper later called Davis "the woman partly responsible for [him] giving up cowboy-ing and going to college".
Cooper was still attending high school in 1920 when he took three art courses at Montana Agricultural College in Bozeman. His interest in art was inspired years earlier by the Western paintings of Charles Marion Russell and Frederic Remington. Cooper especially admired and studied Russell's Lewis and Clark Meeting Indians at Ross' Hole (1910), which still hangs in the state capitol building in Helena. In 1922, to continue his art education, he enrolled in Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa. He did well academically in most of his courses, but was not accepted into the school's drama club. His drawings and watercolor paintings were exhibited throughout the dormitory, and he was named art editor for the college yearbook. During the summers of 1922 and 1923, Cooper worked at Yellowstone National Park as a tour guide driving the yellow open-top buses. Despite a promising first 18 months at Grinnell, he left college suddenly in February 1924, spent a month in Chicago looking for work as an artist, and then returned to Helena, where he sold editorial cartoons to the local Independent newspaper.
In autumn 1924, Cooper's father left the Montana Supreme Court bench and moved with his wife to Los Angeles to administer the estates of two relatives, and Cooper joined his parents there in November at his father's request. After briefly working a series of unpromising jobs, he met two friends from Montana who were working as film extras and stunt riders in low-budget Western films for the small movie studios on Poverty Row. They introduced him to another Montana cowboy, rodeo champion Jay "Slim" Talbot, who took him to see a casting director. Wanting money for a professional art course, Cooper worked as a film extra for $5 a day, and as a stunt rider for $10. Cooper and Talbot became close friends and hunting companions, and Talbot later worked as Cooper's stuntman and stand-in for over three decades.
Career
Silent films, 1925–1928
In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, but also the already emergent major studios, Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt workwhich sometimes injured horses and riders"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name.
Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week.
Cooper's first important film role was a supporting part in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) starring Ronald Colman and Vilma Bánky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal—finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings (both 1927), the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada—both films directed by John Waters.
Paramount paired Cooper with Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss (both 1928)—advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride (also both 1928). Around the same time, Cooper made Lilac Time (1928) with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928.
Hollywood stardom, 1929–1935
Cooper became a major movie star in 1929 with the release of his first talking picture, The Virginian (1929), which was directed by Victor Fleming and co-starred Mary Brian and Walter Huston. Based on the popular novel by Owen Wister, The Virginian was one of the first sound films to define the Western code of honor and helped establish many of the conventions of the Western movie genre that persist to the present day. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, the romantic image of the tall, handsome, and shy cowboy hero who embodied male freedom, courage, and honor was created in large part by Cooper in the film. Unlike some silent film actors who had trouble adapting to the new sound medium, Cooper transitioned naturally, with his "deep and clear" and "pleasantly drawling" voice, which was perfectly suited for the characters he portrayed on screen, also according to Meyers. Looking to capitalize on Cooper's growing popularity, Paramount cast him in several Westerns and wartime dramas, including Only the Brave, The Texan, Seven Days' Leave, A Man from Wyoming, and The Spoilers (all released in 1930). Norman Rockwell depicted Cooper in his role as The Texan for the cover of The Saturday Evening Post on May 24, 1930.
One of the more important performances in Cooper's early career was his portrayal of a sullen legionnaire in Josef von Sternberg's film Morocco (also 1930) with Marlene Dietrich in her introduction to American audiences. During production, von Sternberg focused his energies on Dietrich and treated Cooper dismissively. Tensions came to a head after von Sternberg yelled directions at Cooper in German. The actor approached the director, picked him up by the collar, and said, "If you expect to work in this country you'd better get on to the language we use here." Despite the tensions on the set, Cooper produced "one of his best performances", according to Thornton Delehanty of the New York Evening Post.
After returning to the Western genre in Zane Grey's Fighting Caravans (1931) with French actress Lili Damita, Cooper appeared in the Dashiell Hammett crime film City Streets (also 1931), co-starring Sylvia Sidney and Paul Lukas, playing a westerner who gets involved with big-city gangsters in order to save the woman he loves. Cooper concluded the year with appearances in two unsuccessful films: I Take This Woman (also 1931) with Carole Lombard, and His Woman with Claudette Colbert. The demands and pressures of making ten films in two years left Cooper exhausted and in poor health, suffering from anemia and jaundice. He had lost during that period, and felt lonely, isolated, and depressed by his sudden fame and wealth. In May 1931, Cooper left Hollywood and sailed to Algiers and then Italy, where he lived for the next year.
During his time abroad, Cooper stayed with the Countess Dorothy di Frasso at the Villa Madama in Rome, where she taught him about good food and vintage wines, how to read Italian and French menus, and how to socialize among Europe's nobility and upper classes. After guiding him through the great art museums and galleries of Italy, she accompanied him on a ten-week big-game hunting safari on the slopes of Mount Kenya in East Africa, where he was credited with over sixty kills, including two lions, a rhinoceros, and various antelopes. His safari experience in Africa had a profound influence on Cooper and intensified his love of the wilderness. After returning to Europe, he and the countess set off on a Mediterranean cruise of the Italian and French Rivieras. Rested and rejuvenated by his year-long exile, a healthy Cooper returned to Hollywood in April 1932 and negotiated a new contract with Paramount for two films per year, a salary of $4,000 a week, and director and script approval.
In 1932, after completing Devil and the Deep with Tallulah Bankhead to fulfill his old contract, Cooper appeared in A Farewell to Arms, the first film adaptation of an Ernest Hemingway novel. Co-starring Helen Hayes, a leading New York theatre star and Academy Award winner, and Adolphe Menjou, the film presented Cooper with one of his most ambitious and challenging dramatic roles, playing an American ambulance driver wounded in Italy who falls in love with an English nurse during World War I. Critics praised his highly intense and emotional performance, and the film became one of the year's most commercially successful pictures. In 1933, after making Today We Live with Joan Crawford and One Sunday Afternoon with Fay Wray, Cooper appeared in the Ernst Lubitsch comedy film Design for Living, based on the successful Noël Coward play. Co-starring Miriam Hopkins and Fredric March, the film was a box office success, ranking as one of the top ten highest-grossing films of 1933. All three of the lead actors—March, Cooper, and Hopkins—received attention from this film as they were all at the peak of their careers. Cooper's performance — playing an American artist in Europe competing with his playwright friend for the affections of a beautiful woman — was singled out for its versatility and revealed his genuine ability to do light comedy. Cooper changed his name legally to "Gary Cooper" in August 1933.
In 1934, Cooper was loaned out to MGM for the Civil War drama film Operator 13 with Marion Davies, about a beautiful Union spy who falls in love with a Confederate soldier. Despite Richard Boleslawski's imaginative direction and George J. Folsey's lavish cinematography, the film did poorly at the box office.
Back at Paramount, Cooper appeared in his first of seven films by director Henry Hathaway, Now and Forever, with Carole Lombard and Shirley Temple. In the film, he plays a confidence man who tries to sell his daughter to the relatives who raised her, but is eventually won over by the adorable girl. Impressed by Temple's intelligence and charm, Cooper developed a close rapport with her, both on and off screen. The film was a box-office success.
The following year, Cooper was loaned out to Samuel Goldwyn Productions to appear in King Vidor's romance film The Wedding Night with Anna Sten, who was being groomed as "another Garbo". In the film, Cooper plays an alcoholic novelist who retreats to his family's New England farm where he meets and falls in love with a beautiful Polish neighbor. Cooper delivered a performance of surprising range and depth, according to biographer Larry Swindell. Despite receiving generally favorable reviews, the film was not popular with American audiences, who may have been offended by the film's depiction of an extramarital affair and its tragic ending.
That same year, Cooper appeared in two Henry Hathaway films: the melodrama Peter Ibbetson with Ann Harding, about a man caught up in a dream world created by his love for a childhood sweetheart, and the adventure film The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, about a daring British officer and his men who defend their stronghold at Bengal against rebellious local tribes. While the former, championed by the surrealists became more successful in Europe than in the United States, the latter was nominated for seven Academy Awards and became one of Cooper's most popular and successful adventure films. Hathaway had the highest respect for Cooper's acting ability, calling him "the best actor of all of them".
American folk hero, 1936–1943
From Mr. Deeds to The Real Glory, 1936–1939
Cooper's career took an important turn in 1936. After making Frank Borzage's romantic comedy film Desire with Marlene Dietrich at Paramount—in which he delivered a performance considered by some contemporary critics as one of his finest—Cooper returned to Poverty Row for the first time since his early silent film days to make Frank Capra's Mr. Deeds Goes to Town with Jean Arthur for Columbia Pictures. In the film, Cooper plays the character of Longfellow Deeds, a quiet, innocent writer of greeting cards who inherits a fortune, leaves behind his idyllic life in Vermont, and travels to New York where he faces a world of corruption and deceit. Capra and screenwriter Robert Riskin were able to use Cooper's well-established screen persona as the "quintessential American hero"—a symbol of honesty, courage, and goodness—to create a new type of "folk hero" for the common man. Commenting on Cooper's impact on the character and the film, Capra observed:
Both Desire and Mr. Deeds opened in April 1936 to critical praise and were major box-office successes. In his review in The New York Times, Frank Nugent wrote that Cooper was "proving himself one of the best light comedians in Hollywood". For his performance in Mr. Deeds, Cooper received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.
Cooper appeared in two other Paramount films in 1936. In Lewis Milestone's adventure film The General Died at Dawn with Madeleine Carroll, he plays an American soldier of fortune in China who helps the peasants defend themselves against the oppression of a cruel warlord. Written by playwright Clifford Odets, the film was a critical and commercial success.
In Cecil B. DeMille's sprawling frontier epic The Plainsman—his first of four films with the director—Cooper portrays Wild Bill Hickok in a highly fictionalized version of the opening of the American western frontier. The film was an even greater box-office hit than its predecessor, due in large part to Jean Arthur's definitive depiction of Calamity Jane and Cooper's inspired portrayal of Hickock as an enigmatic figure of "deepening mythic substance". That year, Cooper appeared for the first time on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities, where he would remain for the next twenty-three years.
In late 1936, Paramount was preparing a new contract for Cooper that would raise his salary to $8,000 a week when Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn for six films over six years with a minimum guarantee of $150,000 per picture. Paramount brought suit against Goldwyn and Cooper, and the court ruled that Cooper's new Goldwyn contract afforded the actor sufficient time to also honor his Paramount agreement. Cooper continued to make films with both studios, and by 1939 the United States Treasury reported that Cooper was the country's highest wage earner, at $482,819 (equivalent to $ million in ).
In contrast to his output the previous year, Cooper appeared in only one picture in 1937, Henry Hathaway's adventure film Souls at Sea. A critical and box-office failure, Cooper referred to it as his "almost picture", saying, "It was almost exciting, and almost interesting. And I was almost good." In 1938, he appeared in Archie Mayo's biographical film The Adventures of Marco Polo. Plagued by production problems and a weak screenplay, the film became Goldwyn's biggest failure to that date, losing $700,000. During this period, Cooper turned down several important roles, including the role of Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind. Cooper was producer David O. Selznick's first choice for the part. He made several overtures to the actor, but Cooper had doubts about the project, and did not feel suited to the role. Cooper later admitted, "It was one of the best roles ever offered in Hollywood ... But I said no. I didn't see myself as quite that dashing, and later, when I saw Clark Gable play the role to perfection, I knew I was right."
Back at Paramount, Cooper returned to a more comfortable genre in Ernst Lubitsch's romantic comedy Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938) with Claudette Colbert. In the film, Cooper plays a wealthy American businessman in France who falls in love with an impoverished aristocrat's daughter and persuades her to become his eighth wife. Despite the clever screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder, and solid performances by Cooper and Colbert, American audiences had trouble accepting Cooper in the role of a shallow philanderer. It succeeded only at the European box office market.
In the fall of 1938, Cooper appeared in H. C. Potter's romantic comedy The Cowboy and the Lady with Merle Oberon, about a sweet-natured rodeo cowboy who falls in love with the wealthy daughter of a presidential hopeful, believing her to be a poor, hard-working lady's maid. The efforts of three directors and several eminent screenwriters could not salvage what could have been a fine vehicle for Cooper. While more successful than its predecessor, the film was Cooper's fourth consecutive box-office failure in the American market.
In the next two years, Cooper was more discerning about the roles he accepted and made four successful large-scale adventure and cowboy films. In William A. Wellman's adventure film Beau Geste (1939), he plays one of three daring English brothers who join the French Foreign Legion in the Sahara to fight local tribes. Filmed in the same Mojave Desert locations as the original 1926 version with Ronald Colman, Beau Geste provided Cooper with magnificent sets, exotic settings, high-spirited action, and a role tailored to his personality and screen persona. This was the last film in Cooper's contract with Paramount.
In Henry Hathaway's The Real Glory (1939), he plays a military doctor who accompanies a small group of American Army officers to the Philippines to help the Christian Filipinos defend themselves against Muslim radicals. Many film critics praised Cooper's performance, including author and film critic Graham Greene, who recognized that he "never acted better".
From The Westerner to For Whom the Bell Tolls, 1940–1943
Cooper returned to the Western genre in William Wyler's The Westerner (1940) with Walter Brennan and Doris Davenport, about a drifting cowboy who defends homesteaders against Roy Bean, a corrupt judge known as the "law west of the Pecos". Screenwriter Niven Busch relied on Cooper's extensive knowledge of Western history while working on the script. The film received positive reviews and did well at the box-office, with reviewers praising the performances of the two lead actors. That same year, Cooper appeared in his first all-Technicolor feature, Cecil B. DeMille's adventure film North West Mounted Police (1940). In the film, Cooper plays a Texas Ranger who pursues an outlaw into western Canada where he joins forces with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who are after the same man, a leader of the North-West Rebellion. While not as popular with critics as its predecessor, the film was another box-office success—the sixth-highest-grossing film of 1940.
The early 1940s were Cooper's prime years as an actor. In a relatively short period, he appeared in five critically successful and popular films that produced some of his finest performances. When Frank Capra offered him the lead role in Meet John Doe before Robert Riskin even developed the script, Cooper accepted his friend's offer, saying, "It's okay, Frank, I don't need a script." In the film, Cooper plays Long John Willoughby, a down-and-out bush-league pitcher hired by a newspaper to pretend to be a man who promises to commit suicide on Christmas Eve to protest all the hypocrisy and corruption in the country. Considered by some critics to be Capra's best film at the time, Meet John Doe was received as a "national event" with Cooper appearing on the front cover of Time magazine on March 3, 1941. In his review in the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes called Cooper's performance a "splendid and utterly persuasive portrayal" and praised his "utterly realistic acting which comes through with such authority". Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote, "Gary Cooper, of course, is 'John Doe' to the life and in the whole—shy, bewildered, non-aggressive, but a veritable tiger when aroused."
That same year, Cooper made two films with director and good friend Howard Hawks. In the biographical film Sergeant York, Cooper portrays war hero Alvin C. York, one of the most decorated American soldiers in World War I. The film chronicles York's early backwoods days in Tennessee, his religious conversion and subsequent piety, his stand as a conscientious objector, and finally his heroic actions at the Battle of the Argonne Forest, which earned him the Medal of Honor. Initially, Cooper was nervous and uncertain about playing a living hero, so he traveled to Tennessee to visit York at his home, and the two quiet men established an immediate rapport and discovered they had much in common. Inspired by York's encouragement, Cooper delivered a performance that Howard Barnes of the New York Herald Tribune called "one of extraordinary conviction and versatility", and that Archer Winston of the New York Post called "one of his best". After the film's release, Cooper was awarded the Distinguished Citizenship Medal by the Veterans of Foreign Wars for his "powerful contribution to the promotion of patriotism and loyalty". York admired Cooper's performance and helped promote the film for Warner Bros. Sergeant York became the top-grossing film of the year and was nominated for eleven Academy Awards. Accepting his first Academy Award for Best Actor from his friend James Stewart, Cooper said, "It was Sergeant Alvin York who won this award. Shucks, I've been in the business sixteen years and sometimes dreamed I might get one of these. That's all I can say ... Funny when I was dreaming I always made a better speech."
Cooper concluded the year back at Goldwyn with Howard Hawks to make the romantic comedy Ball of Fire with Barbara Stanwyck. In the film, Cooper plays a shy linguistics professor who leads a team of seven scholars who are writing an encyclopedia. While researching slang, he meets Stanwyck's flirtatious burlesque stripper Sugarpuss O'Shea who blows the dust off their staid life of books. The screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder provided Cooper the opportunity to exercise the full range of his light comedy skills. In his review for the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes wrote that Cooper handled the role with "great skill and comic emphasis" and that his performance was "utterly delightful". Though small in scale, Ball of Fire was one of the top-grossing films of the year—Cooper's fourth consecutive picture to make the top twenty.
Cooper's only film appearance in 1942 was also his last under his Goldwyn contract. In Sam Wood's biographical film The Pride of the Yankees, Cooper portrays baseball star Lou Gehrig who established a record with the New York Yankees for playing in 2,130 consecutive games. Cooper was reluctant to play the seven-time All-Star, who only died the previous year from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) — now commonly called "Lou Gehrig's disease". Beyond the challenges of effectively portraying such a popular and nationally recognized figure, Cooper knew very little about baseball and was not left-handed like Gehrig.
After Gehrig's widow visited the actor and expressed her desire that he portray her husband, Cooper accepted the role that covered a twenty-year span of Gehrig's life—his early love of baseball, his rise to greatness, his loving marriage, and his struggle with illness, culminating in his farewell speech at Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939 before 62,000 fans. Cooper quickly learned the physical movements of a baseball player and developed a fluid, believable swing. The handedness issue was solved by reversing the print for certain batting scenes. The film was one of the year's top ten pictures and received eleven Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's third).
Soon after the publication of Ernest Hemingway's novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, Paramount paid $150,000 for the film rights with the express intent of casting Cooper in the lead role of Robert Jordan, an American explosives expert who fights alongside the Republican loyalists during the Spanish Civil War. The original director, Cecil B. DeMille, was replaced by Sam Wood who brought in Dudley Nichols for the screenplay. After the start of principal photography in the Sierra Nevada in late 1942, Ingrid Bergman was brought in to replace ballerina Vera Zorina as the female lead—a change supported by Cooper and Hemingway. The love scenes between Bergman and Cooper were "rapturous" and passionate. Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune wrote that both actors performed with "the true stature and authority of stars". While the film distorted the novel's original political themes and meaning, For Whom the Bell Tolls was a critical and commercial success and received ten Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's fourth).
World War II related activities
Due to his age and health, Cooper did not serve in the military during World War II, but like many of his colleagues, he got involved in the war effort by entertaining the troops. In June 1943, he visited military hospitals in San Diego, and often appeared at the Hollywood Canteen serving food to the servicemen. In late 1943, Cooper undertook a tour of the South West Pacific with actresses Una Merkel and Phyllis Brooks, and accordionist Andy Arcari.
Traveling on a B-24A Liberator bomber, the group toured the Cook Islands, Fiji, New Caledonia, Queensland, Brisbane—where General Douglas MacArthur told Cooper he was watching Sergeant York in a Manila theater when Japanese bombs began falling—New Guinea, Jayapura, and throughout the Solomon Islands.
The group often shared the same sparse living conditions and K-rations as the troops. Cooper met with the servicemen and women, visited military hospitals, introduced his attractive colleagues, and participated in occasional skits. The shows concluded with Cooper's moving recitation of Lou Gehrig's farewell speech. When he returned to the United States, he visited military hospitals throughout the country. Cooper later called his time with the troops the "greatest emotional experience" of his life.
Mature roles, 1944–1952
In 1944, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's wartime adventure film The Story of Dr. Wassell with Laraine Day — his third movie with the director. In the film, Cooper plays American doctor and missionary Corydon M. Wassell, who leads a group of wounded sailors through the jungles of Java to safety. Despite receiving poor reviews, Dr. Wassell was one of the top-grossing films of the year. With his Goldwyn and Paramount contracts now concluded, Cooper decided to remain independent and formed his own production company, International Pictures, with Leo Spitz, William Goetz, and Nunnally Johnson. The fledgling studio's first offering was Sam Wood's romantic comedy Casanova Brown with Teresa Wright, about a man who learns his soon-to-be ex-wife is pregnant with his child, just as he is about to marry another woman. The film received poor reviews, with the New York Daily News calling it "delightful nonsense", and Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, criticizing Cooper's "somewhat obvious and ridiculous clowning". The film was barely profitable.
In 1945, Cooper starred in and produced Stuart Heisler's Western comedy Along Came Jones with Loretta Young for International. In this lighthearted parody of his past heroic image, Cooper plays comically inept cowboy Melody Jones who is mistaken for a ruthless killer. Audiences embraced Cooper's character, and the film was one of the top box-office pictures of the year—a testament to Cooper's still vital audience appeal. It was also International's biggest financial success during its brief history before being sold off to Universal Studios in 1946.
Cooper's career during the post-war years drifted in new directions as American society was changing. While he still played conventional heroic roles, his films now relied less on his heroic screen persona and more on novel stories and exotic settings. In November 1945, Cooper appeared in Sam Wood's nineteenth-century period drama Saratoga Trunk with Ingrid Bergman, about a Texas cowboy and his relationship with a beautiful fortune-hunter. Filmed in early 1943, the movie's release was delayed for two years due to the increased demand for war movies. Despite poor reviews, Saratoga Trunk did well at the box office and became one of the top money-makers of the year for Warner Bros. Cooper's only film in 1946 was Fritz Lang's romantic thriller Cloak and Dagger, about a mild-mannered physics professor recruited by the OSS during the last years of World War II to investigate the German atomic bomb program. Playing a part loosely based on physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, Cooper was uneasy with the role and unable to convey the "inner sense" of the character. The film received poor reviews and was a box-office failure. In 1947, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's epic adventure film Unconquered with Paulette Goddard, about a Virginia militiaman who defends settlers against an unscrupulous gun trader and hostile Indians on the Western frontier during the eighteenth century. The film received mixed reviews, but even long-time DeMille critic James Agee acknowledged the picture had "some authentic flavor of the period". This last of four films made with DeMille was Cooper's most lucrative, earning the actor over $300,000 (equal to $ today) in salary and percentage of profits. Unconquered would be his last unqualified box-office success for the next five years.
In 1948, after making Leo McCarey's romantic comedy Good Sam, Cooper sold his company to Universal Studios and signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros. that gave him script and director approval and a guaranteed $295,000 (equal to $ today) per picture. His first film under the new contract was King Vidor's drama The Fountainhead (1949) with Patricia Neal and Raymond Massey. In the film, Cooper plays an idealistic and uncompromising architect who struggles to maintain his integrity and individualism in the face of societal pressures to conform to popular standards. Based on the novel by Ayn Rand who also wrote the screenplay, the film reflects her philosophy and attacks the concepts of collectivism while promoting the virtues of individualism. For most critics, Cooper was hopelessly miscast in the role of Howard Roark. In his review for The New York Times, Bosley Crowther concluded he was "Mr. Deeds out of his element". Cooper returned to his element in Delmer Daves' war drama Task Force (1949), about a retiring rear admiral who reminisces about his long career as a naval aviator and his role in the development of aircraft carriers. Cooper's performance and the Technicolor newsreel footage supplied by the United States Navy made the film one of Cooper's most popular during this period. In the next two years, Cooper made four poorly received films: Michael Curtiz' period drama Bright Leaf (1950), Stuart Heisler's Western melodrama Dallas (1950), Henry Hathaway's wartime comedy You're in the Navy Now (1951), and Raoul Walsh's Western action film Distant Drums (1951).
Cooper's most important film during the post-war years was Fred Zinnemann's Western drama High Noon (1952) with Grace Kelly and Katy Jurado for United Artists. In the film, Cooper plays retiring sheriff Will Kane who is preparing to leave town on his honeymoon when he learns that an outlaw he helped put away and his three henchmen are returning to seek their revenge. Unable to gain the support of the frightened townspeople, and abandoned by his young bride, Kane nevertheless stays to face the outlaws alone. During the filming, Cooper was in poor health and in considerable pain from stomach ulcers. His ravaged face and discomfort in some scenes "photographed as self-doubt", according to biographer Hector Arce, and contributed to the effectiveness of his performance. Considered one of the first "adult" Westerns for its theme of moral courage, High Noon received enthusiastic reviews for its artistry, with Time magazine placing it in the ranks of Stagecoach and The Gunfighter. Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote that Cooper was "at the top of his form", and John McCarten, in The New Yorker, wrote that Cooper was never more effective. The film earned $3.75 million in the United States and $18 million worldwide. Following the example of his friend James Stewart, Cooper accepted a lower salary in exchange for a percent of the profits, and ended up making $600,000. Cooper's understated performance was widely praised, and earned him his second Academy Award for Best Actor.
Later films, 1953–1961
After appearing in André de Toth's Civil War drama Springfield Rifle (1952)—a standard Warner Bros. film that was overshadowed by the success of its predecessor—Cooper made four films outside the United States. In Mark Robson's drama Return to Paradise (1953), Cooper plays an American wanderer who liberates the inhabitants of a Polynesian island from the puritanical rule of a misguided pastor. Cooper endured spartan living conditions, long hours, and ill health during the three-month location shoot on the island of Upolu in Western Samoa. Despite its beautiful cinematography, the film received poor reviews. Cooper's next three films were shot in Mexico. In Hugo Fregonese's action adventure film Blowing Wild (1953) with Barbara Stanwyck, he plays a wildcatter in Mexico who gets involved with an oil company executive and his unscrupulous wife with whom he once had an affair.
In 1954, Cooper appeared in Henry Hathaway's Western drama Garden of Evil, with Susan Hayward, about three soldiers of fortune in Mexico hired to rescue a woman's husband. That same year, he appeared in Robert Aldrich's Western adventure Vera Cruz with Burt Lancaster. In the film, Cooper plays an American adventurer hired by Emperor Maximilian I to escort a countess to Vera Cruz during the Mexican Rebellion of 1866. All of these films received poor reviews but did well at the box-office. For his work in Vera Cruz, Cooper earned $1.4 million in salary and percent of the gross.
During this period, Cooper struggled with health problems. As well as his ongoing treatment for ulcers, he suffered a severe shoulder injury during the filming of Blowing Wild when he was hit by metal fragments from a dynamited oil well. During the filming of Vera Cruz, he reinjured his hip falling from a horse, and was burned when Lancaster fired his rifle too close and the wadding from the blank shell pierced his clothing.
In 1955, he appeared in Otto Preminger's biographical war drama The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell, about the World War I general who tried to convince government officials of the importance of air power, and was court-martialed after blaming the War Department for a series of air disasters. Some critics felt that Cooper was miscast, and that his dull, tight-lipped performance did not reflect Mitchell's dynamic and caustic personality. In 1956, Cooper was more effective playing a gentle Indiana Quaker in William Wyler's Civil War drama Friendly Persuasion with Dorothy McGuire. Like Sergeant York and High Noon, the film addresses the conflict between religious pacifism and civic duty. For his performance, Cooper received his second Golden Globe nomination for Best Motion Picture Actor. The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, was awarded the Palme d'Or at the 1957 Cannes Film Festival, and went on to earn $8 million worldwide.
In 1956, Cooper traveled to France to make Billy Wilder's romantic comedy Love in the Afternoon with Audrey Hepburn and Maurice Chevalier. In the film, Cooper plays a middle-aged American playboy in Paris who pursues and eventually falls in love with a much younger woman. Despite receiving some positive reviews—including from Bosley Crowther who praised the film's "charming performances"—most reviewers concluded that Cooper was simply too old for the part. While audiences may not have welcomed seeing Cooper's heroic screen image tarnished by his playing an aging roué trying to seduce an innocent young girl, the film was still a box-office success. The following year, Cooper appeared in Philip Dunne's romantic drama Ten North Frederick. In the film, which was based on the novel by John O'Hara, Cooper plays an attorney whose life is ruined by a double-crossing politician and his own secret affair with his daughter's young roommate. While Cooper brought "conviction and controlled anguish" to his performance, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, it was not enough to save what Bosley Crowther called a "hapless film".
Despite his ongoing health problems and several operations for ulcers and hernias, Cooper continued to work in action films. In 1958, he appeared in Anthony Mann's Western drama Man of the West (1958) with Julie London and Lee J. Cobb, about a reformed outlaw and killer who is forced to confront his violent past when the train he is riding in is held up by his former gang members. The film has been called Cooper's "most pathological Western", with its themes of impotent rage, sexual humiliation, and sadism. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, Cooper, who struggled with moral conflicts in his personal life, "understood the anguish of a character striving to retain his integrity ... [and] brought authentic feeling to the role of a tempted and tormented, yet essentially decent man". Mostly ignored by critics at the time, the film is now well-regarded by film scholars and is considered Cooper's last great film.
After his Warner Bros. contract ended, Cooper formed his own production company, Baroda Productions, and made three unusual films in 1959 about redemption. In Delmer Daves' Western drama The Hanging Tree, Cooper plays a frontier doctor who saves a criminal from a lynch mob, and later tries to exploit his sordid past. Cooper delivered a "powerful and persuasive" performance of an emotionally scarred man whose need to dominate others is transformed by the love and sacrifice of a woman. In Robert Rossen's historical adventure They Came to Cordura with Rita Hayworth, he plays an army officer who is found guilty of cowardice and assigned the degrading task of recommending soldiers for the Medal of Honor during the Pancho Villa Expedition of 1916.
While Cooper received positive reviews, Variety and Films in Review felt he was too old for the part. In Michael Anderson's action drama The Wreck of the Mary Deare with Charlton Heston, Cooper plays a disgraced merchant marine officer who decides to stay aboard his sinking cargo ship in order to prove the vessel was deliberately scuttled and to redeem his good name. Like its two predecessors, the film was physically demanding. Cooper, who was a trained scuba diver, did most of his own underwater scenes. Biographer Jeffrey Meyers observed that in all three roles, Cooper effectively conveyed the sense of lost honor and desire for redemption—what Joseph Conrad in Lord Jim called the "struggles of an individual trying to save from the fire his idea of what his moral identity should be".
Personal life
Marriage and family
Cooper was formally introduced to his future wife, 20-year-old New York debutante Veronica Balfe, on Easter Sunday 1933 at a party given by her uncle, art director Cedric Gibbons. Called "Rocky" by her family and friends, she grew up on Park Avenue and attended finishing schools. Her stepfather was Wall Street tycoon Paul Shields. Cooper and Rocky were quietly married at her parents' Park Avenue residence on December 15, 1933. According to his friends, the marriage had a positive impact on Cooper, who turned away from past indiscretions and took control of his life. Athletic and a lover of the outdoors, Rocky shared many of Cooper's interests, including riding, skiing, and skeet-shooting. She organized their social life, and her wealth and social connections provided Cooper access to New York high society. Cooper and his wife owned homes in the Los Angeles area in Encino (1933–36), Brentwood (1936–53), and Holmby Hills (1954–61), and owned a vacation home in Aspen, Colorado (1949–53).
Gary and Veronica Cooper's daughter, Maria Veronica Cooper, was born on September 15, 1937. By all accounts, he was a patient and affectionate father, teaching Maria to ride a bicycle, play tennis, ski, and ride horses. Sharing many of her parents' interests, she accompanied them on their travels and was often photographed with them. Like her father, she developed a love for art and drawing. As a family they vacationed together in Sun Valley, Idaho, spent time at Rocky's parents' country house in Southampton, New York, and took frequent trips to Europe. Cooper and Rocky were legally separated on May 16, 1951, when Cooper moved out of their home. For over two years, they maintained a fragile and uneasy family life with their daughter. Cooper moved back into their home in November 1953, and their formal reconciliation occurred in February 1954.
Romantic relationships
Prior to his marriage, Cooper had a series of romantic relationships with leading actresses, beginning in 1927 with Clara Bow, who advanced his career by helping him get one of his first leading roles in Children of Divorce. Bow was also responsible for getting Cooper a role in Wings, which generated an enormous amount of fan mail for the young actor. In 1928, he had a relationship with another experienced actress, Evelyn Brent, whom he met while filming Beau Sabreur. In 1929, while filming The Wolf Song, Cooper began an intense affair with Lupe Vélez, which was the most important romance of his early life. During their two years together, Cooper also had brief affairs with Marlene Dietrich while filming Morocco in 1930 and with Carole Lombard while making I Take This Woman in 1931. During his year abroad in 1931–32, Cooper had an affair with the married Countess Dorothy di Frasso, while staying at her Villa Madama near Rome.
After he was married in December 1933, Cooper remained faithful to his wife until the summer of 1942, when he began an affair with Ingrid Bergman during the production of For Whom the Bell Tolls. Their relationship lasted through the completion of filming Saratoga Trunk in June 1943. In 1948, after finishing work on The Fountainhead, Cooper began an affair with actress Patricia Neal, his co-star. At first they kept their affair discreet, but eventually it became an open secret in Hollywood, and Cooper's wife confronted him with the rumors, which he admitted were true. He also confessed that he was in love with Neal, and continued to see her. Cooper and his wife were legally separated in May 1951, but he did not seek a divorce. Neal later claimed that Cooper hit her after she went on a date with Kirk Douglas, and that he arranged for her to have an abortion when she became pregnant with Cooper's child. Neal ended their relationship in late December 1951. During his three-year separation from his wife, Cooper was rumored to have had affairs with Grace Kelly, Lorraine Chanel, and Gisèle Pascal.
Cooper biographers have explored his friendship in the late twenties with the actor Anderson Lawler, with whom Cooper shared a house on and off for a year, while at the same time seeing Clara Bow, Evelyn Brent and Lupe Vélez. Lupe Vélez once told Hedda Hopper of Vélez' affair with Cooper; whenever he would come home after seeing Lawler, she would sniff for Lawler's cologne. Vélez' biographer Michelle Vogel has reported that Vélez consented to Cooper's sexual behavior with Lawler, but only as long as she, too, could participate. In later life, he became involved in a relationship with the costume designer Irene, and was, according to Irene, "the only man she ever loved". A year after his death in 1961, Irene committed suicide by jumping from the 11th floor of the Knickerbocker Hotel, after telling Doris Day of her grief over Cooper's death.
Friendships, interests, and character
Cooper's twenty-year friendship with Ernest Hemingway began at Sun Valley in October 1940. The previous year, Hemingway drew upon Cooper's image when he created the character of Robert Jordan for the novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. The two shared a passion for the outdoors, and for years they hunted duck and pheasant, and skied together in Sun Valley. Both men admired the work of Rudyard Kipling—Cooper kept a copy of the poem "If—" in his dressing room—and retained as adults Kipling's sense of boyish adventure.
As well as admiring Cooper's hunting skills and knowledge of the outdoors, Hemingway believed his character matched his screen persona, once telling a friend, "If you made up a character like Coop, nobody would believe it. He's just too good to be true." They saw each other often, and their friendship remained strong through the years.
Cooper's social life generally centered on sports, outdoor activities, and dinner parties with his family and friends from the film industry, including directors Henry Hathaway, Howard Hawks, William Wellman, and Fred Zinnemann, and actors Joel McCrea, James Stewart, Barbara Stanwyck, and Robert Taylor. As well as hunting, Cooper enjoyed riding, fishing, skiing, and later in life, scuba diving. He never abandoned his early love for art and drawing, and over the years, he and his wife acquired a private collection of modern paintings, including works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Gauguin, and Georgia O'Keeffe. Cooper owned several works by Pablo Picasso, whom he met in 1956. Cooper also had a lifelong passion for automobiles, with a collection that included a 1930 Duesenberg.
Cooper was naturally reserved and introspective, and loved the solitude of outdoor activities. Not unlike his screen persona, his communication style frequently consisted of long silences with an occasional "yup" and "shucks". He once said, "If others have more interesting things to say than I have, I keep quiet." According to his friends, Cooper could also be an articulate, well-informed conversationalist on topics ranging from horses, guns, and Western history to film production, sports cars, and modern art. He was modest and unpretentious, frequently downplaying his acting abilities and career accomplishments. His friends and colleagues described him as charming, well-mannered, and thoughtful, with a lively boyish sense of humor. Cooper maintained a sense of propriety throughout his career and never misused his movie star status—never sought special treatment or refused to work with a director or leading lady. His close friend Joel McCrea recalled, "Coop never fought, he never got mad, he never told anybody off that I know of; everybody that worked with him liked him."
Political views
Like his father, Cooper was a conservative Republican; he voted for Calvin Coolidge in 1924, Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1932, and campaigned for Wendell Willkie in 1940. When Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for an unprecedented fourth presidential term in 1944, Cooper campaigned for Thomas E. Dewey and criticized Roosevelt for being dishonest and adopting "foreign" ideas. In a radio address that he paid for himself just prior to the election, Cooper said, "I disagree with the New Deal belief that the America all of us love is old and worn-out and finished—and has to borrow foreign notions that don't even seem to work any too well where they come from ... Our country is a young country that just has to make up its mind to be itself again." He also attended a Republican rally at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum that drew 93,000 Dewey supporters.
Cooper was one of the founding members of the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, a conservative organization dedicated, according to its statement of principles, to preserving the "American way of life" and opposing communism and fascism. The organization — whose membership included Walter Brennan, Laraine Day, Walt Disney, Clark Gable, Hedda Hopper, Ronald Reagan, Barbara Stanwyck, and John Wayne — advised the United States Congress to investigate communist influence in the motion picture industry. On October 23, 1947, Cooper was subpoenaed to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and was asked if he had observed any "communistic influence" in Hollywood.
Cooper recounted statements he'd heard suggesting that the Constitution was out of date and that Congress was an unnecessary institution—comments that Cooper said he found to be "very un-American" and testified that he had rejected several scripts because he thought they were "tinged with communist ideas". Unlike some other witnesses, Cooper did not name any individuals, nor did he name any scripts, during his testimony.
In 1951, while making High Noon, Cooper became friends with the film's screenwriter, Carl Foreman, who had been a member of the Communist Party. When Foreman was subpoenaed by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Cooper put his career on the line to defend Foreman. When John Wayne and others threatened Cooper with blacklisting himself and the loss of his passport if he did not walk off the film, Cooper gave a statement to the press in support of Foreman, calling him "the finest kind of American". When producer Stanley Kramer removed Foreman's name as screenwriter, Cooper and director Fred Zinnemann threatened to walk off the film if Foreman's name was not restored. Foreman later said that, of all his friends and allies and colleagues in Hollywood, "Cooper was the only big one who tried to help. The only one." Cooper even offered to testify in Foreman's behalf before the committee, but character witnesses were not allowed. Foreman always sent future scripts to Cooper for first refusal, including The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Key and The Guns of Navarone. Cooper had to turn them down because of his age.
Religion
Cooper was baptized in the Anglican Church in December 1911 in Britain, and was raised in the Episcopal Church in the United States. While he was not an observant Christian for most of his adult life, many of his friends believed he had a deeply spiritual side.
On June 26, 1953, Cooper accompanied his wife and daughter, who were devout Catholics, to Rome, where they had an audience with Pope Pius XII. Cooper and his wife were still separated at the time, but the papal visit marked the beginning of their gradual reconciliation. In the coming years, Cooper contemplated his mortality and his personal behavior, and started discussing Catholicism with his family. He began attending church with them regularly, and met with their parish priest, who offered Cooper spiritual guidance. After several months of study, Cooper was baptized as a Roman Catholic on April 9, 1959, before a small group of family and friends at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills.
Final years and death
On April 14, 1960, Cooper underwent surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston for an aggressive form of prostate cancer that had metastasized to his colon. He fell ill again on May 31 and underwent further surgery at Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles in early June to remove a malignant tumor from his large intestine. After recuperating over the summer, Cooper took his family on vacation to the south of France before traveling to the UK in the fall to star in The Naked Edge. In December 1960, he worked on the NBC television documentary The Real West, which was part of the company's Project 20 series.
On December 27, his wife learned from their family doctor that Cooper's cancer had spread to his lungs and bones and was inoperable. His family decided not to tell him immediately.
On January 9, 1961, Cooper attended a dinner that was given in his honor and hosted by Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin at the Friars Club. The dinner was attended by many of his industry friends and concluded with a brief speech by Cooper who said, "The only achievement I'm proud of is the friends I've made in this community."
In mid-January, Cooper took his family to Sun Valley for their last vacation together. Cooper and Hemingway hiked through the snow together for the last time. On February 27, after returning to Los Angeles, Cooper learned that he was dying. He later told his family, "We'll pray for a miracle; but if not, and that's God's will, that's all right too." On April 17, Cooper watched the Academy Awards ceremony on television and saw his good friend James Stewart, who had presented Cooper with his first Oscar years earlier, accept on Cooper's behalf an honorary award for lifetime achievement—his third Oscar. Holding back tears, Stewart said, "Coop, I'll get this to you right away. And Coop, I want you to know this, that with this goes all the warm friendship and the affection and the admiration and the deep, the deep respect of all of us. We're very, very proud of you, Coop. All of us are tremendously proud." The following day, newspapers around the world announced the news that Cooper was dying. In the coming days he received numerous messages of appreciation and encouragement, including telegrams from Pope John XXIII and Queen Elizabeth II, and a telephone call from President John F. Kennedy.
In his last public statement on May 4, Cooper said, "I know that what is happening is God's will. I am not afraid of the future." He received the last rites on May 12. Cooper died quietly the following day, Saturday, May 13, 1961, at 12:47 P.M.
A requiem mass was held on May 18 at the Church of the Good Shepherd, attended by many of Cooper's friends, including James Stewart, Jack Benny, Henry Hathaway, Joel McCrea, Audrey Hepburn, Jack L. Warner, John Ford, John Wayne, Edward G. Robinson, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Fred Astaire, Randolph Scott, Walter Pidgeon, Bob Hope and Marlene Dietrich. Cooper was buried in the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes in Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California. In May 1974, after his family relocated to New York, Cooper's remains were exhumed and reburied in Sacred Hearts Cemetery in Southampton. His grave is marked by a three-ton boulder from a Montauk quarry.
Acting style and reputation
Cooper's acting style consisted of three essential characteristics: his ability to project elements of his own personality onto the characters he portrayed, to appear natural and authentic in his roles, and to underplay and deliver restrained performances calibrated for the camera and the screen. Acting teacher Lee Strasberg once observed: "The simplest examples of Stanislavsky's ideas are actors such as Gary Cooper, John Wayne, and Spencer Tracy. They try not to act but to be themselves, to respond or react. They refuse to say or do anything they feel not to be consonant with their own characters." Film director François Truffaut ranked Cooper among "the greatest actors" because of his ability to deliver great performances "without direction". This ability to project elements of his own personality onto his characters produced a continuity across his performances to the extent that critics and audiences were convinced that he was simply "playing himself".
Cooper's ability to project his personality onto his characters played an important part in his appearing natural and authentic on screen. Actor John Barrymore said of Cooper, "This fellow is the world's greatest actor. He does without effort what the rest of us spend our lives trying to learn—namely, to be natural." Charles Laughton, who played opposite Cooper in Devil and the Deep agreed, "In truth, that boy hasn't the least idea how well he acts ... He gets at it from the inside, from his own clear way of looking at life." William Wyler, who directed Cooper in two films, called him a "superb actor, a master of movie acting".
In his review of Cooper's performance in The Real Glory, Graham Greene wrote, "Sometimes his lean photogenic face seems to leave everything to the lens, but there is no question here of his not acting. Watch him inoculate the girl against cholera—the casual jab of the needle, and the dressing slapped on while he talks, as though a thousand arms had taught him where to stab and he doesn't have to think anymore."
Cooper's style of underplaying before the camera surprised many of his directors and fellow actors. Even in his earliest feature films, he recognized the camera's ability to pick up slight gestures and facial movements. Commenting on Cooper's performance in Sergeant York, director Howard Hawks observed, "He worked very hard and yet he didn't seem to be working. He was a strange actor because you'd look at him during a scene and you'd think ... this isn't going to be any good. But when you saw the rushes in the projection room the next day you could read in his face all the things he'd been thinking." Sam Wood, who directed Cooper in four films, had similar observations about Cooper's performance in Pride of the Yankees, noting, "What I thought was underplaying turned out to be just the right approach. On the screen he's perfect, yet on the set you'd swear it's the worst job of acting in the history of motion pictures."
Fellow actors admired his abilities as an actor. Commenting on her two films playing opposite Cooper, actress Ingrid Bergman concluded, "The personality of this man was so enormous, so overpowering—and that expression in his eyes and his face, it was so delicate and so underplayed. You just didn't notice it until you saw it on the screen. I thought he was marvelous; the most underplaying and the most natural actor I ever worked with."
Tom Hanks declared, "In only one scene in the first film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture, we see the future of screen acting in the form of Gary Cooper. He is quiet and natural, somehow different from the other cast members. He does something mysterious with his eyes and shoulders that is much more like 'being' than 'acting'."
Daniel Day-Lewis said, "I don't particularly like westerns as a genre, but I do love certain westerns. 'High Noon' means a lot to me – I love the purity and the honesty, I love Gary Cooper in that film, the idea of the last man standing."
Chris Pratt stated, "I started watching Westerns when I was shooting in London about four or five years ago. I really fell in love with Gary Cooper, and his stuff. That sucked me into the Westerns. Before, I never got engrossed in the story. I'd just dip in, and there were guys in horses in black and white. High Noon's later Gary Cooper, I liked that. But I liked 'The Westerner'. That's my favorite one. I have that poster hung up in my house because I really like that one."
To Al Pacino, "Gary Cooper was a phenomenon—his ability to take some thing and elevate it, give it such dignity. One of the great presences."
Mylène Demongeot first got with Gary Cooper for the opening of the first escalator to be installed in a cinema, at the Rex Theatre in Paris, on June 7, 1957. She declared in a 2015 filmed interview: "Gary Cooper ... il est sublime ! Aaahhh (Mylène pushing a cry of love not to say ecstasy) il est sublime ... Ah ! Ah ! Ah ! Là je dois dire que ça fait partie des stars, y'a Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, ces grands Américains que j'ai rencontrés comme ça, c'est vraiment des mecs incroyables. Y'en a plus des comme ça ! Euh non. (Gary Cooper was sublime, there I have to say, now he, was part of the stars, Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, those great americans who I've met really were unbelievable guys, there aren't any like them anymore)."
Career assessment and legacy
Cooper's career spanned thirty-six years, from 1925 to 1961. During that time, he appeared in eighty-four feature films in a leading role. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His natural and authentic acting style appealed powerfully to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major movie genres, including Westerns, war films, adventure films, drama films, crime films, romance films, comedy films, and romantic comedy films. He appeared on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities for twenty-three consecutive years, from 1936 to 1958. According to Quigley's annual poll, Cooper was one of the top money-making stars for eighteen years, appearing in the top ten in 1936–37, 1941–49, and 1951–57. He topped the list in 1953. In Quigley's list of all-time money-making stars, Cooper is listed fourth, after John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and Tom Cruise. At the time of his death, it was estimated that his films grossed well over $200 million (equivalent to $ billion in ).
In over half of his feature films, Cooper portrayed Westerners, soldiers, pilots, sailors, and explorers—all men of action. In the rest he played a wide range of characters, included doctors, professors, artists, architects, clerks, and baseball players. Cooper's heroic screen image changed with each period of his career. In his early films, he played the young naive hero sure of his moral position and trusting in the triumph of simple virtues (The Virginian). After becoming a major star, his Western screen persona was replaced by a more cautious hero in adventure films and dramas (A Farewell to Arms). During the height of his career, from 1936 to 1943, he played a new type of hero—a champion of the common man willing to sacrifice himself for others (Mr. Deeds, Meet John Doe, and For Whom the Bell Tolls).
In the post-war years, Cooper attempted broader variations on his screen image, which now reflected a hero increasingly at odds with the world who must face adversity alone (The Fountainhead and High Noon). In his final films, Cooper's hero rejects the violence of the past, and seeks to reclaim lost honor and find redemption (Friendly Persuasion and Man of the West). The screen persona he developed and sustained throughout his career represented the ideal American hero—a tall, handsome, and sincere man of steadfast integrity who emphasized action over intellect, and combined the heroic qualities of the romantic lover, the adventurer, and the common man.
On February 6, 1960, Cooper was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6243 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to the film industry. He was awarded a star on the sidewalk outside the Ellen Theater in Bozeman, Montana.
On May 6, 1961, he was awarded the French Order of Arts and Letters in recognition of his significant contribution to the arts. On July 30, 1961, he was posthumously awarded the David di Donatello Special Award in Italy for his career achievements.
In 1966, he was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. In 2015, he was inducted into the Utah Cowboy and Western Heritage Hall of Fame. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper eleventh on its list of the 25 male stars of classic Hollywood. Three of his characters—Will Kane, Lou Gehrig, and Sergeant York—made AFI's list of the one hundred greatest heroes and villains, all of them as heroes. His Lou Gehrig line, "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.", is ranked by AFI as the thirty-eighth greatest movie quote of all time.
More than a half century after his death, Cooper's enduring legacy, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, is his image of the ideal American hero preserved in his film performances. Charlton Heston once observed, "He projected the kind of man Americans would like to be, probably more than any actor that's ever lived."
In the TV series Justified, based on works and characters created by Elmore Leonard, Gary Cooper is used throughout the six seasons as the man whom U.S. Marshall Raylan Givens, played by Timothy Olyphant, aspires to be. When his colleague asks Marshall Givens how he thinks his dangerous plan to bring down a villain can possibly work, he replies: "Why not? Worked for Gary Cooper."
Gary Cooper is referenced several times in the critically acclaimed television series The Sopranos, with protagonist Tony Soprano asking "What ever happened to Gary Cooper? The strong, silent type." while complaining about his problems to his therapist.
In the 1930s hit song "Puttin' On the Ritz", Cooper is referenced in the line "dress up like a million dollar trooper/Tryin' hard to look like Gary Cooper, Super duper!" More than two decades after Cooper's death a new version of the song was released in 1983 by Taco; the original lyrics were kept, including the references to Cooper.
In J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye, Cooper is "spotted" by Holden Caulfield to distract a woman he is dancing with.
Awards and nominations
Filmography
The following is a list of feature films in which Cooper appeared in a leading role.
The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926)
Children of Divorce (1927)
Arizona Bound (1927)
Wings (1927)
Nevada (1927)
It (1927)
The Last Outlaw (1927)
Beau Sabreur (1928)
The Legion of the Condemned (1928)
Doomsday (1928)
Half a Bride (1928)
Lilac Time (1928)
The First Kiss (1928)
The Shopworn Angel (1928)
Wolf Song (1929)
Betrayal (1929)
The Virginian (1929)
Only the Brave (1930)
The Texan (1930)
Seven Days' Leave (1930)
A Man from Wyoming (1930)
The Spoilers (1930)
Morocco (1930)
Fighting Caravans (1931)
City Streets (1931)
I Take This Woman (1931)
His Woman (1931)
Devil and the Deep (1932)
If I Had a Million (1932)
A Farewell to Arms (1932)
Today We Live (1933)
One Sunday Afternoon (1933)
Design for Living (1933)
Alice in Wonderland (1933)
Operator 13 (1934)
Now and Forever (1934)
The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935)
The Wedding Night (1935)
Peter Ibbetson (1935)
Desire (1936)
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)
The General Died at Dawn (1936)
The Plainsman (1936)
Souls at Sea (1937)
The Adventures of Marco Polo (1938)
Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938)
The Cowboy and the Lady (1938)
Beau Geste (1939)
The Real Glory (1939)
The Westerner (1940)
North West Mounted Police (1940)
Meet John Doe (1941)
Sergeant York (1941)
Ball of Fire (1941)
The Pride of the Yankees (1942)
For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)
The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944)
Casanova Brown (1944)
Along Came Jones (1945)
Saratoga Trunk (1945)
Cloak and Dagger (1946)
Unconquered (1947)
Good Sam (1948)
The Fountainhead (1949)
Task Force (1949)
Bright Leaf (1950)
Dallas (1950)
You're in the Navy Now (1951)
It's a Big Country (1951)
Distant Drums (1951)
High Noon (1952)
Springfield Rifle (1952)
Return to Paradise (1953)
Blowing Wild (1953)
Garden of Evil (1954)
Vera Cruz (1954)
The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (1955)
Friendly Persuasion (1956)
Love in the Afternoon (1957)
Ten North Frederick (1958)
Man of the West (1958)
The Hanging Tree (1959)
They Came to Cordura (1959)
The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959)
The Naked Edge (1961)
Radio appearances
References
Notes
Citations
Bibliography
Adrien Le Bihan, Gary Cooper, le prince des acteurs, LettMotif, 2021, 358p.()
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1901 births
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20th-century American male actors
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American male film actors
American male silent film actors
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American people of English descent
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
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People educated at Dunstable Grammar School
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People from Holmby Hills, Los Angeles | false | [
"\"Toward a Fair Use Standard\", 103 Harv. L. Rev. 1105 (1990), is a law review article on the fair use doctrine in US copyright law, written by then-District Court Judge Pierre N. Leval. The article argued that the most critical element of the fair use analysis is the transformativeness of a work, the first of the statutory factors listed in the Copyright Act of 1976, . \n\nLeval's article is cited in the Supreme Court's 1994 decision in Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc., which marked a shift in judicial treatment of fair use toward a transformativeness analysis and away from emphasizing the \"commerciality\" analysis of the fourth factor. Prior to Leval's article, the fourth factor had often been described as the most important of the factors. \n\nIn his article, Leval noted: \nI believe the answer to the question of justification turns primarily on whether, and to what extent, the challenged use is transformative. The use must be productive and must employ the quoted matter in a different manner or for a different purpose from the original. ...[If] the secondary use adds value to the original—if the quoted matter is used as raw material, transformed in the creation of new information, new aesthetics, new insights and understandings—this is the very type of activity that the fair use doctrine intends to protect for the enrichment of society.\n\nTransformative uses may include criticizing the quoted work, exposing the character of the original author, proving a fact, or summarizing an idea argued in the original in order to defend or rebut it. They also may include parody, symbolism, aesthetic declarations, and innumerable other uses.\n\nLeval's article was published with an accompanying article by Lloyd Weinreb \"Fair's Fair: A Comment on the Fair Use Doctrine\", 103 Harvard Law Review 1137 (1990), which generally critiqued Leval's thesis.\n\nFurther reading \n \n \n\n1990 essays\n1990 in law\nFair use\nCopyright law literature\nLegal literature\nWorks originally published in the Harvard Law Review\nUnited States copyright law",
"In Caspar Hare's theory of perspectival realism, there is a defining intrinsic property that the things that are in perceptual awareness have. Consider seeing object A but not object B. Of course, we can say that the visual experience of A is present to you, and no visual experience of B is present to you. But, it can be argued, this misses the fact that the visual experience of A is simply present, not relative to anything. This is what Hare's perspectival realism attempts to capture, resulting in a weak version of metaphysical solipsism.\n\nAs Hare points out, the same type of argument is often used in the philosophy of time to support theories such as presentism. Of course, we can say that A is happening on [insert today's date]. But, it can be argued, this misses the fact that A is simply happening (right now), not relative to anything.\n\nHare's theory of perspectival realism is closely related to his theory of egocentric presentism.\nSeveral other philosophers have written reviews of Hare's work on this topic.\n\nSee also\n Metaphysical subjectivism\n Centered worlds\n Benj Hellie's vertiginous question\n J.J. Valberg's personal horizon\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Hare, Caspar. Self-Bias, Time-Bias, and the Metaphysics of Self and Time. Preprint of article in The Journal of Philosophy (2007).\n Hare, Caspar. On Myself, and Other, Less Important Subjects. Early draft of book published by Princeton University Press (2009).\n Hare, Caspar. Realism About Tense and Perspective. Preprint of article in Philosophy Compass (2010).\n\nEpistemological theories\nMetaphysics of mind\nPhilosophical realism\nPhilosophy of time\nTheory of mind"
] |
[
"Gary Cooper",
"Silent films, 1925-28",
"what silent films were made in 1925?",
"In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt,",
"what other silent films?",
"Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones.",
"did he win any awards for these films?",
"I don't know.",
"what was his greatest accomplishment?",
"Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects.",
"did Lilac Time succeed?",
"It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928.",
"what is the most important fact in this article?",
"Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky,"
] | C_6ec0895035fd4dbda1785cd7d1c7b5d7_1 | did he win any awards for this role? | 7 | Did Gary Cooper win any awards for his role in The Winning of Barbara Worth? | Gary Cooper | In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, including Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt work--which sometimes injured horses and riders--"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name. Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week. Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal--finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings, the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada--both films directed by John Waters. In 1928, Paramount paired Cooper with a youthful Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss--advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride. That year, Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928. CANNOTANSWER | The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. | Gary Cooper (born Frank James Cooper; May 7, 1901 – May 13, 1961) was an American actor known for his strong, silent, and understated acting style. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor twice and had a further three nominations, as well as receiving an Academy Honorary Award for his career achievements in 1961. He was one of the top 10 film personalities for 23 consecutive years, and one of the top money-making stars for 18 years. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper at No. 11 on its list of the 25 greatest male stars of classic Hollywood cinema.
Cooper's career spanned 36 years, from 1925 to 1961, and included leading roles in 84 feature films. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era through to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His screen persona appealed strongly to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major film genres. His ability to project his own personality onto the characters he played contributed to his natural and authentic appearance on screen. Throughout his career, he sustained a screen persona that represented the ideal American hero.
Cooper began his career as a film extra and stunt rider, but soon landed acting roles. After establishing himself as a Western hero in his early silent films, he appeared as the Virginian and became a movie star in 1929 with his first sound picture, The Virginian. In the early 1930s, he expanded his heroic image to include more cautious characters in adventure films and dramas such as A Farewell to Arms (1932) and The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935). During the height of his career, Cooper portrayed a new type of hero—a champion of the common man—in films such as Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), Meet John Doe (1941), Sergeant York (1941), The Pride of the Yankees (1942), and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943). He later portrayed more mature characters at odds with the world in films such as The Fountainhead (1949) and High Noon (1952). In his final films, he played non-violent characters searching for redemption in films such as Friendly Persuasion (1956) and Man of the West (1958).
Early life
Frank James Cooper was born in Helena, Montana, on May 7, 1901, the younger of two sons of English parents Alice (née Brazier; 1873–1967) and Charles Henry Cooper (1865–1946). His brother, Arthur, was six years his senior. Cooper's father came from Houghton Regis, Bedfordshire, and became a prominent lawyer, rancher, and Montana Supreme Court justice. His mother hailed from Gillingham, Kent, and married Charles in Montana. In 1906, Charles purchased the Seven-Bar-Nine cattle ranch, about north of Helena near Craig, Montana. Cooper and Arthur spent their summers at the ranch and learned to ride horses, hunt, and fish. Cooper attended Central Grade School in Helena.
Alice wanted her sons to have an English education, so she took them back to England in 1909 to enroll them in Dunstable Grammar School in Dunstable, Bedfordshire. While there, Cooper and his brother lived with their father's cousins, William and Emily Barton, at their home in Houghton Regis. Cooper studied Latin, French, and English history at Dunstable until 1912. While he adapted to English school discipline and learned the requisite social graces, he never adjusted to the rigid class structure and formal Eton collars he was required to wear. He received his confirmation in the Church of England at the Church of All Saints in Houghton Regis on December 3, 1911. His mother accompanied her sons back to the U.S. in August 1912, and Cooper resumed his education at Johnson Grammar School in Helena.
When Cooper was 15, he injured his hip in a car accident. On his doctor's recommendation, he returned to the Seven-Bar-Nine ranch to recuperate by horseback riding. The misguided therapy left him with his characteristic stiff, off-balanced walk and slightly angled horse-riding style. He left Helena High School after two years in 1918, and returned to the family ranch to work full-time as a cowboy. In 1919, his father arranged for him to attend Gallatin County High School in Bozeman, Montana, where English teacher Ida Davis encouraged him to focus on academics and participate in debating and dramatics. Cooper later called Davis "the woman partly responsible for [him] giving up cowboy-ing and going to college".
Cooper was still attending high school in 1920 when he took three art courses at Montana Agricultural College in Bozeman. His interest in art was inspired years earlier by the Western paintings of Charles Marion Russell and Frederic Remington. Cooper especially admired and studied Russell's Lewis and Clark Meeting Indians at Ross' Hole (1910), which still hangs in the state capitol building in Helena. In 1922, to continue his art education, he enrolled in Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa. He did well academically in most of his courses, but was not accepted into the school's drama club. His drawings and watercolor paintings were exhibited throughout the dormitory, and he was named art editor for the college yearbook. During the summers of 1922 and 1923, Cooper worked at Yellowstone National Park as a tour guide driving the yellow open-top buses. Despite a promising first 18 months at Grinnell, he left college suddenly in February 1924, spent a month in Chicago looking for work as an artist, and then returned to Helena, where he sold editorial cartoons to the local Independent newspaper.
In autumn 1924, Cooper's father left the Montana Supreme Court bench and moved with his wife to Los Angeles to administer the estates of two relatives, and Cooper joined his parents there in November at his father's request. After briefly working a series of unpromising jobs, he met two friends from Montana who were working as film extras and stunt riders in low-budget Western films for the small movie studios on Poverty Row. They introduced him to another Montana cowboy, rodeo champion Jay "Slim" Talbot, who took him to see a casting director. Wanting money for a professional art course, Cooper worked as a film extra for $5 a day, and as a stunt rider for $10. Cooper and Talbot became close friends and hunting companions, and Talbot later worked as Cooper's stuntman and stand-in for over three decades.
Career
Silent films, 1925–1928
In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, but also the already emergent major studios, Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt workwhich sometimes injured horses and riders"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name.
Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week.
Cooper's first important film role was a supporting part in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) starring Ronald Colman and Vilma Bánky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal—finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings (both 1927), the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada—both films directed by John Waters.
Paramount paired Cooper with Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss (both 1928)—advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride (also both 1928). Around the same time, Cooper made Lilac Time (1928) with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928.
Hollywood stardom, 1929–1935
Cooper became a major movie star in 1929 with the release of his first talking picture, The Virginian (1929), which was directed by Victor Fleming and co-starred Mary Brian and Walter Huston. Based on the popular novel by Owen Wister, The Virginian was one of the first sound films to define the Western code of honor and helped establish many of the conventions of the Western movie genre that persist to the present day. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, the romantic image of the tall, handsome, and shy cowboy hero who embodied male freedom, courage, and honor was created in large part by Cooper in the film. Unlike some silent film actors who had trouble adapting to the new sound medium, Cooper transitioned naturally, with his "deep and clear" and "pleasantly drawling" voice, which was perfectly suited for the characters he portrayed on screen, also according to Meyers. Looking to capitalize on Cooper's growing popularity, Paramount cast him in several Westerns and wartime dramas, including Only the Brave, The Texan, Seven Days' Leave, A Man from Wyoming, and The Spoilers (all released in 1930). Norman Rockwell depicted Cooper in his role as The Texan for the cover of The Saturday Evening Post on May 24, 1930.
One of the more important performances in Cooper's early career was his portrayal of a sullen legionnaire in Josef von Sternberg's film Morocco (also 1930) with Marlene Dietrich in her introduction to American audiences. During production, von Sternberg focused his energies on Dietrich and treated Cooper dismissively. Tensions came to a head after von Sternberg yelled directions at Cooper in German. The actor approached the director, picked him up by the collar, and said, "If you expect to work in this country you'd better get on to the language we use here." Despite the tensions on the set, Cooper produced "one of his best performances", according to Thornton Delehanty of the New York Evening Post.
After returning to the Western genre in Zane Grey's Fighting Caravans (1931) with French actress Lili Damita, Cooper appeared in the Dashiell Hammett crime film City Streets (also 1931), co-starring Sylvia Sidney and Paul Lukas, playing a westerner who gets involved with big-city gangsters in order to save the woman he loves. Cooper concluded the year with appearances in two unsuccessful films: I Take This Woman (also 1931) with Carole Lombard, and His Woman with Claudette Colbert. The demands and pressures of making ten films in two years left Cooper exhausted and in poor health, suffering from anemia and jaundice. He had lost during that period, and felt lonely, isolated, and depressed by his sudden fame and wealth. In May 1931, Cooper left Hollywood and sailed to Algiers and then Italy, where he lived for the next year.
During his time abroad, Cooper stayed with the Countess Dorothy di Frasso at the Villa Madama in Rome, where she taught him about good food and vintage wines, how to read Italian and French menus, and how to socialize among Europe's nobility and upper classes. After guiding him through the great art museums and galleries of Italy, she accompanied him on a ten-week big-game hunting safari on the slopes of Mount Kenya in East Africa, where he was credited with over sixty kills, including two lions, a rhinoceros, and various antelopes. His safari experience in Africa had a profound influence on Cooper and intensified his love of the wilderness. After returning to Europe, he and the countess set off on a Mediterranean cruise of the Italian and French Rivieras. Rested and rejuvenated by his year-long exile, a healthy Cooper returned to Hollywood in April 1932 and negotiated a new contract with Paramount for two films per year, a salary of $4,000 a week, and director and script approval.
In 1932, after completing Devil and the Deep with Tallulah Bankhead to fulfill his old contract, Cooper appeared in A Farewell to Arms, the first film adaptation of an Ernest Hemingway novel. Co-starring Helen Hayes, a leading New York theatre star and Academy Award winner, and Adolphe Menjou, the film presented Cooper with one of his most ambitious and challenging dramatic roles, playing an American ambulance driver wounded in Italy who falls in love with an English nurse during World War I. Critics praised his highly intense and emotional performance, and the film became one of the year's most commercially successful pictures. In 1933, after making Today We Live with Joan Crawford and One Sunday Afternoon with Fay Wray, Cooper appeared in the Ernst Lubitsch comedy film Design for Living, based on the successful Noël Coward play. Co-starring Miriam Hopkins and Fredric March, the film was a box office success, ranking as one of the top ten highest-grossing films of 1933. All three of the lead actors—March, Cooper, and Hopkins—received attention from this film as they were all at the peak of their careers. Cooper's performance — playing an American artist in Europe competing with his playwright friend for the affections of a beautiful woman — was singled out for its versatility and revealed his genuine ability to do light comedy. Cooper changed his name legally to "Gary Cooper" in August 1933.
In 1934, Cooper was loaned out to MGM for the Civil War drama film Operator 13 with Marion Davies, about a beautiful Union spy who falls in love with a Confederate soldier. Despite Richard Boleslawski's imaginative direction and George J. Folsey's lavish cinematography, the film did poorly at the box office.
Back at Paramount, Cooper appeared in his first of seven films by director Henry Hathaway, Now and Forever, with Carole Lombard and Shirley Temple. In the film, he plays a confidence man who tries to sell his daughter to the relatives who raised her, but is eventually won over by the adorable girl. Impressed by Temple's intelligence and charm, Cooper developed a close rapport with her, both on and off screen. The film was a box-office success.
The following year, Cooper was loaned out to Samuel Goldwyn Productions to appear in King Vidor's romance film The Wedding Night with Anna Sten, who was being groomed as "another Garbo". In the film, Cooper plays an alcoholic novelist who retreats to his family's New England farm where he meets and falls in love with a beautiful Polish neighbor. Cooper delivered a performance of surprising range and depth, according to biographer Larry Swindell. Despite receiving generally favorable reviews, the film was not popular with American audiences, who may have been offended by the film's depiction of an extramarital affair and its tragic ending.
That same year, Cooper appeared in two Henry Hathaway films: the melodrama Peter Ibbetson with Ann Harding, about a man caught up in a dream world created by his love for a childhood sweetheart, and the adventure film The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, about a daring British officer and his men who defend their stronghold at Bengal against rebellious local tribes. While the former, championed by the surrealists became more successful in Europe than in the United States, the latter was nominated for seven Academy Awards and became one of Cooper's most popular and successful adventure films. Hathaway had the highest respect for Cooper's acting ability, calling him "the best actor of all of them".
American folk hero, 1936–1943
From Mr. Deeds to The Real Glory, 1936–1939
Cooper's career took an important turn in 1936. After making Frank Borzage's romantic comedy film Desire with Marlene Dietrich at Paramount—in which he delivered a performance considered by some contemporary critics as one of his finest—Cooper returned to Poverty Row for the first time since his early silent film days to make Frank Capra's Mr. Deeds Goes to Town with Jean Arthur for Columbia Pictures. In the film, Cooper plays the character of Longfellow Deeds, a quiet, innocent writer of greeting cards who inherits a fortune, leaves behind his idyllic life in Vermont, and travels to New York where he faces a world of corruption and deceit. Capra and screenwriter Robert Riskin were able to use Cooper's well-established screen persona as the "quintessential American hero"—a symbol of honesty, courage, and goodness—to create a new type of "folk hero" for the common man. Commenting on Cooper's impact on the character and the film, Capra observed:
Both Desire and Mr. Deeds opened in April 1936 to critical praise and were major box-office successes. In his review in The New York Times, Frank Nugent wrote that Cooper was "proving himself one of the best light comedians in Hollywood". For his performance in Mr. Deeds, Cooper received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.
Cooper appeared in two other Paramount films in 1936. In Lewis Milestone's adventure film The General Died at Dawn with Madeleine Carroll, he plays an American soldier of fortune in China who helps the peasants defend themselves against the oppression of a cruel warlord. Written by playwright Clifford Odets, the film was a critical and commercial success.
In Cecil B. DeMille's sprawling frontier epic The Plainsman—his first of four films with the director—Cooper portrays Wild Bill Hickok in a highly fictionalized version of the opening of the American western frontier. The film was an even greater box-office hit than its predecessor, due in large part to Jean Arthur's definitive depiction of Calamity Jane and Cooper's inspired portrayal of Hickock as an enigmatic figure of "deepening mythic substance". That year, Cooper appeared for the first time on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities, where he would remain for the next twenty-three years.
In late 1936, Paramount was preparing a new contract for Cooper that would raise his salary to $8,000 a week when Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn for six films over six years with a minimum guarantee of $150,000 per picture. Paramount brought suit against Goldwyn and Cooper, and the court ruled that Cooper's new Goldwyn contract afforded the actor sufficient time to also honor his Paramount agreement. Cooper continued to make films with both studios, and by 1939 the United States Treasury reported that Cooper was the country's highest wage earner, at $482,819 (equivalent to $ million in ).
In contrast to his output the previous year, Cooper appeared in only one picture in 1937, Henry Hathaway's adventure film Souls at Sea. A critical and box-office failure, Cooper referred to it as his "almost picture", saying, "It was almost exciting, and almost interesting. And I was almost good." In 1938, he appeared in Archie Mayo's biographical film The Adventures of Marco Polo. Plagued by production problems and a weak screenplay, the film became Goldwyn's biggest failure to that date, losing $700,000. During this period, Cooper turned down several important roles, including the role of Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind. Cooper was producer David O. Selznick's first choice for the part. He made several overtures to the actor, but Cooper had doubts about the project, and did not feel suited to the role. Cooper later admitted, "It was one of the best roles ever offered in Hollywood ... But I said no. I didn't see myself as quite that dashing, and later, when I saw Clark Gable play the role to perfection, I knew I was right."
Back at Paramount, Cooper returned to a more comfortable genre in Ernst Lubitsch's romantic comedy Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938) with Claudette Colbert. In the film, Cooper plays a wealthy American businessman in France who falls in love with an impoverished aristocrat's daughter and persuades her to become his eighth wife. Despite the clever screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder, and solid performances by Cooper and Colbert, American audiences had trouble accepting Cooper in the role of a shallow philanderer. It succeeded only at the European box office market.
In the fall of 1938, Cooper appeared in H. C. Potter's romantic comedy The Cowboy and the Lady with Merle Oberon, about a sweet-natured rodeo cowboy who falls in love with the wealthy daughter of a presidential hopeful, believing her to be a poor, hard-working lady's maid. The efforts of three directors and several eminent screenwriters could not salvage what could have been a fine vehicle for Cooper. While more successful than its predecessor, the film was Cooper's fourth consecutive box-office failure in the American market.
In the next two years, Cooper was more discerning about the roles he accepted and made four successful large-scale adventure and cowboy films. In William A. Wellman's adventure film Beau Geste (1939), he plays one of three daring English brothers who join the French Foreign Legion in the Sahara to fight local tribes. Filmed in the same Mojave Desert locations as the original 1926 version with Ronald Colman, Beau Geste provided Cooper with magnificent sets, exotic settings, high-spirited action, and a role tailored to his personality and screen persona. This was the last film in Cooper's contract with Paramount.
In Henry Hathaway's The Real Glory (1939), he plays a military doctor who accompanies a small group of American Army officers to the Philippines to help the Christian Filipinos defend themselves against Muslim radicals. Many film critics praised Cooper's performance, including author and film critic Graham Greene, who recognized that he "never acted better".
From The Westerner to For Whom the Bell Tolls, 1940–1943
Cooper returned to the Western genre in William Wyler's The Westerner (1940) with Walter Brennan and Doris Davenport, about a drifting cowboy who defends homesteaders against Roy Bean, a corrupt judge known as the "law west of the Pecos". Screenwriter Niven Busch relied on Cooper's extensive knowledge of Western history while working on the script. The film received positive reviews and did well at the box-office, with reviewers praising the performances of the two lead actors. That same year, Cooper appeared in his first all-Technicolor feature, Cecil B. DeMille's adventure film North West Mounted Police (1940). In the film, Cooper plays a Texas Ranger who pursues an outlaw into western Canada where he joins forces with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who are after the same man, a leader of the North-West Rebellion. While not as popular with critics as its predecessor, the film was another box-office success—the sixth-highest-grossing film of 1940.
The early 1940s were Cooper's prime years as an actor. In a relatively short period, he appeared in five critically successful and popular films that produced some of his finest performances. When Frank Capra offered him the lead role in Meet John Doe before Robert Riskin even developed the script, Cooper accepted his friend's offer, saying, "It's okay, Frank, I don't need a script." In the film, Cooper plays Long John Willoughby, a down-and-out bush-league pitcher hired by a newspaper to pretend to be a man who promises to commit suicide on Christmas Eve to protest all the hypocrisy and corruption in the country. Considered by some critics to be Capra's best film at the time, Meet John Doe was received as a "national event" with Cooper appearing on the front cover of Time magazine on March 3, 1941. In his review in the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes called Cooper's performance a "splendid and utterly persuasive portrayal" and praised his "utterly realistic acting which comes through with such authority". Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote, "Gary Cooper, of course, is 'John Doe' to the life and in the whole—shy, bewildered, non-aggressive, but a veritable tiger when aroused."
That same year, Cooper made two films with director and good friend Howard Hawks. In the biographical film Sergeant York, Cooper portrays war hero Alvin C. York, one of the most decorated American soldiers in World War I. The film chronicles York's early backwoods days in Tennessee, his religious conversion and subsequent piety, his stand as a conscientious objector, and finally his heroic actions at the Battle of the Argonne Forest, which earned him the Medal of Honor. Initially, Cooper was nervous and uncertain about playing a living hero, so he traveled to Tennessee to visit York at his home, and the two quiet men established an immediate rapport and discovered they had much in common. Inspired by York's encouragement, Cooper delivered a performance that Howard Barnes of the New York Herald Tribune called "one of extraordinary conviction and versatility", and that Archer Winston of the New York Post called "one of his best". After the film's release, Cooper was awarded the Distinguished Citizenship Medal by the Veterans of Foreign Wars for his "powerful contribution to the promotion of patriotism and loyalty". York admired Cooper's performance and helped promote the film for Warner Bros. Sergeant York became the top-grossing film of the year and was nominated for eleven Academy Awards. Accepting his first Academy Award for Best Actor from his friend James Stewart, Cooper said, "It was Sergeant Alvin York who won this award. Shucks, I've been in the business sixteen years and sometimes dreamed I might get one of these. That's all I can say ... Funny when I was dreaming I always made a better speech."
Cooper concluded the year back at Goldwyn with Howard Hawks to make the romantic comedy Ball of Fire with Barbara Stanwyck. In the film, Cooper plays a shy linguistics professor who leads a team of seven scholars who are writing an encyclopedia. While researching slang, he meets Stanwyck's flirtatious burlesque stripper Sugarpuss O'Shea who blows the dust off their staid life of books. The screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder provided Cooper the opportunity to exercise the full range of his light comedy skills. In his review for the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes wrote that Cooper handled the role with "great skill and comic emphasis" and that his performance was "utterly delightful". Though small in scale, Ball of Fire was one of the top-grossing films of the year—Cooper's fourth consecutive picture to make the top twenty.
Cooper's only film appearance in 1942 was also his last under his Goldwyn contract. In Sam Wood's biographical film The Pride of the Yankees, Cooper portrays baseball star Lou Gehrig who established a record with the New York Yankees for playing in 2,130 consecutive games. Cooper was reluctant to play the seven-time All-Star, who only died the previous year from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) — now commonly called "Lou Gehrig's disease". Beyond the challenges of effectively portraying such a popular and nationally recognized figure, Cooper knew very little about baseball and was not left-handed like Gehrig.
After Gehrig's widow visited the actor and expressed her desire that he portray her husband, Cooper accepted the role that covered a twenty-year span of Gehrig's life—his early love of baseball, his rise to greatness, his loving marriage, and his struggle with illness, culminating in his farewell speech at Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939 before 62,000 fans. Cooper quickly learned the physical movements of a baseball player and developed a fluid, believable swing. The handedness issue was solved by reversing the print for certain batting scenes. The film was one of the year's top ten pictures and received eleven Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's third).
Soon after the publication of Ernest Hemingway's novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, Paramount paid $150,000 for the film rights with the express intent of casting Cooper in the lead role of Robert Jordan, an American explosives expert who fights alongside the Republican loyalists during the Spanish Civil War. The original director, Cecil B. DeMille, was replaced by Sam Wood who brought in Dudley Nichols for the screenplay. After the start of principal photography in the Sierra Nevada in late 1942, Ingrid Bergman was brought in to replace ballerina Vera Zorina as the female lead—a change supported by Cooper and Hemingway. The love scenes between Bergman and Cooper were "rapturous" and passionate. Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune wrote that both actors performed with "the true stature and authority of stars". While the film distorted the novel's original political themes and meaning, For Whom the Bell Tolls was a critical and commercial success and received ten Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's fourth).
World War II related activities
Due to his age and health, Cooper did not serve in the military during World War II, but like many of his colleagues, he got involved in the war effort by entertaining the troops. In June 1943, he visited military hospitals in San Diego, and often appeared at the Hollywood Canteen serving food to the servicemen. In late 1943, Cooper undertook a tour of the South West Pacific with actresses Una Merkel and Phyllis Brooks, and accordionist Andy Arcari.
Traveling on a B-24A Liberator bomber, the group toured the Cook Islands, Fiji, New Caledonia, Queensland, Brisbane—where General Douglas MacArthur told Cooper he was watching Sergeant York in a Manila theater when Japanese bombs began falling—New Guinea, Jayapura, and throughout the Solomon Islands.
The group often shared the same sparse living conditions and K-rations as the troops. Cooper met with the servicemen and women, visited military hospitals, introduced his attractive colleagues, and participated in occasional skits. The shows concluded with Cooper's moving recitation of Lou Gehrig's farewell speech. When he returned to the United States, he visited military hospitals throughout the country. Cooper later called his time with the troops the "greatest emotional experience" of his life.
Mature roles, 1944–1952
In 1944, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's wartime adventure film The Story of Dr. Wassell with Laraine Day — his third movie with the director. In the film, Cooper plays American doctor and missionary Corydon M. Wassell, who leads a group of wounded sailors through the jungles of Java to safety. Despite receiving poor reviews, Dr. Wassell was one of the top-grossing films of the year. With his Goldwyn and Paramount contracts now concluded, Cooper decided to remain independent and formed his own production company, International Pictures, with Leo Spitz, William Goetz, and Nunnally Johnson. The fledgling studio's first offering was Sam Wood's romantic comedy Casanova Brown with Teresa Wright, about a man who learns his soon-to-be ex-wife is pregnant with his child, just as he is about to marry another woman. The film received poor reviews, with the New York Daily News calling it "delightful nonsense", and Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, criticizing Cooper's "somewhat obvious and ridiculous clowning". The film was barely profitable.
In 1945, Cooper starred in and produced Stuart Heisler's Western comedy Along Came Jones with Loretta Young for International. In this lighthearted parody of his past heroic image, Cooper plays comically inept cowboy Melody Jones who is mistaken for a ruthless killer. Audiences embraced Cooper's character, and the film was one of the top box-office pictures of the year—a testament to Cooper's still vital audience appeal. It was also International's biggest financial success during its brief history before being sold off to Universal Studios in 1946.
Cooper's career during the post-war years drifted in new directions as American society was changing. While he still played conventional heroic roles, his films now relied less on his heroic screen persona and more on novel stories and exotic settings. In November 1945, Cooper appeared in Sam Wood's nineteenth-century period drama Saratoga Trunk with Ingrid Bergman, about a Texas cowboy and his relationship with a beautiful fortune-hunter. Filmed in early 1943, the movie's release was delayed for two years due to the increased demand for war movies. Despite poor reviews, Saratoga Trunk did well at the box office and became one of the top money-makers of the year for Warner Bros. Cooper's only film in 1946 was Fritz Lang's romantic thriller Cloak and Dagger, about a mild-mannered physics professor recruited by the OSS during the last years of World War II to investigate the German atomic bomb program. Playing a part loosely based on physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, Cooper was uneasy with the role and unable to convey the "inner sense" of the character. The film received poor reviews and was a box-office failure. In 1947, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's epic adventure film Unconquered with Paulette Goddard, about a Virginia militiaman who defends settlers against an unscrupulous gun trader and hostile Indians on the Western frontier during the eighteenth century. The film received mixed reviews, but even long-time DeMille critic James Agee acknowledged the picture had "some authentic flavor of the period". This last of four films made with DeMille was Cooper's most lucrative, earning the actor over $300,000 (equal to $ today) in salary and percentage of profits. Unconquered would be his last unqualified box-office success for the next five years.
In 1948, after making Leo McCarey's romantic comedy Good Sam, Cooper sold his company to Universal Studios and signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros. that gave him script and director approval and a guaranteed $295,000 (equal to $ today) per picture. His first film under the new contract was King Vidor's drama The Fountainhead (1949) with Patricia Neal and Raymond Massey. In the film, Cooper plays an idealistic and uncompromising architect who struggles to maintain his integrity and individualism in the face of societal pressures to conform to popular standards. Based on the novel by Ayn Rand who also wrote the screenplay, the film reflects her philosophy and attacks the concepts of collectivism while promoting the virtues of individualism. For most critics, Cooper was hopelessly miscast in the role of Howard Roark. In his review for The New York Times, Bosley Crowther concluded he was "Mr. Deeds out of his element". Cooper returned to his element in Delmer Daves' war drama Task Force (1949), about a retiring rear admiral who reminisces about his long career as a naval aviator and his role in the development of aircraft carriers. Cooper's performance and the Technicolor newsreel footage supplied by the United States Navy made the film one of Cooper's most popular during this period. In the next two years, Cooper made four poorly received films: Michael Curtiz' period drama Bright Leaf (1950), Stuart Heisler's Western melodrama Dallas (1950), Henry Hathaway's wartime comedy You're in the Navy Now (1951), and Raoul Walsh's Western action film Distant Drums (1951).
Cooper's most important film during the post-war years was Fred Zinnemann's Western drama High Noon (1952) with Grace Kelly and Katy Jurado for United Artists. In the film, Cooper plays retiring sheriff Will Kane who is preparing to leave town on his honeymoon when he learns that an outlaw he helped put away and his three henchmen are returning to seek their revenge. Unable to gain the support of the frightened townspeople, and abandoned by his young bride, Kane nevertheless stays to face the outlaws alone. During the filming, Cooper was in poor health and in considerable pain from stomach ulcers. His ravaged face and discomfort in some scenes "photographed as self-doubt", according to biographer Hector Arce, and contributed to the effectiveness of his performance. Considered one of the first "adult" Westerns for its theme of moral courage, High Noon received enthusiastic reviews for its artistry, with Time magazine placing it in the ranks of Stagecoach and The Gunfighter. Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote that Cooper was "at the top of his form", and John McCarten, in The New Yorker, wrote that Cooper was never more effective. The film earned $3.75 million in the United States and $18 million worldwide. Following the example of his friend James Stewart, Cooper accepted a lower salary in exchange for a percent of the profits, and ended up making $600,000. Cooper's understated performance was widely praised, and earned him his second Academy Award for Best Actor.
Later films, 1953–1961
After appearing in André de Toth's Civil War drama Springfield Rifle (1952)—a standard Warner Bros. film that was overshadowed by the success of its predecessor—Cooper made four films outside the United States. In Mark Robson's drama Return to Paradise (1953), Cooper plays an American wanderer who liberates the inhabitants of a Polynesian island from the puritanical rule of a misguided pastor. Cooper endured spartan living conditions, long hours, and ill health during the three-month location shoot on the island of Upolu in Western Samoa. Despite its beautiful cinematography, the film received poor reviews. Cooper's next three films were shot in Mexico. In Hugo Fregonese's action adventure film Blowing Wild (1953) with Barbara Stanwyck, he plays a wildcatter in Mexico who gets involved with an oil company executive and his unscrupulous wife with whom he once had an affair.
In 1954, Cooper appeared in Henry Hathaway's Western drama Garden of Evil, with Susan Hayward, about three soldiers of fortune in Mexico hired to rescue a woman's husband. That same year, he appeared in Robert Aldrich's Western adventure Vera Cruz with Burt Lancaster. In the film, Cooper plays an American adventurer hired by Emperor Maximilian I to escort a countess to Vera Cruz during the Mexican Rebellion of 1866. All of these films received poor reviews but did well at the box-office. For his work in Vera Cruz, Cooper earned $1.4 million in salary and percent of the gross.
During this period, Cooper struggled with health problems. As well as his ongoing treatment for ulcers, he suffered a severe shoulder injury during the filming of Blowing Wild when he was hit by metal fragments from a dynamited oil well. During the filming of Vera Cruz, he reinjured his hip falling from a horse, and was burned when Lancaster fired his rifle too close and the wadding from the blank shell pierced his clothing.
In 1955, he appeared in Otto Preminger's biographical war drama The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell, about the World War I general who tried to convince government officials of the importance of air power, and was court-martialed after blaming the War Department for a series of air disasters. Some critics felt that Cooper was miscast, and that his dull, tight-lipped performance did not reflect Mitchell's dynamic and caustic personality. In 1956, Cooper was more effective playing a gentle Indiana Quaker in William Wyler's Civil War drama Friendly Persuasion with Dorothy McGuire. Like Sergeant York and High Noon, the film addresses the conflict between religious pacifism and civic duty. For his performance, Cooper received his second Golden Globe nomination for Best Motion Picture Actor. The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, was awarded the Palme d'Or at the 1957 Cannes Film Festival, and went on to earn $8 million worldwide.
In 1956, Cooper traveled to France to make Billy Wilder's romantic comedy Love in the Afternoon with Audrey Hepburn and Maurice Chevalier. In the film, Cooper plays a middle-aged American playboy in Paris who pursues and eventually falls in love with a much younger woman. Despite receiving some positive reviews—including from Bosley Crowther who praised the film's "charming performances"—most reviewers concluded that Cooper was simply too old for the part. While audiences may not have welcomed seeing Cooper's heroic screen image tarnished by his playing an aging roué trying to seduce an innocent young girl, the film was still a box-office success. The following year, Cooper appeared in Philip Dunne's romantic drama Ten North Frederick. In the film, which was based on the novel by John O'Hara, Cooper plays an attorney whose life is ruined by a double-crossing politician and his own secret affair with his daughter's young roommate. While Cooper brought "conviction and controlled anguish" to his performance, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, it was not enough to save what Bosley Crowther called a "hapless film".
Despite his ongoing health problems and several operations for ulcers and hernias, Cooper continued to work in action films. In 1958, he appeared in Anthony Mann's Western drama Man of the West (1958) with Julie London and Lee J. Cobb, about a reformed outlaw and killer who is forced to confront his violent past when the train he is riding in is held up by his former gang members. The film has been called Cooper's "most pathological Western", with its themes of impotent rage, sexual humiliation, and sadism. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, Cooper, who struggled with moral conflicts in his personal life, "understood the anguish of a character striving to retain his integrity ... [and] brought authentic feeling to the role of a tempted and tormented, yet essentially decent man". Mostly ignored by critics at the time, the film is now well-regarded by film scholars and is considered Cooper's last great film.
After his Warner Bros. contract ended, Cooper formed his own production company, Baroda Productions, and made three unusual films in 1959 about redemption. In Delmer Daves' Western drama The Hanging Tree, Cooper plays a frontier doctor who saves a criminal from a lynch mob, and later tries to exploit his sordid past. Cooper delivered a "powerful and persuasive" performance of an emotionally scarred man whose need to dominate others is transformed by the love and sacrifice of a woman. In Robert Rossen's historical adventure They Came to Cordura with Rita Hayworth, he plays an army officer who is found guilty of cowardice and assigned the degrading task of recommending soldiers for the Medal of Honor during the Pancho Villa Expedition of 1916.
While Cooper received positive reviews, Variety and Films in Review felt he was too old for the part. In Michael Anderson's action drama The Wreck of the Mary Deare with Charlton Heston, Cooper plays a disgraced merchant marine officer who decides to stay aboard his sinking cargo ship in order to prove the vessel was deliberately scuttled and to redeem his good name. Like its two predecessors, the film was physically demanding. Cooper, who was a trained scuba diver, did most of his own underwater scenes. Biographer Jeffrey Meyers observed that in all three roles, Cooper effectively conveyed the sense of lost honor and desire for redemption—what Joseph Conrad in Lord Jim called the "struggles of an individual trying to save from the fire his idea of what his moral identity should be".
Personal life
Marriage and family
Cooper was formally introduced to his future wife, 20-year-old New York debutante Veronica Balfe, on Easter Sunday 1933 at a party given by her uncle, art director Cedric Gibbons. Called "Rocky" by her family and friends, she grew up on Park Avenue and attended finishing schools. Her stepfather was Wall Street tycoon Paul Shields. Cooper and Rocky were quietly married at her parents' Park Avenue residence on December 15, 1933. According to his friends, the marriage had a positive impact on Cooper, who turned away from past indiscretions and took control of his life. Athletic and a lover of the outdoors, Rocky shared many of Cooper's interests, including riding, skiing, and skeet-shooting. She organized their social life, and her wealth and social connections provided Cooper access to New York high society. Cooper and his wife owned homes in the Los Angeles area in Encino (1933–36), Brentwood (1936–53), and Holmby Hills (1954–61), and owned a vacation home in Aspen, Colorado (1949–53).
Gary and Veronica Cooper's daughter, Maria Veronica Cooper, was born on September 15, 1937. By all accounts, he was a patient and affectionate father, teaching Maria to ride a bicycle, play tennis, ski, and ride horses. Sharing many of her parents' interests, she accompanied them on their travels and was often photographed with them. Like her father, she developed a love for art and drawing. As a family they vacationed together in Sun Valley, Idaho, spent time at Rocky's parents' country house in Southampton, New York, and took frequent trips to Europe. Cooper and Rocky were legally separated on May 16, 1951, when Cooper moved out of their home. For over two years, they maintained a fragile and uneasy family life with their daughter. Cooper moved back into their home in November 1953, and their formal reconciliation occurred in February 1954.
Romantic relationships
Prior to his marriage, Cooper had a series of romantic relationships with leading actresses, beginning in 1927 with Clara Bow, who advanced his career by helping him get one of his first leading roles in Children of Divorce. Bow was also responsible for getting Cooper a role in Wings, which generated an enormous amount of fan mail for the young actor. In 1928, he had a relationship with another experienced actress, Evelyn Brent, whom he met while filming Beau Sabreur. In 1929, while filming The Wolf Song, Cooper began an intense affair with Lupe Vélez, which was the most important romance of his early life. During their two years together, Cooper also had brief affairs with Marlene Dietrich while filming Morocco in 1930 and with Carole Lombard while making I Take This Woman in 1931. During his year abroad in 1931–32, Cooper had an affair with the married Countess Dorothy di Frasso, while staying at her Villa Madama near Rome.
After he was married in December 1933, Cooper remained faithful to his wife until the summer of 1942, when he began an affair with Ingrid Bergman during the production of For Whom the Bell Tolls. Their relationship lasted through the completion of filming Saratoga Trunk in June 1943. In 1948, after finishing work on The Fountainhead, Cooper began an affair with actress Patricia Neal, his co-star. At first they kept their affair discreet, but eventually it became an open secret in Hollywood, and Cooper's wife confronted him with the rumors, which he admitted were true. He also confessed that he was in love with Neal, and continued to see her. Cooper and his wife were legally separated in May 1951, but he did not seek a divorce. Neal later claimed that Cooper hit her after she went on a date with Kirk Douglas, and that he arranged for her to have an abortion when she became pregnant with Cooper's child. Neal ended their relationship in late December 1951. During his three-year separation from his wife, Cooper was rumored to have had affairs with Grace Kelly, Lorraine Chanel, and Gisèle Pascal.
Cooper biographers have explored his friendship in the late twenties with the actor Anderson Lawler, with whom Cooper shared a house on and off for a year, while at the same time seeing Clara Bow, Evelyn Brent and Lupe Vélez. Lupe Vélez once told Hedda Hopper of Vélez' affair with Cooper; whenever he would come home after seeing Lawler, she would sniff for Lawler's cologne. Vélez' biographer Michelle Vogel has reported that Vélez consented to Cooper's sexual behavior with Lawler, but only as long as she, too, could participate. In later life, he became involved in a relationship with the costume designer Irene, and was, according to Irene, "the only man she ever loved". A year after his death in 1961, Irene committed suicide by jumping from the 11th floor of the Knickerbocker Hotel, after telling Doris Day of her grief over Cooper's death.
Friendships, interests, and character
Cooper's twenty-year friendship with Ernest Hemingway began at Sun Valley in October 1940. The previous year, Hemingway drew upon Cooper's image when he created the character of Robert Jordan for the novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. The two shared a passion for the outdoors, and for years they hunted duck and pheasant, and skied together in Sun Valley. Both men admired the work of Rudyard Kipling—Cooper kept a copy of the poem "If—" in his dressing room—and retained as adults Kipling's sense of boyish adventure.
As well as admiring Cooper's hunting skills and knowledge of the outdoors, Hemingway believed his character matched his screen persona, once telling a friend, "If you made up a character like Coop, nobody would believe it. He's just too good to be true." They saw each other often, and their friendship remained strong through the years.
Cooper's social life generally centered on sports, outdoor activities, and dinner parties with his family and friends from the film industry, including directors Henry Hathaway, Howard Hawks, William Wellman, and Fred Zinnemann, and actors Joel McCrea, James Stewart, Barbara Stanwyck, and Robert Taylor. As well as hunting, Cooper enjoyed riding, fishing, skiing, and later in life, scuba diving. He never abandoned his early love for art and drawing, and over the years, he and his wife acquired a private collection of modern paintings, including works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Gauguin, and Georgia O'Keeffe. Cooper owned several works by Pablo Picasso, whom he met in 1956. Cooper also had a lifelong passion for automobiles, with a collection that included a 1930 Duesenberg.
Cooper was naturally reserved and introspective, and loved the solitude of outdoor activities. Not unlike his screen persona, his communication style frequently consisted of long silences with an occasional "yup" and "shucks". He once said, "If others have more interesting things to say than I have, I keep quiet." According to his friends, Cooper could also be an articulate, well-informed conversationalist on topics ranging from horses, guns, and Western history to film production, sports cars, and modern art. He was modest and unpretentious, frequently downplaying his acting abilities and career accomplishments. His friends and colleagues described him as charming, well-mannered, and thoughtful, with a lively boyish sense of humor. Cooper maintained a sense of propriety throughout his career and never misused his movie star status—never sought special treatment or refused to work with a director or leading lady. His close friend Joel McCrea recalled, "Coop never fought, he never got mad, he never told anybody off that I know of; everybody that worked with him liked him."
Political views
Like his father, Cooper was a conservative Republican; he voted for Calvin Coolidge in 1924, Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1932, and campaigned for Wendell Willkie in 1940. When Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for an unprecedented fourth presidential term in 1944, Cooper campaigned for Thomas E. Dewey and criticized Roosevelt for being dishonest and adopting "foreign" ideas. In a radio address that he paid for himself just prior to the election, Cooper said, "I disagree with the New Deal belief that the America all of us love is old and worn-out and finished—and has to borrow foreign notions that don't even seem to work any too well where they come from ... Our country is a young country that just has to make up its mind to be itself again." He also attended a Republican rally at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum that drew 93,000 Dewey supporters.
Cooper was one of the founding members of the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, a conservative organization dedicated, according to its statement of principles, to preserving the "American way of life" and opposing communism and fascism. The organization — whose membership included Walter Brennan, Laraine Day, Walt Disney, Clark Gable, Hedda Hopper, Ronald Reagan, Barbara Stanwyck, and John Wayne — advised the United States Congress to investigate communist influence in the motion picture industry. On October 23, 1947, Cooper was subpoenaed to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and was asked if he had observed any "communistic influence" in Hollywood.
Cooper recounted statements he'd heard suggesting that the Constitution was out of date and that Congress was an unnecessary institution—comments that Cooper said he found to be "very un-American" and testified that he had rejected several scripts because he thought they were "tinged with communist ideas". Unlike some other witnesses, Cooper did not name any individuals, nor did he name any scripts, during his testimony.
In 1951, while making High Noon, Cooper became friends with the film's screenwriter, Carl Foreman, who had been a member of the Communist Party. When Foreman was subpoenaed by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Cooper put his career on the line to defend Foreman. When John Wayne and others threatened Cooper with blacklisting himself and the loss of his passport if he did not walk off the film, Cooper gave a statement to the press in support of Foreman, calling him "the finest kind of American". When producer Stanley Kramer removed Foreman's name as screenwriter, Cooper and director Fred Zinnemann threatened to walk off the film if Foreman's name was not restored. Foreman later said that, of all his friends and allies and colleagues in Hollywood, "Cooper was the only big one who tried to help. The only one." Cooper even offered to testify in Foreman's behalf before the committee, but character witnesses were not allowed. Foreman always sent future scripts to Cooper for first refusal, including The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Key and The Guns of Navarone. Cooper had to turn them down because of his age.
Religion
Cooper was baptized in the Anglican Church in December 1911 in Britain, and was raised in the Episcopal Church in the United States. While he was not an observant Christian for most of his adult life, many of his friends believed he had a deeply spiritual side.
On June 26, 1953, Cooper accompanied his wife and daughter, who were devout Catholics, to Rome, where they had an audience with Pope Pius XII. Cooper and his wife were still separated at the time, but the papal visit marked the beginning of their gradual reconciliation. In the coming years, Cooper contemplated his mortality and his personal behavior, and started discussing Catholicism with his family. He began attending church with them regularly, and met with their parish priest, who offered Cooper spiritual guidance. After several months of study, Cooper was baptized as a Roman Catholic on April 9, 1959, before a small group of family and friends at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills.
Final years and death
On April 14, 1960, Cooper underwent surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston for an aggressive form of prostate cancer that had metastasized to his colon. He fell ill again on May 31 and underwent further surgery at Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles in early June to remove a malignant tumor from his large intestine. After recuperating over the summer, Cooper took his family on vacation to the south of France before traveling to the UK in the fall to star in The Naked Edge. In December 1960, he worked on the NBC television documentary The Real West, which was part of the company's Project 20 series.
On December 27, his wife learned from their family doctor that Cooper's cancer had spread to his lungs and bones and was inoperable. His family decided not to tell him immediately.
On January 9, 1961, Cooper attended a dinner that was given in his honor and hosted by Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin at the Friars Club. The dinner was attended by many of his industry friends and concluded with a brief speech by Cooper who said, "The only achievement I'm proud of is the friends I've made in this community."
In mid-January, Cooper took his family to Sun Valley for their last vacation together. Cooper and Hemingway hiked through the snow together for the last time. On February 27, after returning to Los Angeles, Cooper learned that he was dying. He later told his family, "We'll pray for a miracle; but if not, and that's God's will, that's all right too." On April 17, Cooper watched the Academy Awards ceremony on television and saw his good friend James Stewart, who had presented Cooper with his first Oscar years earlier, accept on Cooper's behalf an honorary award for lifetime achievement—his third Oscar. Holding back tears, Stewart said, "Coop, I'll get this to you right away. And Coop, I want you to know this, that with this goes all the warm friendship and the affection and the admiration and the deep, the deep respect of all of us. We're very, very proud of you, Coop. All of us are tremendously proud." The following day, newspapers around the world announced the news that Cooper was dying. In the coming days he received numerous messages of appreciation and encouragement, including telegrams from Pope John XXIII and Queen Elizabeth II, and a telephone call from President John F. Kennedy.
In his last public statement on May 4, Cooper said, "I know that what is happening is God's will. I am not afraid of the future." He received the last rites on May 12. Cooper died quietly the following day, Saturday, May 13, 1961, at 12:47 P.M.
A requiem mass was held on May 18 at the Church of the Good Shepherd, attended by many of Cooper's friends, including James Stewart, Jack Benny, Henry Hathaway, Joel McCrea, Audrey Hepburn, Jack L. Warner, John Ford, John Wayne, Edward G. Robinson, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Fred Astaire, Randolph Scott, Walter Pidgeon, Bob Hope and Marlene Dietrich. Cooper was buried in the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes in Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California. In May 1974, after his family relocated to New York, Cooper's remains were exhumed and reburied in Sacred Hearts Cemetery in Southampton. His grave is marked by a three-ton boulder from a Montauk quarry.
Acting style and reputation
Cooper's acting style consisted of three essential characteristics: his ability to project elements of his own personality onto the characters he portrayed, to appear natural and authentic in his roles, and to underplay and deliver restrained performances calibrated for the camera and the screen. Acting teacher Lee Strasberg once observed: "The simplest examples of Stanislavsky's ideas are actors such as Gary Cooper, John Wayne, and Spencer Tracy. They try not to act but to be themselves, to respond or react. They refuse to say or do anything they feel not to be consonant with their own characters." Film director François Truffaut ranked Cooper among "the greatest actors" because of his ability to deliver great performances "without direction". This ability to project elements of his own personality onto his characters produced a continuity across his performances to the extent that critics and audiences were convinced that he was simply "playing himself".
Cooper's ability to project his personality onto his characters played an important part in his appearing natural and authentic on screen. Actor John Barrymore said of Cooper, "This fellow is the world's greatest actor. He does without effort what the rest of us spend our lives trying to learn—namely, to be natural." Charles Laughton, who played opposite Cooper in Devil and the Deep agreed, "In truth, that boy hasn't the least idea how well he acts ... He gets at it from the inside, from his own clear way of looking at life." William Wyler, who directed Cooper in two films, called him a "superb actor, a master of movie acting".
In his review of Cooper's performance in The Real Glory, Graham Greene wrote, "Sometimes his lean photogenic face seems to leave everything to the lens, but there is no question here of his not acting. Watch him inoculate the girl against cholera—the casual jab of the needle, and the dressing slapped on while he talks, as though a thousand arms had taught him where to stab and he doesn't have to think anymore."
Cooper's style of underplaying before the camera surprised many of his directors and fellow actors. Even in his earliest feature films, he recognized the camera's ability to pick up slight gestures and facial movements. Commenting on Cooper's performance in Sergeant York, director Howard Hawks observed, "He worked very hard and yet he didn't seem to be working. He was a strange actor because you'd look at him during a scene and you'd think ... this isn't going to be any good. But when you saw the rushes in the projection room the next day you could read in his face all the things he'd been thinking." Sam Wood, who directed Cooper in four films, had similar observations about Cooper's performance in Pride of the Yankees, noting, "What I thought was underplaying turned out to be just the right approach. On the screen he's perfect, yet on the set you'd swear it's the worst job of acting in the history of motion pictures."
Fellow actors admired his abilities as an actor. Commenting on her two films playing opposite Cooper, actress Ingrid Bergman concluded, "The personality of this man was so enormous, so overpowering—and that expression in his eyes and his face, it was so delicate and so underplayed. You just didn't notice it until you saw it on the screen. I thought he was marvelous; the most underplaying and the most natural actor I ever worked with."
Tom Hanks declared, "In only one scene in the first film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture, we see the future of screen acting in the form of Gary Cooper. He is quiet and natural, somehow different from the other cast members. He does something mysterious with his eyes and shoulders that is much more like 'being' than 'acting'."
Daniel Day-Lewis said, "I don't particularly like westerns as a genre, but I do love certain westerns. 'High Noon' means a lot to me – I love the purity and the honesty, I love Gary Cooper in that film, the idea of the last man standing."
Chris Pratt stated, "I started watching Westerns when I was shooting in London about four or five years ago. I really fell in love with Gary Cooper, and his stuff. That sucked me into the Westerns. Before, I never got engrossed in the story. I'd just dip in, and there were guys in horses in black and white. High Noon's later Gary Cooper, I liked that. But I liked 'The Westerner'. That's my favorite one. I have that poster hung up in my house because I really like that one."
To Al Pacino, "Gary Cooper was a phenomenon—his ability to take some thing and elevate it, give it such dignity. One of the great presences."
Mylène Demongeot first got with Gary Cooper for the opening of the first escalator to be installed in a cinema, at the Rex Theatre in Paris, on June 7, 1957. She declared in a 2015 filmed interview: "Gary Cooper ... il est sublime ! Aaahhh (Mylène pushing a cry of love not to say ecstasy) il est sublime ... Ah ! Ah ! Ah ! Là je dois dire que ça fait partie des stars, y'a Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, ces grands Américains que j'ai rencontrés comme ça, c'est vraiment des mecs incroyables. Y'en a plus des comme ça ! Euh non. (Gary Cooper was sublime, there I have to say, now he, was part of the stars, Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, those great americans who I've met really were unbelievable guys, there aren't any like them anymore)."
Career assessment and legacy
Cooper's career spanned thirty-six years, from 1925 to 1961. During that time, he appeared in eighty-four feature films in a leading role. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His natural and authentic acting style appealed powerfully to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major movie genres, including Westerns, war films, adventure films, drama films, crime films, romance films, comedy films, and romantic comedy films. He appeared on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities for twenty-three consecutive years, from 1936 to 1958. According to Quigley's annual poll, Cooper was one of the top money-making stars for eighteen years, appearing in the top ten in 1936–37, 1941–49, and 1951–57. He topped the list in 1953. In Quigley's list of all-time money-making stars, Cooper is listed fourth, after John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and Tom Cruise. At the time of his death, it was estimated that his films grossed well over $200 million (equivalent to $ billion in ).
In over half of his feature films, Cooper portrayed Westerners, soldiers, pilots, sailors, and explorers—all men of action. In the rest he played a wide range of characters, included doctors, professors, artists, architects, clerks, and baseball players. Cooper's heroic screen image changed with each period of his career. In his early films, he played the young naive hero sure of his moral position and trusting in the triumph of simple virtues (The Virginian). After becoming a major star, his Western screen persona was replaced by a more cautious hero in adventure films and dramas (A Farewell to Arms). During the height of his career, from 1936 to 1943, he played a new type of hero—a champion of the common man willing to sacrifice himself for others (Mr. Deeds, Meet John Doe, and For Whom the Bell Tolls).
In the post-war years, Cooper attempted broader variations on his screen image, which now reflected a hero increasingly at odds with the world who must face adversity alone (The Fountainhead and High Noon). In his final films, Cooper's hero rejects the violence of the past, and seeks to reclaim lost honor and find redemption (Friendly Persuasion and Man of the West). The screen persona he developed and sustained throughout his career represented the ideal American hero—a tall, handsome, and sincere man of steadfast integrity who emphasized action over intellect, and combined the heroic qualities of the romantic lover, the adventurer, and the common man.
On February 6, 1960, Cooper was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6243 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to the film industry. He was awarded a star on the sidewalk outside the Ellen Theater in Bozeman, Montana.
On May 6, 1961, he was awarded the French Order of Arts and Letters in recognition of his significant contribution to the arts. On July 30, 1961, he was posthumously awarded the David di Donatello Special Award in Italy for his career achievements.
In 1966, he was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. In 2015, he was inducted into the Utah Cowboy and Western Heritage Hall of Fame. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper eleventh on its list of the 25 male stars of classic Hollywood. Three of his characters—Will Kane, Lou Gehrig, and Sergeant York—made AFI's list of the one hundred greatest heroes and villains, all of them as heroes. His Lou Gehrig line, "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.", is ranked by AFI as the thirty-eighth greatest movie quote of all time.
More than a half century after his death, Cooper's enduring legacy, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, is his image of the ideal American hero preserved in his film performances. Charlton Heston once observed, "He projected the kind of man Americans would like to be, probably more than any actor that's ever lived."
In the TV series Justified, based on works and characters created by Elmore Leonard, Gary Cooper is used throughout the six seasons as the man whom U.S. Marshall Raylan Givens, played by Timothy Olyphant, aspires to be. When his colleague asks Marshall Givens how he thinks his dangerous plan to bring down a villain can possibly work, he replies: "Why not? Worked for Gary Cooper."
Gary Cooper is referenced several times in the critically acclaimed television series The Sopranos, with protagonist Tony Soprano asking "What ever happened to Gary Cooper? The strong, silent type." while complaining about his problems to his therapist.
In the 1930s hit song "Puttin' On the Ritz", Cooper is referenced in the line "dress up like a million dollar trooper/Tryin' hard to look like Gary Cooper, Super duper!" More than two decades after Cooper's death a new version of the song was released in 1983 by Taco; the original lyrics were kept, including the references to Cooper.
In J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye, Cooper is "spotted" by Holden Caulfield to distract a woman he is dancing with.
Awards and nominations
Filmography
The following is a list of feature films in which Cooper appeared in a leading role.
The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926)
Children of Divorce (1927)
Arizona Bound (1927)
Wings (1927)
Nevada (1927)
It (1927)
The Last Outlaw (1927)
Beau Sabreur (1928)
The Legion of the Condemned (1928)
Doomsday (1928)
Half a Bride (1928)
Lilac Time (1928)
The First Kiss (1928)
The Shopworn Angel (1928)
Wolf Song (1929)
Betrayal (1929)
The Virginian (1929)
Only the Brave (1930)
The Texan (1930)
Seven Days' Leave (1930)
A Man from Wyoming (1930)
The Spoilers (1930)
Morocco (1930)
Fighting Caravans (1931)
City Streets (1931)
I Take This Woman (1931)
His Woman (1931)
Devil and the Deep (1932)
If I Had a Million (1932)
A Farewell to Arms (1932)
Today We Live (1933)
One Sunday Afternoon (1933)
Design for Living (1933)
Alice in Wonderland (1933)
Operator 13 (1934)
Now and Forever (1934)
The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935)
The Wedding Night (1935)
Peter Ibbetson (1935)
Desire (1936)
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)
The General Died at Dawn (1936)
The Plainsman (1936)
Souls at Sea (1937)
The Adventures of Marco Polo (1938)
Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938)
The Cowboy and the Lady (1938)
Beau Geste (1939)
The Real Glory (1939)
The Westerner (1940)
North West Mounted Police (1940)
Meet John Doe (1941)
Sergeant York (1941)
Ball of Fire (1941)
The Pride of the Yankees (1942)
For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)
The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944)
Casanova Brown (1944)
Along Came Jones (1945)
Saratoga Trunk (1945)
Cloak and Dagger (1946)
Unconquered (1947)
Good Sam (1948)
The Fountainhead (1949)
Task Force (1949)
Bright Leaf (1950)
Dallas (1950)
You're in the Navy Now (1951)
It's a Big Country (1951)
Distant Drums (1951)
High Noon (1952)
Springfield Rifle (1952)
Return to Paradise (1953)
Blowing Wild (1953)
Garden of Evil (1954)
Vera Cruz (1954)
The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (1955)
Friendly Persuasion (1956)
Love in the Afternoon (1957)
Ten North Frederick (1958)
Man of the West (1958)
The Hanging Tree (1959)
They Came to Cordura (1959)
The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959)
The Naked Edge (1961)
Radio appearances
References
Notes
Citations
Bibliography
Adrien Le Bihan, Gary Cooper, le prince des acteurs, LettMotif, 2021, 358p.()
External links
1901 births
1961 deaths
20th-century American male actors
Academy Honorary Award recipients
American expatriates in England
American male film actors
American male silent film actors
American male television actors
American people of English descent
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
California Republicans
Catholics from Montana
Conservatism in the United States
Converts to Roman Catholicism from Anglicanism
Deaths from cancer in California
Deaths from prostate cancer
Grinnell College people
Male Western (genre) film actors
Male actors from Montana
Paramount Pictures contract players
People educated at Dunstable Grammar School
People from Brentwood, Los Angeles
People from Dunstable
People from Helena, Montana
People from Holmby Hills, Los Angeles | true | [
"The Star Awards for Best Actor is an award presented annually at the Star Awards, a ceremony that was established in 1994.\n\nThe category was introduced in 1995, at the 2nd Star Awards ceremony; Li Nanxing received the award for his role in Wounded Tracks and it is given in honour of a Mediacorp actor who has delivered an outstanding performance in a leading role. The nominees are determined by a team of judges employed by Mediacorp; winners are selected by a majority vote from the entire judging panel.\n\nSince its inception, the award has been given to 11 actors. Qi Yuwu is the most recent winner in this category for his role in A Quest to Heal. Since the ceremony held in 2019, Chen Hanwei remains as the only actor to win in this category six times, surpassing Xie Shaoguang who has five wins. Chen and Christopher Lee have been nominated on 14 occasions, more than any other actor. Terence Cao holds the record for the most nominations without a win, with six.\n\nRecipients\n\n Each year is linked to the article about the Star Awards held that year.\n\nMultiple awards and nominations\n\nThe following individuals received two or more Best Actor awards:\n\nThe following individuals received two or more Best Actor nominations:\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\nStar Awards",
"The Star Awards for Best Actress is an award presented annually at the Star Awards, a ceremony that was established in 1994.\n\nThe category was introduced in 1995, at the 2nd Star Awards ceremony; Fann Wong received the award for her role in Chronicle of Life and it is given in honour of a Mediacorp actress who has delivered an outstanding performance in a leading role. The nominees are determined by a team of judges employed by Mediacorp; winners are selected by a majority vote from the entire judging panel.\n\nSince its inception, the award has been given to 13 actresses. Zoe Tay is the most recent winner in this category for her role in My Guardian Angels. Since the ceremony held in 2021, Tay remains as the only actress to win in this category four times, surpassing Chen Liping, Huang Biren, and Ivy Lee who have three wins each. Tay has also been nominated on 14 occasions, more than any other actress. Jacelyn Tay holds the record for the most nominations without a win, with five.\n\nRecipients\n\n Each year is linked to the article about the Star Awards held that year.\n\nMultiple awards and nominations\n\nThe following individuals received two or more Best Actress awards:\n\nThe following individuals received two or more Best Actress nominations:\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\nStar Awards"
] |
[
"Gary Cooper",
"Silent films, 1925-28",
"what silent films were made in 1925?",
"In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt,",
"what other silent films?",
"Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones.",
"did he win any awards for these films?",
"I don't know.",
"what was his greatest accomplishment?",
"Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects.",
"did Lilac Time succeed?",
"It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928.",
"what is the most important fact in this article?",
"Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky,",
"did he win any awards for this role?",
"The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a \"dynamic new personality\" and future star."
] | C_6ec0895035fd4dbda1785cd7d1c7b5d7_1 | who did he work with? | 8 | Who did Gary Cooper work with? | Gary Cooper | In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, including Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt work--which sometimes injured horses and riders--"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name. Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week. Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal--finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings, the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada--both films directed by John Waters. In 1928, Paramount paired Cooper with a youthful Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss--advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride. That year, Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928. CANNOTANSWER | Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal--finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures | Gary Cooper (born Frank James Cooper; May 7, 1901 – May 13, 1961) was an American actor known for his strong, silent, and understated acting style. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor twice and had a further three nominations, as well as receiving an Academy Honorary Award for his career achievements in 1961. He was one of the top 10 film personalities for 23 consecutive years, and one of the top money-making stars for 18 years. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper at No. 11 on its list of the 25 greatest male stars of classic Hollywood cinema.
Cooper's career spanned 36 years, from 1925 to 1961, and included leading roles in 84 feature films. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era through to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His screen persona appealed strongly to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major film genres. His ability to project his own personality onto the characters he played contributed to his natural and authentic appearance on screen. Throughout his career, he sustained a screen persona that represented the ideal American hero.
Cooper began his career as a film extra and stunt rider, but soon landed acting roles. After establishing himself as a Western hero in his early silent films, he appeared as the Virginian and became a movie star in 1929 with his first sound picture, The Virginian. In the early 1930s, he expanded his heroic image to include more cautious characters in adventure films and dramas such as A Farewell to Arms (1932) and The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935). During the height of his career, Cooper portrayed a new type of hero—a champion of the common man—in films such as Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), Meet John Doe (1941), Sergeant York (1941), The Pride of the Yankees (1942), and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943). He later portrayed more mature characters at odds with the world in films such as The Fountainhead (1949) and High Noon (1952). In his final films, he played non-violent characters searching for redemption in films such as Friendly Persuasion (1956) and Man of the West (1958).
Early life
Frank James Cooper was born in Helena, Montana, on May 7, 1901, the younger of two sons of English parents Alice (née Brazier; 1873–1967) and Charles Henry Cooper (1865–1946). His brother, Arthur, was six years his senior. Cooper's father came from Houghton Regis, Bedfordshire, and became a prominent lawyer, rancher, and Montana Supreme Court justice. His mother hailed from Gillingham, Kent, and married Charles in Montana. In 1906, Charles purchased the Seven-Bar-Nine cattle ranch, about north of Helena near Craig, Montana. Cooper and Arthur spent their summers at the ranch and learned to ride horses, hunt, and fish. Cooper attended Central Grade School in Helena.
Alice wanted her sons to have an English education, so she took them back to England in 1909 to enroll them in Dunstable Grammar School in Dunstable, Bedfordshire. While there, Cooper and his brother lived with their father's cousins, William and Emily Barton, at their home in Houghton Regis. Cooper studied Latin, French, and English history at Dunstable until 1912. While he adapted to English school discipline and learned the requisite social graces, he never adjusted to the rigid class structure and formal Eton collars he was required to wear. He received his confirmation in the Church of England at the Church of All Saints in Houghton Regis on December 3, 1911. His mother accompanied her sons back to the U.S. in August 1912, and Cooper resumed his education at Johnson Grammar School in Helena.
When Cooper was 15, he injured his hip in a car accident. On his doctor's recommendation, he returned to the Seven-Bar-Nine ranch to recuperate by horseback riding. The misguided therapy left him with his characteristic stiff, off-balanced walk and slightly angled horse-riding style. He left Helena High School after two years in 1918, and returned to the family ranch to work full-time as a cowboy. In 1919, his father arranged for him to attend Gallatin County High School in Bozeman, Montana, where English teacher Ida Davis encouraged him to focus on academics and participate in debating and dramatics. Cooper later called Davis "the woman partly responsible for [him] giving up cowboy-ing and going to college".
Cooper was still attending high school in 1920 when he took three art courses at Montana Agricultural College in Bozeman. His interest in art was inspired years earlier by the Western paintings of Charles Marion Russell and Frederic Remington. Cooper especially admired and studied Russell's Lewis and Clark Meeting Indians at Ross' Hole (1910), which still hangs in the state capitol building in Helena. In 1922, to continue his art education, he enrolled in Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa. He did well academically in most of his courses, but was not accepted into the school's drama club. His drawings and watercolor paintings were exhibited throughout the dormitory, and he was named art editor for the college yearbook. During the summers of 1922 and 1923, Cooper worked at Yellowstone National Park as a tour guide driving the yellow open-top buses. Despite a promising first 18 months at Grinnell, he left college suddenly in February 1924, spent a month in Chicago looking for work as an artist, and then returned to Helena, where he sold editorial cartoons to the local Independent newspaper.
In autumn 1924, Cooper's father left the Montana Supreme Court bench and moved with his wife to Los Angeles to administer the estates of two relatives, and Cooper joined his parents there in November at his father's request. After briefly working a series of unpromising jobs, he met two friends from Montana who were working as film extras and stunt riders in low-budget Western films for the small movie studios on Poverty Row. They introduced him to another Montana cowboy, rodeo champion Jay "Slim" Talbot, who took him to see a casting director. Wanting money for a professional art course, Cooper worked as a film extra for $5 a day, and as a stunt rider for $10. Cooper and Talbot became close friends and hunting companions, and Talbot later worked as Cooper's stuntman and stand-in for over three decades.
Career
Silent films, 1925–1928
In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, but also the already emergent major studios, Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt workwhich sometimes injured horses and riders"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name.
Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week.
Cooper's first important film role was a supporting part in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) starring Ronald Colman and Vilma Bánky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal—finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings (both 1927), the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada—both films directed by John Waters.
Paramount paired Cooper with Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss (both 1928)—advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride (also both 1928). Around the same time, Cooper made Lilac Time (1928) with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928.
Hollywood stardom, 1929–1935
Cooper became a major movie star in 1929 with the release of his first talking picture, The Virginian (1929), which was directed by Victor Fleming and co-starred Mary Brian and Walter Huston. Based on the popular novel by Owen Wister, The Virginian was one of the first sound films to define the Western code of honor and helped establish many of the conventions of the Western movie genre that persist to the present day. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, the romantic image of the tall, handsome, and shy cowboy hero who embodied male freedom, courage, and honor was created in large part by Cooper in the film. Unlike some silent film actors who had trouble adapting to the new sound medium, Cooper transitioned naturally, with his "deep and clear" and "pleasantly drawling" voice, which was perfectly suited for the characters he portrayed on screen, also according to Meyers. Looking to capitalize on Cooper's growing popularity, Paramount cast him in several Westerns and wartime dramas, including Only the Brave, The Texan, Seven Days' Leave, A Man from Wyoming, and The Spoilers (all released in 1930). Norman Rockwell depicted Cooper in his role as The Texan for the cover of The Saturday Evening Post on May 24, 1930.
One of the more important performances in Cooper's early career was his portrayal of a sullen legionnaire in Josef von Sternberg's film Morocco (also 1930) with Marlene Dietrich in her introduction to American audiences. During production, von Sternberg focused his energies on Dietrich and treated Cooper dismissively. Tensions came to a head after von Sternberg yelled directions at Cooper in German. The actor approached the director, picked him up by the collar, and said, "If you expect to work in this country you'd better get on to the language we use here." Despite the tensions on the set, Cooper produced "one of his best performances", according to Thornton Delehanty of the New York Evening Post.
After returning to the Western genre in Zane Grey's Fighting Caravans (1931) with French actress Lili Damita, Cooper appeared in the Dashiell Hammett crime film City Streets (also 1931), co-starring Sylvia Sidney and Paul Lukas, playing a westerner who gets involved with big-city gangsters in order to save the woman he loves. Cooper concluded the year with appearances in two unsuccessful films: I Take This Woman (also 1931) with Carole Lombard, and His Woman with Claudette Colbert. The demands and pressures of making ten films in two years left Cooper exhausted and in poor health, suffering from anemia and jaundice. He had lost during that period, and felt lonely, isolated, and depressed by his sudden fame and wealth. In May 1931, Cooper left Hollywood and sailed to Algiers and then Italy, where he lived for the next year.
During his time abroad, Cooper stayed with the Countess Dorothy di Frasso at the Villa Madama in Rome, where she taught him about good food and vintage wines, how to read Italian and French menus, and how to socialize among Europe's nobility and upper classes. After guiding him through the great art museums and galleries of Italy, she accompanied him on a ten-week big-game hunting safari on the slopes of Mount Kenya in East Africa, where he was credited with over sixty kills, including two lions, a rhinoceros, and various antelopes. His safari experience in Africa had a profound influence on Cooper and intensified his love of the wilderness. After returning to Europe, he and the countess set off on a Mediterranean cruise of the Italian and French Rivieras. Rested and rejuvenated by his year-long exile, a healthy Cooper returned to Hollywood in April 1932 and negotiated a new contract with Paramount for two films per year, a salary of $4,000 a week, and director and script approval.
In 1932, after completing Devil and the Deep with Tallulah Bankhead to fulfill his old contract, Cooper appeared in A Farewell to Arms, the first film adaptation of an Ernest Hemingway novel. Co-starring Helen Hayes, a leading New York theatre star and Academy Award winner, and Adolphe Menjou, the film presented Cooper with one of his most ambitious and challenging dramatic roles, playing an American ambulance driver wounded in Italy who falls in love with an English nurse during World War I. Critics praised his highly intense and emotional performance, and the film became one of the year's most commercially successful pictures. In 1933, after making Today We Live with Joan Crawford and One Sunday Afternoon with Fay Wray, Cooper appeared in the Ernst Lubitsch comedy film Design for Living, based on the successful Noël Coward play. Co-starring Miriam Hopkins and Fredric March, the film was a box office success, ranking as one of the top ten highest-grossing films of 1933. All three of the lead actors—March, Cooper, and Hopkins—received attention from this film as they were all at the peak of their careers. Cooper's performance — playing an American artist in Europe competing with his playwright friend for the affections of a beautiful woman — was singled out for its versatility and revealed his genuine ability to do light comedy. Cooper changed his name legally to "Gary Cooper" in August 1933.
In 1934, Cooper was loaned out to MGM for the Civil War drama film Operator 13 with Marion Davies, about a beautiful Union spy who falls in love with a Confederate soldier. Despite Richard Boleslawski's imaginative direction and George J. Folsey's lavish cinematography, the film did poorly at the box office.
Back at Paramount, Cooper appeared in his first of seven films by director Henry Hathaway, Now and Forever, with Carole Lombard and Shirley Temple. In the film, he plays a confidence man who tries to sell his daughter to the relatives who raised her, but is eventually won over by the adorable girl. Impressed by Temple's intelligence and charm, Cooper developed a close rapport with her, both on and off screen. The film was a box-office success.
The following year, Cooper was loaned out to Samuel Goldwyn Productions to appear in King Vidor's romance film The Wedding Night with Anna Sten, who was being groomed as "another Garbo". In the film, Cooper plays an alcoholic novelist who retreats to his family's New England farm where he meets and falls in love with a beautiful Polish neighbor. Cooper delivered a performance of surprising range and depth, according to biographer Larry Swindell. Despite receiving generally favorable reviews, the film was not popular with American audiences, who may have been offended by the film's depiction of an extramarital affair and its tragic ending.
That same year, Cooper appeared in two Henry Hathaway films: the melodrama Peter Ibbetson with Ann Harding, about a man caught up in a dream world created by his love for a childhood sweetheart, and the adventure film The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, about a daring British officer and his men who defend their stronghold at Bengal against rebellious local tribes. While the former, championed by the surrealists became more successful in Europe than in the United States, the latter was nominated for seven Academy Awards and became one of Cooper's most popular and successful adventure films. Hathaway had the highest respect for Cooper's acting ability, calling him "the best actor of all of them".
American folk hero, 1936–1943
From Mr. Deeds to The Real Glory, 1936–1939
Cooper's career took an important turn in 1936. After making Frank Borzage's romantic comedy film Desire with Marlene Dietrich at Paramount—in which he delivered a performance considered by some contemporary critics as one of his finest—Cooper returned to Poverty Row for the first time since his early silent film days to make Frank Capra's Mr. Deeds Goes to Town with Jean Arthur for Columbia Pictures. In the film, Cooper plays the character of Longfellow Deeds, a quiet, innocent writer of greeting cards who inherits a fortune, leaves behind his idyllic life in Vermont, and travels to New York where he faces a world of corruption and deceit. Capra and screenwriter Robert Riskin were able to use Cooper's well-established screen persona as the "quintessential American hero"—a symbol of honesty, courage, and goodness—to create a new type of "folk hero" for the common man. Commenting on Cooper's impact on the character and the film, Capra observed:
Both Desire and Mr. Deeds opened in April 1936 to critical praise and were major box-office successes. In his review in The New York Times, Frank Nugent wrote that Cooper was "proving himself one of the best light comedians in Hollywood". For his performance in Mr. Deeds, Cooper received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.
Cooper appeared in two other Paramount films in 1936. In Lewis Milestone's adventure film The General Died at Dawn with Madeleine Carroll, he plays an American soldier of fortune in China who helps the peasants defend themselves against the oppression of a cruel warlord. Written by playwright Clifford Odets, the film was a critical and commercial success.
In Cecil B. DeMille's sprawling frontier epic The Plainsman—his first of four films with the director—Cooper portrays Wild Bill Hickok in a highly fictionalized version of the opening of the American western frontier. The film was an even greater box-office hit than its predecessor, due in large part to Jean Arthur's definitive depiction of Calamity Jane and Cooper's inspired portrayal of Hickock as an enigmatic figure of "deepening mythic substance". That year, Cooper appeared for the first time on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities, where he would remain for the next twenty-three years.
In late 1936, Paramount was preparing a new contract for Cooper that would raise his salary to $8,000 a week when Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn for six films over six years with a minimum guarantee of $150,000 per picture. Paramount brought suit against Goldwyn and Cooper, and the court ruled that Cooper's new Goldwyn contract afforded the actor sufficient time to also honor his Paramount agreement. Cooper continued to make films with both studios, and by 1939 the United States Treasury reported that Cooper was the country's highest wage earner, at $482,819 (equivalent to $ million in ).
In contrast to his output the previous year, Cooper appeared in only one picture in 1937, Henry Hathaway's adventure film Souls at Sea. A critical and box-office failure, Cooper referred to it as his "almost picture", saying, "It was almost exciting, and almost interesting. And I was almost good." In 1938, he appeared in Archie Mayo's biographical film The Adventures of Marco Polo. Plagued by production problems and a weak screenplay, the film became Goldwyn's biggest failure to that date, losing $700,000. During this period, Cooper turned down several important roles, including the role of Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind. Cooper was producer David O. Selznick's first choice for the part. He made several overtures to the actor, but Cooper had doubts about the project, and did not feel suited to the role. Cooper later admitted, "It was one of the best roles ever offered in Hollywood ... But I said no. I didn't see myself as quite that dashing, and later, when I saw Clark Gable play the role to perfection, I knew I was right."
Back at Paramount, Cooper returned to a more comfortable genre in Ernst Lubitsch's romantic comedy Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938) with Claudette Colbert. In the film, Cooper plays a wealthy American businessman in France who falls in love with an impoverished aristocrat's daughter and persuades her to become his eighth wife. Despite the clever screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder, and solid performances by Cooper and Colbert, American audiences had trouble accepting Cooper in the role of a shallow philanderer. It succeeded only at the European box office market.
In the fall of 1938, Cooper appeared in H. C. Potter's romantic comedy The Cowboy and the Lady with Merle Oberon, about a sweet-natured rodeo cowboy who falls in love with the wealthy daughter of a presidential hopeful, believing her to be a poor, hard-working lady's maid. The efforts of three directors and several eminent screenwriters could not salvage what could have been a fine vehicle for Cooper. While more successful than its predecessor, the film was Cooper's fourth consecutive box-office failure in the American market.
In the next two years, Cooper was more discerning about the roles he accepted and made four successful large-scale adventure and cowboy films. In William A. Wellman's adventure film Beau Geste (1939), he plays one of three daring English brothers who join the French Foreign Legion in the Sahara to fight local tribes. Filmed in the same Mojave Desert locations as the original 1926 version with Ronald Colman, Beau Geste provided Cooper with magnificent sets, exotic settings, high-spirited action, and a role tailored to his personality and screen persona. This was the last film in Cooper's contract with Paramount.
In Henry Hathaway's The Real Glory (1939), he plays a military doctor who accompanies a small group of American Army officers to the Philippines to help the Christian Filipinos defend themselves against Muslim radicals. Many film critics praised Cooper's performance, including author and film critic Graham Greene, who recognized that he "never acted better".
From The Westerner to For Whom the Bell Tolls, 1940–1943
Cooper returned to the Western genre in William Wyler's The Westerner (1940) with Walter Brennan and Doris Davenport, about a drifting cowboy who defends homesteaders against Roy Bean, a corrupt judge known as the "law west of the Pecos". Screenwriter Niven Busch relied on Cooper's extensive knowledge of Western history while working on the script. The film received positive reviews and did well at the box-office, with reviewers praising the performances of the two lead actors. That same year, Cooper appeared in his first all-Technicolor feature, Cecil B. DeMille's adventure film North West Mounted Police (1940). In the film, Cooper plays a Texas Ranger who pursues an outlaw into western Canada where he joins forces with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who are after the same man, a leader of the North-West Rebellion. While not as popular with critics as its predecessor, the film was another box-office success—the sixth-highest-grossing film of 1940.
The early 1940s were Cooper's prime years as an actor. In a relatively short period, he appeared in five critically successful and popular films that produced some of his finest performances. When Frank Capra offered him the lead role in Meet John Doe before Robert Riskin even developed the script, Cooper accepted his friend's offer, saying, "It's okay, Frank, I don't need a script." In the film, Cooper plays Long John Willoughby, a down-and-out bush-league pitcher hired by a newspaper to pretend to be a man who promises to commit suicide on Christmas Eve to protest all the hypocrisy and corruption in the country. Considered by some critics to be Capra's best film at the time, Meet John Doe was received as a "national event" with Cooper appearing on the front cover of Time magazine on March 3, 1941. In his review in the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes called Cooper's performance a "splendid and utterly persuasive portrayal" and praised his "utterly realistic acting which comes through with such authority". Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote, "Gary Cooper, of course, is 'John Doe' to the life and in the whole—shy, bewildered, non-aggressive, but a veritable tiger when aroused."
That same year, Cooper made two films with director and good friend Howard Hawks. In the biographical film Sergeant York, Cooper portrays war hero Alvin C. York, one of the most decorated American soldiers in World War I. The film chronicles York's early backwoods days in Tennessee, his religious conversion and subsequent piety, his stand as a conscientious objector, and finally his heroic actions at the Battle of the Argonne Forest, which earned him the Medal of Honor. Initially, Cooper was nervous and uncertain about playing a living hero, so he traveled to Tennessee to visit York at his home, and the two quiet men established an immediate rapport and discovered they had much in common. Inspired by York's encouragement, Cooper delivered a performance that Howard Barnes of the New York Herald Tribune called "one of extraordinary conviction and versatility", and that Archer Winston of the New York Post called "one of his best". After the film's release, Cooper was awarded the Distinguished Citizenship Medal by the Veterans of Foreign Wars for his "powerful contribution to the promotion of patriotism and loyalty". York admired Cooper's performance and helped promote the film for Warner Bros. Sergeant York became the top-grossing film of the year and was nominated for eleven Academy Awards. Accepting his first Academy Award for Best Actor from his friend James Stewart, Cooper said, "It was Sergeant Alvin York who won this award. Shucks, I've been in the business sixteen years and sometimes dreamed I might get one of these. That's all I can say ... Funny when I was dreaming I always made a better speech."
Cooper concluded the year back at Goldwyn with Howard Hawks to make the romantic comedy Ball of Fire with Barbara Stanwyck. In the film, Cooper plays a shy linguistics professor who leads a team of seven scholars who are writing an encyclopedia. While researching slang, he meets Stanwyck's flirtatious burlesque stripper Sugarpuss O'Shea who blows the dust off their staid life of books. The screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder provided Cooper the opportunity to exercise the full range of his light comedy skills. In his review for the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes wrote that Cooper handled the role with "great skill and comic emphasis" and that his performance was "utterly delightful". Though small in scale, Ball of Fire was one of the top-grossing films of the year—Cooper's fourth consecutive picture to make the top twenty.
Cooper's only film appearance in 1942 was also his last under his Goldwyn contract. In Sam Wood's biographical film The Pride of the Yankees, Cooper portrays baseball star Lou Gehrig who established a record with the New York Yankees for playing in 2,130 consecutive games. Cooper was reluctant to play the seven-time All-Star, who only died the previous year from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) — now commonly called "Lou Gehrig's disease". Beyond the challenges of effectively portraying such a popular and nationally recognized figure, Cooper knew very little about baseball and was not left-handed like Gehrig.
After Gehrig's widow visited the actor and expressed her desire that he portray her husband, Cooper accepted the role that covered a twenty-year span of Gehrig's life—his early love of baseball, his rise to greatness, his loving marriage, and his struggle with illness, culminating in his farewell speech at Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939 before 62,000 fans. Cooper quickly learned the physical movements of a baseball player and developed a fluid, believable swing. The handedness issue was solved by reversing the print for certain batting scenes. The film was one of the year's top ten pictures and received eleven Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's third).
Soon after the publication of Ernest Hemingway's novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, Paramount paid $150,000 for the film rights with the express intent of casting Cooper in the lead role of Robert Jordan, an American explosives expert who fights alongside the Republican loyalists during the Spanish Civil War. The original director, Cecil B. DeMille, was replaced by Sam Wood who brought in Dudley Nichols for the screenplay. After the start of principal photography in the Sierra Nevada in late 1942, Ingrid Bergman was brought in to replace ballerina Vera Zorina as the female lead—a change supported by Cooper and Hemingway. The love scenes between Bergman and Cooper were "rapturous" and passionate. Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune wrote that both actors performed with "the true stature and authority of stars". While the film distorted the novel's original political themes and meaning, For Whom the Bell Tolls was a critical and commercial success and received ten Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's fourth).
World War II related activities
Due to his age and health, Cooper did not serve in the military during World War II, but like many of his colleagues, he got involved in the war effort by entertaining the troops. In June 1943, he visited military hospitals in San Diego, and often appeared at the Hollywood Canteen serving food to the servicemen. In late 1943, Cooper undertook a tour of the South West Pacific with actresses Una Merkel and Phyllis Brooks, and accordionist Andy Arcari.
Traveling on a B-24A Liberator bomber, the group toured the Cook Islands, Fiji, New Caledonia, Queensland, Brisbane—where General Douglas MacArthur told Cooper he was watching Sergeant York in a Manila theater when Japanese bombs began falling—New Guinea, Jayapura, and throughout the Solomon Islands.
The group often shared the same sparse living conditions and K-rations as the troops. Cooper met with the servicemen and women, visited military hospitals, introduced his attractive colleagues, and participated in occasional skits. The shows concluded with Cooper's moving recitation of Lou Gehrig's farewell speech. When he returned to the United States, he visited military hospitals throughout the country. Cooper later called his time with the troops the "greatest emotional experience" of his life.
Mature roles, 1944–1952
In 1944, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's wartime adventure film The Story of Dr. Wassell with Laraine Day — his third movie with the director. In the film, Cooper plays American doctor and missionary Corydon M. Wassell, who leads a group of wounded sailors through the jungles of Java to safety. Despite receiving poor reviews, Dr. Wassell was one of the top-grossing films of the year. With his Goldwyn and Paramount contracts now concluded, Cooper decided to remain independent and formed his own production company, International Pictures, with Leo Spitz, William Goetz, and Nunnally Johnson. The fledgling studio's first offering was Sam Wood's romantic comedy Casanova Brown with Teresa Wright, about a man who learns his soon-to-be ex-wife is pregnant with his child, just as he is about to marry another woman. The film received poor reviews, with the New York Daily News calling it "delightful nonsense", and Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, criticizing Cooper's "somewhat obvious and ridiculous clowning". The film was barely profitable.
In 1945, Cooper starred in and produced Stuart Heisler's Western comedy Along Came Jones with Loretta Young for International. In this lighthearted parody of his past heroic image, Cooper plays comically inept cowboy Melody Jones who is mistaken for a ruthless killer. Audiences embraced Cooper's character, and the film was one of the top box-office pictures of the year—a testament to Cooper's still vital audience appeal. It was also International's biggest financial success during its brief history before being sold off to Universal Studios in 1946.
Cooper's career during the post-war years drifted in new directions as American society was changing. While he still played conventional heroic roles, his films now relied less on his heroic screen persona and more on novel stories and exotic settings. In November 1945, Cooper appeared in Sam Wood's nineteenth-century period drama Saratoga Trunk with Ingrid Bergman, about a Texas cowboy and his relationship with a beautiful fortune-hunter. Filmed in early 1943, the movie's release was delayed for two years due to the increased demand for war movies. Despite poor reviews, Saratoga Trunk did well at the box office and became one of the top money-makers of the year for Warner Bros. Cooper's only film in 1946 was Fritz Lang's romantic thriller Cloak and Dagger, about a mild-mannered physics professor recruited by the OSS during the last years of World War II to investigate the German atomic bomb program. Playing a part loosely based on physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, Cooper was uneasy with the role and unable to convey the "inner sense" of the character. The film received poor reviews and was a box-office failure. In 1947, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's epic adventure film Unconquered with Paulette Goddard, about a Virginia militiaman who defends settlers against an unscrupulous gun trader and hostile Indians on the Western frontier during the eighteenth century. The film received mixed reviews, but even long-time DeMille critic James Agee acknowledged the picture had "some authentic flavor of the period". This last of four films made with DeMille was Cooper's most lucrative, earning the actor over $300,000 (equal to $ today) in salary and percentage of profits. Unconquered would be his last unqualified box-office success for the next five years.
In 1948, after making Leo McCarey's romantic comedy Good Sam, Cooper sold his company to Universal Studios and signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros. that gave him script and director approval and a guaranteed $295,000 (equal to $ today) per picture. His first film under the new contract was King Vidor's drama The Fountainhead (1949) with Patricia Neal and Raymond Massey. In the film, Cooper plays an idealistic and uncompromising architect who struggles to maintain his integrity and individualism in the face of societal pressures to conform to popular standards. Based on the novel by Ayn Rand who also wrote the screenplay, the film reflects her philosophy and attacks the concepts of collectivism while promoting the virtues of individualism. For most critics, Cooper was hopelessly miscast in the role of Howard Roark. In his review for The New York Times, Bosley Crowther concluded he was "Mr. Deeds out of his element". Cooper returned to his element in Delmer Daves' war drama Task Force (1949), about a retiring rear admiral who reminisces about his long career as a naval aviator and his role in the development of aircraft carriers. Cooper's performance and the Technicolor newsreel footage supplied by the United States Navy made the film one of Cooper's most popular during this period. In the next two years, Cooper made four poorly received films: Michael Curtiz' period drama Bright Leaf (1950), Stuart Heisler's Western melodrama Dallas (1950), Henry Hathaway's wartime comedy You're in the Navy Now (1951), and Raoul Walsh's Western action film Distant Drums (1951).
Cooper's most important film during the post-war years was Fred Zinnemann's Western drama High Noon (1952) with Grace Kelly and Katy Jurado for United Artists. In the film, Cooper plays retiring sheriff Will Kane who is preparing to leave town on his honeymoon when he learns that an outlaw he helped put away and his three henchmen are returning to seek their revenge. Unable to gain the support of the frightened townspeople, and abandoned by his young bride, Kane nevertheless stays to face the outlaws alone. During the filming, Cooper was in poor health and in considerable pain from stomach ulcers. His ravaged face and discomfort in some scenes "photographed as self-doubt", according to biographer Hector Arce, and contributed to the effectiveness of his performance. Considered one of the first "adult" Westerns for its theme of moral courage, High Noon received enthusiastic reviews for its artistry, with Time magazine placing it in the ranks of Stagecoach and The Gunfighter. Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote that Cooper was "at the top of his form", and John McCarten, in The New Yorker, wrote that Cooper was never more effective. The film earned $3.75 million in the United States and $18 million worldwide. Following the example of his friend James Stewart, Cooper accepted a lower salary in exchange for a percent of the profits, and ended up making $600,000. Cooper's understated performance was widely praised, and earned him his second Academy Award for Best Actor.
Later films, 1953–1961
After appearing in André de Toth's Civil War drama Springfield Rifle (1952)—a standard Warner Bros. film that was overshadowed by the success of its predecessor—Cooper made four films outside the United States. In Mark Robson's drama Return to Paradise (1953), Cooper plays an American wanderer who liberates the inhabitants of a Polynesian island from the puritanical rule of a misguided pastor. Cooper endured spartan living conditions, long hours, and ill health during the three-month location shoot on the island of Upolu in Western Samoa. Despite its beautiful cinematography, the film received poor reviews. Cooper's next three films were shot in Mexico. In Hugo Fregonese's action adventure film Blowing Wild (1953) with Barbara Stanwyck, he plays a wildcatter in Mexico who gets involved with an oil company executive and his unscrupulous wife with whom he once had an affair.
In 1954, Cooper appeared in Henry Hathaway's Western drama Garden of Evil, with Susan Hayward, about three soldiers of fortune in Mexico hired to rescue a woman's husband. That same year, he appeared in Robert Aldrich's Western adventure Vera Cruz with Burt Lancaster. In the film, Cooper plays an American adventurer hired by Emperor Maximilian I to escort a countess to Vera Cruz during the Mexican Rebellion of 1866. All of these films received poor reviews but did well at the box-office. For his work in Vera Cruz, Cooper earned $1.4 million in salary and percent of the gross.
During this period, Cooper struggled with health problems. As well as his ongoing treatment for ulcers, he suffered a severe shoulder injury during the filming of Blowing Wild when he was hit by metal fragments from a dynamited oil well. During the filming of Vera Cruz, he reinjured his hip falling from a horse, and was burned when Lancaster fired his rifle too close and the wadding from the blank shell pierced his clothing.
In 1955, he appeared in Otto Preminger's biographical war drama The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell, about the World War I general who tried to convince government officials of the importance of air power, and was court-martialed after blaming the War Department for a series of air disasters. Some critics felt that Cooper was miscast, and that his dull, tight-lipped performance did not reflect Mitchell's dynamic and caustic personality. In 1956, Cooper was more effective playing a gentle Indiana Quaker in William Wyler's Civil War drama Friendly Persuasion with Dorothy McGuire. Like Sergeant York and High Noon, the film addresses the conflict between religious pacifism and civic duty. For his performance, Cooper received his second Golden Globe nomination for Best Motion Picture Actor. The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, was awarded the Palme d'Or at the 1957 Cannes Film Festival, and went on to earn $8 million worldwide.
In 1956, Cooper traveled to France to make Billy Wilder's romantic comedy Love in the Afternoon with Audrey Hepburn and Maurice Chevalier. In the film, Cooper plays a middle-aged American playboy in Paris who pursues and eventually falls in love with a much younger woman. Despite receiving some positive reviews—including from Bosley Crowther who praised the film's "charming performances"—most reviewers concluded that Cooper was simply too old for the part. While audiences may not have welcomed seeing Cooper's heroic screen image tarnished by his playing an aging roué trying to seduce an innocent young girl, the film was still a box-office success. The following year, Cooper appeared in Philip Dunne's romantic drama Ten North Frederick. In the film, which was based on the novel by John O'Hara, Cooper plays an attorney whose life is ruined by a double-crossing politician and his own secret affair with his daughter's young roommate. While Cooper brought "conviction and controlled anguish" to his performance, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, it was not enough to save what Bosley Crowther called a "hapless film".
Despite his ongoing health problems and several operations for ulcers and hernias, Cooper continued to work in action films. In 1958, he appeared in Anthony Mann's Western drama Man of the West (1958) with Julie London and Lee J. Cobb, about a reformed outlaw and killer who is forced to confront his violent past when the train he is riding in is held up by his former gang members. The film has been called Cooper's "most pathological Western", with its themes of impotent rage, sexual humiliation, and sadism. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, Cooper, who struggled with moral conflicts in his personal life, "understood the anguish of a character striving to retain his integrity ... [and] brought authentic feeling to the role of a tempted and tormented, yet essentially decent man". Mostly ignored by critics at the time, the film is now well-regarded by film scholars and is considered Cooper's last great film.
After his Warner Bros. contract ended, Cooper formed his own production company, Baroda Productions, and made three unusual films in 1959 about redemption. In Delmer Daves' Western drama The Hanging Tree, Cooper plays a frontier doctor who saves a criminal from a lynch mob, and later tries to exploit his sordid past. Cooper delivered a "powerful and persuasive" performance of an emotionally scarred man whose need to dominate others is transformed by the love and sacrifice of a woman. In Robert Rossen's historical adventure They Came to Cordura with Rita Hayworth, he plays an army officer who is found guilty of cowardice and assigned the degrading task of recommending soldiers for the Medal of Honor during the Pancho Villa Expedition of 1916.
While Cooper received positive reviews, Variety and Films in Review felt he was too old for the part. In Michael Anderson's action drama The Wreck of the Mary Deare with Charlton Heston, Cooper plays a disgraced merchant marine officer who decides to stay aboard his sinking cargo ship in order to prove the vessel was deliberately scuttled and to redeem his good name. Like its two predecessors, the film was physically demanding. Cooper, who was a trained scuba diver, did most of his own underwater scenes. Biographer Jeffrey Meyers observed that in all three roles, Cooper effectively conveyed the sense of lost honor and desire for redemption—what Joseph Conrad in Lord Jim called the "struggles of an individual trying to save from the fire his idea of what his moral identity should be".
Personal life
Marriage and family
Cooper was formally introduced to his future wife, 20-year-old New York debutante Veronica Balfe, on Easter Sunday 1933 at a party given by her uncle, art director Cedric Gibbons. Called "Rocky" by her family and friends, she grew up on Park Avenue and attended finishing schools. Her stepfather was Wall Street tycoon Paul Shields. Cooper and Rocky were quietly married at her parents' Park Avenue residence on December 15, 1933. According to his friends, the marriage had a positive impact on Cooper, who turned away from past indiscretions and took control of his life. Athletic and a lover of the outdoors, Rocky shared many of Cooper's interests, including riding, skiing, and skeet-shooting. She organized their social life, and her wealth and social connections provided Cooper access to New York high society. Cooper and his wife owned homes in the Los Angeles area in Encino (1933–36), Brentwood (1936–53), and Holmby Hills (1954–61), and owned a vacation home in Aspen, Colorado (1949–53).
Gary and Veronica Cooper's daughter, Maria Veronica Cooper, was born on September 15, 1937. By all accounts, he was a patient and affectionate father, teaching Maria to ride a bicycle, play tennis, ski, and ride horses. Sharing many of her parents' interests, she accompanied them on their travels and was often photographed with them. Like her father, she developed a love for art and drawing. As a family they vacationed together in Sun Valley, Idaho, spent time at Rocky's parents' country house in Southampton, New York, and took frequent trips to Europe. Cooper and Rocky were legally separated on May 16, 1951, when Cooper moved out of their home. For over two years, they maintained a fragile and uneasy family life with their daughter. Cooper moved back into their home in November 1953, and their formal reconciliation occurred in February 1954.
Romantic relationships
Prior to his marriage, Cooper had a series of romantic relationships with leading actresses, beginning in 1927 with Clara Bow, who advanced his career by helping him get one of his first leading roles in Children of Divorce. Bow was also responsible for getting Cooper a role in Wings, which generated an enormous amount of fan mail for the young actor. In 1928, he had a relationship with another experienced actress, Evelyn Brent, whom he met while filming Beau Sabreur. In 1929, while filming The Wolf Song, Cooper began an intense affair with Lupe Vélez, which was the most important romance of his early life. During their two years together, Cooper also had brief affairs with Marlene Dietrich while filming Morocco in 1930 and with Carole Lombard while making I Take This Woman in 1931. During his year abroad in 1931–32, Cooper had an affair with the married Countess Dorothy di Frasso, while staying at her Villa Madama near Rome.
After he was married in December 1933, Cooper remained faithful to his wife until the summer of 1942, when he began an affair with Ingrid Bergman during the production of For Whom the Bell Tolls. Their relationship lasted through the completion of filming Saratoga Trunk in June 1943. In 1948, after finishing work on The Fountainhead, Cooper began an affair with actress Patricia Neal, his co-star. At first they kept their affair discreet, but eventually it became an open secret in Hollywood, and Cooper's wife confronted him with the rumors, which he admitted were true. He also confessed that he was in love with Neal, and continued to see her. Cooper and his wife were legally separated in May 1951, but he did not seek a divorce. Neal later claimed that Cooper hit her after she went on a date with Kirk Douglas, and that he arranged for her to have an abortion when she became pregnant with Cooper's child. Neal ended their relationship in late December 1951. During his three-year separation from his wife, Cooper was rumored to have had affairs with Grace Kelly, Lorraine Chanel, and Gisèle Pascal.
Cooper biographers have explored his friendship in the late twenties with the actor Anderson Lawler, with whom Cooper shared a house on and off for a year, while at the same time seeing Clara Bow, Evelyn Brent and Lupe Vélez. Lupe Vélez once told Hedda Hopper of Vélez' affair with Cooper; whenever he would come home after seeing Lawler, she would sniff for Lawler's cologne. Vélez' biographer Michelle Vogel has reported that Vélez consented to Cooper's sexual behavior with Lawler, but only as long as she, too, could participate. In later life, he became involved in a relationship with the costume designer Irene, and was, according to Irene, "the only man she ever loved". A year after his death in 1961, Irene committed suicide by jumping from the 11th floor of the Knickerbocker Hotel, after telling Doris Day of her grief over Cooper's death.
Friendships, interests, and character
Cooper's twenty-year friendship with Ernest Hemingway began at Sun Valley in October 1940. The previous year, Hemingway drew upon Cooper's image when he created the character of Robert Jordan for the novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. The two shared a passion for the outdoors, and for years they hunted duck and pheasant, and skied together in Sun Valley. Both men admired the work of Rudyard Kipling—Cooper kept a copy of the poem "If—" in his dressing room—and retained as adults Kipling's sense of boyish adventure.
As well as admiring Cooper's hunting skills and knowledge of the outdoors, Hemingway believed his character matched his screen persona, once telling a friend, "If you made up a character like Coop, nobody would believe it. He's just too good to be true." They saw each other often, and their friendship remained strong through the years.
Cooper's social life generally centered on sports, outdoor activities, and dinner parties with his family and friends from the film industry, including directors Henry Hathaway, Howard Hawks, William Wellman, and Fred Zinnemann, and actors Joel McCrea, James Stewart, Barbara Stanwyck, and Robert Taylor. As well as hunting, Cooper enjoyed riding, fishing, skiing, and later in life, scuba diving. He never abandoned his early love for art and drawing, and over the years, he and his wife acquired a private collection of modern paintings, including works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Gauguin, and Georgia O'Keeffe. Cooper owned several works by Pablo Picasso, whom he met in 1956. Cooper also had a lifelong passion for automobiles, with a collection that included a 1930 Duesenberg.
Cooper was naturally reserved and introspective, and loved the solitude of outdoor activities. Not unlike his screen persona, his communication style frequently consisted of long silences with an occasional "yup" and "shucks". He once said, "If others have more interesting things to say than I have, I keep quiet." According to his friends, Cooper could also be an articulate, well-informed conversationalist on topics ranging from horses, guns, and Western history to film production, sports cars, and modern art. He was modest and unpretentious, frequently downplaying his acting abilities and career accomplishments. His friends and colleagues described him as charming, well-mannered, and thoughtful, with a lively boyish sense of humor. Cooper maintained a sense of propriety throughout his career and never misused his movie star status—never sought special treatment or refused to work with a director or leading lady. His close friend Joel McCrea recalled, "Coop never fought, he never got mad, he never told anybody off that I know of; everybody that worked with him liked him."
Political views
Like his father, Cooper was a conservative Republican; he voted for Calvin Coolidge in 1924, Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1932, and campaigned for Wendell Willkie in 1940. When Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for an unprecedented fourth presidential term in 1944, Cooper campaigned for Thomas E. Dewey and criticized Roosevelt for being dishonest and adopting "foreign" ideas. In a radio address that he paid for himself just prior to the election, Cooper said, "I disagree with the New Deal belief that the America all of us love is old and worn-out and finished—and has to borrow foreign notions that don't even seem to work any too well where they come from ... Our country is a young country that just has to make up its mind to be itself again." He also attended a Republican rally at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum that drew 93,000 Dewey supporters.
Cooper was one of the founding members of the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, a conservative organization dedicated, according to its statement of principles, to preserving the "American way of life" and opposing communism and fascism. The organization — whose membership included Walter Brennan, Laraine Day, Walt Disney, Clark Gable, Hedda Hopper, Ronald Reagan, Barbara Stanwyck, and John Wayne — advised the United States Congress to investigate communist influence in the motion picture industry. On October 23, 1947, Cooper was subpoenaed to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and was asked if he had observed any "communistic influence" in Hollywood.
Cooper recounted statements he'd heard suggesting that the Constitution was out of date and that Congress was an unnecessary institution—comments that Cooper said he found to be "very un-American" and testified that he had rejected several scripts because he thought they were "tinged with communist ideas". Unlike some other witnesses, Cooper did not name any individuals, nor did he name any scripts, during his testimony.
In 1951, while making High Noon, Cooper became friends with the film's screenwriter, Carl Foreman, who had been a member of the Communist Party. When Foreman was subpoenaed by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Cooper put his career on the line to defend Foreman. When John Wayne and others threatened Cooper with blacklisting himself and the loss of his passport if he did not walk off the film, Cooper gave a statement to the press in support of Foreman, calling him "the finest kind of American". When producer Stanley Kramer removed Foreman's name as screenwriter, Cooper and director Fred Zinnemann threatened to walk off the film if Foreman's name was not restored. Foreman later said that, of all his friends and allies and colleagues in Hollywood, "Cooper was the only big one who tried to help. The only one." Cooper even offered to testify in Foreman's behalf before the committee, but character witnesses were not allowed. Foreman always sent future scripts to Cooper for first refusal, including The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Key and The Guns of Navarone. Cooper had to turn them down because of his age.
Religion
Cooper was baptized in the Anglican Church in December 1911 in Britain, and was raised in the Episcopal Church in the United States. While he was not an observant Christian for most of his adult life, many of his friends believed he had a deeply spiritual side.
On June 26, 1953, Cooper accompanied his wife and daughter, who were devout Catholics, to Rome, where they had an audience with Pope Pius XII. Cooper and his wife were still separated at the time, but the papal visit marked the beginning of their gradual reconciliation. In the coming years, Cooper contemplated his mortality and his personal behavior, and started discussing Catholicism with his family. He began attending church with them regularly, and met with their parish priest, who offered Cooper spiritual guidance. After several months of study, Cooper was baptized as a Roman Catholic on April 9, 1959, before a small group of family and friends at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills.
Final years and death
On April 14, 1960, Cooper underwent surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston for an aggressive form of prostate cancer that had metastasized to his colon. He fell ill again on May 31 and underwent further surgery at Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles in early June to remove a malignant tumor from his large intestine. After recuperating over the summer, Cooper took his family on vacation to the south of France before traveling to the UK in the fall to star in The Naked Edge. In December 1960, he worked on the NBC television documentary The Real West, which was part of the company's Project 20 series.
On December 27, his wife learned from their family doctor that Cooper's cancer had spread to his lungs and bones and was inoperable. His family decided not to tell him immediately.
On January 9, 1961, Cooper attended a dinner that was given in his honor and hosted by Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin at the Friars Club. The dinner was attended by many of his industry friends and concluded with a brief speech by Cooper who said, "The only achievement I'm proud of is the friends I've made in this community."
In mid-January, Cooper took his family to Sun Valley for their last vacation together. Cooper and Hemingway hiked through the snow together for the last time. On February 27, after returning to Los Angeles, Cooper learned that he was dying. He later told his family, "We'll pray for a miracle; but if not, and that's God's will, that's all right too." On April 17, Cooper watched the Academy Awards ceremony on television and saw his good friend James Stewart, who had presented Cooper with his first Oscar years earlier, accept on Cooper's behalf an honorary award for lifetime achievement—his third Oscar. Holding back tears, Stewart said, "Coop, I'll get this to you right away. And Coop, I want you to know this, that with this goes all the warm friendship and the affection and the admiration and the deep, the deep respect of all of us. We're very, very proud of you, Coop. All of us are tremendously proud." The following day, newspapers around the world announced the news that Cooper was dying. In the coming days he received numerous messages of appreciation and encouragement, including telegrams from Pope John XXIII and Queen Elizabeth II, and a telephone call from President John F. Kennedy.
In his last public statement on May 4, Cooper said, "I know that what is happening is God's will. I am not afraid of the future." He received the last rites on May 12. Cooper died quietly the following day, Saturday, May 13, 1961, at 12:47 P.M.
A requiem mass was held on May 18 at the Church of the Good Shepherd, attended by many of Cooper's friends, including James Stewart, Jack Benny, Henry Hathaway, Joel McCrea, Audrey Hepburn, Jack L. Warner, John Ford, John Wayne, Edward G. Robinson, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Fred Astaire, Randolph Scott, Walter Pidgeon, Bob Hope and Marlene Dietrich. Cooper was buried in the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes in Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California. In May 1974, after his family relocated to New York, Cooper's remains were exhumed and reburied in Sacred Hearts Cemetery in Southampton. His grave is marked by a three-ton boulder from a Montauk quarry.
Acting style and reputation
Cooper's acting style consisted of three essential characteristics: his ability to project elements of his own personality onto the characters he portrayed, to appear natural and authentic in his roles, and to underplay and deliver restrained performances calibrated for the camera and the screen. Acting teacher Lee Strasberg once observed: "The simplest examples of Stanislavsky's ideas are actors such as Gary Cooper, John Wayne, and Spencer Tracy. They try not to act but to be themselves, to respond or react. They refuse to say or do anything they feel not to be consonant with their own characters." Film director François Truffaut ranked Cooper among "the greatest actors" because of his ability to deliver great performances "without direction". This ability to project elements of his own personality onto his characters produced a continuity across his performances to the extent that critics and audiences were convinced that he was simply "playing himself".
Cooper's ability to project his personality onto his characters played an important part in his appearing natural and authentic on screen. Actor John Barrymore said of Cooper, "This fellow is the world's greatest actor. He does without effort what the rest of us spend our lives trying to learn—namely, to be natural." Charles Laughton, who played opposite Cooper in Devil and the Deep agreed, "In truth, that boy hasn't the least idea how well he acts ... He gets at it from the inside, from his own clear way of looking at life." William Wyler, who directed Cooper in two films, called him a "superb actor, a master of movie acting".
In his review of Cooper's performance in The Real Glory, Graham Greene wrote, "Sometimes his lean photogenic face seems to leave everything to the lens, but there is no question here of his not acting. Watch him inoculate the girl against cholera—the casual jab of the needle, and the dressing slapped on while he talks, as though a thousand arms had taught him where to stab and he doesn't have to think anymore."
Cooper's style of underplaying before the camera surprised many of his directors and fellow actors. Even in his earliest feature films, he recognized the camera's ability to pick up slight gestures and facial movements. Commenting on Cooper's performance in Sergeant York, director Howard Hawks observed, "He worked very hard and yet he didn't seem to be working. He was a strange actor because you'd look at him during a scene and you'd think ... this isn't going to be any good. But when you saw the rushes in the projection room the next day you could read in his face all the things he'd been thinking." Sam Wood, who directed Cooper in four films, had similar observations about Cooper's performance in Pride of the Yankees, noting, "What I thought was underplaying turned out to be just the right approach. On the screen he's perfect, yet on the set you'd swear it's the worst job of acting in the history of motion pictures."
Fellow actors admired his abilities as an actor. Commenting on her two films playing opposite Cooper, actress Ingrid Bergman concluded, "The personality of this man was so enormous, so overpowering—and that expression in his eyes and his face, it was so delicate and so underplayed. You just didn't notice it until you saw it on the screen. I thought he was marvelous; the most underplaying and the most natural actor I ever worked with."
Tom Hanks declared, "In only one scene in the first film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture, we see the future of screen acting in the form of Gary Cooper. He is quiet and natural, somehow different from the other cast members. He does something mysterious with his eyes and shoulders that is much more like 'being' than 'acting'."
Daniel Day-Lewis said, "I don't particularly like westerns as a genre, but I do love certain westerns. 'High Noon' means a lot to me – I love the purity and the honesty, I love Gary Cooper in that film, the idea of the last man standing."
Chris Pratt stated, "I started watching Westerns when I was shooting in London about four or five years ago. I really fell in love with Gary Cooper, and his stuff. That sucked me into the Westerns. Before, I never got engrossed in the story. I'd just dip in, and there were guys in horses in black and white. High Noon's later Gary Cooper, I liked that. But I liked 'The Westerner'. That's my favorite one. I have that poster hung up in my house because I really like that one."
To Al Pacino, "Gary Cooper was a phenomenon—his ability to take some thing and elevate it, give it such dignity. One of the great presences."
Mylène Demongeot first got with Gary Cooper for the opening of the first escalator to be installed in a cinema, at the Rex Theatre in Paris, on June 7, 1957. She declared in a 2015 filmed interview: "Gary Cooper ... il est sublime ! Aaahhh (Mylène pushing a cry of love not to say ecstasy) il est sublime ... Ah ! Ah ! Ah ! Là je dois dire que ça fait partie des stars, y'a Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, ces grands Américains que j'ai rencontrés comme ça, c'est vraiment des mecs incroyables. Y'en a plus des comme ça ! Euh non. (Gary Cooper was sublime, there I have to say, now he, was part of the stars, Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, those great americans who I've met really were unbelievable guys, there aren't any like them anymore)."
Career assessment and legacy
Cooper's career spanned thirty-six years, from 1925 to 1961. During that time, he appeared in eighty-four feature films in a leading role. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His natural and authentic acting style appealed powerfully to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major movie genres, including Westerns, war films, adventure films, drama films, crime films, romance films, comedy films, and romantic comedy films. He appeared on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities for twenty-three consecutive years, from 1936 to 1958. According to Quigley's annual poll, Cooper was one of the top money-making stars for eighteen years, appearing in the top ten in 1936–37, 1941–49, and 1951–57. He topped the list in 1953. In Quigley's list of all-time money-making stars, Cooper is listed fourth, after John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and Tom Cruise. At the time of his death, it was estimated that his films grossed well over $200 million (equivalent to $ billion in ).
In over half of his feature films, Cooper portrayed Westerners, soldiers, pilots, sailors, and explorers—all men of action. In the rest he played a wide range of characters, included doctors, professors, artists, architects, clerks, and baseball players. Cooper's heroic screen image changed with each period of his career. In his early films, he played the young naive hero sure of his moral position and trusting in the triumph of simple virtues (The Virginian). After becoming a major star, his Western screen persona was replaced by a more cautious hero in adventure films and dramas (A Farewell to Arms). During the height of his career, from 1936 to 1943, he played a new type of hero—a champion of the common man willing to sacrifice himself for others (Mr. Deeds, Meet John Doe, and For Whom the Bell Tolls).
In the post-war years, Cooper attempted broader variations on his screen image, which now reflected a hero increasingly at odds with the world who must face adversity alone (The Fountainhead and High Noon). In his final films, Cooper's hero rejects the violence of the past, and seeks to reclaim lost honor and find redemption (Friendly Persuasion and Man of the West). The screen persona he developed and sustained throughout his career represented the ideal American hero—a tall, handsome, and sincere man of steadfast integrity who emphasized action over intellect, and combined the heroic qualities of the romantic lover, the adventurer, and the common man.
On February 6, 1960, Cooper was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6243 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to the film industry. He was awarded a star on the sidewalk outside the Ellen Theater in Bozeman, Montana.
On May 6, 1961, he was awarded the French Order of Arts and Letters in recognition of his significant contribution to the arts. On July 30, 1961, he was posthumously awarded the David di Donatello Special Award in Italy for his career achievements.
In 1966, he was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. In 2015, he was inducted into the Utah Cowboy and Western Heritage Hall of Fame. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper eleventh on its list of the 25 male stars of classic Hollywood. Three of his characters—Will Kane, Lou Gehrig, and Sergeant York—made AFI's list of the one hundred greatest heroes and villains, all of them as heroes. His Lou Gehrig line, "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.", is ranked by AFI as the thirty-eighth greatest movie quote of all time.
More than a half century after his death, Cooper's enduring legacy, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, is his image of the ideal American hero preserved in his film performances. Charlton Heston once observed, "He projected the kind of man Americans would like to be, probably more than any actor that's ever lived."
In the TV series Justified, based on works and characters created by Elmore Leonard, Gary Cooper is used throughout the six seasons as the man whom U.S. Marshall Raylan Givens, played by Timothy Olyphant, aspires to be. When his colleague asks Marshall Givens how he thinks his dangerous plan to bring down a villain can possibly work, he replies: "Why not? Worked for Gary Cooper."
Gary Cooper is referenced several times in the critically acclaimed television series The Sopranos, with protagonist Tony Soprano asking "What ever happened to Gary Cooper? The strong, silent type." while complaining about his problems to his therapist.
In the 1930s hit song "Puttin' On the Ritz", Cooper is referenced in the line "dress up like a million dollar trooper/Tryin' hard to look like Gary Cooper, Super duper!" More than two decades after Cooper's death a new version of the song was released in 1983 by Taco; the original lyrics were kept, including the references to Cooper.
In J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye, Cooper is "spotted" by Holden Caulfield to distract a woman he is dancing with.
Awards and nominations
Filmography
The following is a list of feature films in which Cooper appeared in a leading role.
The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926)
Children of Divorce (1927)
Arizona Bound (1927)
Wings (1927)
Nevada (1927)
It (1927)
The Last Outlaw (1927)
Beau Sabreur (1928)
The Legion of the Condemned (1928)
Doomsday (1928)
Half a Bride (1928)
Lilac Time (1928)
The First Kiss (1928)
The Shopworn Angel (1928)
Wolf Song (1929)
Betrayal (1929)
The Virginian (1929)
Only the Brave (1930)
The Texan (1930)
Seven Days' Leave (1930)
A Man from Wyoming (1930)
The Spoilers (1930)
Morocco (1930)
Fighting Caravans (1931)
City Streets (1931)
I Take This Woman (1931)
His Woman (1931)
Devil and the Deep (1932)
If I Had a Million (1932)
A Farewell to Arms (1932)
Today We Live (1933)
One Sunday Afternoon (1933)
Design for Living (1933)
Alice in Wonderland (1933)
Operator 13 (1934)
Now and Forever (1934)
The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935)
The Wedding Night (1935)
Peter Ibbetson (1935)
Desire (1936)
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)
The General Died at Dawn (1936)
The Plainsman (1936)
Souls at Sea (1937)
The Adventures of Marco Polo (1938)
Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938)
The Cowboy and the Lady (1938)
Beau Geste (1939)
The Real Glory (1939)
The Westerner (1940)
North West Mounted Police (1940)
Meet John Doe (1941)
Sergeant York (1941)
Ball of Fire (1941)
The Pride of the Yankees (1942)
For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)
The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944)
Casanova Brown (1944)
Along Came Jones (1945)
Saratoga Trunk (1945)
Cloak and Dagger (1946)
Unconquered (1947)
Good Sam (1948)
The Fountainhead (1949)
Task Force (1949)
Bright Leaf (1950)
Dallas (1950)
You're in the Navy Now (1951)
It's a Big Country (1951)
Distant Drums (1951)
High Noon (1952)
Springfield Rifle (1952)
Return to Paradise (1953)
Blowing Wild (1953)
Garden of Evil (1954)
Vera Cruz (1954)
The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (1955)
Friendly Persuasion (1956)
Love in the Afternoon (1957)
Ten North Frederick (1958)
Man of the West (1958)
The Hanging Tree (1959)
They Came to Cordura (1959)
The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959)
The Naked Edge (1961)
Radio appearances
References
Notes
Citations
Bibliography
Adrien Le Bihan, Gary Cooper, le prince des acteurs, LettMotif, 2021, 358p.()
External links
1901 births
1961 deaths
20th-century American male actors
Academy Honorary Award recipients
American expatriates in England
American male film actors
American male silent film actors
American male television actors
American people of English descent
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
California Republicans
Catholics from Montana
Conservatism in the United States
Converts to Roman Catholicism from Anglicanism
Deaths from cancer in California
Deaths from prostate cancer
Grinnell College people
Male Western (genre) film actors
Male actors from Montana
Paramount Pictures contract players
People educated at Dunstable Grammar School
People from Brentwood, Los Angeles
People from Dunstable
People from Helena, Montana
People from Holmby Hills, Los Angeles | false | [
"Thomas McPherson Brown (1906–1989) was a rheumatologist who held unorthodox views about the basis of rheumatoid arthritis (RA), and believed it could be cured with antibiotics.\n\nBrown graduated from Swarthmore College then attended Johns Hopkins Medical School. He did his medical residency at the hospital associated with the Rockefeller Institute.At Rockefeller he did research on synovial fluid from people with RA and in 1937 found Mycoplasma in the fluid from some patients, leading him to believe that RA might be an infectious disease. His work was interrupted by service in World War II; after the war he obtained a position at George Washington University and began to experimentally treat some people with RA with antibiotics, which at the time were a new class of drugs. Some of the people he treated were members of Congress or ambassadors, and some of them responded positively. He presented his work at a conference in 1949; at the same conference, the new drug cortisone was presented, and it overshadowed his work and became the leading treatment for RA.\n\nThroughout his career, Brown fought to have his antibiotic treatments recognized by the medical establishment; they were not.\n\nFootnotes\n\n1906 births\n1989 deaths\nAmerican rheumatologists\n20th-century American physicians",
"Ben Thigpen (November 16, 1908 – October 5, 1971) was an American jazz drummer. He is the father of drummer Ed Thigpen.\n\nHe was born Benjamin F. Thigpen in Laurel, Mississippi. Ben Thigpen played piano as a child, having been trained by his sister Eva. He played in South Bend, Indiana with Bobby Boswell in the 1920s, and then moved to Chicago to study under Jimmy Bertrand. While there he played with many noted Chicago bandleaders and performers, including Doc Cheatham. He played with Charlie Elgar's Creole Band during 1927-1929 but did not record with them. Following this he spent time in Cleveland with J. Frank Terry, and then became the drummer for Andy Kirk's Clouds of Joy, where he stayed from 1930 to 1947. Much of his work is available on collections highlighting the piano work of Mary Lou Williams, who also played in this ensemble.\n\nAfter his time with Kirk, Thigpen's career is poorly documented. He led his own quintet in St. Louis and recorded with Singleton Palmer in the 1960s.\n\nReferences\n[ Ben Thigpen] at Allmusic\n\nExternal links\n Ben Thigpen recordings at the Discography of American Historical Recordings.\n\nAmerican jazz drummers\n1908 births\n1971 deaths"
] |
[
"Gary Cooper",
"Silent films, 1925-28",
"what silent films were made in 1925?",
"In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt,",
"what other silent films?",
"Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones.",
"did he win any awards for these films?",
"I don't know.",
"what was his greatest accomplishment?",
"Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects.",
"did Lilac Time succeed?",
"It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928.",
"what is the most important fact in this article?",
"Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky,",
"did he win any awards for this role?",
"The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a \"dynamic new personality\" and future star.",
"who did he work with?",
"Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal--finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures"
] | C_6ec0895035fd4dbda1785cd7d1c7b5d7_1 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | 9 | Other than Gary Cooper's silent films from 1925 to 1928, are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | Gary Cooper | In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, including Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt work--which sometimes injured horses and riders--"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name. Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week. Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal--finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings, the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada--both films directed by John Waters. In 1928, Paramount paired Cooper with a youthful Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss--advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride. That year, Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928. CANNOTANSWER | During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film | Gary Cooper (born Frank James Cooper; May 7, 1901 – May 13, 1961) was an American actor known for his strong, silent, and understated acting style. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor twice and had a further three nominations, as well as receiving an Academy Honorary Award for his career achievements in 1961. He was one of the top 10 film personalities for 23 consecutive years, and one of the top money-making stars for 18 years. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper at No. 11 on its list of the 25 greatest male stars of classic Hollywood cinema.
Cooper's career spanned 36 years, from 1925 to 1961, and included leading roles in 84 feature films. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era through to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His screen persona appealed strongly to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major film genres. His ability to project his own personality onto the characters he played contributed to his natural and authentic appearance on screen. Throughout his career, he sustained a screen persona that represented the ideal American hero.
Cooper began his career as a film extra and stunt rider, but soon landed acting roles. After establishing himself as a Western hero in his early silent films, he appeared as the Virginian and became a movie star in 1929 with his first sound picture, The Virginian. In the early 1930s, he expanded his heroic image to include more cautious characters in adventure films and dramas such as A Farewell to Arms (1932) and The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935). During the height of his career, Cooper portrayed a new type of hero—a champion of the common man—in films such as Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), Meet John Doe (1941), Sergeant York (1941), The Pride of the Yankees (1942), and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943). He later portrayed more mature characters at odds with the world in films such as The Fountainhead (1949) and High Noon (1952). In his final films, he played non-violent characters searching for redemption in films such as Friendly Persuasion (1956) and Man of the West (1958).
Early life
Frank James Cooper was born in Helena, Montana, on May 7, 1901, the younger of two sons of English parents Alice (née Brazier; 1873–1967) and Charles Henry Cooper (1865–1946). His brother, Arthur, was six years his senior. Cooper's father came from Houghton Regis, Bedfordshire, and became a prominent lawyer, rancher, and Montana Supreme Court justice. His mother hailed from Gillingham, Kent, and married Charles in Montana. In 1906, Charles purchased the Seven-Bar-Nine cattle ranch, about north of Helena near Craig, Montana. Cooper and Arthur spent their summers at the ranch and learned to ride horses, hunt, and fish. Cooper attended Central Grade School in Helena.
Alice wanted her sons to have an English education, so she took them back to England in 1909 to enroll them in Dunstable Grammar School in Dunstable, Bedfordshire. While there, Cooper and his brother lived with their father's cousins, William and Emily Barton, at their home in Houghton Regis. Cooper studied Latin, French, and English history at Dunstable until 1912. While he adapted to English school discipline and learned the requisite social graces, he never adjusted to the rigid class structure and formal Eton collars he was required to wear. He received his confirmation in the Church of England at the Church of All Saints in Houghton Regis on December 3, 1911. His mother accompanied her sons back to the U.S. in August 1912, and Cooper resumed his education at Johnson Grammar School in Helena.
When Cooper was 15, he injured his hip in a car accident. On his doctor's recommendation, he returned to the Seven-Bar-Nine ranch to recuperate by horseback riding. The misguided therapy left him with his characteristic stiff, off-balanced walk and slightly angled horse-riding style. He left Helena High School after two years in 1918, and returned to the family ranch to work full-time as a cowboy. In 1919, his father arranged for him to attend Gallatin County High School in Bozeman, Montana, where English teacher Ida Davis encouraged him to focus on academics and participate in debating and dramatics. Cooper later called Davis "the woman partly responsible for [him] giving up cowboy-ing and going to college".
Cooper was still attending high school in 1920 when he took three art courses at Montana Agricultural College in Bozeman. His interest in art was inspired years earlier by the Western paintings of Charles Marion Russell and Frederic Remington. Cooper especially admired and studied Russell's Lewis and Clark Meeting Indians at Ross' Hole (1910), which still hangs in the state capitol building in Helena. In 1922, to continue his art education, he enrolled in Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa. He did well academically in most of his courses, but was not accepted into the school's drama club. His drawings and watercolor paintings were exhibited throughout the dormitory, and he was named art editor for the college yearbook. During the summers of 1922 and 1923, Cooper worked at Yellowstone National Park as a tour guide driving the yellow open-top buses. Despite a promising first 18 months at Grinnell, he left college suddenly in February 1924, spent a month in Chicago looking for work as an artist, and then returned to Helena, where he sold editorial cartoons to the local Independent newspaper.
In autumn 1924, Cooper's father left the Montana Supreme Court bench and moved with his wife to Los Angeles to administer the estates of two relatives, and Cooper joined his parents there in November at his father's request. After briefly working a series of unpromising jobs, he met two friends from Montana who were working as film extras and stunt riders in low-budget Western films for the small movie studios on Poverty Row. They introduced him to another Montana cowboy, rodeo champion Jay "Slim" Talbot, who took him to see a casting director. Wanting money for a professional art course, Cooper worked as a film extra for $5 a day, and as a stunt rider for $10. Cooper and Talbot became close friends and hunting companions, and Talbot later worked as Cooper's stuntman and stand-in for over three decades.
Career
Silent films, 1925–1928
In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, but also the already emergent major studios, Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt workwhich sometimes injured horses and riders"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name.
Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week.
Cooper's first important film role was a supporting part in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) starring Ronald Colman and Vilma Bánky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal—finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings (both 1927), the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada—both films directed by John Waters.
Paramount paired Cooper with Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss (both 1928)—advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride (also both 1928). Around the same time, Cooper made Lilac Time (1928) with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928.
Hollywood stardom, 1929–1935
Cooper became a major movie star in 1929 with the release of his first talking picture, The Virginian (1929), which was directed by Victor Fleming and co-starred Mary Brian and Walter Huston. Based on the popular novel by Owen Wister, The Virginian was one of the first sound films to define the Western code of honor and helped establish many of the conventions of the Western movie genre that persist to the present day. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, the romantic image of the tall, handsome, and shy cowboy hero who embodied male freedom, courage, and honor was created in large part by Cooper in the film. Unlike some silent film actors who had trouble adapting to the new sound medium, Cooper transitioned naturally, with his "deep and clear" and "pleasantly drawling" voice, which was perfectly suited for the characters he portrayed on screen, also according to Meyers. Looking to capitalize on Cooper's growing popularity, Paramount cast him in several Westerns and wartime dramas, including Only the Brave, The Texan, Seven Days' Leave, A Man from Wyoming, and The Spoilers (all released in 1930). Norman Rockwell depicted Cooper in his role as The Texan for the cover of The Saturday Evening Post on May 24, 1930.
One of the more important performances in Cooper's early career was his portrayal of a sullen legionnaire in Josef von Sternberg's film Morocco (also 1930) with Marlene Dietrich in her introduction to American audiences. During production, von Sternberg focused his energies on Dietrich and treated Cooper dismissively. Tensions came to a head after von Sternberg yelled directions at Cooper in German. The actor approached the director, picked him up by the collar, and said, "If you expect to work in this country you'd better get on to the language we use here." Despite the tensions on the set, Cooper produced "one of his best performances", according to Thornton Delehanty of the New York Evening Post.
After returning to the Western genre in Zane Grey's Fighting Caravans (1931) with French actress Lili Damita, Cooper appeared in the Dashiell Hammett crime film City Streets (also 1931), co-starring Sylvia Sidney and Paul Lukas, playing a westerner who gets involved with big-city gangsters in order to save the woman he loves. Cooper concluded the year with appearances in two unsuccessful films: I Take This Woman (also 1931) with Carole Lombard, and His Woman with Claudette Colbert. The demands and pressures of making ten films in two years left Cooper exhausted and in poor health, suffering from anemia and jaundice. He had lost during that period, and felt lonely, isolated, and depressed by his sudden fame and wealth. In May 1931, Cooper left Hollywood and sailed to Algiers and then Italy, where he lived for the next year.
During his time abroad, Cooper stayed with the Countess Dorothy di Frasso at the Villa Madama in Rome, where she taught him about good food and vintage wines, how to read Italian and French menus, and how to socialize among Europe's nobility and upper classes. After guiding him through the great art museums and galleries of Italy, she accompanied him on a ten-week big-game hunting safari on the slopes of Mount Kenya in East Africa, where he was credited with over sixty kills, including two lions, a rhinoceros, and various antelopes. His safari experience in Africa had a profound influence on Cooper and intensified his love of the wilderness. After returning to Europe, he and the countess set off on a Mediterranean cruise of the Italian and French Rivieras. Rested and rejuvenated by his year-long exile, a healthy Cooper returned to Hollywood in April 1932 and negotiated a new contract with Paramount for two films per year, a salary of $4,000 a week, and director and script approval.
In 1932, after completing Devil and the Deep with Tallulah Bankhead to fulfill his old contract, Cooper appeared in A Farewell to Arms, the first film adaptation of an Ernest Hemingway novel. Co-starring Helen Hayes, a leading New York theatre star and Academy Award winner, and Adolphe Menjou, the film presented Cooper with one of his most ambitious and challenging dramatic roles, playing an American ambulance driver wounded in Italy who falls in love with an English nurse during World War I. Critics praised his highly intense and emotional performance, and the film became one of the year's most commercially successful pictures. In 1933, after making Today We Live with Joan Crawford and One Sunday Afternoon with Fay Wray, Cooper appeared in the Ernst Lubitsch comedy film Design for Living, based on the successful Noël Coward play. Co-starring Miriam Hopkins and Fredric March, the film was a box office success, ranking as one of the top ten highest-grossing films of 1933. All three of the lead actors—March, Cooper, and Hopkins—received attention from this film as they were all at the peak of their careers. Cooper's performance — playing an American artist in Europe competing with his playwright friend for the affections of a beautiful woman — was singled out for its versatility and revealed his genuine ability to do light comedy. Cooper changed his name legally to "Gary Cooper" in August 1933.
In 1934, Cooper was loaned out to MGM for the Civil War drama film Operator 13 with Marion Davies, about a beautiful Union spy who falls in love with a Confederate soldier. Despite Richard Boleslawski's imaginative direction and George J. Folsey's lavish cinematography, the film did poorly at the box office.
Back at Paramount, Cooper appeared in his first of seven films by director Henry Hathaway, Now and Forever, with Carole Lombard and Shirley Temple. In the film, he plays a confidence man who tries to sell his daughter to the relatives who raised her, but is eventually won over by the adorable girl. Impressed by Temple's intelligence and charm, Cooper developed a close rapport with her, both on and off screen. The film was a box-office success.
The following year, Cooper was loaned out to Samuel Goldwyn Productions to appear in King Vidor's romance film The Wedding Night with Anna Sten, who was being groomed as "another Garbo". In the film, Cooper plays an alcoholic novelist who retreats to his family's New England farm where he meets and falls in love with a beautiful Polish neighbor. Cooper delivered a performance of surprising range and depth, according to biographer Larry Swindell. Despite receiving generally favorable reviews, the film was not popular with American audiences, who may have been offended by the film's depiction of an extramarital affair and its tragic ending.
That same year, Cooper appeared in two Henry Hathaway films: the melodrama Peter Ibbetson with Ann Harding, about a man caught up in a dream world created by his love for a childhood sweetheart, and the adventure film The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, about a daring British officer and his men who defend their stronghold at Bengal against rebellious local tribes. While the former, championed by the surrealists became more successful in Europe than in the United States, the latter was nominated for seven Academy Awards and became one of Cooper's most popular and successful adventure films. Hathaway had the highest respect for Cooper's acting ability, calling him "the best actor of all of them".
American folk hero, 1936–1943
From Mr. Deeds to The Real Glory, 1936–1939
Cooper's career took an important turn in 1936. After making Frank Borzage's romantic comedy film Desire with Marlene Dietrich at Paramount—in which he delivered a performance considered by some contemporary critics as one of his finest—Cooper returned to Poverty Row for the first time since his early silent film days to make Frank Capra's Mr. Deeds Goes to Town with Jean Arthur for Columbia Pictures. In the film, Cooper plays the character of Longfellow Deeds, a quiet, innocent writer of greeting cards who inherits a fortune, leaves behind his idyllic life in Vermont, and travels to New York where he faces a world of corruption and deceit. Capra and screenwriter Robert Riskin were able to use Cooper's well-established screen persona as the "quintessential American hero"—a symbol of honesty, courage, and goodness—to create a new type of "folk hero" for the common man. Commenting on Cooper's impact on the character and the film, Capra observed:
Both Desire and Mr. Deeds opened in April 1936 to critical praise and were major box-office successes. In his review in The New York Times, Frank Nugent wrote that Cooper was "proving himself one of the best light comedians in Hollywood". For his performance in Mr. Deeds, Cooper received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.
Cooper appeared in two other Paramount films in 1936. In Lewis Milestone's adventure film The General Died at Dawn with Madeleine Carroll, he plays an American soldier of fortune in China who helps the peasants defend themselves against the oppression of a cruel warlord. Written by playwright Clifford Odets, the film was a critical and commercial success.
In Cecil B. DeMille's sprawling frontier epic The Plainsman—his first of four films with the director—Cooper portrays Wild Bill Hickok in a highly fictionalized version of the opening of the American western frontier. The film was an even greater box-office hit than its predecessor, due in large part to Jean Arthur's definitive depiction of Calamity Jane and Cooper's inspired portrayal of Hickock as an enigmatic figure of "deepening mythic substance". That year, Cooper appeared for the first time on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities, where he would remain for the next twenty-three years.
In late 1936, Paramount was preparing a new contract for Cooper that would raise his salary to $8,000 a week when Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn for six films over six years with a minimum guarantee of $150,000 per picture. Paramount brought suit against Goldwyn and Cooper, and the court ruled that Cooper's new Goldwyn contract afforded the actor sufficient time to also honor his Paramount agreement. Cooper continued to make films with both studios, and by 1939 the United States Treasury reported that Cooper was the country's highest wage earner, at $482,819 (equivalent to $ million in ).
In contrast to his output the previous year, Cooper appeared in only one picture in 1937, Henry Hathaway's adventure film Souls at Sea. A critical and box-office failure, Cooper referred to it as his "almost picture", saying, "It was almost exciting, and almost interesting. And I was almost good." In 1938, he appeared in Archie Mayo's biographical film The Adventures of Marco Polo. Plagued by production problems and a weak screenplay, the film became Goldwyn's biggest failure to that date, losing $700,000. During this period, Cooper turned down several important roles, including the role of Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind. Cooper was producer David O. Selznick's first choice for the part. He made several overtures to the actor, but Cooper had doubts about the project, and did not feel suited to the role. Cooper later admitted, "It was one of the best roles ever offered in Hollywood ... But I said no. I didn't see myself as quite that dashing, and later, when I saw Clark Gable play the role to perfection, I knew I was right."
Back at Paramount, Cooper returned to a more comfortable genre in Ernst Lubitsch's romantic comedy Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938) with Claudette Colbert. In the film, Cooper plays a wealthy American businessman in France who falls in love with an impoverished aristocrat's daughter and persuades her to become his eighth wife. Despite the clever screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder, and solid performances by Cooper and Colbert, American audiences had trouble accepting Cooper in the role of a shallow philanderer. It succeeded only at the European box office market.
In the fall of 1938, Cooper appeared in H. C. Potter's romantic comedy The Cowboy and the Lady with Merle Oberon, about a sweet-natured rodeo cowboy who falls in love with the wealthy daughter of a presidential hopeful, believing her to be a poor, hard-working lady's maid. The efforts of three directors and several eminent screenwriters could not salvage what could have been a fine vehicle for Cooper. While more successful than its predecessor, the film was Cooper's fourth consecutive box-office failure in the American market.
In the next two years, Cooper was more discerning about the roles he accepted and made four successful large-scale adventure and cowboy films. In William A. Wellman's adventure film Beau Geste (1939), he plays one of three daring English brothers who join the French Foreign Legion in the Sahara to fight local tribes. Filmed in the same Mojave Desert locations as the original 1926 version with Ronald Colman, Beau Geste provided Cooper with magnificent sets, exotic settings, high-spirited action, and a role tailored to his personality and screen persona. This was the last film in Cooper's contract with Paramount.
In Henry Hathaway's The Real Glory (1939), he plays a military doctor who accompanies a small group of American Army officers to the Philippines to help the Christian Filipinos defend themselves against Muslim radicals. Many film critics praised Cooper's performance, including author and film critic Graham Greene, who recognized that he "never acted better".
From The Westerner to For Whom the Bell Tolls, 1940–1943
Cooper returned to the Western genre in William Wyler's The Westerner (1940) with Walter Brennan and Doris Davenport, about a drifting cowboy who defends homesteaders against Roy Bean, a corrupt judge known as the "law west of the Pecos". Screenwriter Niven Busch relied on Cooper's extensive knowledge of Western history while working on the script. The film received positive reviews and did well at the box-office, with reviewers praising the performances of the two lead actors. That same year, Cooper appeared in his first all-Technicolor feature, Cecil B. DeMille's adventure film North West Mounted Police (1940). In the film, Cooper plays a Texas Ranger who pursues an outlaw into western Canada where he joins forces with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who are after the same man, a leader of the North-West Rebellion. While not as popular with critics as its predecessor, the film was another box-office success—the sixth-highest-grossing film of 1940.
The early 1940s were Cooper's prime years as an actor. In a relatively short period, he appeared in five critically successful and popular films that produced some of his finest performances. When Frank Capra offered him the lead role in Meet John Doe before Robert Riskin even developed the script, Cooper accepted his friend's offer, saying, "It's okay, Frank, I don't need a script." In the film, Cooper plays Long John Willoughby, a down-and-out bush-league pitcher hired by a newspaper to pretend to be a man who promises to commit suicide on Christmas Eve to protest all the hypocrisy and corruption in the country. Considered by some critics to be Capra's best film at the time, Meet John Doe was received as a "national event" with Cooper appearing on the front cover of Time magazine on March 3, 1941. In his review in the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes called Cooper's performance a "splendid and utterly persuasive portrayal" and praised his "utterly realistic acting which comes through with such authority". Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote, "Gary Cooper, of course, is 'John Doe' to the life and in the whole—shy, bewildered, non-aggressive, but a veritable tiger when aroused."
That same year, Cooper made two films with director and good friend Howard Hawks. In the biographical film Sergeant York, Cooper portrays war hero Alvin C. York, one of the most decorated American soldiers in World War I. The film chronicles York's early backwoods days in Tennessee, his religious conversion and subsequent piety, his stand as a conscientious objector, and finally his heroic actions at the Battle of the Argonne Forest, which earned him the Medal of Honor. Initially, Cooper was nervous and uncertain about playing a living hero, so he traveled to Tennessee to visit York at his home, and the two quiet men established an immediate rapport and discovered they had much in common. Inspired by York's encouragement, Cooper delivered a performance that Howard Barnes of the New York Herald Tribune called "one of extraordinary conviction and versatility", and that Archer Winston of the New York Post called "one of his best". After the film's release, Cooper was awarded the Distinguished Citizenship Medal by the Veterans of Foreign Wars for his "powerful contribution to the promotion of patriotism and loyalty". York admired Cooper's performance and helped promote the film for Warner Bros. Sergeant York became the top-grossing film of the year and was nominated for eleven Academy Awards. Accepting his first Academy Award for Best Actor from his friend James Stewart, Cooper said, "It was Sergeant Alvin York who won this award. Shucks, I've been in the business sixteen years and sometimes dreamed I might get one of these. That's all I can say ... Funny when I was dreaming I always made a better speech."
Cooper concluded the year back at Goldwyn with Howard Hawks to make the romantic comedy Ball of Fire with Barbara Stanwyck. In the film, Cooper plays a shy linguistics professor who leads a team of seven scholars who are writing an encyclopedia. While researching slang, he meets Stanwyck's flirtatious burlesque stripper Sugarpuss O'Shea who blows the dust off their staid life of books. The screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder provided Cooper the opportunity to exercise the full range of his light comedy skills. In his review for the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes wrote that Cooper handled the role with "great skill and comic emphasis" and that his performance was "utterly delightful". Though small in scale, Ball of Fire was one of the top-grossing films of the year—Cooper's fourth consecutive picture to make the top twenty.
Cooper's only film appearance in 1942 was also his last under his Goldwyn contract. In Sam Wood's biographical film The Pride of the Yankees, Cooper portrays baseball star Lou Gehrig who established a record with the New York Yankees for playing in 2,130 consecutive games. Cooper was reluctant to play the seven-time All-Star, who only died the previous year from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) — now commonly called "Lou Gehrig's disease". Beyond the challenges of effectively portraying such a popular and nationally recognized figure, Cooper knew very little about baseball and was not left-handed like Gehrig.
After Gehrig's widow visited the actor and expressed her desire that he portray her husband, Cooper accepted the role that covered a twenty-year span of Gehrig's life—his early love of baseball, his rise to greatness, his loving marriage, and his struggle with illness, culminating in his farewell speech at Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939 before 62,000 fans. Cooper quickly learned the physical movements of a baseball player and developed a fluid, believable swing. The handedness issue was solved by reversing the print for certain batting scenes. The film was one of the year's top ten pictures and received eleven Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's third).
Soon after the publication of Ernest Hemingway's novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, Paramount paid $150,000 for the film rights with the express intent of casting Cooper in the lead role of Robert Jordan, an American explosives expert who fights alongside the Republican loyalists during the Spanish Civil War. The original director, Cecil B. DeMille, was replaced by Sam Wood who brought in Dudley Nichols for the screenplay. After the start of principal photography in the Sierra Nevada in late 1942, Ingrid Bergman was brought in to replace ballerina Vera Zorina as the female lead—a change supported by Cooper and Hemingway. The love scenes between Bergman and Cooper were "rapturous" and passionate. Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune wrote that both actors performed with "the true stature and authority of stars". While the film distorted the novel's original political themes and meaning, For Whom the Bell Tolls was a critical and commercial success and received ten Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's fourth).
World War II related activities
Due to his age and health, Cooper did not serve in the military during World War II, but like many of his colleagues, he got involved in the war effort by entertaining the troops. In June 1943, he visited military hospitals in San Diego, and often appeared at the Hollywood Canteen serving food to the servicemen. In late 1943, Cooper undertook a tour of the South West Pacific with actresses Una Merkel and Phyllis Brooks, and accordionist Andy Arcari.
Traveling on a B-24A Liberator bomber, the group toured the Cook Islands, Fiji, New Caledonia, Queensland, Brisbane—where General Douglas MacArthur told Cooper he was watching Sergeant York in a Manila theater when Japanese bombs began falling—New Guinea, Jayapura, and throughout the Solomon Islands.
The group often shared the same sparse living conditions and K-rations as the troops. Cooper met with the servicemen and women, visited military hospitals, introduced his attractive colleagues, and participated in occasional skits. The shows concluded with Cooper's moving recitation of Lou Gehrig's farewell speech. When he returned to the United States, he visited military hospitals throughout the country. Cooper later called his time with the troops the "greatest emotional experience" of his life.
Mature roles, 1944–1952
In 1944, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's wartime adventure film The Story of Dr. Wassell with Laraine Day — his third movie with the director. In the film, Cooper plays American doctor and missionary Corydon M. Wassell, who leads a group of wounded sailors through the jungles of Java to safety. Despite receiving poor reviews, Dr. Wassell was one of the top-grossing films of the year. With his Goldwyn and Paramount contracts now concluded, Cooper decided to remain independent and formed his own production company, International Pictures, with Leo Spitz, William Goetz, and Nunnally Johnson. The fledgling studio's first offering was Sam Wood's romantic comedy Casanova Brown with Teresa Wright, about a man who learns his soon-to-be ex-wife is pregnant with his child, just as he is about to marry another woman. The film received poor reviews, with the New York Daily News calling it "delightful nonsense", and Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, criticizing Cooper's "somewhat obvious and ridiculous clowning". The film was barely profitable.
In 1945, Cooper starred in and produced Stuart Heisler's Western comedy Along Came Jones with Loretta Young for International. In this lighthearted parody of his past heroic image, Cooper plays comically inept cowboy Melody Jones who is mistaken for a ruthless killer. Audiences embraced Cooper's character, and the film was one of the top box-office pictures of the year—a testament to Cooper's still vital audience appeal. It was also International's biggest financial success during its brief history before being sold off to Universal Studios in 1946.
Cooper's career during the post-war years drifted in new directions as American society was changing. While he still played conventional heroic roles, his films now relied less on his heroic screen persona and more on novel stories and exotic settings. In November 1945, Cooper appeared in Sam Wood's nineteenth-century period drama Saratoga Trunk with Ingrid Bergman, about a Texas cowboy and his relationship with a beautiful fortune-hunter. Filmed in early 1943, the movie's release was delayed for two years due to the increased demand for war movies. Despite poor reviews, Saratoga Trunk did well at the box office and became one of the top money-makers of the year for Warner Bros. Cooper's only film in 1946 was Fritz Lang's romantic thriller Cloak and Dagger, about a mild-mannered physics professor recruited by the OSS during the last years of World War II to investigate the German atomic bomb program. Playing a part loosely based on physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, Cooper was uneasy with the role and unable to convey the "inner sense" of the character. The film received poor reviews and was a box-office failure. In 1947, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's epic adventure film Unconquered with Paulette Goddard, about a Virginia militiaman who defends settlers against an unscrupulous gun trader and hostile Indians on the Western frontier during the eighteenth century. The film received mixed reviews, but even long-time DeMille critic James Agee acknowledged the picture had "some authentic flavor of the period". This last of four films made with DeMille was Cooper's most lucrative, earning the actor over $300,000 (equal to $ today) in salary and percentage of profits. Unconquered would be his last unqualified box-office success for the next five years.
In 1948, after making Leo McCarey's romantic comedy Good Sam, Cooper sold his company to Universal Studios and signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros. that gave him script and director approval and a guaranteed $295,000 (equal to $ today) per picture. His first film under the new contract was King Vidor's drama The Fountainhead (1949) with Patricia Neal and Raymond Massey. In the film, Cooper plays an idealistic and uncompromising architect who struggles to maintain his integrity and individualism in the face of societal pressures to conform to popular standards. Based on the novel by Ayn Rand who also wrote the screenplay, the film reflects her philosophy and attacks the concepts of collectivism while promoting the virtues of individualism. For most critics, Cooper was hopelessly miscast in the role of Howard Roark. In his review for The New York Times, Bosley Crowther concluded he was "Mr. Deeds out of his element". Cooper returned to his element in Delmer Daves' war drama Task Force (1949), about a retiring rear admiral who reminisces about his long career as a naval aviator and his role in the development of aircraft carriers. Cooper's performance and the Technicolor newsreel footage supplied by the United States Navy made the film one of Cooper's most popular during this period. In the next two years, Cooper made four poorly received films: Michael Curtiz' period drama Bright Leaf (1950), Stuart Heisler's Western melodrama Dallas (1950), Henry Hathaway's wartime comedy You're in the Navy Now (1951), and Raoul Walsh's Western action film Distant Drums (1951).
Cooper's most important film during the post-war years was Fred Zinnemann's Western drama High Noon (1952) with Grace Kelly and Katy Jurado for United Artists. In the film, Cooper plays retiring sheriff Will Kane who is preparing to leave town on his honeymoon when he learns that an outlaw he helped put away and his three henchmen are returning to seek their revenge. Unable to gain the support of the frightened townspeople, and abandoned by his young bride, Kane nevertheless stays to face the outlaws alone. During the filming, Cooper was in poor health and in considerable pain from stomach ulcers. His ravaged face and discomfort in some scenes "photographed as self-doubt", according to biographer Hector Arce, and contributed to the effectiveness of his performance. Considered one of the first "adult" Westerns for its theme of moral courage, High Noon received enthusiastic reviews for its artistry, with Time magazine placing it in the ranks of Stagecoach and The Gunfighter. Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote that Cooper was "at the top of his form", and John McCarten, in The New Yorker, wrote that Cooper was never more effective. The film earned $3.75 million in the United States and $18 million worldwide. Following the example of his friend James Stewart, Cooper accepted a lower salary in exchange for a percent of the profits, and ended up making $600,000. Cooper's understated performance was widely praised, and earned him his second Academy Award for Best Actor.
Later films, 1953–1961
After appearing in André de Toth's Civil War drama Springfield Rifle (1952)—a standard Warner Bros. film that was overshadowed by the success of its predecessor—Cooper made four films outside the United States. In Mark Robson's drama Return to Paradise (1953), Cooper plays an American wanderer who liberates the inhabitants of a Polynesian island from the puritanical rule of a misguided pastor. Cooper endured spartan living conditions, long hours, and ill health during the three-month location shoot on the island of Upolu in Western Samoa. Despite its beautiful cinematography, the film received poor reviews. Cooper's next three films were shot in Mexico. In Hugo Fregonese's action adventure film Blowing Wild (1953) with Barbara Stanwyck, he plays a wildcatter in Mexico who gets involved with an oil company executive and his unscrupulous wife with whom he once had an affair.
In 1954, Cooper appeared in Henry Hathaway's Western drama Garden of Evil, with Susan Hayward, about three soldiers of fortune in Mexico hired to rescue a woman's husband. That same year, he appeared in Robert Aldrich's Western adventure Vera Cruz with Burt Lancaster. In the film, Cooper plays an American adventurer hired by Emperor Maximilian I to escort a countess to Vera Cruz during the Mexican Rebellion of 1866. All of these films received poor reviews but did well at the box-office. For his work in Vera Cruz, Cooper earned $1.4 million in salary and percent of the gross.
During this period, Cooper struggled with health problems. As well as his ongoing treatment for ulcers, he suffered a severe shoulder injury during the filming of Blowing Wild when he was hit by metal fragments from a dynamited oil well. During the filming of Vera Cruz, he reinjured his hip falling from a horse, and was burned when Lancaster fired his rifle too close and the wadding from the blank shell pierced his clothing.
In 1955, he appeared in Otto Preminger's biographical war drama The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell, about the World War I general who tried to convince government officials of the importance of air power, and was court-martialed after blaming the War Department for a series of air disasters. Some critics felt that Cooper was miscast, and that his dull, tight-lipped performance did not reflect Mitchell's dynamic and caustic personality. In 1956, Cooper was more effective playing a gentle Indiana Quaker in William Wyler's Civil War drama Friendly Persuasion with Dorothy McGuire. Like Sergeant York and High Noon, the film addresses the conflict between religious pacifism and civic duty. For his performance, Cooper received his second Golden Globe nomination for Best Motion Picture Actor. The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, was awarded the Palme d'Or at the 1957 Cannes Film Festival, and went on to earn $8 million worldwide.
In 1956, Cooper traveled to France to make Billy Wilder's romantic comedy Love in the Afternoon with Audrey Hepburn and Maurice Chevalier. In the film, Cooper plays a middle-aged American playboy in Paris who pursues and eventually falls in love with a much younger woman. Despite receiving some positive reviews—including from Bosley Crowther who praised the film's "charming performances"—most reviewers concluded that Cooper was simply too old for the part. While audiences may not have welcomed seeing Cooper's heroic screen image tarnished by his playing an aging roué trying to seduce an innocent young girl, the film was still a box-office success. The following year, Cooper appeared in Philip Dunne's romantic drama Ten North Frederick. In the film, which was based on the novel by John O'Hara, Cooper plays an attorney whose life is ruined by a double-crossing politician and his own secret affair with his daughter's young roommate. While Cooper brought "conviction and controlled anguish" to his performance, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, it was not enough to save what Bosley Crowther called a "hapless film".
Despite his ongoing health problems and several operations for ulcers and hernias, Cooper continued to work in action films. In 1958, he appeared in Anthony Mann's Western drama Man of the West (1958) with Julie London and Lee J. Cobb, about a reformed outlaw and killer who is forced to confront his violent past when the train he is riding in is held up by his former gang members. The film has been called Cooper's "most pathological Western", with its themes of impotent rage, sexual humiliation, and sadism. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, Cooper, who struggled with moral conflicts in his personal life, "understood the anguish of a character striving to retain his integrity ... [and] brought authentic feeling to the role of a tempted and tormented, yet essentially decent man". Mostly ignored by critics at the time, the film is now well-regarded by film scholars and is considered Cooper's last great film.
After his Warner Bros. contract ended, Cooper formed his own production company, Baroda Productions, and made three unusual films in 1959 about redemption. In Delmer Daves' Western drama The Hanging Tree, Cooper plays a frontier doctor who saves a criminal from a lynch mob, and later tries to exploit his sordid past. Cooper delivered a "powerful and persuasive" performance of an emotionally scarred man whose need to dominate others is transformed by the love and sacrifice of a woman. In Robert Rossen's historical adventure They Came to Cordura with Rita Hayworth, he plays an army officer who is found guilty of cowardice and assigned the degrading task of recommending soldiers for the Medal of Honor during the Pancho Villa Expedition of 1916.
While Cooper received positive reviews, Variety and Films in Review felt he was too old for the part. In Michael Anderson's action drama The Wreck of the Mary Deare with Charlton Heston, Cooper plays a disgraced merchant marine officer who decides to stay aboard his sinking cargo ship in order to prove the vessel was deliberately scuttled and to redeem his good name. Like its two predecessors, the film was physically demanding. Cooper, who was a trained scuba diver, did most of his own underwater scenes. Biographer Jeffrey Meyers observed that in all three roles, Cooper effectively conveyed the sense of lost honor and desire for redemption—what Joseph Conrad in Lord Jim called the "struggles of an individual trying to save from the fire his idea of what his moral identity should be".
Personal life
Marriage and family
Cooper was formally introduced to his future wife, 20-year-old New York debutante Veronica Balfe, on Easter Sunday 1933 at a party given by her uncle, art director Cedric Gibbons. Called "Rocky" by her family and friends, she grew up on Park Avenue and attended finishing schools. Her stepfather was Wall Street tycoon Paul Shields. Cooper and Rocky were quietly married at her parents' Park Avenue residence on December 15, 1933. According to his friends, the marriage had a positive impact on Cooper, who turned away from past indiscretions and took control of his life. Athletic and a lover of the outdoors, Rocky shared many of Cooper's interests, including riding, skiing, and skeet-shooting. She organized their social life, and her wealth and social connections provided Cooper access to New York high society. Cooper and his wife owned homes in the Los Angeles area in Encino (1933–36), Brentwood (1936–53), and Holmby Hills (1954–61), and owned a vacation home in Aspen, Colorado (1949–53).
Gary and Veronica Cooper's daughter, Maria Veronica Cooper, was born on September 15, 1937. By all accounts, he was a patient and affectionate father, teaching Maria to ride a bicycle, play tennis, ski, and ride horses. Sharing many of her parents' interests, she accompanied them on their travels and was often photographed with them. Like her father, she developed a love for art and drawing. As a family they vacationed together in Sun Valley, Idaho, spent time at Rocky's parents' country house in Southampton, New York, and took frequent trips to Europe. Cooper and Rocky were legally separated on May 16, 1951, when Cooper moved out of their home. For over two years, they maintained a fragile and uneasy family life with their daughter. Cooper moved back into their home in November 1953, and their formal reconciliation occurred in February 1954.
Romantic relationships
Prior to his marriage, Cooper had a series of romantic relationships with leading actresses, beginning in 1927 with Clara Bow, who advanced his career by helping him get one of his first leading roles in Children of Divorce. Bow was also responsible for getting Cooper a role in Wings, which generated an enormous amount of fan mail for the young actor. In 1928, he had a relationship with another experienced actress, Evelyn Brent, whom he met while filming Beau Sabreur. In 1929, while filming The Wolf Song, Cooper began an intense affair with Lupe Vélez, which was the most important romance of his early life. During their two years together, Cooper also had brief affairs with Marlene Dietrich while filming Morocco in 1930 and with Carole Lombard while making I Take This Woman in 1931. During his year abroad in 1931–32, Cooper had an affair with the married Countess Dorothy di Frasso, while staying at her Villa Madama near Rome.
After he was married in December 1933, Cooper remained faithful to his wife until the summer of 1942, when he began an affair with Ingrid Bergman during the production of For Whom the Bell Tolls. Their relationship lasted through the completion of filming Saratoga Trunk in June 1943. In 1948, after finishing work on The Fountainhead, Cooper began an affair with actress Patricia Neal, his co-star. At first they kept their affair discreet, but eventually it became an open secret in Hollywood, and Cooper's wife confronted him with the rumors, which he admitted were true. He also confessed that he was in love with Neal, and continued to see her. Cooper and his wife were legally separated in May 1951, but he did not seek a divorce. Neal later claimed that Cooper hit her after she went on a date with Kirk Douglas, and that he arranged for her to have an abortion when she became pregnant with Cooper's child. Neal ended their relationship in late December 1951. During his three-year separation from his wife, Cooper was rumored to have had affairs with Grace Kelly, Lorraine Chanel, and Gisèle Pascal.
Cooper biographers have explored his friendship in the late twenties with the actor Anderson Lawler, with whom Cooper shared a house on and off for a year, while at the same time seeing Clara Bow, Evelyn Brent and Lupe Vélez. Lupe Vélez once told Hedda Hopper of Vélez' affair with Cooper; whenever he would come home after seeing Lawler, she would sniff for Lawler's cologne. Vélez' biographer Michelle Vogel has reported that Vélez consented to Cooper's sexual behavior with Lawler, but only as long as she, too, could participate. In later life, he became involved in a relationship with the costume designer Irene, and was, according to Irene, "the only man she ever loved". A year after his death in 1961, Irene committed suicide by jumping from the 11th floor of the Knickerbocker Hotel, after telling Doris Day of her grief over Cooper's death.
Friendships, interests, and character
Cooper's twenty-year friendship with Ernest Hemingway began at Sun Valley in October 1940. The previous year, Hemingway drew upon Cooper's image when he created the character of Robert Jordan for the novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. The two shared a passion for the outdoors, and for years they hunted duck and pheasant, and skied together in Sun Valley. Both men admired the work of Rudyard Kipling—Cooper kept a copy of the poem "If—" in his dressing room—and retained as adults Kipling's sense of boyish adventure.
As well as admiring Cooper's hunting skills and knowledge of the outdoors, Hemingway believed his character matched his screen persona, once telling a friend, "If you made up a character like Coop, nobody would believe it. He's just too good to be true." They saw each other often, and their friendship remained strong through the years.
Cooper's social life generally centered on sports, outdoor activities, and dinner parties with his family and friends from the film industry, including directors Henry Hathaway, Howard Hawks, William Wellman, and Fred Zinnemann, and actors Joel McCrea, James Stewart, Barbara Stanwyck, and Robert Taylor. As well as hunting, Cooper enjoyed riding, fishing, skiing, and later in life, scuba diving. He never abandoned his early love for art and drawing, and over the years, he and his wife acquired a private collection of modern paintings, including works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Gauguin, and Georgia O'Keeffe. Cooper owned several works by Pablo Picasso, whom he met in 1956. Cooper also had a lifelong passion for automobiles, with a collection that included a 1930 Duesenberg.
Cooper was naturally reserved and introspective, and loved the solitude of outdoor activities. Not unlike his screen persona, his communication style frequently consisted of long silences with an occasional "yup" and "shucks". He once said, "If others have more interesting things to say than I have, I keep quiet." According to his friends, Cooper could also be an articulate, well-informed conversationalist on topics ranging from horses, guns, and Western history to film production, sports cars, and modern art. He was modest and unpretentious, frequently downplaying his acting abilities and career accomplishments. His friends and colleagues described him as charming, well-mannered, and thoughtful, with a lively boyish sense of humor. Cooper maintained a sense of propriety throughout his career and never misused his movie star status—never sought special treatment or refused to work with a director or leading lady. His close friend Joel McCrea recalled, "Coop never fought, he never got mad, he never told anybody off that I know of; everybody that worked with him liked him."
Political views
Like his father, Cooper was a conservative Republican; he voted for Calvin Coolidge in 1924, Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1932, and campaigned for Wendell Willkie in 1940. When Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for an unprecedented fourth presidential term in 1944, Cooper campaigned for Thomas E. Dewey and criticized Roosevelt for being dishonest and adopting "foreign" ideas. In a radio address that he paid for himself just prior to the election, Cooper said, "I disagree with the New Deal belief that the America all of us love is old and worn-out and finished—and has to borrow foreign notions that don't even seem to work any too well where they come from ... Our country is a young country that just has to make up its mind to be itself again." He also attended a Republican rally at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum that drew 93,000 Dewey supporters.
Cooper was one of the founding members of the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, a conservative organization dedicated, according to its statement of principles, to preserving the "American way of life" and opposing communism and fascism. The organization — whose membership included Walter Brennan, Laraine Day, Walt Disney, Clark Gable, Hedda Hopper, Ronald Reagan, Barbara Stanwyck, and John Wayne — advised the United States Congress to investigate communist influence in the motion picture industry. On October 23, 1947, Cooper was subpoenaed to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and was asked if he had observed any "communistic influence" in Hollywood.
Cooper recounted statements he'd heard suggesting that the Constitution was out of date and that Congress was an unnecessary institution—comments that Cooper said he found to be "very un-American" and testified that he had rejected several scripts because he thought they were "tinged with communist ideas". Unlike some other witnesses, Cooper did not name any individuals, nor did he name any scripts, during his testimony.
In 1951, while making High Noon, Cooper became friends with the film's screenwriter, Carl Foreman, who had been a member of the Communist Party. When Foreman was subpoenaed by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Cooper put his career on the line to defend Foreman. When John Wayne and others threatened Cooper with blacklisting himself and the loss of his passport if he did not walk off the film, Cooper gave a statement to the press in support of Foreman, calling him "the finest kind of American". When producer Stanley Kramer removed Foreman's name as screenwriter, Cooper and director Fred Zinnemann threatened to walk off the film if Foreman's name was not restored. Foreman later said that, of all his friends and allies and colleagues in Hollywood, "Cooper was the only big one who tried to help. The only one." Cooper even offered to testify in Foreman's behalf before the committee, but character witnesses were not allowed. Foreman always sent future scripts to Cooper for first refusal, including The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Key and The Guns of Navarone. Cooper had to turn them down because of his age.
Religion
Cooper was baptized in the Anglican Church in December 1911 in Britain, and was raised in the Episcopal Church in the United States. While he was not an observant Christian for most of his adult life, many of his friends believed he had a deeply spiritual side.
On June 26, 1953, Cooper accompanied his wife and daughter, who were devout Catholics, to Rome, where they had an audience with Pope Pius XII. Cooper and his wife were still separated at the time, but the papal visit marked the beginning of their gradual reconciliation. In the coming years, Cooper contemplated his mortality and his personal behavior, and started discussing Catholicism with his family. He began attending church with them regularly, and met with their parish priest, who offered Cooper spiritual guidance. After several months of study, Cooper was baptized as a Roman Catholic on April 9, 1959, before a small group of family and friends at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills.
Final years and death
On April 14, 1960, Cooper underwent surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston for an aggressive form of prostate cancer that had metastasized to his colon. He fell ill again on May 31 and underwent further surgery at Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles in early June to remove a malignant tumor from his large intestine. After recuperating over the summer, Cooper took his family on vacation to the south of France before traveling to the UK in the fall to star in The Naked Edge. In December 1960, he worked on the NBC television documentary The Real West, which was part of the company's Project 20 series.
On December 27, his wife learned from their family doctor that Cooper's cancer had spread to his lungs and bones and was inoperable. His family decided not to tell him immediately.
On January 9, 1961, Cooper attended a dinner that was given in his honor and hosted by Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin at the Friars Club. The dinner was attended by many of his industry friends and concluded with a brief speech by Cooper who said, "The only achievement I'm proud of is the friends I've made in this community."
In mid-January, Cooper took his family to Sun Valley for their last vacation together. Cooper and Hemingway hiked through the snow together for the last time. On February 27, after returning to Los Angeles, Cooper learned that he was dying. He later told his family, "We'll pray for a miracle; but if not, and that's God's will, that's all right too." On April 17, Cooper watched the Academy Awards ceremony on television and saw his good friend James Stewart, who had presented Cooper with his first Oscar years earlier, accept on Cooper's behalf an honorary award for lifetime achievement—his third Oscar. Holding back tears, Stewart said, "Coop, I'll get this to you right away. And Coop, I want you to know this, that with this goes all the warm friendship and the affection and the admiration and the deep, the deep respect of all of us. We're very, very proud of you, Coop. All of us are tremendously proud." The following day, newspapers around the world announced the news that Cooper was dying. In the coming days he received numerous messages of appreciation and encouragement, including telegrams from Pope John XXIII and Queen Elizabeth II, and a telephone call from President John F. Kennedy.
In his last public statement on May 4, Cooper said, "I know that what is happening is God's will. I am not afraid of the future." He received the last rites on May 12. Cooper died quietly the following day, Saturday, May 13, 1961, at 12:47 P.M.
A requiem mass was held on May 18 at the Church of the Good Shepherd, attended by many of Cooper's friends, including James Stewart, Jack Benny, Henry Hathaway, Joel McCrea, Audrey Hepburn, Jack L. Warner, John Ford, John Wayne, Edward G. Robinson, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Fred Astaire, Randolph Scott, Walter Pidgeon, Bob Hope and Marlene Dietrich. Cooper was buried in the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes in Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California. In May 1974, after his family relocated to New York, Cooper's remains were exhumed and reburied in Sacred Hearts Cemetery in Southampton. His grave is marked by a three-ton boulder from a Montauk quarry.
Acting style and reputation
Cooper's acting style consisted of three essential characteristics: his ability to project elements of his own personality onto the characters he portrayed, to appear natural and authentic in his roles, and to underplay and deliver restrained performances calibrated for the camera and the screen. Acting teacher Lee Strasberg once observed: "The simplest examples of Stanislavsky's ideas are actors such as Gary Cooper, John Wayne, and Spencer Tracy. They try not to act but to be themselves, to respond or react. They refuse to say or do anything they feel not to be consonant with their own characters." Film director François Truffaut ranked Cooper among "the greatest actors" because of his ability to deliver great performances "without direction". This ability to project elements of his own personality onto his characters produced a continuity across his performances to the extent that critics and audiences were convinced that he was simply "playing himself".
Cooper's ability to project his personality onto his characters played an important part in his appearing natural and authentic on screen. Actor John Barrymore said of Cooper, "This fellow is the world's greatest actor. He does without effort what the rest of us spend our lives trying to learn—namely, to be natural." Charles Laughton, who played opposite Cooper in Devil and the Deep agreed, "In truth, that boy hasn't the least idea how well he acts ... He gets at it from the inside, from his own clear way of looking at life." William Wyler, who directed Cooper in two films, called him a "superb actor, a master of movie acting".
In his review of Cooper's performance in The Real Glory, Graham Greene wrote, "Sometimes his lean photogenic face seems to leave everything to the lens, but there is no question here of his not acting. Watch him inoculate the girl against cholera—the casual jab of the needle, and the dressing slapped on while he talks, as though a thousand arms had taught him where to stab and he doesn't have to think anymore."
Cooper's style of underplaying before the camera surprised many of his directors and fellow actors. Even in his earliest feature films, he recognized the camera's ability to pick up slight gestures and facial movements. Commenting on Cooper's performance in Sergeant York, director Howard Hawks observed, "He worked very hard and yet he didn't seem to be working. He was a strange actor because you'd look at him during a scene and you'd think ... this isn't going to be any good. But when you saw the rushes in the projection room the next day you could read in his face all the things he'd been thinking." Sam Wood, who directed Cooper in four films, had similar observations about Cooper's performance in Pride of the Yankees, noting, "What I thought was underplaying turned out to be just the right approach. On the screen he's perfect, yet on the set you'd swear it's the worst job of acting in the history of motion pictures."
Fellow actors admired his abilities as an actor. Commenting on her two films playing opposite Cooper, actress Ingrid Bergman concluded, "The personality of this man was so enormous, so overpowering—and that expression in his eyes and his face, it was so delicate and so underplayed. You just didn't notice it until you saw it on the screen. I thought he was marvelous; the most underplaying and the most natural actor I ever worked with."
Tom Hanks declared, "In only one scene in the first film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture, we see the future of screen acting in the form of Gary Cooper. He is quiet and natural, somehow different from the other cast members. He does something mysterious with his eyes and shoulders that is much more like 'being' than 'acting'."
Daniel Day-Lewis said, "I don't particularly like westerns as a genre, but I do love certain westerns. 'High Noon' means a lot to me – I love the purity and the honesty, I love Gary Cooper in that film, the idea of the last man standing."
Chris Pratt stated, "I started watching Westerns when I was shooting in London about four or five years ago. I really fell in love with Gary Cooper, and his stuff. That sucked me into the Westerns. Before, I never got engrossed in the story. I'd just dip in, and there were guys in horses in black and white. High Noon's later Gary Cooper, I liked that. But I liked 'The Westerner'. That's my favorite one. I have that poster hung up in my house because I really like that one."
To Al Pacino, "Gary Cooper was a phenomenon—his ability to take some thing and elevate it, give it such dignity. One of the great presences."
Mylène Demongeot first got with Gary Cooper for the opening of the first escalator to be installed in a cinema, at the Rex Theatre in Paris, on June 7, 1957. She declared in a 2015 filmed interview: "Gary Cooper ... il est sublime ! Aaahhh (Mylène pushing a cry of love not to say ecstasy) il est sublime ... Ah ! Ah ! Ah ! Là je dois dire que ça fait partie des stars, y'a Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, ces grands Américains que j'ai rencontrés comme ça, c'est vraiment des mecs incroyables. Y'en a plus des comme ça ! Euh non. (Gary Cooper was sublime, there I have to say, now he, was part of the stars, Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, those great americans who I've met really were unbelievable guys, there aren't any like them anymore)."
Career assessment and legacy
Cooper's career spanned thirty-six years, from 1925 to 1961. During that time, he appeared in eighty-four feature films in a leading role. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His natural and authentic acting style appealed powerfully to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major movie genres, including Westerns, war films, adventure films, drama films, crime films, romance films, comedy films, and romantic comedy films. He appeared on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities for twenty-three consecutive years, from 1936 to 1958. According to Quigley's annual poll, Cooper was one of the top money-making stars for eighteen years, appearing in the top ten in 1936–37, 1941–49, and 1951–57. He topped the list in 1953. In Quigley's list of all-time money-making stars, Cooper is listed fourth, after John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and Tom Cruise. At the time of his death, it was estimated that his films grossed well over $200 million (equivalent to $ billion in ).
In over half of his feature films, Cooper portrayed Westerners, soldiers, pilots, sailors, and explorers—all men of action. In the rest he played a wide range of characters, included doctors, professors, artists, architects, clerks, and baseball players. Cooper's heroic screen image changed with each period of his career. In his early films, he played the young naive hero sure of his moral position and trusting in the triumph of simple virtues (The Virginian). After becoming a major star, his Western screen persona was replaced by a more cautious hero in adventure films and dramas (A Farewell to Arms). During the height of his career, from 1936 to 1943, he played a new type of hero—a champion of the common man willing to sacrifice himself for others (Mr. Deeds, Meet John Doe, and For Whom the Bell Tolls).
In the post-war years, Cooper attempted broader variations on his screen image, which now reflected a hero increasingly at odds with the world who must face adversity alone (The Fountainhead and High Noon). In his final films, Cooper's hero rejects the violence of the past, and seeks to reclaim lost honor and find redemption (Friendly Persuasion and Man of the West). The screen persona he developed and sustained throughout his career represented the ideal American hero—a tall, handsome, and sincere man of steadfast integrity who emphasized action over intellect, and combined the heroic qualities of the romantic lover, the adventurer, and the common man.
On February 6, 1960, Cooper was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6243 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to the film industry. He was awarded a star on the sidewalk outside the Ellen Theater in Bozeman, Montana.
On May 6, 1961, he was awarded the French Order of Arts and Letters in recognition of his significant contribution to the arts. On July 30, 1961, he was posthumously awarded the David di Donatello Special Award in Italy for his career achievements.
In 1966, he was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. In 2015, he was inducted into the Utah Cowboy and Western Heritage Hall of Fame. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper eleventh on its list of the 25 male stars of classic Hollywood. Three of his characters—Will Kane, Lou Gehrig, and Sergeant York—made AFI's list of the one hundred greatest heroes and villains, all of them as heroes. His Lou Gehrig line, "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.", is ranked by AFI as the thirty-eighth greatest movie quote of all time.
More than a half century after his death, Cooper's enduring legacy, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, is his image of the ideal American hero preserved in his film performances. Charlton Heston once observed, "He projected the kind of man Americans would like to be, probably more than any actor that's ever lived."
In the TV series Justified, based on works and characters created by Elmore Leonard, Gary Cooper is used throughout the six seasons as the man whom U.S. Marshall Raylan Givens, played by Timothy Olyphant, aspires to be. When his colleague asks Marshall Givens how he thinks his dangerous plan to bring down a villain can possibly work, he replies: "Why not? Worked for Gary Cooper."
Gary Cooper is referenced several times in the critically acclaimed television series The Sopranos, with protagonist Tony Soprano asking "What ever happened to Gary Cooper? The strong, silent type." while complaining about his problems to his therapist.
In the 1930s hit song "Puttin' On the Ritz", Cooper is referenced in the line "dress up like a million dollar trooper/Tryin' hard to look like Gary Cooper, Super duper!" More than two decades after Cooper's death a new version of the song was released in 1983 by Taco; the original lyrics were kept, including the references to Cooper.
In J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye, Cooper is "spotted" by Holden Caulfield to distract a woman he is dancing with.
Awards and nominations
Filmography
The following is a list of feature films in which Cooper appeared in a leading role.
The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926)
Children of Divorce (1927)
Arizona Bound (1927)
Wings (1927)
Nevada (1927)
It (1927)
The Last Outlaw (1927)
Beau Sabreur (1928)
The Legion of the Condemned (1928)
Doomsday (1928)
Half a Bride (1928)
Lilac Time (1928)
The First Kiss (1928)
The Shopworn Angel (1928)
Wolf Song (1929)
Betrayal (1929)
The Virginian (1929)
Only the Brave (1930)
The Texan (1930)
Seven Days' Leave (1930)
A Man from Wyoming (1930)
The Spoilers (1930)
Morocco (1930)
Fighting Caravans (1931)
City Streets (1931)
I Take This Woman (1931)
His Woman (1931)
Devil and the Deep (1932)
If I Had a Million (1932)
A Farewell to Arms (1932)
Today We Live (1933)
One Sunday Afternoon (1933)
Design for Living (1933)
Alice in Wonderland (1933)
Operator 13 (1934)
Now and Forever (1934)
The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935)
The Wedding Night (1935)
Peter Ibbetson (1935)
Desire (1936)
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)
The General Died at Dawn (1936)
The Plainsman (1936)
Souls at Sea (1937)
The Adventures of Marco Polo (1938)
Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938)
The Cowboy and the Lady (1938)
Beau Geste (1939)
The Real Glory (1939)
The Westerner (1940)
North West Mounted Police (1940)
Meet John Doe (1941)
Sergeant York (1941)
Ball of Fire (1941)
The Pride of the Yankees (1942)
For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)
The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944)
Casanova Brown (1944)
Along Came Jones (1945)
Saratoga Trunk (1945)
Cloak and Dagger (1946)
Unconquered (1947)
Good Sam (1948)
The Fountainhead (1949)
Task Force (1949)
Bright Leaf (1950)
Dallas (1950)
You're in the Navy Now (1951)
It's a Big Country (1951)
Distant Drums (1951)
High Noon (1952)
Springfield Rifle (1952)
Return to Paradise (1953)
Blowing Wild (1953)
Garden of Evil (1954)
Vera Cruz (1954)
The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (1955)
Friendly Persuasion (1956)
Love in the Afternoon (1957)
Ten North Frederick (1958)
Man of the West (1958)
The Hanging Tree (1959)
They Came to Cordura (1959)
The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959)
The Naked Edge (1961)
Radio appearances
References
Notes
Citations
Bibliography
Adrien Le Bihan, Gary Cooper, le prince des acteurs, LettMotif, 2021, 358p.()
External links
1901 births
1961 deaths
20th-century American male actors
Academy Honorary Award recipients
American expatriates in England
American male film actors
American male silent film actors
American male television actors
American people of English descent
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
California Republicans
Catholics from Montana
Conservatism in the United States
Converts to Roman Catholicism from Anglicanism
Deaths from cancer in California
Deaths from prostate cancer
Grinnell College people
Male Western (genre) film actors
Male actors from Montana
Paramount Pictures contract players
People educated at Dunstable Grammar School
People from Brentwood, Los Angeles
People from Dunstable
People from Helena, Montana
People from Holmby Hills, Los Angeles | 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"
] |
[
"Gary Cooper",
"Silent films, 1925-28",
"what silent films were made in 1925?",
"In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt,",
"what other silent films?",
"Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones.",
"did he win any awards for these films?",
"I don't know.",
"what was his greatest accomplishment?",
"Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects.",
"did Lilac Time succeed?",
"It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928.",
"what is the most important fact in this article?",
"Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky,",
"did he win any awards for this role?",
"The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a \"dynamic new personality\" and future star.",
"who did he work with?",
"Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal--finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film"
] | C_6ec0895035fd4dbda1785cd7d1c7b5d7_1 | was he married? | 10 | Was Gary Cooper married? | Gary Cooper | In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, including Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt work--which sometimes injured horses and riders--"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name. Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week. Cooper's first important film role was in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) with Ronald Colman and Vilma Banky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal--finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings, the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada--both films directed by John Waters. In 1928, Paramount paired Cooper with a youthful Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss--advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride. That year, Cooper also made Lilac Time with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Gary Cooper (born Frank James Cooper; May 7, 1901 – May 13, 1961) was an American actor known for his strong, silent, and understated acting style. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor twice and had a further three nominations, as well as receiving an Academy Honorary Award for his career achievements in 1961. He was one of the top 10 film personalities for 23 consecutive years, and one of the top money-making stars for 18 years. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper at No. 11 on its list of the 25 greatest male stars of classic Hollywood cinema.
Cooper's career spanned 36 years, from 1925 to 1961, and included leading roles in 84 feature films. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era through to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His screen persona appealed strongly to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major film genres. His ability to project his own personality onto the characters he played contributed to his natural and authentic appearance on screen. Throughout his career, he sustained a screen persona that represented the ideal American hero.
Cooper began his career as a film extra and stunt rider, but soon landed acting roles. After establishing himself as a Western hero in his early silent films, he appeared as the Virginian and became a movie star in 1929 with his first sound picture, The Virginian. In the early 1930s, he expanded his heroic image to include more cautious characters in adventure films and dramas such as A Farewell to Arms (1932) and The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935). During the height of his career, Cooper portrayed a new type of hero—a champion of the common man—in films such as Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), Meet John Doe (1941), Sergeant York (1941), The Pride of the Yankees (1942), and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943). He later portrayed more mature characters at odds with the world in films such as The Fountainhead (1949) and High Noon (1952). In his final films, he played non-violent characters searching for redemption in films such as Friendly Persuasion (1956) and Man of the West (1958).
Early life
Frank James Cooper was born in Helena, Montana, on May 7, 1901, the younger of two sons of English parents Alice (née Brazier; 1873–1967) and Charles Henry Cooper (1865–1946). His brother, Arthur, was six years his senior. Cooper's father came from Houghton Regis, Bedfordshire, and became a prominent lawyer, rancher, and Montana Supreme Court justice. His mother hailed from Gillingham, Kent, and married Charles in Montana. In 1906, Charles purchased the Seven-Bar-Nine cattle ranch, about north of Helena near Craig, Montana. Cooper and Arthur spent their summers at the ranch and learned to ride horses, hunt, and fish. Cooper attended Central Grade School in Helena.
Alice wanted her sons to have an English education, so she took them back to England in 1909 to enroll them in Dunstable Grammar School in Dunstable, Bedfordshire. While there, Cooper and his brother lived with their father's cousins, William and Emily Barton, at their home in Houghton Regis. Cooper studied Latin, French, and English history at Dunstable until 1912. While he adapted to English school discipline and learned the requisite social graces, he never adjusted to the rigid class structure and formal Eton collars he was required to wear. He received his confirmation in the Church of England at the Church of All Saints in Houghton Regis on December 3, 1911. His mother accompanied her sons back to the U.S. in August 1912, and Cooper resumed his education at Johnson Grammar School in Helena.
When Cooper was 15, he injured his hip in a car accident. On his doctor's recommendation, he returned to the Seven-Bar-Nine ranch to recuperate by horseback riding. The misguided therapy left him with his characteristic stiff, off-balanced walk and slightly angled horse-riding style. He left Helena High School after two years in 1918, and returned to the family ranch to work full-time as a cowboy. In 1919, his father arranged for him to attend Gallatin County High School in Bozeman, Montana, where English teacher Ida Davis encouraged him to focus on academics and participate in debating and dramatics. Cooper later called Davis "the woman partly responsible for [him] giving up cowboy-ing and going to college".
Cooper was still attending high school in 1920 when he took three art courses at Montana Agricultural College in Bozeman. His interest in art was inspired years earlier by the Western paintings of Charles Marion Russell and Frederic Remington. Cooper especially admired and studied Russell's Lewis and Clark Meeting Indians at Ross' Hole (1910), which still hangs in the state capitol building in Helena. In 1922, to continue his art education, he enrolled in Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa. He did well academically in most of his courses, but was not accepted into the school's drama club. His drawings and watercolor paintings were exhibited throughout the dormitory, and he was named art editor for the college yearbook. During the summers of 1922 and 1923, Cooper worked at Yellowstone National Park as a tour guide driving the yellow open-top buses. Despite a promising first 18 months at Grinnell, he left college suddenly in February 1924, spent a month in Chicago looking for work as an artist, and then returned to Helena, where he sold editorial cartoons to the local Independent newspaper.
In autumn 1924, Cooper's father left the Montana Supreme Court bench and moved with his wife to Los Angeles to administer the estates of two relatives, and Cooper joined his parents there in November at his father's request. After briefly working a series of unpromising jobs, he met two friends from Montana who were working as film extras and stunt riders in low-budget Western films for the small movie studios on Poverty Row. They introduced him to another Montana cowboy, rodeo champion Jay "Slim" Talbot, who took him to see a casting director. Wanting money for a professional art course, Cooper worked as a film extra for $5 a day, and as a stunt rider for $10. Cooper and Talbot became close friends and hunting companions, and Talbot later worked as Cooper's stuntman and stand-in for over three decades.
Career
Silent films, 1925–1928
In early 1925, Cooper began his film career in silent pictures such as The Thundering Herd and Wild Horse Mesa with Jack Holt, Riders of the Purple Sage and The Lucky Horseshoe with Tom Mix, and The Trail Rider with Buck Jones. He worked for several Poverty Row studios, but also the already emergent major studios, Famous Players-Lasky and Fox Film Corporation. While his skilled horsemanship led to steady work in Westerns, Cooper found the stunt workwhich sometimes injured horses and riders"tough and cruel". Hoping to move beyond the risky stunt work and obtain acting roles, Cooper paid for a screen test and hired casting director Nan Collins to work as his agent. Knowing that other actors were using the name "Frank Cooper", Collins suggested he change his first name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. Cooper immediately liked the name.
Cooper also found work in a variety of non-Western films, appearing, for example, as a masked Cossack in The Eagle (1925), as a Roman guard in Ben-Hur (1925), and as a flood survivor in The Johnstown Flood (1926). Gradually, he began to land credited roles that offered him more screen time, in films such as Tricks (1925), in which he played the film's antagonist, and the short film Lightnin' Wins (1926). As a featured player, he began to attract the attention of major film studios. On June 1, 1926, Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn Productions for fifty dollars a week.
Cooper's first important film role was a supporting part in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) starring Ronald Colman and Vilma Bánky, in which he plays a young engineer who helps a rival suitor save the woman he loves and her town from an impending dam disaster. Cooper's experience living among the Montana cowboys gave his performance an "instinctive authenticity", according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers. The film was a major success. Critics singled out Cooper as a "dynamic new personality" and future star. Goldwyn rushed to offer Cooper a long-term contract, but he held out for a better deal—finally signing a five-year contract with Jesse L. Lasky at Paramount Pictures for $175 a week. In 1927, with help from Clara Bow, Cooper landed high-profile roles in Children of Divorce and Wings (both 1927), the latter being the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture. That year, Cooper also appeared in his first starring roles in Arizona Bound and Nevada—both films directed by John Waters.
Paramount paired Cooper with Fay Wray in The Legion of the Condemned and The First Kiss (both 1928)—advertising them as the studio's "glorious young lovers". Their on-screen chemistry failed to generate much excitement with audiences. With each new film, Cooper's acting skills improved and his popularity continued to grow, especially among female movie-goers. During this time, he was earning as much as $2,750 per film and receiving a thousand fan letters a week. Looking to exploit Cooper's growing audience appeal, the studio placed him opposite popular leading ladies such as Evelyn Brent in Beau Sabreur, Florence Vidor in Doomsday, and Esther Ralston in Half a Bride (also both 1928). Around the same time, Cooper made Lilac Time (1928) with Colleen Moore for First National Pictures, his first movie with synchronized music and sound effects. It became one of the most commercially successful films of 1928.
Hollywood stardom, 1929–1935
Cooper became a major movie star in 1929 with the release of his first talking picture, The Virginian (1929), which was directed by Victor Fleming and co-starred Mary Brian and Walter Huston. Based on the popular novel by Owen Wister, The Virginian was one of the first sound films to define the Western code of honor and helped establish many of the conventions of the Western movie genre that persist to the present day. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, the romantic image of the tall, handsome, and shy cowboy hero who embodied male freedom, courage, and honor was created in large part by Cooper in the film. Unlike some silent film actors who had trouble adapting to the new sound medium, Cooper transitioned naturally, with his "deep and clear" and "pleasantly drawling" voice, which was perfectly suited for the characters he portrayed on screen, also according to Meyers. Looking to capitalize on Cooper's growing popularity, Paramount cast him in several Westerns and wartime dramas, including Only the Brave, The Texan, Seven Days' Leave, A Man from Wyoming, and The Spoilers (all released in 1930). Norman Rockwell depicted Cooper in his role as The Texan for the cover of The Saturday Evening Post on May 24, 1930.
One of the more important performances in Cooper's early career was his portrayal of a sullen legionnaire in Josef von Sternberg's film Morocco (also 1930) with Marlene Dietrich in her introduction to American audiences. During production, von Sternberg focused his energies on Dietrich and treated Cooper dismissively. Tensions came to a head after von Sternberg yelled directions at Cooper in German. The actor approached the director, picked him up by the collar, and said, "If you expect to work in this country you'd better get on to the language we use here." Despite the tensions on the set, Cooper produced "one of his best performances", according to Thornton Delehanty of the New York Evening Post.
After returning to the Western genre in Zane Grey's Fighting Caravans (1931) with French actress Lili Damita, Cooper appeared in the Dashiell Hammett crime film City Streets (also 1931), co-starring Sylvia Sidney and Paul Lukas, playing a westerner who gets involved with big-city gangsters in order to save the woman he loves. Cooper concluded the year with appearances in two unsuccessful films: I Take This Woman (also 1931) with Carole Lombard, and His Woman with Claudette Colbert. The demands and pressures of making ten films in two years left Cooper exhausted and in poor health, suffering from anemia and jaundice. He had lost during that period, and felt lonely, isolated, and depressed by his sudden fame and wealth. In May 1931, Cooper left Hollywood and sailed to Algiers and then Italy, where he lived for the next year.
During his time abroad, Cooper stayed with the Countess Dorothy di Frasso at the Villa Madama in Rome, where she taught him about good food and vintage wines, how to read Italian and French menus, and how to socialize among Europe's nobility and upper classes. After guiding him through the great art museums and galleries of Italy, she accompanied him on a ten-week big-game hunting safari on the slopes of Mount Kenya in East Africa, where he was credited with over sixty kills, including two lions, a rhinoceros, and various antelopes. His safari experience in Africa had a profound influence on Cooper and intensified his love of the wilderness. After returning to Europe, he and the countess set off on a Mediterranean cruise of the Italian and French Rivieras. Rested and rejuvenated by his year-long exile, a healthy Cooper returned to Hollywood in April 1932 and negotiated a new contract with Paramount for two films per year, a salary of $4,000 a week, and director and script approval.
In 1932, after completing Devil and the Deep with Tallulah Bankhead to fulfill his old contract, Cooper appeared in A Farewell to Arms, the first film adaptation of an Ernest Hemingway novel. Co-starring Helen Hayes, a leading New York theatre star and Academy Award winner, and Adolphe Menjou, the film presented Cooper with one of his most ambitious and challenging dramatic roles, playing an American ambulance driver wounded in Italy who falls in love with an English nurse during World War I. Critics praised his highly intense and emotional performance, and the film became one of the year's most commercially successful pictures. In 1933, after making Today We Live with Joan Crawford and One Sunday Afternoon with Fay Wray, Cooper appeared in the Ernst Lubitsch comedy film Design for Living, based on the successful Noël Coward play. Co-starring Miriam Hopkins and Fredric March, the film was a box office success, ranking as one of the top ten highest-grossing films of 1933. All three of the lead actors—March, Cooper, and Hopkins—received attention from this film as they were all at the peak of their careers. Cooper's performance — playing an American artist in Europe competing with his playwright friend for the affections of a beautiful woman — was singled out for its versatility and revealed his genuine ability to do light comedy. Cooper changed his name legally to "Gary Cooper" in August 1933.
In 1934, Cooper was loaned out to MGM for the Civil War drama film Operator 13 with Marion Davies, about a beautiful Union spy who falls in love with a Confederate soldier. Despite Richard Boleslawski's imaginative direction and George J. Folsey's lavish cinematography, the film did poorly at the box office.
Back at Paramount, Cooper appeared in his first of seven films by director Henry Hathaway, Now and Forever, with Carole Lombard and Shirley Temple. In the film, he plays a confidence man who tries to sell his daughter to the relatives who raised her, but is eventually won over by the adorable girl. Impressed by Temple's intelligence and charm, Cooper developed a close rapport with her, both on and off screen. The film was a box-office success.
The following year, Cooper was loaned out to Samuel Goldwyn Productions to appear in King Vidor's romance film The Wedding Night with Anna Sten, who was being groomed as "another Garbo". In the film, Cooper plays an alcoholic novelist who retreats to his family's New England farm where he meets and falls in love with a beautiful Polish neighbor. Cooper delivered a performance of surprising range and depth, according to biographer Larry Swindell. Despite receiving generally favorable reviews, the film was not popular with American audiences, who may have been offended by the film's depiction of an extramarital affair and its tragic ending.
That same year, Cooper appeared in two Henry Hathaway films: the melodrama Peter Ibbetson with Ann Harding, about a man caught up in a dream world created by his love for a childhood sweetheart, and the adventure film The Lives of a Bengal Lancer, about a daring British officer and his men who defend their stronghold at Bengal against rebellious local tribes. While the former, championed by the surrealists became more successful in Europe than in the United States, the latter was nominated for seven Academy Awards and became one of Cooper's most popular and successful adventure films. Hathaway had the highest respect for Cooper's acting ability, calling him "the best actor of all of them".
American folk hero, 1936–1943
From Mr. Deeds to The Real Glory, 1936–1939
Cooper's career took an important turn in 1936. After making Frank Borzage's romantic comedy film Desire with Marlene Dietrich at Paramount—in which he delivered a performance considered by some contemporary critics as one of his finest—Cooper returned to Poverty Row for the first time since his early silent film days to make Frank Capra's Mr. Deeds Goes to Town with Jean Arthur for Columbia Pictures. In the film, Cooper plays the character of Longfellow Deeds, a quiet, innocent writer of greeting cards who inherits a fortune, leaves behind his idyllic life in Vermont, and travels to New York where he faces a world of corruption and deceit. Capra and screenwriter Robert Riskin were able to use Cooper's well-established screen persona as the "quintessential American hero"—a symbol of honesty, courage, and goodness—to create a new type of "folk hero" for the common man. Commenting on Cooper's impact on the character and the film, Capra observed:
Both Desire and Mr. Deeds opened in April 1936 to critical praise and were major box-office successes. In his review in The New York Times, Frank Nugent wrote that Cooper was "proving himself one of the best light comedians in Hollywood". For his performance in Mr. Deeds, Cooper received his first Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.
Cooper appeared in two other Paramount films in 1936. In Lewis Milestone's adventure film The General Died at Dawn with Madeleine Carroll, he plays an American soldier of fortune in China who helps the peasants defend themselves against the oppression of a cruel warlord. Written by playwright Clifford Odets, the film was a critical and commercial success.
In Cecil B. DeMille's sprawling frontier epic The Plainsman—his first of four films with the director—Cooper portrays Wild Bill Hickok in a highly fictionalized version of the opening of the American western frontier. The film was an even greater box-office hit than its predecessor, due in large part to Jean Arthur's definitive depiction of Calamity Jane and Cooper's inspired portrayal of Hickock as an enigmatic figure of "deepening mythic substance". That year, Cooper appeared for the first time on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities, where he would remain for the next twenty-three years.
In late 1936, Paramount was preparing a new contract for Cooper that would raise his salary to $8,000 a week when Cooper signed a contract with Samuel Goldwyn for six films over six years with a minimum guarantee of $150,000 per picture. Paramount brought suit against Goldwyn and Cooper, and the court ruled that Cooper's new Goldwyn contract afforded the actor sufficient time to also honor his Paramount agreement. Cooper continued to make films with both studios, and by 1939 the United States Treasury reported that Cooper was the country's highest wage earner, at $482,819 (equivalent to $ million in ).
In contrast to his output the previous year, Cooper appeared in only one picture in 1937, Henry Hathaway's adventure film Souls at Sea. A critical and box-office failure, Cooper referred to it as his "almost picture", saying, "It was almost exciting, and almost interesting. And I was almost good." In 1938, he appeared in Archie Mayo's biographical film The Adventures of Marco Polo. Plagued by production problems and a weak screenplay, the film became Goldwyn's biggest failure to that date, losing $700,000. During this period, Cooper turned down several important roles, including the role of Rhett Butler in Gone with the Wind. Cooper was producer David O. Selznick's first choice for the part. He made several overtures to the actor, but Cooper had doubts about the project, and did not feel suited to the role. Cooper later admitted, "It was one of the best roles ever offered in Hollywood ... But I said no. I didn't see myself as quite that dashing, and later, when I saw Clark Gable play the role to perfection, I knew I was right."
Back at Paramount, Cooper returned to a more comfortable genre in Ernst Lubitsch's romantic comedy Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938) with Claudette Colbert. In the film, Cooper plays a wealthy American businessman in France who falls in love with an impoverished aristocrat's daughter and persuades her to become his eighth wife. Despite the clever screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder, and solid performances by Cooper and Colbert, American audiences had trouble accepting Cooper in the role of a shallow philanderer. It succeeded only at the European box office market.
In the fall of 1938, Cooper appeared in H. C. Potter's romantic comedy The Cowboy and the Lady with Merle Oberon, about a sweet-natured rodeo cowboy who falls in love with the wealthy daughter of a presidential hopeful, believing her to be a poor, hard-working lady's maid. The efforts of three directors and several eminent screenwriters could not salvage what could have been a fine vehicle for Cooper. While more successful than its predecessor, the film was Cooper's fourth consecutive box-office failure in the American market.
In the next two years, Cooper was more discerning about the roles he accepted and made four successful large-scale adventure and cowboy films. In William A. Wellman's adventure film Beau Geste (1939), he plays one of three daring English brothers who join the French Foreign Legion in the Sahara to fight local tribes. Filmed in the same Mojave Desert locations as the original 1926 version with Ronald Colman, Beau Geste provided Cooper with magnificent sets, exotic settings, high-spirited action, and a role tailored to his personality and screen persona. This was the last film in Cooper's contract with Paramount.
In Henry Hathaway's The Real Glory (1939), he plays a military doctor who accompanies a small group of American Army officers to the Philippines to help the Christian Filipinos defend themselves against Muslim radicals. Many film critics praised Cooper's performance, including author and film critic Graham Greene, who recognized that he "never acted better".
From The Westerner to For Whom the Bell Tolls, 1940–1943
Cooper returned to the Western genre in William Wyler's The Westerner (1940) with Walter Brennan and Doris Davenport, about a drifting cowboy who defends homesteaders against Roy Bean, a corrupt judge known as the "law west of the Pecos". Screenwriter Niven Busch relied on Cooper's extensive knowledge of Western history while working on the script. The film received positive reviews and did well at the box-office, with reviewers praising the performances of the two lead actors. That same year, Cooper appeared in his first all-Technicolor feature, Cecil B. DeMille's adventure film North West Mounted Police (1940). In the film, Cooper plays a Texas Ranger who pursues an outlaw into western Canada where he joins forces with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who are after the same man, a leader of the North-West Rebellion. While not as popular with critics as its predecessor, the film was another box-office success—the sixth-highest-grossing film of 1940.
The early 1940s were Cooper's prime years as an actor. In a relatively short period, he appeared in five critically successful and popular films that produced some of his finest performances. When Frank Capra offered him the lead role in Meet John Doe before Robert Riskin even developed the script, Cooper accepted his friend's offer, saying, "It's okay, Frank, I don't need a script." In the film, Cooper plays Long John Willoughby, a down-and-out bush-league pitcher hired by a newspaper to pretend to be a man who promises to commit suicide on Christmas Eve to protest all the hypocrisy and corruption in the country. Considered by some critics to be Capra's best film at the time, Meet John Doe was received as a "national event" with Cooper appearing on the front cover of Time magazine on March 3, 1941. In his review in the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes called Cooper's performance a "splendid and utterly persuasive portrayal" and praised his "utterly realistic acting which comes through with such authority". Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote, "Gary Cooper, of course, is 'John Doe' to the life and in the whole—shy, bewildered, non-aggressive, but a veritable tiger when aroused."
That same year, Cooper made two films with director and good friend Howard Hawks. In the biographical film Sergeant York, Cooper portrays war hero Alvin C. York, one of the most decorated American soldiers in World War I. The film chronicles York's early backwoods days in Tennessee, his religious conversion and subsequent piety, his stand as a conscientious objector, and finally his heroic actions at the Battle of the Argonne Forest, which earned him the Medal of Honor. Initially, Cooper was nervous and uncertain about playing a living hero, so he traveled to Tennessee to visit York at his home, and the two quiet men established an immediate rapport and discovered they had much in common. Inspired by York's encouragement, Cooper delivered a performance that Howard Barnes of the New York Herald Tribune called "one of extraordinary conviction and versatility", and that Archer Winston of the New York Post called "one of his best". After the film's release, Cooper was awarded the Distinguished Citizenship Medal by the Veterans of Foreign Wars for his "powerful contribution to the promotion of patriotism and loyalty". York admired Cooper's performance and helped promote the film for Warner Bros. Sergeant York became the top-grossing film of the year and was nominated for eleven Academy Awards. Accepting his first Academy Award for Best Actor from his friend James Stewart, Cooper said, "It was Sergeant Alvin York who won this award. Shucks, I've been in the business sixteen years and sometimes dreamed I might get one of these. That's all I can say ... Funny when I was dreaming I always made a better speech."
Cooper concluded the year back at Goldwyn with Howard Hawks to make the romantic comedy Ball of Fire with Barbara Stanwyck. In the film, Cooper plays a shy linguistics professor who leads a team of seven scholars who are writing an encyclopedia. While researching slang, he meets Stanwyck's flirtatious burlesque stripper Sugarpuss O'Shea who blows the dust off their staid life of books. The screenplay by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder provided Cooper the opportunity to exercise the full range of his light comedy skills. In his review for the New York Herald Tribune, Howard Barnes wrote that Cooper handled the role with "great skill and comic emphasis" and that his performance was "utterly delightful". Though small in scale, Ball of Fire was one of the top-grossing films of the year—Cooper's fourth consecutive picture to make the top twenty.
Cooper's only film appearance in 1942 was also his last under his Goldwyn contract. In Sam Wood's biographical film The Pride of the Yankees, Cooper portrays baseball star Lou Gehrig who established a record with the New York Yankees for playing in 2,130 consecutive games. Cooper was reluctant to play the seven-time All-Star, who only died the previous year from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) — now commonly called "Lou Gehrig's disease". Beyond the challenges of effectively portraying such a popular and nationally recognized figure, Cooper knew very little about baseball and was not left-handed like Gehrig.
After Gehrig's widow visited the actor and expressed her desire that he portray her husband, Cooper accepted the role that covered a twenty-year span of Gehrig's life—his early love of baseball, his rise to greatness, his loving marriage, and his struggle with illness, culminating in his farewell speech at Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939 before 62,000 fans. Cooper quickly learned the physical movements of a baseball player and developed a fluid, believable swing. The handedness issue was solved by reversing the print for certain batting scenes. The film was one of the year's top ten pictures and received eleven Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's third).
Soon after the publication of Ernest Hemingway's novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, Paramount paid $150,000 for the film rights with the express intent of casting Cooper in the lead role of Robert Jordan, an American explosives expert who fights alongside the Republican loyalists during the Spanish Civil War. The original director, Cecil B. DeMille, was replaced by Sam Wood who brought in Dudley Nichols for the screenplay. After the start of principal photography in the Sierra Nevada in late 1942, Ingrid Bergman was brought in to replace ballerina Vera Zorina as the female lead—a change supported by Cooper and Hemingway. The love scenes between Bergman and Cooper were "rapturous" and passionate. Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune wrote that both actors performed with "the true stature and authority of stars". While the film distorted the novel's original political themes and meaning, For Whom the Bell Tolls was a critical and commercial success and received ten Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actor (Cooper's fourth).
World War II related activities
Due to his age and health, Cooper did not serve in the military during World War II, but like many of his colleagues, he got involved in the war effort by entertaining the troops. In June 1943, he visited military hospitals in San Diego, and often appeared at the Hollywood Canteen serving food to the servicemen. In late 1943, Cooper undertook a tour of the South West Pacific with actresses Una Merkel and Phyllis Brooks, and accordionist Andy Arcari.
Traveling on a B-24A Liberator bomber, the group toured the Cook Islands, Fiji, New Caledonia, Queensland, Brisbane—where General Douglas MacArthur told Cooper he was watching Sergeant York in a Manila theater when Japanese bombs began falling—New Guinea, Jayapura, and throughout the Solomon Islands.
The group often shared the same sparse living conditions and K-rations as the troops. Cooper met with the servicemen and women, visited military hospitals, introduced his attractive colleagues, and participated in occasional skits. The shows concluded with Cooper's moving recitation of Lou Gehrig's farewell speech. When he returned to the United States, he visited military hospitals throughout the country. Cooper later called his time with the troops the "greatest emotional experience" of his life.
Mature roles, 1944–1952
In 1944, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's wartime adventure film The Story of Dr. Wassell with Laraine Day — his third movie with the director. In the film, Cooper plays American doctor and missionary Corydon M. Wassell, who leads a group of wounded sailors through the jungles of Java to safety. Despite receiving poor reviews, Dr. Wassell was one of the top-grossing films of the year. With his Goldwyn and Paramount contracts now concluded, Cooper decided to remain independent and formed his own production company, International Pictures, with Leo Spitz, William Goetz, and Nunnally Johnson. The fledgling studio's first offering was Sam Wood's romantic comedy Casanova Brown with Teresa Wright, about a man who learns his soon-to-be ex-wife is pregnant with his child, just as he is about to marry another woman. The film received poor reviews, with the New York Daily News calling it "delightful nonsense", and Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, criticizing Cooper's "somewhat obvious and ridiculous clowning". The film was barely profitable.
In 1945, Cooper starred in and produced Stuart Heisler's Western comedy Along Came Jones with Loretta Young for International. In this lighthearted parody of his past heroic image, Cooper plays comically inept cowboy Melody Jones who is mistaken for a ruthless killer. Audiences embraced Cooper's character, and the film was one of the top box-office pictures of the year—a testament to Cooper's still vital audience appeal. It was also International's biggest financial success during its brief history before being sold off to Universal Studios in 1946.
Cooper's career during the post-war years drifted in new directions as American society was changing. While he still played conventional heroic roles, his films now relied less on his heroic screen persona and more on novel stories and exotic settings. In November 1945, Cooper appeared in Sam Wood's nineteenth-century period drama Saratoga Trunk with Ingrid Bergman, about a Texas cowboy and his relationship with a beautiful fortune-hunter. Filmed in early 1943, the movie's release was delayed for two years due to the increased demand for war movies. Despite poor reviews, Saratoga Trunk did well at the box office and became one of the top money-makers of the year for Warner Bros. Cooper's only film in 1946 was Fritz Lang's romantic thriller Cloak and Dagger, about a mild-mannered physics professor recruited by the OSS during the last years of World War II to investigate the German atomic bomb program. Playing a part loosely based on physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, Cooper was uneasy with the role and unable to convey the "inner sense" of the character. The film received poor reviews and was a box-office failure. In 1947, Cooper appeared in Cecil B. DeMille's epic adventure film Unconquered with Paulette Goddard, about a Virginia militiaman who defends settlers against an unscrupulous gun trader and hostile Indians on the Western frontier during the eighteenth century. The film received mixed reviews, but even long-time DeMille critic James Agee acknowledged the picture had "some authentic flavor of the period". This last of four films made with DeMille was Cooper's most lucrative, earning the actor over $300,000 (equal to $ today) in salary and percentage of profits. Unconquered would be his last unqualified box-office success for the next five years.
In 1948, after making Leo McCarey's romantic comedy Good Sam, Cooper sold his company to Universal Studios and signed a long-term contract with Warner Bros. that gave him script and director approval and a guaranteed $295,000 (equal to $ today) per picture. His first film under the new contract was King Vidor's drama The Fountainhead (1949) with Patricia Neal and Raymond Massey. In the film, Cooper plays an idealistic and uncompromising architect who struggles to maintain his integrity and individualism in the face of societal pressures to conform to popular standards. Based on the novel by Ayn Rand who also wrote the screenplay, the film reflects her philosophy and attacks the concepts of collectivism while promoting the virtues of individualism. For most critics, Cooper was hopelessly miscast in the role of Howard Roark. In his review for The New York Times, Bosley Crowther concluded he was "Mr. Deeds out of his element". Cooper returned to his element in Delmer Daves' war drama Task Force (1949), about a retiring rear admiral who reminisces about his long career as a naval aviator and his role in the development of aircraft carriers. Cooper's performance and the Technicolor newsreel footage supplied by the United States Navy made the film one of Cooper's most popular during this period. In the next two years, Cooper made four poorly received films: Michael Curtiz' period drama Bright Leaf (1950), Stuart Heisler's Western melodrama Dallas (1950), Henry Hathaway's wartime comedy You're in the Navy Now (1951), and Raoul Walsh's Western action film Distant Drums (1951).
Cooper's most important film during the post-war years was Fred Zinnemann's Western drama High Noon (1952) with Grace Kelly and Katy Jurado for United Artists. In the film, Cooper plays retiring sheriff Will Kane who is preparing to leave town on his honeymoon when he learns that an outlaw he helped put away and his three henchmen are returning to seek their revenge. Unable to gain the support of the frightened townspeople, and abandoned by his young bride, Kane nevertheless stays to face the outlaws alone. During the filming, Cooper was in poor health and in considerable pain from stomach ulcers. His ravaged face and discomfort in some scenes "photographed as self-doubt", according to biographer Hector Arce, and contributed to the effectiveness of his performance. Considered one of the first "adult" Westerns for its theme of moral courage, High Noon received enthusiastic reviews for its artistry, with Time magazine placing it in the ranks of Stagecoach and The Gunfighter. Bosley Crowther, in The New York Times, wrote that Cooper was "at the top of his form", and John McCarten, in The New Yorker, wrote that Cooper was never more effective. The film earned $3.75 million in the United States and $18 million worldwide. Following the example of his friend James Stewart, Cooper accepted a lower salary in exchange for a percent of the profits, and ended up making $600,000. Cooper's understated performance was widely praised, and earned him his second Academy Award for Best Actor.
Later films, 1953–1961
After appearing in André de Toth's Civil War drama Springfield Rifle (1952)—a standard Warner Bros. film that was overshadowed by the success of its predecessor—Cooper made four films outside the United States. In Mark Robson's drama Return to Paradise (1953), Cooper plays an American wanderer who liberates the inhabitants of a Polynesian island from the puritanical rule of a misguided pastor. Cooper endured spartan living conditions, long hours, and ill health during the three-month location shoot on the island of Upolu in Western Samoa. Despite its beautiful cinematography, the film received poor reviews. Cooper's next three films were shot in Mexico. In Hugo Fregonese's action adventure film Blowing Wild (1953) with Barbara Stanwyck, he plays a wildcatter in Mexico who gets involved with an oil company executive and his unscrupulous wife with whom he once had an affair.
In 1954, Cooper appeared in Henry Hathaway's Western drama Garden of Evil, with Susan Hayward, about three soldiers of fortune in Mexico hired to rescue a woman's husband. That same year, he appeared in Robert Aldrich's Western adventure Vera Cruz with Burt Lancaster. In the film, Cooper plays an American adventurer hired by Emperor Maximilian I to escort a countess to Vera Cruz during the Mexican Rebellion of 1866. All of these films received poor reviews but did well at the box-office. For his work in Vera Cruz, Cooper earned $1.4 million in salary and percent of the gross.
During this period, Cooper struggled with health problems. As well as his ongoing treatment for ulcers, he suffered a severe shoulder injury during the filming of Blowing Wild when he was hit by metal fragments from a dynamited oil well. During the filming of Vera Cruz, he reinjured his hip falling from a horse, and was burned when Lancaster fired his rifle too close and the wadding from the blank shell pierced his clothing.
In 1955, he appeared in Otto Preminger's biographical war drama The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell, about the World War I general who tried to convince government officials of the importance of air power, and was court-martialed after blaming the War Department for a series of air disasters. Some critics felt that Cooper was miscast, and that his dull, tight-lipped performance did not reflect Mitchell's dynamic and caustic personality. In 1956, Cooper was more effective playing a gentle Indiana Quaker in William Wyler's Civil War drama Friendly Persuasion with Dorothy McGuire. Like Sergeant York and High Noon, the film addresses the conflict between religious pacifism and civic duty. For his performance, Cooper received his second Golden Globe nomination for Best Motion Picture Actor. The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, was awarded the Palme d'Or at the 1957 Cannes Film Festival, and went on to earn $8 million worldwide.
In 1956, Cooper traveled to France to make Billy Wilder's romantic comedy Love in the Afternoon with Audrey Hepburn and Maurice Chevalier. In the film, Cooper plays a middle-aged American playboy in Paris who pursues and eventually falls in love with a much younger woman. Despite receiving some positive reviews—including from Bosley Crowther who praised the film's "charming performances"—most reviewers concluded that Cooper was simply too old for the part. While audiences may not have welcomed seeing Cooper's heroic screen image tarnished by his playing an aging roué trying to seduce an innocent young girl, the film was still a box-office success. The following year, Cooper appeared in Philip Dunne's romantic drama Ten North Frederick. In the film, which was based on the novel by John O'Hara, Cooper plays an attorney whose life is ruined by a double-crossing politician and his own secret affair with his daughter's young roommate. While Cooper brought "conviction and controlled anguish" to his performance, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, it was not enough to save what Bosley Crowther called a "hapless film".
Despite his ongoing health problems and several operations for ulcers and hernias, Cooper continued to work in action films. In 1958, he appeared in Anthony Mann's Western drama Man of the West (1958) with Julie London and Lee J. Cobb, about a reformed outlaw and killer who is forced to confront his violent past when the train he is riding in is held up by his former gang members. The film has been called Cooper's "most pathological Western", with its themes of impotent rage, sexual humiliation, and sadism. According to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, Cooper, who struggled with moral conflicts in his personal life, "understood the anguish of a character striving to retain his integrity ... [and] brought authentic feeling to the role of a tempted and tormented, yet essentially decent man". Mostly ignored by critics at the time, the film is now well-regarded by film scholars and is considered Cooper's last great film.
After his Warner Bros. contract ended, Cooper formed his own production company, Baroda Productions, and made three unusual films in 1959 about redemption. In Delmer Daves' Western drama The Hanging Tree, Cooper plays a frontier doctor who saves a criminal from a lynch mob, and later tries to exploit his sordid past. Cooper delivered a "powerful and persuasive" performance of an emotionally scarred man whose need to dominate others is transformed by the love and sacrifice of a woman. In Robert Rossen's historical adventure They Came to Cordura with Rita Hayworth, he plays an army officer who is found guilty of cowardice and assigned the degrading task of recommending soldiers for the Medal of Honor during the Pancho Villa Expedition of 1916.
While Cooper received positive reviews, Variety and Films in Review felt he was too old for the part. In Michael Anderson's action drama The Wreck of the Mary Deare with Charlton Heston, Cooper plays a disgraced merchant marine officer who decides to stay aboard his sinking cargo ship in order to prove the vessel was deliberately scuttled and to redeem his good name. Like its two predecessors, the film was physically demanding. Cooper, who was a trained scuba diver, did most of his own underwater scenes. Biographer Jeffrey Meyers observed that in all three roles, Cooper effectively conveyed the sense of lost honor and desire for redemption—what Joseph Conrad in Lord Jim called the "struggles of an individual trying to save from the fire his idea of what his moral identity should be".
Personal life
Marriage and family
Cooper was formally introduced to his future wife, 20-year-old New York debutante Veronica Balfe, on Easter Sunday 1933 at a party given by her uncle, art director Cedric Gibbons. Called "Rocky" by her family and friends, she grew up on Park Avenue and attended finishing schools. Her stepfather was Wall Street tycoon Paul Shields. Cooper and Rocky were quietly married at her parents' Park Avenue residence on December 15, 1933. According to his friends, the marriage had a positive impact on Cooper, who turned away from past indiscretions and took control of his life. Athletic and a lover of the outdoors, Rocky shared many of Cooper's interests, including riding, skiing, and skeet-shooting. She organized their social life, and her wealth and social connections provided Cooper access to New York high society. Cooper and his wife owned homes in the Los Angeles area in Encino (1933–36), Brentwood (1936–53), and Holmby Hills (1954–61), and owned a vacation home in Aspen, Colorado (1949–53).
Gary and Veronica Cooper's daughter, Maria Veronica Cooper, was born on September 15, 1937. By all accounts, he was a patient and affectionate father, teaching Maria to ride a bicycle, play tennis, ski, and ride horses. Sharing many of her parents' interests, she accompanied them on their travels and was often photographed with them. Like her father, she developed a love for art and drawing. As a family they vacationed together in Sun Valley, Idaho, spent time at Rocky's parents' country house in Southampton, New York, and took frequent trips to Europe. Cooper and Rocky were legally separated on May 16, 1951, when Cooper moved out of their home. For over two years, they maintained a fragile and uneasy family life with their daughter. Cooper moved back into their home in November 1953, and their formal reconciliation occurred in February 1954.
Romantic relationships
Prior to his marriage, Cooper had a series of romantic relationships with leading actresses, beginning in 1927 with Clara Bow, who advanced his career by helping him get one of his first leading roles in Children of Divorce. Bow was also responsible for getting Cooper a role in Wings, which generated an enormous amount of fan mail for the young actor. In 1928, he had a relationship with another experienced actress, Evelyn Brent, whom he met while filming Beau Sabreur. In 1929, while filming The Wolf Song, Cooper began an intense affair with Lupe Vélez, which was the most important romance of his early life. During their two years together, Cooper also had brief affairs with Marlene Dietrich while filming Morocco in 1930 and with Carole Lombard while making I Take This Woman in 1931. During his year abroad in 1931–32, Cooper had an affair with the married Countess Dorothy di Frasso, while staying at her Villa Madama near Rome.
After he was married in December 1933, Cooper remained faithful to his wife until the summer of 1942, when he began an affair with Ingrid Bergman during the production of For Whom the Bell Tolls. Their relationship lasted through the completion of filming Saratoga Trunk in June 1943. In 1948, after finishing work on The Fountainhead, Cooper began an affair with actress Patricia Neal, his co-star. At first they kept their affair discreet, but eventually it became an open secret in Hollywood, and Cooper's wife confronted him with the rumors, which he admitted were true. He also confessed that he was in love with Neal, and continued to see her. Cooper and his wife were legally separated in May 1951, but he did not seek a divorce. Neal later claimed that Cooper hit her after she went on a date with Kirk Douglas, and that he arranged for her to have an abortion when she became pregnant with Cooper's child. Neal ended their relationship in late December 1951. During his three-year separation from his wife, Cooper was rumored to have had affairs with Grace Kelly, Lorraine Chanel, and Gisèle Pascal.
Cooper biographers have explored his friendship in the late twenties with the actor Anderson Lawler, with whom Cooper shared a house on and off for a year, while at the same time seeing Clara Bow, Evelyn Brent and Lupe Vélez. Lupe Vélez once told Hedda Hopper of Vélez' affair with Cooper; whenever he would come home after seeing Lawler, she would sniff for Lawler's cologne. Vélez' biographer Michelle Vogel has reported that Vélez consented to Cooper's sexual behavior with Lawler, but only as long as she, too, could participate. In later life, he became involved in a relationship with the costume designer Irene, and was, according to Irene, "the only man she ever loved". A year after his death in 1961, Irene committed suicide by jumping from the 11th floor of the Knickerbocker Hotel, after telling Doris Day of her grief over Cooper's death.
Friendships, interests, and character
Cooper's twenty-year friendship with Ernest Hemingway began at Sun Valley in October 1940. The previous year, Hemingway drew upon Cooper's image when he created the character of Robert Jordan for the novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. The two shared a passion for the outdoors, and for years they hunted duck and pheasant, and skied together in Sun Valley. Both men admired the work of Rudyard Kipling—Cooper kept a copy of the poem "If—" in his dressing room—and retained as adults Kipling's sense of boyish adventure.
As well as admiring Cooper's hunting skills and knowledge of the outdoors, Hemingway believed his character matched his screen persona, once telling a friend, "If you made up a character like Coop, nobody would believe it. He's just too good to be true." They saw each other often, and their friendship remained strong through the years.
Cooper's social life generally centered on sports, outdoor activities, and dinner parties with his family and friends from the film industry, including directors Henry Hathaway, Howard Hawks, William Wellman, and Fred Zinnemann, and actors Joel McCrea, James Stewart, Barbara Stanwyck, and Robert Taylor. As well as hunting, Cooper enjoyed riding, fishing, skiing, and later in life, scuba diving. He never abandoned his early love for art and drawing, and over the years, he and his wife acquired a private collection of modern paintings, including works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Gauguin, and Georgia O'Keeffe. Cooper owned several works by Pablo Picasso, whom he met in 1956. Cooper also had a lifelong passion for automobiles, with a collection that included a 1930 Duesenberg.
Cooper was naturally reserved and introspective, and loved the solitude of outdoor activities. Not unlike his screen persona, his communication style frequently consisted of long silences with an occasional "yup" and "shucks". He once said, "If others have more interesting things to say than I have, I keep quiet." According to his friends, Cooper could also be an articulate, well-informed conversationalist on topics ranging from horses, guns, and Western history to film production, sports cars, and modern art. He was modest and unpretentious, frequently downplaying his acting abilities and career accomplishments. His friends and colleagues described him as charming, well-mannered, and thoughtful, with a lively boyish sense of humor. Cooper maintained a sense of propriety throughout his career and never misused his movie star status—never sought special treatment or refused to work with a director or leading lady. His close friend Joel McCrea recalled, "Coop never fought, he never got mad, he never told anybody off that I know of; everybody that worked with him liked him."
Political views
Like his father, Cooper was a conservative Republican; he voted for Calvin Coolidge in 1924, Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1932, and campaigned for Wendell Willkie in 1940. When Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for an unprecedented fourth presidential term in 1944, Cooper campaigned for Thomas E. Dewey and criticized Roosevelt for being dishonest and adopting "foreign" ideas. In a radio address that he paid for himself just prior to the election, Cooper said, "I disagree with the New Deal belief that the America all of us love is old and worn-out and finished—and has to borrow foreign notions that don't even seem to work any too well where they come from ... Our country is a young country that just has to make up its mind to be itself again." He also attended a Republican rally at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum that drew 93,000 Dewey supporters.
Cooper was one of the founding members of the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, a conservative organization dedicated, according to its statement of principles, to preserving the "American way of life" and opposing communism and fascism. The organization — whose membership included Walter Brennan, Laraine Day, Walt Disney, Clark Gable, Hedda Hopper, Ronald Reagan, Barbara Stanwyck, and John Wayne — advised the United States Congress to investigate communist influence in the motion picture industry. On October 23, 1947, Cooper was subpoenaed to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and was asked if he had observed any "communistic influence" in Hollywood.
Cooper recounted statements he'd heard suggesting that the Constitution was out of date and that Congress was an unnecessary institution—comments that Cooper said he found to be "very un-American" and testified that he had rejected several scripts because he thought they were "tinged with communist ideas". Unlike some other witnesses, Cooper did not name any individuals, nor did he name any scripts, during his testimony.
In 1951, while making High Noon, Cooper became friends with the film's screenwriter, Carl Foreman, who had been a member of the Communist Party. When Foreman was subpoenaed by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Cooper put his career on the line to defend Foreman. When John Wayne and others threatened Cooper with blacklisting himself and the loss of his passport if he did not walk off the film, Cooper gave a statement to the press in support of Foreman, calling him "the finest kind of American". When producer Stanley Kramer removed Foreman's name as screenwriter, Cooper and director Fred Zinnemann threatened to walk off the film if Foreman's name was not restored. Foreman later said that, of all his friends and allies and colleagues in Hollywood, "Cooper was the only big one who tried to help. The only one." Cooper even offered to testify in Foreman's behalf before the committee, but character witnesses were not allowed. Foreman always sent future scripts to Cooper for first refusal, including The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Key and The Guns of Navarone. Cooper had to turn them down because of his age.
Religion
Cooper was baptized in the Anglican Church in December 1911 in Britain, and was raised in the Episcopal Church in the United States. While he was not an observant Christian for most of his adult life, many of his friends believed he had a deeply spiritual side.
On June 26, 1953, Cooper accompanied his wife and daughter, who were devout Catholics, to Rome, where they had an audience with Pope Pius XII. Cooper and his wife were still separated at the time, but the papal visit marked the beginning of their gradual reconciliation. In the coming years, Cooper contemplated his mortality and his personal behavior, and started discussing Catholicism with his family. He began attending church with them regularly, and met with their parish priest, who offered Cooper spiritual guidance. After several months of study, Cooper was baptized as a Roman Catholic on April 9, 1959, before a small group of family and friends at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills.
Final years and death
On April 14, 1960, Cooper underwent surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston for an aggressive form of prostate cancer that had metastasized to his colon. He fell ill again on May 31 and underwent further surgery at Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles in early June to remove a malignant tumor from his large intestine. After recuperating over the summer, Cooper took his family on vacation to the south of France before traveling to the UK in the fall to star in The Naked Edge. In December 1960, he worked on the NBC television documentary The Real West, which was part of the company's Project 20 series.
On December 27, his wife learned from their family doctor that Cooper's cancer had spread to his lungs and bones and was inoperable. His family decided not to tell him immediately.
On January 9, 1961, Cooper attended a dinner that was given in his honor and hosted by Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin at the Friars Club. The dinner was attended by many of his industry friends and concluded with a brief speech by Cooper who said, "The only achievement I'm proud of is the friends I've made in this community."
In mid-January, Cooper took his family to Sun Valley for their last vacation together. Cooper and Hemingway hiked through the snow together for the last time. On February 27, after returning to Los Angeles, Cooper learned that he was dying. He later told his family, "We'll pray for a miracle; but if not, and that's God's will, that's all right too." On April 17, Cooper watched the Academy Awards ceremony on television and saw his good friend James Stewart, who had presented Cooper with his first Oscar years earlier, accept on Cooper's behalf an honorary award for lifetime achievement—his third Oscar. Holding back tears, Stewart said, "Coop, I'll get this to you right away. And Coop, I want you to know this, that with this goes all the warm friendship and the affection and the admiration and the deep, the deep respect of all of us. We're very, very proud of you, Coop. All of us are tremendously proud." The following day, newspapers around the world announced the news that Cooper was dying. In the coming days he received numerous messages of appreciation and encouragement, including telegrams from Pope John XXIII and Queen Elizabeth II, and a telephone call from President John F. Kennedy.
In his last public statement on May 4, Cooper said, "I know that what is happening is God's will. I am not afraid of the future." He received the last rites on May 12. Cooper died quietly the following day, Saturday, May 13, 1961, at 12:47 P.M.
A requiem mass was held on May 18 at the Church of the Good Shepherd, attended by many of Cooper's friends, including James Stewart, Jack Benny, Henry Hathaway, Joel McCrea, Audrey Hepburn, Jack L. Warner, John Ford, John Wayne, Edward G. Robinson, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Fred Astaire, Randolph Scott, Walter Pidgeon, Bob Hope and Marlene Dietrich. Cooper was buried in the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes in Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City, California. In May 1974, after his family relocated to New York, Cooper's remains were exhumed and reburied in Sacred Hearts Cemetery in Southampton. His grave is marked by a three-ton boulder from a Montauk quarry.
Acting style and reputation
Cooper's acting style consisted of three essential characteristics: his ability to project elements of his own personality onto the characters he portrayed, to appear natural and authentic in his roles, and to underplay and deliver restrained performances calibrated for the camera and the screen. Acting teacher Lee Strasberg once observed: "The simplest examples of Stanislavsky's ideas are actors such as Gary Cooper, John Wayne, and Spencer Tracy. They try not to act but to be themselves, to respond or react. They refuse to say or do anything they feel not to be consonant with their own characters." Film director François Truffaut ranked Cooper among "the greatest actors" because of his ability to deliver great performances "without direction". This ability to project elements of his own personality onto his characters produced a continuity across his performances to the extent that critics and audiences were convinced that he was simply "playing himself".
Cooper's ability to project his personality onto his characters played an important part in his appearing natural and authentic on screen. Actor John Barrymore said of Cooper, "This fellow is the world's greatest actor. He does without effort what the rest of us spend our lives trying to learn—namely, to be natural." Charles Laughton, who played opposite Cooper in Devil and the Deep agreed, "In truth, that boy hasn't the least idea how well he acts ... He gets at it from the inside, from his own clear way of looking at life." William Wyler, who directed Cooper in two films, called him a "superb actor, a master of movie acting".
In his review of Cooper's performance in The Real Glory, Graham Greene wrote, "Sometimes his lean photogenic face seems to leave everything to the lens, but there is no question here of his not acting. Watch him inoculate the girl against cholera—the casual jab of the needle, and the dressing slapped on while he talks, as though a thousand arms had taught him where to stab and he doesn't have to think anymore."
Cooper's style of underplaying before the camera surprised many of his directors and fellow actors. Even in his earliest feature films, he recognized the camera's ability to pick up slight gestures and facial movements. Commenting on Cooper's performance in Sergeant York, director Howard Hawks observed, "He worked very hard and yet he didn't seem to be working. He was a strange actor because you'd look at him during a scene and you'd think ... this isn't going to be any good. But when you saw the rushes in the projection room the next day you could read in his face all the things he'd been thinking." Sam Wood, who directed Cooper in four films, had similar observations about Cooper's performance in Pride of the Yankees, noting, "What I thought was underplaying turned out to be just the right approach. On the screen he's perfect, yet on the set you'd swear it's the worst job of acting in the history of motion pictures."
Fellow actors admired his abilities as an actor. Commenting on her two films playing opposite Cooper, actress Ingrid Bergman concluded, "The personality of this man was so enormous, so overpowering—and that expression in his eyes and his face, it was so delicate and so underplayed. You just didn't notice it until you saw it on the screen. I thought he was marvelous; the most underplaying and the most natural actor I ever worked with."
Tom Hanks declared, "In only one scene in the first film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture, we see the future of screen acting in the form of Gary Cooper. He is quiet and natural, somehow different from the other cast members. He does something mysterious with his eyes and shoulders that is much more like 'being' than 'acting'."
Daniel Day-Lewis said, "I don't particularly like westerns as a genre, but I do love certain westerns. 'High Noon' means a lot to me – I love the purity and the honesty, I love Gary Cooper in that film, the idea of the last man standing."
Chris Pratt stated, "I started watching Westerns when I was shooting in London about four or five years ago. I really fell in love with Gary Cooper, and his stuff. That sucked me into the Westerns. Before, I never got engrossed in the story. I'd just dip in, and there were guys in horses in black and white. High Noon's later Gary Cooper, I liked that. But I liked 'The Westerner'. That's my favorite one. I have that poster hung up in my house because I really like that one."
To Al Pacino, "Gary Cooper was a phenomenon—his ability to take some thing and elevate it, give it such dignity. One of the great presences."
Mylène Demongeot first got with Gary Cooper for the opening of the first escalator to be installed in a cinema, at the Rex Theatre in Paris, on June 7, 1957. She declared in a 2015 filmed interview: "Gary Cooper ... il est sublime ! Aaahhh (Mylène pushing a cry of love not to say ecstasy) il est sublime ... Ah ! Ah ! Ah ! Là je dois dire que ça fait partie des stars, y'a Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, ces grands Américains que j'ai rencontrés comme ça, c'est vraiment des mecs incroyables. Y'en a plus des comme ça ! Euh non. (Gary Cooper was sublime, there I have to say, now he, was part of the stars, Gary Cooper, Cary Grant, John Wayne, those great americans who I've met really were unbelievable guys, there aren't any like them anymore)."
Career assessment and legacy
Cooper's career spanned thirty-six years, from 1925 to 1961. During that time, he appeared in eighty-four feature films in a leading role. He was a major movie star from the end of the silent film era to the end of the golden age of Classical Hollywood. His natural and authentic acting style appealed powerfully to both men and women, and his range of performances included roles in most major movie genres, including Westerns, war films, adventure films, drama films, crime films, romance films, comedy films, and romantic comedy films. He appeared on the Motion Picture Herald exhibitor's poll of top ten film personalities for twenty-three consecutive years, from 1936 to 1958. According to Quigley's annual poll, Cooper was one of the top money-making stars for eighteen years, appearing in the top ten in 1936–37, 1941–49, and 1951–57. He topped the list in 1953. In Quigley's list of all-time money-making stars, Cooper is listed fourth, after John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and Tom Cruise. At the time of his death, it was estimated that his films grossed well over $200 million (equivalent to $ billion in ).
In over half of his feature films, Cooper portrayed Westerners, soldiers, pilots, sailors, and explorers—all men of action. In the rest he played a wide range of characters, included doctors, professors, artists, architects, clerks, and baseball players. Cooper's heroic screen image changed with each period of his career. In his early films, he played the young naive hero sure of his moral position and trusting in the triumph of simple virtues (The Virginian). After becoming a major star, his Western screen persona was replaced by a more cautious hero in adventure films and dramas (A Farewell to Arms). During the height of his career, from 1936 to 1943, he played a new type of hero—a champion of the common man willing to sacrifice himself for others (Mr. Deeds, Meet John Doe, and For Whom the Bell Tolls).
In the post-war years, Cooper attempted broader variations on his screen image, which now reflected a hero increasingly at odds with the world who must face adversity alone (The Fountainhead and High Noon). In his final films, Cooper's hero rejects the violence of the past, and seeks to reclaim lost honor and find redemption (Friendly Persuasion and Man of the West). The screen persona he developed and sustained throughout his career represented the ideal American hero—a tall, handsome, and sincere man of steadfast integrity who emphasized action over intellect, and combined the heroic qualities of the romantic lover, the adventurer, and the common man.
On February 6, 1960, Cooper was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6243 Hollywood Boulevard for his contribution to the film industry. He was awarded a star on the sidewalk outside the Ellen Theater in Bozeman, Montana.
On May 6, 1961, he was awarded the French Order of Arts and Letters in recognition of his significant contribution to the arts. On July 30, 1961, he was posthumously awarded the David di Donatello Special Award in Italy for his career achievements.
In 1966, he was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. In 2015, he was inducted into the Utah Cowboy and Western Heritage Hall of Fame. The American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Cooper eleventh on its list of the 25 male stars of classic Hollywood. Three of his characters—Will Kane, Lou Gehrig, and Sergeant York—made AFI's list of the one hundred greatest heroes and villains, all of them as heroes. His Lou Gehrig line, "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.", is ranked by AFI as the thirty-eighth greatest movie quote of all time.
More than a half century after his death, Cooper's enduring legacy, according to biographer Jeffrey Meyers, is his image of the ideal American hero preserved in his film performances. Charlton Heston once observed, "He projected the kind of man Americans would like to be, probably more than any actor that's ever lived."
In the TV series Justified, based on works and characters created by Elmore Leonard, Gary Cooper is used throughout the six seasons as the man whom U.S. Marshall Raylan Givens, played by Timothy Olyphant, aspires to be. When his colleague asks Marshall Givens how he thinks his dangerous plan to bring down a villain can possibly work, he replies: "Why not? Worked for Gary Cooper."
Gary Cooper is referenced several times in the critically acclaimed television series The Sopranos, with protagonist Tony Soprano asking "What ever happened to Gary Cooper? The strong, silent type." while complaining about his problems to his therapist.
In the 1930s hit song "Puttin' On the Ritz", Cooper is referenced in the line "dress up like a million dollar trooper/Tryin' hard to look like Gary Cooper, Super duper!" More than two decades after Cooper's death a new version of the song was released in 1983 by Taco; the original lyrics were kept, including the references to Cooper.
In J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye, Cooper is "spotted" by Holden Caulfield to distract a woman he is dancing with.
Awards and nominations
Filmography
The following is a list of feature films in which Cooper appeared in a leading role.
The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926)
Children of Divorce (1927)
Arizona Bound (1927)
Wings (1927)
Nevada (1927)
It (1927)
The Last Outlaw (1927)
Beau Sabreur (1928)
The Legion of the Condemned (1928)
Doomsday (1928)
Half a Bride (1928)
Lilac Time (1928)
The First Kiss (1928)
The Shopworn Angel (1928)
Wolf Song (1929)
Betrayal (1929)
The Virginian (1929)
Only the Brave (1930)
The Texan (1930)
Seven Days' Leave (1930)
A Man from Wyoming (1930)
The Spoilers (1930)
Morocco (1930)
Fighting Caravans (1931)
City Streets (1931)
I Take This Woman (1931)
His Woman (1931)
Devil and the Deep (1932)
If I Had a Million (1932)
A Farewell to Arms (1932)
Today We Live (1933)
One Sunday Afternoon (1933)
Design for Living (1933)
Alice in Wonderland (1933)
Operator 13 (1934)
Now and Forever (1934)
The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935)
The Wedding Night (1935)
Peter Ibbetson (1935)
Desire (1936)
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)
The General Died at Dawn (1936)
The Plainsman (1936)
Souls at Sea (1937)
The Adventures of Marco Polo (1938)
Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938)
The Cowboy and the Lady (1938)
Beau Geste (1939)
The Real Glory (1939)
The Westerner (1940)
North West Mounted Police (1940)
Meet John Doe (1941)
Sergeant York (1941)
Ball of Fire (1941)
The Pride of the Yankees (1942)
For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)
The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944)
Casanova Brown (1944)
Along Came Jones (1945)
Saratoga Trunk (1945)
Cloak and Dagger (1946)
Unconquered (1947)
Good Sam (1948)
The Fountainhead (1949)
Task Force (1949)
Bright Leaf (1950)
Dallas (1950)
You're in the Navy Now (1951)
It's a Big Country (1951)
Distant Drums (1951)
High Noon (1952)
Springfield Rifle (1952)
Return to Paradise (1953)
Blowing Wild (1953)
Garden of Evil (1954)
Vera Cruz (1954)
The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (1955)
Friendly Persuasion (1956)
Love in the Afternoon (1957)
Ten North Frederick (1958)
Man of the West (1958)
The Hanging Tree (1959)
They Came to Cordura (1959)
The Wreck of the Mary Deare (1959)
The Naked Edge (1961)
Radio appearances
References
Notes
Citations
Bibliography
Adrien Le Bihan, Gary Cooper, le prince des acteurs, LettMotif, 2021, 358p.()
External links
1901 births
1961 deaths
20th-century American male actors
Academy Honorary Award recipients
American expatriates in England
American male film actors
American male silent film actors
American male television actors
American people of English descent
Best Actor Academy Award winners
Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners
California Republicans
Catholics from Montana
Conservatism in the United States
Converts to Roman Catholicism from Anglicanism
Deaths from cancer in California
Deaths from prostate cancer
Grinnell College people
Male Western (genre) film actors
Male actors from Montana
Paramount Pictures contract players
People educated at Dunstable Grammar School
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People from Holmby Hills, Los Angeles | false | [
"This article contains a list of child bridegrooms or child husbands wherein notable or historically significant examples have been singled out.\n\nList\n\nAntiquity \n Tutankhamun was married before the age of nine years to his half-sister Ankhesenamun (aged about 16).\n\n8th century \n The future Emperor Shōmu (aged about 16) was married to in Asukabe-hime (aged 16) .\n\n10th century \n The future Otto II, Holy Roman Emperor (aged 16/17), was married to Theophanu (aged about 17) in 972.\n\n The future Louis V of France (aged about 15) was married to the twice-widowed Adelaide-Blanche of Anjou (aged 40) in 982.\n\n The future Emperor Ichijō (aged 10) was married to Fujiwara no Teishi (about 12/13) in October 990.\n\n11th century \n Fujiwara no Shōshi (aged about 12) was married to the future Emperor Ichijō (aged 19/20) in 1000.\n\n The future Emperor Go-Ichijō (aged 10) married his aunt Fujiwara no Ishi (aged 19) in 1018.\n\n The future Emperor Horikawa (aged 14) was married to his paternal aunt Princess Tokushi (aged about 33) in 1093.\n\n12th century \n Pons, Count of Tripoli (aged 13/14), was married to Cecile of France (aged 14/15) in 1112.\n\n William Adelin (aged 15), son and heir of Henry I of England, was married to Matilda of Anjou (aged about 13) in 1119.\n\n Louis VII of France (aged 17) married Eleanor of Aquitaine (aged about 15) in 1137; their marriage was annulled in 1152.\n\n Eustace IV, Count of Boulogne (aged about 12/13), was married to Constance of France (aged about 15/16) in 1140.\n\n Philip I, Count of Flanders (aged 15/16), was married to Elisabeth of Vermandois (aged 16) in 1159.\n\n The future Emperor Nijō (aged 15) was married to his paternal aunt Princess Yoshiko (aged 17) in March 1159.\n\n Alfonso VIII of Castile (aged 14/15) married Eleanor of England in 1170, when she was about 9-years-old.\n\n Henry the Young King (aged 17) was married to Margaret of France (aged 13/14) in 1172. They had been betrothed since 1160, when Henry was 5 and Margaret was about 2.\n\n Canute VI of Denmark (aged about 13/14) was married to Gertrude of Bavaria (aged 22 or 25) in 1177. They had been engaged since 1171, since he was about 7/8 and she was about 16 or 19.\n\n Henry I, Duke of Brabant (aged about 14), was married to Matilda of Boulogne (aged 9) in 1179.\n\n Alexios II Komnenos was 10 when he is reported to have married Agnes of France (aged 9) in 1180.\n\n Philip II of France (aged 14) married Isabella of Hainault (aged 10) in 1180.\n\n Humphrey IV of Toron (aged about 17) married Isabella of Jerusalem (aged 10/11) in 1183. They had been betrothed when Humphrey was about 14/15 and Isabella was 8-years-old.\n\n Conrad II, Duke of Swabia (aged 13/14), married Berengaria of Castile in 1187, when she was about 8-years-old. The marriage was never consummated due to Berengaria's young age.\n\n William IV, Count of Ponthieu (aged 15/16), was married to Alys of France, Countess of Vexin (aged 34), in 1195.\n\n13th century \n Henry VI, Count Palatine of the Rhine (aged about 16), was married to Matilda of Brabant (aged about 12) in 1212.\n\n Henry I of Castile married his cousin Mafalda of Portugal (aged about 20) in 1215, when he was either 10- or 11-years-old. The marriage was never consummated due to Henry's young age; and the marriage was annulled by the Pope in 1216 on the grounds of consanguinity. Later that year, Henry was betrothed to his second cousin Sancha, heiress of León, but he died in 1217 at the age of 13.\n\n Baldwin II of Constantinople (aged about 17) was married to Marie of Brienne (aged about 10) in 1234.\n\n Alexander III of Scotland (aged 10) was married to Margaret of England (aged 11) in December 1251.\n\n Edward I of England (aged 15) was married to Eleanor of Castile (aged 13) in 1254.\n\n The future Philip III of France (aged 17) was married to Isabella of Aragon (aged 13/14) in May 1262. They had been betrothed since May 1258, when he was 13 and she was 9/10.\n\n John I, Duke of Brabant (17/18), was married to Margaret of France (aged 15/16) in 1270.\n\n The future Ladislaus IV of Hungary (aged 7/8) was married to Elizabeth of Sicily (aged 8/9) in 1270.\n\n Philip of Sicily (aged about 15/16) was married to Isabella of Villehardouin (aged either 8 or 11) in May 1271.\n\n The future Philip IV of France (aged 16) was married to Joan I of Navarre (aged 11) in August 1285.\n\n Wenceslaus II of Bohemia (aged 13) was married to Judith of Habsburg (aged 13) in January 1285.\n\n John II, Duke of Brabant (aged 14), was married to Margaret of England (aged 15) in 1290. John and Margaret had been betrothed since they were 2 and 3, respectively.\n\n Henry, Count of Luxembourg (aged about 13/14), was married to Margaret of Brabant (aged 15) in July 1292.\n\n John I, Count of Holland (aged 12/13), was married to Elizabeth of Rhuddlan (aged 14) in 1297.\n\n14th century \n Roger Mortimer, 1st Earl of March (aged 14), was married to Joan de Geneville (aged 15) in 1301.\n\n The future Gaston I, Count of Foix (aged 13/14), was married to Joan of Artois (aged 11/12) in 1301.\n\n The future Louis X of France (aged 15) was married to Margaret of Burgundy (aged about 15) in 1305.\n\n Philip V of France (aged about 13/14) was married to Joan of Burgundy (aged 14/15) in 1307.\n\n The future Charles IV of France (aged 13) was married to Blanche of Burgundy (aged about 11/12) in January 1308.\n\n John of Luxembourg (aged 14) was married to Elizabeth of Bohemia (aged 18) in September 1310.\n\n John III, Duke of Brabant (aged 10/11), was married to Marie of Évreux (aged 7/8) in 1311.\n\n Edmund Mortimer (aged about 13/14, possibly younger) was married to Elizabeth de Badlesmere (aged 3) in 1316.\n\n Thomas Beauchamp (aged about 6) was married to Katherine Mortimer (aged about 5) in 1319.\n\n Louis I, Count of Flanders (aged about 15/16), was married to Margaret of France (aged 9/10) in 1320.\n\n Guigues VIII of Viennois (aged 13/14) was married to Isabella of France (aged 10/11) in 1323.\n\n Alfonso XI of Castile (aged 13/14) was married to Constanza Manuel of Villena (aged at most 10) in 1325. He had the marriage annulled two years later, and in 1328, at the age of 16/17, married his double first cousin Maria of Portugal (aged 14/15).\n \n Edward III of England (aged 15) was married to Philippa of Hainault (between the ages of 12 and 17) in 1327.\n\n The future David II of Scotland (aged 4) was married to Joan of the Tower (aged 7) in 1328.\n\n Laurence Hastings, 1st Earl of Pembroke (aged about 9/10), was married to Agnes Mortimer (aged about 11/12) in 1328 or 1329. Laurence was a ward of Agnes's father, Roger Mortimer, 1st Earl of March.\n\n Charles IV, King of Bohemia (aged about 12/13; later Holy Roman Emperor), was married to Blanche of Valois (aged about 12/13) in 1329.\n\n Reginald II, Duke of Guelders (aged about 16), was married to Sophia Berthout in 1311. After Sophia's death in 1329, he married Eleanor of Woodstock (aged 13) in 1332, when he was about 37-years-old.\n\n John, Duke of Normandy (aged 13), was married to Bonne of Luxembourg (aged 17) in July 1332.\n\n Andrew of Hungary (aged 6) was married to the future Joanna I of Naples (aged about 6/7) in 1333.\n\n William IV, Count of Holland (aged 10/11), was married to Joanna of Brabant (aged 11/12) in 1334.\n\n Marie de Namur (aged about 13/14) was married to Henry II, Graf of Vianden, in 1335/36. Henry was murdered in 1337; about three years later, in 1340, Marie (now about 17/18) was married to Theobald of Bar, Seigneur de Pierrepont (aged about 25/26), her second cousin, once removed.\n\n Philip of Burgundy (aged about 14/15) was married to Joan I, Countess of Auvergne (aged about 11/12), circa 1338.\n\n William Montagu (aged 12) was married to Joan of Kent (aged 13) in either late 1340 or early 1341. In 1348, it was revealed that Joan had secretly married Thomas Holland, 1st Earl of Kent, in 1340; and, as a result, Montagu's marriage to Joan was annulled.\n\n Gaston III, Count of Foix (aged 16/17), was married to Agnes of Navarre (aged 13/14) in 1348.\n\n Charles V of France (aged 12) was married Joanna of Bourbon (aged 12) to in April 1350.\n\n Thomas de Vere, 8th Earl of Oxford (aged about 15), was married to Maud de Ufford (born 1345/46) sometime before 10 June 1350, when Maud was about 5-years-old.\n\n Lionel of Antwerp, 1st Duke of Clarence (aged 13/14), was married to Elizabeth de Burgh, 4th Countess of Ulster (aged 20), in 1352.\n\n Philip I, Duke of Burgundy (aged 10/11), was married to the future Margaret III, Countess of Flanders (aged 6/7), in 1357.\n\n Richard Fitzalan (aged 12/13) was married to Elizabeth de Bohun (aged about 9) in 1359.\n\n John Hastings, 2nd Earl of Pembroke (aged 11), was married to Margaret of England (aged 12), daughter of Henry III of England, in 1359.\n\n Gian Galeazzo Visconti (aged 8) was married to Isabella of Valois (aged 11/12) in October 1360, about a week before Gian's 9th birthday.\n\n Albert III, Duke of Austria (aged 16/17), was married to Elisabeth of Bohemia (aged 7/8) in 1366.\n\n Edmund Mortimer, 3rd Earl of March (aged 15/16), was married to Philippa of Clarence (aged 12/13) in 1368.\n\n The future Charles III of Navarre (aged 13/14) was married to Eleanor of Castile (aged about 12) in May 1375.\n\n John V, Lord of Arkel (aged 14), was married to Joanna of Jülich in October 1376.\n\n John Hastings, 3rd Earl of Pembroke (aged 8), was married to Elizabeth of Lancaster (aged 17) in 1380. The marriage remained unconsummated due to John's age, and was annulled after Elizabeth became pregnant by John Holland, 1st Duke of Exeter, whom she later married.\n\n Henry Bolingbroke (aged 13; later King Henry IV of England) was married to Mary de Bohun (aged about 10/11) in 1380.\n\n Richard II of England (aged 15) was married to Anne of Bohemia (aged 15) in January 1382.\n\n John, Count of Nevers (aged 14) was married to Margaret of Bavaria (aged 21/22) in April 1385.\n\n The future John V, Duke of Brittany (aged 6/7), was married to Joan of France (aged 4/5) in 1396.\n\n John of Perche (aged 10/11) was married to Marie of Brittany (aged 5) in July 1396.\n\n15th century \n Louis, Duke of Guyenne (aged 7), married Margaret of Nevers (aged 10) in August 1404.\nCharles, Duke of Orléans (aged 11), married his cousin Isabella of Valois (aged 16) in June 1406.\n\n Philip the Good (aged 12) was married to Michelle of Valois (aged 14) in June 1409.\n\n John, Duke of Touraine (aged 16), was married to Jacqueline of Hainaut (aged 14) in 1415.\n\n John IV, Duke of Brabant (aged 14), was married to Jacqueline of Hainaut (aged 16) in March 1418, following her first husband's death the year before.\n\n John II, Duke of Alençon (aged 15), married Joan of Valois (aged 15), daughter of Charles, Duke of Orléans, in 1424.\n\n Louis, Dauphin of France (aged 12), was married to Margaret Stewart (aged 11), daughter of James I of Scotland, in June 1436. The wedding took place a little over a week before Louis's thirteenth birthday.\n\n Henry IV of Castile (aged 14/15) was married to his cousin Blanche of Navarre (aged 15/16) in 1440.\n\n Afonso V of Portugal (aged 15) was married to Isabel of Coimbra (aged 15) in May 1447.\n\n John de la Pole (age 7) was married to Margaret Beaufort, (age 7; approximately) in 1450 by the arrangement John's father. The marriage was annulled in 1453.\n\n Ferdinand II of Aragon (aged 17) was married to his second cousin Infanta Isabella of Castile (aged 18; later Isabella I of Castile) in 1469. They became the parents of Catherine of Aragon.\n\n John, Prince of Portugal (aged 14) was married to his first cousin Eleanor of Viseu (aged 11) in January 1470.\n\n Louis, Duke of Orléans (aged 14) was married to his cousin Joan of France, Duchess of Berry (age 12), in 1476.\n\n Richard of Shrewsbury, 1st Duke of York (age 4), was married to Anne de Mowbray, 8th Countess of Norfolk (age 6), in 1477. She died at age 10 and he, as one of the Princes in the Tower, is believed to have been murdered at age 10.\n\n Afonso, Prince of Portugal (aged about 15), was married by proxy to Isabella of Aragon (aged 19) in the spring of 1490.\n\n16th century \n Arthur, Prince of Wales (aged 15), was married to Catherine of Aragon (aged 15) in 1501. He died a few months later and she eventually married his younger brother, Henry VIII of England.\n\n Charles, Count of Montpensier (aged 15), was married to Suzanne, Duchess of Bourbon (aged 14), in 1505.\n\n Henry VIII of England (aged 17), married Catherine of Aragon (aged 23) in June 1509, a couple of weeks before his 18th birthday.\n\n Claude, Duke of Guise (aged 16), was married to Antoinette de Bourbon (aged 18) in 1513.\n\n Henry, Duke of Orléans (aged 14), was married to Catherine de' Medici (aged 14) in 1533.\n\n Henry Grey, Marquess of Dorset (aged 15/16), was married to Lady Frances Brandon (aged 15/16) in 1533.\n\n Henry Clifford (aged 17/18) was married to Lady Eleanor Brandon (aged 15/16) in 1535.\n\n Ottavio Farnese, Duke of Parma (aged 14), grandson of Pope Paul III, was married to Margaret of Parma (aged 15), illegitimate daughter of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, in November 1538.\n\n Philip, Prince of Asturias (aged 16; later Philip II of Spain), was married to Maria Manuela, Princess of Portugal (aged 16), in 1543.\n\n João Manuel, Prince of Portugal (aged 14), was married to his double first cousin Joanna of Austria (aged 16) in 1552.\n\n Lord Guildford Dudley (aged about 17/18) was married to Lady Jane Grey (aged about 16/17) in 1553.\n\n Henry, Lord Herbert, was at most 15-years-old, was married to Lady Katherine Grey (aged 12), younger sister of Lady Jane Grey, in 1553. The marriage was annulled in 1554.\n\n Francis, Dauphin of France (aged 13/14), was married to Mary, Queen of Scots (aged 15/16), in 1558. The pair had been betrothed since Mary was five and Francis was three.\n\n Charles III, Duke of Lorraine (aged 15), was married to Claude of France (aged 11), daughter of Henry II of France, in 1559.\n\n17th century \n Alfonso, Hereditary Prince of Modena (aged 16/17), was married to Isabella of Savoy (aged 16) in 1608.\n\n César, Duke of Vendôme (aged 14), was married to Françoise de Lorraine (aged 15/16) in July 1608.\n\n Frederick V, Elector Palatine (aged 16), married Elizabeth Stuart (aged 16), eldest daughter of James VI and I and Anne of Denmark, in 1613.\n\n Louis XIII of France (aged 14) was married to his second cousin Anne of Austria (aged 14) in November 1615.\n\n The future Ferdinand Maria, Elector of Bavaria (aged 14), was married to Princess Henriette Adelaide of Savoy (aged 14) in December 1650.\n\n The future William II, Prince of Orange (aged 15), married Mary, Princess Royal (aged 9), in 1641. The marriage was reported to not have been consummated for a number of years due to the bride's age.\n\n Walter Scott of Highchester (aged 14) was married to Mary Scott, 3rd Countess of Buccleuch (aged 11), in 1659.\n\n James Crofts, 1st Duke of Monmouth (aged 14), illegitimate son of Charles II of England and his mistress Lucy Walter, was married to Anne Scott, 1st Duchess of Buccleuch (aged 12), in April 1663.\n\n Sir Edward Lee (aged 14) was married to Lady Charlotte FitzRoy (aged 13) in 1677. They had been betrothed since 1674, before Charlotte's tenth birthday.\n\n Ivan V of Russia (aged 17) was married to Praskovia Saltykova (aged 18/19) in either late 1683 or early 1684.\n\n Louis, Prince of Condé (aged 16), was married to his distant cousin Louise Françoise de Bourbon (aged 11) in 1685.\n\n Philippe, Duke of Chartres (aged 17), married his first cousin Françoise Marie de Bourbon (aged 14), legitimated daughter of Louis XIV, in February 1692.\n\n Louis, Duke of Burgundy (aged 15), was married to Marie Adélaïde of Savoy (aged 12) in December 1697.\n\n18th century \n Philip V of Spain (aged 17) was married to Maria Luisa Gabriela of Savoy (aged 12) in September 1701, five days before Maria Luisa's 13th birthday.\n\n Louis Armand II, Prince of Conti (aged 17), was married to Louise Élisabeth de Bourbon (aged 19) in July 1713.\n\n Jules, Prince of Soubise (aged 17), was married to Anne Julie de Melun (aged 15/16) in September 1714.\n\n Louis, Prince of Asturias (aged 14), was married by proxy to Louise Élisabeth d'Orléans (aged 11) in November 1721.\n\n Louis XV of France (aged 15) was married to Marie Leszczyńska (aged 22) in 1725.\n\n José, Prince of Brazil (aged 14), was married to Infanta Mariana Victoria of Spain (aged 10) in January 1729.\n\n Louis François, Prince of Conti (aged 14), was married to Louise Diane d'Orléans (aged 15) in January 1732.\n\n Gaston, Count of Marsan (aged 17), was married to Marie Louise de Rohan (aged 16) in June 1736.\n\n Ercole Rinaldo d'Este (aged 13/14) was married to Maria Teresa Cybo-Malaspina, Duchess of Massa (aged 15/16) in 1741.\n\n Louis, Dauphin of France (aged 15), was married to Infanta Maria Teresa Rafaela of Spain (aged 18) in 1744. After Maria Teresa's death in early 1746, Louis was required to remarry quickly in order to secure the succession to the French crown. Thus, he married again in February 1747, at the age of 17, to Duchess Maria Josepha of Saxony (aged 15).\n\n Peter of Holstein-Gottorp (later Peter III of Russia) was 17-years-old when he married his 16-year-old second cousin Princess Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst (later known as Catherine the Great) in 1745.\n\n Louis Joseph, Prince of Condé (aged 16), was married to Charlotte de Rohan (aged 15) in 1753.\n\n Christian VII of Denmark (aged 17) was married to Princess Caroline Matilda of Great Britain (aged 15) in 1766.\n\n Ferdinand IV & III of Naples and Sicily (aged 17) was married by proxy to Maria Carolina of Austria (aged 15) in April 1768.\n\n Louis Henri, Duke of Enghien (aged 14), was married to Bathilde d'Orléans (aged 19) in 1770.\n\n Louis-Auguste, Dauphin of France (aged 15), was married to Archduchess Maria Antonia of Austria (aged 14; later known as Marie Antoinette) in April 1770.\n\n Louis Stanislas, Count of Provence (aged 15; the future King Louis XVIII of France), was married to Marie Joséphine of Savoy (aged 17) in 1771.\n\n Charles Philippe, Duke of Artois (aged 16; later Charles X of France), was married to Princess Maria Theresa of Savoy (aged 17) in 1773.\n\n The future Alexander I of Russia (aged 15) married Princess Louise of Baden (aged 14) in 1793.\n\n19th century\n Ferdinand, Prince of Asturias (aged 17; later Ferdinand VII of Spain), was married to his first cousin Princess Maria Antonia of Naples and Sicily (aged 17) in October 1802, about a week before his 18th birthday.\n\n Tokugawa Iemochi (aged 15) was married to Chikako, Princess Kazu (aged 15), daughter of Emperor Ninkō, in February 1862.\n\nCeremonial marriages\n\nSanele Masilela, a nine year old South African boy married 62-year-old Helen Shabangu.\nJose Griggs, at the age of seven, married nine-year-old Jayla Cooper\n\nSee also\nList of child brides\nTeen marriage\n\nReferences\n\nLists of men\nHusbands",
"Lachlan Og MacLean, 1st Laird of Torloisk was the second son of Sir Lachlan Mor Maclean and the first Laird of Torloisk.\n\nBiography\nHe was the second son of Sir Lachlan Mor Maclean, and he received from his father a charter of the lands of Lehire-Torloisk, forfeited by the son of Ailean nan Sop, which was afterward confirmed by royal grant. He was present at the Battle of Gruinnart, and was severely wounded. He was a witness to a charter given by his father to Martin MacGillivray of Pennyghael, and subscribed himself in the Irish characters, Mise Lachin Mhac Gilleoin. He was an important man in his day, and was so influential that he was compelled to make his appearance before the privy council.\n\nHe was first married to Marian, daughter of Sir Duncan Campbell of Achnabreck and had:\nHector MacLean, 2nd Laird of Torloisk\nHe was a second time married to Margaret, daughter of Captain Stewart of Dumbarton, but had no children. \nHe was a third time married to Marian, daughter of Donald MacDonald of Clanranald, and had:\nHector Maclean\nLachlan Og Maclean, who died unmarried but had a son Donald Maclean\nLachlan Catanach Maclean was killed at Inverkeithing\nEwen Maclean\nJohn Diuriach Maclean married the daughter of John Maclean, Laird of Ardgour and had Allan and several daughters\nOther children include: \nAllan Maclean who died unmarried at Harris\nNeil Maclean who married a daughter of Lochbuie, by whom he had a daughter\nLachlan, who died a lieutenant-colonel in the British service\nJannet Maclean, married Hector, first MacLean of Kinlochaline \nMary Maclean, married John Garbh, eldest son of John Dubh of Morvern \nCatherine Maclean, married John, brother to MacNeil of Barra\nJulian Maclean, married Allan MacLean, brother of Lochbuie\nIsabella Maclean, married Martin MacGillivray of Pennyghael\n\nLachlan Og lived to an advanced age, and was succeeded by his eldest son, Hector MacLean, 2nd Laird of Torloisk.\n\nReferences\n\nYear of birth missing\nYear of death missing\nLachlan Og MacLean, 1st Laird of Torloisk\nLachlan"
] |
[
"Henry Irving",
"Peak years"
] | C_f3675a36154a4513a9141f85ee158360_0 | What did Irving act in during his peak years? | 1 | What did IHenry Irving act in during his peak years? | Henry Irving | In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum under his own management. With Terry as Ophelia and Portia, he revived Hamlet and produced The Merchant of Venice (1879). His Shylock was as much discussed as his Hamlet had been, the dignity with which he invested the vengeful Jewish merchant marking a departure from the traditional interpretation of the role. After the production of Tennyson's The Cup and revivals of Othello (in which Irving played Iago to Edwin Booth's title character) and Romeo and Juliet, there began a period at the Lyceum which had a potent effect on the English stage. Much Ado about Nothing (1882) was followed by Twelfth Night (1884); an adaptation of Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield by W. G. Wills (1885); Faust (1886); Macbeth (1888, with incidental music by Arthur Sullivan); The Dead Heart, by Watts Phillips (1889); Ravenswood by Herman, and Merivales' dramatic version of Scott's Bride of Lammermoor (1890). Portrayals in 1892 of the characters of Wolsey in Henry VIII and of the title character in King Lear were followed in 1893 by a performance of Becket in Tennyson's play of the same name. During these years, too, Irving, with the whole Lyceum company, paid several successful visits to the United States and Canada, which were repeated in succeeding years. As Terry aged, there seemed to be fewer opportunities for her in his company; that was one reason she eventually left, moving on into less steady but nonetheless beloved stage work, including solo performances of Shakespeare's women. CANNOTANSWER | In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum | Sir Henry Irving (6 February 1838 – 13 October 1905), born John Henry Brodribb, sometimes known as J. H. Irving, was an English stage actor in the Victorian era, known as an actor-manager because he took complete responsibility (supervision of sets, lighting, direction, casting, as well as playing the leading roles) for season after season at the West End’s Lyceum Theatre, establishing himself and his company as representative of English classical theatre. In 1895 he became the first actor to be awarded a knighthood, indicating full acceptance into the higher circles of British society.
Irving is widely acknowledged to be one of the inspirations for Count Dracula, the title character of the 1897 novel Dracula whose author, Bram Stoker, was business manager of the theatre.
Life and career
Irving was born to a working-class family in Keinton Mandeville in the county of Somerset. W.H. Davies, the celebrated poet, was a cousin. Irving spent his childhood living with his aunt, Mrs Penberthy, at Halsetown in Cornwall. He competed in a recitation contest at a local Methodist chapel where he was beaten by William Curnow, later the editor of The Sydney Morning Herald. He attended City Commercial School for two years before going to work in the office of a law firm at age 13. When he saw Samuel Phelps play Hamlet soon after this, he sought lessons, letters of introduction, and work in the Lyceum Theatre in Sunderland in 1856, labouring against great odds until his 1871 success in The Bells in London set him apart from all the rest.
He married Florence O'Callaghan on 15 July 1869 at St. Marylebone, London, but his personal life took second place to his professional life. On opening night of The Bells, 25 November 1871, Florence, who was pregnant with their second child, criticised his profession: "Are you going on making a fool of yourself like this all your life?" Irving exited their carriage at Hyde Park Corner, walked off into the night, and chose never to see her again. He maintained a discreet distance from his children as well, but became closer to them as they grew older. Florence Irving never divorced Irving, and once he had been knighted she styled herself "Lady Irving"; Irving never remarried.
His elder son, Harry Brodribb Irving (1870–1919), usually known as "H B Irving", became a famous actor and later a theatre manager. His younger son, Laurence Irving (1871–1914), became a dramatist and later drowned, with his wife Mabel Hackney, in the sinking of the Empress of Ireland. H B married Dorothea Baird and they had a son, Laurence Irving (1897–1988), who became a well-known Hollywood art director and his grandfather's biographer.
In November 1882 Irving became a Freemason, being initiated into the prestigious Jerusalem Lodge No 197 in London. In 1887 he became a founder member and first Treasurer of the Savage Club Lodge No 2190, a Lodge associated with London's Savage Club.
He eventually took over the management of the Lyceum Theatre and brought actress Ellen Terry into partnership with him as Ophelia to his Hamlet, Lady Macbeth to his Macbeth, Portia to his Shylock, Beatrice to his Benedick, etc. Before joining the Lyceum, Terry had fled her first marriage and conceived two out-of-wedlock children with architect-designer Edward William Godwin, but regardless of how much and how often her behavior defied the strict morality expected by her Victorian audiences, she somehow remained popular. It could be said that Irving found his family in his professional company, which included his ardent supporter and manager Bram Stoker and Terry's two illegitimate children, Teddy and Edy.
Whether Irving's long, spectacularly successful relationship with leading lady Ellen Terry was romantic as well as professional has been the subject of much historical speculation. Most of their correspondence was lost or burned by her descendants. According to Michael Holroyd's book about Irving and Terry, A Strange Eventful History:
Terry's son Teddy, later known as Edward Gordon Craig, spent much of his childhood (from 1879, when he was 8, until 1897) indulged by Irving backstage at the Lyceum. Craig, who came to be regarded as something of a visionary for the theatre of the future, wrote an especially vivid, book-length tribute to Irving. ("Let me state at once, in clearest unmistakable terms, that I have never known of, or seen, or heard, a greater actor than was Irving.") George Bernard Shaw, at the time a theatre critic who was jealous of Irving's connection to Ellen Terry (whom Shaw himself wanted in his own plays), conceded Irving's genius after Irving died.
Early career
After a few years' schooling while living at Halsetown, near St Ives, Cornwall, Irving became a clerk to a firm of East India merchants in London, but he soon gave up a commercial career for acting. On 29 September 1856 he made his first appearance at Sunderland as Gaston, Duke of Orleans, in Bulwer Lytton's play, Richelieu, billed as Henry Irving. This name he eventually assumed by royal licence. When the inexperienced Irving got stage fright and was hissed off the stage the actor Samuel Johnson was among those who supported him with practical advice. Later in life Irving gave them all regular work when he formed his own Company at the Lyceum Theatre.
For 10 years, he went through an arduous training in various stock companies in Scotland and the north of England, taking more than 500 parts.
He gained recognition by degrees, and in 1866 Ruth Herbert engaged him as her leading man and sometime stage director at the St. James's Theatre, London, where she first played Doricourt in The Belle's Stratagem. One piece that he directed there was W. S. Gilbert's first successful solo play, Dulcamara, or the Little Duck and the Great Quack (1866) The next year he joined the company of the newly opened Queen's Theatre, where he acted with Charles Wyndham, J. L. Toole, Lionel Brough, John Clayton|, Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Wigan, Ellen Terry and Nellie Farren. This was followed by short engagements at the Haymarket Theatre, Drury Lane, and the Gaiety Theatre. In the spring of 1869, Irving was one of the original twelve members of The Lambs of London—assembled by John Hare as a social club for actors—and would be made an Honorary Lifetime member in 1883. He finally made his first conspicuous success as Digby Grant in James Albery's Two Roses, which was produced at the Vaudeville Theatre on 4 June 1870 and ran for a very successful 300 nights.
In 1871, Irving began his association with the Lyceum Theatre by an engagement under Bateman's management. The fortunes of the house were at a low ebb when the tide was turned by Irving's sudden success as Mathias in The Bells, a version of Erckmann-Chatrian's Le Juif polonais by Leopold Lewis, a property which Irving had found for himself. The play ran for 150 nights, established Irving at the forefront of the British drama, and would prove a popular vehicle for Irving for the rest of his professional life. With Bateman, Irving was seen in W. G. Wills' Charles I and Eugene Aram, in Richelieu, and in 1874 in Hamlet. The unconventionality of this last performance, during a run of 200 nights, aroused keen discussion and singled him out as the most interesting English actor of his day. In 1875, again with Bateman, he was seen as the title character in Macbeth; in 1876 as Othello, and as Philip in Alfred Lord Tennyson's Queen Mary; in 1877 in Richard III; and in The Lyons Mail. During this time he became lifelong friends with Bram Stoker, who praised him in his review of Hamlet and thereafter joined Irving as the manager for the company.
Peak years
In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum under his own management. With Terry as Ophelia and Portia, he revived Hamlet and produced The Merchant of Venice (1879). His Shylock was as much discussed as his Hamlet had been, the dignity with which he invested the vengeful Jewish merchant marking a departure from the traditional interpretation of the role.
After the production of Tennyson's The Cup and revivals of Othello (in which Irving played Iago to Edwin Booth's title character) and Romeo and Juliet, there began a period at the Lyceum which had a potent effect on the English stage.
Much Ado about Nothing (1882) was followed by Twelfth Night (1884); an adaptation of Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield by W. G. Wills (1885); Faust (1885); Macbeth (1888, with incidental music by Arthur Sullivan); The Dead Heart, by Watts Phillips (1889); Ravenswood by Herman, and Merivales' dramatic version of Scott's Bride of Lammermoor (1890). Portrayals in 1892 of the characters of Wolsey in Henry VIII and of the title character in King Lear were followed in 1893 by a performance of Becket in Tennyson's play of the same name. During these years, too, Irving, with the whole Lyceum company, paid several successful visits to the United States and Canada, which were repeated in succeeding years. As Terry aged, there seemed to be fewer opportunities for her in his company; that was one reason she eventually left, moving on into less steady but nonetheless beloved stage work, including solo performances of Shakespeare's women.
Influence on Bram Stoker's Dracula
From 1878, Bram Stoker worked for Irving as a business manager at the Lyceum. Stoker idolised Irving to the point that "As one contemporary remarked, 'To Bram, Irving is as a god, and can do no wrong.' In the considered judgment of one biographer, Stoker's friendship with Irving was 'the most important love relationship of his adult life.'" Irving, however, "… was a self-absorbed and profoundly manipulative man. He enjoyed cultivating rivalries between his followers, and to remain in his circle required constant, careful courting of his notoriously fickle affections." When Stoker began writing Dracula, Irving was the chief inspiration for the title character. In his 2002 paper for The American Historical Review, "Buffalo Bill Meets Dracula: William F. Cody, Bram Stoker, and the Frontiers of Racial Decay", historian Louis S. Warren writes:
Later years
The chief remaining novelties at the Lyceum during Irving's term as sole manager (at the beginning of 1899 the theatre passed into the hands of a limited-liability company) were Arthur Conan Doyle's Waterloo (1894); J. Comyns Carr's King Arthur in 1895; Cymbeline, in which Irving played Iachimo, in 1896; Sardou's Madame Sans-Gene in 1897; and Peter the Great, a play by Laurence Irving, the actor's second son, in 1898.
Irving received a death threat in 1899 from fellow actor (and murderer of William Terriss) Richard Archer Prince. Terriss had been stabbed at the stage door of the Adelphi Theatre in December 1897 and in the wake of his death, Prince was committed to Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum. Irving was critical of the unusually lenient sentence, remarking 'Terriss was an actor, so his murderer will not be executed.' Two years later, Prince had found Irving's home address and threatened to murder him 'when he gets out'. Irving was advised to submit the letter to the Home Office to ensure Prince's continued incarceration, which Irving declined to do.
In 1898 Irving was Rede Lecturer at the University of Cambridge. The new regime at the Lyceum was signalled by the production of Sardou's Robespierre in 1899, in which Irving reappeared after a serious illness, and in 1901 by an elaborate revival of Coriolanus. Irving's only subsequent production in London was as Sardou's Dante (1903) at the Drury Lane.
On 13 October 1905, at 67 years old, Irving was taking part in a performance while on tour in Bradford, when he suffered a stroke. He was taken to the lobby of the Midland Hotel, Bradford, where he died shortly afterwards. His death was described by Thomas Anstey Guthrie in his 'Long Retrospect':
The chair that he was sitting in when he died is now at the Garrick Club. He was cremated and his ashes buried in Westminster Abbey, thereby becoming the first person ever to be cremated prior to interment at Westminster.
There is a statue of him near the National Portrait Gallery in London. That statue, as well as the influence of Irving himself, plays an important part in the Robertson Davies novel World of Wonders. The Irving Memorial Garden was opened on 19 July 1951 by Laurence Olivier.
Legacy
Both on and off the stage, Irving always maintained a high ideal of his profession, and in 1895 he received a knighthood (first offered in 1883), the first ever accorded an actor. He was also the recipient of honorary degrees from the universities of Dublin (LL.D 1892), Cambridge (Litt.D 1898), and Glasgow (LL.D 1899). He also received the Komthur Cross, 2nd class, of the Saxe-Ernestine House Order of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and Saxe-Meiningen.
His acting divided critics; opinions differed as to the extent to which his mannerisms of voice and deportment interfered with or assisted the expression of his ideas.
Irving's idiosyncratic style of acting and its effect on amateur players was mildly satirised in The Diary of a Nobody. Mr Pooter's son brings Mr Burwin-Fosselton of the Holloway Comedians to supper, a young man who entirely monopolised the conversation, and:
"...who not only looked rather like Mr Irving but seemed to imagine he was the celebrated actor... he began doing the Irving business all through supper. He sank so low down in his chair that his chin was almost on a level with the table, and twice he kicked Carrie under the table, upset his wine, and flashed a knife uncomfortably near Gowing's face."
In the 1963 West End musical comedy Half a Sixpence the actor Chitterlow does an impression of Irving in The Bells. Percy French's burlesque heroic poem "Abdul Abulbul Amir" lists among the mock-heroic attributes of Abdul's adversary, the Russian Count Ivan Skavinsky Skavar, that "he could imitate Irving". In the 1995 film A Midwinter's Tale by Kenneth Branagh, two actors discuss Irving, and one of them, Richard Briers does an imitation of his speech. In the play The Woman in Black, set in the Victorian era, the actor playing Kipps tells Kipps 'We'll make an Irving of you yet,' in Act 1, as Kipps is not a very good actor due to his inexperience.
In the political sitcom Yes, Prime Minister (sequel to Yes, Minister), in the episode "The Patron of the Arts", first aired on 14 January 1988, the Prime Minister is asked what was the last play he'd seen, and replies "Hamlet." When asked "Whose?"—specifically, who played Hamlet, not who wrote it—he is unable to remember and is prompted with the suggestion "Henry Irving?" to audience laughter.
Biography
In 1906, Bram Stoker published a two-volume biography about Irving called Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving.
See also
Irving Family
Notes
References
Further reading
Stoker, Bram. Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving: Volume 1 and Volume 2. London : W. Heinemann, 1906. Scanned books via Internet Archive.
Archer, William 1885. Henry Irving, Actor and Manager: A Critical Study, London:Field & Tuer.
Beerbohm, Max. 1928. 'Henry Irving' in A Variety of Things. New York, Knopf.
Holroyd, Michael. 2008. A Strange Eventful History, Farrar Straus Giroux,
Irving, Laurence. 1989. Henry Irving: The Actor and His World. Lively Arts.
External links
The Irving Society
The Henry Irving Foundation
Information about Irving at the PeoplePlay UK website
NY Times article that includes information about Irving's American tour and the lease of the Lyceum to the American company at the same time
My First "Reading" by Henry Irving, an article written by Irving about a personal experience
Henry Irving North American Theatre Online with bio and pics
Henry Irving-Ellen Terry tour correspondence, 1884-1896, held by the Billy Rose Theatre Division, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts
1838 births
1905 deaths
English male stage actors
English male Shakespearean actors
19th-century English male actors
20th-century English male actors
19th-century theatre
Actor-managers
Knights Bachelor
Actors awarded knighthoods
English people of Cornish descent
People from South Somerset (district)
Burials at Westminster Abbey
Freemasons of the United Grand Lodge of England
19th-century theatre managers
20th-century theatre managers
Members of The Lambs Club | true | [
"Tropical Storm Irving, known in the Philippines as Tropical Depression Edeng, was an early-season tropical cyclone that struck southern Japan during August 1992. A distinct but weak low-pressure area developed within the Western Pacific monsoon trough. A tropical depression formed on July 31, and following an increase in both organization and thunderstorm activity, the depression attained tropical storm intensity on the morning of August 2. After tracking west-northwest and then north, Irving turned to the northeast, and attained peak intensity a day later. In response to a subtropical ridge to the north, the system began to track west-northwestward, and made landfall at maximum intensity over southwestern Shikoku at peak intensity. Irving turned sharply to the west and rapidly weakened, dissipating over the Korea Strait at noon on August 5.\n\nTropical Storm Irving was the first of two successive systems to move over the Japanese archipelago. Two people were reported missing in Wakayama prefecture. A swimmer was reported missing and two other people were killed offshore Kyōtango due to high waves. Overall, 51 flights linking Osaka and Shikoku were cancelled while ferry services between the Kansai region and Shikoku were also suspended. Damage was estimated at 601 million (US$4.74 million).\n\nMeteorological history\n\nThe final tropical cyclone to develop during July 1992, Tropical Storm Irving originated from a distinct but weak low-pressure area embedded in the Western Pacific monsoon trough that extended from the South China Sea to the central Philippine Sea. The Joint Typhoon Warning Center (JTWC) starting following the system at 06:00 UTC on July 30. Thunderstorm activity steadily increased; however, multiple low-level circulations remained present. On July 31, the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) upgraded the system into a tropical depression. The development of curved cloud lines on satellite imagery prompted to the JTWC to issue a Tropical Cyclone Formation Alert at 08:02 UTC. Following an improvement of the system's structure, the JTWC upgraded the system into a tropical depression, and the first warning was issued. A hurricane hunter aircraft investigated the system and discovered that the low-level circulation was further north than what was inferred from the satellite data. The depression slowly tracked northward near the western periphery of a subtropical ridge. Early on August 2, the JMA classified the depression as a tropical storm. Meanwhile, the JTWC upgraded the depression into Tropical Storm Irving, based on an increase in atmospheric convection near the center and Dvorak satellite estimates.\n\nAfter tracking north-northeast, Irving then turned northeast. On the morning of August 3, the JMA upgraded Irving into a severe tropical storm. According to the JTWC, the cyclone attained typhoon intensity that evening. At the same time, the JMA estimated that Irving attained its peak intensity of and a barometric pressure of . According to the JTWC, Irving continued to intensify in contrast to forecasts and attained a peak intensity of at 00:00 UTC on August 4, in agreement with surface observations. However, this period of intensification was not observed during real time by the JTWC; operationally, the organization estimated maximum winds of , based on Dvorak intensity estimates. At the time of peak intensity, visible satellite imagery showed an elliptic eye in diameter. With a subtropical ridge established to the north, the tropical cyclone began to track west-northwestward. Upon making landfall over southwestern Shikoku at peak intensity, Irving turned sharply to the west and rapidly weakened. The JTWC and JMA downgraded Irving to a tropical storm on August 4 as it interacted with land. After weakening to a tropical depression later that day, Irving dissipated over the Korea Strait near Pusan. The JMA ceased watching the remnants of the system midday on August 5.\n\nImpact\nTropical Storm Irving was the first of two successive systems to move over the Japanese archipelago, with Typhoon Jannis succeeding it. The storm dropped heavy rainfall across much of the Japanese archipelago. A peak rainfall total of occurred at Nagaoka District. During a 24-hour time period, fell in Hidegadake. A peak hourly rainfall total of was observed in Odochi. A wind gust of was recorded in Tosashimizu.\n\nAcross Tokushima Prefecture, there were four landslides and roads were cut in two places. Two people suffered injuries in Kōchi Prefecture. Damage was estimated at ¥514 million, of which ¥447 million was due to of crop damage. Roads were cut in 89 spots and 1,180 customers lost power for half an hour. Strong winds also downed many trees and all transport in the prefecture was halted. Irving passed quite close to Oita Prefecture; however, the storm's small size limited damage. Twenty-five flights were cancelled at Fukuoka Airport and two more were cancelled at Kitakyushu Airport. Ten ferries were cancelled in Fukuoka Prefecture. Roads were damaged in 17 spots in Wakayama prefecture, where two people were reported missing due to rough seas. Two Okayama Airport flights were cancelled. A swimmer was reported missing and two other individuals were killed offshore Kyōtango due to high waves. A total of of crops were damaged in Kyoto Prefecture, amounting to ¥87 million. Overall, 51 flights linking Osaka and Shikoku were cancelled and ferry services between the Kansai region and Shikoku were also suspended. Damage was estimated at ¥601 million.\n\nSee also\n\nTropical Storm Harry (1991) - similar early-season tropical cyclone that struck Japan\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nI\nI\nI\nI",
"Roman Holiday is a jukebox musical with music and lyrics by Cole Porter, and a book by Paul Blake. Based on the 1953 film of the same name, the musical tells the story of a young European princess and the American reporter who inadvertently aids in her escape from a whirlwind European tour, resulting in 24 hours spent in Italy's capital.\n\nProductions \nRoman Holiday: the Cole Porter Musical debuted at The Muny in St. Louis, Missouri on July 9, 2001. There was a reading for the Guthrie Theatre 2012 production starring Laura Osnes and John Behlmann. A production of Roman Holiday opened the Guthrie Theatre in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 2012 from June 9 to August 19 After a substantial book rewrite and recruiting a new director, the revised production announced a pre-broadway run at the Golden Gate Theatre in San Francisco during May–June 2017, starring Stephanie Styles and Drew Gehling.\n\nMusical numbers\nGuthrie Theater\n\n Act I\n \"Overture\"\n \"Once Upon a Time\" – Princess\n \"I’m Throwing a Ball Tonight\" – Joe, Ensemble\n \"Experiment\" – Countess, Princess\n \"Why Shouldn’t I?\" – Princess\n \"Ace In the Hole\" – Joe, Ensemble\n \"Let’s Be Buddies\" – Joe, Princess\n \"Look What I Found\" – Joe, Princess, Ensemble\n \"Wouldn’t It Be Fun?\" – Irving, Princess, Joe\n \"Most Gentlemen Don’t Like Love\" – Francesca, Princess\n \"Ridin’ High\" – Joe, Princess, Ensemble\n\n Act II\n \"Entr’acte\"\n \"A Picture of Me Without You\" – Joe, Princess, Irving\n \"Use Your Imagination\" – Princess, Joe\n \"Just One of Those Things\" – Francesca, Male Quartet\n \"Easy to Love\" – Joe\n \"Ev’ry Time We Say Goodbye\" – Princess, Joe\n \"I Sleep Easier Now\" – Countess \n \"Night and Day\" – Joe\n \"Experiment (Reprise)\" – Princess\n\nGolden Gate Theatre\n\n Act I\n \"Why Shouldn’t I\" – Princess\n \"You Do Something to Me\" – Francesca and Ensemble\n \"Take Me Back to Manhattan\" – Joe, Irving and Ensemble\n \"Let’s Step Out\" – Princess\n \"Let’s Step Out (Reprise)\" – Princess\n \"Experiment\" – Joe\n \"Experiment Ballet\" – Princess, Joe and Ensemble\n \"Look What I Found\" – Joe, Princess and Ensemble\n \"Night and Day\" – Irving and Francesca\n \"Look What I Found (Reprise)\" – Princess, Joe and Irving\n \"Ridin’ High\" – Joe, Princess and Ensemble\n \"Why Shouldn’t I (Reprise)\" – Princess\n\n Act II\n \"Most Gentlemen Don’t Like Love\" – Francesca and Ladies\n \"Night and Day (Reprise)\" – Irving\n \"Use Your Imagination\" – Princess and Joe\n \"Begin the Beguine\" – Francesca and Men\n \"You Do Something to Me (Reprise)\" – Irving and Francesca\n \"Easy to Love\" – Joe\n \"Goodbye, Little Dream\" – Princess\n \"Just One of Those Things\" – Princess and Joe\n \"Experiment (Reprise)\" – Princess\n\nCharacters and original cast\n\nReferences\n\n2001 musicals\nCole Porter\nJukebox musicals\nMusicals based on films"
] |
[
"Henry Irving",
"Peak years",
"What did Irving act in during his peak years?",
"In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum"
] | C_f3675a36154a4513a9141f85ee158360_0 | What was his role at the Lyceum? | 2 | What was Henry Irvings role at the Lyceum in 1878? | Henry Irving | In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum under his own management. With Terry as Ophelia and Portia, he revived Hamlet and produced The Merchant of Venice (1879). His Shylock was as much discussed as his Hamlet had been, the dignity with which he invested the vengeful Jewish merchant marking a departure from the traditional interpretation of the role. After the production of Tennyson's The Cup and revivals of Othello (in which Irving played Iago to Edwin Booth's title character) and Romeo and Juliet, there began a period at the Lyceum which had a potent effect on the English stage. Much Ado about Nothing (1882) was followed by Twelfth Night (1884); an adaptation of Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield by W. G. Wills (1885); Faust (1886); Macbeth (1888, with incidental music by Arthur Sullivan); The Dead Heart, by Watts Phillips (1889); Ravenswood by Herman, and Merivales' dramatic version of Scott's Bride of Lammermoor (1890). Portrayals in 1892 of the characters of Wolsey in Henry VIII and of the title character in King Lear were followed in 1893 by a performance of Becket in Tennyson's play of the same name. During these years, too, Irving, with the whole Lyceum company, paid several successful visits to the United States and Canada, which were repeated in succeeding years. As Terry aged, there seemed to be fewer opportunities for her in his company; that was one reason she eventually left, moving on into less steady but nonetheless beloved stage work, including solo performances of Shakespeare's women. CANNOTANSWER | re-opened the Lyceum under his own management. | Sir Henry Irving (6 February 1838 – 13 October 1905), born John Henry Brodribb, sometimes known as J. H. Irving, was an English stage actor in the Victorian era, known as an actor-manager because he took complete responsibility (supervision of sets, lighting, direction, casting, as well as playing the leading roles) for season after season at the West End’s Lyceum Theatre, establishing himself and his company as representative of English classical theatre. In 1895 he became the first actor to be awarded a knighthood, indicating full acceptance into the higher circles of British society.
Irving is widely acknowledged to be one of the inspirations for Count Dracula, the title character of the 1897 novel Dracula whose author, Bram Stoker, was business manager of the theatre.
Life and career
Irving was born to a working-class family in Keinton Mandeville in the county of Somerset. W.H. Davies, the celebrated poet, was a cousin. Irving spent his childhood living with his aunt, Mrs Penberthy, at Halsetown in Cornwall. He competed in a recitation contest at a local Methodist chapel where he was beaten by William Curnow, later the editor of The Sydney Morning Herald. He attended City Commercial School for two years before going to work in the office of a law firm at age 13. When he saw Samuel Phelps play Hamlet soon after this, he sought lessons, letters of introduction, and work in the Lyceum Theatre in Sunderland in 1856, labouring against great odds until his 1871 success in The Bells in London set him apart from all the rest.
He married Florence O'Callaghan on 15 July 1869 at St. Marylebone, London, but his personal life took second place to his professional life. On opening night of The Bells, 25 November 1871, Florence, who was pregnant with their second child, criticised his profession: "Are you going on making a fool of yourself like this all your life?" Irving exited their carriage at Hyde Park Corner, walked off into the night, and chose never to see her again. He maintained a discreet distance from his children as well, but became closer to them as they grew older. Florence Irving never divorced Irving, and once he had been knighted she styled herself "Lady Irving"; Irving never remarried.
His elder son, Harry Brodribb Irving (1870–1919), usually known as "H B Irving", became a famous actor and later a theatre manager. His younger son, Laurence Irving (1871–1914), became a dramatist and later drowned, with his wife Mabel Hackney, in the sinking of the Empress of Ireland. H B married Dorothea Baird and they had a son, Laurence Irving (1897–1988), who became a well-known Hollywood art director and his grandfather's biographer.
In November 1882 Irving became a Freemason, being initiated into the prestigious Jerusalem Lodge No 197 in London. In 1887 he became a founder member and first Treasurer of the Savage Club Lodge No 2190, a Lodge associated with London's Savage Club.
He eventually took over the management of the Lyceum Theatre and brought actress Ellen Terry into partnership with him as Ophelia to his Hamlet, Lady Macbeth to his Macbeth, Portia to his Shylock, Beatrice to his Benedick, etc. Before joining the Lyceum, Terry had fled her first marriage and conceived two out-of-wedlock children with architect-designer Edward William Godwin, but regardless of how much and how often her behavior defied the strict morality expected by her Victorian audiences, she somehow remained popular. It could be said that Irving found his family in his professional company, which included his ardent supporter and manager Bram Stoker and Terry's two illegitimate children, Teddy and Edy.
Whether Irving's long, spectacularly successful relationship with leading lady Ellen Terry was romantic as well as professional has been the subject of much historical speculation. Most of their correspondence was lost or burned by her descendants. According to Michael Holroyd's book about Irving and Terry, A Strange Eventful History:
Terry's son Teddy, later known as Edward Gordon Craig, spent much of his childhood (from 1879, when he was 8, until 1897) indulged by Irving backstage at the Lyceum. Craig, who came to be regarded as something of a visionary for the theatre of the future, wrote an especially vivid, book-length tribute to Irving. ("Let me state at once, in clearest unmistakable terms, that I have never known of, or seen, or heard, a greater actor than was Irving.") George Bernard Shaw, at the time a theatre critic who was jealous of Irving's connection to Ellen Terry (whom Shaw himself wanted in his own plays), conceded Irving's genius after Irving died.
Early career
After a few years' schooling while living at Halsetown, near St Ives, Cornwall, Irving became a clerk to a firm of East India merchants in London, but he soon gave up a commercial career for acting. On 29 September 1856 he made his first appearance at Sunderland as Gaston, Duke of Orleans, in Bulwer Lytton's play, Richelieu, billed as Henry Irving. This name he eventually assumed by royal licence. When the inexperienced Irving got stage fright and was hissed off the stage the actor Samuel Johnson was among those who supported him with practical advice. Later in life Irving gave them all regular work when he formed his own Company at the Lyceum Theatre.
For 10 years, he went through an arduous training in various stock companies in Scotland and the north of England, taking more than 500 parts.
He gained recognition by degrees, and in 1866 Ruth Herbert engaged him as her leading man and sometime stage director at the St. James's Theatre, London, where she first played Doricourt in The Belle's Stratagem. One piece that he directed there was W. S. Gilbert's first successful solo play, Dulcamara, or the Little Duck and the Great Quack (1866) The next year he joined the company of the newly opened Queen's Theatre, where he acted with Charles Wyndham, J. L. Toole, Lionel Brough, John Clayton|, Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Wigan, Ellen Terry and Nellie Farren. This was followed by short engagements at the Haymarket Theatre, Drury Lane, and the Gaiety Theatre. In the spring of 1869, Irving was one of the original twelve members of The Lambs of London—assembled by John Hare as a social club for actors—and would be made an Honorary Lifetime member in 1883. He finally made his first conspicuous success as Digby Grant in James Albery's Two Roses, which was produced at the Vaudeville Theatre on 4 June 1870 and ran for a very successful 300 nights.
In 1871, Irving began his association with the Lyceum Theatre by an engagement under Bateman's management. The fortunes of the house were at a low ebb when the tide was turned by Irving's sudden success as Mathias in The Bells, a version of Erckmann-Chatrian's Le Juif polonais by Leopold Lewis, a property which Irving had found for himself. The play ran for 150 nights, established Irving at the forefront of the British drama, and would prove a popular vehicle for Irving for the rest of his professional life. With Bateman, Irving was seen in W. G. Wills' Charles I and Eugene Aram, in Richelieu, and in 1874 in Hamlet. The unconventionality of this last performance, during a run of 200 nights, aroused keen discussion and singled him out as the most interesting English actor of his day. In 1875, again with Bateman, he was seen as the title character in Macbeth; in 1876 as Othello, and as Philip in Alfred Lord Tennyson's Queen Mary; in 1877 in Richard III; and in The Lyons Mail. During this time he became lifelong friends with Bram Stoker, who praised him in his review of Hamlet and thereafter joined Irving as the manager for the company.
Peak years
In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum under his own management. With Terry as Ophelia and Portia, he revived Hamlet and produced The Merchant of Venice (1879). His Shylock was as much discussed as his Hamlet had been, the dignity with which he invested the vengeful Jewish merchant marking a departure from the traditional interpretation of the role.
After the production of Tennyson's The Cup and revivals of Othello (in which Irving played Iago to Edwin Booth's title character) and Romeo and Juliet, there began a period at the Lyceum which had a potent effect on the English stage.
Much Ado about Nothing (1882) was followed by Twelfth Night (1884); an adaptation of Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield by W. G. Wills (1885); Faust (1885); Macbeth (1888, with incidental music by Arthur Sullivan); The Dead Heart, by Watts Phillips (1889); Ravenswood by Herman, and Merivales' dramatic version of Scott's Bride of Lammermoor (1890). Portrayals in 1892 of the characters of Wolsey in Henry VIII and of the title character in King Lear were followed in 1893 by a performance of Becket in Tennyson's play of the same name. During these years, too, Irving, with the whole Lyceum company, paid several successful visits to the United States and Canada, which were repeated in succeeding years. As Terry aged, there seemed to be fewer opportunities for her in his company; that was one reason she eventually left, moving on into less steady but nonetheless beloved stage work, including solo performances of Shakespeare's women.
Influence on Bram Stoker's Dracula
From 1878, Bram Stoker worked for Irving as a business manager at the Lyceum. Stoker idolised Irving to the point that "As one contemporary remarked, 'To Bram, Irving is as a god, and can do no wrong.' In the considered judgment of one biographer, Stoker's friendship with Irving was 'the most important love relationship of his adult life.'" Irving, however, "… was a self-absorbed and profoundly manipulative man. He enjoyed cultivating rivalries between his followers, and to remain in his circle required constant, careful courting of his notoriously fickle affections." When Stoker began writing Dracula, Irving was the chief inspiration for the title character. In his 2002 paper for The American Historical Review, "Buffalo Bill Meets Dracula: William F. Cody, Bram Stoker, and the Frontiers of Racial Decay", historian Louis S. Warren writes:
Later years
The chief remaining novelties at the Lyceum during Irving's term as sole manager (at the beginning of 1899 the theatre passed into the hands of a limited-liability company) were Arthur Conan Doyle's Waterloo (1894); J. Comyns Carr's King Arthur in 1895; Cymbeline, in which Irving played Iachimo, in 1896; Sardou's Madame Sans-Gene in 1897; and Peter the Great, a play by Laurence Irving, the actor's second son, in 1898.
Irving received a death threat in 1899 from fellow actor (and murderer of William Terriss) Richard Archer Prince. Terriss had been stabbed at the stage door of the Adelphi Theatre in December 1897 and in the wake of his death, Prince was committed to Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum. Irving was critical of the unusually lenient sentence, remarking 'Terriss was an actor, so his murderer will not be executed.' Two years later, Prince had found Irving's home address and threatened to murder him 'when he gets out'. Irving was advised to submit the letter to the Home Office to ensure Prince's continued incarceration, which Irving declined to do.
In 1898 Irving was Rede Lecturer at the University of Cambridge. The new regime at the Lyceum was signalled by the production of Sardou's Robespierre in 1899, in which Irving reappeared after a serious illness, and in 1901 by an elaborate revival of Coriolanus. Irving's only subsequent production in London was as Sardou's Dante (1903) at the Drury Lane.
On 13 October 1905, at 67 years old, Irving was taking part in a performance while on tour in Bradford, when he suffered a stroke. He was taken to the lobby of the Midland Hotel, Bradford, where he died shortly afterwards. His death was described by Thomas Anstey Guthrie in his 'Long Retrospect':
The chair that he was sitting in when he died is now at the Garrick Club. He was cremated and his ashes buried in Westminster Abbey, thereby becoming the first person ever to be cremated prior to interment at Westminster.
There is a statue of him near the National Portrait Gallery in London. That statue, as well as the influence of Irving himself, plays an important part in the Robertson Davies novel World of Wonders. The Irving Memorial Garden was opened on 19 July 1951 by Laurence Olivier.
Legacy
Both on and off the stage, Irving always maintained a high ideal of his profession, and in 1895 he received a knighthood (first offered in 1883), the first ever accorded an actor. He was also the recipient of honorary degrees from the universities of Dublin (LL.D 1892), Cambridge (Litt.D 1898), and Glasgow (LL.D 1899). He also received the Komthur Cross, 2nd class, of the Saxe-Ernestine House Order of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and Saxe-Meiningen.
His acting divided critics; opinions differed as to the extent to which his mannerisms of voice and deportment interfered with or assisted the expression of his ideas.
Irving's idiosyncratic style of acting and its effect on amateur players was mildly satirised in The Diary of a Nobody. Mr Pooter's son brings Mr Burwin-Fosselton of the Holloway Comedians to supper, a young man who entirely monopolised the conversation, and:
"...who not only looked rather like Mr Irving but seemed to imagine he was the celebrated actor... he began doing the Irving business all through supper. He sank so low down in his chair that his chin was almost on a level with the table, and twice he kicked Carrie under the table, upset his wine, and flashed a knife uncomfortably near Gowing's face."
In the 1963 West End musical comedy Half a Sixpence the actor Chitterlow does an impression of Irving in The Bells. Percy French's burlesque heroic poem "Abdul Abulbul Amir" lists among the mock-heroic attributes of Abdul's adversary, the Russian Count Ivan Skavinsky Skavar, that "he could imitate Irving". In the 1995 film A Midwinter's Tale by Kenneth Branagh, two actors discuss Irving, and one of them, Richard Briers does an imitation of his speech. In the play The Woman in Black, set in the Victorian era, the actor playing Kipps tells Kipps 'We'll make an Irving of you yet,' in Act 1, as Kipps is not a very good actor due to his inexperience.
In the political sitcom Yes, Prime Minister (sequel to Yes, Minister), in the episode "The Patron of the Arts", first aired on 14 January 1988, the Prime Minister is asked what was the last play he'd seen, and replies "Hamlet." When asked "Whose?"—specifically, who played Hamlet, not who wrote it—he is unable to remember and is prompted with the suggestion "Henry Irving?" to audience laughter.
Biography
In 1906, Bram Stoker published a two-volume biography about Irving called Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving.
See also
Irving Family
Notes
References
Further reading
Stoker, Bram. Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving: Volume 1 and Volume 2. London : W. Heinemann, 1906. Scanned books via Internet Archive.
Archer, William 1885. Henry Irving, Actor and Manager: A Critical Study, London:Field & Tuer.
Beerbohm, Max. 1928. 'Henry Irving' in A Variety of Things. New York, Knopf.
Holroyd, Michael. 2008. A Strange Eventful History, Farrar Straus Giroux,
Irving, Laurence. 1989. Henry Irving: The Actor and His World. Lively Arts.
External links
The Irving Society
The Henry Irving Foundation
Information about Irving at the PeoplePlay UK website
NY Times article that includes information about Irving's American tour and the lease of the Lyceum to the American company at the same time
My First "Reading" by Henry Irving, an article written by Irving about a personal experience
Henry Irving North American Theatre Online with bio and pics
Henry Irving-Ellen Terry tour correspondence, 1884-1896, held by the Billy Rose Theatre Division, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts
1838 births
1905 deaths
English male stage actors
English male Shakespearean actors
19th-century English male actors
20th-century English male actors
19th-century theatre
Actor-managers
Knights Bachelor
Actors awarded knighthoods
English people of Cornish descent
People from South Somerset (district)
Burials at Westminster Abbey
Freemasons of the United Grand Lodge of England
19th-century theatre managers
20th-century theatre managers
Members of The Lambs Club | true | [
"Anton Edler von Gapp (March 24, 1778 – April 1, 1862) was an Austrian lawyer, professor of law and in 1821 the Rector of the Olomouc Lyceum.\n\nAfter finishing his law studies in 1806 von Gapp went to teach as a substitute at the (standard) Lyceum in Linz. He became professor at the lyceum in 1810. In 1816 he moved to Olomouc, where he became professor of Roman and canonical law at the (academic) Lyceum (now Palacký University of Olomouc). He was the director of the faculty of law between the years 1826–34, and in 1821 he was the rector of the Olomouc Lyceum. In years 1835–1848 he was teaching Roman law at the Faculty of Law of University of Vienna.\n\nHis son was Wesener Gapp.\n\nWorks\n\nSources \nGerhard Köbler:Österreich\n\n1778 births\n1862 deaths\nAustrian lawyers\nAustrian jurists\nAustrian educators\nEdlers of Austria\n19th-century Austrian lawyers\nPalacký University Olomouc faculty\nRectors of the Palacký University Olomouc",
"Samuel Johnson (1830–15 February 1900) was an actor-manager and Shakespearean actor of the 19th century and a member of Henry Irving's Company at the Lyceum Theatre, for which he played the comedy roles.\n\nEarly career\nBorn in Ayrshire, Sam Johnson was one of at least seven children born to the actor Samuel Johnson and Isabella (née Elliott). Most of his siblings were actors, while one brother was a scene painter. He first appeared on stage at the Maryport Theatre in Cumberland in 1844 as Bartolo in The Wife. In 1845 he and his two sisters went to Belfast and joined Cunningham's company at the Theatre Royal. In 1846 he and his sister, the actress Barbara Johnson, were appearing in Belfast. In December 1846 Barbara Johnson married the actor John W. Anson. The three, together with two others from the Belfast company, moved to Scotland where they formed a new company, of which John Anson was manager. From early 1847 in the Perth area, they appeared in towns with a repertory of plays so that the audience of each town could see several plays in a week. Barbara Anson took the lead female roles, and John Anson and Samuel Johnson shared the low comedy parts. Late in 1847 the trio played in the Dundee area.\n\nFrom 1853 to 1855 he was in partnership with John Coleman, and the two rented theatres in Stockport, Oldham (where over 2,000 applicants responded to their advert for actors), Cambridge and Sheffield. On leaving the partnership Johnson appeared at the Lyceum Theatre in Sunderland and the Theatre Royal in Newcastle. The New Royal Lyceum Theatre re-opened in Sunderland in 1856 with a production of Bulwer Lytton's play Richelieu, in which Johnson played the Governor and the 18-year-old Henry Irving played Gaston, Duke of Orleans. When the inexperienced Irving got stage fright and was hissed off the stage, Johnson was among those who supported Irving with practical advice. Later in life Irving gave them all regular work when he formed his own company at the Lyceum Theatre.\n\nLondon and Dublin\nJohnson made his London stage début at a Savage Club performance at the Lyceum Theatre as Cassim Baba in The Forty Thieves. He then joined the company at Astley's Amphitheatre, appearing in plays and farces until early 1860. From 1860 to late 1862 Johnson was in Edinburgh where he played low comedy roles and Scottish characters, and from April to December 1862 he was actor-manager of the new Theatre Royal at St Helens. During 1863 he appeared at the St James's Theatre in The Carte de Visite and played Spilliken in H.J. Byron's Goldenhair the Good and Leontes in William Brough's burlesque Perdita, the title role being played by Marie Wilton.\n\nFrom 1864 to 1873 Johnson was a member of the Company of the Theatre Royal in Dublin. Here, among other roles, he played the Gravedigger in Hamlet (1864), and M'Nally in the first performance of Dion Boucicault's Arrah-na-Pogue (1864), with Boucicault, John Brougham and Samuel Anderson Emery in the cast.\n\nLyceum Theatre\n\nFrom 1874 to 1878 Johnson was actor and stage manager with Mr. Warden's Company in Belfast, touring with the company to Edinburgh and Glasgow in a series of old comedies. With his daughter Isa Johnson he appeared in a number of Easter pantomimes. In August 1878 he was at the Lyceum Theatre in London as Police Sergeant Tollit in Mary Warner.\n\nImmediately after this play finished, the Lyceum was taken over by Henry Irving who asked Johnson to join his new company at the theatre. Johnson stayed with Irving's Lyceum Theatre Company until 1899, playing in twenty-three productions, and went to America on five of the Lyceum tours. While many of his roles with the company were small, John Martin-Harvey described him as the acknowledged Shakespearean clown of his day, and his Lancelot Gobbo in The Merchant of Venice, Dogberry in Much Ado About Nothing (1882 and 1893) and Gravedigger in Hamlet reflect this.\n\nFor Irving, Johnson played Mr. Wardle in Jingle, Sancho Panza in Don Quixote, Samson Rawbold in The Iron Chest, Farmer Flamborough in Olivia (opposite Hermann Vezin as Dr. Primrose), Jock Howieson in The King and the Miller (1890 and 1895), Choppard in The Lyons Mail, and played in Eugene Aram and Faust. He was Feste in Twelfth Night, Colonna in The Corsican Brothers (1880 and 1891), Countryman in Becket (1893 and 1894), Marcel in Louis XI (1890), Porter in Macbeth (1895) and Hans in The Bells (1891 to 1898). His daughter Isa Johnson played Annette in The Bells for a few performances at the Lyceum and went on one of the company's provincial tours.\n\nLast years\n\nIn February 1899 Johnson played Mr. Stryver in The Only Way, again at the Lyceum Theatre but now under John Martin-Harvey as manager. Not feeling in the best of health, Johnson decided not to join the sixth Lyceum tour to America, appearing instead in his last role as Meester van Speenen in The Black Tulip with Cyril Maude and Winifred Emery at the Theatre Royal Haymarket in a production that ran for 77 performances and which closed on 6 January 1900.\n\nA heavy drinker, Johnson died of cirrhosis of the liver on 15 February 1900 at 29, Weltje Road in Hammersmith in London.\n\nPersonal life\nHe married Mary Ann Hornby on 10 July 1858 at Marske-by-the-Sea. The couple had a son, Samuel Forster Johnson (1859–1860), and a daughter, the actress Isabella 'Isa' Elizabeth Johnson (1861–1941). A Freemason, he was a Past Master of Asaph Lodge.\n\nJohnson is buried in Brookwood Cemetery with his wife, son and daughter and in the same plot as his sister and her husband, John W. Anson. The funeral was attended by his brother John Johnson and by actors and others from Asaph Lodge, Logic Club, Genesius Club, the Actors' Association, the Lyceum Benevolent Fund and the Actors' Benevolent Fund. Henry Irving and other members of the Lyceum Theatre Company were still on tour in America and were therefore not able to attend.\n\nReferences\n\n1830 births\n1900 deaths\nActor-managers\n19th-century British male actors\nEnglish male stage actors\nEnglish male Shakespearean actors\nBritish male stage actors\nBurials at Brookwood Cemetery\nScottish Freemasons\n19th-century theatre managers"
] |
[
"Henry Irving",
"Peak years",
"What did Irving act in during his peak years?",
"In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum",
"What was his role at the Lyceum?",
"re-opened the Lyceum under his own management."
] | C_f3675a36154a4513a9141f85ee158360_0 | What plays did the Lyceum put on under his leadership? | 3 | What plays did the Lyceum put on under Henry Irving's leadership? | Henry Irving | In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum under his own management. With Terry as Ophelia and Portia, he revived Hamlet and produced The Merchant of Venice (1879). His Shylock was as much discussed as his Hamlet had been, the dignity with which he invested the vengeful Jewish merchant marking a departure from the traditional interpretation of the role. After the production of Tennyson's The Cup and revivals of Othello (in which Irving played Iago to Edwin Booth's title character) and Romeo and Juliet, there began a period at the Lyceum which had a potent effect on the English stage. Much Ado about Nothing (1882) was followed by Twelfth Night (1884); an adaptation of Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield by W. G. Wills (1885); Faust (1886); Macbeth (1888, with incidental music by Arthur Sullivan); The Dead Heart, by Watts Phillips (1889); Ravenswood by Herman, and Merivales' dramatic version of Scott's Bride of Lammermoor (1890). Portrayals in 1892 of the characters of Wolsey in Henry VIII and of the title character in King Lear were followed in 1893 by a performance of Becket in Tennyson's play of the same name. During these years, too, Irving, with the whole Lyceum company, paid several successful visits to the United States and Canada, which were repeated in succeeding years. As Terry aged, there seemed to be fewer opportunities for her in his company; that was one reason she eventually left, moving on into less steady but nonetheless beloved stage work, including solo performances of Shakespeare's women. CANNOTANSWER | he revived Hamlet and produced The Merchant of Venice (1879). | Sir Henry Irving (6 February 1838 – 13 October 1905), born John Henry Brodribb, sometimes known as J. H. Irving, was an English stage actor in the Victorian era, known as an actor-manager because he took complete responsibility (supervision of sets, lighting, direction, casting, as well as playing the leading roles) for season after season at the West End’s Lyceum Theatre, establishing himself and his company as representative of English classical theatre. In 1895 he became the first actor to be awarded a knighthood, indicating full acceptance into the higher circles of British society.
Irving is widely acknowledged to be one of the inspirations for Count Dracula, the title character of the 1897 novel Dracula whose author, Bram Stoker, was business manager of the theatre.
Life and career
Irving was born to a working-class family in Keinton Mandeville in the county of Somerset. W.H. Davies, the celebrated poet, was a cousin. Irving spent his childhood living with his aunt, Mrs Penberthy, at Halsetown in Cornwall. He competed in a recitation contest at a local Methodist chapel where he was beaten by William Curnow, later the editor of The Sydney Morning Herald. He attended City Commercial School for two years before going to work in the office of a law firm at age 13. When he saw Samuel Phelps play Hamlet soon after this, he sought lessons, letters of introduction, and work in the Lyceum Theatre in Sunderland in 1856, labouring against great odds until his 1871 success in The Bells in London set him apart from all the rest.
He married Florence O'Callaghan on 15 July 1869 at St. Marylebone, London, but his personal life took second place to his professional life. On opening night of The Bells, 25 November 1871, Florence, who was pregnant with their second child, criticised his profession: "Are you going on making a fool of yourself like this all your life?" Irving exited their carriage at Hyde Park Corner, walked off into the night, and chose never to see her again. He maintained a discreet distance from his children as well, but became closer to them as they grew older. Florence Irving never divorced Irving, and once he had been knighted she styled herself "Lady Irving"; Irving never remarried.
His elder son, Harry Brodribb Irving (1870–1919), usually known as "H B Irving", became a famous actor and later a theatre manager. His younger son, Laurence Irving (1871–1914), became a dramatist and later drowned, with his wife Mabel Hackney, in the sinking of the Empress of Ireland. H B married Dorothea Baird and they had a son, Laurence Irving (1897–1988), who became a well-known Hollywood art director and his grandfather's biographer.
In November 1882 Irving became a Freemason, being initiated into the prestigious Jerusalem Lodge No 197 in London. In 1887 he became a founder member and first Treasurer of the Savage Club Lodge No 2190, a Lodge associated with London's Savage Club.
He eventually took over the management of the Lyceum Theatre and brought actress Ellen Terry into partnership with him as Ophelia to his Hamlet, Lady Macbeth to his Macbeth, Portia to his Shylock, Beatrice to his Benedick, etc. Before joining the Lyceum, Terry had fled her first marriage and conceived two out-of-wedlock children with architect-designer Edward William Godwin, but regardless of how much and how often her behavior defied the strict morality expected by her Victorian audiences, she somehow remained popular. It could be said that Irving found his family in his professional company, which included his ardent supporter and manager Bram Stoker and Terry's two illegitimate children, Teddy and Edy.
Whether Irving's long, spectacularly successful relationship with leading lady Ellen Terry was romantic as well as professional has been the subject of much historical speculation. Most of their correspondence was lost or burned by her descendants. According to Michael Holroyd's book about Irving and Terry, A Strange Eventful History:
Terry's son Teddy, later known as Edward Gordon Craig, spent much of his childhood (from 1879, when he was 8, until 1897) indulged by Irving backstage at the Lyceum. Craig, who came to be regarded as something of a visionary for the theatre of the future, wrote an especially vivid, book-length tribute to Irving. ("Let me state at once, in clearest unmistakable terms, that I have never known of, or seen, or heard, a greater actor than was Irving.") George Bernard Shaw, at the time a theatre critic who was jealous of Irving's connection to Ellen Terry (whom Shaw himself wanted in his own plays), conceded Irving's genius after Irving died.
Early career
After a few years' schooling while living at Halsetown, near St Ives, Cornwall, Irving became a clerk to a firm of East India merchants in London, but he soon gave up a commercial career for acting. On 29 September 1856 he made his first appearance at Sunderland as Gaston, Duke of Orleans, in Bulwer Lytton's play, Richelieu, billed as Henry Irving. This name he eventually assumed by royal licence. When the inexperienced Irving got stage fright and was hissed off the stage the actor Samuel Johnson was among those who supported him with practical advice. Later in life Irving gave them all regular work when he formed his own Company at the Lyceum Theatre.
For 10 years, he went through an arduous training in various stock companies in Scotland and the north of England, taking more than 500 parts.
He gained recognition by degrees, and in 1866 Ruth Herbert engaged him as her leading man and sometime stage director at the St. James's Theatre, London, where she first played Doricourt in The Belle's Stratagem. One piece that he directed there was W. S. Gilbert's first successful solo play, Dulcamara, or the Little Duck and the Great Quack (1866) The next year he joined the company of the newly opened Queen's Theatre, where he acted with Charles Wyndham, J. L. Toole, Lionel Brough, John Clayton|, Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Wigan, Ellen Terry and Nellie Farren. This was followed by short engagements at the Haymarket Theatre, Drury Lane, and the Gaiety Theatre. In the spring of 1869, Irving was one of the original twelve members of The Lambs of London—assembled by John Hare as a social club for actors—and would be made an Honorary Lifetime member in 1883. He finally made his first conspicuous success as Digby Grant in James Albery's Two Roses, which was produced at the Vaudeville Theatre on 4 June 1870 and ran for a very successful 300 nights.
In 1871, Irving began his association with the Lyceum Theatre by an engagement under Bateman's management. The fortunes of the house were at a low ebb when the tide was turned by Irving's sudden success as Mathias in The Bells, a version of Erckmann-Chatrian's Le Juif polonais by Leopold Lewis, a property which Irving had found for himself. The play ran for 150 nights, established Irving at the forefront of the British drama, and would prove a popular vehicle for Irving for the rest of his professional life. With Bateman, Irving was seen in W. G. Wills' Charles I and Eugene Aram, in Richelieu, and in 1874 in Hamlet. The unconventionality of this last performance, during a run of 200 nights, aroused keen discussion and singled him out as the most interesting English actor of his day. In 1875, again with Bateman, he was seen as the title character in Macbeth; in 1876 as Othello, and as Philip in Alfred Lord Tennyson's Queen Mary; in 1877 in Richard III; and in The Lyons Mail. During this time he became lifelong friends with Bram Stoker, who praised him in his review of Hamlet and thereafter joined Irving as the manager for the company.
Peak years
In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum under his own management. With Terry as Ophelia and Portia, he revived Hamlet and produced The Merchant of Venice (1879). His Shylock was as much discussed as his Hamlet had been, the dignity with which he invested the vengeful Jewish merchant marking a departure from the traditional interpretation of the role.
After the production of Tennyson's The Cup and revivals of Othello (in which Irving played Iago to Edwin Booth's title character) and Romeo and Juliet, there began a period at the Lyceum which had a potent effect on the English stage.
Much Ado about Nothing (1882) was followed by Twelfth Night (1884); an adaptation of Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield by W. G. Wills (1885); Faust (1885); Macbeth (1888, with incidental music by Arthur Sullivan); The Dead Heart, by Watts Phillips (1889); Ravenswood by Herman, and Merivales' dramatic version of Scott's Bride of Lammermoor (1890). Portrayals in 1892 of the characters of Wolsey in Henry VIII and of the title character in King Lear were followed in 1893 by a performance of Becket in Tennyson's play of the same name. During these years, too, Irving, with the whole Lyceum company, paid several successful visits to the United States and Canada, which were repeated in succeeding years. As Terry aged, there seemed to be fewer opportunities for her in his company; that was one reason she eventually left, moving on into less steady but nonetheless beloved stage work, including solo performances of Shakespeare's women.
Influence on Bram Stoker's Dracula
From 1878, Bram Stoker worked for Irving as a business manager at the Lyceum. Stoker idolised Irving to the point that "As one contemporary remarked, 'To Bram, Irving is as a god, and can do no wrong.' In the considered judgment of one biographer, Stoker's friendship with Irving was 'the most important love relationship of his adult life.'" Irving, however, "… was a self-absorbed and profoundly manipulative man. He enjoyed cultivating rivalries between his followers, and to remain in his circle required constant, careful courting of his notoriously fickle affections." When Stoker began writing Dracula, Irving was the chief inspiration for the title character. In his 2002 paper for The American Historical Review, "Buffalo Bill Meets Dracula: William F. Cody, Bram Stoker, and the Frontiers of Racial Decay", historian Louis S. Warren writes:
Later years
The chief remaining novelties at the Lyceum during Irving's term as sole manager (at the beginning of 1899 the theatre passed into the hands of a limited-liability company) were Arthur Conan Doyle's Waterloo (1894); J. Comyns Carr's King Arthur in 1895; Cymbeline, in which Irving played Iachimo, in 1896; Sardou's Madame Sans-Gene in 1897; and Peter the Great, a play by Laurence Irving, the actor's second son, in 1898.
Irving received a death threat in 1899 from fellow actor (and murderer of William Terriss) Richard Archer Prince. Terriss had been stabbed at the stage door of the Adelphi Theatre in December 1897 and in the wake of his death, Prince was committed to Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum. Irving was critical of the unusually lenient sentence, remarking 'Terriss was an actor, so his murderer will not be executed.' Two years later, Prince had found Irving's home address and threatened to murder him 'when he gets out'. Irving was advised to submit the letter to the Home Office to ensure Prince's continued incarceration, which Irving declined to do.
In 1898 Irving was Rede Lecturer at the University of Cambridge. The new regime at the Lyceum was signalled by the production of Sardou's Robespierre in 1899, in which Irving reappeared after a serious illness, and in 1901 by an elaborate revival of Coriolanus. Irving's only subsequent production in London was as Sardou's Dante (1903) at the Drury Lane.
On 13 October 1905, at 67 years old, Irving was taking part in a performance while on tour in Bradford, when he suffered a stroke. He was taken to the lobby of the Midland Hotel, Bradford, where he died shortly afterwards. His death was described by Thomas Anstey Guthrie in his 'Long Retrospect':
The chair that he was sitting in when he died is now at the Garrick Club. He was cremated and his ashes buried in Westminster Abbey, thereby becoming the first person ever to be cremated prior to interment at Westminster.
There is a statue of him near the National Portrait Gallery in London. That statue, as well as the influence of Irving himself, plays an important part in the Robertson Davies novel World of Wonders. The Irving Memorial Garden was opened on 19 July 1951 by Laurence Olivier.
Legacy
Both on and off the stage, Irving always maintained a high ideal of his profession, and in 1895 he received a knighthood (first offered in 1883), the first ever accorded an actor. He was also the recipient of honorary degrees from the universities of Dublin (LL.D 1892), Cambridge (Litt.D 1898), and Glasgow (LL.D 1899). He also received the Komthur Cross, 2nd class, of the Saxe-Ernestine House Order of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and Saxe-Meiningen.
His acting divided critics; opinions differed as to the extent to which his mannerisms of voice and deportment interfered with or assisted the expression of his ideas.
Irving's idiosyncratic style of acting and its effect on amateur players was mildly satirised in The Diary of a Nobody. Mr Pooter's son brings Mr Burwin-Fosselton of the Holloway Comedians to supper, a young man who entirely monopolised the conversation, and:
"...who not only looked rather like Mr Irving but seemed to imagine he was the celebrated actor... he began doing the Irving business all through supper. He sank so low down in his chair that his chin was almost on a level with the table, and twice he kicked Carrie under the table, upset his wine, and flashed a knife uncomfortably near Gowing's face."
In the 1963 West End musical comedy Half a Sixpence the actor Chitterlow does an impression of Irving in The Bells. Percy French's burlesque heroic poem "Abdul Abulbul Amir" lists among the mock-heroic attributes of Abdul's adversary, the Russian Count Ivan Skavinsky Skavar, that "he could imitate Irving". In the 1995 film A Midwinter's Tale by Kenneth Branagh, two actors discuss Irving, and one of them, Richard Briers does an imitation of his speech. In the play The Woman in Black, set in the Victorian era, the actor playing Kipps tells Kipps 'We'll make an Irving of you yet,' in Act 1, as Kipps is not a very good actor due to his inexperience.
In the political sitcom Yes, Prime Minister (sequel to Yes, Minister), in the episode "The Patron of the Arts", first aired on 14 January 1988, the Prime Minister is asked what was the last play he'd seen, and replies "Hamlet." When asked "Whose?"—specifically, who played Hamlet, not who wrote it—he is unable to remember and is prompted with the suggestion "Henry Irving?" to audience laughter.
Biography
In 1906, Bram Stoker published a two-volume biography about Irving called Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving.
See also
Irving Family
Notes
References
Further reading
Stoker, Bram. Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving: Volume 1 and Volume 2. London : W. Heinemann, 1906. Scanned books via Internet Archive.
Archer, William 1885. Henry Irving, Actor and Manager: A Critical Study, London:Field & Tuer.
Beerbohm, Max. 1928. 'Henry Irving' in A Variety of Things. New York, Knopf.
Holroyd, Michael. 2008. A Strange Eventful History, Farrar Straus Giroux,
Irving, Laurence. 1989. Henry Irving: The Actor and His World. Lively Arts.
External links
The Irving Society
The Henry Irving Foundation
Information about Irving at the PeoplePlay UK website
NY Times article that includes information about Irving's American tour and the lease of the Lyceum to the American company at the same time
My First "Reading" by Henry Irving, an article written by Irving about a personal experience
Henry Irving North American Theatre Online with bio and pics
Henry Irving-Ellen Terry tour correspondence, 1884-1896, held by the Billy Rose Theatre Division, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts
1838 births
1905 deaths
English male stage actors
English male Shakespearean actors
19th-century English male actors
20th-century English male actors
19th-century theatre
Actor-managers
Knights Bachelor
Actors awarded knighthoods
English people of Cornish descent
People from South Somerset (district)
Burials at Westminster Abbey
Freemasons of the United Grand Lodge of England
19th-century theatre managers
20th-century theatre managers
Members of The Lambs Club | true | [
"What Shadows is a play by Chris Hannan.\n\nThe play premiered in The STUDIO at Birmingham Repertory Theatre running from 27 October to 12 November 2016. The cast included Ian McDiarmid as Enoch Powell and directed by Roxana Silbert.\n\nThe play was revived at the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh from 7 to 23 September before transferring to the Park Theatre, London from 27 September to 28 October 2017. McDiarmid reprised his role as Powell.\n\nBritish political plays\nPlays based on real people\n2016 plays\nEnoch Powell",
"Tipping the Velvet is a play based on the 1998 novel of the same name by Sarah Waters, adapted for the stage by Laura Wade. It received its world premiere at the Lyric Hammersmith, in September 2015, before transferring to the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh the following month with whom it is a co-production.\n\nProduction history\nTipping the Velvet has been adapted for the stage by Laura Wade, based on the 1998 novel of the same name by Sarah Waters. The novel was previously adapted into a BBC television series in 2002. On 14 April 2015, it was announced the play would receive its world premiere the same year and would begin previews at the Lyric Hammersmith on 18 September 2015, with an official opening night on 28 September, booking for a limited period until 24 October. The adaption had been in production for around four years.\n\nThe play is directed by Lyndsey Turner, with choreography by Alistair David, design by Lizzie Clachan, lighting design by Jon Clark, music by Michael Bruce and sound by Nick Manning. Following its premiere production the play is scheduled to transfer to the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh, as part of the 50th anniversary season of the Royal Lyceum Theatre company, where it will run from 28 October to 14 November 2015. A typical performance runs two hours and 54 minutes, including one interval of 20 mins.\n\nSpeaking about her novel being adapted Waters said she was \"thrilled\" and that she could \"think of no better setting for the play than the lush Lyric interior or the beautiful Lyceum in Edinburgh, and no more exciting creative talents than those of writer Laura Wade and director Lyndsey Turner.\" In addition Sean Holmes the artistic director of the Lyric speaking about what he commissioned the piece said that “What’s so brilliant about the novel is it is such an upfront, unapologetic celebration of sexuality that just happens to be between two women. “Obviously it’s set at a time when that’s frowned upon but it’s also just really about the journey to love and sexual discovery and the massive, formative journey that applies to everyone, whatever your sexuality is, and yet you never see portrayed between gay women.”\n\nPrincipal roles and original cast\n\nReferences\n\n2015 plays\nPlays based on novels\nLGBT-related plays"
] |
[
"Henry Irving",
"Peak years",
"What did Irving act in during his peak years?",
"In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum",
"What was his role at the Lyceum?",
"re-opened the Lyceum under his own management.",
"What plays did the Lyceum put on under his leadership?",
"he revived Hamlet and produced The Merchant of Venice (1879)."
] | C_f3675a36154a4513a9141f85ee158360_0 | Did they put on anything besides Shakespeare? | 4 | Did the Lyceum put on anything besides Shakespeare under Henry Irving's leadership? | Henry Irving | In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum under his own management. With Terry as Ophelia and Portia, he revived Hamlet and produced The Merchant of Venice (1879). His Shylock was as much discussed as his Hamlet had been, the dignity with which he invested the vengeful Jewish merchant marking a departure from the traditional interpretation of the role. After the production of Tennyson's The Cup and revivals of Othello (in which Irving played Iago to Edwin Booth's title character) and Romeo and Juliet, there began a period at the Lyceum which had a potent effect on the English stage. Much Ado about Nothing (1882) was followed by Twelfth Night (1884); an adaptation of Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield by W. G. Wills (1885); Faust (1886); Macbeth (1888, with incidental music by Arthur Sullivan); The Dead Heart, by Watts Phillips (1889); Ravenswood by Herman, and Merivales' dramatic version of Scott's Bride of Lammermoor (1890). Portrayals in 1892 of the characters of Wolsey in Henry VIII and of the title character in King Lear were followed in 1893 by a performance of Becket in Tennyson's play of the same name. During these years, too, Irving, with the whole Lyceum company, paid several successful visits to the United States and Canada, which were repeated in succeeding years. As Terry aged, there seemed to be fewer opportunities for her in his company; that was one reason she eventually left, moving on into less steady but nonetheless beloved stage work, including solo performances of Shakespeare's women. CANNOTANSWER | The Dead Heart, by Watts Phillips (1889); Ravenswood by Herman, and Merivales' dramatic version of Scott's Bride of Lammermoor | Sir Henry Irving (6 February 1838 – 13 October 1905), born John Henry Brodribb, sometimes known as J. H. Irving, was an English stage actor in the Victorian era, known as an actor-manager because he took complete responsibility (supervision of sets, lighting, direction, casting, as well as playing the leading roles) for season after season at the West End’s Lyceum Theatre, establishing himself and his company as representative of English classical theatre. In 1895 he became the first actor to be awarded a knighthood, indicating full acceptance into the higher circles of British society.
Irving is widely acknowledged to be one of the inspirations for Count Dracula, the title character of the 1897 novel Dracula whose author, Bram Stoker, was business manager of the theatre.
Life and career
Irving was born to a working-class family in Keinton Mandeville in the county of Somerset. W.H. Davies, the celebrated poet, was a cousin. Irving spent his childhood living with his aunt, Mrs Penberthy, at Halsetown in Cornwall. He competed in a recitation contest at a local Methodist chapel where he was beaten by William Curnow, later the editor of The Sydney Morning Herald. He attended City Commercial School for two years before going to work in the office of a law firm at age 13. When he saw Samuel Phelps play Hamlet soon after this, he sought lessons, letters of introduction, and work in the Lyceum Theatre in Sunderland in 1856, labouring against great odds until his 1871 success in The Bells in London set him apart from all the rest.
He married Florence O'Callaghan on 15 July 1869 at St. Marylebone, London, but his personal life took second place to his professional life. On opening night of The Bells, 25 November 1871, Florence, who was pregnant with their second child, criticised his profession: "Are you going on making a fool of yourself like this all your life?" Irving exited their carriage at Hyde Park Corner, walked off into the night, and chose never to see her again. He maintained a discreet distance from his children as well, but became closer to them as they grew older. Florence Irving never divorced Irving, and once he had been knighted she styled herself "Lady Irving"; Irving never remarried.
His elder son, Harry Brodribb Irving (1870–1919), usually known as "H B Irving", became a famous actor and later a theatre manager. His younger son, Laurence Irving (1871–1914), became a dramatist and later drowned, with his wife Mabel Hackney, in the sinking of the Empress of Ireland. H B married Dorothea Baird and they had a son, Laurence Irving (1897–1988), who became a well-known Hollywood art director and his grandfather's biographer.
In November 1882 Irving became a Freemason, being initiated into the prestigious Jerusalem Lodge No 197 in London. In 1887 he became a founder member and first Treasurer of the Savage Club Lodge No 2190, a Lodge associated with London's Savage Club.
He eventually took over the management of the Lyceum Theatre and brought actress Ellen Terry into partnership with him as Ophelia to his Hamlet, Lady Macbeth to his Macbeth, Portia to his Shylock, Beatrice to his Benedick, etc. Before joining the Lyceum, Terry had fled her first marriage and conceived two out-of-wedlock children with architect-designer Edward William Godwin, but regardless of how much and how often her behavior defied the strict morality expected by her Victorian audiences, she somehow remained popular. It could be said that Irving found his family in his professional company, which included his ardent supporter and manager Bram Stoker and Terry's two illegitimate children, Teddy and Edy.
Whether Irving's long, spectacularly successful relationship with leading lady Ellen Terry was romantic as well as professional has been the subject of much historical speculation. Most of their correspondence was lost or burned by her descendants. According to Michael Holroyd's book about Irving and Terry, A Strange Eventful History:
Terry's son Teddy, later known as Edward Gordon Craig, spent much of his childhood (from 1879, when he was 8, until 1897) indulged by Irving backstage at the Lyceum. Craig, who came to be regarded as something of a visionary for the theatre of the future, wrote an especially vivid, book-length tribute to Irving. ("Let me state at once, in clearest unmistakable terms, that I have never known of, or seen, or heard, a greater actor than was Irving.") George Bernard Shaw, at the time a theatre critic who was jealous of Irving's connection to Ellen Terry (whom Shaw himself wanted in his own plays), conceded Irving's genius after Irving died.
Early career
After a few years' schooling while living at Halsetown, near St Ives, Cornwall, Irving became a clerk to a firm of East India merchants in London, but he soon gave up a commercial career for acting. On 29 September 1856 he made his first appearance at Sunderland as Gaston, Duke of Orleans, in Bulwer Lytton's play, Richelieu, billed as Henry Irving. This name he eventually assumed by royal licence. When the inexperienced Irving got stage fright and was hissed off the stage the actor Samuel Johnson was among those who supported him with practical advice. Later in life Irving gave them all regular work when he formed his own Company at the Lyceum Theatre.
For 10 years, he went through an arduous training in various stock companies in Scotland and the north of England, taking more than 500 parts.
He gained recognition by degrees, and in 1866 Ruth Herbert engaged him as her leading man and sometime stage director at the St. James's Theatre, London, where she first played Doricourt in The Belle's Stratagem. One piece that he directed there was W. S. Gilbert's first successful solo play, Dulcamara, or the Little Duck and the Great Quack (1866) The next year he joined the company of the newly opened Queen's Theatre, where he acted with Charles Wyndham, J. L. Toole, Lionel Brough, John Clayton|, Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Wigan, Ellen Terry and Nellie Farren. This was followed by short engagements at the Haymarket Theatre, Drury Lane, and the Gaiety Theatre. In the spring of 1869, Irving was one of the original twelve members of The Lambs of London—assembled by John Hare as a social club for actors—and would be made an Honorary Lifetime member in 1883. He finally made his first conspicuous success as Digby Grant in James Albery's Two Roses, which was produced at the Vaudeville Theatre on 4 June 1870 and ran for a very successful 300 nights.
In 1871, Irving began his association with the Lyceum Theatre by an engagement under Bateman's management. The fortunes of the house were at a low ebb when the tide was turned by Irving's sudden success as Mathias in The Bells, a version of Erckmann-Chatrian's Le Juif polonais by Leopold Lewis, a property which Irving had found for himself. The play ran for 150 nights, established Irving at the forefront of the British drama, and would prove a popular vehicle for Irving for the rest of his professional life. With Bateman, Irving was seen in W. G. Wills' Charles I and Eugene Aram, in Richelieu, and in 1874 in Hamlet. The unconventionality of this last performance, during a run of 200 nights, aroused keen discussion and singled him out as the most interesting English actor of his day. In 1875, again with Bateman, he was seen as the title character in Macbeth; in 1876 as Othello, and as Philip in Alfred Lord Tennyson's Queen Mary; in 1877 in Richard III; and in The Lyons Mail. During this time he became lifelong friends with Bram Stoker, who praised him in his review of Hamlet and thereafter joined Irving as the manager for the company.
Peak years
In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum under his own management. With Terry as Ophelia and Portia, he revived Hamlet and produced The Merchant of Venice (1879). His Shylock was as much discussed as his Hamlet had been, the dignity with which he invested the vengeful Jewish merchant marking a departure from the traditional interpretation of the role.
After the production of Tennyson's The Cup and revivals of Othello (in which Irving played Iago to Edwin Booth's title character) and Romeo and Juliet, there began a period at the Lyceum which had a potent effect on the English stage.
Much Ado about Nothing (1882) was followed by Twelfth Night (1884); an adaptation of Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield by W. G. Wills (1885); Faust (1885); Macbeth (1888, with incidental music by Arthur Sullivan); The Dead Heart, by Watts Phillips (1889); Ravenswood by Herman, and Merivales' dramatic version of Scott's Bride of Lammermoor (1890). Portrayals in 1892 of the characters of Wolsey in Henry VIII and of the title character in King Lear were followed in 1893 by a performance of Becket in Tennyson's play of the same name. During these years, too, Irving, with the whole Lyceum company, paid several successful visits to the United States and Canada, which were repeated in succeeding years. As Terry aged, there seemed to be fewer opportunities for her in his company; that was one reason she eventually left, moving on into less steady but nonetheless beloved stage work, including solo performances of Shakespeare's women.
Influence on Bram Stoker's Dracula
From 1878, Bram Stoker worked for Irving as a business manager at the Lyceum. Stoker idolised Irving to the point that "As one contemporary remarked, 'To Bram, Irving is as a god, and can do no wrong.' In the considered judgment of one biographer, Stoker's friendship with Irving was 'the most important love relationship of his adult life.'" Irving, however, "… was a self-absorbed and profoundly manipulative man. He enjoyed cultivating rivalries between his followers, and to remain in his circle required constant, careful courting of his notoriously fickle affections." When Stoker began writing Dracula, Irving was the chief inspiration for the title character. In his 2002 paper for The American Historical Review, "Buffalo Bill Meets Dracula: William F. Cody, Bram Stoker, and the Frontiers of Racial Decay", historian Louis S. Warren writes:
Later years
The chief remaining novelties at the Lyceum during Irving's term as sole manager (at the beginning of 1899 the theatre passed into the hands of a limited-liability company) were Arthur Conan Doyle's Waterloo (1894); J. Comyns Carr's King Arthur in 1895; Cymbeline, in which Irving played Iachimo, in 1896; Sardou's Madame Sans-Gene in 1897; and Peter the Great, a play by Laurence Irving, the actor's second son, in 1898.
Irving received a death threat in 1899 from fellow actor (and murderer of William Terriss) Richard Archer Prince. Terriss had been stabbed at the stage door of the Adelphi Theatre in December 1897 and in the wake of his death, Prince was committed to Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum. Irving was critical of the unusually lenient sentence, remarking 'Terriss was an actor, so his murderer will not be executed.' Two years later, Prince had found Irving's home address and threatened to murder him 'when he gets out'. Irving was advised to submit the letter to the Home Office to ensure Prince's continued incarceration, which Irving declined to do.
In 1898 Irving was Rede Lecturer at the University of Cambridge. The new regime at the Lyceum was signalled by the production of Sardou's Robespierre in 1899, in which Irving reappeared after a serious illness, and in 1901 by an elaborate revival of Coriolanus. Irving's only subsequent production in London was as Sardou's Dante (1903) at the Drury Lane.
On 13 October 1905, at 67 years old, Irving was taking part in a performance while on tour in Bradford, when he suffered a stroke. He was taken to the lobby of the Midland Hotel, Bradford, where he died shortly afterwards. His death was described by Thomas Anstey Guthrie in his 'Long Retrospect':
The chair that he was sitting in when he died is now at the Garrick Club. He was cremated and his ashes buried in Westminster Abbey, thereby becoming the first person ever to be cremated prior to interment at Westminster.
There is a statue of him near the National Portrait Gallery in London. That statue, as well as the influence of Irving himself, plays an important part in the Robertson Davies novel World of Wonders. The Irving Memorial Garden was opened on 19 July 1951 by Laurence Olivier.
Legacy
Both on and off the stage, Irving always maintained a high ideal of his profession, and in 1895 he received a knighthood (first offered in 1883), the first ever accorded an actor. He was also the recipient of honorary degrees from the universities of Dublin (LL.D 1892), Cambridge (Litt.D 1898), and Glasgow (LL.D 1899). He also received the Komthur Cross, 2nd class, of the Saxe-Ernestine House Order of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and Saxe-Meiningen.
His acting divided critics; opinions differed as to the extent to which his mannerisms of voice and deportment interfered with or assisted the expression of his ideas.
Irving's idiosyncratic style of acting and its effect on amateur players was mildly satirised in The Diary of a Nobody. Mr Pooter's son brings Mr Burwin-Fosselton of the Holloway Comedians to supper, a young man who entirely monopolised the conversation, and:
"...who not only looked rather like Mr Irving but seemed to imagine he was the celebrated actor... he began doing the Irving business all through supper. He sank so low down in his chair that his chin was almost on a level with the table, and twice he kicked Carrie under the table, upset his wine, and flashed a knife uncomfortably near Gowing's face."
In the 1963 West End musical comedy Half a Sixpence the actor Chitterlow does an impression of Irving in The Bells. Percy French's burlesque heroic poem "Abdul Abulbul Amir" lists among the mock-heroic attributes of Abdul's adversary, the Russian Count Ivan Skavinsky Skavar, that "he could imitate Irving". In the 1995 film A Midwinter's Tale by Kenneth Branagh, two actors discuss Irving, and one of them, Richard Briers does an imitation of his speech. In the play The Woman in Black, set in the Victorian era, the actor playing Kipps tells Kipps 'We'll make an Irving of you yet,' in Act 1, as Kipps is not a very good actor due to his inexperience.
In the political sitcom Yes, Prime Minister (sequel to Yes, Minister), in the episode "The Patron of the Arts", first aired on 14 January 1988, the Prime Minister is asked what was the last play he'd seen, and replies "Hamlet." When asked "Whose?"—specifically, who played Hamlet, not who wrote it—he is unable to remember and is prompted with the suggestion "Henry Irving?" to audience laughter.
Biography
In 1906, Bram Stoker published a two-volume biography about Irving called Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving.
See also
Irving Family
Notes
References
Further reading
Stoker, Bram. Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving: Volume 1 and Volume 2. London : W. Heinemann, 1906. Scanned books via Internet Archive.
Archer, William 1885. Henry Irving, Actor and Manager: A Critical Study, London:Field & Tuer.
Beerbohm, Max. 1928. 'Henry Irving' in A Variety of Things. New York, Knopf.
Holroyd, Michael. 2008. A Strange Eventful History, Farrar Straus Giroux,
Irving, Laurence. 1989. Henry Irving: The Actor and His World. Lively Arts.
External links
The Irving Society
The Henry Irving Foundation
Information about Irving at the PeoplePlay UK website
NY Times article that includes information about Irving's American tour and the lease of the Lyceum to the American company at the same time
My First "Reading" by Henry Irving, an article written by Irving about a personal experience
Henry Irving North American Theatre Online with bio and pics
Henry Irving-Ellen Terry tour correspondence, 1884-1896, held by the Billy Rose Theatre Division, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts
1838 births
1905 deaths
English male stage actors
English male Shakespearean actors
19th-century English male actors
20th-century English male actors
19th-century theatre
Actor-managers
Knights Bachelor
Actors awarded knighthoods
English people of Cornish descent
People from South Somerset (district)
Burials at Westminster Abbey
Freemasons of the United Grand Lodge of England
19th-century theatre managers
20th-century theatre managers
Members of The Lambs Club | true | [
"Shakespeare is a feature on Earth's Moon, a crater in Taurus–Littrow valley. Astronauts Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt landed southwest of it in 1972, on the Apollo 17 mission. They did not visit it, but in fact drove around it during EVA 3.\n\nTo the south is Van Serg, to the northeast is Cochise, and to the northwest is a crater unofficially called Henry on some maps.\n\nThe crater was named by the astronauts after English playwright William Shakespeare.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nGeological Investigation of the Taurus–Littrow Valley: Apollo 17 Landing Site\nShakespeare at The Moon Wiki\n\nImpact craters on the Moon\nApollo 17",
"Clement Mansfield Ingleby (29 October 1823 – 26 September 1886) was an English Shakespearian scholar.\n\nEarly life and education\n\nClement Ingleby was born at Edgbaston near Birmingham, the son of a lawyer. Poor health – he was not expected to live long – kept him from attending school, so he was privately educated at home. He went to Trinity College, Cambridge, when twenty years old, and specialised in mathematics. He received his B.A. in 1847 and his M.A. in 1850. Returning to Birmingham he went to work in his father's law office, and then became a partner in the firm of Ingleby, Wragge, and Ingleby (now Wragge & Co LLP). In spite of his poor health he devoted his spare time to metaphysics, mathematics, and English literature.\n\nIn 1850 Ingleby married Sarah Oakes (d. 3 January 1906).\n\nClass in logic\nIn 1855 the Birmingham and Midland Institute was established, an experiment in continuing adult education. Ingleby took on giving a class in logic and metaphysics at the industrial branch. His methods were novel and the class was successful. A disciple of William Hamilton, Ingleby focused on the most current views, even obtaining from Hamilton his yet-unpublished improvements. Urged by his students, Ingleby issued Outlines of Theoretical Logic in 1856 as a textbook in the subject. It was his first published volume.\n\nCollier Shakespeare controversy \nIn the 1850s documents discovered by John Payne Collier bearing on Elizabethan stage history in general and Shakespeare's life in particular fell under suspicion. Re-examination of several documents showed them to be out-and-out forgeries, forgeries so obvious it was difficult to see how Collier could have been deceived by them. One item of particular interest, the Perkins Folio, had never been examined by anybody besides Collier. It contained many corrections in what appeared to be a 16th-century hand that Collier suggested might be based on stage tradition. Ingleby, along with Sir Frederick Madden, who put the resources of the British Museum on the task, were finally able to examine the Perkins Folio in detail. They discovered—as was the case with others of the forgeries—modern pencil-marks under the supposedly ancient writing. The handwriting of these appeared to be Collier's.\n\nThe conclusion was inescapable—Collier himself must have forged these documents. In 1859 Ingleby published a small volume entitled The Shakespeare Fabrications, setting these facts forth dispassionately. (An appendix to this volume dealing with the Ireland Shakespeare forgeries, however, was later repudiated by the author.) Collier denied the allegations, but Ingleby's A Complete View of the Shakespeare Controversy closed the discussion, and Collier did not reply.\n\nMove to London\n\nIngleby abandoned law for literature in 1859, and removed from Birmingham to the neighbourhood of London. His early works were of a philosophical nature (his Introduction to Metaphysics in two parts came out in 1864 and 1869), but he is best known as the author of a long series of works on Shakespearian subjects. In 1874 appeared The Still Lion, enlarged in 1875 as Shakespeare Hermeneutics. This warned against needless emendation of Shakespeare's text and explained some alleged problems. In 1875 Shakespeare's Centurie of Prayse came out, a definitive collection of allusions to Shakespeare and his works between 1592 and 1692. Other contributions include Shakespeare: the Man and the Book (a collection of essays in two volumes, 1877 and 1881), Shakespeare's Bones (1882), and Shakespeare and the Enclosure of the Common Fields at Welcombe (1885).\n\nOther interests\n\nIngleby was also a musician (he sang Shakespearean songs as part of the 1864 tercentenary celebration of Shakespeare's birth in Birmingham), a chess enthusiast who contributed problems to Chess Player's Chronicle and the Illustrated London News, and a member of the Athenæum Club. At various times he was Secretary of the Birmingham and Edgbaston Chess Club and a Vice-President of the Royal Society of Literature.\n\nDeath\n\nIll-health had plagued him throughout his life, and in 1886 he became seriously ill. His edition of Cymbeline had just come out when he died on 26 September 1886.\n\nCharacter\n\nIngleby took a dark view of his own character: \"I am morally weak in many respects,\" he wrote. \"In some matters I have been systematically deceptive, and occasionally cowardly and treacherous. I am passionately fond of personal beauty; but on the whole, I dislike my kind, and my natural affections are weak\" Horace Howard Furness, however, wrote of him:\n\nSelected works\n Outlines of Theoretical Logic: Founded on the New Analytic of Sir William Hamilton, Cambridge, 1856.\n The Shakespeare Fabrications, London, 1859.\n A Complete View of the Shakspere Controversy, London, 1861.\n Was Thomas Lodge an Actor?, London, 1868.\n Reflections Historical and Critical on the Revival of Philosophy at Cambridge, 1870.\n The Shakspere Allusion Books, London, 1874.\n Shakespeare's Centurie of Prayse: Being Materials for a History of Opinion on Shakespeare and His Works, London, 1874; 2nd edition, 1879.\n Shakespeare Hermeneutics; Or, The Still Lion: Being an Essay Towards the Restoration of Shakespeare's Text, London, 1875.\n Shakespeare: The Man and the Book: Being a Collection of Occasional Papers on the Bard and His Writings; Part the First, London, 1877.\n Occasional Papers on Shakespeare, Being the Second Part of Shakespeare: The Man and the Book, London, 1881.\n Shakespeare's Bones: The Proposal to Disinter Them, Considered in Relation to their Possible Bearing on His Portraiture, London, 1883.\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nAttribution\n \n The entry cites as general references:\nA biographical sketch in Edgbastonia (1886);\nTimmins's Memoir in Shakespeariana (1886);\nprivate information.\n\nExternal links\n\n \n \n Works by Clement Mansfield Ingleby at Google Books\n Clement Mansfield Ingleby Material at The National Archives of the United Kingdom\n\n1823 births\n1886 deaths\nEnglish non-fiction writers\nEnglish male non-fiction writers\nShakespearean scholars\nPeople from Edgbaston\nEnglish male dramatists and playwrights"
] |
[
"Henry Irving",
"Peak years",
"What did Irving act in during his peak years?",
"In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum",
"What was his role at the Lyceum?",
"re-opened the Lyceum under his own management.",
"What plays did the Lyceum put on under his leadership?",
"he revived Hamlet and produced The Merchant of Venice (1879).",
"Did they put on anything besides Shakespeare?",
"The Dead Heart, by Watts Phillips (1889); Ravenswood by Herman, and Merivales' dramatic version of Scott's Bride of Lammermoor"
] | C_f3675a36154a4513a9141f85ee158360_0 | Any other notable works that were performed? | 5 | Besides The Dead Heart, Ravenswood and Hamlet, any other notable works that were performed under Henry Irving's leadership? | Henry Irving | In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum under his own management. With Terry as Ophelia and Portia, he revived Hamlet and produced The Merchant of Venice (1879). His Shylock was as much discussed as his Hamlet had been, the dignity with which he invested the vengeful Jewish merchant marking a departure from the traditional interpretation of the role. After the production of Tennyson's The Cup and revivals of Othello (in which Irving played Iago to Edwin Booth's title character) and Romeo and Juliet, there began a period at the Lyceum which had a potent effect on the English stage. Much Ado about Nothing (1882) was followed by Twelfth Night (1884); an adaptation of Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield by W. G. Wills (1885); Faust (1886); Macbeth (1888, with incidental music by Arthur Sullivan); The Dead Heart, by Watts Phillips (1889); Ravenswood by Herman, and Merivales' dramatic version of Scott's Bride of Lammermoor (1890). Portrayals in 1892 of the characters of Wolsey in Henry VIII and of the title character in King Lear were followed in 1893 by a performance of Becket in Tennyson's play of the same name. During these years, too, Irving, with the whole Lyceum company, paid several successful visits to the United States and Canada, which were repeated in succeeding years. As Terry aged, there seemed to be fewer opportunities for her in his company; that was one reason she eventually left, moving on into less steady but nonetheless beloved stage work, including solo performances of Shakespeare's women. CANNOTANSWER | Portrayals in 1892 of the characters of Wolsey in Henry VIII and of the title character in King Lear | Sir Henry Irving (6 February 1838 – 13 October 1905), born John Henry Brodribb, sometimes known as J. H. Irving, was an English stage actor in the Victorian era, known as an actor-manager because he took complete responsibility (supervision of sets, lighting, direction, casting, as well as playing the leading roles) for season after season at the West End’s Lyceum Theatre, establishing himself and his company as representative of English classical theatre. In 1895 he became the first actor to be awarded a knighthood, indicating full acceptance into the higher circles of British society.
Irving is widely acknowledged to be one of the inspirations for Count Dracula, the title character of the 1897 novel Dracula whose author, Bram Stoker, was business manager of the theatre.
Life and career
Irving was born to a working-class family in Keinton Mandeville in the county of Somerset. W.H. Davies, the celebrated poet, was a cousin. Irving spent his childhood living with his aunt, Mrs Penberthy, at Halsetown in Cornwall. He competed in a recitation contest at a local Methodist chapel where he was beaten by William Curnow, later the editor of The Sydney Morning Herald. He attended City Commercial School for two years before going to work in the office of a law firm at age 13. When he saw Samuel Phelps play Hamlet soon after this, he sought lessons, letters of introduction, and work in the Lyceum Theatre in Sunderland in 1856, labouring against great odds until his 1871 success in The Bells in London set him apart from all the rest.
He married Florence O'Callaghan on 15 July 1869 at St. Marylebone, London, but his personal life took second place to his professional life. On opening night of The Bells, 25 November 1871, Florence, who was pregnant with their second child, criticised his profession: "Are you going on making a fool of yourself like this all your life?" Irving exited their carriage at Hyde Park Corner, walked off into the night, and chose never to see her again. He maintained a discreet distance from his children as well, but became closer to them as they grew older. Florence Irving never divorced Irving, and once he had been knighted she styled herself "Lady Irving"; Irving never remarried.
His elder son, Harry Brodribb Irving (1870–1919), usually known as "H B Irving", became a famous actor and later a theatre manager. His younger son, Laurence Irving (1871–1914), became a dramatist and later drowned, with his wife Mabel Hackney, in the sinking of the Empress of Ireland. H B married Dorothea Baird and they had a son, Laurence Irving (1897–1988), who became a well-known Hollywood art director and his grandfather's biographer.
In November 1882 Irving became a Freemason, being initiated into the prestigious Jerusalem Lodge No 197 in London. In 1887 he became a founder member and first Treasurer of the Savage Club Lodge No 2190, a Lodge associated with London's Savage Club.
He eventually took over the management of the Lyceum Theatre and brought actress Ellen Terry into partnership with him as Ophelia to his Hamlet, Lady Macbeth to his Macbeth, Portia to his Shylock, Beatrice to his Benedick, etc. Before joining the Lyceum, Terry had fled her first marriage and conceived two out-of-wedlock children with architect-designer Edward William Godwin, but regardless of how much and how often her behavior defied the strict morality expected by her Victorian audiences, she somehow remained popular. It could be said that Irving found his family in his professional company, which included his ardent supporter and manager Bram Stoker and Terry's two illegitimate children, Teddy and Edy.
Whether Irving's long, spectacularly successful relationship with leading lady Ellen Terry was romantic as well as professional has been the subject of much historical speculation. Most of their correspondence was lost or burned by her descendants. According to Michael Holroyd's book about Irving and Terry, A Strange Eventful History:
Terry's son Teddy, later known as Edward Gordon Craig, spent much of his childhood (from 1879, when he was 8, until 1897) indulged by Irving backstage at the Lyceum. Craig, who came to be regarded as something of a visionary for the theatre of the future, wrote an especially vivid, book-length tribute to Irving. ("Let me state at once, in clearest unmistakable terms, that I have never known of, or seen, or heard, a greater actor than was Irving.") George Bernard Shaw, at the time a theatre critic who was jealous of Irving's connection to Ellen Terry (whom Shaw himself wanted in his own plays), conceded Irving's genius after Irving died.
Early career
After a few years' schooling while living at Halsetown, near St Ives, Cornwall, Irving became a clerk to a firm of East India merchants in London, but he soon gave up a commercial career for acting. On 29 September 1856 he made his first appearance at Sunderland as Gaston, Duke of Orleans, in Bulwer Lytton's play, Richelieu, billed as Henry Irving. This name he eventually assumed by royal licence. When the inexperienced Irving got stage fright and was hissed off the stage the actor Samuel Johnson was among those who supported him with practical advice. Later in life Irving gave them all regular work when he formed his own Company at the Lyceum Theatre.
For 10 years, he went through an arduous training in various stock companies in Scotland and the north of England, taking more than 500 parts.
He gained recognition by degrees, and in 1866 Ruth Herbert engaged him as her leading man and sometime stage director at the St. James's Theatre, London, where she first played Doricourt in The Belle's Stratagem. One piece that he directed there was W. S. Gilbert's first successful solo play, Dulcamara, or the Little Duck and the Great Quack (1866) The next year he joined the company of the newly opened Queen's Theatre, where he acted with Charles Wyndham, J. L. Toole, Lionel Brough, John Clayton|, Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Wigan, Ellen Terry and Nellie Farren. This was followed by short engagements at the Haymarket Theatre, Drury Lane, and the Gaiety Theatre. In the spring of 1869, Irving was one of the original twelve members of The Lambs of London—assembled by John Hare as a social club for actors—and would be made an Honorary Lifetime member in 1883. He finally made his first conspicuous success as Digby Grant in James Albery's Two Roses, which was produced at the Vaudeville Theatre on 4 June 1870 and ran for a very successful 300 nights.
In 1871, Irving began his association with the Lyceum Theatre by an engagement under Bateman's management. The fortunes of the house were at a low ebb when the tide was turned by Irving's sudden success as Mathias in The Bells, a version of Erckmann-Chatrian's Le Juif polonais by Leopold Lewis, a property which Irving had found for himself. The play ran for 150 nights, established Irving at the forefront of the British drama, and would prove a popular vehicle for Irving for the rest of his professional life. With Bateman, Irving was seen in W. G. Wills' Charles I and Eugene Aram, in Richelieu, and in 1874 in Hamlet. The unconventionality of this last performance, during a run of 200 nights, aroused keen discussion and singled him out as the most interesting English actor of his day. In 1875, again with Bateman, he was seen as the title character in Macbeth; in 1876 as Othello, and as Philip in Alfred Lord Tennyson's Queen Mary; in 1877 in Richard III; and in The Lyons Mail. During this time he became lifelong friends with Bram Stoker, who praised him in his review of Hamlet and thereafter joined Irving as the manager for the company.
Peak years
In 1878, Irving entered into a partnership with actress Ellen Terry and re-opened the Lyceum under his own management. With Terry as Ophelia and Portia, he revived Hamlet and produced The Merchant of Venice (1879). His Shylock was as much discussed as his Hamlet had been, the dignity with which he invested the vengeful Jewish merchant marking a departure from the traditional interpretation of the role.
After the production of Tennyson's The Cup and revivals of Othello (in which Irving played Iago to Edwin Booth's title character) and Romeo and Juliet, there began a period at the Lyceum which had a potent effect on the English stage.
Much Ado about Nothing (1882) was followed by Twelfth Night (1884); an adaptation of Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield by W. G. Wills (1885); Faust (1885); Macbeth (1888, with incidental music by Arthur Sullivan); The Dead Heart, by Watts Phillips (1889); Ravenswood by Herman, and Merivales' dramatic version of Scott's Bride of Lammermoor (1890). Portrayals in 1892 of the characters of Wolsey in Henry VIII and of the title character in King Lear were followed in 1893 by a performance of Becket in Tennyson's play of the same name. During these years, too, Irving, with the whole Lyceum company, paid several successful visits to the United States and Canada, which were repeated in succeeding years. As Terry aged, there seemed to be fewer opportunities for her in his company; that was one reason she eventually left, moving on into less steady but nonetheless beloved stage work, including solo performances of Shakespeare's women.
Influence on Bram Stoker's Dracula
From 1878, Bram Stoker worked for Irving as a business manager at the Lyceum. Stoker idolised Irving to the point that "As one contemporary remarked, 'To Bram, Irving is as a god, and can do no wrong.' In the considered judgment of one biographer, Stoker's friendship with Irving was 'the most important love relationship of his adult life.'" Irving, however, "… was a self-absorbed and profoundly manipulative man. He enjoyed cultivating rivalries between his followers, and to remain in his circle required constant, careful courting of his notoriously fickle affections." When Stoker began writing Dracula, Irving was the chief inspiration for the title character. In his 2002 paper for The American Historical Review, "Buffalo Bill Meets Dracula: William F. Cody, Bram Stoker, and the Frontiers of Racial Decay", historian Louis S. Warren writes:
Later years
The chief remaining novelties at the Lyceum during Irving's term as sole manager (at the beginning of 1899 the theatre passed into the hands of a limited-liability company) were Arthur Conan Doyle's Waterloo (1894); J. Comyns Carr's King Arthur in 1895; Cymbeline, in which Irving played Iachimo, in 1896; Sardou's Madame Sans-Gene in 1897; and Peter the Great, a play by Laurence Irving, the actor's second son, in 1898.
Irving received a death threat in 1899 from fellow actor (and murderer of William Terriss) Richard Archer Prince. Terriss had been stabbed at the stage door of the Adelphi Theatre in December 1897 and in the wake of his death, Prince was committed to Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum. Irving was critical of the unusually lenient sentence, remarking 'Terriss was an actor, so his murderer will not be executed.' Two years later, Prince had found Irving's home address and threatened to murder him 'when he gets out'. Irving was advised to submit the letter to the Home Office to ensure Prince's continued incarceration, which Irving declined to do.
In 1898 Irving was Rede Lecturer at the University of Cambridge. The new regime at the Lyceum was signalled by the production of Sardou's Robespierre in 1899, in which Irving reappeared after a serious illness, and in 1901 by an elaborate revival of Coriolanus. Irving's only subsequent production in London was as Sardou's Dante (1903) at the Drury Lane.
On 13 October 1905, at 67 years old, Irving was taking part in a performance while on tour in Bradford, when he suffered a stroke. He was taken to the lobby of the Midland Hotel, Bradford, where he died shortly afterwards. His death was described by Thomas Anstey Guthrie in his 'Long Retrospect':
The chair that he was sitting in when he died is now at the Garrick Club. He was cremated and his ashes buried in Westminster Abbey, thereby becoming the first person ever to be cremated prior to interment at Westminster.
There is a statue of him near the National Portrait Gallery in London. That statue, as well as the influence of Irving himself, plays an important part in the Robertson Davies novel World of Wonders. The Irving Memorial Garden was opened on 19 July 1951 by Laurence Olivier.
Legacy
Both on and off the stage, Irving always maintained a high ideal of his profession, and in 1895 he received a knighthood (first offered in 1883), the first ever accorded an actor. He was also the recipient of honorary degrees from the universities of Dublin (LL.D 1892), Cambridge (Litt.D 1898), and Glasgow (LL.D 1899). He also received the Komthur Cross, 2nd class, of the Saxe-Ernestine House Order of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and Saxe-Meiningen.
His acting divided critics; opinions differed as to the extent to which his mannerisms of voice and deportment interfered with or assisted the expression of his ideas.
Irving's idiosyncratic style of acting and its effect on amateur players was mildly satirised in The Diary of a Nobody. Mr Pooter's son brings Mr Burwin-Fosselton of the Holloway Comedians to supper, a young man who entirely monopolised the conversation, and:
"...who not only looked rather like Mr Irving but seemed to imagine he was the celebrated actor... he began doing the Irving business all through supper. He sank so low down in his chair that his chin was almost on a level with the table, and twice he kicked Carrie under the table, upset his wine, and flashed a knife uncomfortably near Gowing's face."
In the 1963 West End musical comedy Half a Sixpence the actor Chitterlow does an impression of Irving in The Bells. Percy French's burlesque heroic poem "Abdul Abulbul Amir" lists among the mock-heroic attributes of Abdul's adversary, the Russian Count Ivan Skavinsky Skavar, that "he could imitate Irving". In the 1995 film A Midwinter's Tale by Kenneth Branagh, two actors discuss Irving, and one of them, Richard Briers does an imitation of his speech. In the play The Woman in Black, set in the Victorian era, the actor playing Kipps tells Kipps 'We'll make an Irving of you yet,' in Act 1, as Kipps is not a very good actor due to his inexperience.
In the political sitcom Yes, Prime Minister (sequel to Yes, Minister), in the episode "The Patron of the Arts", first aired on 14 January 1988, the Prime Minister is asked what was the last play he'd seen, and replies "Hamlet." When asked "Whose?"—specifically, who played Hamlet, not who wrote it—he is unable to remember and is prompted with the suggestion "Henry Irving?" to audience laughter.
Biography
In 1906, Bram Stoker published a two-volume biography about Irving called Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving.
See also
Irving Family
Notes
References
Further reading
Stoker, Bram. Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving: Volume 1 and Volume 2. London : W. Heinemann, 1906. Scanned books via Internet Archive.
Archer, William 1885. Henry Irving, Actor and Manager: A Critical Study, London:Field & Tuer.
Beerbohm, Max. 1928. 'Henry Irving' in A Variety of Things. New York, Knopf.
Holroyd, Michael. 2008. A Strange Eventful History, Farrar Straus Giroux,
Irving, Laurence. 1989. Henry Irving: The Actor and His World. Lively Arts.
External links
The Irving Society
The Henry Irving Foundation
Information about Irving at the PeoplePlay UK website
NY Times article that includes information about Irving's American tour and the lease of the Lyceum to the American company at the same time
My First "Reading" by Henry Irving, an article written by Irving about a personal experience
Henry Irving North American Theatre Online with bio and pics
Henry Irving-Ellen Terry tour correspondence, 1884-1896, held by the Billy Rose Theatre Division, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts
1838 births
1905 deaths
English male stage actors
English male Shakespearean actors
19th-century English male actors
20th-century English male actors
19th-century theatre
Actor-managers
Knights Bachelor
Actors awarded knighthoods
English people of Cornish descent
People from South Somerset (district)
Burials at Westminster Abbey
Freemasons of the United Grand Lodge of England
19th-century theatre managers
20th-century theatre managers
Members of The Lambs Club | true | [
"The Toronto Symphony Orchestra (TSO) was a Canadian orchestra based in Toronto, Ontario that was active during the first two decades of the 20th century under the leadership of conductor and pianist Frank Welsman. It was the first professional orchestra that existed for any notable length in the city of Toronto. After 13 seasons of performance, the orchestra folded in 1918 because of problems related to World War I. The current Toronto Symphony Orchestra is unrelated to this one.\n\nHistory\nThe TSO was founded in 1906 under the name the Toronto Conservatory Symphony Orchestra by Frank Welsman. The orchestra was originally formed as a student ensemble for the Toronto Conservatory of Music (TCM), and during its first two years the orchestra was made up of only students and faculty from the school. Faculty member and violinist Bertha Drechsler Adamson served as the orchestra's concertmistress.\n\nIn 1908 the TSO cut ties with the TCM and became an entirely professional orchestra that was governed by a board under the leadership of Toronto businessman H.C. Cox. The orchestra received financial support from the Massey family. At that time the orchestra was renamed the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. Welsman continued in his roles as conductor and artistic director and many of the conservatory's faculty members continued to play with the orchestra. Frank Blachford was appointed the new concertmaster and other professionals were hired at this time to raise the overall playing talent of the orchestra. Composer and cellist Leo Smith joined the orchestra in 1910 after leaving the orchestra of the Royal Opera House in London. He eventually became principal cellist of the ensemble and served as the author of the ensemble's program notes from 1910-1918. Some of the other notable musicians in the orchestra included Jack Arthur, Luigi Romanelli, and Harry Adaskin.\n\nTSO gave its first full season of professional concerts in 1908 at Massey Hall. The orchestra concerts were popular events among Toronto's social elite. The TSO attempted to reach a different audience by establishing extra concerts of popular music in 1909 with ticket prices at just 25 cents.\n\nDuring its history, the TSO mainly performed works from the standard German Classical and Romantic period repertoires, such as symphonies by Ludwig van Beethoven, Joseph Haydn, Felix Mendelssohn, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and Franz Schubert. In 1911 the ensemble gave a program entirely devoted to the works of Richard Wagner. Strangely absent from the orchestra's repertoire were the works of Johannes Brahms. The group also performed more rarely heard works such as both of Karl Goldmark's symphonies and Richard Strauss's Death and Transfiguration.\n\nOutside of the German repertoire, the TSO performed such works as Antonín Dvořák's Symphony No. 9, several symphonic works by Vasily Kalinnikov, and the final three symphonies by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky among others. In April 1911 the ensemble performed Edward Elgar's oratorio The Dream of Gerontius with the composer as guest conductor and the Sheffield Choir. A survey taken of audience members in 1913 revealed that the group's most popularly received works were Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 6, Mendelssohn's A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Franz Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2.\n\nThe TSO was host to many important musicians. Sergei Rachmaninoff notably performed his own Piano Concerto No. 2 with the orchestra in 1914. Other notable guests included pianists Wilhelm Backhaus and Vladimir de Pachmann; singers Clara Butt, Johanna Gadski, Alma Gluck, Louise Homer, Leo Slezak, and Ernestine Schumann-Heink; and violinists Mischa Elman, Carl Flesch, Fritz Kreisler, and Eugène Ysaÿe.\n \nDuring World War I, the TSO began to experience financial difficulties and faced other war related problems affecting travel, audience attendance, and the ability to keep its players. Ultimately these problems compounded and the orchestra disbanded in 1918.\n\nReferences\n\nCanadian orchestras\nDisbanded orchestras\nMusical groups from Toronto\nMusical groups established in 1906\nMusical groups disestablished in 1918\n1906 establishments in Ontario\n1918 disestablishments in Ontario",
"A throttle body spacer is usually a thick piece of metal that is bolted to the outlet of the throttle body of an automotive engine upstream of air flow into the manifold. By changing the airflow, this after-market add-on claims to be a performance enhancing accessory that can increase an engine's horse power, torque and fuel economy. It functions by swirling or directing the air flow to maximize air volume to the manifold. There is much debate about the veracity of the manufacturers' claims for these devices. The general consensus is that it works well on some engine configurations, and not at all or adversely on others. \n\nVehicle modifications\nEngine technology\nIn 2009 the BBK Performance R&D Department performed extensive dyno testing of off the shelf throttle body spacers from other manufacturers. The intention was to determine whether or not throttle body spacers were a viable product that BBK could manufacture that would provide notable results for their customers. The tests were performed on Ford 4.6L 3-V, GM LS, and Mopar HEMI V8 applications using a Dynojet 248C dynamometer. The tests consisted of a baseline dyno run, cool down period, and a repeat test after the spacers were installed. None of the spacers produced any additional horsepower or torque when tested. The only notable change was a loss of 4 horsepower to the tires on the Mopar application with the spacer installed. An additional test was run after removing the spacer, resulting in a return of the lost horsepower. Proving that some spacers can actually rob power from an engine. After seeing the results, it was clear that throttle body spacers were simply gimmicks and provided no real performance value. BBK scrapped all plans to manufacture throttle body spacers."
] |
[
"Sandy Denny",
"Early career"
] | C_e6cc2f78b77b4fcab1029b8e527f1a13_1 | How did she get started in her career? | 1 | How did Sandy Denny get started in her career? | Sandy Denny | Her nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn. After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fhir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels". Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes. By this time she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark which was released belatedly in 1973 credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer. CANNOTANSWER | in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. | Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny (6 January 1947 – 21 April 1978) was an English singer-songwriter who was lead singer of the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. She has been described as "the pre-eminent British folk rock singer".
After briefly working with the Strawbs, Denny joined Fairport Convention in 1968, remaining with them until 1969. She formed the short-lived band Fotheringay in 1970, before focusing on a solo career. Between 1971 and 1977, Denny released four solo albums: The North Star Grassman and the Ravens, Sandy, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz and Rendezvous. She also duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore" for Led Zeppelin's album Led Zeppelin IV in 1971. Denny died in 1978 at the age of 31 due to injuries and health issues related to alcohol abuse.
Music publications Uncut and Mojo have described Denny as Britain's finest female singer-songwriter. Her composition "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" has been recorded by Judy Collins, Eva Cassidy, Nina Simone, 10,000 Maniacs and Cat Power. Her recorded work has been the subject of numerous reissues, along with a wealth of previously unreleased material which has appeared over the more than 40 years since her death, including a 19-CD box set released in November 2010.
Childhood
Denny was born on 6 January 1947 at Nelson Hospital, Kingston Road, Merton Park, London, to Neil and Edna Denny. She studied classical piano as a child.
Her paternal grandfather was from Dundee, and her paternal grandmother was a Scots Gaelic speaker and singer of traditional songs. At an early age Denny showed an interest in singing, although her strict parents were reluctant to believe there was a living to be made from it. She attended Coombe Girls' School in New Malden; after leaving school she began training as a nurse at the Royal Brompton Hospital.
Early career
Denny's nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn.
After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames, Denny began working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels".
Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes.
By this time, she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark, which was released belatedly in 1973, credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer.
From Fairport to Fotheringay
After making the Saga albums with Alex Campbell and Johnny Silvo, Denny looked for a band that would allow her to stretch herself as a vocalist, reach a wider audience, and have the opportunity to display her songwriting. She said, "I wanted to do something more with my voice." After working briefly with the Strawbs, Denny remained unconvinced that they could provide that opportunity, and so she ended her relationship with the band.
Fairport Convention conducted auditions in May 1968 for a replacement singer following the departure of Judy Dyble after their debut album, and Denny became the obvious choice. According to group member Simon Nicol, her personality and musicianship made her stand out from the other auditionees "like a clean glass in a sink full of dirty dishes".
Beginning with What We Did on Our Holidays, the first of three albums she made with the band in the late 1960s, Denny is credited with encouraging Fairport Convention to explore the traditional British folk repertoire, and is thus regarded as a key figure in the development of British folk rock. She brought with her the traditional repertoire she had refined in the clubs, including "A Sailor's Life" featured on their second album together Unhalfbricking. Framing Denny's performance of this song with their own electric improvisations, her bandmates discovered what then proved to be the inspiration for an entire album, the influential Liege & Lief (1969).
Denny left Fairport Convention in December 1969 to develop her own songwriting more fully. To this end, she formed her own band, Fotheringay, which included her future husband, Australian Trevor Lucas, formerly of the group Eclection.
They created one self-titled album, which included an eight-minute version of the traditional "Banks of the Nile", and several Denny originals, among them "The Sea" and "Nothing More". The latter marked her first composition on the piano, which was to become her primary instrument from then on. Fotheringay started to record a second album in late 1970, but it remained unfinished after Denny announced that she was leaving the group and producer Joe Boyd left to take up a job at Warner Brothers in California. Denny would later blame Boyd's hostility towards the group for its demise.
Solo career and final years
She then turned to recording her first solo album, The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. Released in 1971, it is distinguished by its elusive lyrics and unconventional harmonies. Highlights included "Late November", inspired by a dream and the death of Fairport band member Martin Lamble, and "Next Time Around" a cryptogram about Jackson C. Frank, one of her many portraits in song.
Sandy, with a cover photograph by David Bailey, followed in 1972 and was the first of her albums to be produced by Trevor Lucas. As well as introducing eight new original compositions, the album marked her last recording of a traditional song, "The Quiet Joys of Brotherhood" (words by Richard Fariña), with Denny's ambitious multi-tracked vocal arrangement inspired by the Ensemble of the Bulgarian Republic.
Melody Maker readers twice voted her the "Best British Female Singer", in 1970 and 1971 and, together with contemporaries including Richard Thompson and Ashley Hutchings, she participated in a one-off project called the Bunch to record a collection of rock and roll era standards released under the title of Rock On.
In 1971, Denny duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore", which was included on Led Zeppelin's 1971 album (Led Zeppelin IV); she was the only guest vocalist ever to appear on a Led Zeppelin album. In 1972 Denny had a small cameo on Lou Reizner's symphonic arrangement of the Who's rock opera Tommy. Her brief appearance was at the end of the track "It's a Boy", which also featured vocals from Pete Townshend.
In 1973, she married long-term boyfriend and producer Trevor Lucas and recorded a third solo album, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz. The songs continued to detail many of her personal preoccupations: loss, loneliness, fear of the dark, the passing of time and the changing seasons. The album contained one of her best loved compositions, "Solo", and featured a cover image by Gered Mankowitz.
In 1974, she returned to Fairport Convention (of which her husband was by then a member) for a world tour (captured on the 1974 album Fairport Live Convention) and a studio album, Rising for the Moon in 1975. Although her development as a soloist and songwriter had taken her further away from the folk roots direction that the band had pursued since Liege & Lief, seven of the eleven tracks on Rising for the Moon were either written or co-written by her.
Denny and Lucas left Fairport Convention at the end of 1975 and embarked on what was to become her final album Rendezvous. Released in 1977, the album sold poorly and Denny was subsequently dropped by Island Records. Having relocated to the village of Byfield in Northamptonshire in the mid-seventies, Denny gave birth to her only child, a daughter named Georgia, in July 1977.
A UK tour to promote Rendezvous in autumn 1977 marked her final public appearances. The closing night at the Royalty Theatre in London on 27 November 1977 was recorded for a live album, Gold Dust, which, because of technical problems in the recording of the electric guitar, was belatedly released in 1998 after most of the guitars had been re-recorded by Jerry Donahue.
Death
Linda Thompson would later note that Denny "really started going downhill in 1976" and demonstrated increasing levels of both manic and depressive behaviour. Learning that she was pregnant did little to mellow Denny's reckless lifestyle, which was heightened by increasing depression, mood swings and the unravelling of her "tumultuous" marriage to Trevor Lucas. She abused drugs and alcohol while pregnant with her daughter, Georgia, who was born prematurely in July 1977. Much like her moods, Denny's interest towards her daughter appeared to oscillate between obsessive and unconcerned; friends recalled both frantic, middle-of-the-night phone calls about teething, as well as Denny "crashing the car and leaving the baby in the pub and all sorts of stuff".
Friends would later note that Denny had a history of purposely throwing herself off bar stools and down flights of stairs in order to get a reaction. Several remembered this behaviour as "Sandy's party trick", while Dave Pegg's wife Chris stated, "She certainly did it in my house and it could be a very dramatic gesture, like self-harming. She could do it without hurting herself usually but I had a feeling there would be one time too many." Those who knew Denny said that her increasing level of alcohol abuse in the last years of her life led to an increasing number of falls (both accidental and deliberate), resulting in a growing number of injuries.
In late March 1978, while on holiday with her parents and baby Georgia in Cornwall, Denny was injured when she fell down a staircase and hit her head on concrete. Following the incident, she suffered from intense headaches; a doctor prescribed her the painkiller dextropropoxyphene, a drug known to have fatal side effects when mixed with alcohol. On 1 April, several days after the fall in Cornwall, Denny performed a charity concert at Byfield. The final song she performed was "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?"
At some unknown point during the first half of April 1978, Denny suffered yet another major fall at her home in Byfield. On 13 April, concerned about his wife's erratic behaviour and fearing for his daughter's safety, Trevor Lucas left the UK and returned to his native Australia with their child, leaving Denny without telling her. He sold their Austin Princess car in order to raise funds for the journey.
On discovering Lucas' departure, Denny went to stay at the home of her friend Miranda Ward. During this time, Denny apparently set up an appointment to speak with a doctor about her headaches, and also intended to get advice about her alcohol addiction. At some point after 8 am on 17 April, Denny fell into a coma. Ward was out of the house at the time, and had asked her friend Jon Cole (of the band The Movies) to check in on Denny. Cole entered the home at 3 pm, and found Denny unconscious at the foot of the staircase which led to the second floor of the house. She was rushed by ambulance to Queen Mary's Hospital in nearby Roehampton.
On 19 April, she was transferred to Atkinson Morley Hospital in Wimbledon. After receiving news that Denny was in a coma, Lucas returned from Australia. Upon his arrival at the hospital, doctors informed him that Denny was effectively brain-dead and her condition would not improve. He granted their recommendation to turn off life-support machines; however, just ten minutes before this was to take place, at 7:50 pm on 21 April 1978, Sandy Denny died, without regaining consciousness. Her death was ruled to be the result of a traumatic mid-brain haemorrhage and blunt force trauma to her head. She was 31 years old.
The funeral took place on 27 April 1978 at Putney Vale Cemetery. After the vicar had read Denny's favourite psalm, Psalm 23, a piper played "Flowers of the Forest", a traditional song commemorating the fallen of Flodden Field and one which had appeared on the 1970 Fairport album Full House. The inscription on her headstone reads:
Posthumous releases
Official releases
Although Denny had a devoted following in her lifetime, she did not achieve mass market success. In the years since her death, her reputation has grown. A four-album box set entitled Who Knows Where the Time Goes? (1985) was produced by her widower Trevor Lucas and Joe Boyd and included a number of rare and previously unreleased tracks by Denny, either solo or with Fairport Convention (1968, 1969, 1974) and Fotheringay (1970). This was the first public indication that a large cache of unreleased material existed. A one-disc subset of these recordings was subsequently issued on CD by Island in 1987 entitled The Best Of Sandy Denny.
In 1987, a compilation of previously unreleased tracks recorded for the BBC by incarnations of Fairport including Denny was released on LP under the title Heyday, which was subsequently released on CD in 2001 and again, with extra tracks, in 2002; all tracks were later included, with others, on the 2007 4-CD box set Fairport Convention Live at the BBC (see below). The initial purpose of this compilation was to document the more "American" material performed live by the What We Did on Our Holidays lineup of the band that never made it to vinyl, while the re-releases added additional songs as performed by the Unhalfbricking and Liege and Lief lineups.
Also in 1987, a VHS documentary, It All Comes 'Round Again, on Fairport Convention was released which contained excerpts of several audio recordings featuring Denny, plus a single poor-quality video recording of her singing her song "Solo" during her second stint with Fairport in 1974, as filmed by the University of Birmingham's "Guild TV" amateur organisation. The original tape of this recording has apparently been lost; however, "Like an Old Fashioned Waltz" does appear on the DVD documentary Sandy Denny Under Review (see below) and other tracks have been made available via YouTube in very poor quality.
Over the period 1988–1994, the Australian "Friends of Fairport" issued a series of subscriber-only cassette compilations drawing in the main on previously unreleased tapes from Trevor Lucas' collection (as stored in his attic in fact). Attic Tracks (AT) 1 (1988) contained out-takes from Sandy as well as some Fairport material and a few bizarre extras; AT 2 (1989) contained only Trevor Lucas material, no Denny; AT 3 (1989) entitled First and Last Tracks comprised 1966–1967 home demos and rare radio tracks, as well as 9 "pre-overdub" songs from Denny's last concert at the Royalty Theatre, London, on 27 November 1977 (a partial alternative to the later, overdubbed CD release Gold Dust), and AT 4 (1994): Together Again comprised one side of Lucas and the other of Denny in the form of more home demos, studio outtakes, and 4 tracks from a 1973 BBC radio concert. A cut-down version of these tracks (18 songs) was subsequently compiled for CD release by the Australian label Raven Records in 1995 called Sandy Denny, Trevor Lucas and Friends: The Attic Tracks 1972–1984.
In 1991, Joe Boyd issued a new version of Denny's All Our Own Work album with the Strawbs, called Sandy Denny and the Strawbs, on his Hannibal Records label. The album had strings added to some tracks, including "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" and further tracks with Denny on lead vocal.
In 1997, a one-disc compilation of Denny's solo BBC recordings was released as The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 on Strange Fruit Records. Due to rights issues it was withdrawn on the day of release, thereby creating a highly collectible disc (up until the release of the comprehensive Live at the BBC box set in 2007). This release was followed in 1998 when Denny's final performance at the Royalty Theatre, entitled Gold Dust, was issued on CD, following a degree of re-recording and overdubbing of selected backing parts to replace reportedly unsatisfactory originals.
In 1999, a single-disc compilation, Listen Listen – An Introduction to Sandy Denny, was released on Island Records comprising 17 previously released tracks taken from her four Island solo albums.
No More Sad Refrains: The Anthology was released by Universal Records in 2000. When first released, this compilation had several rare tracks, including "The Ballad of Easy Rider" from the Liege and Lief sessions, "Learning the Game" and "When Will I Be Loved" from the Bunch album Rock On, "Here in Silence" and "Man of Iron" from the Pass of Arms soundtrack, and a previously unissued demo of "Stranger to Himself".
In 2002, a previously unreleased, 2-CD live US concert recording by Fairport Convention from 1974 featuring Denny was released on the Burning Airlines label. Entitled Before The Moon, it originated from a radio broadcast from Ebbets Field in Denver, Colorado, on 23/24 May 1974. The second disc was a limited release bonus with the original release comprising the second set from the same concert. This recording was re-released in shortened form as a single disc in 2011 on the It's About Music label entitled Fairport Convention with Sandy Denny: Ebbets Field 1974.
Also in 2002, the American A&M Records issued a budget-price "20th Century Masters" compilation called The Best of Sandy Denny with 10 tracks all available on Denny's studio albums.
In 2004 a second comprehensive five-CD box set was released on the Fledg'ling record label called A Boxful of Treasures that included many unreleased recordings, in particular a whole disc of acoustic demos, many recorded at her home in Byfield that was highly prized amongst fans and critics alike, who had long asserted that her solo performances showed her work in its best light, revealing the true quality of her vocal style and compositions. Also in 2004, the Spectrum label issued a 16-track compilation of previously released material entitled The Collection: Chronological Covers & Concert Classics, including a mix of studio recordings and live excerpts from the Gold Dust Royalty concert.
In 2005, remastered versions of all Denny's solo albums came out with bonus tracks. Also in 2005, a single CD compilation entitled Where the Time Goes: Sandy '67 was released on Castle Music containing all of Saga's Denny album tracks (including the alternative recordings on It's Sandy Denny), together with two self accompanied tracks from Denny's recordings with the Strawbs.
A DVD documentary entitled Sandy Denny Under Review was released on the Sexy Intellectual label in 2006 which contained interviews with her contemporaries plus brief excerpts from her audio recordings, plus some short video clips including two of the poor quality video recordings with Fairport from Birmingham University (details given above), two with Fotheringay from German TV's Beat-Club (further details given below), and three solo excerpts from the only surviving BBC footage on One In Ten (details as given in the next item).
A 4-disc box set, Sandy Denny Live at the BBC, came out in September 2007 containing (virtually) all of the known solo recordings made by Denny for that UK broadcaster including two complete concerts, one at the Paris Theatre in 1972 and one recorded for Sounds on Sunday in 1973, plus a range of other material spanning the years 1966–1973. Disc 3 of this set was a DVD containing surviving TV footage from a 1971 BBC One in Ten session comprising solo performances by Denny of "The North Star Grassman and the Ravens", "Crazy Lady Blues" and "Late November", along with digitised excerpts from her diaries, rare photos and a discography. A 1-disc subset of this box set entitled The Best of the BBC Recordings was subsequently released in 2008.
A companion box set, Fairport Convention Live at the BBC, also came out in 2007 and covered equivalent live recordings by Fairport over the period 1968–1974, of which the first two discs (1968–1970) contain examples from Denny's time with that group.
In 2008, Jerry Donahue completed the unfinished second Fotheringay album begun in the autumn of 1970. It was released to general acclaim as Fotheringay 2 and contained some notable Denny performances, in particular earlier versions of two Denny compositions, "Late November" and "John the Gun", and performances of the traditional songs "Gypsy Davey" and "Wild Mountain Thyme". Also in 2008, Island Remasters issued a double CD entitled The Music Weaver (Sandy Denny Remembered) which contained a mix of better known tracks and less well known demos and live recordings, previously released but not in companion with studio sessions. This compilation is also one of the very few to contain the Led Zeppelin track "The Battle Of Evermore" which features a rare guest appearance by Denny.
In 2010, a large 19-CD retrospective box set, simply titled Sandy Denny, was released by Universal/Island Records in a limited edition of 3,000. It contained Denny's entire catalogue of studio recordings, including her work with the Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay and as a solo artist. The compilation also included a large number of outtakes, demos, live recordings, radio sessions and interviews. The box set was released to good reviews, including a 5-star review in Uncut and a 4-star review in The Guardian.
In late 2010, Thea Gilmore was commissioned by Denny's estate, in conjunction with Island Records, to write melodies to unrecorded lyrics found in Denny's papers. The resulting album, Don't Stop Singing, was released in November 2011 to generally good notices, including 4-star reviews in The Independent and The Guardian among others. On 21 April 2012, the single "London" was released as an exclusive Record Store Day 7″ single.
Further recordings were released in 2011, including a German recording of Fotheringay in concert released as Essen 1970 on the Garden of Delights label. The performance was remastered by original band member Jerry Donahue. This release was followed by 19 Rupert Street, a home recording of a rehearsal featuring Sandy and Alex Campbell recorded at his flat in August 1967. This release is notable for the fact that Sandy performs a number of tracks that are not available in any other versions, including a cover of "Fairytale Lullaby" by John Martyn. This CD was put out by Sandy's former Strawbs bandmate Dave Cousins on his Witchwood label.
Two-disc "Deluxe Editions" of Denny's album reissues appeared in 2011–2012 with additional tracks; the 2012 Deluxe Edition of Sandy included a previously unreleased eight-song solo set from her 1973 U.S. tour recorded at Ebbet's Field in Denver, Colorado. A similar two-disc reissue of Fairport Convention's Rising for the Moon also included, for the first time, the complete 1974 L.A. Troubadour performance of Fairport with Denny back on board, prior to the official announcement of her re-joining the group.
On account of unprecedented demand for, and exhaustion of supply of the limited edition 19-CD set cited above, in October 2012 a limited edition 4-CD version was released entitled The Notes and The Words: A Collection of Demos and Rarities, containing "75 songs that represent the cream of the rarities, demos and outtakes from the box set". Limited to 3,500 copies, this compilation is also now out-of-print.
In 2013, Spectrum records issued a single-disc CD entitled The Lady – The Essential Sandy Denny that comprised 15 previously issued tracks, generally from Denny's well known albums.
2014 saw the release of another Fairport live U.S. radio broadcast from their 1974 tour with Denny, on RockBeat Records, entitled Live 1974 (My Father's Place), comprising 11 live tracks, most featuring Denny, recorded at the New York rock club My Father's Place.
A four-disc Fotheringay retrospective, Nothing More: The Collected Fotheringay, was released on 30 March 2015. This is the most comprehensive compilation of the group's recordings, and contains, in addition to all the tracks on Fotheringay and Fotheringay 2 as both final studio versions and demos/alternate takes, the complete live concert set from Rotterdam in 1970 (including several previously unreleased tracks), seven Fotheringay tracks recorded in session for BBC radio (which had previously circulated only as bootlegs), plus a DVD disc containing four performances by Fotheringay recorded for the German Beat-Club TV series in 1970, which considerably augment the otherwise sparse known TV footage of Denny in particular.
May 2016 saw the release of a 2-CD compilation, I've Always Kept A Unicorn – The Acoustic Sandy Denny which collected together many previously released, but dispersed, acoustic and/or demo versions of songs better known from their album counterparts, as well as three previously unreleased demos (with Linda Thompson, at the time Linda Peters) from 1972's Rock On sessions by one-off band The Bunch.
A 7-CD box set by Fairport Convention entitled Come All Ye – The First 10 Years was released in July 2017 and contains a small number of additional, previously unreleased demos and alternate takes featuring Denny during her first tenure with the band over the period 1968–1969. Tracks not previously available include versions of Joni Mitchell's Eastern Rain, an a capella version of Nottamun Town, alternative takes of Autopsy and Who Knows Where the Time Goes, and a rehearsal version of The Deserter.
Unofficial releases and audience tapes
In addition to the authorised material listed above, a number unofficial/unauthorised compilations exist plus a range of audience recordings of varying quality, none of which would likely see the light of day as commercial issues but are of interest to a sector of Denny's audience on either historic or aesthetic grounds, often providing alternative views of songs known otherwise only from their commercially released versions. The first available unauthorised/bootleg CDs available in the 1980s and 1990s comprised principally off-air and other obscure material under such titles as Borrowed Thyme, Poems from Alexandra, Dark the Night, Wild Mountain Thyme and One Last Sad Refrain; such compilations are now largely superseded by the subsequent availability of most of the off-air material in much better quality as official releases as described above.
Of more enduring interest are audience tapes of shows of which no "official" tapes survive. These include some early shows by Fairport Convention; a performance by Fotheringay at the 1970 Tenth National Jazz and Blues Festival, held at Plumpton Race Track, Streat, East Sussex, England; "solo" shows by Denny (on occasion with a small band including, among others, Richard Thompson) at the 1971 Lincoln Folk Festival and at the Eltham Well Hall Open Theatre in 1972; performances from York University and Guildhall, Newcastle upon Tyne, also in 1972; an early 1972 U.S. performance from The Bitter End in New York; and several sets (Birmingham and Croydon) from her final 1977 tour in addition to the officially released Gold Dust album; plus quite a large number of recordings strongly featuring Denny as part of the re-formed Fairport Convention over the period 1974–1975. The majority of these can be fairly easily located via relevant internet searches and, in addition, can be readily downloaded from archival music servers such as Sugarmegs (Sandy Denny concerts listed under "S": SugarMegs Streaming Server, Fairport and Fotheringay under "F": SugarMegs Streaming Server). A provisional list of such recordings as are known to exist, with details on where each can be accessed, is available here.
Legacy
Estate and family
After relocating to Australia and remarrying, Trevor Lucas died of a heart attack in 1989. Denny's estate is now managed by Lucas' widow, Elizabeth Hurtt-Lucas. A number of otherwise unreleased recordings of Sandy Denny from his collection have subsequently been the basis for posthumous releases of Denny's work including those on The Attic Tracks and elsewhere.
Sandy Denny's daughter, Georgia, has rarely spoken about her mother in a public forum and in the mid-2000s declined an invitation to write the liner notes for Sandy Denny Live at the BBC. However, in 2006 she flew to Britain from Australia to accept on her mother's behalf the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards award for Most Influential Folk Album of All Time, which was given for Fairport Convention's Liege and Lief. Georgia gave birth to twin daughters on 29 April 1997, and a tribute album, Georgia on Our Mind, featuring many of Sandy Denny's former bandmates and friends, was compiled in the children's honour. She also administers a Facebook page "Sandy Denny and Family" dedicated to her mother's memory and more recently, under the name Georgia Katt, has released some of her own DJ-based music.
Tributes
Since her death, many tributes have been made to Denny, both in music and elsewhere. Dave Pegg of Fairport Convention recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on his 1983 solo album The Cocktail Cowboy Goes It Alone. Dave Cousins of the Strawbs wrote "Ringing Down the Years" in memory of Denny shortly after her death. Songs more specific to the death were Bert Jansch's "Where Did My Life Go" and Richard Thompson's "Did She Jump or Was She Pushed?" Fellow Brit folk pioneers Spriguns changed the title of their 1978 album to Magic Lady after hearing of Denny's death while recording. In 1998, a variety of Daylily was named after her.
Denny's songs have been covered by numerous artists in the years since her death. Some of the notable acts to have covered her music include Yo La Tengo, former Marillion frontman Fish, who covered "Solo" on his album Songs from the Mirror, Cat Power, Judy Collins, Nanci Griffith and Nina Simone. Kate Bush mentioned Denny in the lyric of "Blow Away (For Bill)", as one of the musicians to greet Bill in Heaven. "Blow Away (For Bill)" is the third track on Bush's 1980 album Never for Ever. In 1984, Clann Eadair released the single "A tribute to Sandy Denny", featuring Phil Lynott on vocals.
Several radio specials have been produced about Denny's life and music, including BBC Radio 2's The Sandy Denny Story: Who Knows Where the Time Goes. In 2007, Denny's song "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" also received BBC Radio 2's 2007 Folk Award for "Favourite Folk Track of All Time". In 2010, she was recognized by NPR in their 50 Great Voices special series.
In April 2008, a tribute concert was held at The Troubadour in London, to mark the thirtieth anniversary of Denny's death. Those taking part included Martin Carthy, Linda Thompson and Joe Boyd.
A more extensive tribute was given later that year in December at the Southbank in the Queen Elizabeth Hall called The Lady: A Tribute to Sandy Denny with a band composed of members of Bellowhead, the evening featured a mix of young folk acts like Jim Moray and Lisa Knapp alongside those that had known and worked with Denny such as Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. These acts were joined by performers from outside the world of folk like PP Arnold and Marc Almond. The concert, which primarily featured songs written by Denny, received a four-star review in The Guardian. In May 2012 the Southbank concert was expanded into an eight date UK tour called The Lady: A Homage to Sandy Denny. The tour showcased Sandy's entire songbook taking in her work with Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, her solo career and the new songs completed by Thea Gilmore on her album Don't Stop Singing.
The band was, once again, composed of members of Bellowhead. Other acts performing included the aforementioned Thea Gilmore and up-and-coming folk acts Lavinia Blackwall of Trembling Bells, Blair Dunlop and Sam Carter, alongside more established folk stars Maddy Prior, Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. The line-up was completed with performers not normally associated with the folk scene; Green Gartside, Joan Wasser (also known as Joan As Police Woman), and PP Arnold. The tour was well received, obtaining a four-star review in The Times. The London concert at the Barbican was filmed for BBC4, and broadcast in a 90-minute programme titled The Songs of Sandy Denny in November 2012.
In the 2012 Irish film Silence (Harvest Films & South Wind Blows), "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" is used during the film and final credits.
In April 2016 Denny was inducted into the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards Hall of Fame.
Alela Diane recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on her album Cusp, released in February 2018. The song reflects on Denny's final tragic days and her orphaned baby daughter.
Discography
Solo studio albums
The North Star Grassman and the Ravens (1971)
Sandy (1972)
Like an Old Fashioned Waltz (1974)
Rendezvous (1977)
Solo live albums
The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 (1997)
Gold Dust (1998) (live recording from final tour, 1977)
Live at the BBC (2007 4-disc compilation)
Sandy – Deluxe edition, 2012 – includes "Live at Ebbetts Field" (previously unreleased concert on disc 2)
With others
Denny's collaborations with other artists, including with Alex Campbell, The Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, and The Bunch, together with numerous posthumous releases and compilation albums, are detailed further on the Sandy Denny discography page.
References and notes
General
Further reading
Mick Houghton. I've Always Kept a Unicorn – The Biography of Sandy Denny. Faber & Faber, 2015;
Clinton Heylin. No More Sad Refrains – The Life and Times of Sandy Denny. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Clinton Heylin. Gypsy Love Songs & Sad Refrains – The Recordings of Richard Thompson and Sandy Denny. Labour of Love Productions, 1989.
Colin Larkin. The Guinness Who's Who of Folk Music. Guinness Publishing Ltd;
Jim Irvin. Angel of Avalon. MOJO Magazine, August 1998.
Colin Harper, Trevor Hodgett. Irish Folk, Traditional & Blues: A Secret History. Cherry Red, 2005;
Pamela Murray Winters. No Thought of Leaving: A life of Sandy Denny. 2000. (Unpublished).
Brian Hinton, Geoff Wall. Ashley Hutchings: The Guv'nor & the Rise of Folk Rock. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Patrick Humphries. Meet On The Ledge: The Classic Years 1967–1975. Virgin Books, 1997;
Patrick Humphries. Richard Thompson: Strange Affair – The Biography. Virgin Books, 1996;
Philip Ward, "Sandy Denny: A Thirtieth Anniversary", R2 (Rock'n'Reel) 2(9), May/June 2008.
Philip Ward, Sandy Denny: Reflections on Her Music''. Matador, 2011;
External links
Official website
Homage to Sandy Denny
Dedicated to the memory of Sandy Denny
Sandy Denny website
1947 births
1978 deaths
20th-century English singers
20th-century English women singers
A&M Records artists
Accidental deaths from falls
Accidental deaths in London
Deaths by intracerebral hemorrhage
Alumni of Kingston College (England)
British folk rock musicians
Burials at Putney Vale Cemetery
English folk singers
English people of Scottish descent
English women singer-songwriters
Fairport Convention members
Women rock singers
Fotheringay members
Island Records artists
People from Byfield, Northamptonshire
People from Wimbledon, London
Singers from London
Strawbs members
The Bunch members | true | [
"Lindsley Register is an American actress, producer and writer. She is best known for her role as Laura on The Walking Dead, and as Dharma on Six. She has also appeared in an episode of House of Cards.\n\nEarly life and education \nRegister was born and raised in Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, United States. She was brought up with two older brothers and a younger sister. She went to Liberty University, and it was not until Register ditched a major in Teaching English as a Second Language during college that she started to take acting seriously. Register had a very traditional conservative Baptist upbringing. During college, Register started acting in plays, and this made her fall in love with acting; she realized this was something she wanted to pursue. Acting really broadened her views and mindset; it made her think from a different perspective, rather than her own which she was brought up with her entire life. Having a mentor figure really helped her with this change. She eventually graduated with a double major in Theater performance and Theater Education, and it did not take very long for her to get going in the industry. Within her first year, she got an agent and secured roles on multiple shows and films.\n\nCareer \nDuring her first year after graduating from college, Register received a costarring role in episode 404 of House of Cards, portraying one of the protesters opposite to Kevin Spacey. This would help her get several more roles in indie films and other notable shows, such as The Haves and the Have Nots, where she plays as Karen, and Outcast. Her first series regular role came in the new History channel series Six. Most recently, she has become well known for her role as Laura in The Walking Dead. Register joined The Walking Dead cast during season 7 of the show, and has been a part of the show ever since. In a YouTube video posted during the production of season 8, Register revealed how being called up to The Walking Dead was one of the most terrifying, yet exciting challenges and moments in her career. In that video, she explained how huge the step up was with the massive production set, especially with the character of Laura in her words \"a stretch from who I am naturally\". However, none of this would harm her performance. On November 14, 2018, Register announced on her Facebook page that she was part of the movie Scorn, which is set to be released later this year. In addition to Register's acting career, Register is also a producer and writer, working as the writer and executive producer for the short films Morsus and Ave Maria. She is also the executive producer of the movie Scorn, in which she is also one of the main cast.\n\nFilmography\n\nReferences \n\n21st-century American actresses\nAmerican film actresses\nAmerican women film producers\nAmerican women screenwriters\nLiving people\nYear of birth missing (living people)\nActresses from Virginia\nScreenwriters from Virginia\nLiberty University alumni\nAmerican television actresses",
"Guddi Maruti is an Indian actress best known for her comedy roles on TV and in Bollywood movies.\n\nEarly life \nMaruti was born to an actor-director father Marutirao Parab on 4 April 1961 Her real name is Tahira Parab and she was nicknamed Guddi. Manmohan Desai gave her the screen name which is what she is known by today.\n\nCareer \nMaruti started her career at the age of 10 years as a child artist in the film Jaan Haazir Hain. After her father's death, she continued acting to support the family. Due to her physical appearance, she bagged comedy roles in films and kept on going with her career.\n\nMaruti has acted in over 97 movies since the 1980s. Over the years, she acted in TV shows and is well known for her role as Bua in the TV show Doli Armano Ki. Her popular movies include Khiladi, Shola Aur Shabnam, Aashik Aawara, Dulhe Raja and Biwi No. 1. She did not take chances to get to mainstream acting to avoid risks of being unsuccessful.\n\nIn 1995, Maruti and Vrajesh Hirjee did a stand up comedy show, Sorry Meri Lorry, which also added to her fame.\n\nShe took a career break in 2006 and rejoined the film industry in 2015. She started her career again with the comedy movie Hum Sab Ullu Hain.\n\n Personal life\nMarried\n\n Filmography \n\n Television \n Idhar Udhar (1986) as Moti Shabnam\n Agadam Bagdam Tigdam (2007) as Rosie\n Mrs. Kaushik Ki Paanch Bahuein (2012) as Paddy Aunty\n Doli Armaano Ki (2013) as Bua\n Yeh Un Dinon Ki Baat Hai (2018–2019) as Principal Ma'am VJN College\n Hello Zindagi'' (2019) as Bijoya Di\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\n1959 births\nActresses in Hindi cinema\nIndian film actresses\nLiving people\nPlace of birth missing (living people)"
] |
[
"Sandy Denny",
"Early career",
"How did she get started in her career?",
"in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus."
] | C_e6cc2f78b77b4fcab1029b8e527f1a13_1 | What did she do in the club? | 2 | What did Sandy Denny do in the folk club? | Sandy Denny | Her nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn. After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fhir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels". Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes. By this time she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark which was released belatedly in 1973 credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer. CANNOTANSWER | After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings | Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny (6 January 1947 – 21 April 1978) was an English singer-songwriter who was lead singer of the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. She has been described as "the pre-eminent British folk rock singer".
After briefly working with the Strawbs, Denny joined Fairport Convention in 1968, remaining with them until 1969. She formed the short-lived band Fotheringay in 1970, before focusing on a solo career. Between 1971 and 1977, Denny released four solo albums: The North Star Grassman and the Ravens, Sandy, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz and Rendezvous. She also duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore" for Led Zeppelin's album Led Zeppelin IV in 1971. Denny died in 1978 at the age of 31 due to injuries and health issues related to alcohol abuse.
Music publications Uncut and Mojo have described Denny as Britain's finest female singer-songwriter. Her composition "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" has been recorded by Judy Collins, Eva Cassidy, Nina Simone, 10,000 Maniacs and Cat Power. Her recorded work has been the subject of numerous reissues, along with a wealth of previously unreleased material which has appeared over the more than 40 years since her death, including a 19-CD box set released in November 2010.
Childhood
Denny was born on 6 January 1947 at Nelson Hospital, Kingston Road, Merton Park, London, to Neil and Edna Denny. She studied classical piano as a child.
Her paternal grandfather was from Dundee, and her paternal grandmother was a Scots Gaelic speaker and singer of traditional songs. At an early age Denny showed an interest in singing, although her strict parents were reluctant to believe there was a living to be made from it. She attended Coombe Girls' School in New Malden; after leaving school she began training as a nurse at the Royal Brompton Hospital.
Early career
Denny's nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn.
After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames, Denny began working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels".
Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes.
By this time, she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark, which was released belatedly in 1973, credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer.
From Fairport to Fotheringay
After making the Saga albums with Alex Campbell and Johnny Silvo, Denny looked for a band that would allow her to stretch herself as a vocalist, reach a wider audience, and have the opportunity to display her songwriting. She said, "I wanted to do something more with my voice." After working briefly with the Strawbs, Denny remained unconvinced that they could provide that opportunity, and so she ended her relationship with the band.
Fairport Convention conducted auditions in May 1968 for a replacement singer following the departure of Judy Dyble after their debut album, and Denny became the obvious choice. According to group member Simon Nicol, her personality and musicianship made her stand out from the other auditionees "like a clean glass in a sink full of dirty dishes".
Beginning with What We Did on Our Holidays, the first of three albums she made with the band in the late 1960s, Denny is credited with encouraging Fairport Convention to explore the traditional British folk repertoire, and is thus regarded as a key figure in the development of British folk rock. She brought with her the traditional repertoire she had refined in the clubs, including "A Sailor's Life" featured on their second album together Unhalfbricking. Framing Denny's performance of this song with their own electric improvisations, her bandmates discovered what then proved to be the inspiration for an entire album, the influential Liege & Lief (1969).
Denny left Fairport Convention in December 1969 to develop her own songwriting more fully. To this end, she formed her own band, Fotheringay, which included her future husband, Australian Trevor Lucas, formerly of the group Eclection.
They created one self-titled album, which included an eight-minute version of the traditional "Banks of the Nile", and several Denny originals, among them "The Sea" and "Nothing More". The latter marked her first composition on the piano, which was to become her primary instrument from then on. Fotheringay started to record a second album in late 1970, but it remained unfinished after Denny announced that she was leaving the group and producer Joe Boyd left to take up a job at Warner Brothers in California. Denny would later blame Boyd's hostility towards the group for its demise.
Solo career and final years
She then turned to recording her first solo album, The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. Released in 1971, it is distinguished by its elusive lyrics and unconventional harmonies. Highlights included "Late November", inspired by a dream and the death of Fairport band member Martin Lamble, and "Next Time Around" a cryptogram about Jackson C. Frank, one of her many portraits in song.
Sandy, with a cover photograph by David Bailey, followed in 1972 and was the first of her albums to be produced by Trevor Lucas. As well as introducing eight new original compositions, the album marked her last recording of a traditional song, "The Quiet Joys of Brotherhood" (words by Richard Fariña), with Denny's ambitious multi-tracked vocal arrangement inspired by the Ensemble of the Bulgarian Republic.
Melody Maker readers twice voted her the "Best British Female Singer", in 1970 and 1971 and, together with contemporaries including Richard Thompson and Ashley Hutchings, she participated in a one-off project called the Bunch to record a collection of rock and roll era standards released under the title of Rock On.
In 1971, Denny duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore", which was included on Led Zeppelin's 1971 album (Led Zeppelin IV); she was the only guest vocalist ever to appear on a Led Zeppelin album. In 1972 Denny had a small cameo on Lou Reizner's symphonic arrangement of the Who's rock opera Tommy. Her brief appearance was at the end of the track "It's a Boy", which also featured vocals from Pete Townshend.
In 1973, she married long-term boyfriend and producer Trevor Lucas and recorded a third solo album, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz. The songs continued to detail many of her personal preoccupations: loss, loneliness, fear of the dark, the passing of time and the changing seasons. The album contained one of her best loved compositions, "Solo", and featured a cover image by Gered Mankowitz.
In 1974, she returned to Fairport Convention (of which her husband was by then a member) for a world tour (captured on the 1974 album Fairport Live Convention) and a studio album, Rising for the Moon in 1975. Although her development as a soloist and songwriter had taken her further away from the folk roots direction that the band had pursued since Liege & Lief, seven of the eleven tracks on Rising for the Moon were either written or co-written by her.
Denny and Lucas left Fairport Convention at the end of 1975 and embarked on what was to become her final album Rendezvous. Released in 1977, the album sold poorly and Denny was subsequently dropped by Island Records. Having relocated to the village of Byfield in Northamptonshire in the mid-seventies, Denny gave birth to her only child, a daughter named Georgia, in July 1977.
A UK tour to promote Rendezvous in autumn 1977 marked her final public appearances. The closing night at the Royalty Theatre in London on 27 November 1977 was recorded for a live album, Gold Dust, which, because of technical problems in the recording of the electric guitar, was belatedly released in 1998 after most of the guitars had been re-recorded by Jerry Donahue.
Death
Linda Thompson would later note that Denny "really started going downhill in 1976" and demonstrated increasing levels of both manic and depressive behaviour. Learning that she was pregnant did little to mellow Denny's reckless lifestyle, which was heightened by increasing depression, mood swings and the unravelling of her "tumultuous" marriage to Trevor Lucas. She abused drugs and alcohol while pregnant with her daughter, Georgia, who was born prematurely in July 1977. Much like her moods, Denny's interest towards her daughter appeared to oscillate between obsessive and unconcerned; friends recalled both frantic, middle-of-the-night phone calls about teething, as well as Denny "crashing the car and leaving the baby in the pub and all sorts of stuff".
Friends would later note that Denny had a history of purposely throwing herself off bar stools and down flights of stairs in order to get a reaction. Several remembered this behaviour as "Sandy's party trick", while Dave Pegg's wife Chris stated, "She certainly did it in my house and it could be a very dramatic gesture, like self-harming. She could do it without hurting herself usually but I had a feeling there would be one time too many." Those who knew Denny said that her increasing level of alcohol abuse in the last years of her life led to an increasing number of falls (both accidental and deliberate), resulting in a growing number of injuries.
In late March 1978, while on holiday with her parents and baby Georgia in Cornwall, Denny was injured when she fell down a staircase and hit her head on concrete. Following the incident, she suffered from intense headaches; a doctor prescribed her the painkiller dextropropoxyphene, a drug known to have fatal side effects when mixed with alcohol. On 1 April, several days after the fall in Cornwall, Denny performed a charity concert at Byfield. The final song she performed was "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?"
At some unknown point during the first half of April 1978, Denny suffered yet another major fall at her home in Byfield. On 13 April, concerned about his wife's erratic behaviour and fearing for his daughter's safety, Trevor Lucas left the UK and returned to his native Australia with their child, leaving Denny without telling her. He sold their Austin Princess car in order to raise funds for the journey.
On discovering Lucas' departure, Denny went to stay at the home of her friend Miranda Ward. During this time, Denny apparently set up an appointment to speak with a doctor about her headaches, and also intended to get advice about her alcohol addiction. At some point after 8 am on 17 April, Denny fell into a coma. Ward was out of the house at the time, and had asked her friend Jon Cole (of the band The Movies) to check in on Denny. Cole entered the home at 3 pm, and found Denny unconscious at the foot of the staircase which led to the second floor of the house. She was rushed by ambulance to Queen Mary's Hospital in nearby Roehampton.
On 19 April, she was transferred to Atkinson Morley Hospital in Wimbledon. After receiving news that Denny was in a coma, Lucas returned from Australia. Upon his arrival at the hospital, doctors informed him that Denny was effectively brain-dead and her condition would not improve. He granted their recommendation to turn off life-support machines; however, just ten minutes before this was to take place, at 7:50 pm on 21 April 1978, Sandy Denny died, without regaining consciousness. Her death was ruled to be the result of a traumatic mid-brain haemorrhage and blunt force trauma to her head. She was 31 years old.
The funeral took place on 27 April 1978 at Putney Vale Cemetery. After the vicar had read Denny's favourite psalm, Psalm 23, a piper played "Flowers of the Forest", a traditional song commemorating the fallen of Flodden Field and one which had appeared on the 1970 Fairport album Full House. The inscription on her headstone reads:
Posthumous releases
Official releases
Although Denny had a devoted following in her lifetime, she did not achieve mass market success. In the years since her death, her reputation has grown. A four-album box set entitled Who Knows Where the Time Goes? (1985) was produced by her widower Trevor Lucas and Joe Boyd and included a number of rare and previously unreleased tracks by Denny, either solo or with Fairport Convention (1968, 1969, 1974) and Fotheringay (1970). This was the first public indication that a large cache of unreleased material existed. A one-disc subset of these recordings was subsequently issued on CD by Island in 1987 entitled The Best Of Sandy Denny.
In 1987, a compilation of previously unreleased tracks recorded for the BBC by incarnations of Fairport including Denny was released on LP under the title Heyday, which was subsequently released on CD in 2001 and again, with extra tracks, in 2002; all tracks were later included, with others, on the 2007 4-CD box set Fairport Convention Live at the BBC (see below). The initial purpose of this compilation was to document the more "American" material performed live by the What We Did on Our Holidays lineup of the band that never made it to vinyl, while the re-releases added additional songs as performed by the Unhalfbricking and Liege and Lief lineups.
Also in 1987, a VHS documentary, It All Comes 'Round Again, on Fairport Convention was released which contained excerpts of several audio recordings featuring Denny, plus a single poor-quality video recording of her singing her song "Solo" during her second stint with Fairport in 1974, as filmed by the University of Birmingham's "Guild TV" amateur organisation. The original tape of this recording has apparently been lost; however, "Like an Old Fashioned Waltz" does appear on the DVD documentary Sandy Denny Under Review (see below) and other tracks have been made available via YouTube in very poor quality.
Over the period 1988–1994, the Australian "Friends of Fairport" issued a series of subscriber-only cassette compilations drawing in the main on previously unreleased tapes from Trevor Lucas' collection (as stored in his attic in fact). Attic Tracks (AT) 1 (1988) contained out-takes from Sandy as well as some Fairport material and a few bizarre extras; AT 2 (1989) contained only Trevor Lucas material, no Denny; AT 3 (1989) entitled First and Last Tracks comprised 1966–1967 home demos and rare radio tracks, as well as 9 "pre-overdub" songs from Denny's last concert at the Royalty Theatre, London, on 27 November 1977 (a partial alternative to the later, overdubbed CD release Gold Dust), and AT 4 (1994): Together Again comprised one side of Lucas and the other of Denny in the form of more home demos, studio outtakes, and 4 tracks from a 1973 BBC radio concert. A cut-down version of these tracks (18 songs) was subsequently compiled for CD release by the Australian label Raven Records in 1995 called Sandy Denny, Trevor Lucas and Friends: The Attic Tracks 1972–1984.
In 1991, Joe Boyd issued a new version of Denny's All Our Own Work album with the Strawbs, called Sandy Denny and the Strawbs, on his Hannibal Records label. The album had strings added to some tracks, including "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" and further tracks with Denny on lead vocal.
In 1997, a one-disc compilation of Denny's solo BBC recordings was released as The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 on Strange Fruit Records. Due to rights issues it was withdrawn on the day of release, thereby creating a highly collectible disc (up until the release of the comprehensive Live at the BBC box set in 2007). This release was followed in 1998 when Denny's final performance at the Royalty Theatre, entitled Gold Dust, was issued on CD, following a degree of re-recording and overdubbing of selected backing parts to replace reportedly unsatisfactory originals.
In 1999, a single-disc compilation, Listen Listen – An Introduction to Sandy Denny, was released on Island Records comprising 17 previously released tracks taken from her four Island solo albums.
No More Sad Refrains: The Anthology was released by Universal Records in 2000. When first released, this compilation had several rare tracks, including "The Ballad of Easy Rider" from the Liege and Lief sessions, "Learning the Game" and "When Will I Be Loved" from the Bunch album Rock On, "Here in Silence" and "Man of Iron" from the Pass of Arms soundtrack, and a previously unissued demo of "Stranger to Himself".
In 2002, a previously unreleased, 2-CD live US concert recording by Fairport Convention from 1974 featuring Denny was released on the Burning Airlines label. Entitled Before The Moon, it originated from a radio broadcast from Ebbets Field in Denver, Colorado, on 23/24 May 1974. The second disc was a limited release bonus with the original release comprising the second set from the same concert. This recording was re-released in shortened form as a single disc in 2011 on the It's About Music label entitled Fairport Convention with Sandy Denny: Ebbets Field 1974.
Also in 2002, the American A&M Records issued a budget-price "20th Century Masters" compilation called The Best of Sandy Denny with 10 tracks all available on Denny's studio albums.
In 2004 a second comprehensive five-CD box set was released on the Fledg'ling record label called A Boxful of Treasures that included many unreleased recordings, in particular a whole disc of acoustic demos, many recorded at her home in Byfield that was highly prized amongst fans and critics alike, who had long asserted that her solo performances showed her work in its best light, revealing the true quality of her vocal style and compositions. Also in 2004, the Spectrum label issued a 16-track compilation of previously released material entitled The Collection: Chronological Covers & Concert Classics, including a mix of studio recordings and live excerpts from the Gold Dust Royalty concert.
In 2005, remastered versions of all Denny's solo albums came out with bonus tracks. Also in 2005, a single CD compilation entitled Where the Time Goes: Sandy '67 was released on Castle Music containing all of Saga's Denny album tracks (including the alternative recordings on It's Sandy Denny), together with two self accompanied tracks from Denny's recordings with the Strawbs.
A DVD documentary entitled Sandy Denny Under Review was released on the Sexy Intellectual label in 2006 which contained interviews with her contemporaries plus brief excerpts from her audio recordings, plus some short video clips including two of the poor quality video recordings with Fairport from Birmingham University (details given above), two with Fotheringay from German TV's Beat-Club (further details given below), and three solo excerpts from the only surviving BBC footage on One In Ten (details as given in the next item).
A 4-disc box set, Sandy Denny Live at the BBC, came out in September 2007 containing (virtually) all of the known solo recordings made by Denny for that UK broadcaster including two complete concerts, one at the Paris Theatre in 1972 and one recorded for Sounds on Sunday in 1973, plus a range of other material spanning the years 1966–1973. Disc 3 of this set was a DVD containing surviving TV footage from a 1971 BBC One in Ten session comprising solo performances by Denny of "The North Star Grassman and the Ravens", "Crazy Lady Blues" and "Late November", along with digitised excerpts from her diaries, rare photos and a discography. A 1-disc subset of this box set entitled The Best of the BBC Recordings was subsequently released in 2008.
A companion box set, Fairport Convention Live at the BBC, also came out in 2007 and covered equivalent live recordings by Fairport over the period 1968–1974, of which the first two discs (1968–1970) contain examples from Denny's time with that group.
In 2008, Jerry Donahue completed the unfinished second Fotheringay album begun in the autumn of 1970. It was released to general acclaim as Fotheringay 2 and contained some notable Denny performances, in particular earlier versions of two Denny compositions, "Late November" and "John the Gun", and performances of the traditional songs "Gypsy Davey" and "Wild Mountain Thyme". Also in 2008, Island Remasters issued a double CD entitled The Music Weaver (Sandy Denny Remembered) which contained a mix of better known tracks and less well known demos and live recordings, previously released but not in companion with studio sessions. This compilation is also one of the very few to contain the Led Zeppelin track "The Battle Of Evermore" which features a rare guest appearance by Denny.
In 2010, a large 19-CD retrospective box set, simply titled Sandy Denny, was released by Universal/Island Records in a limited edition of 3,000. It contained Denny's entire catalogue of studio recordings, including her work with the Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay and as a solo artist. The compilation also included a large number of outtakes, demos, live recordings, radio sessions and interviews. The box set was released to good reviews, including a 5-star review in Uncut and a 4-star review in The Guardian.
In late 2010, Thea Gilmore was commissioned by Denny's estate, in conjunction with Island Records, to write melodies to unrecorded lyrics found in Denny's papers. The resulting album, Don't Stop Singing, was released in November 2011 to generally good notices, including 4-star reviews in The Independent and The Guardian among others. On 21 April 2012, the single "London" was released as an exclusive Record Store Day 7″ single.
Further recordings were released in 2011, including a German recording of Fotheringay in concert released as Essen 1970 on the Garden of Delights label. The performance was remastered by original band member Jerry Donahue. This release was followed by 19 Rupert Street, a home recording of a rehearsal featuring Sandy and Alex Campbell recorded at his flat in August 1967. This release is notable for the fact that Sandy performs a number of tracks that are not available in any other versions, including a cover of "Fairytale Lullaby" by John Martyn. This CD was put out by Sandy's former Strawbs bandmate Dave Cousins on his Witchwood label.
Two-disc "Deluxe Editions" of Denny's album reissues appeared in 2011–2012 with additional tracks; the 2012 Deluxe Edition of Sandy included a previously unreleased eight-song solo set from her 1973 U.S. tour recorded at Ebbet's Field in Denver, Colorado. A similar two-disc reissue of Fairport Convention's Rising for the Moon also included, for the first time, the complete 1974 L.A. Troubadour performance of Fairport with Denny back on board, prior to the official announcement of her re-joining the group.
On account of unprecedented demand for, and exhaustion of supply of the limited edition 19-CD set cited above, in October 2012 a limited edition 4-CD version was released entitled The Notes and The Words: A Collection of Demos and Rarities, containing "75 songs that represent the cream of the rarities, demos and outtakes from the box set". Limited to 3,500 copies, this compilation is also now out-of-print.
In 2013, Spectrum records issued a single-disc CD entitled The Lady – The Essential Sandy Denny that comprised 15 previously issued tracks, generally from Denny's well known albums.
2014 saw the release of another Fairport live U.S. radio broadcast from their 1974 tour with Denny, on RockBeat Records, entitled Live 1974 (My Father's Place), comprising 11 live tracks, most featuring Denny, recorded at the New York rock club My Father's Place.
A four-disc Fotheringay retrospective, Nothing More: The Collected Fotheringay, was released on 30 March 2015. This is the most comprehensive compilation of the group's recordings, and contains, in addition to all the tracks on Fotheringay and Fotheringay 2 as both final studio versions and demos/alternate takes, the complete live concert set from Rotterdam in 1970 (including several previously unreleased tracks), seven Fotheringay tracks recorded in session for BBC radio (which had previously circulated only as bootlegs), plus a DVD disc containing four performances by Fotheringay recorded for the German Beat-Club TV series in 1970, which considerably augment the otherwise sparse known TV footage of Denny in particular.
May 2016 saw the release of a 2-CD compilation, I've Always Kept A Unicorn – The Acoustic Sandy Denny which collected together many previously released, but dispersed, acoustic and/or demo versions of songs better known from their album counterparts, as well as three previously unreleased demos (with Linda Thompson, at the time Linda Peters) from 1972's Rock On sessions by one-off band The Bunch.
A 7-CD box set by Fairport Convention entitled Come All Ye – The First 10 Years was released in July 2017 and contains a small number of additional, previously unreleased demos and alternate takes featuring Denny during her first tenure with the band over the period 1968–1969. Tracks not previously available include versions of Joni Mitchell's Eastern Rain, an a capella version of Nottamun Town, alternative takes of Autopsy and Who Knows Where the Time Goes, and a rehearsal version of The Deserter.
Unofficial releases and audience tapes
In addition to the authorised material listed above, a number unofficial/unauthorised compilations exist plus a range of audience recordings of varying quality, none of which would likely see the light of day as commercial issues but are of interest to a sector of Denny's audience on either historic or aesthetic grounds, often providing alternative views of songs known otherwise only from their commercially released versions. The first available unauthorised/bootleg CDs available in the 1980s and 1990s comprised principally off-air and other obscure material under such titles as Borrowed Thyme, Poems from Alexandra, Dark the Night, Wild Mountain Thyme and One Last Sad Refrain; such compilations are now largely superseded by the subsequent availability of most of the off-air material in much better quality as official releases as described above.
Of more enduring interest are audience tapes of shows of which no "official" tapes survive. These include some early shows by Fairport Convention; a performance by Fotheringay at the 1970 Tenth National Jazz and Blues Festival, held at Plumpton Race Track, Streat, East Sussex, England; "solo" shows by Denny (on occasion with a small band including, among others, Richard Thompson) at the 1971 Lincoln Folk Festival and at the Eltham Well Hall Open Theatre in 1972; performances from York University and Guildhall, Newcastle upon Tyne, also in 1972; an early 1972 U.S. performance from The Bitter End in New York; and several sets (Birmingham and Croydon) from her final 1977 tour in addition to the officially released Gold Dust album; plus quite a large number of recordings strongly featuring Denny as part of the re-formed Fairport Convention over the period 1974–1975. The majority of these can be fairly easily located via relevant internet searches and, in addition, can be readily downloaded from archival music servers such as Sugarmegs (Sandy Denny concerts listed under "S": SugarMegs Streaming Server, Fairport and Fotheringay under "F": SugarMegs Streaming Server). A provisional list of such recordings as are known to exist, with details on where each can be accessed, is available here.
Legacy
Estate and family
After relocating to Australia and remarrying, Trevor Lucas died of a heart attack in 1989. Denny's estate is now managed by Lucas' widow, Elizabeth Hurtt-Lucas. A number of otherwise unreleased recordings of Sandy Denny from his collection have subsequently been the basis for posthumous releases of Denny's work including those on The Attic Tracks and elsewhere.
Sandy Denny's daughter, Georgia, has rarely spoken about her mother in a public forum and in the mid-2000s declined an invitation to write the liner notes for Sandy Denny Live at the BBC. However, in 2006 she flew to Britain from Australia to accept on her mother's behalf the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards award for Most Influential Folk Album of All Time, which was given for Fairport Convention's Liege and Lief. Georgia gave birth to twin daughters on 29 April 1997, and a tribute album, Georgia on Our Mind, featuring many of Sandy Denny's former bandmates and friends, was compiled in the children's honour. She also administers a Facebook page "Sandy Denny and Family" dedicated to her mother's memory and more recently, under the name Georgia Katt, has released some of her own DJ-based music.
Tributes
Since her death, many tributes have been made to Denny, both in music and elsewhere. Dave Pegg of Fairport Convention recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on his 1983 solo album The Cocktail Cowboy Goes It Alone. Dave Cousins of the Strawbs wrote "Ringing Down the Years" in memory of Denny shortly after her death. Songs more specific to the death were Bert Jansch's "Where Did My Life Go" and Richard Thompson's "Did She Jump or Was She Pushed?" Fellow Brit folk pioneers Spriguns changed the title of their 1978 album to Magic Lady after hearing of Denny's death while recording. In 1998, a variety of Daylily was named after her.
Denny's songs have been covered by numerous artists in the years since her death. Some of the notable acts to have covered her music include Yo La Tengo, former Marillion frontman Fish, who covered "Solo" on his album Songs from the Mirror, Cat Power, Judy Collins, Nanci Griffith and Nina Simone. Kate Bush mentioned Denny in the lyric of "Blow Away (For Bill)", as one of the musicians to greet Bill in Heaven. "Blow Away (For Bill)" is the third track on Bush's 1980 album Never for Ever. In 1984, Clann Eadair released the single "A tribute to Sandy Denny", featuring Phil Lynott on vocals.
Several radio specials have been produced about Denny's life and music, including BBC Radio 2's The Sandy Denny Story: Who Knows Where the Time Goes. In 2007, Denny's song "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" also received BBC Radio 2's 2007 Folk Award for "Favourite Folk Track of All Time". In 2010, she was recognized by NPR in their 50 Great Voices special series.
In April 2008, a tribute concert was held at The Troubadour in London, to mark the thirtieth anniversary of Denny's death. Those taking part included Martin Carthy, Linda Thompson and Joe Boyd.
A more extensive tribute was given later that year in December at the Southbank in the Queen Elizabeth Hall called The Lady: A Tribute to Sandy Denny with a band composed of members of Bellowhead, the evening featured a mix of young folk acts like Jim Moray and Lisa Knapp alongside those that had known and worked with Denny such as Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. These acts were joined by performers from outside the world of folk like PP Arnold and Marc Almond. The concert, which primarily featured songs written by Denny, received a four-star review in The Guardian. In May 2012 the Southbank concert was expanded into an eight date UK tour called The Lady: A Homage to Sandy Denny. The tour showcased Sandy's entire songbook taking in her work with Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, her solo career and the new songs completed by Thea Gilmore on her album Don't Stop Singing.
The band was, once again, composed of members of Bellowhead. Other acts performing included the aforementioned Thea Gilmore and up-and-coming folk acts Lavinia Blackwall of Trembling Bells, Blair Dunlop and Sam Carter, alongside more established folk stars Maddy Prior, Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. The line-up was completed with performers not normally associated with the folk scene; Green Gartside, Joan Wasser (also known as Joan As Police Woman), and PP Arnold. The tour was well received, obtaining a four-star review in The Times. The London concert at the Barbican was filmed for BBC4, and broadcast in a 90-minute programme titled The Songs of Sandy Denny in November 2012.
In the 2012 Irish film Silence (Harvest Films & South Wind Blows), "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" is used during the film and final credits.
In April 2016 Denny was inducted into the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards Hall of Fame.
Alela Diane recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on her album Cusp, released in February 2018. The song reflects on Denny's final tragic days and her orphaned baby daughter.
Discography
Solo studio albums
The North Star Grassman and the Ravens (1971)
Sandy (1972)
Like an Old Fashioned Waltz (1974)
Rendezvous (1977)
Solo live albums
The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 (1997)
Gold Dust (1998) (live recording from final tour, 1977)
Live at the BBC (2007 4-disc compilation)
Sandy – Deluxe edition, 2012 – includes "Live at Ebbetts Field" (previously unreleased concert on disc 2)
With others
Denny's collaborations with other artists, including with Alex Campbell, The Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, and The Bunch, together with numerous posthumous releases and compilation albums, are detailed further on the Sandy Denny discography page.
References and notes
General
Further reading
Mick Houghton. I've Always Kept a Unicorn – The Biography of Sandy Denny. Faber & Faber, 2015;
Clinton Heylin. No More Sad Refrains – The Life and Times of Sandy Denny. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Clinton Heylin. Gypsy Love Songs & Sad Refrains – The Recordings of Richard Thompson and Sandy Denny. Labour of Love Productions, 1989.
Colin Larkin. The Guinness Who's Who of Folk Music. Guinness Publishing Ltd;
Jim Irvin. Angel of Avalon. MOJO Magazine, August 1998.
Colin Harper, Trevor Hodgett. Irish Folk, Traditional & Blues: A Secret History. Cherry Red, 2005;
Pamela Murray Winters. No Thought of Leaving: A life of Sandy Denny. 2000. (Unpublished).
Brian Hinton, Geoff Wall. Ashley Hutchings: The Guv'nor & the Rise of Folk Rock. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Patrick Humphries. Meet On The Ledge: The Classic Years 1967–1975. Virgin Books, 1997;
Patrick Humphries. Richard Thompson: Strange Affair – The Biography. Virgin Books, 1996;
Philip Ward, "Sandy Denny: A Thirtieth Anniversary", R2 (Rock'n'Reel) 2(9), May/June 2008.
Philip Ward, Sandy Denny: Reflections on Her Music''. Matador, 2011;
External links
Official website
Homage to Sandy Denny
Dedicated to the memory of Sandy Denny
Sandy Denny website
1947 births
1978 deaths
20th-century English singers
20th-century English women singers
A&M Records artists
Accidental deaths from falls
Accidental deaths in London
Deaths by intracerebral hemorrhage
Alumni of Kingston College (England)
British folk rock musicians
Burials at Putney Vale Cemetery
English folk singers
English people of Scottish descent
English women singer-songwriters
Fairport Convention members
Women rock singers
Fotheringay members
Island Records artists
People from Byfield, Northamptonshire
People from Wimbledon, London
Singers from London
Strawbs members
The Bunch members | false | [
"Tune in Tokyo is an Australia dance duo formed in 2010 by Australian Idol winner Natalie Gauci and producer Paul Brandoli. They are currently signed to Onelove Records, a dance sub-label of Sony BMG. Their debut single \"Dreamer\" did not appear on the ARIA Top 100, but reached #3 on the ARIA Club Charts.\n\nBackground\nIn 2010 Gauci formed Tune in Tokyo, an electro-pop and dance music band, with producer Paul Brandoli. As the group's lead singer, Gauci's look and sound had changed. She told the Daily Telegraph that she developed her new look and sound after hanging out in Melbourne's gay dance clubs with musician, and her then-husband, Hamish Cowan (Cordrazine). Gauci explained, \"That's where I came out of my shell. I didn't have anyone telling me what to do. Tune in Tokyo is just one part of what I want to do. We got a lot of feedback straight away, which was great because it gave me confidence about the project\". They released their debut single \"Dreamer\" in November 2010, followed by \"Ray of Love\" in April 2012.\n\nDiscography\n\nSingles\n\nReferences\n\nAustralian electronic dance music groups\nAustralian musical duos\nEnglish pop music groups\nMusical groups established in 2010\n2010 establishments in Australia",
"\"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)"
] |
[
"Sandy Denny",
"Early career",
"How did she get started in her career?",
"in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus.",
"What did she do in the club?",
"After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings"
] | C_e6cc2f78b77b4fcab1029b8e527f1a13_1 | What did she do there? | 3 | What did Sandy Denny do in the folk club? | Sandy Denny | Her nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn. After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fhir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels". Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes. By this time she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark which was released belatedly in 1973 credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer. CANNOTANSWER | the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. | Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny (6 January 1947 – 21 April 1978) was an English singer-songwriter who was lead singer of the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. She has been described as "the pre-eminent British folk rock singer".
After briefly working with the Strawbs, Denny joined Fairport Convention in 1968, remaining with them until 1969. She formed the short-lived band Fotheringay in 1970, before focusing on a solo career. Between 1971 and 1977, Denny released four solo albums: The North Star Grassman and the Ravens, Sandy, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz and Rendezvous. She also duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore" for Led Zeppelin's album Led Zeppelin IV in 1971. Denny died in 1978 at the age of 31 due to injuries and health issues related to alcohol abuse.
Music publications Uncut and Mojo have described Denny as Britain's finest female singer-songwriter. Her composition "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" has been recorded by Judy Collins, Eva Cassidy, Nina Simone, 10,000 Maniacs and Cat Power. Her recorded work has been the subject of numerous reissues, along with a wealth of previously unreleased material which has appeared over the more than 40 years since her death, including a 19-CD box set released in November 2010.
Childhood
Denny was born on 6 January 1947 at Nelson Hospital, Kingston Road, Merton Park, London, to Neil and Edna Denny. She studied classical piano as a child.
Her paternal grandfather was from Dundee, and her paternal grandmother was a Scots Gaelic speaker and singer of traditional songs. At an early age Denny showed an interest in singing, although her strict parents were reluctant to believe there was a living to be made from it. She attended Coombe Girls' School in New Malden; after leaving school she began training as a nurse at the Royal Brompton Hospital.
Early career
Denny's nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn.
After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames, Denny began working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels".
Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes.
By this time, she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark, which was released belatedly in 1973, credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer.
From Fairport to Fotheringay
After making the Saga albums with Alex Campbell and Johnny Silvo, Denny looked for a band that would allow her to stretch herself as a vocalist, reach a wider audience, and have the opportunity to display her songwriting. She said, "I wanted to do something more with my voice." After working briefly with the Strawbs, Denny remained unconvinced that they could provide that opportunity, and so she ended her relationship with the band.
Fairport Convention conducted auditions in May 1968 for a replacement singer following the departure of Judy Dyble after their debut album, and Denny became the obvious choice. According to group member Simon Nicol, her personality and musicianship made her stand out from the other auditionees "like a clean glass in a sink full of dirty dishes".
Beginning with What We Did on Our Holidays, the first of three albums she made with the band in the late 1960s, Denny is credited with encouraging Fairport Convention to explore the traditional British folk repertoire, and is thus regarded as a key figure in the development of British folk rock. She brought with her the traditional repertoire she had refined in the clubs, including "A Sailor's Life" featured on their second album together Unhalfbricking. Framing Denny's performance of this song with their own electric improvisations, her bandmates discovered what then proved to be the inspiration for an entire album, the influential Liege & Lief (1969).
Denny left Fairport Convention in December 1969 to develop her own songwriting more fully. To this end, she formed her own band, Fotheringay, which included her future husband, Australian Trevor Lucas, formerly of the group Eclection.
They created one self-titled album, which included an eight-minute version of the traditional "Banks of the Nile", and several Denny originals, among them "The Sea" and "Nothing More". The latter marked her first composition on the piano, which was to become her primary instrument from then on. Fotheringay started to record a second album in late 1970, but it remained unfinished after Denny announced that she was leaving the group and producer Joe Boyd left to take up a job at Warner Brothers in California. Denny would later blame Boyd's hostility towards the group for its demise.
Solo career and final years
She then turned to recording her first solo album, The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. Released in 1971, it is distinguished by its elusive lyrics and unconventional harmonies. Highlights included "Late November", inspired by a dream and the death of Fairport band member Martin Lamble, and "Next Time Around" a cryptogram about Jackson C. Frank, one of her many portraits in song.
Sandy, with a cover photograph by David Bailey, followed in 1972 and was the first of her albums to be produced by Trevor Lucas. As well as introducing eight new original compositions, the album marked her last recording of a traditional song, "The Quiet Joys of Brotherhood" (words by Richard Fariña), with Denny's ambitious multi-tracked vocal arrangement inspired by the Ensemble of the Bulgarian Republic.
Melody Maker readers twice voted her the "Best British Female Singer", in 1970 and 1971 and, together with contemporaries including Richard Thompson and Ashley Hutchings, she participated in a one-off project called the Bunch to record a collection of rock and roll era standards released under the title of Rock On.
In 1971, Denny duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore", which was included on Led Zeppelin's 1971 album (Led Zeppelin IV); she was the only guest vocalist ever to appear on a Led Zeppelin album. In 1972 Denny had a small cameo on Lou Reizner's symphonic arrangement of the Who's rock opera Tommy. Her brief appearance was at the end of the track "It's a Boy", which also featured vocals from Pete Townshend.
In 1973, she married long-term boyfriend and producer Trevor Lucas and recorded a third solo album, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz. The songs continued to detail many of her personal preoccupations: loss, loneliness, fear of the dark, the passing of time and the changing seasons. The album contained one of her best loved compositions, "Solo", and featured a cover image by Gered Mankowitz.
In 1974, she returned to Fairport Convention (of which her husband was by then a member) for a world tour (captured on the 1974 album Fairport Live Convention) and a studio album, Rising for the Moon in 1975. Although her development as a soloist and songwriter had taken her further away from the folk roots direction that the band had pursued since Liege & Lief, seven of the eleven tracks on Rising for the Moon were either written or co-written by her.
Denny and Lucas left Fairport Convention at the end of 1975 and embarked on what was to become her final album Rendezvous. Released in 1977, the album sold poorly and Denny was subsequently dropped by Island Records. Having relocated to the village of Byfield in Northamptonshire in the mid-seventies, Denny gave birth to her only child, a daughter named Georgia, in July 1977.
A UK tour to promote Rendezvous in autumn 1977 marked her final public appearances. The closing night at the Royalty Theatre in London on 27 November 1977 was recorded for a live album, Gold Dust, which, because of technical problems in the recording of the electric guitar, was belatedly released in 1998 after most of the guitars had been re-recorded by Jerry Donahue.
Death
Linda Thompson would later note that Denny "really started going downhill in 1976" and demonstrated increasing levels of both manic and depressive behaviour. Learning that she was pregnant did little to mellow Denny's reckless lifestyle, which was heightened by increasing depression, mood swings and the unravelling of her "tumultuous" marriage to Trevor Lucas. She abused drugs and alcohol while pregnant with her daughter, Georgia, who was born prematurely in July 1977. Much like her moods, Denny's interest towards her daughter appeared to oscillate between obsessive and unconcerned; friends recalled both frantic, middle-of-the-night phone calls about teething, as well as Denny "crashing the car and leaving the baby in the pub and all sorts of stuff".
Friends would later note that Denny had a history of purposely throwing herself off bar stools and down flights of stairs in order to get a reaction. Several remembered this behaviour as "Sandy's party trick", while Dave Pegg's wife Chris stated, "She certainly did it in my house and it could be a very dramatic gesture, like self-harming. She could do it without hurting herself usually but I had a feeling there would be one time too many." Those who knew Denny said that her increasing level of alcohol abuse in the last years of her life led to an increasing number of falls (both accidental and deliberate), resulting in a growing number of injuries.
In late March 1978, while on holiday with her parents and baby Georgia in Cornwall, Denny was injured when she fell down a staircase and hit her head on concrete. Following the incident, she suffered from intense headaches; a doctor prescribed her the painkiller dextropropoxyphene, a drug known to have fatal side effects when mixed with alcohol. On 1 April, several days after the fall in Cornwall, Denny performed a charity concert at Byfield. The final song she performed was "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?"
At some unknown point during the first half of April 1978, Denny suffered yet another major fall at her home in Byfield. On 13 April, concerned about his wife's erratic behaviour and fearing for his daughter's safety, Trevor Lucas left the UK and returned to his native Australia with their child, leaving Denny without telling her. He sold their Austin Princess car in order to raise funds for the journey.
On discovering Lucas' departure, Denny went to stay at the home of her friend Miranda Ward. During this time, Denny apparently set up an appointment to speak with a doctor about her headaches, and also intended to get advice about her alcohol addiction. At some point after 8 am on 17 April, Denny fell into a coma. Ward was out of the house at the time, and had asked her friend Jon Cole (of the band The Movies) to check in on Denny. Cole entered the home at 3 pm, and found Denny unconscious at the foot of the staircase which led to the second floor of the house. She was rushed by ambulance to Queen Mary's Hospital in nearby Roehampton.
On 19 April, she was transferred to Atkinson Morley Hospital in Wimbledon. After receiving news that Denny was in a coma, Lucas returned from Australia. Upon his arrival at the hospital, doctors informed him that Denny was effectively brain-dead and her condition would not improve. He granted their recommendation to turn off life-support machines; however, just ten minutes before this was to take place, at 7:50 pm on 21 April 1978, Sandy Denny died, without regaining consciousness. Her death was ruled to be the result of a traumatic mid-brain haemorrhage and blunt force trauma to her head. She was 31 years old.
The funeral took place on 27 April 1978 at Putney Vale Cemetery. After the vicar had read Denny's favourite psalm, Psalm 23, a piper played "Flowers of the Forest", a traditional song commemorating the fallen of Flodden Field and one which had appeared on the 1970 Fairport album Full House. The inscription on her headstone reads:
Posthumous releases
Official releases
Although Denny had a devoted following in her lifetime, she did not achieve mass market success. In the years since her death, her reputation has grown. A four-album box set entitled Who Knows Where the Time Goes? (1985) was produced by her widower Trevor Lucas and Joe Boyd and included a number of rare and previously unreleased tracks by Denny, either solo or with Fairport Convention (1968, 1969, 1974) and Fotheringay (1970). This was the first public indication that a large cache of unreleased material existed. A one-disc subset of these recordings was subsequently issued on CD by Island in 1987 entitled The Best Of Sandy Denny.
In 1987, a compilation of previously unreleased tracks recorded for the BBC by incarnations of Fairport including Denny was released on LP under the title Heyday, which was subsequently released on CD in 2001 and again, with extra tracks, in 2002; all tracks were later included, with others, on the 2007 4-CD box set Fairport Convention Live at the BBC (see below). The initial purpose of this compilation was to document the more "American" material performed live by the What We Did on Our Holidays lineup of the band that never made it to vinyl, while the re-releases added additional songs as performed by the Unhalfbricking and Liege and Lief lineups.
Also in 1987, a VHS documentary, It All Comes 'Round Again, on Fairport Convention was released which contained excerpts of several audio recordings featuring Denny, plus a single poor-quality video recording of her singing her song "Solo" during her second stint with Fairport in 1974, as filmed by the University of Birmingham's "Guild TV" amateur organisation. The original tape of this recording has apparently been lost; however, "Like an Old Fashioned Waltz" does appear on the DVD documentary Sandy Denny Under Review (see below) and other tracks have been made available via YouTube in very poor quality.
Over the period 1988–1994, the Australian "Friends of Fairport" issued a series of subscriber-only cassette compilations drawing in the main on previously unreleased tapes from Trevor Lucas' collection (as stored in his attic in fact). Attic Tracks (AT) 1 (1988) contained out-takes from Sandy as well as some Fairport material and a few bizarre extras; AT 2 (1989) contained only Trevor Lucas material, no Denny; AT 3 (1989) entitled First and Last Tracks comprised 1966–1967 home demos and rare radio tracks, as well as 9 "pre-overdub" songs from Denny's last concert at the Royalty Theatre, London, on 27 November 1977 (a partial alternative to the later, overdubbed CD release Gold Dust), and AT 4 (1994): Together Again comprised one side of Lucas and the other of Denny in the form of more home demos, studio outtakes, and 4 tracks from a 1973 BBC radio concert. A cut-down version of these tracks (18 songs) was subsequently compiled for CD release by the Australian label Raven Records in 1995 called Sandy Denny, Trevor Lucas and Friends: The Attic Tracks 1972–1984.
In 1991, Joe Boyd issued a new version of Denny's All Our Own Work album with the Strawbs, called Sandy Denny and the Strawbs, on his Hannibal Records label. The album had strings added to some tracks, including "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" and further tracks with Denny on lead vocal.
In 1997, a one-disc compilation of Denny's solo BBC recordings was released as The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 on Strange Fruit Records. Due to rights issues it was withdrawn on the day of release, thereby creating a highly collectible disc (up until the release of the comprehensive Live at the BBC box set in 2007). This release was followed in 1998 when Denny's final performance at the Royalty Theatre, entitled Gold Dust, was issued on CD, following a degree of re-recording and overdubbing of selected backing parts to replace reportedly unsatisfactory originals.
In 1999, a single-disc compilation, Listen Listen – An Introduction to Sandy Denny, was released on Island Records comprising 17 previously released tracks taken from her four Island solo albums.
No More Sad Refrains: The Anthology was released by Universal Records in 2000. When first released, this compilation had several rare tracks, including "The Ballad of Easy Rider" from the Liege and Lief sessions, "Learning the Game" and "When Will I Be Loved" from the Bunch album Rock On, "Here in Silence" and "Man of Iron" from the Pass of Arms soundtrack, and a previously unissued demo of "Stranger to Himself".
In 2002, a previously unreleased, 2-CD live US concert recording by Fairport Convention from 1974 featuring Denny was released on the Burning Airlines label. Entitled Before The Moon, it originated from a radio broadcast from Ebbets Field in Denver, Colorado, on 23/24 May 1974. The second disc was a limited release bonus with the original release comprising the second set from the same concert. This recording was re-released in shortened form as a single disc in 2011 on the It's About Music label entitled Fairport Convention with Sandy Denny: Ebbets Field 1974.
Also in 2002, the American A&M Records issued a budget-price "20th Century Masters" compilation called The Best of Sandy Denny with 10 tracks all available on Denny's studio albums.
In 2004 a second comprehensive five-CD box set was released on the Fledg'ling record label called A Boxful of Treasures that included many unreleased recordings, in particular a whole disc of acoustic demos, many recorded at her home in Byfield that was highly prized amongst fans and critics alike, who had long asserted that her solo performances showed her work in its best light, revealing the true quality of her vocal style and compositions. Also in 2004, the Spectrum label issued a 16-track compilation of previously released material entitled The Collection: Chronological Covers & Concert Classics, including a mix of studio recordings and live excerpts from the Gold Dust Royalty concert.
In 2005, remastered versions of all Denny's solo albums came out with bonus tracks. Also in 2005, a single CD compilation entitled Where the Time Goes: Sandy '67 was released on Castle Music containing all of Saga's Denny album tracks (including the alternative recordings on It's Sandy Denny), together with two self accompanied tracks from Denny's recordings with the Strawbs.
A DVD documentary entitled Sandy Denny Under Review was released on the Sexy Intellectual label in 2006 which contained interviews with her contemporaries plus brief excerpts from her audio recordings, plus some short video clips including two of the poor quality video recordings with Fairport from Birmingham University (details given above), two with Fotheringay from German TV's Beat-Club (further details given below), and three solo excerpts from the only surviving BBC footage on One In Ten (details as given in the next item).
A 4-disc box set, Sandy Denny Live at the BBC, came out in September 2007 containing (virtually) all of the known solo recordings made by Denny for that UK broadcaster including two complete concerts, one at the Paris Theatre in 1972 and one recorded for Sounds on Sunday in 1973, plus a range of other material spanning the years 1966–1973. Disc 3 of this set was a DVD containing surviving TV footage from a 1971 BBC One in Ten session comprising solo performances by Denny of "The North Star Grassman and the Ravens", "Crazy Lady Blues" and "Late November", along with digitised excerpts from her diaries, rare photos and a discography. A 1-disc subset of this box set entitled The Best of the BBC Recordings was subsequently released in 2008.
A companion box set, Fairport Convention Live at the BBC, also came out in 2007 and covered equivalent live recordings by Fairport over the period 1968–1974, of which the first two discs (1968–1970) contain examples from Denny's time with that group.
In 2008, Jerry Donahue completed the unfinished second Fotheringay album begun in the autumn of 1970. It was released to general acclaim as Fotheringay 2 and contained some notable Denny performances, in particular earlier versions of two Denny compositions, "Late November" and "John the Gun", and performances of the traditional songs "Gypsy Davey" and "Wild Mountain Thyme". Also in 2008, Island Remasters issued a double CD entitled The Music Weaver (Sandy Denny Remembered) which contained a mix of better known tracks and less well known demos and live recordings, previously released but not in companion with studio sessions. This compilation is also one of the very few to contain the Led Zeppelin track "The Battle Of Evermore" which features a rare guest appearance by Denny.
In 2010, a large 19-CD retrospective box set, simply titled Sandy Denny, was released by Universal/Island Records in a limited edition of 3,000. It contained Denny's entire catalogue of studio recordings, including her work with the Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay and as a solo artist. The compilation also included a large number of outtakes, demos, live recordings, radio sessions and interviews. The box set was released to good reviews, including a 5-star review in Uncut and a 4-star review in The Guardian.
In late 2010, Thea Gilmore was commissioned by Denny's estate, in conjunction with Island Records, to write melodies to unrecorded lyrics found in Denny's papers. The resulting album, Don't Stop Singing, was released in November 2011 to generally good notices, including 4-star reviews in The Independent and The Guardian among others. On 21 April 2012, the single "London" was released as an exclusive Record Store Day 7″ single.
Further recordings were released in 2011, including a German recording of Fotheringay in concert released as Essen 1970 on the Garden of Delights label. The performance was remastered by original band member Jerry Donahue. This release was followed by 19 Rupert Street, a home recording of a rehearsal featuring Sandy and Alex Campbell recorded at his flat in August 1967. This release is notable for the fact that Sandy performs a number of tracks that are not available in any other versions, including a cover of "Fairytale Lullaby" by John Martyn. This CD was put out by Sandy's former Strawbs bandmate Dave Cousins on his Witchwood label.
Two-disc "Deluxe Editions" of Denny's album reissues appeared in 2011–2012 with additional tracks; the 2012 Deluxe Edition of Sandy included a previously unreleased eight-song solo set from her 1973 U.S. tour recorded at Ebbet's Field in Denver, Colorado. A similar two-disc reissue of Fairport Convention's Rising for the Moon also included, for the first time, the complete 1974 L.A. Troubadour performance of Fairport with Denny back on board, prior to the official announcement of her re-joining the group.
On account of unprecedented demand for, and exhaustion of supply of the limited edition 19-CD set cited above, in October 2012 a limited edition 4-CD version was released entitled The Notes and The Words: A Collection of Demos and Rarities, containing "75 songs that represent the cream of the rarities, demos and outtakes from the box set". Limited to 3,500 copies, this compilation is also now out-of-print.
In 2013, Spectrum records issued a single-disc CD entitled The Lady – The Essential Sandy Denny that comprised 15 previously issued tracks, generally from Denny's well known albums.
2014 saw the release of another Fairport live U.S. radio broadcast from their 1974 tour with Denny, on RockBeat Records, entitled Live 1974 (My Father's Place), comprising 11 live tracks, most featuring Denny, recorded at the New York rock club My Father's Place.
A four-disc Fotheringay retrospective, Nothing More: The Collected Fotheringay, was released on 30 March 2015. This is the most comprehensive compilation of the group's recordings, and contains, in addition to all the tracks on Fotheringay and Fotheringay 2 as both final studio versions and demos/alternate takes, the complete live concert set from Rotterdam in 1970 (including several previously unreleased tracks), seven Fotheringay tracks recorded in session for BBC radio (which had previously circulated only as bootlegs), plus a DVD disc containing four performances by Fotheringay recorded for the German Beat-Club TV series in 1970, which considerably augment the otherwise sparse known TV footage of Denny in particular.
May 2016 saw the release of a 2-CD compilation, I've Always Kept A Unicorn – The Acoustic Sandy Denny which collected together many previously released, but dispersed, acoustic and/or demo versions of songs better known from their album counterparts, as well as three previously unreleased demos (with Linda Thompson, at the time Linda Peters) from 1972's Rock On sessions by one-off band The Bunch.
A 7-CD box set by Fairport Convention entitled Come All Ye – The First 10 Years was released in July 2017 and contains a small number of additional, previously unreleased demos and alternate takes featuring Denny during her first tenure with the band over the period 1968–1969. Tracks not previously available include versions of Joni Mitchell's Eastern Rain, an a capella version of Nottamun Town, alternative takes of Autopsy and Who Knows Where the Time Goes, and a rehearsal version of The Deserter.
Unofficial releases and audience tapes
In addition to the authorised material listed above, a number unofficial/unauthorised compilations exist plus a range of audience recordings of varying quality, none of which would likely see the light of day as commercial issues but are of interest to a sector of Denny's audience on either historic or aesthetic grounds, often providing alternative views of songs known otherwise only from their commercially released versions. The first available unauthorised/bootleg CDs available in the 1980s and 1990s comprised principally off-air and other obscure material under such titles as Borrowed Thyme, Poems from Alexandra, Dark the Night, Wild Mountain Thyme and One Last Sad Refrain; such compilations are now largely superseded by the subsequent availability of most of the off-air material in much better quality as official releases as described above.
Of more enduring interest are audience tapes of shows of which no "official" tapes survive. These include some early shows by Fairport Convention; a performance by Fotheringay at the 1970 Tenth National Jazz and Blues Festival, held at Plumpton Race Track, Streat, East Sussex, England; "solo" shows by Denny (on occasion with a small band including, among others, Richard Thompson) at the 1971 Lincoln Folk Festival and at the Eltham Well Hall Open Theatre in 1972; performances from York University and Guildhall, Newcastle upon Tyne, also in 1972; an early 1972 U.S. performance from The Bitter End in New York; and several sets (Birmingham and Croydon) from her final 1977 tour in addition to the officially released Gold Dust album; plus quite a large number of recordings strongly featuring Denny as part of the re-formed Fairport Convention over the period 1974–1975. The majority of these can be fairly easily located via relevant internet searches and, in addition, can be readily downloaded from archival music servers such as Sugarmegs (Sandy Denny concerts listed under "S": SugarMegs Streaming Server, Fairport and Fotheringay under "F": SugarMegs Streaming Server). A provisional list of such recordings as are known to exist, with details on where each can be accessed, is available here.
Legacy
Estate and family
After relocating to Australia and remarrying, Trevor Lucas died of a heart attack in 1989. Denny's estate is now managed by Lucas' widow, Elizabeth Hurtt-Lucas. A number of otherwise unreleased recordings of Sandy Denny from his collection have subsequently been the basis for posthumous releases of Denny's work including those on The Attic Tracks and elsewhere.
Sandy Denny's daughter, Georgia, has rarely spoken about her mother in a public forum and in the mid-2000s declined an invitation to write the liner notes for Sandy Denny Live at the BBC. However, in 2006 she flew to Britain from Australia to accept on her mother's behalf the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards award for Most Influential Folk Album of All Time, which was given for Fairport Convention's Liege and Lief. Georgia gave birth to twin daughters on 29 April 1997, and a tribute album, Georgia on Our Mind, featuring many of Sandy Denny's former bandmates and friends, was compiled in the children's honour. She also administers a Facebook page "Sandy Denny and Family" dedicated to her mother's memory and more recently, under the name Georgia Katt, has released some of her own DJ-based music.
Tributes
Since her death, many tributes have been made to Denny, both in music and elsewhere. Dave Pegg of Fairport Convention recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on his 1983 solo album The Cocktail Cowboy Goes It Alone. Dave Cousins of the Strawbs wrote "Ringing Down the Years" in memory of Denny shortly after her death. Songs more specific to the death were Bert Jansch's "Where Did My Life Go" and Richard Thompson's "Did She Jump or Was She Pushed?" Fellow Brit folk pioneers Spriguns changed the title of their 1978 album to Magic Lady after hearing of Denny's death while recording. In 1998, a variety of Daylily was named after her.
Denny's songs have been covered by numerous artists in the years since her death. Some of the notable acts to have covered her music include Yo La Tengo, former Marillion frontman Fish, who covered "Solo" on his album Songs from the Mirror, Cat Power, Judy Collins, Nanci Griffith and Nina Simone. Kate Bush mentioned Denny in the lyric of "Blow Away (For Bill)", as one of the musicians to greet Bill in Heaven. "Blow Away (For Bill)" is the third track on Bush's 1980 album Never for Ever. In 1984, Clann Eadair released the single "A tribute to Sandy Denny", featuring Phil Lynott on vocals.
Several radio specials have been produced about Denny's life and music, including BBC Radio 2's The Sandy Denny Story: Who Knows Where the Time Goes. In 2007, Denny's song "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" also received BBC Radio 2's 2007 Folk Award for "Favourite Folk Track of All Time". In 2010, she was recognized by NPR in their 50 Great Voices special series.
In April 2008, a tribute concert was held at The Troubadour in London, to mark the thirtieth anniversary of Denny's death. Those taking part included Martin Carthy, Linda Thompson and Joe Boyd.
A more extensive tribute was given later that year in December at the Southbank in the Queen Elizabeth Hall called The Lady: A Tribute to Sandy Denny with a band composed of members of Bellowhead, the evening featured a mix of young folk acts like Jim Moray and Lisa Knapp alongside those that had known and worked with Denny such as Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. These acts were joined by performers from outside the world of folk like PP Arnold and Marc Almond. The concert, which primarily featured songs written by Denny, received a four-star review in The Guardian. In May 2012 the Southbank concert was expanded into an eight date UK tour called The Lady: A Homage to Sandy Denny. The tour showcased Sandy's entire songbook taking in her work with Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, her solo career and the new songs completed by Thea Gilmore on her album Don't Stop Singing.
The band was, once again, composed of members of Bellowhead. Other acts performing included the aforementioned Thea Gilmore and up-and-coming folk acts Lavinia Blackwall of Trembling Bells, Blair Dunlop and Sam Carter, alongside more established folk stars Maddy Prior, Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. The line-up was completed with performers not normally associated with the folk scene; Green Gartside, Joan Wasser (also known as Joan As Police Woman), and PP Arnold. The tour was well received, obtaining a four-star review in The Times. The London concert at the Barbican was filmed for BBC4, and broadcast in a 90-minute programme titled The Songs of Sandy Denny in November 2012.
In the 2012 Irish film Silence (Harvest Films & South Wind Blows), "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" is used during the film and final credits.
In April 2016 Denny was inducted into the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards Hall of Fame.
Alela Diane recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on her album Cusp, released in February 2018. The song reflects on Denny's final tragic days and her orphaned baby daughter.
Discography
Solo studio albums
The North Star Grassman and the Ravens (1971)
Sandy (1972)
Like an Old Fashioned Waltz (1974)
Rendezvous (1977)
Solo live albums
The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 (1997)
Gold Dust (1998) (live recording from final tour, 1977)
Live at the BBC (2007 4-disc compilation)
Sandy – Deluxe edition, 2012 – includes "Live at Ebbetts Field" (previously unreleased concert on disc 2)
With others
Denny's collaborations with other artists, including with Alex Campbell, The Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, and The Bunch, together with numerous posthumous releases and compilation albums, are detailed further on the Sandy Denny discography page.
References and notes
General
Further reading
Mick Houghton. I've Always Kept a Unicorn – The Biography of Sandy Denny. Faber & Faber, 2015;
Clinton Heylin. No More Sad Refrains – The Life and Times of Sandy Denny. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Clinton Heylin. Gypsy Love Songs & Sad Refrains – The Recordings of Richard Thompson and Sandy Denny. Labour of Love Productions, 1989.
Colin Larkin. The Guinness Who's Who of Folk Music. Guinness Publishing Ltd;
Jim Irvin. Angel of Avalon. MOJO Magazine, August 1998.
Colin Harper, Trevor Hodgett. Irish Folk, Traditional & Blues: A Secret History. Cherry Red, 2005;
Pamela Murray Winters. No Thought of Leaving: A life of Sandy Denny. 2000. (Unpublished).
Brian Hinton, Geoff Wall. Ashley Hutchings: The Guv'nor & the Rise of Folk Rock. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Patrick Humphries. Meet On The Ledge: The Classic Years 1967–1975. Virgin Books, 1997;
Patrick Humphries. Richard Thompson: Strange Affair – The Biography. Virgin Books, 1996;
Philip Ward, "Sandy Denny: A Thirtieth Anniversary", R2 (Rock'n'Reel) 2(9), May/June 2008.
Philip Ward, Sandy Denny: Reflections on Her Music''. Matador, 2011;
External links
Official website
Homage to Sandy Denny
Dedicated to the memory of Sandy Denny
Sandy Denny website
1947 births
1978 deaths
20th-century English singers
20th-century English women singers
A&M Records artists
Accidental deaths from falls
Accidental deaths in London
Deaths by intracerebral hemorrhage
Alumni of Kingston College (England)
British folk rock musicians
Burials at Putney Vale Cemetery
English folk singers
English people of Scottish descent
English women singer-songwriters
Fairport Convention members
Women rock singers
Fotheringay members
Island Records artists
People from Byfield, Northamptonshire
People from Wimbledon, London
Singers from London
Strawbs members
The Bunch members | true | [
"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",
"There's a Girl in My Hammerlock is a 1991 young adult novel by Jerry Spinelli.\n\nPlot\nMaisie Potter tries out for the wrestling team in her junior high to get close to a boy she likes, but she soon finds out that what she really loves is the sport of wrestling.\n\nMaisie initially wants to be on the cheerleading squad, but she did not make the cut during tryouts. She is infatuated with a boy at her school, Eric Delong, and will do anything to be near him. Because he tries out for the wrestling team, Maisie decides to try out too. She makes the team but discovers that wrestling is a lot harder than she initially thought. She wins some of her matches but most of her opponents forfeit because they don't think it's right for a girl to wrestle a boy. She has to decide if she should do things that other people want her to do or things that she truly wants to do and is good at.\n\nExternal links\nAuthor Jerry Spinelli's homepage\n\n1991 American novels\nNovels by Jerry Spinelli\nAmerican sports novels\nAmerican young adult novels"
] |
[
"Sandy Denny",
"Early career",
"How did she get started in her career?",
"in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus.",
"What did she do in the club?",
"After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings",
"What did she do there?",
"the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs."
] | C_e6cc2f78b77b4fcab1029b8e527f1a13_1 | How long did she work there? | 4 | How long did Sandy Denny work in the folk club? | Sandy Denny | Her nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn. After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fhir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels". Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes. By this time she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark which was released belatedly in 1973 credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny (6 January 1947 – 21 April 1978) was an English singer-songwriter who was lead singer of the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. She has been described as "the pre-eminent British folk rock singer".
After briefly working with the Strawbs, Denny joined Fairport Convention in 1968, remaining with them until 1969. She formed the short-lived band Fotheringay in 1970, before focusing on a solo career. Between 1971 and 1977, Denny released four solo albums: The North Star Grassman and the Ravens, Sandy, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz and Rendezvous. She also duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore" for Led Zeppelin's album Led Zeppelin IV in 1971. Denny died in 1978 at the age of 31 due to injuries and health issues related to alcohol abuse.
Music publications Uncut and Mojo have described Denny as Britain's finest female singer-songwriter. Her composition "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" has been recorded by Judy Collins, Eva Cassidy, Nina Simone, 10,000 Maniacs and Cat Power. Her recorded work has been the subject of numerous reissues, along with a wealth of previously unreleased material which has appeared over the more than 40 years since her death, including a 19-CD box set released in November 2010.
Childhood
Denny was born on 6 January 1947 at Nelson Hospital, Kingston Road, Merton Park, London, to Neil and Edna Denny. She studied classical piano as a child.
Her paternal grandfather was from Dundee, and her paternal grandmother was a Scots Gaelic speaker and singer of traditional songs. At an early age Denny showed an interest in singing, although her strict parents were reluctant to believe there was a living to be made from it. She attended Coombe Girls' School in New Malden; after leaving school she began training as a nurse at the Royal Brompton Hospital.
Early career
Denny's nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn.
After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames, Denny began working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels".
Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes.
By this time, she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark, which was released belatedly in 1973, credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer.
From Fairport to Fotheringay
After making the Saga albums with Alex Campbell and Johnny Silvo, Denny looked for a band that would allow her to stretch herself as a vocalist, reach a wider audience, and have the opportunity to display her songwriting. She said, "I wanted to do something more with my voice." After working briefly with the Strawbs, Denny remained unconvinced that they could provide that opportunity, and so she ended her relationship with the band.
Fairport Convention conducted auditions in May 1968 for a replacement singer following the departure of Judy Dyble after their debut album, and Denny became the obvious choice. According to group member Simon Nicol, her personality and musicianship made her stand out from the other auditionees "like a clean glass in a sink full of dirty dishes".
Beginning with What We Did on Our Holidays, the first of three albums she made with the band in the late 1960s, Denny is credited with encouraging Fairport Convention to explore the traditional British folk repertoire, and is thus regarded as a key figure in the development of British folk rock. She brought with her the traditional repertoire she had refined in the clubs, including "A Sailor's Life" featured on their second album together Unhalfbricking. Framing Denny's performance of this song with their own electric improvisations, her bandmates discovered what then proved to be the inspiration for an entire album, the influential Liege & Lief (1969).
Denny left Fairport Convention in December 1969 to develop her own songwriting more fully. To this end, she formed her own band, Fotheringay, which included her future husband, Australian Trevor Lucas, formerly of the group Eclection.
They created one self-titled album, which included an eight-minute version of the traditional "Banks of the Nile", and several Denny originals, among them "The Sea" and "Nothing More". The latter marked her first composition on the piano, which was to become her primary instrument from then on. Fotheringay started to record a second album in late 1970, but it remained unfinished after Denny announced that she was leaving the group and producer Joe Boyd left to take up a job at Warner Brothers in California. Denny would later blame Boyd's hostility towards the group for its demise.
Solo career and final years
She then turned to recording her first solo album, The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. Released in 1971, it is distinguished by its elusive lyrics and unconventional harmonies. Highlights included "Late November", inspired by a dream and the death of Fairport band member Martin Lamble, and "Next Time Around" a cryptogram about Jackson C. Frank, one of her many portraits in song.
Sandy, with a cover photograph by David Bailey, followed in 1972 and was the first of her albums to be produced by Trevor Lucas. As well as introducing eight new original compositions, the album marked her last recording of a traditional song, "The Quiet Joys of Brotherhood" (words by Richard Fariña), with Denny's ambitious multi-tracked vocal arrangement inspired by the Ensemble of the Bulgarian Republic.
Melody Maker readers twice voted her the "Best British Female Singer", in 1970 and 1971 and, together with contemporaries including Richard Thompson and Ashley Hutchings, she participated in a one-off project called the Bunch to record a collection of rock and roll era standards released under the title of Rock On.
In 1971, Denny duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore", which was included on Led Zeppelin's 1971 album (Led Zeppelin IV); she was the only guest vocalist ever to appear on a Led Zeppelin album. In 1972 Denny had a small cameo on Lou Reizner's symphonic arrangement of the Who's rock opera Tommy. Her brief appearance was at the end of the track "It's a Boy", which also featured vocals from Pete Townshend.
In 1973, she married long-term boyfriend and producer Trevor Lucas and recorded a third solo album, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz. The songs continued to detail many of her personal preoccupations: loss, loneliness, fear of the dark, the passing of time and the changing seasons. The album contained one of her best loved compositions, "Solo", and featured a cover image by Gered Mankowitz.
In 1974, she returned to Fairport Convention (of which her husband was by then a member) for a world tour (captured on the 1974 album Fairport Live Convention) and a studio album, Rising for the Moon in 1975. Although her development as a soloist and songwriter had taken her further away from the folk roots direction that the band had pursued since Liege & Lief, seven of the eleven tracks on Rising for the Moon were either written or co-written by her.
Denny and Lucas left Fairport Convention at the end of 1975 and embarked on what was to become her final album Rendezvous. Released in 1977, the album sold poorly and Denny was subsequently dropped by Island Records. Having relocated to the village of Byfield in Northamptonshire in the mid-seventies, Denny gave birth to her only child, a daughter named Georgia, in July 1977.
A UK tour to promote Rendezvous in autumn 1977 marked her final public appearances. The closing night at the Royalty Theatre in London on 27 November 1977 was recorded for a live album, Gold Dust, which, because of technical problems in the recording of the electric guitar, was belatedly released in 1998 after most of the guitars had been re-recorded by Jerry Donahue.
Death
Linda Thompson would later note that Denny "really started going downhill in 1976" and demonstrated increasing levels of both manic and depressive behaviour. Learning that she was pregnant did little to mellow Denny's reckless lifestyle, which was heightened by increasing depression, mood swings and the unravelling of her "tumultuous" marriage to Trevor Lucas. She abused drugs and alcohol while pregnant with her daughter, Georgia, who was born prematurely in July 1977. Much like her moods, Denny's interest towards her daughter appeared to oscillate between obsessive and unconcerned; friends recalled both frantic, middle-of-the-night phone calls about teething, as well as Denny "crashing the car and leaving the baby in the pub and all sorts of stuff".
Friends would later note that Denny had a history of purposely throwing herself off bar stools and down flights of stairs in order to get a reaction. Several remembered this behaviour as "Sandy's party trick", while Dave Pegg's wife Chris stated, "She certainly did it in my house and it could be a very dramatic gesture, like self-harming. She could do it without hurting herself usually but I had a feeling there would be one time too many." Those who knew Denny said that her increasing level of alcohol abuse in the last years of her life led to an increasing number of falls (both accidental and deliberate), resulting in a growing number of injuries.
In late March 1978, while on holiday with her parents and baby Georgia in Cornwall, Denny was injured when she fell down a staircase and hit her head on concrete. Following the incident, she suffered from intense headaches; a doctor prescribed her the painkiller dextropropoxyphene, a drug known to have fatal side effects when mixed with alcohol. On 1 April, several days after the fall in Cornwall, Denny performed a charity concert at Byfield. The final song she performed was "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?"
At some unknown point during the first half of April 1978, Denny suffered yet another major fall at her home in Byfield. On 13 April, concerned about his wife's erratic behaviour and fearing for his daughter's safety, Trevor Lucas left the UK and returned to his native Australia with their child, leaving Denny without telling her. He sold their Austin Princess car in order to raise funds for the journey.
On discovering Lucas' departure, Denny went to stay at the home of her friend Miranda Ward. During this time, Denny apparently set up an appointment to speak with a doctor about her headaches, and also intended to get advice about her alcohol addiction. At some point after 8 am on 17 April, Denny fell into a coma. Ward was out of the house at the time, and had asked her friend Jon Cole (of the band The Movies) to check in on Denny. Cole entered the home at 3 pm, and found Denny unconscious at the foot of the staircase which led to the second floor of the house. She was rushed by ambulance to Queen Mary's Hospital in nearby Roehampton.
On 19 April, she was transferred to Atkinson Morley Hospital in Wimbledon. After receiving news that Denny was in a coma, Lucas returned from Australia. Upon his arrival at the hospital, doctors informed him that Denny was effectively brain-dead and her condition would not improve. He granted their recommendation to turn off life-support machines; however, just ten minutes before this was to take place, at 7:50 pm on 21 April 1978, Sandy Denny died, without regaining consciousness. Her death was ruled to be the result of a traumatic mid-brain haemorrhage and blunt force trauma to her head. She was 31 years old.
The funeral took place on 27 April 1978 at Putney Vale Cemetery. After the vicar had read Denny's favourite psalm, Psalm 23, a piper played "Flowers of the Forest", a traditional song commemorating the fallen of Flodden Field and one which had appeared on the 1970 Fairport album Full House. The inscription on her headstone reads:
Posthumous releases
Official releases
Although Denny had a devoted following in her lifetime, she did not achieve mass market success. In the years since her death, her reputation has grown. A four-album box set entitled Who Knows Where the Time Goes? (1985) was produced by her widower Trevor Lucas and Joe Boyd and included a number of rare and previously unreleased tracks by Denny, either solo or with Fairport Convention (1968, 1969, 1974) and Fotheringay (1970). This was the first public indication that a large cache of unreleased material existed. A one-disc subset of these recordings was subsequently issued on CD by Island in 1987 entitled The Best Of Sandy Denny.
In 1987, a compilation of previously unreleased tracks recorded for the BBC by incarnations of Fairport including Denny was released on LP under the title Heyday, which was subsequently released on CD in 2001 and again, with extra tracks, in 2002; all tracks were later included, with others, on the 2007 4-CD box set Fairport Convention Live at the BBC (see below). The initial purpose of this compilation was to document the more "American" material performed live by the What We Did on Our Holidays lineup of the band that never made it to vinyl, while the re-releases added additional songs as performed by the Unhalfbricking and Liege and Lief lineups.
Also in 1987, a VHS documentary, It All Comes 'Round Again, on Fairport Convention was released which contained excerpts of several audio recordings featuring Denny, plus a single poor-quality video recording of her singing her song "Solo" during her second stint with Fairport in 1974, as filmed by the University of Birmingham's "Guild TV" amateur organisation. The original tape of this recording has apparently been lost; however, "Like an Old Fashioned Waltz" does appear on the DVD documentary Sandy Denny Under Review (see below) and other tracks have been made available via YouTube in very poor quality.
Over the period 1988–1994, the Australian "Friends of Fairport" issued a series of subscriber-only cassette compilations drawing in the main on previously unreleased tapes from Trevor Lucas' collection (as stored in his attic in fact). Attic Tracks (AT) 1 (1988) contained out-takes from Sandy as well as some Fairport material and a few bizarre extras; AT 2 (1989) contained only Trevor Lucas material, no Denny; AT 3 (1989) entitled First and Last Tracks comprised 1966–1967 home demos and rare radio tracks, as well as 9 "pre-overdub" songs from Denny's last concert at the Royalty Theatre, London, on 27 November 1977 (a partial alternative to the later, overdubbed CD release Gold Dust), and AT 4 (1994): Together Again comprised one side of Lucas and the other of Denny in the form of more home demos, studio outtakes, and 4 tracks from a 1973 BBC radio concert. A cut-down version of these tracks (18 songs) was subsequently compiled for CD release by the Australian label Raven Records in 1995 called Sandy Denny, Trevor Lucas and Friends: The Attic Tracks 1972–1984.
In 1991, Joe Boyd issued a new version of Denny's All Our Own Work album with the Strawbs, called Sandy Denny and the Strawbs, on his Hannibal Records label. The album had strings added to some tracks, including "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" and further tracks with Denny on lead vocal.
In 1997, a one-disc compilation of Denny's solo BBC recordings was released as The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 on Strange Fruit Records. Due to rights issues it was withdrawn on the day of release, thereby creating a highly collectible disc (up until the release of the comprehensive Live at the BBC box set in 2007). This release was followed in 1998 when Denny's final performance at the Royalty Theatre, entitled Gold Dust, was issued on CD, following a degree of re-recording and overdubbing of selected backing parts to replace reportedly unsatisfactory originals.
In 1999, a single-disc compilation, Listen Listen – An Introduction to Sandy Denny, was released on Island Records comprising 17 previously released tracks taken from her four Island solo albums.
No More Sad Refrains: The Anthology was released by Universal Records in 2000. When first released, this compilation had several rare tracks, including "The Ballad of Easy Rider" from the Liege and Lief sessions, "Learning the Game" and "When Will I Be Loved" from the Bunch album Rock On, "Here in Silence" and "Man of Iron" from the Pass of Arms soundtrack, and a previously unissued demo of "Stranger to Himself".
In 2002, a previously unreleased, 2-CD live US concert recording by Fairport Convention from 1974 featuring Denny was released on the Burning Airlines label. Entitled Before The Moon, it originated from a radio broadcast from Ebbets Field in Denver, Colorado, on 23/24 May 1974. The second disc was a limited release bonus with the original release comprising the second set from the same concert. This recording was re-released in shortened form as a single disc in 2011 on the It's About Music label entitled Fairport Convention with Sandy Denny: Ebbets Field 1974.
Also in 2002, the American A&M Records issued a budget-price "20th Century Masters" compilation called The Best of Sandy Denny with 10 tracks all available on Denny's studio albums.
In 2004 a second comprehensive five-CD box set was released on the Fledg'ling record label called A Boxful of Treasures that included many unreleased recordings, in particular a whole disc of acoustic demos, many recorded at her home in Byfield that was highly prized amongst fans and critics alike, who had long asserted that her solo performances showed her work in its best light, revealing the true quality of her vocal style and compositions. Also in 2004, the Spectrum label issued a 16-track compilation of previously released material entitled The Collection: Chronological Covers & Concert Classics, including a mix of studio recordings and live excerpts from the Gold Dust Royalty concert.
In 2005, remastered versions of all Denny's solo albums came out with bonus tracks. Also in 2005, a single CD compilation entitled Where the Time Goes: Sandy '67 was released on Castle Music containing all of Saga's Denny album tracks (including the alternative recordings on It's Sandy Denny), together with two self accompanied tracks from Denny's recordings with the Strawbs.
A DVD documentary entitled Sandy Denny Under Review was released on the Sexy Intellectual label in 2006 which contained interviews with her contemporaries plus brief excerpts from her audio recordings, plus some short video clips including two of the poor quality video recordings with Fairport from Birmingham University (details given above), two with Fotheringay from German TV's Beat-Club (further details given below), and three solo excerpts from the only surviving BBC footage on One In Ten (details as given in the next item).
A 4-disc box set, Sandy Denny Live at the BBC, came out in September 2007 containing (virtually) all of the known solo recordings made by Denny for that UK broadcaster including two complete concerts, one at the Paris Theatre in 1972 and one recorded for Sounds on Sunday in 1973, plus a range of other material spanning the years 1966–1973. Disc 3 of this set was a DVD containing surviving TV footage from a 1971 BBC One in Ten session comprising solo performances by Denny of "The North Star Grassman and the Ravens", "Crazy Lady Blues" and "Late November", along with digitised excerpts from her diaries, rare photos and a discography. A 1-disc subset of this box set entitled The Best of the BBC Recordings was subsequently released in 2008.
A companion box set, Fairport Convention Live at the BBC, also came out in 2007 and covered equivalent live recordings by Fairport over the period 1968–1974, of which the first two discs (1968–1970) contain examples from Denny's time with that group.
In 2008, Jerry Donahue completed the unfinished second Fotheringay album begun in the autumn of 1970. It was released to general acclaim as Fotheringay 2 and contained some notable Denny performances, in particular earlier versions of two Denny compositions, "Late November" and "John the Gun", and performances of the traditional songs "Gypsy Davey" and "Wild Mountain Thyme". Also in 2008, Island Remasters issued a double CD entitled The Music Weaver (Sandy Denny Remembered) which contained a mix of better known tracks and less well known demos and live recordings, previously released but not in companion with studio sessions. This compilation is also one of the very few to contain the Led Zeppelin track "The Battle Of Evermore" which features a rare guest appearance by Denny.
In 2010, a large 19-CD retrospective box set, simply titled Sandy Denny, was released by Universal/Island Records in a limited edition of 3,000. It contained Denny's entire catalogue of studio recordings, including her work with the Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay and as a solo artist. The compilation also included a large number of outtakes, demos, live recordings, radio sessions and interviews. The box set was released to good reviews, including a 5-star review in Uncut and a 4-star review in The Guardian.
In late 2010, Thea Gilmore was commissioned by Denny's estate, in conjunction with Island Records, to write melodies to unrecorded lyrics found in Denny's papers. The resulting album, Don't Stop Singing, was released in November 2011 to generally good notices, including 4-star reviews in The Independent and The Guardian among others. On 21 April 2012, the single "London" was released as an exclusive Record Store Day 7″ single.
Further recordings were released in 2011, including a German recording of Fotheringay in concert released as Essen 1970 on the Garden of Delights label. The performance was remastered by original band member Jerry Donahue. This release was followed by 19 Rupert Street, a home recording of a rehearsal featuring Sandy and Alex Campbell recorded at his flat in August 1967. This release is notable for the fact that Sandy performs a number of tracks that are not available in any other versions, including a cover of "Fairytale Lullaby" by John Martyn. This CD was put out by Sandy's former Strawbs bandmate Dave Cousins on his Witchwood label.
Two-disc "Deluxe Editions" of Denny's album reissues appeared in 2011–2012 with additional tracks; the 2012 Deluxe Edition of Sandy included a previously unreleased eight-song solo set from her 1973 U.S. tour recorded at Ebbet's Field in Denver, Colorado. A similar two-disc reissue of Fairport Convention's Rising for the Moon also included, for the first time, the complete 1974 L.A. Troubadour performance of Fairport with Denny back on board, prior to the official announcement of her re-joining the group.
On account of unprecedented demand for, and exhaustion of supply of the limited edition 19-CD set cited above, in October 2012 a limited edition 4-CD version was released entitled The Notes and The Words: A Collection of Demos and Rarities, containing "75 songs that represent the cream of the rarities, demos and outtakes from the box set". Limited to 3,500 copies, this compilation is also now out-of-print.
In 2013, Spectrum records issued a single-disc CD entitled The Lady – The Essential Sandy Denny that comprised 15 previously issued tracks, generally from Denny's well known albums.
2014 saw the release of another Fairport live U.S. radio broadcast from their 1974 tour with Denny, on RockBeat Records, entitled Live 1974 (My Father's Place), comprising 11 live tracks, most featuring Denny, recorded at the New York rock club My Father's Place.
A four-disc Fotheringay retrospective, Nothing More: The Collected Fotheringay, was released on 30 March 2015. This is the most comprehensive compilation of the group's recordings, and contains, in addition to all the tracks on Fotheringay and Fotheringay 2 as both final studio versions and demos/alternate takes, the complete live concert set from Rotterdam in 1970 (including several previously unreleased tracks), seven Fotheringay tracks recorded in session for BBC radio (which had previously circulated only as bootlegs), plus a DVD disc containing four performances by Fotheringay recorded for the German Beat-Club TV series in 1970, which considerably augment the otherwise sparse known TV footage of Denny in particular.
May 2016 saw the release of a 2-CD compilation, I've Always Kept A Unicorn – The Acoustic Sandy Denny which collected together many previously released, but dispersed, acoustic and/or demo versions of songs better known from their album counterparts, as well as three previously unreleased demos (with Linda Thompson, at the time Linda Peters) from 1972's Rock On sessions by one-off band The Bunch.
A 7-CD box set by Fairport Convention entitled Come All Ye – The First 10 Years was released in July 2017 and contains a small number of additional, previously unreleased demos and alternate takes featuring Denny during her first tenure with the band over the period 1968–1969. Tracks not previously available include versions of Joni Mitchell's Eastern Rain, an a capella version of Nottamun Town, alternative takes of Autopsy and Who Knows Where the Time Goes, and a rehearsal version of The Deserter.
Unofficial releases and audience tapes
In addition to the authorised material listed above, a number unofficial/unauthorised compilations exist plus a range of audience recordings of varying quality, none of which would likely see the light of day as commercial issues but are of interest to a sector of Denny's audience on either historic or aesthetic grounds, often providing alternative views of songs known otherwise only from their commercially released versions. The first available unauthorised/bootleg CDs available in the 1980s and 1990s comprised principally off-air and other obscure material under such titles as Borrowed Thyme, Poems from Alexandra, Dark the Night, Wild Mountain Thyme and One Last Sad Refrain; such compilations are now largely superseded by the subsequent availability of most of the off-air material in much better quality as official releases as described above.
Of more enduring interest are audience tapes of shows of which no "official" tapes survive. These include some early shows by Fairport Convention; a performance by Fotheringay at the 1970 Tenth National Jazz and Blues Festival, held at Plumpton Race Track, Streat, East Sussex, England; "solo" shows by Denny (on occasion with a small band including, among others, Richard Thompson) at the 1971 Lincoln Folk Festival and at the Eltham Well Hall Open Theatre in 1972; performances from York University and Guildhall, Newcastle upon Tyne, also in 1972; an early 1972 U.S. performance from The Bitter End in New York; and several sets (Birmingham and Croydon) from her final 1977 tour in addition to the officially released Gold Dust album; plus quite a large number of recordings strongly featuring Denny as part of the re-formed Fairport Convention over the period 1974–1975. The majority of these can be fairly easily located via relevant internet searches and, in addition, can be readily downloaded from archival music servers such as Sugarmegs (Sandy Denny concerts listed under "S": SugarMegs Streaming Server, Fairport and Fotheringay under "F": SugarMegs Streaming Server). A provisional list of such recordings as are known to exist, with details on where each can be accessed, is available here.
Legacy
Estate and family
After relocating to Australia and remarrying, Trevor Lucas died of a heart attack in 1989. Denny's estate is now managed by Lucas' widow, Elizabeth Hurtt-Lucas. A number of otherwise unreleased recordings of Sandy Denny from his collection have subsequently been the basis for posthumous releases of Denny's work including those on The Attic Tracks and elsewhere.
Sandy Denny's daughter, Georgia, has rarely spoken about her mother in a public forum and in the mid-2000s declined an invitation to write the liner notes for Sandy Denny Live at the BBC. However, in 2006 she flew to Britain from Australia to accept on her mother's behalf the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards award for Most Influential Folk Album of All Time, which was given for Fairport Convention's Liege and Lief. Georgia gave birth to twin daughters on 29 April 1997, and a tribute album, Georgia on Our Mind, featuring many of Sandy Denny's former bandmates and friends, was compiled in the children's honour. She also administers a Facebook page "Sandy Denny and Family" dedicated to her mother's memory and more recently, under the name Georgia Katt, has released some of her own DJ-based music.
Tributes
Since her death, many tributes have been made to Denny, both in music and elsewhere. Dave Pegg of Fairport Convention recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on his 1983 solo album The Cocktail Cowboy Goes It Alone. Dave Cousins of the Strawbs wrote "Ringing Down the Years" in memory of Denny shortly after her death. Songs more specific to the death were Bert Jansch's "Where Did My Life Go" and Richard Thompson's "Did She Jump or Was She Pushed?" Fellow Brit folk pioneers Spriguns changed the title of their 1978 album to Magic Lady after hearing of Denny's death while recording. In 1998, a variety of Daylily was named after her.
Denny's songs have been covered by numerous artists in the years since her death. Some of the notable acts to have covered her music include Yo La Tengo, former Marillion frontman Fish, who covered "Solo" on his album Songs from the Mirror, Cat Power, Judy Collins, Nanci Griffith and Nina Simone. Kate Bush mentioned Denny in the lyric of "Blow Away (For Bill)", as one of the musicians to greet Bill in Heaven. "Blow Away (For Bill)" is the third track on Bush's 1980 album Never for Ever. In 1984, Clann Eadair released the single "A tribute to Sandy Denny", featuring Phil Lynott on vocals.
Several radio specials have been produced about Denny's life and music, including BBC Radio 2's The Sandy Denny Story: Who Knows Where the Time Goes. In 2007, Denny's song "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" also received BBC Radio 2's 2007 Folk Award for "Favourite Folk Track of All Time". In 2010, she was recognized by NPR in their 50 Great Voices special series.
In April 2008, a tribute concert was held at The Troubadour in London, to mark the thirtieth anniversary of Denny's death. Those taking part included Martin Carthy, Linda Thompson and Joe Boyd.
A more extensive tribute was given later that year in December at the Southbank in the Queen Elizabeth Hall called The Lady: A Tribute to Sandy Denny with a band composed of members of Bellowhead, the evening featured a mix of young folk acts like Jim Moray and Lisa Knapp alongside those that had known and worked with Denny such as Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. These acts were joined by performers from outside the world of folk like PP Arnold and Marc Almond. The concert, which primarily featured songs written by Denny, received a four-star review in The Guardian. In May 2012 the Southbank concert was expanded into an eight date UK tour called The Lady: A Homage to Sandy Denny. The tour showcased Sandy's entire songbook taking in her work with Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, her solo career and the new songs completed by Thea Gilmore on her album Don't Stop Singing.
The band was, once again, composed of members of Bellowhead. Other acts performing included the aforementioned Thea Gilmore and up-and-coming folk acts Lavinia Blackwall of Trembling Bells, Blair Dunlop and Sam Carter, alongside more established folk stars Maddy Prior, Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. The line-up was completed with performers not normally associated with the folk scene; Green Gartside, Joan Wasser (also known as Joan As Police Woman), and PP Arnold. The tour was well received, obtaining a four-star review in The Times. The London concert at the Barbican was filmed for BBC4, and broadcast in a 90-minute programme titled The Songs of Sandy Denny in November 2012.
In the 2012 Irish film Silence (Harvest Films & South Wind Blows), "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" is used during the film and final credits.
In April 2016 Denny was inducted into the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards Hall of Fame.
Alela Diane recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on her album Cusp, released in February 2018. The song reflects on Denny's final tragic days and her orphaned baby daughter.
Discography
Solo studio albums
The North Star Grassman and the Ravens (1971)
Sandy (1972)
Like an Old Fashioned Waltz (1974)
Rendezvous (1977)
Solo live albums
The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 (1997)
Gold Dust (1998) (live recording from final tour, 1977)
Live at the BBC (2007 4-disc compilation)
Sandy – Deluxe edition, 2012 – includes "Live at Ebbetts Field" (previously unreleased concert on disc 2)
With others
Denny's collaborations with other artists, including with Alex Campbell, The Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, and The Bunch, together with numerous posthumous releases and compilation albums, are detailed further on the Sandy Denny discography page.
References and notes
General
Further reading
Mick Houghton. I've Always Kept a Unicorn – The Biography of Sandy Denny. Faber & Faber, 2015;
Clinton Heylin. No More Sad Refrains – The Life and Times of Sandy Denny. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Clinton Heylin. Gypsy Love Songs & Sad Refrains – The Recordings of Richard Thompson and Sandy Denny. Labour of Love Productions, 1989.
Colin Larkin. The Guinness Who's Who of Folk Music. Guinness Publishing Ltd;
Jim Irvin. Angel of Avalon. MOJO Magazine, August 1998.
Colin Harper, Trevor Hodgett. Irish Folk, Traditional & Blues: A Secret History. Cherry Red, 2005;
Pamela Murray Winters. No Thought of Leaving: A life of Sandy Denny. 2000. (Unpublished).
Brian Hinton, Geoff Wall. Ashley Hutchings: The Guv'nor & the Rise of Folk Rock. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Patrick Humphries. Meet On The Ledge: The Classic Years 1967–1975. Virgin Books, 1997;
Patrick Humphries. Richard Thompson: Strange Affair – The Biography. Virgin Books, 1996;
Philip Ward, "Sandy Denny: A Thirtieth Anniversary", R2 (Rock'n'Reel) 2(9), May/June 2008.
Philip Ward, Sandy Denny: Reflections on Her Music''. Matador, 2011;
External links
Official website
Homage to Sandy Denny
Dedicated to the memory of Sandy Denny
Sandy Denny website
1947 births
1978 deaths
20th-century English singers
20th-century English women singers
A&M Records artists
Accidental deaths from falls
Accidental deaths in London
Deaths by intracerebral hemorrhage
Alumni of Kingston College (England)
British folk rock musicians
Burials at Putney Vale Cemetery
English folk singers
English people of Scottish descent
English women singer-songwriters
Fairport Convention members
Women rock singers
Fotheringay members
Island Records artists
People from Byfield, Northamptonshire
People from Wimbledon, London
Singers from London
Strawbs members
The Bunch members | false | [
"James v Redcats (Brands) Ltd [2007] IRLR 296 is a legal case in the United Kingdom on the definition of a worker under the National Minimum Wage Act 1998. The Employment Appeal Tribunal held that lack of \"mutuality of obligation\" does not affect the status of being an employee, and therefore coverage under the 1998 Act.\n\nFacts\nMs James worked for Redcats (Brands) Ltd, a postal company, as a courier. She was making a claim that she was not being paid a minimum wage, and as a preliminary point, it needed to be determined whether she was a \"worker\" under s 54(3) of the 1998 Act. Redcats argued that she was \"self-employed\" and therefore not protected by the legislation.\n\nMs James used her own car to deliver parcels. Redcats set delivery deadlines and gave detailed instructions on how to carry out her duties. The first tribunal held there was only a contract for services (i.e. self-employed) not of service (i.e. not a 'worker') because there was no so called \"mutuality of obligation\". Redcats did not promise her any particular amount of work, said the tribunal and she could always decline it. At the Employment Appeal Tribunal Ms James argued this was simply untrue and there was an obligation to accept work.\n\nJudgment\nElias J found in favour of Ms James. She was indeed a worker, and even if there was a lack of mutuality of obligation, this did not matter to the status of a person when work was being done. Even if a person is doing small contractual stints, and there was no overarching contract, there could still be an employment relationship (following McMeechan v Secretary of State for Employment [1997] ICR 549).\n\nThe case was remitted to the tribunal, on this guidance, to determine the case afresh.\n\nSee also\n\nUK labour law\n\nNotes\n\nUnited Kingdom wages case law\nEmployment Appeal Tribunal cases\n2007 in case law\n2007 in British law",
"The Migraine Disability Assessment Test (MIDAS) is a test used by doctors to determine how severely migraines affect a patient's life. Patients are asked questions about the frequency and duration of their headaches, as well as how often these headaches limited their ability to participate in activities at work, at school, or at home.\n\nThe test was evaluated by the professional journal Neurology in 2001; it was found to be both reliable and valid.\n\nQuestions\nThe MIDAS contains the following questions:\n\n On how many days in the last 3 months did you miss work or school because of your headaches?\n How many days in the last 3 months was your productivity at work or school reduced by half or more because of your headaches? (Do not include days you counted in question 1 where you missed work or school.)\n On how many days in the last 3 months did you not do household work because of your headaches?\n How many days in the last three months was your productivity in household work reduced by half of more because of your headaches? (Do not include days you counted in question 3 where you did not do household work.)\n On how many days in the last 3 months did you miss family, social or leisure activities because of your headaches?\n\nThe patient's score consists of the total of these five questions. Additionally, there is a section for patients to share with their doctors:\n\nWhat your Physician will need to know about your headache:\n\nA. On how many days in the last 3 months did you have a headache?\n(If a headache lasted more than 1 day, count each day.)\t\n\nB. On a scale of 0 - 10, on average how painful were these headaches? \n(where 0 = no pain at all and 10 = pain as bad as it can be.)\n\nScoring\nOnce scored, the test gives the patient an idea of how debilitating his/her migraines are based on this scale:\n\n0 to 5, MIDAS Grade I, Little or no disability \n\n6 to 10, MIDAS Grade II, Mild disability\n\n11 to 20, MIDAS Grade III, Moderate disability\n\n21+, MIDAS Grade IV, Severe disability\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nMigraine Treatment\n\nMigraine"
] |
[
"Sandy Denny",
"Early career",
"How did she get started in her career?",
"in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus.",
"What did she do in the club?",
"After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings",
"What did she do there?",
"the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs.",
"How long did she work there?",
"I don't know."
] | C_e6cc2f78b77b4fcab1029b8e527f1a13_1 | What did she do after leaving there? | 5 | What did Sandy Denny do after leaving the folk club? | Sandy Denny | Her nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn. After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fhir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels". Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes. By this time she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark which was released belatedly in 1973 credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer. CANNOTANSWER | Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, | Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny (6 January 1947 – 21 April 1978) was an English singer-songwriter who was lead singer of the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. She has been described as "the pre-eminent British folk rock singer".
After briefly working with the Strawbs, Denny joined Fairport Convention in 1968, remaining with them until 1969. She formed the short-lived band Fotheringay in 1970, before focusing on a solo career. Between 1971 and 1977, Denny released four solo albums: The North Star Grassman and the Ravens, Sandy, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz and Rendezvous. She also duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore" for Led Zeppelin's album Led Zeppelin IV in 1971. Denny died in 1978 at the age of 31 due to injuries and health issues related to alcohol abuse.
Music publications Uncut and Mojo have described Denny as Britain's finest female singer-songwriter. Her composition "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" has been recorded by Judy Collins, Eva Cassidy, Nina Simone, 10,000 Maniacs and Cat Power. Her recorded work has been the subject of numerous reissues, along with a wealth of previously unreleased material which has appeared over the more than 40 years since her death, including a 19-CD box set released in November 2010.
Childhood
Denny was born on 6 January 1947 at Nelson Hospital, Kingston Road, Merton Park, London, to Neil and Edna Denny. She studied classical piano as a child.
Her paternal grandfather was from Dundee, and her paternal grandmother was a Scots Gaelic speaker and singer of traditional songs. At an early age Denny showed an interest in singing, although her strict parents were reluctant to believe there was a living to be made from it. She attended Coombe Girls' School in New Malden; after leaving school she began training as a nurse at the Royal Brompton Hospital.
Early career
Denny's nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn.
After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames, Denny began working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels".
Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes.
By this time, she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark, which was released belatedly in 1973, credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer.
From Fairport to Fotheringay
After making the Saga albums with Alex Campbell and Johnny Silvo, Denny looked for a band that would allow her to stretch herself as a vocalist, reach a wider audience, and have the opportunity to display her songwriting. She said, "I wanted to do something more with my voice." After working briefly with the Strawbs, Denny remained unconvinced that they could provide that opportunity, and so she ended her relationship with the band.
Fairport Convention conducted auditions in May 1968 for a replacement singer following the departure of Judy Dyble after their debut album, and Denny became the obvious choice. According to group member Simon Nicol, her personality and musicianship made her stand out from the other auditionees "like a clean glass in a sink full of dirty dishes".
Beginning with What We Did on Our Holidays, the first of three albums she made with the band in the late 1960s, Denny is credited with encouraging Fairport Convention to explore the traditional British folk repertoire, and is thus regarded as a key figure in the development of British folk rock. She brought with her the traditional repertoire she had refined in the clubs, including "A Sailor's Life" featured on their second album together Unhalfbricking. Framing Denny's performance of this song with their own electric improvisations, her bandmates discovered what then proved to be the inspiration for an entire album, the influential Liege & Lief (1969).
Denny left Fairport Convention in December 1969 to develop her own songwriting more fully. To this end, she formed her own band, Fotheringay, which included her future husband, Australian Trevor Lucas, formerly of the group Eclection.
They created one self-titled album, which included an eight-minute version of the traditional "Banks of the Nile", and several Denny originals, among them "The Sea" and "Nothing More". The latter marked her first composition on the piano, which was to become her primary instrument from then on. Fotheringay started to record a second album in late 1970, but it remained unfinished after Denny announced that she was leaving the group and producer Joe Boyd left to take up a job at Warner Brothers in California. Denny would later blame Boyd's hostility towards the group for its demise.
Solo career and final years
She then turned to recording her first solo album, The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. Released in 1971, it is distinguished by its elusive lyrics and unconventional harmonies. Highlights included "Late November", inspired by a dream and the death of Fairport band member Martin Lamble, and "Next Time Around" a cryptogram about Jackson C. Frank, one of her many portraits in song.
Sandy, with a cover photograph by David Bailey, followed in 1972 and was the first of her albums to be produced by Trevor Lucas. As well as introducing eight new original compositions, the album marked her last recording of a traditional song, "The Quiet Joys of Brotherhood" (words by Richard Fariña), with Denny's ambitious multi-tracked vocal arrangement inspired by the Ensemble of the Bulgarian Republic.
Melody Maker readers twice voted her the "Best British Female Singer", in 1970 and 1971 and, together with contemporaries including Richard Thompson and Ashley Hutchings, she participated in a one-off project called the Bunch to record a collection of rock and roll era standards released under the title of Rock On.
In 1971, Denny duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore", which was included on Led Zeppelin's 1971 album (Led Zeppelin IV); she was the only guest vocalist ever to appear on a Led Zeppelin album. In 1972 Denny had a small cameo on Lou Reizner's symphonic arrangement of the Who's rock opera Tommy. Her brief appearance was at the end of the track "It's a Boy", which also featured vocals from Pete Townshend.
In 1973, she married long-term boyfriend and producer Trevor Lucas and recorded a third solo album, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz. The songs continued to detail many of her personal preoccupations: loss, loneliness, fear of the dark, the passing of time and the changing seasons. The album contained one of her best loved compositions, "Solo", and featured a cover image by Gered Mankowitz.
In 1974, she returned to Fairport Convention (of which her husband was by then a member) for a world tour (captured on the 1974 album Fairport Live Convention) and a studio album, Rising for the Moon in 1975. Although her development as a soloist and songwriter had taken her further away from the folk roots direction that the band had pursued since Liege & Lief, seven of the eleven tracks on Rising for the Moon were either written or co-written by her.
Denny and Lucas left Fairport Convention at the end of 1975 and embarked on what was to become her final album Rendezvous. Released in 1977, the album sold poorly and Denny was subsequently dropped by Island Records. Having relocated to the village of Byfield in Northamptonshire in the mid-seventies, Denny gave birth to her only child, a daughter named Georgia, in July 1977.
A UK tour to promote Rendezvous in autumn 1977 marked her final public appearances. The closing night at the Royalty Theatre in London on 27 November 1977 was recorded for a live album, Gold Dust, which, because of technical problems in the recording of the electric guitar, was belatedly released in 1998 after most of the guitars had been re-recorded by Jerry Donahue.
Death
Linda Thompson would later note that Denny "really started going downhill in 1976" and demonstrated increasing levels of both manic and depressive behaviour. Learning that she was pregnant did little to mellow Denny's reckless lifestyle, which was heightened by increasing depression, mood swings and the unravelling of her "tumultuous" marriage to Trevor Lucas. She abused drugs and alcohol while pregnant with her daughter, Georgia, who was born prematurely in July 1977. Much like her moods, Denny's interest towards her daughter appeared to oscillate between obsessive and unconcerned; friends recalled both frantic, middle-of-the-night phone calls about teething, as well as Denny "crashing the car and leaving the baby in the pub and all sorts of stuff".
Friends would later note that Denny had a history of purposely throwing herself off bar stools and down flights of stairs in order to get a reaction. Several remembered this behaviour as "Sandy's party trick", while Dave Pegg's wife Chris stated, "She certainly did it in my house and it could be a very dramatic gesture, like self-harming. She could do it without hurting herself usually but I had a feeling there would be one time too many." Those who knew Denny said that her increasing level of alcohol abuse in the last years of her life led to an increasing number of falls (both accidental and deliberate), resulting in a growing number of injuries.
In late March 1978, while on holiday with her parents and baby Georgia in Cornwall, Denny was injured when she fell down a staircase and hit her head on concrete. Following the incident, she suffered from intense headaches; a doctor prescribed her the painkiller dextropropoxyphene, a drug known to have fatal side effects when mixed with alcohol. On 1 April, several days after the fall in Cornwall, Denny performed a charity concert at Byfield. The final song she performed was "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?"
At some unknown point during the first half of April 1978, Denny suffered yet another major fall at her home in Byfield. On 13 April, concerned about his wife's erratic behaviour and fearing for his daughter's safety, Trevor Lucas left the UK and returned to his native Australia with their child, leaving Denny without telling her. He sold their Austin Princess car in order to raise funds for the journey.
On discovering Lucas' departure, Denny went to stay at the home of her friend Miranda Ward. During this time, Denny apparently set up an appointment to speak with a doctor about her headaches, and also intended to get advice about her alcohol addiction. At some point after 8 am on 17 April, Denny fell into a coma. Ward was out of the house at the time, and had asked her friend Jon Cole (of the band The Movies) to check in on Denny. Cole entered the home at 3 pm, and found Denny unconscious at the foot of the staircase which led to the second floor of the house. She was rushed by ambulance to Queen Mary's Hospital in nearby Roehampton.
On 19 April, she was transferred to Atkinson Morley Hospital in Wimbledon. After receiving news that Denny was in a coma, Lucas returned from Australia. Upon his arrival at the hospital, doctors informed him that Denny was effectively brain-dead and her condition would not improve. He granted their recommendation to turn off life-support machines; however, just ten minutes before this was to take place, at 7:50 pm on 21 April 1978, Sandy Denny died, without regaining consciousness. Her death was ruled to be the result of a traumatic mid-brain haemorrhage and blunt force trauma to her head. She was 31 years old.
The funeral took place on 27 April 1978 at Putney Vale Cemetery. After the vicar had read Denny's favourite psalm, Psalm 23, a piper played "Flowers of the Forest", a traditional song commemorating the fallen of Flodden Field and one which had appeared on the 1970 Fairport album Full House. The inscription on her headstone reads:
Posthumous releases
Official releases
Although Denny had a devoted following in her lifetime, she did not achieve mass market success. In the years since her death, her reputation has grown. A four-album box set entitled Who Knows Where the Time Goes? (1985) was produced by her widower Trevor Lucas and Joe Boyd and included a number of rare and previously unreleased tracks by Denny, either solo or with Fairport Convention (1968, 1969, 1974) and Fotheringay (1970). This was the first public indication that a large cache of unreleased material existed. A one-disc subset of these recordings was subsequently issued on CD by Island in 1987 entitled The Best Of Sandy Denny.
In 1987, a compilation of previously unreleased tracks recorded for the BBC by incarnations of Fairport including Denny was released on LP under the title Heyday, which was subsequently released on CD in 2001 and again, with extra tracks, in 2002; all tracks were later included, with others, on the 2007 4-CD box set Fairport Convention Live at the BBC (see below). The initial purpose of this compilation was to document the more "American" material performed live by the What We Did on Our Holidays lineup of the band that never made it to vinyl, while the re-releases added additional songs as performed by the Unhalfbricking and Liege and Lief lineups.
Also in 1987, a VHS documentary, It All Comes 'Round Again, on Fairport Convention was released which contained excerpts of several audio recordings featuring Denny, plus a single poor-quality video recording of her singing her song "Solo" during her second stint with Fairport in 1974, as filmed by the University of Birmingham's "Guild TV" amateur organisation. The original tape of this recording has apparently been lost; however, "Like an Old Fashioned Waltz" does appear on the DVD documentary Sandy Denny Under Review (see below) and other tracks have been made available via YouTube in very poor quality.
Over the period 1988–1994, the Australian "Friends of Fairport" issued a series of subscriber-only cassette compilations drawing in the main on previously unreleased tapes from Trevor Lucas' collection (as stored in his attic in fact). Attic Tracks (AT) 1 (1988) contained out-takes from Sandy as well as some Fairport material and a few bizarre extras; AT 2 (1989) contained only Trevor Lucas material, no Denny; AT 3 (1989) entitled First and Last Tracks comprised 1966–1967 home demos and rare radio tracks, as well as 9 "pre-overdub" songs from Denny's last concert at the Royalty Theatre, London, on 27 November 1977 (a partial alternative to the later, overdubbed CD release Gold Dust), and AT 4 (1994): Together Again comprised one side of Lucas and the other of Denny in the form of more home demos, studio outtakes, and 4 tracks from a 1973 BBC radio concert. A cut-down version of these tracks (18 songs) was subsequently compiled for CD release by the Australian label Raven Records in 1995 called Sandy Denny, Trevor Lucas and Friends: The Attic Tracks 1972–1984.
In 1991, Joe Boyd issued a new version of Denny's All Our Own Work album with the Strawbs, called Sandy Denny and the Strawbs, on his Hannibal Records label. The album had strings added to some tracks, including "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" and further tracks with Denny on lead vocal.
In 1997, a one-disc compilation of Denny's solo BBC recordings was released as The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 on Strange Fruit Records. Due to rights issues it was withdrawn on the day of release, thereby creating a highly collectible disc (up until the release of the comprehensive Live at the BBC box set in 2007). This release was followed in 1998 when Denny's final performance at the Royalty Theatre, entitled Gold Dust, was issued on CD, following a degree of re-recording and overdubbing of selected backing parts to replace reportedly unsatisfactory originals.
In 1999, a single-disc compilation, Listen Listen – An Introduction to Sandy Denny, was released on Island Records comprising 17 previously released tracks taken from her four Island solo albums.
No More Sad Refrains: The Anthology was released by Universal Records in 2000. When first released, this compilation had several rare tracks, including "The Ballad of Easy Rider" from the Liege and Lief sessions, "Learning the Game" and "When Will I Be Loved" from the Bunch album Rock On, "Here in Silence" and "Man of Iron" from the Pass of Arms soundtrack, and a previously unissued demo of "Stranger to Himself".
In 2002, a previously unreleased, 2-CD live US concert recording by Fairport Convention from 1974 featuring Denny was released on the Burning Airlines label. Entitled Before The Moon, it originated from a radio broadcast from Ebbets Field in Denver, Colorado, on 23/24 May 1974. The second disc was a limited release bonus with the original release comprising the second set from the same concert. This recording was re-released in shortened form as a single disc in 2011 on the It's About Music label entitled Fairport Convention with Sandy Denny: Ebbets Field 1974.
Also in 2002, the American A&M Records issued a budget-price "20th Century Masters" compilation called The Best of Sandy Denny with 10 tracks all available on Denny's studio albums.
In 2004 a second comprehensive five-CD box set was released on the Fledg'ling record label called A Boxful of Treasures that included many unreleased recordings, in particular a whole disc of acoustic demos, many recorded at her home in Byfield that was highly prized amongst fans and critics alike, who had long asserted that her solo performances showed her work in its best light, revealing the true quality of her vocal style and compositions. Also in 2004, the Spectrum label issued a 16-track compilation of previously released material entitled The Collection: Chronological Covers & Concert Classics, including a mix of studio recordings and live excerpts from the Gold Dust Royalty concert.
In 2005, remastered versions of all Denny's solo albums came out with bonus tracks. Also in 2005, a single CD compilation entitled Where the Time Goes: Sandy '67 was released on Castle Music containing all of Saga's Denny album tracks (including the alternative recordings on It's Sandy Denny), together with two self accompanied tracks from Denny's recordings with the Strawbs.
A DVD documentary entitled Sandy Denny Under Review was released on the Sexy Intellectual label in 2006 which contained interviews with her contemporaries plus brief excerpts from her audio recordings, plus some short video clips including two of the poor quality video recordings with Fairport from Birmingham University (details given above), two with Fotheringay from German TV's Beat-Club (further details given below), and three solo excerpts from the only surviving BBC footage on One In Ten (details as given in the next item).
A 4-disc box set, Sandy Denny Live at the BBC, came out in September 2007 containing (virtually) all of the known solo recordings made by Denny for that UK broadcaster including two complete concerts, one at the Paris Theatre in 1972 and one recorded for Sounds on Sunday in 1973, plus a range of other material spanning the years 1966–1973. Disc 3 of this set was a DVD containing surviving TV footage from a 1971 BBC One in Ten session comprising solo performances by Denny of "The North Star Grassman and the Ravens", "Crazy Lady Blues" and "Late November", along with digitised excerpts from her diaries, rare photos and a discography. A 1-disc subset of this box set entitled The Best of the BBC Recordings was subsequently released in 2008.
A companion box set, Fairport Convention Live at the BBC, also came out in 2007 and covered equivalent live recordings by Fairport over the period 1968–1974, of which the first two discs (1968–1970) contain examples from Denny's time with that group.
In 2008, Jerry Donahue completed the unfinished second Fotheringay album begun in the autumn of 1970. It was released to general acclaim as Fotheringay 2 and contained some notable Denny performances, in particular earlier versions of two Denny compositions, "Late November" and "John the Gun", and performances of the traditional songs "Gypsy Davey" and "Wild Mountain Thyme". Also in 2008, Island Remasters issued a double CD entitled The Music Weaver (Sandy Denny Remembered) which contained a mix of better known tracks and less well known demos and live recordings, previously released but not in companion with studio sessions. This compilation is also one of the very few to contain the Led Zeppelin track "The Battle Of Evermore" which features a rare guest appearance by Denny.
In 2010, a large 19-CD retrospective box set, simply titled Sandy Denny, was released by Universal/Island Records in a limited edition of 3,000. It contained Denny's entire catalogue of studio recordings, including her work with the Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay and as a solo artist. The compilation also included a large number of outtakes, demos, live recordings, radio sessions and interviews. The box set was released to good reviews, including a 5-star review in Uncut and a 4-star review in The Guardian.
In late 2010, Thea Gilmore was commissioned by Denny's estate, in conjunction with Island Records, to write melodies to unrecorded lyrics found in Denny's papers. The resulting album, Don't Stop Singing, was released in November 2011 to generally good notices, including 4-star reviews in The Independent and The Guardian among others. On 21 April 2012, the single "London" was released as an exclusive Record Store Day 7″ single.
Further recordings were released in 2011, including a German recording of Fotheringay in concert released as Essen 1970 on the Garden of Delights label. The performance was remastered by original band member Jerry Donahue. This release was followed by 19 Rupert Street, a home recording of a rehearsal featuring Sandy and Alex Campbell recorded at his flat in August 1967. This release is notable for the fact that Sandy performs a number of tracks that are not available in any other versions, including a cover of "Fairytale Lullaby" by John Martyn. This CD was put out by Sandy's former Strawbs bandmate Dave Cousins on his Witchwood label.
Two-disc "Deluxe Editions" of Denny's album reissues appeared in 2011–2012 with additional tracks; the 2012 Deluxe Edition of Sandy included a previously unreleased eight-song solo set from her 1973 U.S. tour recorded at Ebbet's Field in Denver, Colorado. A similar two-disc reissue of Fairport Convention's Rising for the Moon also included, for the first time, the complete 1974 L.A. Troubadour performance of Fairport with Denny back on board, prior to the official announcement of her re-joining the group.
On account of unprecedented demand for, and exhaustion of supply of the limited edition 19-CD set cited above, in October 2012 a limited edition 4-CD version was released entitled The Notes and The Words: A Collection of Demos and Rarities, containing "75 songs that represent the cream of the rarities, demos and outtakes from the box set". Limited to 3,500 copies, this compilation is also now out-of-print.
In 2013, Spectrum records issued a single-disc CD entitled The Lady – The Essential Sandy Denny that comprised 15 previously issued tracks, generally from Denny's well known albums.
2014 saw the release of another Fairport live U.S. radio broadcast from their 1974 tour with Denny, on RockBeat Records, entitled Live 1974 (My Father's Place), comprising 11 live tracks, most featuring Denny, recorded at the New York rock club My Father's Place.
A four-disc Fotheringay retrospective, Nothing More: The Collected Fotheringay, was released on 30 March 2015. This is the most comprehensive compilation of the group's recordings, and contains, in addition to all the tracks on Fotheringay and Fotheringay 2 as both final studio versions and demos/alternate takes, the complete live concert set from Rotterdam in 1970 (including several previously unreleased tracks), seven Fotheringay tracks recorded in session for BBC radio (which had previously circulated only as bootlegs), plus a DVD disc containing four performances by Fotheringay recorded for the German Beat-Club TV series in 1970, which considerably augment the otherwise sparse known TV footage of Denny in particular.
May 2016 saw the release of a 2-CD compilation, I've Always Kept A Unicorn – The Acoustic Sandy Denny which collected together many previously released, but dispersed, acoustic and/or demo versions of songs better known from their album counterparts, as well as three previously unreleased demos (with Linda Thompson, at the time Linda Peters) from 1972's Rock On sessions by one-off band The Bunch.
A 7-CD box set by Fairport Convention entitled Come All Ye – The First 10 Years was released in July 2017 and contains a small number of additional, previously unreleased demos and alternate takes featuring Denny during her first tenure with the band over the period 1968–1969. Tracks not previously available include versions of Joni Mitchell's Eastern Rain, an a capella version of Nottamun Town, alternative takes of Autopsy and Who Knows Where the Time Goes, and a rehearsal version of The Deserter.
Unofficial releases and audience tapes
In addition to the authorised material listed above, a number unofficial/unauthorised compilations exist plus a range of audience recordings of varying quality, none of which would likely see the light of day as commercial issues but are of interest to a sector of Denny's audience on either historic or aesthetic grounds, often providing alternative views of songs known otherwise only from their commercially released versions. The first available unauthorised/bootleg CDs available in the 1980s and 1990s comprised principally off-air and other obscure material under such titles as Borrowed Thyme, Poems from Alexandra, Dark the Night, Wild Mountain Thyme and One Last Sad Refrain; such compilations are now largely superseded by the subsequent availability of most of the off-air material in much better quality as official releases as described above.
Of more enduring interest are audience tapes of shows of which no "official" tapes survive. These include some early shows by Fairport Convention; a performance by Fotheringay at the 1970 Tenth National Jazz and Blues Festival, held at Plumpton Race Track, Streat, East Sussex, England; "solo" shows by Denny (on occasion with a small band including, among others, Richard Thompson) at the 1971 Lincoln Folk Festival and at the Eltham Well Hall Open Theatre in 1972; performances from York University and Guildhall, Newcastle upon Tyne, also in 1972; an early 1972 U.S. performance from The Bitter End in New York; and several sets (Birmingham and Croydon) from her final 1977 tour in addition to the officially released Gold Dust album; plus quite a large number of recordings strongly featuring Denny as part of the re-formed Fairport Convention over the period 1974–1975. The majority of these can be fairly easily located via relevant internet searches and, in addition, can be readily downloaded from archival music servers such as Sugarmegs (Sandy Denny concerts listed under "S": SugarMegs Streaming Server, Fairport and Fotheringay under "F": SugarMegs Streaming Server). A provisional list of such recordings as are known to exist, with details on where each can be accessed, is available here.
Legacy
Estate and family
After relocating to Australia and remarrying, Trevor Lucas died of a heart attack in 1989. Denny's estate is now managed by Lucas' widow, Elizabeth Hurtt-Lucas. A number of otherwise unreleased recordings of Sandy Denny from his collection have subsequently been the basis for posthumous releases of Denny's work including those on The Attic Tracks and elsewhere.
Sandy Denny's daughter, Georgia, has rarely spoken about her mother in a public forum and in the mid-2000s declined an invitation to write the liner notes for Sandy Denny Live at the BBC. However, in 2006 she flew to Britain from Australia to accept on her mother's behalf the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards award for Most Influential Folk Album of All Time, which was given for Fairport Convention's Liege and Lief. Georgia gave birth to twin daughters on 29 April 1997, and a tribute album, Georgia on Our Mind, featuring many of Sandy Denny's former bandmates and friends, was compiled in the children's honour. She also administers a Facebook page "Sandy Denny and Family" dedicated to her mother's memory and more recently, under the name Georgia Katt, has released some of her own DJ-based music.
Tributes
Since her death, many tributes have been made to Denny, both in music and elsewhere. Dave Pegg of Fairport Convention recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on his 1983 solo album The Cocktail Cowboy Goes It Alone. Dave Cousins of the Strawbs wrote "Ringing Down the Years" in memory of Denny shortly after her death. Songs more specific to the death were Bert Jansch's "Where Did My Life Go" and Richard Thompson's "Did She Jump or Was She Pushed?" Fellow Brit folk pioneers Spriguns changed the title of their 1978 album to Magic Lady after hearing of Denny's death while recording. In 1998, a variety of Daylily was named after her.
Denny's songs have been covered by numerous artists in the years since her death. Some of the notable acts to have covered her music include Yo La Tengo, former Marillion frontman Fish, who covered "Solo" on his album Songs from the Mirror, Cat Power, Judy Collins, Nanci Griffith and Nina Simone. Kate Bush mentioned Denny in the lyric of "Blow Away (For Bill)", as one of the musicians to greet Bill in Heaven. "Blow Away (For Bill)" is the third track on Bush's 1980 album Never for Ever. In 1984, Clann Eadair released the single "A tribute to Sandy Denny", featuring Phil Lynott on vocals.
Several radio specials have been produced about Denny's life and music, including BBC Radio 2's The Sandy Denny Story: Who Knows Where the Time Goes. In 2007, Denny's song "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" also received BBC Radio 2's 2007 Folk Award for "Favourite Folk Track of All Time". In 2010, she was recognized by NPR in their 50 Great Voices special series.
In April 2008, a tribute concert was held at The Troubadour in London, to mark the thirtieth anniversary of Denny's death. Those taking part included Martin Carthy, Linda Thompson and Joe Boyd.
A more extensive tribute was given later that year in December at the Southbank in the Queen Elizabeth Hall called The Lady: A Tribute to Sandy Denny with a band composed of members of Bellowhead, the evening featured a mix of young folk acts like Jim Moray and Lisa Knapp alongside those that had known and worked with Denny such as Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. These acts were joined by performers from outside the world of folk like PP Arnold and Marc Almond. The concert, which primarily featured songs written by Denny, received a four-star review in The Guardian. In May 2012 the Southbank concert was expanded into an eight date UK tour called The Lady: A Homage to Sandy Denny. The tour showcased Sandy's entire songbook taking in her work with Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, her solo career and the new songs completed by Thea Gilmore on her album Don't Stop Singing.
The band was, once again, composed of members of Bellowhead. Other acts performing included the aforementioned Thea Gilmore and up-and-coming folk acts Lavinia Blackwall of Trembling Bells, Blair Dunlop and Sam Carter, alongside more established folk stars Maddy Prior, Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. The line-up was completed with performers not normally associated with the folk scene; Green Gartside, Joan Wasser (also known as Joan As Police Woman), and PP Arnold. The tour was well received, obtaining a four-star review in The Times. The London concert at the Barbican was filmed for BBC4, and broadcast in a 90-minute programme titled The Songs of Sandy Denny in November 2012.
In the 2012 Irish film Silence (Harvest Films & South Wind Blows), "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" is used during the film and final credits.
In April 2016 Denny was inducted into the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards Hall of Fame.
Alela Diane recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on her album Cusp, released in February 2018. The song reflects on Denny's final tragic days and her orphaned baby daughter.
Discography
Solo studio albums
The North Star Grassman and the Ravens (1971)
Sandy (1972)
Like an Old Fashioned Waltz (1974)
Rendezvous (1977)
Solo live albums
The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 (1997)
Gold Dust (1998) (live recording from final tour, 1977)
Live at the BBC (2007 4-disc compilation)
Sandy – Deluxe edition, 2012 – includes "Live at Ebbetts Field" (previously unreleased concert on disc 2)
With others
Denny's collaborations with other artists, including with Alex Campbell, The Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, and The Bunch, together with numerous posthumous releases and compilation albums, are detailed further on the Sandy Denny discography page.
References and notes
General
Further reading
Mick Houghton. I've Always Kept a Unicorn – The Biography of Sandy Denny. Faber & Faber, 2015;
Clinton Heylin. No More Sad Refrains – The Life and Times of Sandy Denny. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Clinton Heylin. Gypsy Love Songs & Sad Refrains – The Recordings of Richard Thompson and Sandy Denny. Labour of Love Productions, 1989.
Colin Larkin. The Guinness Who's Who of Folk Music. Guinness Publishing Ltd;
Jim Irvin. Angel of Avalon. MOJO Magazine, August 1998.
Colin Harper, Trevor Hodgett. Irish Folk, Traditional & Blues: A Secret History. Cherry Red, 2005;
Pamela Murray Winters. No Thought of Leaving: A life of Sandy Denny. 2000. (Unpublished).
Brian Hinton, Geoff Wall. Ashley Hutchings: The Guv'nor & the Rise of Folk Rock. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Patrick Humphries. Meet On The Ledge: The Classic Years 1967–1975. Virgin Books, 1997;
Patrick Humphries. Richard Thompson: Strange Affair – The Biography. Virgin Books, 1996;
Philip Ward, "Sandy Denny: A Thirtieth Anniversary", R2 (Rock'n'Reel) 2(9), May/June 2008.
Philip Ward, Sandy Denny: Reflections on Her Music''. Matador, 2011;
External links
Official website
Homage to Sandy Denny
Dedicated to the memory of Sandy Denny
Sandy Denny website
1947 births
1978 deaths
20th-century English singers
20th-century English women singers
A&M Records artists
Accidental deaths from falls
Accidental deaths in London
Deaths by intracerebral hemorrhage
Alumni of Kingston College (England)
British folk rock musicians
Burials at Putney Vale Cemetery
English folk singers
English people of Scottish descent
English women singer-songwriters
Fairport Convention members
Women rock singers
Fotheringay members
Island Records artists
People from Byfield, Northamptonshire
People from Wimbledon, London
Singers from London
Strawbs members
The Bunch members | true | [
"Before All of This is the title of Ian McNabb's seventh solo album after leaving the Icicle Works. It includes his last commercial single to date, \"Let the Young Girl Do What She Wants To\".\n\nMcNabb's album People Don't Stop Believin' comprises outtakes, B-sides and alternate versions of tracks recorded during sessions for Before All of This.\n\nTrack listing\n \"There Oughta Be a Law\" [3:29]\n \"Before All of This\" [3:48]\n \"Unfinished Business in London Town (for Lee)\" [3:55]\n \"Western Eyes\" [5:14]\n \"The Lonely Ones (Part 1)\" [3:37]\n \"Rider (The Heartless Mare)\" [3:55]\n \"Finally Getting Over You\" [2:58]\n \"Let the Young Girl Do What She Wants To\" [4:34]\n \"The Nicest Kind of Lie\" [4:14]\n \"Lovers at the End of Time\" [5:06]\n \"Picture of the Moon\" [2:38]\n \"The New Me\" [4:56]\n \"Keeping Your Love Alive\" [2:43]\n \"The Lonely Ones (Part 2)\" [4:54]\n\nReferences\n\n2005 albums\nIan McNabb albums",
"\"Heather\" is the 4th episode of the first season of the CW television series The Secret Circle, and the series' 4th episode overall. It was aired on October 6, 2011. The episode was written by David Ehrman and it was directed by Dave Barrett.\n\nPlot\nThe Circle is trying to discover what happened to Heather Barnes, the woman Zachary mentioned in the previous episode and what he meant. While searching about her, they find out where his brother, Wade (Ben Cotton), lives and Cassie (Britt Robertson) and Adam (Thomas Dekker) go there to ask him about her.\n\nWhen they get there, they discover that Heather (Camille Sullivan) is in a catatonic state since the night of the fire on the boat, sixteen years ago. Wade tells them that she hadn't moved at all since then and the moment he says that, Heather grabs Cassie's arm. While being there, they see a witchcraft mark on Heather's arm.\n\nCassie doesn't know what is going on and she can't understand why her mother would do something like that to her friend. Feeling guilty for what her mother did, she wants to help Heather by undoing the spell. Adam agrees to help her, after Cassie is telling him that she found her mom's Book of Shadows and there is a spell they can use.\n\nAdam calls Diana (Shelley Hennig) and informs her what they want to do. When Diana gets there, she is telling them that it's not a good idea to undo the spell, since they don't know why Amelia did it in the first place and because they also don't know how to do it. She stops them and Adam is leaving with her.\n\nFaye (Phoebe Tonkin) is getting there later, finding Cassie alone. When Cassie tells her what's going on and what she wants to do, Faye offers to help her. They go together back to Wade's house and they undo the spell, but nothing seems to happen.\n\nThey leave the house but when Wade is back, Heather wakes up, knocks him down and leaves. She is getting to Cassie's house, looking for Amelia to help her but she only finds Cassie. Heather tries to explain her about demons but while she is doing it, demons take control of her and she is attacking Cassie and later Faye who's upstairs.\n\nMeanwhile, Diana is showing Adam what she found in her Book of Shadows about Heather's mark and that it's connected with demons and black magic. They try to call Cassie to let her know so she won't attempt to undo the spell but it's too late.\n\nNick (Louis Hunter) and Melissa (Jessica Parker Kennedy), who are at Nick's room, see from the window that Cassie and Faye are in danger and they get there to help them. Nick manages to fights back the possessed Heather. Heather is running into the street and gets hit by a car.\n\nAll these leave the members of the Circle with more questions of what happened sixteen years ago on that boat and how their parents died and an unleashed demon that (in the form of a black snake) gets out of Heather's dead body and gets into Melissa's at the end of the episode.\n\nReception\n\nRatings\nIn its original American broadcast, \"Heather\" was watched by 1.96 million; down 0.16 from the previous episode.\n\nReviews\n\"Heather\" received generally positive reviews.\n\nJim Garner from TV Fanatic rated the episode with 4.3/5 saying that this episode was as action-packed/fast-paced as The Vampire Diaries show.\n\nSarah Maines from The TV Chick said that with this episode the show had overcome the hurdle of starting being good and that the episode was awesome and also terrifying. \"Aside from the snake demon and the nightmares I’m definitely going to have about it tonight, this was the first truly great episode of Secret Circle. I can’t wait to tune in next week and find out how the circle deals with Melissa’s possession!\"\n\nKatherine Miller from The A.V. Club gave a B+ rate to the episode saying that we had seen creepiness on the episode and she liked it. \"Now there’s the team behind The Vampire Diaries we all know and love. The Secret Circle nixed the parents, the school, and Cassie’s unyielding obstinacy, threw in some danger and some tiny, tiny demon snakes, and boom, things got good.\"\n\nFeature music\nIn the \"Heather\" episode we can hear the songs:\n \"Stare Into The Sun\" by Graffiti6\n \"All of This\" by The Naked and Famous\n \"No Sacrifice\" by Uh Huh Her\n \"Give you More\" by Taxi Girl\n \"Coming Down\" by Dum Dum Girls\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n2011 American television episodes\nThe Secret Circle (TV series) episodes"
] |
[
"Sandy Denny",
"Early career",
"How did she get started in her career?",
"in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus.",
"What did she do in the club?",
"After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings",
"What did she do there?",
"the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs.",
"How long did she work there?",
"I don't know.",
"What did she do after leaving there?",
"Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label,"
] | C_e6cc2f78b77b4fcab1029b8e527f1a13_1 | What did she record? | 6 | What did Sandy Denny record for the Saga label? | Sandy Denny | Her nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn. After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fhir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels". Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes. By this time she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark which was released belatedly in 1973 credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer. CANNOTANSWER | the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. | Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny (6 January 1947 – 21 April 1978) was an English singer-songwriter who was lead singer of the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. She has been described as "the pre-eminent British folk rock singer".
After briefly working with the Strawbs, Denny joined Fairport Convention in 1968, remaining with them until 1969. She formed the short-lived band Fotheringay in 1970, before focusing on a solo career. Between 1971 and 1977, Denny released four solo albums: The North Star Grassman and the Ravens, Sandy, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz and Rendezvous. She also duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore" for Led Zeppelin's album Led Zeppelin IV in 1971. Denny died in 1978 at the age of 31 due to injuries and health issues related to alcohol abuse.
Music publications Uncut and Mojo have described Denny as Britain's finest female singer-songwriter. Her composition "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" has been recorded by Judy Collins, Eva Cassidy, Nina Simone, 10,000 Maniacs and Cat Power. Her recorded work has been the subject of numerous reissues, along with a wealth of previously unreleased material which has appeared over the more than 40 years since her death, including a 19-CD box set released in November 2010.
Childhood
Denny was born on 6 January 1947 at Nelson Hospital, Kingston Road, Merton Park, London, to Neil and Edna Denny. She studied classical piano as a child.
Her paternal grandfather was from Dundee, and her paternal grandmother was a Scots Gaelic speaker and singer of traditional songs. At an early age Denny showed an interest in singing, although her strict parents were reluctant to believe there was a living to be made from it. She attended Coombe Girls' School in New Malden; after leaving school she began training as a nurse at the Royal Brompton Hospital.
Early career
Denny's nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn.
After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames, Denny began working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels".
Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes.
By this time, she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark, which was released belatedly in 1973, credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer.
From Fairport to Fotheringay
After making the Saga albums with Alex Campbell and Johnny Silvo, Denny looked for a band that would allow her to stretch herself as a vocalist, reach a wider audience, and have the opportunity to display her songwriting. She said, "I wanted to do something more with my voice." After working briefly with the Strawbs, Denny remained unconvinced that they could provide that opportunity, and so she ended her relationship with the band.
Fairport Convention conducted auditions in May 1968 for a replacement singer following the departure of Judy Dyble after their debut album, and Denny became the obvious choice. According to group member Simon Nicol, her personality and musicianship made her stand out from the other auditionees "like a clean glass in a sink full of dirty dishes".
Beginning with What We Did on Our Holidays, the first of three albums she made with the band in the late 1960s, Denny is credited with encouraging Fairport Convention to explore the traditional British folk repertoire, and is thus regarded as a key figure in the development of British folk rock. She brought with her the traditional repertoire she had refined in the clubs, including "A Sailor's Life" featured on their second album together Unhalfbricking. Framing Denny's performance of this song with their own electric improvisations, her bandmates discovered what then proved to be the inspiration for an entire album, the influential Liege & Lief (1969).
Denny left Fairport Convention in December 1969 to develop her own songwriting more fully. To this end, she formed her own band, Fotheringay, which included her future husband, Australian Trevor Lucas, formerly of the group Eclection.
They created one self-titled album, which included an eight-minute version of the traditional "Banks of the Nile", and several Denny originals, among them "The Sea" and "Nothing More". The latter marked her first composition on the piano, which was to become her primary instrument from then on. Fotheringay started to record a second album in late 1970, but it remained unfinished after Denny announced that she was leaving the group and producer Joe Boyd left to take up a job at Warner Brothers in California. Denny would later blame Boyd's hostility towards the group for its demise.
Solo career and final years
She then turned to recording her first solo album, The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. Released in 1971, it is distinguished by its elusive lyrics and unconventional harmonies. Highlights included "Late November", inspired by a dream and the death of Fairport band member Martin Lamble, and "Next Time Around" a cryptogram about Jackson C. Frank, one of her many portraits in song.
Sandy, with a cover photograph by David Bailey, followed in 1972 and was the first of her albums to be produced by Trevor Lucas. As well as introducing eight new original compositions, the album marked her last recording of a traditional song, "The Quiet Joys of Brotherhood" (words by Richard Fariña), with Denny's ambitious multi-tracked vocal arrangement inspired by the Ensemble of the Bulgarian Republic.
Melody Maker readers twice voted her the "Best British Female Singer", in 1970 and 1971 and, together with contemporaries including Richard Thompson and Ashley Hutchings, she participated in a one-off project called the Bunch to record a collection of rock and roll era standards released under the title of Rock On.
In 1971, Denny duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore", which was included on Led Zeppelin's 1971 album (Led Zeppelin IV); she was the only guest vocalist ever to appear on a Led Zeppelin album. In 1972 Denny had a small cameo on Lou Reizner's symphonic arrangement of the Who's rock opera Tommy. Her brief appearance was at the end of the track "It's a Boy", which also featured vocals from Pete Townshend.
In 1973, she married long-term boyfriend and producer Trevor Lucas and recorded a third solo album, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz. The songs continued to detail many of her personal preoccupations: loss, loneliness, fear of the dark, the passing of time and the changing seasons. The album contained one of her best loved compositions, "Solo", and featured a cover image by Gered Mankowitz.
In 1974, she returned to Fairport Convention (of which her husband was by then a member) for a world tour (captured on the 1974 album Fairport Live Convention) and a studio album, Rising for the Moon in 1975. Although her development as a soloist and songwriter had taken her further away from the folk roots direction that the band had pursued since Liege & Lief, seven of the eleven tracks on Rising for the Moon were either written or co-written by her.
Denny and Lucas left Fairport Convention at the end of 1975 and embarked on what was to become her final album Rendezvous. Released in 1977, the album sold poorly and Denny was subsequently dropped by Island Records. Having relocated to the village of Byfield in Northamptonshire in the mid-seventies, Denny gave birth to her only child, a daughter named Georgia, in July 1977.
A UK tour to promote Rendezvous in autumn 1977 marked her final public appearances. The closing night at the Royalty Theatre in London on 27 November 1977 was recorded for a live album, Gold Dust, which, because of technical problems in the recording of the electric guitar, was belatedly released in 1998 after most of the guitars had been re-recorded by Jerry Donahue.
Death
Linda Thompson would later note that Denny "really started going downhill in 1976" and demonstrated increasing levels of both manic and depressive behaviour. Learning that she was pregnant did little to mellow Denny's reckless lifestyle, which was heightened by increasing depression, mood swings and the unravelling of her "tumultuous" marriage to Trevor Lucas. She abused drugs and alcohol while pregnant with her daughter, Georgia, who was born prematurely in July 1977. Much like her moods, Denny's interest towards her daughter appeared to oscillate between obsessive and unconcerned; friends recalled both frantic, middle-of-the-night phone calls about teething, as well as Denny "crashing the car and leaving the baby in the pub and all sorts of stuff".
Friends would later note that Denny had a history of purposely throwing herself off bar stools and down flights of stairs in order to get a reaction. Several remembered this behaviour as "Sandy's party trick", while Dave Pegg's wife Chris stated, "She certainly did it in my house and it could be a very dramatic gesture, like self-harming. She could do it without hurting herself usually but I had a feeling there would be one time too many." Those who knew Denny said that her increasing level of alcohol abuse in the last years of her life led to an increasing number of falls (both accidental and deliberate), resulting in a growing number of injuries.
In late March 1978, while on holiday with her parents and baby Georgia in Cornwall, Denny was injured when she fell down a staircase and hit her head on concrete. Following the incident, she suffered from intense headaches; a doctor prescribed her the painkiller dextropropoxyphene, a drug known to have fatal side effects when mixed with alcohol. On 1 April, several days after the fall in Cornwall, Denny performed a charity concert at Byfield. The final song she performed was "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?"
At some unknown point during the first half of April 1978, Denny suffered yet another major fall at her home in Byfield. On 13 April, concerned about his wife's erratic behaviour and fearing for his daughter's safety, Trevor Lucas left the UK and returned to his native Australia with their child, leaving Denny without telling her. He sold their Austin Princess car in order to raise funds for the journey.
On discovering Lucas' departure, Denny went to stay at the home of her friend Miranda Ward. During this time, Denny apparently set up an appointment to speak with a doctor about her headaches, and also intended to get advice about her alcohol addiction. At some point after 8 am on 17 April, Denny fell into a coma. Ward was out of the house at the time, and had asked her friend Jon Cole (of the band The Movies) to check in on Denny. Cole entered the home at 3 pm, and found Denny unconscious at the foot of the staircase which led to the second floor of the house. She was rushed by ambulance to Queen Mary's Hospital in nearby Roehampton.
On 19 April, she was transferred to Atkinson Morley Hospital in Wimbledon. After receiving news that Denny was in a coma, Lucas returned from Australia. Upon his arrival at the hospital, doctors informed him that Denny was effectively brain-dead and her condition would not improve. He granted their recommendation to turn off life-support machines; however, just ten minutes before this was to take place, at 7:50 pm on 21 April 1978, Sandy Denny died, without regaining consciousness. Her death was ruled to be the result of a traumatic mid-brain haemorrhage and blunt force trauma to her head. She was 31 years old.
The funeral took place on 27 April 1978 at Putney Vale Cemetery. After the vicar had read Denny's favourite psalm, Psalm 23, a piper played "Flowers of the Forest", a traditional song commemorating the fallen of Flodden Field and one which had appeared on the 1970 Fairport album Full House. The inscription on her headstone reads:
Posthumous releases
Official releases
Although Denny had a devoted following in her lifetime, she did not achieve mass market success. In the years since her death, her reputation has grown. A four-album box set entitled Who Knows Where the Time Goes? (1985) was produced by her widower Trevor Lucas and Joe Boyd and included a number of rare and previously unreleased tracks by Denny, either solo or with Fairport Convention (1968, 1969, 1974) and Fotheringay (1970). This was the first public indication that a large cache of unreleased material existed. A one-disc subset of these recordings was subsequently issued on CD by Island in 1987 entitled The Best Of Sandy Denny.
In 1987, a compilation of previously unreleased tracks recorded for the BBC by incarnations of Fairport including Denny was released on LP under the title Heyday, which was subsequently released on CD in 2001 and again, with extra tracks, in 2002; all tracks were later included, with others, on the 2007 4-CD box set Fairport Convention Live at the BBC (see below). The initial purpose of this compilation was to document the more "American" material performed live by the What We Did on Our Holidays lineup of the band that never made it to vinyl, while the re-releases added additional songs as performed by the Unhalfbricking and Liege and Lief lineups.
Also in 1987, a VHS documentary, It All Comes 'Round Again, on Fairport Convention was released which contained excerpts of several audio recordings featuring Denny, plus a single poor-quality video recording of her singing her song "Solo" during her second stint with Fairport in 1974, as filmed by the University of Birmingham's "Guild TV" amateur organisation. The original tape of this recording has apparently been lost; however, "Like an Old Fashioned Waltz" does appear on the DVD documentary Sandy Denny Under Review (see below) and other tracks have been made available via YouTube in very poor quality.
Over the period 1988–1994, the Australian "Friends of Fairport" issued a series of subscriber-only cassette compilations drawing in the main on previously unreleased tapes from Trevor Lucas' collection (as stored in his attic in fact). Attic Tracks (AT) 1 (1988) contained out-takes from Sandy as well as some Fairport material and a few bizarre extras; AT 2 (1989) contained only Trevor Lucas material, no Denny; AT 3 (1989) entitled First and Last Tracks comprised 1966–1967 home demos and rare radio tracks, as well as 9 "pre-overdub" songs from Denny's last concert at the Royalty Theatre, London, on 27 November 1977 (a partial alternative to the later, overdubbed CD release Gold Dust), and AT 4 (1994): Together Again comprised one side of Lucas and the other of Denny in the form of more home demos, studio outtakes, and 4 tracks from a 1973 BBC radio concert. A cut-down version of these tracks (18 songs) was subsequently compiled for CD release by the Australian label Raven Records in 1995 called Sandy Denny, Trevor Lucas and Friends: The Attic Tracks 1972–1984.
In 1991, Joe Boyd issued a new version of Denny's All Our Own Work album with the Strawbs, called Sandy Denny and the Strawbs, on his Hannibal Records label. The album had strings added to some tracks, including "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" and further tracks with Denny on lead vocal.
In 1997, a one-disc compilation of Denny's solo BBC recordings was released as The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 on Strange Fruit Records. Due to rights issues it was withdrawn on the day of release, thereby creating a highly collectible disc (up until the release of the comprehensive Live at the BBC box set in 2007). This release was followed in 1998 when Denny's final performance at the Royalty Theatre, entitled Gold Dust, was issued on CD, following a degree of re-recording and overdubbing of selected backing parts to replace reportedly unsatisfactory originals.
In 1999, a single-disc compilation, Listen Listen – An Introduction to Sandy Denny, was released on Island Records comprising 17 previously released tracks taken from her four Island solo albums.
No More Sad Refrains: The Anthology was released by Universal Records in 2000. When first released, this compilation had several rare tracks, including "The Ballad of Easy Rider" from the Liege and Lief sessions, "Learning the Game" and "When Will I Be Loved" from the Bunch album Rock On, "Here in Silence" and "Man of Iron" from the Pass of Arms soundtrack, and a previously unissued demo of "Stranger to Himself".
In 2002, a previously unreleased, 2-CD live US concert recording by Fairport Convention from 1974 featuring Denny was released on the Burning Airlines label. Entitled Before The Moon, it originated from a radio broadcast from Ebbets Field in Denver, Colorado, on 23/24 May 1974. The second disc was a limited release bonus with the original release comprising the second set from the same concert. This recording was re-released in shortened form as a single disc in 2011 on the It's About Music label entitled Fairport Convention with Sandy Denny: Ebbets Field 1974.
Also in 2002, the American A&M Records issued a budget-price "20th Century Masters" compilation called The Best of Sandy Denny with 10 tracks all available on Denny's studio albums.
In 2004 a second comprehensive five-CD box set was released on the Fledg'ling record label called A Boxful of Treasures that included many unreleased recordings, in particular a whole disc of acoustic demos, many recorded at her home in Byfield that was highly prized amongst fans and critics alike, who had long asserted that her solo performances showed her work in its best light, revealing the true quality of her vocal style and compositions. Also in 2004, the Spectrum label issued a 16-track compilation of previously released material entitled The Collection: Chronological Covers & Concert Classics, including a mix of studio recordings and live excerpts from the Gold Dust Royalty concert.
In 2005, remastered versions of all Denny's solo albums came out with bonus tracks. Also in 2005, a single CD compilation entitled Where the Time Goes: Sandy '67 was released on Castle Music containing all of Saga's Denny album tracks (including the alternative recordings on It's Sandy Denny), together with two self accompanied tracks from Denny's recordings with the Strawbs.
A DVD documentary entitled Sandy Denny Under Review was released on the Sexy Intellectual label in 2006 which contained interviews with her contemporaries plus brief excerpts from her audio recordings, plus some short video clips including two of the poor quality video recordings with Fairport from Birmingham University (details given above), two with Fotheringay from German TV's Beat-Club (further details given below), and three solo excerpts from the only surviving BBC footage on One In Ten (details as given in the next item).
A 4-disc box set, Sandy Denny Live at the BBC, came out in September 2007 containing (virtually) all of the known solo recordings made by Denny for that UK broadcaster including two complete concerts, one at the Paris Theatre in 1972 and one recorded for Sounds on Sunday in 1973, plus a range of other material spanning the years 1966–1973. Disc 3 of this set was a DVD containing surviving TV footage from a 1971 BBC One in Ten session comprising solo performances by Denny of "The North Star Grassman and the Ravens", "Crazy Lady Blues" and "Late November", along with digitised excerpts from her diaries, rare photos and a discography. A 1-disc subset of this box set entitled The Best of the BBC Recordings was subsequently released in 2008.
A companion box set, Fairport Convention Live at the BBC, also came out in 2007 and covered equivalent live recordings by Fairport over the period 1968–1974, of which the first two discs (1968–1970) contain examples from Denny's time with that group.
In 2008, Jerry Donahue completed the unfinished second Fotheringay album begun in the autumn of 1970. It was released to general acclaim as Fotheringay 2 and contained some notable Denny performances, in particular earlier versions of two Denny compositions, "Late November" and "John the Gun", and performances of the traditional songs "Gypsy Davey" and "Wild Mountain Thyme". Also in 2008, Island Remasters issued a double CD entitled The Music Weaver (Sandy Denny Remembered) which contained a mix of better known tracks and less well known demos and live recordings, previously released but not in companion with studio sessions. This compilation is also one of the very few to contain the Led Zeppelin track "The Battle Of Evermore" which features a rare guest appearance by Denny.
In 2010, a large 19-CD retrospective box set, simply titled Sandy Denny, was released by Universal/Island Records in a limited edition of 3,000. It contained Denny's entire catalogue of studio recordings, including her work with the Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay and as a solo artist. The compilation also included a large number of outtakes, demos, live recordings, radio sessions and interviews. The box set was released to good reviews, including a 5-star review in Uncut and a 4-star review in The Guardian.
In late 2010, Thea Gilmore was commissioned by Denny's estate, in conjunction with Island Records, to write melodies to unrecorded lyrics found in Denny's papers. The resulting album, Don't Stop Singing, was released in November 2011 to generally good notices, including 4-star reviews in The Independent and The Guardian among others. On 21 April 2012, the single "London" was released as an exclusive Record Store Day 7″ single.
Further recordings were released in 2011, including a German recording of Fotheringay in concert released as Essen 1970 on the Garden of Delights label. The performance was remastered by original band member Jerry Donahue. This release was followed by 19 Rupert Street, a home recording of a rehearsal featuring Sandy and Alex Campbell recorded at his flat in August 1967. This release is notable for the fact that Sandy performs a number of tracks that are not available in any other versions, including a cover of "Fairytale Lullaby" by John Martyn. This CD was put out by Sandy's former Strawbs bandmate Dave Cousins on his Witchwood label.
Two-disc "Deluxe Editions" of Denny's album reissues appeared in 2011–2012 with additional tracks; the 2012 Deluxe Edition of Sandy included a previously unreleased eight-song solo set from her 1973 U.S. tour recorded at Ebbet's Field in Denver, Colorado. A similar two-disc reissue of Fairport Convention's Rising for the Moon also included, for the first time, the complete 1974 L.A. Troubadour performance of Fairport with Denny back on board, prior to the official announcement of her re-joining the group.
On account of unprecedented demand for, and exhaustion of supply of the limited edition 19-CD set cited above, in October 2012 a limited edition 4-CD version was released entitled The Notes and The Words: A Collection of Demos and Rarities, containing "75 songs that represent the cream of the rarities, demos and outtakes from the box set". Limited to 3,500 copies, this compilation is also now out-of-print.
In 2013, Spectrum records issued a single-disc CD entitled The Lady – The Essential Sandy Denny that comprised 15 previously issued tracks, generally from Denny's well known albums.
2014 saw the release of another Fairport live U.S. radio broadcast from their 1974 tour with Denny, on RockBeat Records, entitled Live 1974 (My Father's Place), comprising 11 live tracks, most featuring Denny, recorded at the New York rock club My Father's Place.
A four-disc Fotheringay retrospective, Nothing More: The Collected Fotheringay, was released on 30 March 2015. This is the most comprehensive compilation of the group's recordings, and contains, in addition to all the tracks on Fotheringay and Fotheringay 2 as both final studio versions and demos/alternate takes, the complete live concert set from Rotterdam in 1970 (including several previously unreleased tracks), seven Fotheringay tracks recorded in session for BBC radio (which had previously circulated only as bootlegs), plus a DVD disc containing four performances by Fotheringay recorded for the German Beat-Club TV series in 1970, which considerably augment the otherwise sparse known TV footage of Denny in particular.
May 2016 saw the release of a 2-CD compilation, I've Always Kept A Unicorn – The Acoustic Sandy Denny which collected together many previously released, but dispersed, acoustic and/or demo versions of songs better known from their album counterparts, as well as three previously unreleased demos (with Linda Thompson, at the time Linda Peters) from 1972's Rock On sessions by one-off band The Bunch.
A 7-CD box set by Fairport Convention entitled Come All Ye – The First 10 Years was released in July 2017 and contains a small number of additional, previously unreleased demos and alternate takes featuring Denny during her first tenure with the band over the period 1968–1969. Tracks not previously available include versions of Joni Mitchell's Eastern Rain, an a capella version of Nottamun Town, alternative takes of Autopsy and Who Knows Where the Time Goes, and a rehearsal version of The Deserter.
Unofficial releases and audience tapes
In addition to the authorised material listed above, a number unofficial/unauthorised compilations exist plus a range of audience recordings of varying quality, none of which would likely see the light of day as commercial issues but are of interest to a sector of Denny's audience on either historic or aesthetic grounds, often providing alternative views of songs known otherwise only from their commercially released versions. The first available unauthorised/bootleg CDs available in the 1980s and 1990s comprised principally off-air and other obscure material under such titles as Borrowed Thyme, Poems from Alexandra, Dark the Night, Wild Mountain Thyme and One Last Sad Refrain; such compilations are now largely superseded by the subsequent availability of most of the off-air material in much better quality as official releases as described above.
Of more enduring interest are audience tapes of shows of which no "official" tapes survive. These include some early shows by Fairport Convention; a performance by Fotheringay at the 1970 Tenth National Jazz and Blues Festival, held at Plumpton Race Track, Streat, East Sussex, England; "solo" shows by Denny (on occasion with a small band including, among others, Richard Thompson) at the 1971 Lincoln Folk Festival and at the Eltham Well Hall Open Theatre in 1972; performances from York University and Guildhall, Newcastle upon Tyne, also in 1972; an early 1972 U.S. performance from The Bitter End in New York; and several sets (Birmingham and Croydon) from her final 1977 tour in addition to the officially released Gold Dust album; plus quite a large number of recordings strongly featuring Denny as part of the re-formed Fairport Convention over the period 1974–1975. The majority of these can be fairly easily located via relevant internet searches and, in addition, can be readily downloaded from archival music servers such as Sugarmegs (Sandy Denny concerts listed under "S": SugarMegs Streaming Server, Fairport and Fotheringay under "F": SugarMegs Streaming Server). A provisional list of such recordings as are known to exist, with details on where each can be accessed, is available here.
Legacy
Estate and family
After relocating to Australia and remarrying, Trevor Lucas died of a heart attack in 1989. Denny's estate is now managed by Lucas' widow, Elizabeth Hurtt-Lucas. A number of otherwise unreleased recordings of Sandy Denny from his collection have subsequently been the basis for posthumous releases of Denny's work including those on The Attic Tracks and elsewhere.
Sandy Denny's daughter, Georgia, has rarely spoken about her mother in a public forum and in the mid-2000s declined an invitation to write the liner notes for Sandy Denny Live at the BBC. However, in 2006 she flew to Britain from Australia to accept on her mother's behalf the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards award for Most Influential Folk Album of All Time, which was given for Fairport Convention's Liege and Lief. Georgia gave birth to twin daughters on 29 April 1997, and a tribute album, Georgia on Our Mind, featuring many of Sandy Denny's former bandmates and friends, was compiled in the children's honour. She also administers a Facebook page "Sandy Denny and Family" dedicated to her mother's memory and more recently, under the name Georgia Katt, has released some of her own DJ-based music.
Tributes
Since her death, many tributes have been made to Denny, both in music and elsewhere. Dave Pegg of Fairport Convention recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on his 1983 solo album The Cocktail Cowboy Goes It Alone. Dave Cousins of the Strawbs wrote "Ringing Down the Years" in memory of Denny shortly after her death. Songs more specific to the death were Bert Jansch's "Where Did My Life Go" and Richard Thompson's "Did She Jump or Was She Pushed?" Fellow Brit folk pioneers Spriguns changed the title of their 1978 album to Magic Lady after hearing of Denny's death while recording. In 1998, a variety of Daylily was named after her.
Denny's songs have been covered by numerous artists in the years since her death. Some of the notable acts to have covered her music include Yo La Tengo, former Marillion frontman Fish, who covered "Solo" on his album Songs from the Mirror, Cat Power, Judy Collins, Nanci Griffith and Nina Simone. Kate Bush mentioned Denny in the lyric of "Blow Away (For Bill)", as one of the musicians to greet Bill in Heaven. "Blow Away (For Bill)" is the third track on Bush's 1980 album Never for Ever. In 1984, Clann Eadair released the single "A tribute to Sandy Denny", featuring Phil Lynott on vocals.
Several radio specials have been produced about Denny's life and music, including BBC Radio 2's The Sandy Denny Story: Who Knows Where the Time Goes. In 2007, Denny's song "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" also received BBC Radio 2's 2007 Folk Award for "Favourite Folk Track of All Time". In 2010, she was recognized by NPR in their 50 Great Voices special series.
In April 2008, a tribute concert was held at The Troubadour in London, to mark the thirtieth anniversary of Denny's death. Those taking part included Martin Carthy, Linda Thompson and Joe Boyd.
A more extensive tribute was given later that year in December at the Southbank in the Queen Elizabeth Hall called The Lady: A Tribute to Sandy Denny with a band composed of members of Bellowhead, the evening featured a mix of young folk acts like Jim Moray and Lisa Knapp alongside those that had known and worked with Denny such as Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. These acts were joined by performers from outside the world of folk like PP Arnold and Marc Almond. The concert, which primarily featured songs written by Denny, received a four-star review in The Guardian. In May 2012 the Southbank concert was expanded into an eight date UK tour called The Lady: A Homage to Sandy Denny. The tour showcased Sandy's entire songbook taking in her work with Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, her solo career and the new songs completed by Thea Gilmore on her album Don't Stop Singing.
The band was, once again, composed of members of Bellowhead. Other acts performing included the aforementioned Thea Gilmore and up-and-coming folk acts Lavinia Blackwall of Trembling Bells, Blair Dunlop and Sam Carter, alongside more established folk stars Maddy Prior, Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. The line-up was completed with performers not normally associated with the folk scene; Green Gartside, Joan Wasser (also known as Joan As Police Woman), and PP Arnold. The tour was well received, obtaining a four-star review in The Times. The London concert at the Barbican was filmed for BBC4, and broadcast in a 90-minute programme titled The Songs of Sandy Denny in November 2012.
In the 2012 Irish film Silence (Harvest Films & South Wind Blows), "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" is used during the film and final credits.
In April 2016 Denny was inducted into the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards Hall of Fame.
Alela Diane recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on her album Cusp, released in February 2018. The song reflects on Denny's final tragic days and her orphaned baby daughter.
Discography
Solo studio albums
The North Star Grassman and the Ravens (1971)
Sandy (1972)
Like an Old Fashioned Waltz (1974)
Rendezvous (1977)
Solo live albums
The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 (1997)
Gold Dust (1998) (live recording from final tour, 1977)
Live at the BBC (2007 4-disc compilation)
Sandy – Deluxe edition, 2012 – includes "Live at Ebbetts Field" (previously unreleased concert on disc 2)
With others
Denny's collaborations with other artists, including with Alex Campbell, The Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, and The Bunch, together with numerous posthumous releases and compilation albums, are detailed further on the Sandy Denny discography page.
References and notes
General
Further reading
Mick Houghton. I've Always Kept a Unicorn – The Biography of Sandy Denny. Faber & Faber, 2015;
Clinton Heylin. No More Sad Refrains – The Life and Times of Sandy Denny. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Clinton Heylin. Gypsy Love Songs & Sad Refrains – The Recordings of Richard Thompson and Sandy Denny. Labour of Love Productions, 1989.
Colin Larkin. The Guinness Who's Who of Folk Music. Guinness Publishing Ltd;
Jim Irvin. Angel of Avalon. MOJO Magazine, August 1998.
Colin Harper, Trevor Hodgett. Irish Folk, Traditional & Blues: A Secret History. Cherry Red, 2005;
Pamela Murray Winters. No Thought of Leaving: A life of Sandy Denny. 2000. (Unpublished).
Brian Hinton, Geoff Wall. Ashley Hutchings: The Guv'nor & the Rise of Folk Rock. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Patrick Humphries. Meet On The Ledge: The Classic Years 1967–1975. Virgin Books, 1997;
Patrick Humphries. Richard Thompson: Strange Affair – The Biography. Virgin Books, 1996;
Philip Ward, "Sandy Denny: A Thirtieth Anniversary", R2 (Rock'n'Reel) 2(9), May/June 2008.
Philip Ward, Sandy Denny: Reflections on Her Music''. Matador, 2011;
External links
Official website
Homage to Sandy Denny
Dedicated to the memory of Sandy Denny
Sandy Denny website
1947 births
1978 deaths
20th-century English singers
20th-century English women singers
A&M Records artists
Accidental deaths from falls
Accidental deaths in London
Deaths by intracerebral hemorrhage
Alumni of Kingston College (England)
British folk rock musicians
Burials at Putney Vale Cemetery
English folk singers
English people of Scottish descent
English women singer-songwriters
Fairport Convention members
Women rock singers
Fotheringay members
Island Records artists
People from Byfield, Northamptonshire
People from Wimbledon, London
Singers from London
Strawbs members
The Bunch members | true | [
"What A Summer (foal in 1973) was an American Thoroughbred Champion racehorse who defeated both male and female competitors. She was bred in Maryland by Milton Polinger. She was a gray out of the mare Summer Classic who was sired by Summer Tan. Her sire was What Luck, a multiple stakes winning son of U.S. Racing Hall of Fame inductee Bold Ruler. What A Summer is probably best remembered for her win in the Grade II $65,000 Black-Eyed Susan Stakes over stakes winners Dearly Precious and Artfully on May 14, 1976.\n\nTwo-year-old season \n\nWhat A Summer was trained very early in her career by Hall of Fame conditioner Bud Delp while racing for her breeder, Milton Polinger. She was bought by Mrs. Bertram Firestone following Polinger's death in the early fall of 1976. That death delayed her the first start of her career until late in the year. Mrs. Firestone turned the mare over to trainer LeRoy Jolley. What A Summer did not start racing until near the end of her two-year-old season, when she broke her maiden at Philadelphia Park. Near the end of the year, she won an allowance race. She ended the year with two wins in four starts.\n\nThree-year-old season \nIn January, What A Summer placed second in her first stakes race, the $25,000 Heirloom Stakes at the old Liberty Bell Race Track in Philadelphia. Two months later, she won her second allowance race over winners and convinced her connections that she was ready to step up in class and take on stakes winners in the Grade II $65,000 Black-Eyed Susan Stakes. In that race, she withstood a fast closing challenge down the stretch to hold off a late charge by 4:5 favorite Dearly Precious in a final time of 1:42.40 for the mile and one sixteenth on the dirt track at Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore, Maryland. Her jockey, Chris McCarron, was credited with a solid ride by conserving energy with moderate fractions in the middle portion of the race. Stakes winner Artfully held on for third in the field of ten three-year-old fillies. In December 1976, What A Summer won the $50,000 Anne Arundel Stakes at Laurel Park Racecourse, beating Turn the Guns and Avum in 1:38.20 for the mile under McCarron.\n\nFour-year-old season \n\nIn 1977, What A Summer won the $75,000 Fall Highweight Handicap twice, carrying the high weight of 134 pounds under jockey Jacinto Vásquez. The Fall Highweight is run in November of each year at Aqueduct Racetrack. In the 1977 race, she finished in a time of 1:09.4 and she broke the stakes record for six furlongs. That year, she also won the $40,000 Silver Spoon Handicap, the $50,000 Maskette Handicap and the $35,000 Distaff Handicap. She placed second in the grade one Beldame Stakes at Belmont Park and showed in both the $40,000 Grey Flight Handicap and the $25,000 Regret Stakes.\n\nFive-year-old season \n\nIn 1978 as a five-year-old, What A Summer repeated two of her victories from the year before in both the Fall Highweight Handicap, under Hall of Fame jockey Ángel Cordero Jr., and the $40,000 Silver Spoon Handicap. She also won the $40,000 First Flight Handicap. She placed second in the grade two Vosburgh Stakes, the grade three Vagrancy Handicap, the Sport Page Handicap, the Suwanee River Handicap and the Egret Handicap.\n\nHonors \n\nWhat A Summer was named Maryland-bred horse of the year in 1977 and twice was named champion older mare for the state of Maryland in both 1977 and 1978. She was retired in 1978 and as a broodmare she produced several graded stakes winners. After her retirement, Laurel Park Racecourse named a race in honor, the What A Summer Stakes. She was an Eclipse Award winner and was named American Champion Sprint Horse in 1977.\n\nWhat A Summer ended her career with a record of 18 wins out of 31 starts in her career. Her most memorable race was perhaps her dominating performance in the de facto second leg of the filly Triple Crown, the Black-Eyed Susan Stakes. In addition to her 18 wins, she placed nine times with earnings of $479,161. That record of 27 first or second finishes in 31 starts at 87% is among the best in history.\n\nReferences\n What A Summer's pedigree and partial racing stats\n\n1973 racehorse births\nRacehorses bred in Maryland\nRacehorses trained in the United States\nEclipse Award winners\nThoroughbred family 17-b",
"Debra Forster (born 25 August 1961) is an Australian former swimmer who won a gold medal in the 100m backstroke event at the 1978 Commonwealth Games in Edmonton, Canada.\n\nUpon finding out that she would be going to the 1978 Commonwealth Games in what would be her first trip overseas, Forster was surprised to be selected as she did not believe she had swum well during the selection trials in Sydney. She \"burst into international swimming\" in January 1978 when she set an Australian record in the 100m backstroke of 1:04.87 at Melbourne's Olympic stadium. At the time she was selected for the Commonwealth Games, she was training to be a secretary.\n\nWhile training for the games in Honolulu, she had decided that she would quit swimming upon her return home, yet had a change of heart upon winning a gold medal in the 1978 Commonwealth 100m backstroke event. After her win, she noted that she had changed her entire outlook on swimming, deciding that \"it was all worth while\" and then aiming towards winning a berth on the swimming team for the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow. During her time in Edmonton, she got tonsillitis and had to isolate in bed for several days, although it wasn't believed likely to have any effect on her performance.\n\nIn January 1979, she set an Australian residential and Victorian state 100m backstroke record with a time of 1:04.64, beating her own previous best by 0.23 seconds. She then followed this up with a Victorian state record in the 200m backstroke of 2:18.91.\n\nPersonal\nHer mother was Jean Forster, from the Melbourne suburb of Cheltenham, Victoria.\n\nReferences\n\n1961 births\nLiving people\nAustralian female backstroke swimmers\nCommonwealth Games gold medallists for Australia\nSwimmers at the 1978 Commonwealth Games\nCommonwealth Games medallists in swimming"
] |
[
"Sandy Denny",
"Early career",
"How did she get started in her career?",
"in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus.",
"What did she do in the club?",
"After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings",
"What did she do there?",
"the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs.",
"How long did she work there?",
"I don't know.",
"What did she do after leaving there?",
"Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label,",
"What did she record?",
"the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo."
] | C_e6cc2f78b77b4fcab1029b8e527f1a13_1 | Did they do well? | 7 | Did Sandy Dennys albums do well? | Sandy Denny | Her nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn. After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fhir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels". Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes. By this time she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark which was released belatedly in 1973 credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny (6 January 1947 – 21 April 1978) was an English singer-songwriter who was lead singer of the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. She has been described as "the pre-eminent British folk rock singer".
After briefly working with the Strawbs, Denny joined Fairport Convention in 1968, remaining with them until 1969. She formed the short-lived band Fotheringay in 1970, before focusing on a solo career. Between 1971 and 1977, Denny released four solo albums: The North Star Grassman and the Ravens, Sandy, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz and Rendezvous. She also duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore" for Led Zeppelin's album Led Zeppelin IV in 1971. Denny died in 1978 at the age of 31 due to injuries and health issues related to alcohol abuse.
Music publications Uncut and Mojo have described Denny as Britain's finest female singer-songwriter. Her composition "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" has been recorded by Judy Collins, Eva Cassidy, Nina Simone, 10,000 Maniacs and Cat Power. Her recorded work has been the subject of numerous reissues, along with a wealth of previously unreleased material which has appeared over the more than 40 years since her death, including a 19-CD box set released in November 2010.
Childhood
Denny was born on 6 January 1947 at Nelson Hospital, Kingston Road, Merton Park, London, to Neil and Edna Denny. She studied classical piano as a child.
Her paternal grandfather was from Dundee, and her paternal grandmother was a Scots Gaelic speaker and singer of traditional songs. At an early age Denny showed an interest in singing, although her strict parents were reluctant to believe there was a living to be made from it. She attended Coombe Girls' School in New Malden; after leaving school she began training as a nurse at the Royal Brompton Hospital.
Early career
Denny's nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn.
After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames, Denny began working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels".
Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes.
By this time, she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark, which was released belatedly in 1973, credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer.
From Fairport to Fotheringay
After making the Saga albums with Alex Campbell and Johnny Silvo, Denny looked for a band that would allow her to stretch herself as a vocalist, reach a wider audience, and have the opportunity to display her songwriting. She said, "I wanted to do something more with my voice." After working briefly with the Strawbs, Denny remained unconvinced that they could provide that opportunity, and so she ended her relationship with the band.
Fairport Convention conducted auditions in May 1968 for a replacement singer following the departure of Judy Dyble after their debut album, and Denny became the obvious choice. According to group member Simon Nicol, her personality and musicianship made her stand out from the other auditionees "like a clean glass in a sink full of dirty dishes".
Beginning with What We Did on Our Holidays, the first of three albums she made with the band in the late 1960s, Denny is credited with encouraging Fairport Convention to explore the traditional British folk repertoire, and is thus regarded as a key figure in the development of British folk rock. She brought with her the traditional repertoire she had refined in the clubs, including "A Sailor's Life" featured on their second album together Unhalfbricking. Framing Denny's performance of this song with their own electric improvisations, her bandmates discovered what then proved to be the inspiration for an entire album, the influential Liege & Lief (1969).
Denny left Fairport Convention in December 1969 to develop her own songwriting more fully. To this end, she formed her own band, Fotheringay, which included her future husband, Australian Trevor Lucas, formerly of the group Eclection.
They created one self-titled album, which included an eight-minute version of the traditional "Banks of the Nile", and several Denny originals, among them "The Sea" and "Nothing More". The latter marked her first composition on the piano, which was to become her primary instrument from then on. Fotheringay started to record a second album in late 1970, but it remained unfinished after Denny announced that she was leaving the group and producer Joe Boyd left to take up a job at Warner Brothers in California. Denny would later blame Boyd's hostility towards the group for its demise.
Solo career and final years
She then turned to recording her first solo album, The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. Released in 1971, it is distinguished by its elusive lyrics and unconventional harmonies. Highlights included "Late November", inspired by a dream and the death of Fairport band member Martin Lamble, and "Next Time Around" a cryptogram about Jackson C. Frank, one of her many portraits in song.
Sandy, with a cover photograph by David Bailey, followed in 1972 and was the first of her albums to be produced by Trevor Lucas. As well as introducing eight new original compositions, the album marked her last recording of a traditional song, "The Quiet Joys of Brotherhood" (words by Richard Fariña), with Denny's ambitious multi-tracked vocal arrangement inspired by the Ensemble of the Bulgarian Republic.
Melody Maker readers twice voted her the "Best British Female Singer", in 1970 and 1971 and, together with contemporaries including Richard Thompson and Ashley Hutchings, she participated in a one-off project called the Bunch to record a collection of rock and roll era standards released under the title of Rock On.
In 1971, Denny duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore", which was included on Led Zeppelin's 1971 album (Led Zeppelin IV); she was the only guest vocalist ever to appear on a Led Zeppelin album. In 1972 Denny had a small cameo on Lou Reizner's symphonic arrangement of the Who's rock opera Tommy. Her brief appearance was at the end of the track "It's a Boy", which also featured vocals from Pete Townshend.
In 1973, she married long-term boyfriend and producer Trevor Lucas and recorded a third solo album, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz. The songs continued to detail many of her personal preoccupations: loss, loneliness, fear of the dark, the passing of time and the changing seasons. The album contained one of her best loved compositions, "Solo", and featured a cover image by Gered Mankowitz.
In 1974, she returned to Fairport Convention (of which her husband was by then a member) for a world tour (captured on the 1974 album Fairport Live Convention) and a studio album, Rising for the Moon in 1975. Although her development as a soloist and songwriter had taken her further away from the folk roots direction that the band had pursued since Liege & Lief, seven of the eleven tracks on Rising for the Moon were either written or co-written by her.
Denny and Lucas left Fairport Convention at the end of 1975 and embarked on what was to become her final album Rendezvous. Released in 1977, the album sold poorly and Denny was subsequently dropped by Island Records. Having relocated to the village of Byfield in Northamptonshire in the mid-seventies, Denny gave birth to her only child, a daughter named Georgia, in July 1977.
A UK tour to promote Rendezvous in autumn 1977 marked her final public appearances. The closing night at the Royalty Theatre in London on 27 November 1977 was recorded for a live album, Gold Dust, which, because of technical problems in the recording of the electric guitar, was belatedly released in 1998 after most of the guitars had been re-recorded by Jerry Donahue.
Death
Linda Thompson would later note that Denny "really started going downhill in 1976" and demonstrated increasing levels of both manic and depressive behaviour. Learning that she was pregnant did little to mellow Denny's reckless lifestyle, which was heightened by increasing depression, mood swings and the unravelling of her "tumultuous" marriage to Trevor Lucas. She abused drugs and alcohol while pregnant with her daughter, Georgia, who was born prematurely in July 1977. Much like her moods, Denny's interest towards her daughter appeared to oscillate between obsessive and unconcerned; friends recalled both frantic, middle-of-the-night phone calls about teething, as well as Denny "crashing the car and leaving the baby in the pub and all sorts of stuff".
Friends would later note that Denny had a history of purposely throwing herself off bar stools and down flights of stairs in order to get a reaction. Several remembered this behaviour as "Sandy's party trick", while Dave Pegg's wife Chris stated, "She certainly did it in my house and it could be a very dramatic gesture, like self-harming. She could do it without hurting herself usually but I had a feeling there would be one time too many." Those who knew Denny said that her increasing level of alcohol abuse in the last years of her life led to an increasing number of falls (both accidental and deliberate), resulting in a growing number of injuries.
In late March 1978, while on holiday with her parents and baby Georgia in Cornwall, Denny was injured when she fell down a staircase and hit her head on concrete. Following the incident, she suffered from intense headaches; a doctor prescribed her the painkiller dextropropoxyphene, a drug known to have fatal side effects when mixed with alcohol. On 1 April, several days after the fall in Cornwall, Denny performed a charity concert at Byfield. The final song she performed was "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?"
At some unknown point during the first half of April 1978, Denny suffered yet another major fall at her home in Byfield. On 13 April, concerned about his wife's erratic behaviour and fearing for his daughter's safety, Trevor Lucas left the UK and returned to his native Australia with their child, leaving Denny without telling her. He sold their Austin Princess car in order to raise funds for the journey.
On discovering Lucas' departure, Denny went to stay at the home of her friend Miranda Ward. During this time, Denny apparently set up an appointment to speak with a doctor about her headaches, and also intended to get advice about her alcohol addiction. At some point after 8 am on 17 April, Denny fell into a coma. Ward was out of the house at the time, and had asked her friend Jon Cole (of the band The Movies) to check in on Denny. Cole entered the home at 3 pm, and found Denny unconscious at the foot of the staircase which led to the second floor of the house. She was rushed by ambulance to Queen Mary's Hospital in nearby Roehampton.
On 19 April, she was transferred to Atkinson Morley Hospital in Wimbledon. After receiving news that Denny was in a coma, Lucas returned from Australia. Upon his arrival at the hospital, doctors informed him that Denny was effectively brain-dead and her condition would not improve. He granted their recommendation to turn off life-support machines; however, just ten minutes before this was to take place, at 7:50 pm on 21 April 1978, Sandy Denny died, without regaining consciousness. Her death was ruled to be the result of a traumatic mid-brain haemorrhage and blunt force trauma to her head. She was 31 years old.
The funeral took place on 27 April 1978 at Putney Vale Cemetery. After the vicar had read Denny's favourite psalm, Psalm 23, a piper played "Flowers of the Forest", a traditional song commemorating the fallen of Flodden Field and one which had appeared on the 1970 Fairport album Full House. The inscription on her headstone reads:
Posthumous releases
Official releases
Although Denny had a devoted following in her lifetime, she did not achieve mass market success. In the years since her death, her reputation has grown. A four-album box set entitled Who Knows Where the Time Goes? (1985) was produced by her widower Trevor Lucas and Joe Boyd and included a number of rare and previously unreleased tracks by Denny, either solo or with Fairport Convention (1968, 1969, 1974) and Fotheringay (1970). This was the first public indication that a large cache of unreleased material existed. A one-disc subset of these recordings was subsequently issued on CD by Island in 1987 entitled The Best Of Sandy Denny.
In 1987, a compilation of previously unreleased tracks recorded for the BBC by incarnations of Fairport including Denny was released on LP under the title Heyday, which was subsequently released on CD in 2001 and again, with extra tracks, in 2002; all tracks were later included, with others, on the 2007 4-CD box set Fairport Convention Live at the BBC (see below). The initial purpose of this compilation was to document the more "American" material performed live by the What We Did on Our Holidays lineup of the band that never made it to vinyl, while the re-releases added additional songs as performed by the Unhalfbricking and Liege and Lief lineups.
Also in 1987, a VHS documentary, It All Comes 'Round Again, on Fairport Convention was released which contained excerpts of several audio recordings featuring Denny, plus a single poor-quality video recording of her singing her song "Solo" during her second stint with Fairport in 1974, as filmed by the University of Birmingham's "Guild TV" amateur organisation. The original tape of this recording has apparently been lost; however, "Like an Old Fashioned Waltz" does appear on the DVD documentary Sandy Denny Under Review (see below) and other tracks have been made available via YouTube in very poor quality.
Over the period 1988–1994, the Australian "Friends of Fairport" issued a series of subscriber-only cassette compilations drawing in the main on previously unreleased tapes from Trevor Lucas' collection (as stored in his attic in fact). Attic Tracks (AT) 1 (1988) contained out-takes from Sandy as well as some Fairport material and a few bizarre extras; AT 2 (1989) contained only Trevor Lucas material, no Denny; AT 3 (1989) entitled First and Last Tracks comprised 1966–1967 home demos and rare radio tracks, as well as 9 "pre-overdub" songs from Denny's last concert at the Royalty Theatre, London, on 27 November 1977 (a partial alternative to the later, overdubbed CD release Gold Dust), and AT 4 (1994): Together Again comprised one side of Lucas and the other of Denny in the form of more home demos, studio outtakes, and 4 tracks from a 1973 BBC radio concert. A cut-down version of these tracks (18 songs) was subsequently compiled for CD release by the Australian label Raven Records in 1995 called Sandy Denny, Trevor Lucas and Friends: The Attic Tracks 1972–1984.
In 1991, Joe Boyd issued a new version of Denny's All Our Own Work album with the Strawbs, called Sandy Denny and the Strawbs, on his Hannibal Records label. The album had strings added to some tracks, including "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" and further tracks with Denny on lead vocal.
In 1997, a one-disc compilation of Denny's solo BBC recordings was released as The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 on Strange Fruit Records. Due to rights issues it was withdrawn on the day of release, thereby creating a highly collectible disc (up until the release of the comprehensive Live at the BBC box set in 2007). This release was followed in 1998 when Denny's final performance at the Royalty Theatre, entitled Gold Dust, was issued on CD, following a degree of re-recording and overdubbing of selected backing parts to replace reportedly unsatisfactory originals.
In 1999, a single-disc compilation, Listen Listen – An Introduction to Sandy Denny, was released on Island Records comprising 17 previously released tracks taken from her four Island solo albums.
No More Sad Refrains: The Anthology was released by Universal Records in 2000. When first released, this compilation had several rare tracks, including "The Ballad of Easy Rider" from the Liege and Lief sessions, "Learning the Game" and "When Will I Be Loved" from the Bunch album Rock On, "Here in Silence" and "Man of Iron" from the Pass of Arms soundtrack, and a previously unissued demo of "Stranger to Himself".
In 2002, a previously unreleased, 2-CD live US concert recording by Fairport Convention from 1974 featuring Denny was released on the Burning Airlines label. Entitled Before The Moon, it originated from a radio broadcast from Ebbets Field in Denver, Colorado, on 23/24 May 1974. The second disc was a limited release bonus with the original release comprising the second set from the same concert. This recording was re-released in shortened form as a single disc in 2011 on the It's About Music label entitled Fairport Convention with Sandy Denny: Ebbets Field 1974.
Also in 2002, the American A&M Records issued a budget-price "20th Century Masters" compilation called The Best of Sandy Denny with 10 tracks all available on Denny's studio albums.
In 2004 a second comprehensive five-CD box set was released on the Fledg'ling record label called A Boxful of Treasures that included many unreleased recordings, in particular a whole disc of acoustic demos, many recorded at her home in Byfield that was highly prized amongst fans and critics alike, who had long asserted that her solo performances showed her work in its best light, revealing the true quality of her vocal style and compositions. Also in 2004, the Spectrum label issued a 16-track compilation of previously released material entitled The Collection: Chronological Covers & Concert Classics, including a mix of studio recordings and live excerpts from the Gold Dust Royalty concert.
In 2005, remastered versions of all Denny's solo albums came out with bonus tracks. Also in 2005, a single CD compilation entitled Where the Time Goes: Sandy '67 was released on Castle Music containing all of Saga's Denny album tracks (including the alternative recordings on It's Sandy Denny), together with two self accompanied tracks from Denny's recordings with the Strawbs.
A DVD documentary entitled Sandy Denny Under Review was released on the Sexy Intellectual label in 2006 which contained interviews with her contemporaries plus brief excerpts from her audio recordings, plus some short video clips including two of the poor quality video recordings with Fairport from Birmingham University (details given above), two with Fotheringay from German TV's Beat-Club (further details given below), and three solo excerpts from the only surviving BBC footage on One In Ten (details as given in the next item).
A 4-disc box set, Sandy Denny Live at the BBC, came out in September 2007 containing (virtually) all of the known solo recordings made by Denny for that UK broadcaster including two complete concerts, one at the Paris Theatre in 1972 and one recorded for Sounds on Sunday in 1973, plus a range of other material spanning the years 1966–1973. Disc 3 of this set was a DVD containing surviving TV footage from a 1971 BBC One in Ten session comprising solo performances by Denny of "The North Star Grassman and the Ravens", "Crazy Lady Blues" and "Late November", along with digitised excerpts from her diaries, rare photos and a discography. A 1-disc subset of this box set entitled The Best of the BBC Recordings was subsequently released in 2008.
A companion box set, Fairport Convention Live at the BBC, also came out in 2007 and covered equivalent live recordings by Fairport over the period 1968–1974, of which the first two discs (1968–1970) contain examples from Denny's time with that group.
In 2008, Jerry Donahue completed the unfinished second Fotheringay album begun in the autumn of 1970. It was released to general acclaim as Fotheringay 2 and contained some notable Denny performances, in particular earlier versions of two Denny compositions, "Late November" and "John the Gun", and performances of the traditional songs "Gypsy Davey" and "Wild Mountain Thyme". Also in 2008, Island Remasters issued a double CD entitled The Music Weaver (Sandy Denny Remembered) which contained a mix of better known tracks and less well known demos and live recordings, previously released but not in companion with studio sessions. This compilation is also one of the very few to contain the Led Zeppelin track "The Battle Of Evermore" which features a rare guest appearance by Denny.
In 2010, a large 19-CD retrospective box set, simply titled Sandy Denny, was released by Universal/Island Records in a limited edition of 3,000. It contained Denny's entire catalogue of studio recordings, including her work with the Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay and as a solo artist. The compilation also included a large number of outtakes, demos, live recordings, radio sessions and interviews. The box set was released to good reviews, including a 5-star review in Uncut and a 4-star review in The Guardian.
In late 2010, Thea Gilmore was commissioned by Denny's estate, in conjunction with Island Records, to write melodies to unrecorded lyrics found in Denny's papers. The resulting album, Don't Stop Singing, was released in November 2011 to generally good notices, including 4-star reviews in The Independent and The Guardian among others. On 21 April 2012, the single "London" was released as an exclusive Record Store Day 7″ single.
Further recordings were released in 2011, including a German recording of Fotheringay in concert released as Essen 1970 on the Garden of Delights label. The performance was remastered by original band member Jerry Donahue. This release was followed by 19 Rupert Street, a home recording of a rehearsal featuring Sandy and Alex Campbell recorded at his flat in August 1967. This release is notable for the fact that Sandy performs a number of tracks that are not available in any other versions, including a cover of "Fairytale Lullaby" by John Martyn. This CD was put out by Sandy's former Strawbs bandmate Dave Cousins on his Witchwood label.
Two-disc "Deluxe Editions" of Denny's album reissues appeared in 2011–2012 with additional tracks; the 2012 Deluxe Edition of Sandy included a previously unreleased eight-song solo set from her 1973 U.S. tour recorded at Ebbet's Field in Denver, Colorado. A similar two-disc reissue of Fairport Convention's Rising for the Moon also included, for the first time, the complete 1974 L.A. Troubadour performance of Fairport with Denny back on board, prior to the official announcement of her re-joining the group.
On account of unprecedented demand for, and exhaustion of supply of the limited edition 19-CD set cited above, in October 2012 a limited edition 4-CD version was released entitled The Notes and The Words: A Collection of Demos and Rarities, containing "75 songs that represent the cream of the rarities, demos and outtakes from the box set". Limited to 3,500 copies, this compilation is also now out-of-print.
In 2013, Spectrum records issued a single-disc CD entitled The Lady – The Essential Sandy Denny that comprised 15 previously issued tracks, generally from Denny's well known albums.
2014 saw the release of another Fairport live U.S. radio broadcast from their 1974 tour with Denny, on RockBeat Records, entitled Live 1974 (My Father's Place), comprising 11 live tracks, most featuring Denny, recorded at the New York rock club My Father's Place.
A four-disc Fotheringay retrospective, Nothing More: The Collected Fotheringay, was released on 30 March 2015. This is the most comprehensive compilation of the group's recordings, and contains, in addition to all the tracks on Fotheringay and Fotheringay 2 as both final studio versions and demos/alternate takes, the complete live concert set from Rotterdam in 1970 (including several previously unreleased tracks), seven Fotheringay tracks recorded in session for BBC radio (which had previously circulated only as bootlegs), plus a DVD disc containing four performances by Fotheringay recorded for the German Beat-Club TV series in 1970, which considerably augment the otherwise sparse known TV footage of Denny in particular.
May 2016 saw the release of a 2-CD compilation, I've Always Kept A Unicorn – The Acoustic Sandy Denny which collected together many previously released, but dispersed, acoustic and/or demo versions of songs better known from their album counterparts, as well as three previously unreleased demos (with Linda Thompson, at the time Linda Peters) from 1972's Rock On sessions by one-off band The Bunch.
A 7-CD box set by Fairport Convention entitled Come All Ye – The First 10 Years was released in July 2017 and contains a small number of additional, previously unreleased demos and alternate takes featuring Denny during her first tenure with the band over the period 1968–1969. Tracks not previously available include versions of Joni Mitchell's Eastern Rain, an a capella version of Nottamun Town, alternative takes of Autopsy and Who Knows Where the Time Goes, and a rehearsal version of The Deserter.
Unofficial releases and audience tapes
In addition to the authorised material listed above, a number unofficial/unauthorised compilations exist plus a range of audience recordings of varying quality, none of which would likely see the light of day as commercial issues but are of interest to a sector of Denny's audience on either historic or aesthetic grounds, often providing alternative views of songs known otherwise only from their commercially released versions. The first available unauthorised/bootleg CDs available in the 1980s and 1990s comprised principally off-air and other obscure material under such titles as Borrowed Thyme, Poems from Alexandra, Dark the Night, Wild Mountain Thyme and One Last Sad Refrain; such compilations are now largely superseded by the subsequent availability of most of the off-air material in much better quality as official releases as described above.
Of more enduring interest are audience tapes of shows of which no "official" tapes survive. These include some early shows by Fairport Convention; a performance by Fotheringay at the 1970 Tenth National Jazz and Blues Festival, held at Plumpton Race Track, Streat, East Sussex, England; "solo" shows by Denny (on occasion with a small band including, among others, Richard Thompson) at the 1971 Lincoln Folk Festival and at the Eltham Well Hall Open Theatre in 1972; performances from York University and Guildhall, Newcastle upon Tyne, also in 1972; an early 1972 U.S. performance from The Bitter End in New York; and several sets (Birmingham and Croydon) from her final 1977 tour in addition to the officially released Gold Dust album; plus quite a large number of recordings strongly featuring Denny as part of the re-formed Fairport Convention over the period 1974–1975. The majority of these can be fairly easily located via relevant internet searches and, in addition, can be readily downloaded from archival music servers such as Sugarmegs (Sandy Denny concerts listed under "S": SugarMegs Streaming Server, Fairport and Fotheringay under "F": SugarMegs Streaming Server). A provisional list of such recordings as are known to exist, with details on where each can be accessed, is available here.
Legacy
Estate and family
After relocating to Australia and remarrying, Trevor Lucas died of a heart attack in 1989. Denny's estate is now managed by Lucas' widow, Elizabeth Hurtt-Lucas. A number of otherwise unreleased recordings of Sandy Denny from his collection have subsequently been the basis for posthumous releases of Denny's work including those on The Attic Tracks and elsewhere.
Sandy Denny's daughter, Georgia, has rarely spoken about her mother in a public forum and in the mid-2000s declined an invitation to write the liner notes for Sandy Denny Live at the BBC. However, in 2006 she flew to Britain from Australia to accept on her mother's behalf the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards award for Most Influential Folk Album of All Time, which was given for Fairport Convention's Liege and Lief. Georgia gave birth to twin daughters on 29 April 1997, and a tribute album, Georgia on Our Mind, featuring many of Sandy Denny's former bandmates and friends, was compiled in the children's honour. She also administers a Facebook page "Sandy Denny and Family" dedicated to her mother's memory and more recently, under the name Georgia Katt, has released some of her own DJ-based music.
Tributes
Since her death, many tributes have been made to Denny, both in music and elsewhere. Dave Pegg of Fairport Convention recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on his 1983 solo album The Cocktail Cowboy Goes It Alone. Dave Cousins of the Strawbs wrote "Ringing Down the Years" in memory of Denny shortly after her death. Songs more specific to the death were Bert Jansch's "Where Did My Life Go" and Richard Thompson's "Did She Jump or Was She Pushed?" Fellow Brit folk pioneers Spriguns changed the title of their 1978 album to Magic Lady after hearing of Denny's death while recording. In 1998, a variety of Daylily was named after her.
Denny's songs have been covered by numerous artists in the years since her death. Some of the notable acts to have covered her music include Yo La Tengo, former Marillion frontman Fish, who covered "Solo" on his album Songs from the Mirror, Cat Power, Judy Collins, Nanci Griffith and Nina Simone. Kate Bush mentioned Denny in the lyric of "Blow Away (For Bill)", as one of the musicians to greet Bill in Heaven. "Blow Away (For Bill)" is the third track on Bush's 1980 album Never for Ever. In 1984, Clann Eadair released the single "A tribute to Sandy Denny", featuring Phil Lynott on vocals.
Several radio specials have been produced about Denny's life and music, including BBC Radio 2's The Sandy Denny Story: Who Knows Where the Time Goes. In 2007, Denny's song "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" also received BBC Radio 2's 2007 Folk Award for "Favourite Folk Track of All Time". In 2010, she was recognized by NPR in their 50 Great Voices special series.
In April 2008, a tribute concert was held at The Troubadour in London, to mark the thirtieth anniversary of Denny's death. Those taking part included Martin Carthy, Linda Thompson and Joe Boyd.
A more extensive tribute was given later that year in December at the Southbank in the Queen Elizabeth Hall called The Lady: A Tribute to Sandy Denny with a band composed of members of Bellowhead, the evening featured a mix of young folk acts like Jim Moray and Lisa Knapp alongside those that had known and worked with Denny such as Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. These acts were joined by performers from outside the world of folk like PP Arnold and Marc Almond. The concert, which primarily featured songs written by Denny, received a four-star review in The Guardian. In May 2012 the Southbank concert was expanded into an eight date UK tour called The Lady: A Homage to Sandy Denny. The tour showcased Sandy's entire songbook taking in her work with Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, her solo career and the new songs completed by Thea Gilmore on her album Don't Stop Singing.
The band was, once again, composed of members of Bellowhead. Other acts performing included the aforementioned Thea Gilmore and up-and-coming folk acts Lavinia Blackwall of Trembling Bells, Blair Dunlop and Sam Carter, alongside more established folk stars Maddy Prior, Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. The line-up was completed with performers not normally associated with the folk scene; Green Gartside, Joan Wasser (also known as Joan As Police Woman), and PP Arnold. The tour was well received, obtaining a four-star review in The Times. The London concert at the Barbican was filmed for BBC4, and broadcast in a 90-minute programme titled The Songs of Sandy Denny in November 2012.
In the 2012 Irish film Silence (Harvest Films & South Wind Blows), "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" is used during the film and final credits.
In April 2016 Denny was inducted into the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards Hall of Fame.
Alela Diane recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on her album Cusp, released in February 2018. The song reflects on Denny's final tragic days and her orphaned baby daughter.
Discography
Solo studio albums
The North Star Grassman and the Ravens (1971)
Sandy (1972)
Like an Old Fashioned Waltz (1974)
Rendezvous (1977)
Solo live albums
The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 (1997)
Gold Dust (1998) (live recording from final tour, 1977)
Live at the BBC (2007 4-disc compilation)
Sandy – Deluxe edition, 2012 – includes "Live at Ebbetts Field" (previously unreleased concert on disc 2)
With others
Denny's collaborations with other artists, including with Alex Campbell, The Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, and The Bunch, together with numerous posthumous releases and compilation albums, are detailed further on the Sandy Denny discography page.
References and notes
General
Further reading
Mick Houghton. I've Always Kept a Unicorn – The Biography of Sandy Denny. Faber & Faber, 2015;
Clinton Heylin. No More Sad Refrains – The Life and Times of Sandy Denny. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Clinton Heylin. Gypsy Love Songs & Sad Refrains – The Recordings of Richard Thompson and Sandy Denny. Labour of Love Productions, 1989.
Colin Larkin. The Guinness Who's Who of Folk Music. Guinness Publishing Ltd;
Jim Irvin. Angel of Avalon. MOJO Magazine, August 1998.
Colin Harper, Trevor Hodgett. Irish Folk, Traditional & Blues: A Secret History. Cherry Red, 2005;
Pamela Murray Winters. No Thought of Leaving: A life of Sandy Denny. 2000. (Unpublished).
Brian Hinton, Geoff Wall. Ashley Hutchings: The Guv'nor & the Rise of Folk Rock. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Patrick Humphries. Meet On The Ledge: The Classic Years 1967–1975. Virgin Books, 1997;
Patrick Humphries. Richard Thompson: Strange Affair – The Biography. Virgin Books, 1996;
Philip Ward, "Sandy Denny: A Thirtieth Anniversary", R2 (Rock'n'Reel) 2(9), May/June 2008.
Philip Ward, Sandy Denny: Reflections on Her Music''. Matador, 2011;
External links
Official website
Homage to Sandy Denny
Dedicated to the memory of Sandy Denny
Sandy Denny website
1947 births
1978 deaths
20th-century English singers
20th-century English women singers
A&M Records artists
Accidental deaths from falls
Accidental deaths in London
Deaths by intracerebral hemorrhage
Alumni of Kingston College (England)
British folk rock musicians
Burials at Putney Vale Cemetery
English folk singers
English people of Scottish descent
English women singer-songwriters
Fairport Convention members
Women rock singers
Fotheringay members
Island Records artists
People from Byfield, Northamptonshire
People from Wimbledon, London
Singers from London
Strawbs members
The Bunch members | false | [
"Follow Me is the second album of Dutch singer Do.\n\nIt did well in the Netherlands, debuting at #8 in the Mega Top 100 (album chart).\n\nAlbum information\nAfter her successful debut album Do she began working on her second album with her best friend and musical partner Glenn Corneille. They made a basis for the next album but Glenn Corneille died in a car disaster. However, Do needed to go on, so she started again where she left off.\n\nThe album contains 12 songs. Do co-wrote 3 songs; Love Me, Tune Into Me and When Everything is Gone. It features several different music genres, such as Pop, Jazz, Gospel and Country.\n\nTrack listing\n\nChart positions\n\nReferences\n.\n\n2006 albums\nDo (singer) albums\nSony BMG albums",
"Do-support (or do-insertion), in English grammar, is the use of the auxiliary verb do, including its inflected forms does and did, to form negated clauses and questions as well as other constructions in which subject–auxiliary inversion is required.\n\nThe verb \"do\" can be used as an auxiliary even in simple declarative sentences, and it usually serves to add emphasis, as in \"I did shut the fridge.\" However, in the negated and inverted clauses referred to above, it is used because the conventions of Modern English syntax permit these constructions only when an auxiliary is present. It is not idiomatic in Modern English to add the negating word not to a lexical verb with finite form; not can be added only to an auxiliary or copular verb. For example, the sentence I am not with the copula be is fully idiomatic, but I know not with a finite lexical verb, while grammatical, is archaic. If there is no other auxiliary present when negation is required, the auxiliary do is used to produce a form like I do not (don't) know. The same applies in clauses requiring inversion, including most questions: inversion must involve the subject and an auxiliary verb so it is not idiomatic to say Know you him?; today's English usually substitutes Do you know him?\n\nDo-support is not used when there is already an auxiliary or copular verb present or with non-finite verb forms (infinitives and participles). It is sometimes used with subjunctive forms. Furthermore, the use of do as an auxiliary should be distinguished from the use of do as a normal lexical verb, as in They do their homework.\n\nCommon uses\nDo-support appears to accommodate a number of varying grammatical constructions:\nquestion formation,\nthe appearance of the negation not, and\nnegative inversion.\nThese constructions often cannot occur without do-support or the presence of some other auxiliary verb.\n\nIn questions\nThe presence of an auxiliary (or copular) verb allows subject–auxiliary inversion to take place, as is required in most interrogative sentences in English. If there is already an auxiliary or copula present, do-support is not required when forming questions:\n\n He will laugh. → Will he laugh? (the auxiliary will inverts with the subject he)\n She is at home. → Is she at home? (the copula is inverts with the subject she)\n\nThis applies not only in yes–no questions but also in questions formed using interrogative words:\n\n When will he laugh?\n\nHowever, if there is no auxiliary or copula present, inversion requires the introduction of an auxiliary in the form of do-support:\n\n I know. → Do I know? (Compare: *Know I?)\n He laughs. → Does he laugh? (Compare: *Laughs he?)\n She came home. → Did she come home? (Compare: *Came she home?)\n\nThe finite (inflected) verb is now the auxiliary do; the following verb is a bare infinitive which does not inflect: does he laugh? (not laughs); did she come? (not came).\n\nIn negated questions, the negating word not may appear either following the subject, or attached to the auxiliary in the contracted form n't. That applies both to do-support and to other auxiliaries:\n\n Why are you not playing? / Why aren't you playing?\n Do you not want to try? / Don't you want to try?\n\nThe above principles do not apply to wh-questions if the interrogative word is the subject or part of the subject. Then, there is no inversion and so there is no need for do-support: Who lives here?, Whose dog bit you?\n\nThe verb have, in the sense of possession, is sometimes used without do-support as if it were an auxiliary, but this is considered dated. The version with do-support is also correct:\n\n Have you any idea what is going on here?\n Do you have any idea what is going on here?\n (Have you got any idea what is going on here? – the order is similar to the first example, but have is an auxiliary verb here)\n\nFor elliptical questions and tag questions, see the elliptical sentences section below.\n\nWith not\nIn the same way that the presence of an auxiliary allows question formation, the appearance of the negating word not is allowed as well. Then too, if no other auxiliary or copular verb is present, do-support is required.\n\n He will laugh. → He will not laugh. (not attaches to the auxiliary will)\n She laughs. → She does not laugh. (not attaches to the added auxiliary does)\n\nIn the second sentence, do-support is required because idiomatic Modern English does not allow forms like *She laughs not. The verb have, in the sense of possession, is sometimes negated thus:\n\n I haven't the foggiest idea.\n\nMost combinations of auxiliary/copula plus not have a contracted form ending in -n't, such as isn't, won't, etc. The relevant contractions for negations formed using do-support are don't, doesn't and didn't. Such forms are used very frequently in informal English.\n\nDo-support is required for negated imperatives even when the verb is the copula be:\n\nDo not do that.\nDon't be silly.\n\nHowever, there is no do-support with non-finite, as they are negated by a preceding not:\n\nIt would be a crime not to help him (the infinitive to help is negated)\nNot knowing what else to do, I stood my ground (the present participle knowing is negated)\nNot eating vegetables can harm your health (the gerund eating is negated)\n\nWith subjunctive verb forms, as a present subjunctive, do is infrequently used for negation, which is frequently considered ambiguous or incorrect because it resembles the indicative. The usual method to negate the present subjunctive is to precede the verb with a not, especially if the verb is be (as do-support with it, whether it be indicative or subjunctive, is ungrammatical):\n\nI suggest that he not receive any more funding (the present subjunctive receive is negated)\nIt is important that he not be there (the present subjunctive be is negated)\n\nAs a past subjunctive, however, did is needed for negation (unless the verb is be, whose past subjunctive is were):\n\nI wish that he did not know it\nI wish that he were not here\n\nThe negation in the examples negates the non-finite predicate. Compare the following competing formulations:\n\nI did not try to laugh. vs. I tried not to laugh.\nThey do not want to go. vs. They want not to go.\n\nThere are two predicates in each of the verb chains in the sentences. Do-support is needed when the higher of the two is negated; it is not needed to negate the lower nonfinite predicate.\n\nFor negated questions, see the questions section above. For negated elliptical sentences, see the elliptical sentences section below.\n\nNegative inversion\nThe same principles as for question formation apply to other clauses in which subject–auxiliary inversion is required, particularly after negative expressions and expressions involving only (negative inversion):\n\n Never did he run that fast again. (wrong: *Never he did run that fast again. *Never ran he that fast again.)\n Only here do I feel at home. (wrong: *Only here feel I at home.)\n\nFurther uses\nIn addition to providing do-support in questions and negated clauses as described above, the auxiliary verb do can also be used in clauses that do not require do-support. In such cases, do-support may appear for pragmatic reasons.\n\nFor emphasis\nThe auxiliary generally appears for purposes of emphasis, for instance to establish a contrast or to express a correction:\n Did Bill eat his breakfast? Yes, he did eat his breakfast (did emphasizes the positive answer, which may be unexpected).\n Bill doesn't sing, then. No, he does sing (does emphasizes the correction of the previous statement).\n\nAs before, the main verb following the auxiliary becomes a bare infinitive, which is not inflected (one cannot say *did ate or *does sings in the above examples).\n\nAs with typical do-support, that usage of do does not occur with other auxiliaries or a copular verb. Then, emphasis can be obtained by adding stress to the auxiliary or copular:\n\n Would you take the risk? Yes, I would take the risk.\n Bill isn't singing, then. No, he is singing.\n\n(Some auxiliaries, such as can, change their pronunciation when stressed; see Weak and strong forms in English.)\n\nIn negative sentences, emphasis can be obtained by adding stress either to the negating word (if used in full) or to the contracted form ending in n't. That applies whether or not do-support is used:\n\n I wouldn't (or would not) take the risk.\n They don't (or do not) appear on the list.\n\nEmphatic do can also be used with imperatives, including with the copula be:\n\n Do take care! Do be careful!\n\nIn elliptical sentences\nThe auxiliary do is also used in various types of elliptical sentences, where the main verb is omitted (it can be said to be \"understood\", usually because it would be the same verb as was used in a preceding sentence or clause). That includes the following types:\n\nTag questions:\n He plays well, doesn't he?\n You don't like Sara, do you?\nElliptical questions:\n I like pasta. Do you?\n I went to the party. Why didn't you?\nElliptical statements:\n They swam, but I didn't.\n He looks smart, and so do you.\n You fell asleep, and I did, too.\n\nSuch uses include cases that do-support would have been used in a complete clause (questions, negatives, inversion) but also cases that (as in the last example) the complete clause would normally have been constructed without do (I fell asleep too). In such instances do may be said to be acting as a pro-verb since it effectively takes the place of a verb or verb phrase: did substitutes for fell asleep.\n\nAs in the principal cases of do-support, do does not normally occur when there is already an auxiliary or copula present; the auxiliary or copula is retained in the elliptical sentence:\n\nHe is playing well, isn't he?\nI can cook pasta. Can you?\nYou should get some sleep, and I should too.\n\nHowever, it is possible to use do as a pro-verb (see below section #Pro-verbs & Do-so Substitution even after auxiliaries in some dialects:\n\nHave you put the shelf up yet? I haven't done (or I haven't), but I will do (or I will).\n(However it is not normally used in this way as a to-infinitive: Have you put the shelf up? I plan to, rather than *I plan to do; or as a passive participle: Was it built? Yes, it was, not *Yes, it was done.)\n\nPro-verbal uses of do are also found in the imperative: Please do. Don't!\n\nPro-verbs and do-so substitution\nThe phrases do so and do what for questions are pro-verb forms in English. They can be used as substitutes for verbs in x-bar theory grammar to test verb phrase completeness. Bare infinitives forms often are used in place of the missing pro-verb forms.\n\nExamples from Santorini and Kroch:\n\nTests for constituenthood of a verb-phrase in X'-grammar\nThe do so construction can be used to test if a verb-phrase is a constituent phrase in X'-grammar by substitution similarly to how other pro-forms can be used to test for noun-phrases, etc.\n\nIn X-bar theory, the verb-phrase projects three bar-levels such as this:\n\n VP\n / \\\n ZP X'\n / \\\n X' YP\n |\n X \n |\n head\n\nWith a simple sentence:\n\n S\n |\n VP\n / \\\n / \\\n / \\\n / \\\n NP \\\n / \\ \\ \n DP N' V'\n | | / \\\nThe children / \\\n / \\\n V' PP\n / \\ /_\\\n / \\ with gusto\n V NP\n | /_\\\n ate the pizza\n\nHere again exemplified by Santorini and Kroch, do so substitution for testing constituent verb phrases in the above sample sentence:\n\n S\n |\n VP\n / \\\n / \\\n / \\\n / \\\n NP \\\n / \\ \\ \n DP N' V'\n | | / \\\nThe children / \\\n / \\\n V' PP\n / \\ /_\\\n / \\ with gusto\n V NP\n | /_\\\n did so the pizza\n\nUse of do as main verb\nApart from its uses as an auxiliary, the verb do (with its inflected forms does, did, done, doing) can be used as an ordinary lexical verb (main verb):\n\nDo your homework!\nWhat are you doing?\n\nLike other non-auxiliary verbs, do cannot be directly negated with not and cannot participate in inversion so it may itself require do-support, with both auxiliary and lexical instances of do appearing together:\n\n They didn't do the laundry on Sunday. (did is the auxiliary, do is the main verb)\n Why do you do karate? (the first do is the auxiliary, the second is the main verb)\n How do you do? (a set phrase used as a polite greeting)\n\nMeaning contribution\nIn the various cases seen above that require do-support, the auxiliary verb do makes no apparent contribution to the meaning of the sentence so it is sometimes called a dummy auxiliary. Historically, however, in Middle English, auxiliary do apparently had a meaning contribution, serving as a marker of aspect (probably perfective aspect, but in some cases, the meaning may have been imperfective). In Early Modern English, the semantic value was lost, and the usage of forms with do began to approximate that found today.\n\nOrigins\n\nSome form of auxiliary \"do\" occurs in all West Germanic languages except Afrikaans. It is generally accepted that the past tense of Germanic weak verbs (in English, -ed) was formed from a combination of the infinitive with a past tense form of \"do\", as exemplified in Gothic. The origins of the construction in English are debated: some scholars argue it was already present in Old English, but not written due to stigmatization. Scholars disagree whether the construction arose from the use of \"do\" as a lexical verb in its own right, or whether periphrastic \"do\" arose from a causative meaning of the verb or vice versa. Examples of auxiliary \"do\" in Old English writing appear to be limited to its use in a causative sense, which is parallel to the earliest uses in other West Germanic languages. Others argue that the construction arose either via the influence of Celtic speakers or that the construction arose as a form of creolization when native speakers addressed foreigners and children.\n\nSee also\n\nEnglish verbs\nEnglish clause syntax\nIntensifier\n\nReferences\n\nEnglish grammar\nWord order\nSyntax\nGenerative syntax"
] |
[
"Sandy Denny",
"Early career",
"How did she get started in her career?",
"in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus.",
"What did she do in the club?",
"After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings",
"What did she do there?",
"the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs.",
"How long did she work there?",
"I don't know.",
"What did she do after leaving there?",
"Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label,",
"What did she record?",
"the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo.",
"Did they do well?",
"I don't know."
] | C_e6cc2f78b77b4fcab1029b8e527f1a13_1 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | 8 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article aside from Sandy Dennys albums and work on the folk club?? | Sandy Denny | Her nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn. After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fhir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels". Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes. By this time she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark which was released belatedly in 1973 credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer. CANNOTANSWER | at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. | Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny (6 January 1947 – 21 April 1978) was an English singer-songwriter who was lead singer of the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. She has been described as "the pre-eminent British folk rock singer".
After briefly working with the Strawbs, Denny joined Fairport Convention in 1968, remaining with them until 1969. She formed the short-lived band Fotheringay in 1970, before focusing on a solo career. Between 1971 and 1977, Denny released four solo albums: The North Star Grassman and the Ravens, Sandy, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz and Rendezvous. She also duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore" for Led Zeppelin's album Led Zeppelin IV in 1971. Denny died in 1978 at the age of 31 due to injuries and health issues related to alcohol abuse.
Music publications Uncut and Mojo have described Denny as Britain's finest female singer-songwriter. Her composition "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" has been recorded by Judy Collins, Eva Cassidy, Nina Simone, 10,000 Maniacs and Cat Power. Her recorded work has been the subject of numerous reissues, along with a wealth of previously unreleased material which has appeared over the more than 40 years since her death, including a 19-CD box set released in November 2010.
Childhood
Denny was born on 6 January 1947 at Nelson Hospital, Kingston Road, Merton Park, London, to Neil and Edna Denny. She studied classical piano as a child.
Her paternal grandfather was from Dundee, and her paternal grandmother was a Scots Gaelic speaker and singer of traditional songs. At an early age Denny showed an interest in singing, although her strict parents were reluctant to believe there was a living to be made from it. She attended Coombe Girls' School in New Malden; after leaving school she began training as a nurse at the Royal Brompton Hospital.
Early career
Denny's nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn.
After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames, Denny began working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels".
Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes.
By this time, she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark, which was released belatedly in 1973, credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer.
From Fairport to Fotheringay
After making the Saga albums with Alex Campbell and Johnny Silvo, Denny looked for a band that would allow her to stretch herself as a vocalist, reach a wider audience, and have the opportunity to display her songwriting. She said, "I wanted to do something more with my voice." After working briefly with the Strawbs, Denny remained unconvinced that they could provide that opportunity, and so she ended her relationship with the band.
Fairport Convention conducted auditions in May 1968 for a replacement singer following the departure of Judy Dyble after their debut album, and Denny became the obvious choice. According to group member Simon Nicol, her personality and musicianship made her stand out from the other auditionees "like a clean glass in a sink full of dirty dishes".
Beginning with What We Did on Our Holidays, the first of three albums she made with the band in the late 1960s, Denny is credited with encouraging Fairport Convention to explore the traditional British folk repertoire, and is thus regarded as a key figure in the development of British folk rock. She brought with her the traditional repertoire she had refined in the clubs, including "A Sailor's Life" featured on their second album together Unhalfbricking. Framing Denny's performance of this song with their own electric improvisations, her bandmates discovered what then proved to be the inspiration for an entire album, the influential Liege & Lief (1969).
Denny left Fairport Convention in December 1969 to develop her own songwriting more fully. To this end, she formed her own band, Fotheringay, which included her future husband, Australian Trevor Lucas, formerly of the group Eclection.
They created one self-titled album, which included an eight-minute version of the traditional "Banks of the Nile", and several Denny originals, among them "The Sea" and "Nothing More". The latter marked her first composition on the piano, which was to become her primary instrument from then on. Fotheringay started to record a second album in late 1970, but it remained unfinished after Denny announced that she was leaving the group and producer Joe Boyd left to take up a job at Warner Brothers in California. Denny would later blame Boyd's hostility towards the group for its demise.
Solo career and final years
She then turned to recording her first solo album, The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. Released in 1971, it is distinguished by its elusive lyrics and unconventional harmonies. Highlights included "Late November", inspired by a dream and the death of Fairport band member Martin Lamble, and "Next Time Around" a cryptogram about Jackson C. Frank, one of her many portraits in song.
Sandy, with a cover photograph by David Bailey, followed in 1972 and was the first of her albums to be produced by Trevor Lucas. As well as introducing eight new original compositions, the album marked her last recording of a traditional song, "The Quiet Joys of Brotherhood" (words by Richard Fariña), with Denny's ambitious multi-tracked vocal arrangement inspired by the Ensemble of the Bulgarian Republic.
Melody Maker readers twice voted her the "Best British Female Singer", in 1970 and 1971 and, together with contemporaries including Richard Thompson and Ashley Hutchings, she participated in a one-off project called the Bunch to record a collection of rock and roll era standards released under the title of Rock On.
In 1971, Denny duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore", which was included on Led Zeppelin's 1971 album (Led Zeppelin IV); she was the only guest vocalist ever to appear on a Led Zeppelin album. In 1972 Denny had a small cameo on Lou Reizner's symphonic arrangement of the Who's rock opera Tommy. Her brief appearance was at the end of the track "It's a Boy", which also featured vocals from Pete Townshend.
In 1973, she married long-term boyfriend and producer Trevor Lucas and recorded a third solo album, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz. The songs continued to detail many of her personal preoccupations: loss, loneliness, fear of the dark, the passing of time and the changing seasons. The album contained one of her best loved compositions, "Solo", and featured a cover image by Gered Mankowitz.
In 1974, she returned to Fairport Convention (of which her husband was by then a member) for a world tour (captured on the 1974 album Fairport Live Convention) and a studio album, Rising for the Moon in 1975. Although her development as a soloist and songwriter had taken her further away from the folk roots direction that the band had pursued since Liege & Lief, seven of the eleven tracks on Rising for the Moon were either written or co-written by her.
Denny and Lucas left Fairport Convention at the end of 1975 and embarked on what was to become her final album Rendezvous. Released in 1977, the album sold poorly and Denny was subsequently dropped by Island Records. Having relocated to the village of Byfield in Northamptonshire in the mid-seventies, Denny gave birth to her only child, a daughter named Georgia, in July 1977.
A UK tour to promote Rendezvous in autumn 1977 marked her final public appearances. The closing night at the Royalty Theatre in London on 27 November 1977 was recorded for a live album, Gold Dust, which, because of technical problems in the recording of the electric guitar, was belatedly released in 1998 after most of the guitars had been re-recorded by Jerry Donahue.
Death
Linda Thompson would later note that Denny "really started going downhill in 1976" and demonstrated increasing levels of both manic and depressive behaviour. Learning that she was pregnant did little to mellow Denny's reckless lifestyle, which was heightened by increasing depression, mood swings and the unravelling of her "tumultuous" marriage to Trevor Lucas. She abused drugs and alcohol while pregnant with her daughter, Georgia, who was born prematurely in July 1977. Much like her moods, Denny's interest towards her daughter appeared to oscillate between obsessive and unconcerned; friends recalled both frantic, middle-of-the-night phone calls about teething, as well as Denny "crashing the car and leaving the baby in the pub and all sorts of stuff".
Friends would later note that Denny had a history of purposely throwing herself off bar stools and down flights of stairs in order to get a reaction. Several remembered this behaviour as "Sandy's party trick", while Dave Pegg's wife Chris stated, "She certainly did it in my house and it could be a very dramatic gesture, like self-harming. She could do it without hurting herself usually but I had a feeling there would be one time too many." Those who knew Denny said that her increasing level of alcohol abuse in the last years of her life led to an increasing number of falls (both accidental and deliberate), resulting in a growing number of injuries.
In late March 1978, while on holiday with her parents and baby Georgia in Cornwall, Denny was injured when she fell down a staircase and hit her head on concrete. Following the incident, she suffered from intense headaches; a doctor prescribed her the painkiller dextropropoxyphene, a drug known to have fatal side effects when mixed with alcohol. On 1 April, several days after the fall in Cornwall, Denny performed a charity concert at Byfield. The final song she performed was "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?"
At some unknown point during the first half of April 1978, Denny suffered yet another major fall at her home in Byfield. On 13 April, concerned about his wife's erratic behaviour and fearing for his daughter's safety, Trevor Lucas left the UK and returned to his native Australia with their child, leaving Denny without telling her. He sold their Austin Princess car in order to raise funds for the journey.
On discovering Lucas' departure, Denny went to stay at the home of her friend Miranda Ward. During this time, Denny apparently set up an appointment to speak with a doctor about her headaches, and also intended to get advice about her alcohol addiction. At some point after 8 am on 17 April, Denny fell into a coma. Ward was out of the house at the time, and had asked her friend Jon Cole (of the band The Movies) to check in on Denny. Cole entered the home at 3 pm, and found Denny unconscious at the foot of the staircase which led to the second floor of the house. She was rushed by ambulance to Queen Mary's Hospital in nearby Roehampton.
On 19 April, she was transferred to Atkinson Morley Hospital in Wimbledon. After receiving news that Denny was in a coma, Lucas returned from Australia. Upon his arrival at the hospital, doctors informed him that Denny was effectively brain-dead and her condition would not improve. He granted their recommendation to turn off life-support machines; however, just ten minutes before this was to take place, at 7:50 pm on 21 April 1978, Sandy Denny died, without regaining consciousness. Her death was ruled to be the result of a traumatic mid-brain haemorrhage and blunt force trauma to her head. She was 31 years old.
The funeral took place on 27 April 1978 at Putney Vale Cemetery. After the vicar had read Denny's favourite psalm, Psalm 23, a piper played "Flowers of the Forest", a traditional song commemorating the fallen of Flodden Field and one which had appeared on the 1970 Fairport album Full House. The inscription on her headstone reads:
Posthumous releases
Official releases
Although Denny had a devoted following in her lifetime, she did not achieve mass market success. In the years since her death, her reputation has grown. A four-album box set entitled Who Knows Where the Time Goes? (1985) was produced by her widower Trevor Lucas and Joe Boyd and included a number of rare and previously unreleased tracks by Denny, either solo or with Fairport Convention (1968, 1969, 1974) and Fotheringay (1970). This was the first public indication that a large cache of unreleased material existed. A one-disc subset of these recordings was subsequently issued on CD by Island in 1987 entitled The Best Of Sandy Denny.
In 1987, a compilation of previously unreleased tracks recorded for the BBC by incarnations of Fairport including Denny was released on LP under the title Heyday, which was subsequently released on CD in 2001 and again, with extra tracks, in 2002; all tracks were later included, with others, on the 2007 4-CD box set Fairport Convention Live at the BBC (see below). The initial purpose of this compilation was to document the more "American" material performed live by the What We Did on Our Holidays lineup of the band that never made it to vinyl, while the re-releases added additional songs as performed by the Unhalfbricking and Liege and Lief lineups.
Also in 1987, a VHS documentary, It All Comes 'Round Again, on Fairport Convention was released which contained excerpts of several audio recordings featuring Denny, plus a single poor-quality video recording of her singing her song "Solo" during her second stint with Fairport in 1974, as filmed by the University of Birmingham's "Guild TV" amateur organisation. The original tape of this recording has apparently been lost; however, "Like an Old Fashioned Waltz" does appear on the DVD documentary Sandy Denny Under Review (see below) and other tracks have been made available via YouTube in very poor quality.
Over the period 1988–1994, the Australian "Friends of Fairport" issued a series of subscriber-only cassette compilations drawing in the main on previously unreleased tapes from Trevor Lucas' collection (as stored in his attic in fact). Attic Tracks (AT) 1 (1988) contained out-takes from Sandy as well as some Fairport material and a few bizarre extras; AT 2 (1989) contained only Trevor Lucas material, no Denny; AT 3 (1989) entitled First and Last Tracks comprised 1966–1967 home demos and rare radio tracks, as well as 9 "pre-overdub" songs from Denny's last concert at the Royalty Theatre, London, on 27 November 1977 (a partial alternative to the later, overdubbed CD release Gold Dust), and AT 4 (1994): Together Again comprised one side of Lucas and the other of Denny in the form of more home demos, studio outtakes, and 4 tracks from a 1973 BBC radio concert. A cut-down version of these tracks (18 songs) was subsequently compiled for CD release by the Australian label Raven Records in 1995 called Sandy Denny, Trevor Lucas and Friends: The Attic Tracks 1972–1984.
In 1991, Joe Boyd issued a new version of Denny's All Our Own Work album with the Strawbs, called Sandy Denny and the Strawbs, on his Hannibal Records label. The album had strings added to some tracks, including "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" and further tracks with Denny on lead vocal.
In 1997, a one-disc compilation of Denny's solo BBC recordings was released as The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 on Strange Fruit Records. Due to rights issues it was withdrawn on the day of release, thereby creating a highly collectible disc (up until the release of the comprehensive Live at the BBC box set in 2007). This release was followed in 1998 when Denny's final performance at the Royalty Theatre, entitled Gold Dust, was issued on CD, following a degree of re-recording and overdubbing of selected backing parts to replace reportedly unsatisfactory originals.
In 1999, a single-disc compilation, Listen Listen – An Introduction to Sandy Denny, was released on Island Records comprising 17 previously released tracks taken from her four Island solo albums.
No More Sad Refrains: The Anthology was released by Universal Records in 2000. When first released, this compilation had several rare tracks, including "The Ballad of Easy Rider" from the Liege and Lief sessions, "Learning the Game" and "When Will I Be Loved" from the Bunch album Rock On, "Here in Silence" and "Man of Iron" from the Pass of Arms soundtrack, and a previously unissued demo of "Stranger to Himself".
In 2002, a previously unreleased, 2-CD live US concert recording by Fairport Convention from 1974 featuring Denny was released on the Burning Airlines label. Entitled Before The Moon, it originated from a radio broadcast from Ebbets Field in Denver, Colorado, on 23/24 May 1974. The second disc was a limited release bonus with the original release comprising the second set from the same concert. This recording was re-released in shortened form as a single disc in 2011 on the It's About Music label entitled Fairport Convention with Sandy Denny: Ebbets Field 1974.
Also in 2002, the American A&M Records issued a budget-price "20th Century Masters" compilation called The Best of Sandy Denny with 10 tracks all available on Denny's studio albums.
In 2004 a second comprehensive five-CD box set was released on the Fledg'ling record label called A Boxful of Treasures that included many unreleased recordings, in particular a whole disc of acoustic demos, many recorded at her home in Byfield that was highly prized amongst fans and critics alike, who had long asserted that her solo performances showed her work in its best light, revealing the true quality of her vocal style and compositions. Also in 2004, the Spectrum label issued a 16-track compilation of previously released material entitled The Collection: Chronological Covers & Concert Classics, including a mix of studio recordings and live excerpts from the Gold Dust Royalty concert.
In 2005, remastered versions of all Denny's solo albums came out with bonus tracks. Also in 2005, a single CD compilation entitled Where the Time Goes: Sandy '67 was released on Castle Music containing all of Saga's Denny album tracks (including the alternative recordings on It's Sandy Denny), together with two self accompanied tracks from Denny's recordings with the Strawbs.
A DVD documentary entitled Sandy Denny Under Review was released on the Sexy Intellectual label in 2006 which contained interviews with her contemporaries plus brief excerpts from her audio recordings, plus some short video clips including two of the poor quality video recordings with Fairport from Birmingham University (details given above), two with Fotheringay from German TV's Beat-Club (further details given below), and three solo excerpts from the only surviving BBC footage on One In Ten (details as given in the next item).
A 4-disc box set, Sandy Denny Live at the BBC, came out in September 2007 containing (virtually) all of the known solo recordings made by Denny for that UK broadcaster including two complete concerts, one at the Paris Theatre in 1972 and one recorded for Sounds on Sunday in 1973, plus a range of other material spanning the years 1966–1973. Disc 3 of this set was a DVD containing surviving TV footage from a 1971 BBC One in Ten session comprising solo performances by Denny of "The North Star Grassman and the Ravens", "Crazy Lady Blues" and "Late November", along with digitised excerpts from her diaries, rare photos and a discography. A 1-disc subset of this box set entitled The Best of the BBC Recordings was subsequently released in 2008.
A companion box set, Fairport Convention Live at the BBC, also came out in 2007 and covered equivalent live recordings by Fairport over the period 1968–1974, of which the first two discs (1968–1970) contain examples from Denny's time with that group.
In 2008, Jerry Donahue completed the unfinished second Fotheringay album begun in the autumn of 1970. It was released to general acclaim as Fotheringay 2 and contained some notable Denny performances, in particular earlier versions of two Denny compositions, "Late November" and "John the Gun", and performances of the traditional songs "Gypsy Davey" and "Wild Mountain Thyme". Also in 2008, Island Remasters issued a double CD entitled The Music Weaver (Sandy Denny Remembered) which contained a mix of better known tracks and less well known demos and live recordings, previously released but not in companion with studio sessions. This compilation is also one of the very few to contain the Led Zeppelin track "The Battle Of Evermore" which features a rare guest appearance by Denny.
In 2010, a large 19-CD retrospective box set, simply titled Sandy Denny, was released by Universal/Island Records in a limited edition of 3,000. It contained Denny's entire catalogue of studio recordings, including her work with the Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay and as a solo artist. The compilation also included a large number of outtakes, demos, live recordings, radio sessions and interviews. The box set was released to good reviews, including a 5-star review in Uncut and a 4-star review in The Guardian.
In late 2010, Thea Gilmore was commissioned by Denny's estate, in conjunction with Island Records, to write melodies to unrecorded lyrics found in Denny's papers. The resulting album, Don't Stop Singing, was released in November 2011 to generally good notices, including 4-star reviews in The Independent and The Guardian among others. On 21 April 2012, the single "London" was released as an exclusive Record Store Day 7″ single.
Further recordings were released in 2011, including a German recording of Fotheringay in concert released as Essen 1970 on the Garden of Delights label. The performance was remastered by original band member Jerry Donahue. This release was followed by 19 Rupert Street, a home recording of a rehearsal featuring Sandy and Alex Campbell recorded at his flat in August 1967. This release is notable for the fact that Sandy performs a number of tracks that are not available in any other versions, including a cover of "Fairytale Lullaby" by John Martyn. This CD was put out by Sandy's former Strawbs bandmate Dave Cousins on his Witchwood label.
Two-disc "Deluxe Editions" of Denny's album reissues appeared in 2011–2012 with additional tracks; the 2012 Deluxe Edition of Sandy included a previously unreleased eight-song solo set from her 1973 U.S. tour recorded at Ebbet's Field in Denver, Colorado. A similar two-disc reissue of Fairport Convention's Rising for the Moon also included, for the first time, the complete 1974 L.A. Troubadour performance of Fairport with Denny back on board, prior to the official announcement of her re-joining the group.
On account of unprecedented demand for, and exhaustion of supply of the limited edition 19-CD set cited above, in October 2012 a limited edition 4-CD version was released entitled The Notes and The Words: A Collection of Demos and Rarities, containing "75 songs that represent the cream of the rarities, demos and outtakes from the box set". Limited to 3,500 copies, this compilation is also now out-of-print.
In 2013, Spectrum records issued a single-disc CD entitled The Lady – The Essential Sandy Denny that comprised 15 previously issued tracks, generally from Denny's well known albums.
2014 saw the release of another Fairport live U.S. radio broadcast from their 1974 tour with Denny, on RockBeat Records, entitled Live 1974 (My Father's Place), comprising 11 live tracks, most featuring Denny, recorded at the New York rock club My Father's Place.
A four-disc Fotheringay retrospective, Nothing More: The Collected Fotheringay, was released on 30 March 2015. This is the most comprehensive compilation of the group's recordings, and contains, in addition to all the tracks on Fotheringay and Fotheringay 2 as both final studio versions and demos/alternate takes, the complete live concert set from Rotterdam in 1970 (including several previously unreleased tracks), seven Fotheringay tracks recorded in session for BBC radio (which had previously circulated only as bootlegs), plus a DVD disc containing four performances by Fotheringay recorded for the German Beat-Club TV series in 1970, which considerably augment the otherwise sparse known TV footage of Denny in particular.
May 2016 saw the release of a 2-CD compilation, I've Always Kept A Unicorn – The Acoustic Sandy Denny which collected together many previously released, but dispersed, acoustic and/or demo versions of songs better known from their album counterparts, as well as three previously unreleased demos (with Linda Thompson, at the time Linda Peters) from 1972's Rock On sessions by one-off band The Bunch.
A 7-CD box set by Fairport Convention entitled Come All Ye – The First 10 Years was released in July 2017 and contains a small number of additional, previously unreleased demos and alternate takes featuring Denny during her first tenure with the band over the period 1968–1969. Tracks not previously available include versions of Joni Mitchell's Eastern Rain, an a capella version of Nottamun Town, alternative takes of Autopsy and Who Knows Where the Time Goes, and a rehearsal version of The Deserter.
Unofficial releases and audience tapes
In addition to the authorised material listed above, a number unofficial/unauthorised compilations exist plus a range of audience recordings of varying quality, none of which would likely see the light of day as commercial issues but are of interest to a sector of Denny's audience on either historic or aesthetic grounds, often providing alternative views of songs known otherwise only from their commercially released versions. The first available unauthorised/bootleg CDs available in the 1980s and 1990s comprised principally off-air and other obscure material under such titles as Borrowed Thyme, Poems from Alexandra, Dark the Night, Wild Mountain Thyme and One Last Sad Refrain; such compilations are now largely superseded by the subsequent availability of most of the off-air material in much better quality as official releases as described above.
Of more enduring interest are audience tapes of shows of which no "official" tapes survive. These include some early shows by Fairport Convention; a performance by Fotheringay at the 1970 Tenth National Jazz and Blues Festival, held at Plumpton Race Track, Streat, East Sussex, England; "solo" shows by Denny (on occasion with a small band including, among others, Richard Thompson) at the 1971 Lincoln Folk Festival and at the Eltham Well Hall Open Theatre in 1972; performances from York University and Guildhall, Newcastle upon Tyne, also in 1972; an early 1972 U.S. performance from The Bitter End in New York; and several sets (Birmingham and Croydon) from her final 1977 tour in addition to the officially released Gold Dust album; plus quite a large number of recordings strongly featuring Denny as part of the re-formed Fairport Convention over the period 1974–1975. The majority of these can be fairly easily located via relevant internet searches and, in addition, can be readily downloaded from archival music servers such as Sugarmegs (Sandy Denny concerts listed under "S": SugarMegs Streaming Server, Fairport and Fotheringay under "F": SugarMegs Streaming Server). A provisional list of such recordings as are known to exist, with details on where each can be accessed, is available here.
Legacy
Estate and family
After relocating to Australia and remarrying, Trevor Lucas died of a heart attack in 1989. Denny's estate is now managed by Lucas' widow, Elizabeth Hurtt-Lucas. A number of otherwise unreleased recordings of Sandy Denny from his collection have subsequently been the basis for posthumous releases of Denny's work including those on The Attic Tracks and elsewhere.
Sandy Denny's daughter, Georgia, has rarely spoken about her mother in a public forum and in the mid-2000s declined an invitation to write the liner notes for Sandy Denny Live at the BBC. However, in 2006 she flew to Britain from Australia to accept on her mother's behalf the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards award for Most Influential Folk Album of All Time, which was given for Fairport Convention's Liege and Lief. Georgia gave birth to twin daughters on 29 April 1997, and a tribute album, Georgia on Our Mind, featuring many of Sandy Denny's former bandmates and friends, was compiled in the children's honour. She also administers a Facebook page "Sandy Denny and Family" dedicated to her mother's memory and more recently, under the name Georgia Katt, has released some of her own DJ-based music.
Tributes
Since her death, many tributes have been made to Denny, both in music and elsewhere. Dave Pegg of Fairport Convention recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on his 1983 solo album The Cocktail Cowboy Goes It Alone. Dave Cousins of the Strawbs wrote "Ringing Down the Years" in memory of Denny shortly after her death. Songs more specific to the death were Bert Jansch's "Where Did My Life Go" and Richard Thompson's "Did She Jump or Was She Pushed?" Fellow Brit folk pioneers Spriguns changed the title of their 1978 album to Magic Lady after hearing of Denny's death while recording. In 1998, a variety of Daylily was named after her.
Denny's songs have been covered by numerous artists in the years since her death. Some of the notable acts to have covered her music include Yo La Tengo, former Marillion frontman Fish, who covered "Solo" on his album Songs from the Mirror, Cat Power, Judy Collins, Nanci Griffith and Nina Simone. Kate Bush mentioned Denny in the lyric of "Blow Away (For Bill)", as one of the musicians to greet Bill in Heaven. "Blow Away (For Bill)" is the third track on Bush's 1980 album Never for Ever. In 1984, Clann Eadair released the single "A tribute to Sandy Denny", featuring Phil Lynott on vocals.
Several radio specials have been produced about Denny's life and music, including BBC Radio 2's The Sandy Denny Story: Who Knows Where the Time Goes. In 2007, Denny's song "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" also received BBC Radio 2's 2007 Folk Award for "Favourite Folk Track of All Time". In 2010, she was recognized by NPR in their 50 Great Voices special series.
In April 2008, a tribute concert was held at The Troubadour in London, to mark the thirtieth anniversary of Denny's death. Those taking part included Martin Carthy, Linda Thompson and Joe Boyd.
A more extensive tribute was given later that year in December at the Southbank in the Queen Elizabeth Hall called The Lady: A Tribute to Sandy Denny with a band composed of members of Bellowhead, the evening featured a mix of young folk acts like Jim Moray and Lisa Knapp alongside those that had known and worked with Denny such as Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. These acts were joined by performers from outside the world of folk like PP Arnold and Marc Almond. The concert, which primarily featured songs written by Denny, received a four-star review in The Guardian. In May 2012 the Southbank concert was expanded into an eight date UK tour called The Lady: A Homage to Sandy Denny. The tour showcased Sandy's entire songbook taking in her work with Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, her solo career and the new songs completed by Thea Gilmore on her album Don't Stop Singing.
The band was, once again, composed of members of Bellowhead. Other acts performing included the aforementioned Thea Gilmore and up-and-coming folk acts Lavinia Blackwall of Trembling Bells, Blair Dunlop and Sam Carter, alongside more established folk stars Maddy Prior, Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. The line-up was completed with performers not normally associated with the folk scene; Green Gartside, Joan Wasser (also known as Joan As Police Woman), and PP Arnold. The tour was well received, obtaining a four-star review in The Times. The London concert at the Barbican was filmed for BBC4, and broadcast in a 90-minute programme titled The Songs of Sandy Denny in November 2012.
In the 2012 Irish film Silence (Harvest Films & South Wind Blows), "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" is used during the film and final credits.
In April 2016 Denny was inducted into the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards Hall of Fame.
Alela Diane recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on her album Cusp, released in February 2018. The song reflects on Denny's final tragic days and her orphaned baby daughter.
Discography
Solo studio albums
The North Star Grassman and the Ravens (1971)
Sandy (1972)
Like an Old Fashioned Waltz (1974)
Rendezvous (1977)
Solo live albums
The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 (1997)
Gold Dust (1998) (live recording from final tour, 1977)
Live at the BBC (2007 4-disc compilation)
Sandy – Deluxe edition, 2012 – includes "Live at Ebbetts Field" (previously unreleased concert on disc 2)
With others
Denny's collaborations with other artists, including with Alex Campbell, The Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, and The Bunch, together with numerous posthumous releases and compilation albums, are detailed further on the Sandy Denny discography page.
References and notes
General
Further reading
Mick Houghton. I've Always Kept a Unicorn – The Biography of Sandy Denny. Faber & Faber, 2015;
Clinton Heylin. No More Sad Refrains – The Life and Times of Sandy Denny. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Clinton Heylin. Gypsy Love Songs & Sad Refrains – The Recordings of Richard Thompson and Sandy Denny. Labour of Love Productions, 1989.
Colin Larkin. The Guinness Who's Who of Folk Music. Guinness Publishing Ltd;
Jim Irvin. Angel of Avalon. MOJO Magazine, August 1998.
Colin Harper, Trevor Hodgett. Irish Folk, Traditional & Blues: A Secret History. Cherry Red, 2005;
Pamela Murray Winters. No Thought of Leaving: A life of Sandy Denny. 2000. (Unpublished).
Brian Hinton, Geoff Wall. Ashley Hutchings: The Guv'nor & the Rise of Folk Rock. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Patrick Humphries. Meet On The Ledge: The Classic Years 1967–1975. Virgin Books, 1997;
Patrick Humphries. Richard Thompson: Strange Affair – The Biography. Virgin Books, 1996;
Philip Ward, "Sandy Denny: A Thirtieth Anniversary", R2 (Rock'n'Reel) 2(9), May/June 2008.
Philip Ward, Sandy Denny: Reflections on Her Music''. Matador, 2011;
External links
Official website
Homage to Sandy Denny
Dedicated to the memory of Sandy Denny
Sandy Denny website
1947 births
1978 deaths
20th-century English singers
20th-century English women singers
A&M Records artists
Accidental deaths from falls
Accidental deaths in London
Deaths by intracerebral hemorrhage
Alumni of Kingston College (England)
British folk rock musicians
Burials at Putney Vale Cemetery
English folk singers
English people of Scottish descent
English women singer-songwriters
Fairport Convention members
Women rock singers
Fotheringay members
Island Records artists
People from Byfield, Northamptonshire
People from Wimbledon, London
Singers from London
Strawbs members
The Bunch members | 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"
] |
[
"Sandy Denny",
"Early career",
"How did she get started in her career?",
"in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus.",
"What did she do in the club?",
"After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings",
"What did she do there?",
"the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs.",
"How long did she work there?",
"I don't know.",
"What did she do after leaving there?",
"Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label,",
"What did she record?",
"the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo.",
"Did they do well?",
"I don't know.",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band."
] | C_e6cc2f78b77b4fcab1029b8e527f1a13_1 | Did she agree to join? | 9 | Did Sandy Dennys agree to join The Troubadour folk club? | Sandy Denny | Her nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn. After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fhir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels". Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes. By this time she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark which was released belatedly in 1973 credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer. CANNOTANSWER | She recorded one album with them in Denmark which was released belatedly in 1973 credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. | Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny (6 January 1947 – 21 April 1978) was an English singer-songwriter who was lead singer of the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. She has been described as "the pre-eminent British folk rock singer".
After briefly working with the Strawbs, Denny joined Fairport Convention in 1968, remaining with them until 1969. She formed the short-lived band Fotheringay in 1970, before focusing on a solo career. Between 1971 and 1977, Denny released four solo albums: The North Star Grassman and the Ravens, Sandy, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz and Rendezvous. She also duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore" for Led Zeppelin's album Led Zeppelin IV in 1971. Denny died in 1978 at the age of 31 due to injuries and health issues related to alcohol abuse.
Music publications Uncut and Mojo have described Denny as Britain's finest female singer-songwriter. Her composition "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" has been recorded by Judy Collins, Eva Cassidy, Nina Simone, 10,000 Maniacs and Cat Power. Her recorded work has been the subject of numerous reissues, along with a wealth of previously unreleased material which has appeared over the more than 40 years since her death, including a 19-CD box set released in November 2010.
Childhood
Denny was born on 6 January 1947 at Nelson Hospital, Kingston Road, Merton Park, London, to Neil and Edna Denny. She studied classical piano as a child.
Her paternal grandfather was from Dundee, and her paternal grandmother was a Scots Gaelic speaker and singer of traditional songs. At an early age Denny showed an interest in singing, although her strict parents were reluctant to believe there was a living to be made from it. She attended Coombe Girls' School in New Malden; after leaving school she began training as a nurse at the Royal Brompton Hospital.
Early career
Denny's nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn.
After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames, Denny began working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels".
Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes.
By this time, she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark, which was released belatedly in 1973, credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer.
From Fairport to Fotheringay
After making the Saga albums with Alex Campbell and Johnny Silvo, Denny looked for a band that would allow her to stretch herself as a vocalist, reach a wider audience, and have the opportunity to display her songwriting. She said, "I wanted to do something more with my voice." After working briefly with the Strawbs, Denny remained unconvinced that they could provide that opportunity, and so she ended her relationship with the band.
Fairport Convention conducted auditions in May 1968 for a replacement singer following the departure of Judy Dyble after their debut album, and Denny became the obvious choice. According to group member Simon Nicol, her personality and musicianship made her stand out from the other auditionees "like a clean glass in a sink full of dirty dishes".
Beginning with What We Did on Our Holidays, the first of three albums she made with the band in the late 1960s, Denny is credited with encouraging Fairport Convention to explore the traditional British folk repertoire, and is thus regarded as a key figure in the development of British folk rock. She brought with her the traditional repertoire she had refined in the clubs, including "A Sailor's Life" featured on their second album together Unhalfbricking. Framing Denny's performance of this song with their own electric improvisations, her bandmates discovered what then proved to be the inspiration for an entire album, the influential Liege & Lief (1969).
Denny left Fairport Convention in December 1969 to develop her own songwriting more fully. To this end, she formed her own band, Fotheringay, which included her future husband, Australian Trevor Lucas, formerly of the group Eclection.
They created one self-titled album, which included an eight-minute version of the traditional "Banks of the Nile", and several Denny originals, among them "The Sea" and "Nothing More". The latter marked her first composition on the piano, which was to become her primary instrument from then on. Fotheringay started to record a second album in late 1970, but it remained unfinished after Denny announced that she was leaving the group and producer Joe Boyd left to take up a job at Warner Brothers in California. Denny would later blame Boyd's hostility towards the group for its demise.
Solo career and final years
She then turned to recording her first solo album, The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. Released in 1971, it is distinguished by its elusive lyrics and unconventional harmonies. Highlights included "Late November", inspired by a dream and the death of Fairport band member Martin Lamble, and "Next Time Around" a cryptogram about Jackson C. Frank, one of her many portraits in song.
Sandy, with a cover photograph by David Bailey, followed in 1972 and was the first of her albums to be produced by Trevor Lucas. As well as introducing eight new original compositions, the album marked her last recording of a traditional song, "The Quiet Joys of Brotherhood" (words by Richard Fariña), with Denny's ambitious multi-tracked vocal arrangement inspired by the Ensemble of the Bulgarian Republic.
Melody Maker readers twice voted her the "Best British Female Singer", in 1970 and 1971 and, together with contemporaries including Richard Thompson and Ashley Hutchings, she participated in a one-off project called the Bunch to record a collection of rock and roll era standards released under the title of Rock On.
In 1971, Denny duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore", which was included on Led Zeppelin's 1971 album (Led Zeppelin IV); she was the only guest vocalist ever to appear on a Led Zeppelin album. In 1972 Denny had a small cameo on Lou Reizner's symphonic arrangement of the Who's rock opera Tommy. Her brief appearance was at the end of the track "It's a Boy", which also featured vocals from Pete Townshend.
In 1973, she married long-term boyfriend and producer Trevor Lucas and recorded a third solo album, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz. The songs continued to detail many of her personal preoccupations: loss, loneliness, fear of the dark, the passing of time and the changing seasons. The album contained one of her best loved compositions, "Solo", and featured a cover image by Gered Mankowitz.
In 1974, she returned to Fairport Convention (of which her husband was by then a member) for a world tour (captured on the 1974 album Fairport Live Convention) and a studio album, Rising for the Moon in 1975. Although her development as a soloist and songwriter had taken her further away from the folk roots direction that the band had pursued since Liege & Lief, seven of the eleven tracks on Rising for the Moon were either written or co-written by her.
Denny and Lucas left Fairport Convention at the end of 1975 and embarked on what was to become her final album Rendezvous. Released in 1977, the album sold poorly and Denny was subsequently dropped by Island Records. Having relocated to the village of Byfield in Northamptonshire in the mid-seventies, Denny gave birth to her only child, a daughter named Georgia, in July 1977.
A UK tour to promote Rendezvous in autumn 1977 marked her final public appearances. The closing night at the Royalty Theatre in London on 27 November 1977 was recorded for a live album, Gold Dust, which, because of technical problems in the recording of the electric guitar, was belatedly released in 1998 after most of the guitars had been re-recorded by Jerry Donahue.
Death
Linda Thompson would later note that Denny "really started going downhill in 1976" and demonstrated increasing levels of both manic and depressive behaviour. Learning that she was pregnant did little to mellow Denny's reckless lifestyle, which was heightened by increasing depression, mood swings and the unravelling of her "tumultuous" marriage to Trevor Lucas. She abused drugs and alcohol while pregnant with her daughter, Georgia, who was born prematurely in July 1977. Much like her moods, Denny's interest towards her daughter appeared to oscillate between obsessive and unconcerned; friends recalled both frantic, middle-of-the-night phone calls about teething, as well as Denny "crashing the car and leaving the baby in the pub and all sorts of stuff".
Friends would later note that Denny had a history of purposely throwing herself off bar stools and down flights of stairs in order to get a reaction. Several remembered this behaviour as "Sandy's party trick", while Dave Pegg's wife Chris stated, "She certainly did it in my house and it could be a very dramatic gesture, like self-harming. She could do it without hurting herself usually but I had a feeling there would be one time too many." Those who knew Denny said that her increasing level of alcohol abuse in the last years of her life led to an increasing number of falls (both accidental and deliberate), resulting in a growing number of injuries.
In late March 1978, while on holiday with her parents and baby Georgia in Cornwall, Denny was injured when she fell down a staircase and hit her head on concrete. Following the incident, she suffered from intense headaches; a doctor prescribed her the painkiller dextropropoxyphene, a drug known to have fatal side effects when mixed with alcohol. On 1 April, several days after the fall in Cornwall, Denny performed a charity concert at Byfield. The final song she performed was "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?"
At some unknown point during the first half of April 1978, Denny suffered yet another major fall at her home in Byfield. On 13 April, concerned about his wife's erratic behaviour and fearing for his daughter's safety, Trevor Lucas left the UK and returned to his native Australia with their child, leaving Denny without telling her. He sold their Austin Princess car in order to raise funds for the journey.
On discovering Lucas' departure, Denny went to stay at the home of her friend Miranda Ward. During this time, Denny apparently set up an appointment to speak with a doctor about her headaches, and also intended to get advice about her alcohol addiction. At some point after 8 am on 17 April, Denny fell into a coma. Ward was out of the house at the time, and had asked her friend Jon Cole (of the band The Movies) to check in on Denny. Cole entered the home at 3 pm, and found Denny unconscious at the foot of the staircase which led to the second floor of the house. She was rushed by ambulance to Queen Mary's Hospital in nearby Roehampton.
On 19 April, she was transferred to Atkinson Morley Hospital in Wimbledon. After receiving news that Denny was in a coma, Lucas returned from Australia. Upon his arrival at the hospital, doctors informed him that Denny was effectively brain-dead and her condition would not improve. He granted their recommendation to turn off life-support machines; however, just ten minutes before this was to take place, at 7:50 pm on 21 April 1978, Sandy Denny died, without regaining consciousness. Her death was ruled to be the result of a traumatic mid-brain haemorrhage and blunt force trauma to her head. She was 31 years old.
The funeral took place on 27 April 1978 at Putney Vale Cemetery. After the vicar had read Denny's favourite psalm, Psalm 23, a piper played "Flowers of the Forest", a traditional song commemorating the fallen of Flodden Field and one which had appeared on the 1970 Fairport album Full House. The inscription on her headstone reads:
Posthumous releases
Official releases
Although Denny had a devoted following in her lifetime, she did not achieve mass market success. In the years since her death, her reputation has grown. A four-album box set entitled Who Knows Where the Time Goes? (1985) was produced by her widower Trevor Lucas and Joe Boyd and included a number of rare and previously unreleased tracks by Denny, either solo or with Fairport Convention (1968, 1969, 1974) and Fotheringay (1970). This was the first public indication that a large cache of unreleased material existed. A one-disc subset of these recordings was subsequently issued on CD by Island in 1987 entitled The Best Of Sandy Denny.
In 1987, a compilation of previously unreleased tracks recorded for the BBC by incarnations of Fairport including Denny was released on LP under the title Heyday, which was subsequently released on CD in 2001 and again, with extra tracks, in 2002; all tracks were later included, with others, on the 2007 4-CD box set Fairport Convention Live at the BBC (see below). The initial purpose of this compilation was to document the more "American" material performed live by the What We Did on Our Holidays lineup of the band that never made it to vinyl, while the re-releases added additional songs as performed by the Unhalfbricking and Liege and Lief lineups.
Also in 1987, a VHS documentary, It All Comes 'Round Again, on Fairport Convention was released which contained excerpts of several audio recordings featuring Denny, plus a single poor-quality video recording of her singing her song "Solo" during her second stint with Fairport in 1974, as filmed by the University of Birmingham's "Guild TV" amateur organisation. The original tape of this recording has apparently been lost; however, "Like an Old Fashioned Waltz" does appear on the DVD documentary Sandy Denny Under Review (see below) and other tracks have been made available via YouTube in very poor quality.
Over the period 1988–1994, the Australian "Friends of Fairport" issued a series of subscriber-only cassette compilations drawing in the main on previously unreleased tapes from Trevor Lucas' collection (as stored in his attic in fact). Attic Tracks (AT) 1 (1988) contained out-takes from Sandy as well as some Fairport material and a few bizarre extras; AT 2 (1989) contained only Trevor Lucas material, no Denny; AT 3 (1989) entitled First and Last Tracks comprised 1966–1967 home demos and rare radio tracks, as well as 9 "pre-overdub" songs from Denny's last concert at the Royalty Theatre, London, on 27 November 1977 (a partial alternative to the later, overdubbed CD release Gold Dust), and AT 4 (1994): Together Again comprised one side of Lucas and the other of Denny in the form of more home demos, studio outtakes, and 4 tracks from a 1973 BBC radio concert. A cut-down version of these tracks (18 songs) was subsequently compiled for CD release by the Australian label Raven Records in 1995 called Sandy Denny, Trevor Lucas and Friends: The Attic Tracks 1972–1984.
In 1991, Joe Boyd issued a new version of Denny's All Our Own Work album with the Strawbs, called Sandy Denny and the Strawbs, on his Hannibal Records label. The album had strings added to some tracks, including "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" and further tracks with Denny on lead vocal.
In 1997, a one-disc compilation of Denny's solo BBC recordings was released as The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 on Strange Fruit Records. Due to rights issues it was withdrawn on the day of release, thereby creating a highly collectible disc (up until the release of the comprehensive Live at the BBC box set in 2007). This release was followed in 1998 when Denny's final performance at the Royalty Theatre, entitled Gold Dust, was issued on CD, following a degree of re-recording and overdubbing of selected backing parts to replace reportedly unsatisfactory originals.
In 1999, a single-disc compilation, Listen Listen – An Introduction to Sandy Denny, was released on Island Records comprising 17 previously released tracks taken from her four Island solo albums.
No More Sad Refrains: The Anthology was released by Universal Records in 2000. When first released, this compilation had several rare tracks, including "The Ballad of Easy Rider" from the Liege and Lief sessions, "Learning the Game" and "When Will I Be Loved" from the Bunch album Rock On, "Here in Silence" and "Man of Iron" from the Pass of Arms soundtrack, and a previously unissued demo of "Stranger to Himself".
In 2002, a previously unreleased, 2-CD live US concert recording by Fairport Convention from 1974 featuring Denny was released on the Burning Airlines label. Entitled Before The Moon, it originated from a radio broadcast from Ebbets Field in Denver, Colorado, on 23/24 May 1974. The second disc was a limited release bonus with the original release comprising the second set from the same concert. This recording was re-released in shortened form as a single disc in 2011 on the It's About Music label entitled Fairport Convention with Sandy Denny: Ebbets Field 1974.
Also in 2002, the American A&M Records issued a budget-price "20th Century Masters" compilation called The Best of Sandy Denny with 10 tracks all available on Denny's studio albums.
In 2004 a second comprehensive five-CD box set was released on the Fledg'ling record label called A Boxful of Treasures that included many unreleased recordings, in particular a whole disc of acoustic demos, many recorded at her home in Byfield that was highly prized amongst fans and critics alike, who had long asserted that her solo performances showed her work in its best light, revealing the true quality of her vocal style and compositions. Also in 2004, the Spectrum label issued a 16-track compilation of previously released material entitled The Collection: Chronological Covers & Concert Classics, including a mix of studio recordings and live excerpts from the Gold Dust Royalty concert.
In 2005, remastered versions of all Denny's solo albums came out with bonus tracks. Also in 2005, a single CD compilation entitled Where the Time Goes: Sandy '67 was released on Castle Music containing all of Saga's Denny album tracks (including the alternative recordings on It's Sandy Denny), together with two self accompanied tracks from Denny's recordings with the Strawbs.
A DVD documentary entitled Sandy Denny Under Review was released on the Sexy Intellectual label in 2006 which contained interviews with her contemporaries plus brief excerpts from her audio recordings, plus some short video clips including two of the poor quality video recordings with Fairport from Birmingham University (details given above), two with Fotheringay from German TV's Beat-Club (further details given below), and three solo excerpts from the only surviving BBC footage on One In Ten (details as given in the next item).
A 4-disc box set, Sandy Denny Live at the BBC, came out in September 2007 containing (virtually) all of the known solo recordings made by Denny for that UK broadcaster including two complete concerts, one at the Paris Theatre in 1972 and one recorded for Sounds on Sunday in 1973, plus a range of other material spanning the years 1966–1973. Disc 3 of this set was a DVD containing surviving TV footage from a 1971 BBC One in Ten session comprising solo performances by Denny of "The North Star Grassman and the Ravens", "Crazy Lady Blues" and "Late November", along with digitised excerpts from her diaries, rare photos and a discography. A 1-disc subset of this box set entitled The Best of the BBC Recordings was subsequently released in 2008.
A companion box set, Fairport Convention Live at the BBC, also came out in 2007 and covered equivalent live recordings by Fairport over the period 1968–1974, of which the first two discs (1968–1970) contain examples from Denny's time with that group.
In 2008, Jerry Donahue completed the unfinished second Fotheringay album begun in the autumn of 1970. It was released to general acclaim as Fotheringay 2 and contained some notable Denny performances, in particular earlier versions of two Denny compositions, "Late November" and "John the Gun", and performances of the traditional songs "Gypsy Davey" and "Wild Mountain Thyme". Also in 2008, Island Remasters issued a double CD entitled The Music Weaver (Sandy Denny Remembered) which contained a mix of better known tracks and less well known demos and live recordings, previously released but not in companion with studio sessions. This compilation is also one of the very few to contain the Led Zeppelin track "The Battle Of Evermore" which features a rare guest appearance by Denny.
In 2010, a large 19-CD retrospective box set, simply titled Sandy Denny, was released by Universal/Island Records in a limited edition of 3,000. It contained Denny's entire catalogue of studio recordings, including her work with the Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay and as a solo artist. The compilation also included a large number of outtakes, demos, live recordings, radio sessions and interviews. The box set was released to good reviews, including a 5-star review in Uncut and a 4-star review in The Guardian.
In late 2010, Thea Gilmore was commissioned by Denny's estate, in conjunction with Island Records, to write melodies to unrecorded lyrics found in Denny's papers. The resulting album, Don't Stop Singing, was released in November 2011 to generally good notices, including 4-star reviews in The Independent and The Guardian among others. On 21 April 2012, the single "London" was released as an exclusive Record Store Day 7″ single.
Further recordings were released in 2011, including a German recording of Fotheringay in concert released as Essen 1970 on the Garden of Delights label. The performance was remastered by original band member Jerry Donahue. This release was followed by 19 Rupert Street, a home recording of a rehearsal featuring Sandy and Alex Campbell recorded at his flat in August 1967. This release is notable for the fact that Sandy performs a number of tracks that are not available in any other versions, including a cover of "Fairytale Lullaby" by John Martyn. This CD was put out by Sandy's former Strawbs bandmate Dave Cousins on his Witchwood label.
Two-disc "Deluxe Editions" of Denny's album reissues appeared in 2011–2012 with additional tracks; the 2012 Deluxe Edition of Sandy included a previously unreleased eight-song solo set from her 1973 U.S. tour recorded at Ebbet's Field in Denver, Colorado. A similar two-disc reissue of Fairport Convention's Rising for the Moon also included, for the first time, the complete 1974 L.A. Troubadour performance of Fairport with Denny back on board, prior to the official announcement of her re-joining the group.
On account of unprecedented demand for, and exhaustion of supply of the limited edition 19-CD set cited above, in October 2012 a limited edition 4-CD version was released entitled The Notes and The Words: A Collection of Demos and Rarities, containing "75 songs that represent the cream of the rarities, demos and outtakes from the box set". Limited to 3,500 copies, this compilation is also now out-of-print.
In 2013, Spectrum records issued a single-disc CD entitled The Lady – The Essential Sandy Denny that comprised 15 previously issued tracks, generally from Denny's well known albums.
2014 saw the release of another Fairport live U.S. radio broadcast from their 1974 tour with Denny, on RockBeat Records, entitled Live 1974 (My Father's Place), comprising 11 live tracks, most featuring Denny, recorded at the New York rock club My Father's Place.
A four-disc Fotheringay retrospective, Nothing More: The Collected Fotheringay, was released on 30 March 2015. This is the most comprehensive compilation of the group's recordings, and contains, in addition to all the tracks on Fotheringay and Fotheringay 2 as both final studio versions and demos/alternate takes, the complete live concert set from Rotterdam in 1970 (including several previously unreleased tracks), seven Fotheringay tracks recorded in session for BBC radio (which had previously circulated only as bootlegs), plus a DVD disc containing four performances by Fotheringay recorded for the German Beat-Club TV series in 1970, which considerably augment the otherwise sparse known TV footage of Denny in particular.
May 2016 saw the release of a 2-CD compilation, I've Always Kept A Unicorn – The Acoustic Sandy Denny which collected together many previously released, but dispersed, acoustic and/or demo versions of songs better known from their album counterparts, as well as three previously unreleased demos (with Linda Thompson, at the time Linda Peters) from 1972's Rock On sessions by one-off band The Bunch.
A 7-CD box set by Fairport Convention entitled Come All Ye – The First 10 Years was released in July 2017 and contains a small number of additional, previously unreleased demos and alternate takes featuring Denny during her first tenure with the band over the period 1968–1969. Tracks not previously available include versions of Joni Mitchell's Eastern Rain, an a capella version of Nottamun Town, alternative takes of Autopsy and Who Knows Where the Time Goes, and a rehearsal version of The Deserter.
Unofficial releases and audience tapes
In addition to the authorised material listed above, a number unofficial/unauthorised compilations exist plus a range of audience recordings of varying quality, none of which would likely see the light of day as commercial issues but are of interest to a sector of Denny's audience on either historic or aesthetic grounds, often providing alternative views of songs known otherwise only from their commercially released versions. The first available unauthorised/bootleg CDs available in the 1980s and 1990s comprised principally off-air and other obscure material under such titles as Borrowed Thyme, Poems from Alexandra, Dark the Night, Wild Mountain Thyme and One Last Sad Refrain; such compilations are now largely superseded by the subsequent availability of most of the off-air material in much better quality as official releases as described above.
Of more enduring interest are audience tapes of shows of which no "official" tapes survive. These include some early shows by Fairport Convention; a performance by Fotheringay at the 1970 Tenth National Jazz and Blues Festival, held at Plumpton Race Track, Streat, East Sussex, England; "solo" shows by Denny (on occasion with a small band including, among others, Richard Thompson) at the 1971 Lincoln Folk Festival and at the Eltham Well Hall Open Theatre in 1972; performances from York University and Guildhall, Newcastle upon Tyne, also in 1972; an early 1972 U.S. performance from The Bitter End in New York; and several sets (Birmingham and Croydon) from her final 1977 tour in addition to the officially released Gold Dust album; plus quite a large number of recordings strongly featuring Denny as part of the re-formed Fairport Convention over the period 1974–1975. The majority of these can be fairly easily located via relevant internet searches and, in addition, can be readily downloaded from archival music servers such as Sugarmegs (Sandy Denny concerts listed under "S": SugarMegs Streaming Server, Fairport and Fotheringay under "F": SugarMegs Streaming Server). A provisional list of such recordings as are known to exist, with details on where each can be accessed, is available here.
Legacy
Estate and family
After relocating to Australia and remarrying, Trevor Lucas died of a heart attack in 1989. Denny's estate is now managed by Lucas' widow, Elizabeth Hurtt-Lucas. A number of otherwise unreleased recordings of Sandy Denny from his collection have subsequently been the basis for posthumous releases of Denny's work including those on The Attic Tracks and elsewhere.
Sandy Denny's daughter, Georgia, has rarely spoken about her mother in a public forum and in the mid-2000s declined an invitation to write the liner notes for Sandy Denny Live at the BBC. However, in 2006 she flew to Britain from Australia to accept on her mother's behalf the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards award for Most Influential Folk Album of All Time, which was given for Fairport Convention's Liege and Lief. Georgia gave birth to twin daughters on 29 April 1997, and a tribute album, Georgia on Our Mind, featuring many of Sandy Denny's former bandmates and friends, was compiled in the children's honour. She also administers a Facebook page "Sandy Denny and Family" dedicated to her mother's memory and more recently, under the name Georgia Katt, has released some of her own DJ-based music.
Tributes
Since her death, many tributes have been made to Denny, both in music and elsewhere. Dave Pegg of Fairport Convention recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on his 1983 solo album The Cocktail Cowboy Goes It Alone. Dave Cousins of the Strawbs wrote "Ringing Down the Years" in memory of Denny shortly after her death. Songs more specific to the death were Bert Jansch's "Where Did My Life Go" and Richard Thompson's "Did She Jump or Was She Pushed?" Fellow Brit folk pioneers Spriguns changed the title of their 1978 album to Magic Lady after hearing of Denny's death while recording. In 1998, a variety of Daylily was named after her.
Denny's songs have been covered by numerous artists in the years since her death. Some of the notable acts to have covered her music include Yo La Tengo, former Marillion frontman Fish, who covered "Solo" on his album Songs from the Mirror, Cat Power, Judy Collins, Nanci Griffith and Nina Simone. Kate Bush mentioned Denny in the lyric of "Blow Away (For Bill)", as one of the musicians to greet Bill in Heaven. "Blow Away (For Bill)" is the third track on Bush's 1980 album Never for Ever. In 1984, Clann Eadair released the single "A tribute to Sandy Denny", featuring Phil Lynott on vocals.
Several radio specials have been produced about Denny's life and music, including BBC Radio 2's The Sandy Denny Story: Who Knows Where the Time Goes. In 2007, Denny's song "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" also received BBC Radio 2's 2007 Folk Award for "Favourite Folk Track of All Time". In 2010, she was recognized by NPR in their 50 Great Voices special series.
In April 2008, a tribute concert was held at The Troubadour in London, to mark the thirtieth anniversary of Denny's death. Those taking part included Martin Carthy, Linda Thompson and Joe Boyd.
A more extensive tribute was given later that year in December at the Southbank in the Queen Elizabeth Hall called The Lady: A Tribute to Sandy Denny with a band composed of members of Bellowhead, the evening featured a mix of young folk acts like Jim Moray and Lisa Knapp alongside those that had known and worked with Denny such as Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. These acts were joined by performers from outside the world of folk like PP Arnold and Marc Almond. The concert, which primarily featured songs written by Denny, received a four-star review in The Guardian. In May 2012 the Southbank concert was expanded into an eight date UK tour called The Lady: A Homage to Sandy Denny. The tour showcased Sandy's entire songbook taking in her work with Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, her solo career and the new songs completed by Thea Gilmore on her album Don't Stop Singing.
The band was, once again, composed of members of Bellowhead. Other acts performing included the aforementioned Thea Gilmore and up-and-coming folk acts Lavinia Blackwall of Trembling Bells, Blair Dunlop and Sam Carter, alongside more established folk stars Maddy Prior, Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. The line-up was completed with performers not normally associated with the folk scene; Green Gartside, Joan Wasser (also known as Joan As Police Woman), and PP Arnold. The tour was well received, obtaining a four-star review in The Times. The London concert at the Barbican was filmed for BBC4, and broadcast in a 90-minute programme titled The Songs of Sandy Denny in November 2012.
In the 2012 Irish film Silence (Harvest Films & South Wind Blows), "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" is used during the film and final credits.
In April 2016 Denny was inducted into the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards Hall of Fame.
Alela Diane recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on her album Cusp, released in February 2018. The song reflects on Denny's final tragic days and her orphaned baby daughter.
Discography
Solo studio albums
The North Star Grassman and the Ravens (1971)
Sandy (1972)
Like an Old Fashioned Waltz (1974)
Rendezvous (1977)
Solo live albums
The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 (1997)
Gold Dust (1998) (live recording from final tour, 1977)
Live at the BBC (2007 4-disc compilation)
Sandy – Deluxe edition, 2012 – includes "Live at Ebbetts Field" (previously unreleased concert on disc 2)
With others
Denny's collaborations with other artists, including with Alex Campbell, The Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, and The Bunch, together with numerous posthumous releases and compilation albums, are detailed further on the Sandy Denny discography page.
References and notes
General
Further reading
Mick Houghton. I've Always Kept a Unicorn – The Biography of Sandy Denny. Faber & Faber, 2015;
Clinton Heylin. No More Sad Refrains – The Life and Times of Sandy Denny. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Clinton Heylin. Gypsy Love Songs & Sad Refrains – The Recordings of Richard Thompson and Sandy Denny. Labour of Love Productions, 1989.
Colin Larkin. The Guinness Who's Who of Folk Music. Guinness Publishing Ltd;
Jim Irvin. Angel of Avalon. MOJO Magazine, August 1998.
Colin Harper, Trevor Hodgett. Irish Folk, Traditional & Blues: A Secret History. Cherry Red, 2005;
Pamela Murray Winters. No Thought of Leaving: A life of Sandy Denny. 2000. (Unpublished).
Brian Hinton, Geoff Wall. Ashley Hutchings: The Guv'nor & the Rise of Folk Rock. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Patrick Humphries. Meet On The Ledge: The Classic Years 1967–1975. Virgin Books, 1997;
Patrick Humphries. Richard Thompson: Strange Affair – The Biography. Virgin Books, 1996;
Philip Ward, "Sandy Denny: A Thirtieth Anniversary", R2 (Rock'n'Reel) 2(9), May/June 2008.
Philip Ward, Sandy Denny: Reflections on Her Music''. Matador, 2011;
External links
Official website
Homage to Sandy Denny
Dedicated to the memory of Sandy Denny
Sandy Denny website
1947 births
1978 deaths
20th-century English singers
20th-century English women singers
A&M Records artists
Accidental deaths from falls
Accidental deaths in London
Deaths by intracerebral hemorrhage
Alumni of Kingston College (England)
British folk rock musicians
Burials at Putney Vale Cemetery
English folk singers
English people of Scottish descent
English women singer-songwriters
Fairport Convention members
Women rock singers
Fotheringay members
Island Records artists
People from Byfield, Northamptonshire
People from Wimbledon, London
Singers from London
Strawbs members
The Bunch members | false | [
"\"No. No. No.\" was the response of British prime minister Margaret Thatcher to European Commission president Jacques Delors's proposals for European integration at the October 1990 European Council summit meeting in Rome. Her remarks led to the resignation of deputy prime minister Geoffrey Howe and the ensuing Conservative Party leadership election in which Thatcher was ousted.\n\nBackground\n\nOn 30 October 1990, a day after returning from the European Council summit meeting in Rome, Thatcher delivered a statement to the House of Commons on the summit. Both her foreign secretary Geoffrey Howe and chancellor Nigel Lawson had threatened resignation the previous year if Thatcher did not agree to let Britain join the European Exchange Rate Mechanism. Thatcher subsequently replaced Howe as foreign secretary, appointing him leader of the House and deputy prime minister. At the summit, Thatcher went against her cabinet's collective position by rejecting Britain's membership of any future arrangement for an economic and monetary union.\n\nThatcher was speaking in response to a question from the Leader of the Opposition, Neil Kinnock, when she said that: Thatcher then continued by contending that \"the Labour party would give all those things up easily. Perhaps it would agree to a single currency and abolition of the pound sterling. Perhaps, being totally incompetent in monetary matters, it would be only too delighted to hand over full responsibility to a central bank, as it did to the IMF\", the final part of her statement a reference to the 1976 sterling crisis under a Labour government.\n\nThatcher's \"No. No. No.\" response was seen as undermining any progress that had been made at the summit in Rome. It was a spontaneous expression and had not been prepared. Biographer Charles Moore felt that she expressed her words \"firmly\" but \"not vehemently\", with each pronunciation of the negative exclamation \"spoken quieter than the last\" as she put her spectacles on, preparing to move on to her next point. Moore also felt that Thatcher's response was \"endlessly and rightly quoted afterwards\" as part of a \"classic combative statement of her views\" but was \"almost always wrenched from its context\"; she was not attacking the Community (EEC) or undermining her own government's policies, but was instead attacking the Commission for its ambition of further European integration (which her government and most Conservative MPs opposed), denouncing the idea that the EEC should acquire the attributes of a European government. Moore wrote that \"for those long waiting to make their move 'No. No. No.' was not so much a shock as a cue\".\n\nHowe then resolved to resign from government and join the back benches after Thatcher dismissed further EEC integration and the potentiality of a single currency, which had been espoused by the Delors Commission, with her \"No. No. No.\"\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nWorks cited\n\nExternal links \n HC Stmnt: [Rome European Council] [\"No no no\"] [film] at the Margaret Thatcher Foundation\n\n1990 in British politics\n1990 in the European Economic Community\nEuroscepticism in the United Kingdom\nEurozone\nMargaret Thatcher\nPolitical quotes",
"Emily M. Agree is an American sociologist. She is a professor of sociology in the Departments of Sociology and Population, Family, and Reproductive Health at Johns Hopkins University, and associate director at the Hopkins Population Center.\n\nEducation\nAgree graduated with B.A. degree in population studies from the University of Rochester in 1980. After writing a thesis entitled \"Patterns of Contact between Older Unmarried Women and their Adult Children: A Multivariate Analysis\" at Georgetown University, she graduated with an M.A. in demography in 1986. She then wrote her dissertation on \"The Effects of Demographic Change on Living Arrangements of the Elderly in Brazil: 1960-1980\" at Duke University where she got her Ph.D. in sociology in 1993.\n\nCareer\nFollowing her graduation from Duke, Agree was a postdoctoral research fellow at the Population Studies Center at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan. From 1995 to 2003, Agree was an assistant professor at the Department of Population, Family, and Reproductive Health of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and then served as its associate professor until 2012. During her time at the Johns Hopkins University, Agree was also an interim director at the Johns Hopkins Population Center from 2005 to 2006 and served as director of its Center for Population Aging and Health from 2009 to 2012. She also served as a visiting research fellow and scholar at the Office for National Statistics in the United Kingdom in 2002 and at Age Concern Institute of Gerontology of King's College London from 2002 to 2004 respectively.\n\nPrior to her graduation, Agree was a consultant researcher at the Research and Policy Division of the World Bank Group in 1983 in Washington, D.C. In 1984, she joined the Government Accountability Office as elevator and the same year was promoted as research associate at the Center for Population Research in Georgetown University. She then served as a senior research associate from 1985 to 1986 at the same university until she was promoted to senior research scholar in 1987 and by 1990 became associate population affairs officer at the Department of International Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division, Population and Development Section of the United Nations.\n\nAs a consultant, Agree served for World Bank Group from 1982 to 1983 and from 1988 to 1992 she served with Decision Demographics and the United Nations Population Division. From 1993 to 1994, Agree served with the National Academy on Aging of the United States Administration on Aging and from 1994 to 2000 was with the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe following which she served with the United States Census Bureau in 2000 and 2008 respectively.\n\nRecognitions\nAgree is a member of the Gerontological Society of America since 1984 and a fellow of the same society since 1998.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n20th-century births\nLiving people\nAmerican women sociologists\nUniversity of Rochester alumni\nGeorgetown University alumni\nDuke University alumni\nUniversity of Michigan faculty\nFellows of the Gerontological Society of America\nYear of birth missing (living people)\nPlace of birth missing (living people)\n21st-century social scientists\n21st-century American women scientists"
] |
[
"Sandy Denny",
"Early career",
"How did she get started in her career?",
"in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus.",
"What did she do in the club?",
"After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings",
"What did she do there?",
"the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs.",
"How long did she work there?",
"I don't know.",
"What did she do after leaving there?",
"Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label,",
"What did she record?",
"the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo.",
"Did they do well?",
"I don't know.",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band.",
"Did she agree to join?",
"She recorded one album with them in Denmark which was released belatedly in 1973 credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work."
] | C_e6cc2f78b77b4fcab1029b8e527f1a13_1 | Did it get any awards? | 10 | Did the album All Our Own Work get any awards? | Sandy Denny | Her nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn. After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fhir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels". Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes. By this time she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark which was released belatedly in 1973 credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer. CANNOTANSWER | The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" | Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny (6 January 1947 – 21 April 1978) was an English singer-songwriter who was lead singer of the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. She has been described as "the pre-eminent British folk rock singer".
After briefly working with the Strawbs, Denny joined Fairport Convention in 1968, remaining with them until 1969. She formed the short-lived band Fotheringay in 1970, before focusing on a solo career. Between 1971 and 1977, Denny released four solo albums: The North Star Grassman and the Ravens, Sandy, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz and Rendezvous. She also duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore" for Led Zeppelin's album Led Zeppelin IV in 1971. Denny died in 1978 at the age of 31 due to injuries and health issues related to alcohol abuse.
Music publications Uncut and Mojo have described Denny as Britain's finest female singer-songwriter. Her composition "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" has been recorded by Judy Collins, Eva Cassidy, Nina Simone, 10,000 Maniacs and Cat Power. Her recorded work has been the subject of numerous reissues, along with a wealth of previously unreleased material which has appeared over the more than 40 years since her death, including a 19-CD box set released in November 2010.
Childhood
Denny was born on 6 January 1947 at Nelson Hospital, Kingston Road, Merton Park, London, to Neil and Edna Denny. She studied classical piano as a child.
Her paternal grandfather was from Dundee, and her paternal grandmother was a Scots Gaelic speaker and singer of traditional songs. At an early age Denny showed an interest in singing, although her strict parents were reluctant to believe there was a living to be made from it. She attended Coombe Girls' School in New Malden; after leaving school she began training as a nurse at the Royal Brompton Hospital.
Early career
Denny's nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn.
After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames, Denny began working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels".
Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes.
By this time, she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark, which was released belatedly in 1973, credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer.
From Fairport to Fotheringay
After making the Saga albums with Alex Campbell and Johnny Silvo, Denny looked for a band that would allow her to stretch herself as a vocalist, reach a wider audience, and have the opportunity to display her songwriting. She said, "I wanted to do something more with my voice." After working briefly with the Strawbs, Denny remained unconvinced that they could provide that opportunity, and so she ended her relationship with the band.
Fairport Convention conducted auditions in May 1968 for a replacement singer following the departure of Judy Dyble after their debut album, and Denny became the obvious choice. According to group member Simon Nicol, her personality and musicianship made her stand out from the other auditionees "like a clean glass in a sink full of dirty dishes".
Beginning with What We Did on Our Holidays, the first of three albums she made with the band in the late 1960s, Denny is credited with encouraging Fairport Convention to explore the traditional British folk repertoire, and is thus regarded as a key figure in the development of British folk rock. She brought with her the traditional repertoire she had refined in the clubs, including "A Sailor's Life" featured on their second album together Unhalfbricking. Framing Denny's performance of this song with their own electric improvisations, her bandmates discovered what then proved to be the inspiration for an entire album, the influential Liege & Lief (1969).
Denny left Fairport Convention in December 1969 to develop her own songwriting more fully. To this end, she formed her own band, Fotheringay, which included her future husband, Australian Trevor Lucas, formerly of the group Eclection.
They created one self-titled album, which included an eight-minute version of the traditional "Banks of the Nile", and several Denny originals, among them "The Sea" and "Nothing More". The latter marked her first composition on the piano, which was to become her primary instrument from then on. Fotheringay started to record a second album in late 1970, but it remained unfinished after Denny announced that she was leaving the group and producer Joe Boyd left to take up a job at Warner Brothers in California. Denny would later blame Boyd's hostility towards the group for its demise.
Solo career and final years
She then turned to recording her first solo album, The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. Released in 1971, it is distinguished by its elusive lyrics and unconventional harmonies. Highlights included "Late November", inspired by a dream and the death of Fairport band member Martin Lamble, and "Next Time Around" a cryptogram about Jackson C. Frank, one of her many portraits in song.
Sandy, with a cover photograph by David Bailey, followed in 1972 and was the first of her albums to be produced by Trevor Lucas. As well as introducing eight new original compositions, the album marked her last recording of a traditional song, "The Quiet Joys of Brotherhood" (words by Richard Fariña), with Denny's ambitious multi-tracked vocal arrangement inspired by the Ensemble of the Bulgarian Republic.
Melody Maker readers twice voted her the "Best British Female Singer", in 1970 and 1971 and, together with contemporaries including Richard Thompson and Ashley Hutchings, she participated in a one-off project called the Bunch to record a collection of rock and roll era standards released under the title of Rock On.
In 1971, Denny duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore", which was included on Led Zeppelin's 1971 album (Led Zeppelin IV); she was the only guest vocalist ever to appear on a Led Zeppelin album. In 1972 Denny had a small cameo on Lou Reizner's symphonic arrangement of the Who's rock opera Tommy. Her brief appearance was at the end of the track "It's a Boy", which also featured vocals from Pete Townshend.
In 1973, she married long-term boyfriend and producer Trevor Lucas and recorded a third solo album, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz. The songs continued to detail many of her personal preoccupations: loss, loneliness, fear of the dark, the passing of time and the changing seasons. The album contained one of her best loved compositions, "Solo", and featured a cover image by Gered Mankowitz.
In 1974, she returned to Fairport Convention (of which her husband was by then a member) for a world tour (captured on the 1974 album Fairport Live Convention) and a studio album, Rising for the Moon in 1975. Although her development as a soloist and songwriter had taken her further away from the folk roots direction that the band had pursued since Liege & Lief, seven of the eleven tracks on Rising for the Moon were either written or co-written by her.
Denny and Lucas left Fairport Convention at the end of 1975 and embarked on what was to become her final album Rendezvous. Released in 1977, the album sold poorly and Denny was subsequently dropped by Island Records. Having relocated to the village of Byfield in Northamptonshire in the mid-seventies, Denny gave birth to her only child, a daughter named Georgia, in July 1977.
A UK tour to promote Rendezvous in autumn 1977 marked her final public appearances. The closing night at the Royalty Theatre in London on 27 November 1977 was recorded for a live album, Gold Dust, which, because of technical problems in the recording of the electric guitar, was belatedly released in 1998 after most of the guitars had been re-recorded by Jerry Donahue.
Death
Linda Thompson would later note that Denny "really started going downhill in 1976" and demonstrated increasing levels of both manic and depressive behaviour. Learning that she was pregnant did little to mellow Denny's reckless lifestyle, which was heightened by increasing depression, mood swings and the unravelling of her "tumultuous" marriage to Trevor Lucas. She abused drugs and alcohol while pregnant with her daughter, Georgia, who was born prematurely in July 1977. Much like her moods, Denny's interest towards her daughter appeared to oscillate between obsessive and unconcerned; friends recalled both frantic, middle-of-the-night phone calls about teething, as well as Denny "crashing the car and leaving the baby in the pub and all sorts of stuff".
Friends would later note that Denny had a history of purposely throwing herself off bar stools and down flights of stairs in order to get a reaction. Several remembered this behaviour as "Sandy's party trick", while Dave Pegg's wife Chris stated, "She certainly did it in my house and it could be a very dramatic gesture, like self-harming. She could do it without hurting herself usually but I had a feeling there would be one time too many." Those who knew Denny said that her increasing level of alcohol abuse in the last years of her life led to an increasing number of falls (both accidental and deliberate), resulting in a growing number of injuries.
In late March 1978, while on holiday with her parents and baby Georgia in Cornwall, Denny was injured when she fell down a staircase and hit her head on concrete. Following the incident, she suffered from intense headaches; a doctor prescribed her the painkiller dextropropoxyphene, a drug known to have fatal side effects when mixed with alcohol. On 1 April, several days after the fall in Cornwall, Denny performed a charity concert at Byfield. The final song she performed was "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?"
At some unknown point during the first half of April 1978, Denny suffered yet another major fall at her home in Byfield. On 13 April, concerned about his wife's erratic behaviour and fearing for his daughter's safety, Trevor Lucas left the UK and returned to his native Australia with their child, leaving Denny without telling her. He sold their Austin Princess car in order to raise funds for the journey.
On discovering Lucas' departure, Denny went to stay at the home of her friend Miranda Ward. During this time, Denny apparently set up an appointment to speak with a doctor about her headaches, and also intended to get advice about her alcohol addiction. At some point after 8 am on 17 April, Denny fell into a coma. Ward was out of the house at the time, and had asked her friend Jon Cole (of the band The Movies) to check in on Denny. Cole entered the home at 3 pm, and found Denny unconscious at the foot of the staircase which led to the second floor of the house. She was rushed by ambulance to Queen Mary's Hospital in nearby Roehampton.
On 19 April, she was transferred to Atkinson Morley Hospital in Wimbledon. After receiving news that Denny was in a coma, Lucas returned from Australia. Upon his arrival at the hospital, doctors informed him that Denny was effectively brain-dead and her condition would not improve. He granted their recommendation to turn off life-support machines; however, just ten minutes before this was to take place, at 7:50 pm on 21 April 1978, Sandy Denny died, without regaining consciousness. Her death was ruled to be the result of a traumatic mid-brain haemorrhage and blunt force trauma to her head. She was 31 years old.
The funeral took place on 27 April 1978 at Putney Vale Cemetery. After the vicar had read Denny's favourite psalm, Psalm 23, a piper played "Flowers of the Forest", a traditional song commemorating the fallen of Flodden Field and one which had appeared on the 1970 Fairport album Full House. The inscription on her headstone reads:
Posthumous releases
Official releases
Although Denny had a devoted following in her lifetime, she did not achieve mass market success. In the years since her death, her reputation has grown. A four-album box set entitled Who Knows Where the Time Goes? (1985) was produced by her widower Trevor Lucas and Joe Boyd and included a number of rare and previously unreleased tracks by Denny, either solo or with Fairport Convention (1968, 1969, 1974) and Fotheringay (1970). This was the first public indication that a large cache of unreleased material existed. A one-disc subset of these recordings was subsequently issued on CD by Island in 1987 entitled The Best Of Sandy Denny.
In 1987, a compilation of previously unreleased tracks recorded for the BBC by incarnations of Fairport including Denny was released on LP under the title Heyday, which was subsequently released on CD in 2001 and again, with extra tracks, in 2002; all tracks were later included, with others, on the 2007 4-CD box set Fairport Convention Live at the BBC (see below). The initial purpose of this compilation was to document the more "American" material performed live by the What We Did on Our Holidays lineup of the band that never made it to vinyl, while the re-releases added additional songs as performed by the Unhalfbricking and Liege and Lief lineups.
Also in 1987, a VHS documentary, It All Comes 'Round Again, on Fairport Convention was released which contained excerpts of several audio recordings featuring Denny, plus a single poor-quality video recording of her singing her song "Solo" during her second stint with Fairport in 1974, as filmed by the University of Birmingham's "Guild TV" amateur organisation. The original tape of this recording has apparently been lost; however, "Like an Old Fashioned Waltz" does appear on the DVD documentary Sandy Denny Under Review (see below) and other tracks have been made available via YouTube in very poor quality.
Over the period 1988–1994, the Australian "Friends of Fairport" issued a series of subscriber-only cassette compilations drawing in the main on previously unreleased tapes from Trevor Lucas' collection (as stored in his attic in fact). Attic Tracks (AT) 1 (1988) contained out-takes from Sandy as well as some Fairport material and a few bizarre extras; AT 2 (1989) contained only Trevor Lucas material, no Denny; AT 3 (1989) entitled First and Last Tracks comprised 1966–1967 home demos and rare radio tracks, as well as 9 "pre-overdub" songs from Denny's last concert at the Royalty Theatre, London, on 27 November 1977 (a partial alternative to the later, overdubbed CD release Gold Dust), and AT 4 (1994): Together Again comprised one side of Lucas and the other of Denny in the form of more home demos, studio outtakes, and 4 tracks from a 1973 BBC radio concert. A cut-down version of these tracks (18 songs) was subsequently compiled for CD release by the Australian label Raven Records in 1995 called Sandy Denny, Trevor Lucas and Friends: The Attic Tracks 1972–1984.
In 1991, Joe Boyd issued a new version of Denny's All Our Own Work album with the Strawbs, called Sandy Denny and the Strawbs, on his Hannibal Records label. The album had strings added to some tracks, including "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" and further tracks with Denny on lead vocal.
In 1997, a one-disc compilation of Denny's solo BBC recordings was released as The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 on Strange Fruit Records. Due to rights issues it was withdrawn on the day of release, thereby creating a highly collectible disc (up until the release of the comprehensive Live at the BBC box set in 2007). This release was followed in 1998 when Denny's final performance at the Royalty Theatre, entitled Gold Dust, was issued on CD, following a degree of re-recording and overdubbing of selected backing parts to replace reportedly unsatisfactory originals.
In 1999, a single-disc compilation, Listen Listen – An Introduction to Sandy Denny, was released on Island Records comprising 17 previously released tracks taken from her four Island solo albums.
No More Sad Refrains: The Anthology was released by Universal Records in 2000. When first released, this compilation had several rare tracks, including "The Ballad of Easy Rider" from the Liege and Lief sessions, "Learning the Game" and "When Will I Be Loved" from the Bunch album Rock On, "Here in Silence" and "Man of Iron" from the Pass of Arms soundtrack, and a previously unissued demo of "Stranger to Himself".
In 2002, a previously unreleased, 2-CD live US concert recording by Fairport Convention from 1974 featuring Denny was released on the Burning Airlines label. Entitled Before The Moon, it originated from a radio broadcast from Ebbets Field in Denver, Colorado, on 23/24 May 1974. The second disc was a limited release bonus with the original release comprising the second set from the same concert. This recording was re-released in shortened form as a single disc in 2011 on the It's About Music label entitled Fairport Convention with Sandy Denny: Ebbets Field 1974.
Also in 2002, the American A&M Records issued a budget-price "20th Century Masters" compilation called The Best of Sandy Denny with 10 tracks all available on Denny's studio albums.
In 2004 a second comprehensive five-CD box set was released on the Fledg'ling record label called A Boxful of Treasures that included many unreleased recordings, in particular a whole disc of acoustic demos, many recorded at her home in Byfield that was highly prized amongst fans and critics alike, who had long asserted that her solo performances showed her work in its best light, revealing the true quality of her vocal style and compositions. Also in 2004, the Spectrum label issued a 16-track compilation of previously released material entitled The Collection: Chronological Covers & Concert Classics, including a mix of studio recordings and live excerpts from the Gold Dust Royalty concert.
In 2005, remastered versions of all Denny's solo albums came out with bonus tracks. Also in 2005, a single CD compilation entitled Where the Time Goes: Sandy '67 was released on Castle Music containing all of Saga's Denny album tracks (including the alternative recordings on It's Sandy Denny), together with two self accompanied tracks from Denny's recordings with the Strawbs.
A DVD documentary entitled Sandy Denny Under Review was released on the Sexy Intellectual label in 2006 which contained interviews with her contemporaries plus brief excerpts from her audio recordings, plus some short video clips including two of the poor quality video recordings with Fairport from Birmingham University (details given above), two with Fotheringay from German TV's Beat-Club (further details given below), and three solo excerpts from the only surviving BBC footage on One In Ten (details as given in the next item).
A 4-disc box set, Sandy Denny Live at the BBC, came out in September 2007 containing (virtually) all of the known solo recordings made by Denny for that UK broadcaster including two complete concerts, one at the Paris Theatre in 1972 and one recorded for Sounds on Sunday in 1973, plus a range of other material spanning the years 1966–1973. Disc 3 of this set was a DVD containing surviving TV footage from a 1971 BBC One in Ten session comprising solo performances by Denny of "The North Star Grassman and the Ravens", "Crazy Lady Blues" and "Late November", along with digitised excerpts from her diaries, rare photos and a discography. A 1-disc subset of this box set entitled The Best of the BBC Recordings was subsequently released in 2008.
A companion box set, Fairport Convention Live at the BBC, also came out in 2007 and covered equivalent live recordings by Fairport over the period 1968–1974, of which the first two discs (1968–1970) contain examples from Denny's time with that group.
In 2008, Jerry Donahue completed the unfinished second Fotheringay album begun in the autumn of 1970. It was released to general acclaim as Fotheringay 2 and contained some notable Denny performances, in particular earlier versions of two Denny compositions, "Late November" and "John the Gun", and performances of the traditional songs "Gypsy Davey" and "Wild Mountain Thyme". Also in 2008, Island Remasters issued a double CD entitled The Music Weaver (Sandy Denny Remembered) which contained a mix of better known tracks and less well known demos and live recordings, previously released but not in companion with studio sessions. This compilation is also one of the very few to contain the Led Zeppelin track "The Battle Of Evermore" which features a rare guest appearance by Denny.
In 2010, a large 19-CD retrospective box set, simply titled Sandy Denny, was released by Universal/Island Records in a limited edition of 3,000. It contained Denny's entire catalogue of studio recordings, including her work with the Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay and as a solo artist. The compilation also included a large number of outtakes, demos, live recordings, radio sessions and interviews. The box set was released to good reviews, including a 5-star review in Uncut and a 4-star review in The Guardian.
In late 2010, Thea Gilmore was commissioned by Denny's estate, in conjunction with Island Records, to write melodies to unrecorded lyrics found in Denny's papers. The resulting album, Don't Stop Singing, was released in November 2011 to generally good notices, including 4-star reviews in The Independent and The Guardian among others. On 21 April 2012, the single "London" was released as an exclusive Record Store Day 7″ single.
Further recordings were released in 2011, including a German recording of Fotheringay in concert released as Essen 1970 on the Garden of Delights label. The performance was remastered by original band member Jerry Donahue. This release was followed by 19 Rupert Street, a home recording of a rehearsal featuring Sandy and Alex Campbell recorded at his flat in August 1967. This release is notable for the fact that Sandy performs a number of tracks that are not available in any other versions, including a cover of "Fairytale Lullaby" by John Martyn. This CD was put out by Sandy's former Strawbs bandmate Dave Cousins on his Witchwood label.
Two-disc "Deluxe Editions" of Denny's album reissues appeared in 2011–2012 with additional tracks; the 2012 Deluxe Edition of Sandy included a previously unreleased eight-song solo set from her 1973 U.S. tour recorded at Ebbet's Field in Denver, Colorado. A similar two-disc reissue of Fairport Convention's Rising for the Moon also included, for the first time, the complete 1974 L.A. Troubadour performance of Fairport with Denny back on board, prior to the official announcement of her re-joining the group.
On account of unprecedented demand for, and exhaustion of supply of the limited edition 19-CD set cited above, in October 2012 a limited edition 4-CD version was released entitled The Notes and The Words: A Collection of Demos and Rarities, containing "75 songs that represent the cream of the rarities, demos and outtakes from the box set". Limited to 3,500 copies, this compilation is also now out-of-print.
In 2013, Spectrum records issued a single-disc CD entitled The Lady – The Essential Sandy Denny that comprised 15 previously issued tracks, generally from Denny's well known albums.
2014 saw the release of another Fairport live U.S. radio broadcast from their 1974 tour with Denny, on RockBeat Records, entitled Live 1974 (My Father's Place), comprising 11 live tracks, most featuring Denny, recorded at the New York rock club My Father's Place.
A four-disc Fotheringay retrospective, Nothing More: The Collected Fotheringay, was released on 30 March 2015. This is the most comprehensive compilation of the group's recordings, and contains, in addition to all the tracks on Fotheringay and Fotheringay 2 as both final studio versions and demos/alternate takes, the complete live concert set from Rotterdam in 1970 (including several previously unreleased tracks), seven Fotheringay tracks recorded in session for BBC radio (which had previously circulated only as bootlegs), plus a DVD disc containing four performances by Fotheringay recorded for the German Beat-Club TV series in 1970, which considerably augment the otherwise sparse known TV footage of Denny in particular.
May 2016 saw the release of a 2-CD compilation, I've Always Kept A Unicorn – The Acoustic Sandy Denny which collected together many previously released, but dispersed, acoustic and/or demo versions of songs better known from their album counterparts, as well as three previously unreleased demos (with Linda Thompson, at the time Linda Peters) from 1972's Rock On sessions by one-off band The Bunch.
A 7-CD box set by Fairport Convention entitled Come All Ye – The First 10 Years was released in July 2017 and contains a small number of additional, previously unreleased demos and alternate takes featuring Denny during her first tenure with the band over the period 1968–1969. Tracks not previously available include versions of Joni Mitchell's Eastern Rain, an a capella version of Nottamun Town, alternative takes of Autopsy and Who Knows Where the Time Goes, and a rehearsal version of The Deserter.
Unofficial releases and audience tapes
In addition to the authorised material listed above, a number unofficial/unauthorised compilations exist plus a range of audience recordings of varying quality, none of which would likely see the light of day as commercial issues but are of interest to a sector of Denny's audience on either historic or aesthetic grounds, often providing alternative views of songs known otherwise only from their commercially released versions. The first available unauthorised/bootleg CDs available in the 1980s and 1990s comprised principally off-air and other obscure material under such titles as Borrowed Thyme, Poems from Alexandra, Dark the Night, Wild Mountain Thyme and One Last Sad Refrain; such compilations are now largely superseded by the subsequent availability of most of the off-air material in much better quality as official releases as described above.
Of more enduring interest are audience tapes of shows of which no "official" tapes survive. These include some early shows by Fairport Convention; a performance by Fotheringay at the 1970 Tenth National Jazz and Blues Festival, held at Plumpton Race Track, Streat, East Sussex, England; "solo" shows by Denny (on occasion with a small band including, among others, Richard Thompson) at the 1971 Lincoln Folk Festival and at the Eltham Well Hall Open Theatre in 1972; performances from York University and Guildhall, Newcastle upon Tyne, also in 1972; an early 1972 U.S. performance from The Bitter End in New York; and several sets (Birmingham and Croydon) from her final 1977 tour in addition to the officially released Gold Dust album; plus quite a large number of recordings strongly featuring Denny as part of the re-formed Fairport Convention over the period 1974–1975. The majority of these can be fairly easily located via relevant internet searches and, in addition, can be readily downloaded from archival music servers such as Sugarmegs (Sandy Denny concerts listed under "S": SugarMegs Streaming Server, Fairport and Fotheringay under "F": SugarMegs Streaming Server). A provisional list of such recordings as are known to exist, with details on where each can be accessed, is available here.
Legacy
Estate and family
After relocating to Australia and remarrying, Trevor Lucas died of a heart attack in 1989. Denny's estate is now managed by Lucas' widow, Elizabeth Hurtt-Lucas. A number of otherwise unreleased recordings of Sandy Denny from his collection have subsequently been the basis for posthumous releases of Denny's work including those on The Attic Tracks and elsewhere.
Sandy Denny's daughter, Georgia, has rarely spoken about her mother in a public forum and in the mid-2000s declined an invitation to write the liner notes for Sandy Denny Live at the BBC. However, in 2006 she flew to Britain from Australia to accept on her mother's behalf the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards award for Most Influential Folk Album of All Time, which was given for Fairport Convention's Liege and Lief. Georgia gave birth to twin daughters on 29 April 1997, and a tribute album, Georgia on Our Mind, featuring many of Sandy Denny's former bandmates and friends, was compiled in the children's honour. She also administers a Facebook page "Sandy Denny and Family" dedicated to her mother's memory and more recently, under the name Georgia Katt, has released some of her own DJ-based music.
Tributes
Since her death, many tributes have been made to Denny, both in music and elsewhere. Dave Pegg of Fairport Convention recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on his 1983 solo album The Cocktail Cowboy Goes It Alone. Dave Cousins of the Strawbs wrote "Ringing Down the Years" in memory of Denny shortly after her death. Songs more specific to the death were Bert Jansch's "Where Did My Life Go" and Richard Thompson's "Did She Jump or Was She Pushed?" Fellow Brit folk pioneers Spriguns changed the title of their 1978 album to Magic Lady after hearing of Denny's death while recording. In 1998, a variety of Daylily was named after her.
Denny's songs have been covered by numerous artists in the years since her death. Some of the notable acts to have covered her music include Yo La Tengo, former Marillion frontman Fish, who covered "Solo" on his album Songs from the Mirror, Cat Power, Judy Collins, Nanci Griffith and Nina Simone. Kate Bush mentioned Denny in the lyric of "Blow Away (For Bill)", as one of the musicians to greet Bill in Heaven. "Blow Away (For Bill)" is the third track on Bush's 1980 album Never for Ever. In 1984, Clann Eadair released the single "A tribute to Sandy Denny", featuring Phil Lynott on vocals.
Several radio specials have been produced about Denny's life and music, including BBC Radio 2's The Sandy Denny Story: Who Knows Where the Time Goes. In 2007, Denny's song "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" also received BBC Radio 2's 2007 Folk Award for "Favourite Folk Track of All Time". In 2010, she was recognized by NPR in their 50 Great Voices special series.
In April 2008, a tribute concert was held at The Troubadour in London, to mark the thirtieth anniversary of Denny's death. Those taking part included Martin Carthy, Linda Thompson and Joe Boyd.
A more extensive tribute was given later that year in December at the Southbank in the Queen Elizabeth Hall called The Lady: A Tribute to Sandy Denny with a band composed of members of Bellowhead, the evening featured a mix of young folk acts like Jim Moray and Lisa Knapp alongside those that had known and worked with Denny such as Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. These acts were joined by performers from outside the world of folk like PP Arnold and Marc Almond. The concert, which primarily featured songs written by Denny, received a four-star review in The Guardian. In May 2012 the Southbank concert was expanded into an eight date UK tour called The Lady: A Homage to Sandy Denny. The tour showcased Sandy's entire songbook taking in her work with Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, her solo career and the new songs completed by Thea Gilmore on her album Don't Stop Singing.
The band was, once again, composed of members of Bellowhead. Other acts performing included the aforementioned Thea Gilmore and up-and-coming folk acts Lavinia Blackwall of Trembling Bells, Blair Dunlop and Sam Carter, alongside more established folk stars Maddy Prior, Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. The line-up was completed with performers not normally associated with the folk scene; Green Gartside, Joan Wasser (also known as Joan As Police Woman), and PP Arnold. The tour was well received, obtaining a four-star review in The Times. The London concert at the Barbican was filmed for BBC4, and broadcast in a 90-minute programme titled The Songs of Sandy Denny in November 2012.
In the 2012 Irish film Silence (Harvest Films & South Wind Blows), "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" is used during the film and final credits.
In April 2016 Denny was inducted into the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards Hall of Fame.
Alela Diane recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on her album Cusp, released in February 2018. The song reflects on Denny's final tragic days and her orphaned baby daughter.
Discography
Solo studio albums
The North Star Grassman and the Ravens (1971)
Sandy (1972)
Like an Old Fashioned Waltz (1974)
Rendezvous (1977)
Solo live albums
The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 (1997)
Gold Dust (1998) (live recording from final tour, 1977)
Live at the BBC (2007 4-disc compilation)
Sandy – Deluxe edition, 2012 – includes "Live at Ebbetts Field" (previously unreleased concert on disc 2)
With others
Denny's collaborations with other artists, including with Alex Campbell, The Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, and The Bunch, together with numerous posthumous releases and compilation albums, are detailed further on the Sandy Denny discography page.
References and notes
General
Further reading
Mick Houghton. I've Always Kept a Unicorn – The Biography of Sandy Denny. Faber & Faber, 2015;
Clinton Heylin. No More Sad Refrains – The Life and Times of Sandy Denny. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Clinton Heylin. Gypsy Love Songs & Sad Refrains – The Recordings of Richard Thompson and Sandy Denny. Labour of Love Productions, 1989.
Colin Larkin. The Guinness Who's Who of Folk Music. Guinness Publishing Ltd;
Jim Irvin. Angel of Avalon. MOJO Magazine, August 1998.
Colin Harper, Trevor Hodgett. Irish Folk, Traditional & Blues: A Secret History. Cherry Red, 2005;
Pamela Murray Winters. No Thought of Leaving: A life of Sandy Denny. 2000. (Unpublished).
Brian Hinton, Geoff Wall. Ashley Hutchings: The Guv'nor & the Rise of Folk Rock. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Patrick Humphries. Meet On The Ledge: The Classic Years 1967–1975. Virgin Books, 1997;
Patrick Humphries. Richard Thompson: Strange Affair – The Biography. Virgin Books, 1996;
Philip Ward, "Sandy Denny: A Thirtieth Anniversary", R2 (Rock'n'Reel) 2(9), May/June 2008.
Philip Ward, Sandy Denny: Reflections on Her Music''. Matador, 2011;
External links
Official website
Homage to Sandy Denny
Dedicated to the memory of Sandy Denny
Sandy Denny website
1947 births
1978 deaths
20th-century English singers
20th-century English women singers
A&M Records artists
Accidental deaths from falls
Accidental deaths in London
Deaths by intracerebral hemorrhage
Alumni of Kingston College (England)
British folk rock musicians
Burials at Putney Vale Cemetery
English folk singers
English people of Scottish descent
English women singer-songwriters
Fairport Convention members
Women rock singers
Fotheringay members
Island Records artists
People from Byfield, Northamptonshire
People from Wimbledon, London
Singers from London
Strawbs members
The Bunch members | true | [
"Pyramix is the first remix album and sixth album by rapper/DJ, Egyptian Lover. The album was released in 1993 for Egyptian Empire Records and was produced by The Egyptian Lover himself. The album was both a commercial and critical failure and did not make it to any billboard charts or feature any hit singles.\n\nTrack listing\n\"Pyramix\" – 1:56\n\"Dance\" – 1:53\n\"The Lover\" – 5:26\n\"I Want Cha\" – 2:19\n\"Computer Power (Version II)\" – 5:25\n\"Kinky Nation (Kingdom Kum)\" – 2:34\n\"Egypt, Egypt\" – 6:44\n\"Planet E (Remix)\" – 7:04\n\"Egypt's Revenge (Mega Mix)\" – 5:27\n\"Get High, Get X'D, Get Drunk, Get Sex'd\" – 5:48\n\nReferences\n\nEgyptian Lover albums\nAlbums produced by Egyptian Lover\n1993 remix albums",
"Active Pensionists (Danish: Aktive Pensionister) was a political party in Denmark.\n\nHistory\nActive Pensionists was established in 1997. The party ran in 2001 in Copenhagen (507 votes), Frederikshavn (212 votes) and Skagen Municipality (19 votes). They did not get any municipal seats.\n\nIn 2005, Active Pensionists ran in Greve Municipality (43 votes), Vejle Municipality (158 votes), Fredericia Municipality (679) and Copenhagen Municipality (232 votes). They did not manage to get any municipal seats.\n\nThe party has not run for municipal elections since 2005, and is assumedly dissolved.\n\nElection results\n\nMunicipal elections\n\nReferences\n\nPolitical parties in Denmark\nPensioners' parties\n1997 establishments in Denmark\nPolitical parties established in 1997\nDefunct political parties in Denmark"
] |
[
"Sandy Denny",
"Early career",
"How did she get started in her career?",
"in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus.",
"What did she do in the club?",
"After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings",
"What did she do there?",
"the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs.",
"How long did she work there?",
"I don't know.",
"What did she do after leaving there?",
"Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label,",
"What did she record?",
"the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo.",
"Did they do well?",
"I don't know.",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band.",
"Did she agree to join?",
"She recorded one album with them in Denmark which was released belatedly in 1973 credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work.",
"Did it get any awards?",
"The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, \"Who Knows Where the Time Goes?\""
] | C_e6cc2f78b77b4fcab1029b8e527f1a13_1 | Did she join another band after leaving? | 11 | Did Sandy Dennys join another band besides The Troubadour folk club? | Sandy Denny | Her nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn. After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames Denny started working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fhir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels". Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes. By this time she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark which was released belatedly in 1973 credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny (6 January 1947 – 21 April 1978) was an English singer-songwriter who was lead singer of the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. She has been described as "the pre-eminent British folk rock singer".
After briefly working with the Strawbs, Denny joined Fairport Convention in 1968, remaining with them until 1969. She formed the short-lived band Fotheringay in 1970, before focusing on a solo career. Between 1971 and 1977, Denny released four solo albums: The North Star Grassman and the Ravens, Sandy, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz and Rendezvous. She also duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore" for Led Zeppelin's album Led Zeppelin IV in 1971. Denny died in 1978 at the age of 31 due to injuries and health issues related to alcohol abuse.
Music publications Uncut and Mojo have described Denny as Britain's finest female singer-songwriter. Her composition "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" has been recorded by Judy Collins, Eva Cassidy, Nina Simone, 10,000 Maniacs and Cat Power. Her recorded work has been the subject of numerous reissues, along with a wealth of previously unreleased material which has appeared over the more than 40 years since her death, including a 19-CD box set released in November 2010.
Childhood
Denny was born on 6 January 1947 at Nelson Hospital, Kingston Road, Merton Park, London, to Neil and Edna Denny. She studied classical piano as a child.
Her paternal grandfather was from Dundee, and her paternal grandmother was a Scots Gaelic speaker and singer of traditional songs. At an early age Denny showed an interest in singing, although her strict parents were reluctant to believe there was a living to be made from it. She attended Coombe Girls' School in New Malden; after leaving school she began training as a nurse at the Royal Brompton Hospital.
Early career
Denny's nursing career proved short-lived. In the meantime she had secured a place on a foundation course at Kingston College of Art, which she took up in September 1965, becoming involved with the folk club on campus. Her contemporaries at the college included guitarist and future member of Pentangle, John Renbourn.
After her first public appearance at the Barge in Kingston upon Thames, Denny began working the folk club circuit in the evenings with an American-influenced repertoire, including songs by Tom Paxton, together with traditional folk songs. Denny made the first of many appearances for the BBC at Cecil Sharp House on 2 December 1966 on the Folk Song Cellar programme where she accompanied herself on two traditional songs: "Fir a Bhata" and "Green Grow the Laurels".
Her earliest professional recordings were made a few months later in mid-1967 for the Saga label, featuring traditional songs and covers of folk contemporaries including her boyfriend of this period, the American singer-songwriter Jackson C. Frank. They were released on the albums Alex Campbell and His Friends and Sandy and Johnny with Johnny Silvo. These songs were collected on the 1970 album It's Sandy Denny where the tracks from Sandy and Johnny had been re-recorded with more accomplished vocals and guitar playing. The complete Saga studio recordings were issued on the 2005 compilation Where The Time Goes.
By this time, she had abandoned her studies at art college and was devoting herself full-time to music. While she was performing at The Troubadour folk club, a member of the Strawbs heard her, and in 1967, she was invited to join the band. She recorded one album with them in Denmark, which was released belatedly in 1973, credited to Sandy Denny and the Strawbs: All Our Own Work. The album includes an early solo version of her best-known (and widely recorded) composition, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" A demo of that song found its way into the hands of American singer Judy Collins, who chose to cover it as the title track of an album of her own, released in November 1968, thus giving Denny international exposure as a songwriter before she had become widely known as a singer.
From Fairport to Fotheringay
After making the Saga albums with Alex Campbell and Johnny Silvo, Denny looked for a band that would allow her to stretch herself as a vocalist, reach a wider audience, and have the opportunity to display her songwriting. She said, "I wanted to do something more with my voice." After working briefly with the Strawbs, Denny remained unconvinced that they could provide that opportunity, and so she ended her relationship with the band.
Fairport Convention conducted auditions in May 1968 for a replacement singer following the departure of Judy Dyble after their debut album, and Denny became the obvious choice. According to group member Simon Nicol, her personality and musicianship made her stand out from the other auditionees "like a clean glass in a sink full of dirty dishes".
Beginning with What We Did on Our Holidays, the first of three albums she made with the band in the late 1960s, Denny is credited with encouraging Fairport Convention to explore the traditional British folk repertoire, and is thus regarded as a key figure in the development of British folk rock. She brought with her the traditional repertoire she had refined in the clubs, including "A Sailor's Life" featured on their second album together Unhalfbricking. Framing Denny's performance of this song with their own electric improvisations, her bandmates discovered what then proved to be the inspiration for an entire album, the influential Liege & Lief (1969).
Denny left Fairport Convention in December 1969 to develop her own songwriting more fully. To this end, she formed her own band, Fotheringay, which included her future husband, Australian Trevor Lucas, formerly of the group Eclection.
They created one self-titled album, which included an eight-minute version of the traditional "Banks of the Nile", and several Denny originals, among them "The Sea" and "Nothing More". The latter marked her first composition on the piano, which was to become her primary instrument from then on. Fotheringay started to record a second album in late 1970, but it remained unfinished after Denny announced that she was leaving the group and producer Joe Boyd left to take up a job at Warner Brothers in California. Denny would later blame Boyd's hostility towards the group for its demise.
Solo career and final years
She then turned to recording her first solo album, The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. Released in 1971, it is distinguished by its elusive lyrics and unconventional harmonies. Highlights included "Late November", inspired by a dream and the death of Fairport band member Martin Lamble, and "Next Time Around" a cryptogram about Jackson C. Frank, one of her many portraits in song.
Sandy, with a cover photograph by David Bailey, followed in 1972 and was the first of her albums to be produced by Trevor Lucas. As well as introducing eight new original compositions, the album marked her last recording of a traditional song, "The Quiet Joys of Brotherhood" (words by Richard Fariña), with Denny's ambitious multi-tracked vocal arrangement inspired by the Ensemble of the Bulgarian Republic.
Melody Maker readers twice voted her the "Best British Female Singer", in 1970 and 1971 and, together with contemporaries including Richard Thompson and Ashley Hutchings, she participated in a one-off project called the Bunch to record a collection of rock and roll era standards released under the title of Rock On.
In 1971, Denny duetted with Robert Plant on "The Battle of Evermore", which was included on Led Zeppelin's 1971 album (Led Zeppelin IV); she was the only guest vocalist ever to appear on a Led Zeppelin album. In 1972 Denny had a small cameo on Lou Reizner's symphonic arrangement of the Who's rock opera Tommy. Her brief appearance was at the end of the track "It's a Boy", which also featured vocals from Pete Townshend.
In 1973, she married long-term boyfriend and producer Trevor Lucas and recorded a third solo album, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz. The songs continued to detail many of her personal preoccupations: loss, loneliness, fear of the dark, the passing of time and the changing seasons. The album contained one of her best loved compositions, "Solo", and featured a cover image by Gered Mankowitz.
In 1974, she returned to Fairport Convention (of which her husband was by then a member) for a world tour (captured on the 1974 album Fairport Live Convention) and a studio album, Rising for the Moon in 1975. Although her development as a soloist and songwriter had taken her further away from the folk roots direction that the band had pursued since Liege & Lief, seven of the eleven tracks on Rising for the Moon were either written or co-written by her.
Denny and Lucas left Fairport Convention at the end of 1975 and embarked on what was to become her final album Rendezvous. Released in 1977, the album sold poorly and Denny was subsequently dropped by Island Records. Having relocated to the village of Byfield in Northamptonshire in the mid-seventies, Denny gave birth to her only child, a daughter named Georgia, in July 1977.
A UK tour to promote Rendezvous in autumn 1977 marked her final public appearances. The closing night at the Royalty Theatre in London on 27 November 1977 was recorded for a live album, Gold Dust, which, because of technical problems in the recording of the electric guitar, was belatedly released in 1998 after most of the guitars had been re-recorded by Jerry Donahue.
Death
Linda Thompson would later note that Denny "really started going downhill in 1976" and demonstrated increasing levels of both manic and depressive behaviour. Learning that she was pregnant did little to mellow Denny's reckless lifestyle, which was heightened by increasing depression, mood swings and the unravelling of her "tumultuous" marriage to Trevor Lucas. She abused drugs and alcohol while pregnant with her daughter, Georgia, who was born prematurely in July 1977. Much like her moods, Denny's interest towards her daughter appeared to oscillate between obsessive and unconcerned; friends recalled both frantic, middle-of-the-night phone calls about teething, as well as Denny "crashing the car and leaving the baby in the pub and all sorts of stuff".
Friends would later note that Denny had a history of purposely throwing herself off bar stools and down flights of stairs in order to get a reaction. Several remembered this behaviour as "Sandy's party trick", while Dave Pegg's wife Chris stated, "She certainly did it in my house and it could be a very dramatic gesture, like self-harming. She could do it without hurting herself usually but I had a feeling there would be one time too many." Those who knew Denny said that her increasing level of alcohol abuse in the last years of her life led to an increasing number of falls (both accidental and deliberate), resulting in a growing number of injuries.
In late March 1978, while on holiday with her parents and baby Georgia in Cornwall, Denny was injured when she fell down a staircase and hit her head on concrete. Following the incident, she suffered from intense headaches; a doctor prescribed her the painkiller dextropropoxyphene, a drug known to have fatal side effects when mixed with alcohol. On 1 April, several days after the fall in Cornwall, Denny performed a charity concert at Byfield. The final song she performed was "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?"
At some unknown point during the first half of April 1978, Denny suffered yet another major fall at her home in Byfield. On 13 April, concerned about his wife's erratic behaviour and fearing for his daughter's safety, Trevor Lucas left the UK and returned to his native Australia with their child, leaving Denny without telling her. He sold their Austin Princess car in order to raise funds for the journey.
On discovering Lucas' departure, Denny went to stay at the home of her friend Miranda Ward. During this time, Denny apparently set up an appointment to speak with a doctor about her headaches, and also intended to get advice about her alcohol addiction. At some point after 8 am on 17 April, Denny fell into a coma. Ward was out of the house at the time, and had asked her friend Jon Cole (of the band The Movies) to check in on Denny. Cole entered the home at 3 pm, and found Denny unconscious at the foot of the staircase which led to the second floor of the house. She was rushed by ambulance to Queen Mary's Hospital in nearby Roehampton.
On 19 April, she was transferred to Atkinson Morley Hospital in Wimbledon. After receiving news that Denny was in a coma, Lucas returned from Australia. Upon his arrival at the hospital, doctors informed him that Denny was effectively brain-dead and her condition would not improve. He granted their recommendation to turn off life-support machines; however, just ten minutes before this was to take place, at 7:50 pm on 21 April 1978, Sandy Denny died, without regaining consciousness. Her death was ruled to be the result of a traumatic mid-brain haemorrhage and blunt force trauma to her head. She was 31 years old.
The funeral took place on 27 April 1978 at Putney Vale Cemetery. After the vicar had read Denny's favourite psalm, Psalm 23, a piper played "Flowers of the Forest", a traditional song commemorating the fallen of Flodden Field and one which had appeared on the 1970 Fairport album Full House. The inscription on her headstone reads:
Posthumous releases
Official releases
Although Denny had a devoted following in her lifetime, she did not achieve mass market success. In the years since her death, her reputation has grown. A four-album box set entitled Who Knows Where the Time Goes? (1985) was produced by her widower Trevor Lucas and Joe Boyd and included a number of rare and previously unreleased tracks by Denny, either solo or with Fairport Convention (1968, 1969, 1974) and Fotheringay (1970). This was the first public indication that a large cache of unreleased material existed. A one-disc subset of these recordings was subsequently issued on CD by Island in 1987 entitled The Best Of Sandy Denny.
In 1987, a compilation of previously unreleased tracks recorded for the BBC by incarnations of Fairport including Denny was released on LP under the title Heyday, which was subsequently released on CD in 2001 and again, with extra tracks, in 2002; all tracks were later included, with others, on the 2007 4-CD box set Fairport Convention Live at the BBC (see below). The initial purpose of this compilation was to document the more "American" material performed live by the What We Did on Our Holidays lineup of the band that never made it to vinyl, while the re-releases added additional songs as performed by the Unhalfbricking and Liege and Lief lineups.
Also in 1987, a VHS documentary, It All Comes 'Round Again, on Fairport Convention was released which contained excerpts of several audio recordings featuring Denny, plus a single poor-quality video recording of her singing her song "Solo" during her second stint with Fairport in 1974, as filmed by the University of Birmingham's "Guild TV" amateur organisation. The original tape of this recording has apparently been lost; however, "Like an Old Fashioned Waltz" does appear on the DVD documentary Sandy Denny Under Review (see below) and other tracks have been made available via YouTube in very poor quality.
Over the period 1988–1994, the Australian "Friends of Fairport" issued a series of subscriber-only cassette compilations drawing in the main on previously unreleased tapes from Trevor Lucas' collection (as stored in his attic in fact). Attic Tracks (AT) 1 (1988) contained out-takes from Sandy as well as some Fairport material and a few bizarre extras; AT 2 (1989) contained only Trevor Lucas material, no Denny; AT 3 (1989) entitled First and Last Tracks comprised 1966–1967 home demos and rare radio tracks, as well as 9 "pre-overdub" songs from Denny's last concert at the Royalty Theatre, London, on 27 November 1977 (a partial alternative to the later, overdubbed CD release Gold Dust), and AT 4 (1994): Together Again comprised one side of Lucas and the other of Denny in the form of more home demos, studio outtakes, and 4 tracks from a 1973 BBC radio concert. A cut-down version of these tracks (18 songs) was subsequently compiled for CD release by the Australian label Raven Records in 1995 called Sandy Denny, Trevor Lucas and Friends: The Attic Tracks 1972–1984.
In 1991, Joe Boyd issued a new version of Denny's All Our Own Work album with the Strawbs, called Sandy Denny and the Strawbs, on his Hannibal Records label. The album had strings added to some tracks, including "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" and further tracks with Denny on lead vocal.
In 1997, a one-disc compilation of Denny's solo BBC recordings was released as The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 on Strange Fruit Records. Due to rights issues it was withdrawn on the day of release, thereby creating a highly collectible disc (up until the release of the comprehensive Live at the BBC box set in 2007). This release was followed in 1998 when Denny's final performance at the Royalty Theatre, entitled Gold Dust, was issued on CD, following a degree of re-recording and overdubbing of selected backing parts to replace reportedly unsatisfactory originals.
In 1999, a single-disc compilation, Listen Listen – An Introduction to Sandy Denny, was released on Island Records comprising 17 previously released tracks taken from her four Island solo albums.
No More Sad Refrains: The Anthology was released by Universal Records in 2000. When first released, this compilation had several rare tracks, including "The Ballad of Easy Rider" from the Liege and Lief sessions, "Learning the Game" and "When Will I Be Loved" from the Bunch album Rock On, "Here in Silence" and "Man of Iron" from the Pass of Arms soundtrack, and a previously unissued demo of "Stranger to Himself".
In 2002, a previously unreleased, 2-CD live US concert recording by Fairport Convention from 1974 featuring Denny was released on the Burning Airlines label. Entitled Before The Moon, it originated from a radio broadcast from Ebbets Field in Denver, Colorado, on 23/24 May 1974. The second disc was a limited release bonus with the original release comprising the second set from the same concert. This recording was re-released in shortened form as a single disc in 2011 on the It's About Music label entitled Fairport Convention with Sandy Denny: Ebbets Field 1974.
Also in 2002, the American A&M Records issued a budget-price "20th Century Masters" compilation called The Best of Sandy Denny with 10 tracks all available on Denny's studio albums.
In 2004 a second comprehensive five-CD box set was released on the Fledg'ling record label called A Boxful of Treasures that included many unreleased recordings, in particular a whole disc of acoustic demos, many recorded at her home in Byfield that was highly prized amongst fans and critics alike, who had long asserted that her solo performances showed her work in its best light, revealing the true quality of her vocal style and compositions. Also in 2004, the Spectrum label issued a 16-track compilation of previously released material entitled The Collection: Chronological Covers & Concert Classics, including a mix of studio recordings and live excerpts from the Gold Dust Royalty concert.
In 2005, remastered versions of all Denny's solo albums came out with bonus tracks. Also in 2005, a single CD compilation entitled Where the Time Goes: Sandy '67 was released on Castle Music containing all of Saga's Denny album tracks (including the alternative recordings on It's Sandy Denny), together with two self accompanied tracks from Denny's recordings with the Strawbs.
A DVD documentary entitled Sandy Denny Under Review was released on the Sexy Intellectual label in 2006 which contained interviews with her contemporaries plus brief excerpts from her audio recordings, plus some short video clips including two of the poor quality video recordings with Fairport from Birmingham University (details given above), two with Fotheringay from German TV's Beat-Club (further details given below), and three solo excerpts from the only surviving BBC footage on One In Ten (details as given in the next item).
A 4-disc box set, Sandy Denny Live at the BBC, came out in September 2007 containing (virtually) all of the known solo recordings made by Denny for that UK broadcaster including two complete concerts, one at the Paris Theatre in 1972 and one recorded for Sounds on Sunday in 1973, plus a range of other material spanning the years 1966–1973. Disc 3 of this set was a DVD containing surviving TV footage from a 1971 BBC One in Ten session comprising solo performances by Denny of "The North Star Grassman and the Ravens", "Crazy Lady Blues" and "Late November", along with digitised excerpts from her diaries, rare photos and a discography. A 1-disc subset of this box set entitled The Best of the BBC Recordings was subsequently released in 2008.
A companion box set, Fairport Convention Live at the BBC, also came out in 2007 and covered equivalent live recordings by Fairport over the period 1968–1974, of which the first two discs (1968–1970) contain examples from Denny's time with that group.
In 2008, Jerry Donahue completed the unfinished second Fotheringay album begun in the autumn of 1970. It was released to general acclaim as Fotheringay 2 and contained some notable Denny performances, in particular earlier versions of two Denny compositions, "Late November" and "John the Gun", and performances of the traditional songs "Gypsy Davey" and "Wild Mountain Thyme". Also in 2008, Island Remasters issued a double CD entitled The Music Weaver (Sandy Denny Remembered) which contained a mix of better known tracks and less well known demos and live recordings, previously released but not in companion with studio sessions. This compilation is also one of the very few to contain the Led Zeppelin track "The Battle Of Evermore" which features a rare guest appearance by Denny.
In 2010, a large 19-CD retrospective box set, simply titled Sandy Denny, was released by Universal/Island Records in a limited edition of 3,000. It contained Denny's entire catalogue of studio recordings, including her work with the Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay and as a solo artist. The compilation also included a large number of outtakes, demos, live recordings, radio sessions and interviews. The box set was released to good reviews, including a 5-star review in Uncut and a 4-star review in The Guardian.
In late 2010, Thea Gilmore was commissioned by Denny's estate, in conjunction with Island Records, to write melodies to unrecorded lyrics found in Denny's papers. The resulting album, Don't Stop Singing, was released in November 2011 to generally good notices, including 4-star reviews in The Independent and The Guardian among others. On 21 April 2012, the single "London" was released as an exclusive Record Store Day 7″ single.
Further recordings were released in 2011, including a German recording of Fotheringay in concert released as Essen 1970 on the Garden of Delights label. The performance was remastered by original band member Jerry Donahue. This release was followed by 19 Rupert Street, a home recording of a rehearsal featuring Sandy and Alex Campbell recorded at his flat in August 1967. This release is notable for the fact that Sandy performs a number of tracks that are not available in any other versions, including a cover of "Fairytale Lullaby" by John Martyn. This CD was put out by Sandy's former Strawbs bandmate Dave Cousins on his Witchwood label.
Two-disc "Deluxe Editions" of Denny's album reissues appeared in 2011–2012 with additional tracks; the 2012 Deluxe Edition of Sandy included a previously unreleased eight-song solo set from her 1973 U.S. tour recorded at Ebbet's Field in Denver, Colorado. A similar two-disc reissue of Fairport Convention's Rising for the Moon also included, for the first time, the complete 1974 L.A. Troubadour performance of Fairport with Denny back on board, prior to the official announcement of her re-joining the group.
On account of unprecedented demand for, and exhaustion of supply of the limited edition 19-CD set cited above, in October 2012 a limited edition 4-CD version was released entitled The Notes and The Words: A Collection of Demos and Rarities, containing "75 songs that represent the cream of the rarities, demos and outtakes from the box set". Limited to 3,500 copies, this compilation is also now out-of-print.
In 2013, Spectrum records issued a single-disc CD entitled The Lady – The Essential Sandy Denny that comprised 15 previously issued tracks, generally from Denny's well known albums.
2014 saw the release of another Fairport live U.S. radio broadcast from their 1974 tour with Denny, on RockBeat Records, entitled Live 1974 (My Father's Place), comprising 11 live tracks, most featuring Denny, recorded at the New York rock club My Father's Place.
A four-disc Fotheringay retrospective, Nothing More: The Collected Fotheringay, was released on 30 March 2015. This is the most comprehensive compilation of the group's recordings, and contains, in addition to all the tracks on Fotheringay and Fotheringay 2 as both final studio versions and demos/alternate takes, the complete live concert set from Rotterdam in 1970 (including several previously unreleased tracks), seven Fotheringay tracks recorded in session for BBC radio (which had previously circulated only as bootlegs), plus a DVD disc containing four performances by Fotheringay recorded for the German Beat-Club TV series in 1970, which considerably augment the otherwise sparse known TV footage of Denny in particular.
May 2016 saw the release of a 2-CD compilation, I've Always Kept A Unicorn – The Acoustic Sandy Denny which collected together many previously released, but dispersed, acoustic and/or demo versions of songs better known from their album counterparts, as well as three previously unreleased demos (with Linda Thompson, at the time Linda Peters) from 1972's Rock On sessions by one-off band The Bunch.
A 7-CD box set by Fairport Convention entitled Come All Ye – The First 10 Years was released in July 2017 and contains a small number of additional, previously unreleased demos and alternate takes featuring Denny during her first tenure with the band over the period 1968–1969. Tracks not previously available include versions of Joni Mitchell's Eastern Rain, an a capella version of Nottamun Town, alternative takes of Autopsy and Who Knows Where the Time Goes, and a rehearsal version of The Deserter.
Unofficial releases and audience tapes
In addition to the authorised material listed above, a number unofficial/unauthorised compilations exist plus a range of audience recordings of varying quality, none of which would likely see the light of day as commercial issues but are of interest to a sector of Denny's audience on either historic or aesthetic grounds, often providing alternative views of songs known otherwise only from their commercially released versions. The first available unauthorised/bootleg CDs available in the 1980s and 1990s comprised principally off-air and other obscure material under such titles as Borrowed Thyme, Poems from Alexandra, Dark the Night, Wild Mountain Thyme and One Last Sad Refrain; such compilations are now largely superseded by the subsequent availability of most of the off-air material in much better quality as official releases as described above.
Of more enduring interest are audience tapes of shows of which no "official" tapes survive. These include some early shows by Fairport Convention; a performance by Fotheringay at the 1970 Tenth National Jazz and Blues Festival, held at Plumpton Race Track, Streat, East Sussex, England; "solo" shows by Denny (on occasion with a small band including, among others, Richard Thompson) at the 1971 Lincoln Folk Festival and at the Eltham Well Hall Open Theatre in 1972; performances from York University and Guildhall, Newcastle upon Tyne, also in 1972; an early 1972 U.S. performance from The Bitter End in New York; and several sets (Birmingham and Croydon) from her final 1977 tour in addition to the officially released Gold Dust album; plus quite a large number of recordings strongly featuring Denny as part of the re-formed Fairport Convention over the period 1974–1975. The majority of these can be fairly easily located via relevant internet searches and, in addition, can be readily downloaded from archival music servers such as Sugarmegs (Sandy Denny concerts listed under "S": SugarMegs Streaming Server, Fairport and Fotheringay under "F": SugarMegs Streaming Server). A provisional list of such recordings as are known to exist, with details on where each can be accessed, is available here.
Legacy
Estate and family
After relocating to Australia and remarrying, Trevor Lucas died of a heart attack in 1989. Denny's estate is now managed by Lucas' widow, Elizabeth Hurtt-Lucas. A number of otherwise unreleased recordings of Sandy Denny from his collection have subsequently been the basis for posthumous releases of Denny's work including those on The Attic Tracks and elsewhere.
Sandy Denny's daughter, Georgia, has rarely spoken about her mother in a public forum and in the mid-2000s declined an invitation to write the liner notes for Sandy Denny Live at the BBC. However, in 2006 she flew to Britain from Australia to accept on her mother's behalf the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards award for Most Influential Folk Album of All Time, which was given for Fairport Convention's Liege and Lief. Georgia gave birth to twin daughters on 29 April 1997, and a tribute album, Georgia on Our Mind, featuring many of Sandy Denny's former bandmates and friends, was compiled in the children's honour. She also administers a Facebook page "Sandy Denny and Family" dedicated to her mother's memory and more recently, under the name Georgia Katt, has released some of her own DJ-based music.
Tributes
Since her death, many tributes have been made to Denny, both in music and elsewhere. Dave Pegg of Fairport Convention recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on his 1983 solo album The Cocktail Cowboy Goes It Alone. Dave Cousins of the Strawbs wrote "Ringing Down the Years" in memory of Denny shortly after her death. Songs more specific to the death were Bert Jansch's "Where Did My Life Go" and Richard Thompson's "Did She Jump or Was She Pushed?" Fellow Brit folk pioneers Spriguns changed the title of their 1978 album to Magic Lady after hearing of Denny's death while recording. In 1998, a variety of Daylily was named after her.
Denny's songs have been covered by numerous artists in the years since her death. Some of the notable acts to have covered her music include Yo La Tengo, former Marillion frontman Fish, who covered "Solo" on his album Songs from the Mirror, Cat Power, Judy Collins, Nanci Griffith and Nina Simone. Kate Bush mentioned Denny in the lyric of "Blow Away (For Bill)", as one of the musicians to greet Bill in Heaven. "Blow Away (For Bill)" is the third track on Bush's 1980 album Never for Ever. In 1984, Clann Eadair released the single "A tribute to Sandy Denny", featuring Phil Lynott on vocals.
Several radio specials have been produced about Denny's life and music, including BBC Radio 2's The Sandy Denny Story: Who Knows Where the Time Goes. In 2007, Denny's song "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" also received BBC Radio 2's 2007 Folk Award for "Favourite Folk Track of All Time". In 2010, she was recognized by NPR in their 50 Great Voices special series.
In April 2008, a tribute concert was held at The Troubadour in London, to mark the thirtieth anniversary of Denny's death. Those taking part included Martin Carthy, Linda Thompson and Joe Boyd.
A more extensive tribute was given later that year in December at the Southbank in the Queen Elizabeth Hall called The Lady: A Tribute to Sandy Denny with a band composed of members of Bellowhead, the evening featured a mix of young folk acts like Jim Moray and Lisa Knapp alongside those that had known and worked with Denny such as Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. These acts were joined by performers from outside the world of folk like PP Arnold and Marc Almond. The concert, which primarily featured songs written by Denny, received a four-star review in The Guardian. In May 2012 the Southbank concert was expanded into an eight date UK tour called The Lady: A Homage to Sandy Denny. The tour showcased Sandy's entire songbook taking in her work with Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, her solo career and the new songs completed by Thea Gilmore on her album Don't Stop Singing.
The band was, once again, composed of members of Bellowhead. Other acts performing included the aforementioned Thea Gilmore and up-and-coming folk acts Lavinia Blackwall of Trembling Bells, Blair Dunlop and Sam Carter, alongside more established folk stars Maddy Prior, Dave Swarbrick and Jerry Donahue. The line-up was completed with performers not normally associated with the folk scene; Green Gartside, Joan Wasser (also known as Joan As Police Woman), and PP Arnold. The tour was well received, obtaining a four-star review in The Times. The London concert at the Barbican was filmed for BBC4, and broadcast in a 90-minute programme titled The Songs of Sandy Denny in November 2012.
In the 2012 Irish film Silence (Harvest Films & South Wind Blows), "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" is used during the film and final credits.
In April 2016 Denny was inducted into the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards Hall of Fame.
Alela Diane recorded the tribute "Song for Sandy" on her album Cusp, released in February 2018. The song reflects on Denny's final tragic days and her orphaned baby daughter.
Discography
Solo studio albums
The North Star Grassman and the Ravens (1971)
Sandy (1972)
Like an Old Fashioned Waltz (1974)
Rendezvous (1977)
Solo live albums
The BBC Sessions 1971–1973 (1997)
Gold Dust (1998) (live recording from final tour, 1977)
Live at the BBC (2007 4-disc compilation)
Sandy – Deluxe edition, 2012 – includes "Live at Ebbetts Field" (previously unreleased concert on disc 2)
With others
Denny's collaborations with other artists, including with Alex Campbell, The Strawbs, Fairport Convention, Fotheringay, and The Bunch, together with numerous posthumous releases and compilation albums, are detailed further on the Sandy Denny discography page.
References and notes
General
Further reading
Mick Houghton. I've Always Kept a Unicorn – The Biography of Sandy Denny. Faber & Faber, 2015;
Clinton Heylin. No More Sad Refrains – The Life and Times of Sandy Denny. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Clinton Heylin. Gypsy Love Songs & Sad Refrains – The Recordings of Richard Thompson and Sandy Denny. Labour of Love Productions, 1989.
Colin Larkin. The Guinness Who's Who of Folk Music. Guinness Publishing Ltd;
Jim Irvin. Angel of Avalon. MOJO Magazine, August 1998.
Colin Harper, Trevor Hodgett. Irish Folk, Traditional & Blues: A Secret History. Cherry Red, 2005;
Pamela Murray Winters. No Thought of Leaving: A life of Sandy Denny. 2000. (Unpublished).
Brian Hinton, Geoff Wall. Ashley Hutchings: The Guv'nor & the Rise of Folk Rock. London: Helter Skelter, 2002;
Patrick Humphries. Meet On The Ledge: The Classic Years 1967–1975. Virgin Books, 1997;
Patrick Humphries. Richard Thompson: Strange Affair – The Biography. Virgin Books, 1996;
Philip Ward, "Sandy Denny: A Thirtieth Anniversary", R2 (Rock'n'Reel) 2(9), May/June 2008.
Philip Ward, Sandy Denny: Reflections on Her Music''. Matador, 2011;
External links
Official website
Homage to Sandy Denny
Dedicated to the memory of Sandy Denny
Sandy Denny website
1947 births
1978 deaths
20th-century English singers
20th-century English women singers
A&M Records artists
Accidental deaths from falls
Accidental deaths in London
Deaths by intracerebral hemorrhage
Alumni of Kingston College (England)
British folk rock musicians
Burials at Putney Vale Cemetery
English folk singers
English people of Scottish descent
English women singer-songwriters
Fairport Convention members
Women rock singers
Fotheringay members
Island Records artists
People from Byfield, Northamptonshire
People from Wimbledon, London
Singers from London
Strawbs members
The Bunch members | false | [
"Joanita Kawalya is a Ugandan musician and activist. She is a member of the Afrigo Band, the longest-lasting musical band in Uganda, which has been in continuous existence since 1975.\n\nEarly life and education\nKawalya was born to the late singer Eclaus Kawalya on 5 January 1967. She worked as a teacher at Lubiri Senior Secondary School between 1989 and 1993.\n\nMusic career\nKawalya started singing at an early age. She went on to sing in choir in school and later as a part time member of \"The Wrens\", courtesy of her father's guest performances with the band. He would take the whole family with him. She joined Afrigo Band in 1986 when she was nineteen-year-old, replacing her sister, Margaret, also a vocalist who was leaving for Germany. She did music as she did a teaching course at Kyambogo University In 1993, she quit teaching and concentrated on music and mothering her two children.\n\nOther responsibilities\nShe has served as a community advisory member on the National Aids project, the Walter Reed project and the Makerere Johns Hopkins joint project. She has also been involved in grass root campaigns for HIV/AIDS and her face is now recognizable as one of the facilitators for the Nabagereka's annual cultural fete, the Kisakaate. Kawalya is also involved in mentorship of talent. \n\nshe recently participated in the gender identity week organized by Makerere University School of Women and Gender Studies\n\nFamily \nJoanita Kawalya is a married mother of two children.\n\nSee also\n Afrigo Band\n Moses Matovu\n Frank Mbalire\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Bobi Wine & Joanita Kawalya Join Katutandike As Goodwill Ambassadors\n\n1967 births\n20th-century Ugandan women singers\n21st-century Ugandan women singers\nLiving people\nGanda people\nMembers of Afrigo Band\nPeople educated at Trinity College Nabbingo",
"Grinding Stone is the only album by The Gary Moore Band. Released in 1973, it was recorded between Moore's leaving Skid Row and joining Thin Lizzy.\n\nIt contains a mixture of styles that differ from his later solo work. Moore did not release another solo album until 1978's Back on the Streets.\n\nBackground\nMoore put the band together after leaving the group Skid Row, signing to CBS Records. At the time, Moore was unsure about which direction he wanted to take his music in, and consequently the album features a variety of styles. These included the title track's blues shuffle, double-tracked lead guitars on \"Time To Heal\" and \"Spirit\", Latin rhythms reminiscent of Santana, and slide guitar on \"Boogie My Way Back Home\". Keyboardist Jan Schelhaas guested on the album, as did Irish guitarist Philip Donnelly.\n\nMoore split up the band so he could join Thin Lizzy as a replacement for Eric Bell. Drummer Pearse Kelly briefly covered for Thin Lizzy's Brian Downey while the latter was ill. He would revisit some of the jazz fusion styles explored on the album with the group Colosseum II.\n\nReception\nThe album was favourably reviewed by Billboard, who thought \"Sail Across the Mountain\" was its strongest track. It was not commercially successful, and did not chart. Moore would not release another album under his own name until Back on the Streets five years later, after several years in Colosseum II and another stint in Thin Lizzy.\n\nA retrospective review in AllMusic was mixed, saying that while the eclectic and varied styles were interesting, it was not Moore's best album. However, the reviewer felt the album helped explain Moore's change in styles between Skid Row and Colosseum II, and concluded that it was an overlooked album in his solo career.\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel\nThe Gary Moore Band\nGary Moore – lead guitar, vocals\nJohn Curtis – bass guitar\nPearse Kelly – drums, percussion\n\nAdditional musicians\nFrank Boylan – bass guitar\nPhilip Donnelly – rhythm guitar\nJan Schelhaas – keyboards\n\nProduction\nMartin Birch – producer, engineer\n\nReferences\n\nGary Moore albums\n1973 debut albums\nAlbums produced by Martin Birch\nCBS Records albums"
] |
[
"Gustave Courbet",
"The Artist's Studio"
] | C_844f4ddfe7ba4b7ca989631723998286_1 | What was The Artists studio? | 1 | What was The Artist's studio? | Gustave Courbet | In 1855, Courbet submitted fourteen paintings for exhibition at the Exposition Universelle. Three were rejected for lack of space, including A Burial at Ornans and his other monumental canvas The Artist's Studio. Refusing to be denied, Courbet took matters into his own hands. He displayed forty of his paintings, including The Artist's Studio, in his own gallery called The Pavilion of Realism (Pavillon du Realisme) which was a temporary structure that he erected next door to the official Salon-like Exposition Universelle. The work is an allegory of Courbet's life as a painter, seen as an heroic venture, in which he is flanked by friends and admirers on the right, and challenges and opposition to the left. Friends on the right include the art critics Champfleury, and Charles Baudelaire, and art collector Alfred Bruyas. On the left are figures (priest, prostitute, grave digger, merchant and others) who represent what Courbet described in a letter to Champfleury as "the other world of trivial life, the people, misery, poverty, wealth, the exploited and the exploiters, the people who live off death." In the foreground of the left-hand side is a man with dogs, who was not mentioned in Courbet's letter to Champfleury. X-rays show he was painted in later, but his role in the painting is important: he is an allegory of the then current French Emperor, Napoleon III, identified by his famous hunting dogs and iconic twirled moustache. By placing him on the left, Courbet publicly shows his disdain for the emperor and depicts him as a criminal, suggesting that his "ownership" of France is an illegal one. Although artists like Eugene Delacroix were ardent champions of his effort, the public went to the show mostly out of curiosity and to deride him. Attendance and sales were disappointing, but Courbet's status as a hero to the French avant-garde became assured. He was admired by the American James McNeill Whistler, and he became an inspiration to the younger generation of French artists including Edouard Manet and the Impressionist painters. The Artist's Studio was recognized as a masterpiece by Delacroix, Baudelaire, and Champfleury, if not by the public. CANNOTANSWER | his paintings, including The Artist's Studio, | Jean Désiré Gustave Courbet ( , , ; 10 June 1819 – 31 December 1877) was a French painter who led the Realism movement in 19th-century French painting. Committed to painting only what he could see, he rejected academic convention and the Romanticism of the previous generation of visual artists. His independence set an example that was important to later artists, such as the Impressionists and the Cubists. Courbet occupies an important place in 19th-century French painting as an innovator and as an artist willing to make bold social statements through his work.
Courbet's paintings of the late 1840s and early 1850s brought him his first recognition. They challenged convention by depicting unidealized peasants and workers, often on a grand scale traditionally reserved for paintings of religious or historical subjects. Courbet's subsequent paintings were mostly of a less overtly political character: landscapes, seascapes, hunting scenes, nudes, and still lifes. Courbet, a socialist, was active in the political developments of France. He was imprisoned for six months in 1871 for his involvement with the Paris Commune, and lived in exile in Switzerland from 1873 until his death.
Biography
Gustave Courbet was born in 1819 to Régis and Sylvie Oudot Courbet in Ornans (department of Doubs). Being a prosperous farming family, anti-monarchical feelings prevailed in the household. (His maternal grandfather fought in the French Revolution.) Courbet's sisters, Zoé, Zélie, and Juliette, were his first models for drawing and painting. After moving to Paris he often returned home to Ornans to hunt, fish and find inspiration.
Courbet went to Paris in 1839 and worked at the studio of Steuben and Hesse. An independent spirit, he soon left, preferring to develop his own style by studying the paintings of Spanish, Flemish and French masters in the Louvre, and painting copies of their work.
Courbet's first works were an Odalisque inspired by the writing of Victor Hugo and a Lélia illustrating George Sand, but he soon abandoned literary influences, choosing instead to base his paintings on observed reality. Among his paintings of the early 1840s are several self-portraits, Romantic in conception, in which the artist portrayed himself in various roles. These include Self-Portrait with Black Dog (c. 1842–44, accepted for exhibition at the 1844 Paris Salon), the theatrical Self-Portrait which is also known as Desperate Man (c. 1843–45), Lovers in the Countryside (1844, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Lyon), The Sculptor (1845), The Wounded Man (1844–54, Musée d'Orsay, Paris), The Cellist, Self-Portrait (1847, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, shown at the 1848 Salon), and Man with a Pipe (1848–49, Musée Fabre, Montpellier).
Trips to the Netherlands and Belgium in 1846–47 strengthened Courbet's belief that painters should portray the life around them, as Rembrandt, Hals and other Dutch masters had. By 1848, he had gained supporters among the younger critics, the Neo-romantics and Realists, notably Champfleury.
Courbet achieved his first Salon success in 1849 with his painting After Dinner at Ornans. The work, reminiscent of Chardin and Le Nain, earned Courbet a gold medal and was purchased by the state. The gold medal meant that his works would no longer require jury approval for exhibition at the Salon—an exemption Courbet enjoyed until 1857 (when the rule changed).
In 1849–50, Courbet painted The Stone Breakers (destroyed in the Allied Bombing of Dresden in 1945), which Proudhon admired as an icon of peasant life; it has been called "the first of his great works". The painting was inspired by a scene Courbet witnessed on the roadside. He later explained to Champfleury and the writer Francis Wey: "It is not often that one encounters so complete an expression of poverty and so, right then and there I got the idea for a painting. I told them to come to my studio the next morning."
Realism
Courbet's work belonged neither to the predominant Romantic nor Neoclassical schools. History painting, which the Paris Salon esteemed as a painter's highest calling, did not interest him, for he believed that "the artists of one century [are] basically incapable of reproducing the aspect of a past or future century ..." Instead, he maintained that the only possible source for living art is the artist's own experience. He and Jean-François Millet would find inspiration painting the life of peasants and workers.
Courbet painted figurative compositions, landscapes, seascapes, and still lifes. He courted controversy by addressing social issues in his work, and by painting subjects that were considered vulgar, such as the rural bourgeoisie, peasants, and working conditions of the poor. His work, along with that of Honoré Daumier and Jean-François Millet, became known as Realism. For Courbet realism dealt not with the perfection of line and form, but entailed spontaneous and rough handling of paint, suggesting direct observation by the artist while portraying the irregularities in nature. He depicted the harshness in life, and in doing so challenged contemporary academic ideas of art.
The Stone Breakers
Considered to be the first of Courbet's great works, The Stone Breakers of 1849 is an example of social realism that caused a sensation when it was first exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1850. The work was based on two men, one young and one old, whom Courbet discovered engaged in backbreaking labor on the side of the road when he returned to Ornans for an eight-month visit in October 1848. On his inspiration, Courbet told his friends and art critics Francis Wey and Jules Champfleury, "It is not often that one encounters so complete an expression of poverty and so, right then and there I got the idea for a painting."
While other artists had depicted the plight of the rural poor, Courbet's peasants are not idealized like those in works such as Millet's The Gleaners.
In February 1945, the work was destroyed during World War II, along with 154 other pictures, when a transport vehicle moving the pictures to the castle of Königstein, near Dresden, was bombed by Allied forces.
A Burial at Ornans
The Salon of 1850–1851 found him triumphant with The Stone Breakers, the Peasants of Flagey and A Burial at Ornans. The Burial, one of Courbet's most important works, records the funeral of his grand uncle which he attended in September 1848. People who attended the funeral were the models for the painting. Previously, models had been used as actors in historical narratives, but in Burial Courbet said he "painted the very people who had been present at the interment, all the townspeople". The result is a realistic presentation of them, and of life in Ornans.
The vast painting, measuring , drew both praise and fierce denunciations from critics and the public, in part because it upset convention by depicting a prosaic ritual on a scale which would previously have been reserved for a religious or royal subject.
According to art historian Sarah Faunce, "In Paris the Burial was judged as a work that had thrust itself into the grand tradition of history painting, like an upstart in dirty boots crashing a genteel party, and in terms of that tradition it was of course found wanting." The painting lacks the sentimental rhetoric that was expected in a genre work: Courbet's mourners make no theatrical gestures of grief, and their faces seemed more caricatured than ennobled. The critics accused Courbet of a deliberate pursuit of ugliness.
Eventually, the public grew more interested in the new Realist approach, and the lavish, decadent fantasy of Romanticism lost popularity. Courbet well understood the importance of the painting, and said of it, "The Burial at Ornans was in reality the burial of Romanticism."
Courbet became a celebrity, and was spoken of as a genius, a "terrible socialist" and a "savage". He actively encouraged the public's perception of him as an unschooled peasant, while his ambition, his bold pronouncements to journalists, and his insistence on depicting his own life in his art gave him a reputation for unbridled vanity.
Courbet associated his ideas of realism in art with political anarchism, and, having gained an audience, he promoted democratic and socialist ideas by writing politically motivated essays and dissertations. His familiar visage was the object of frequent caricature in the popular French press.
In 1850, Courbet wrote to a friend:
During the 1850s, Courbet painted numerous figurative works using common folk and friends as his subjects, such as Village Damsels (1852), The Wrestlers (1853), The Bathers (1853), The Sleeping Spinner (1853), and The Wheat Sifters (1854).
The Artist's Studio
In 1855, Courbet submitted fourteen paintings for exhibition at the Exposition Universelle. Three were rejected for lack of space, including A Burial at Ornans and his other monumental canvas The Artist's Studio. Refusing to be denied, Courbet took matters into his own hands. He displayed forty of his paintings, including The Artist's Studio, in his own gallery called The Pavilion of Realism (Pavillon du Réalisme) which was a temporary structure that he erected next door to the official Salon-like Exposition Universelle.
The work is an allegory of Courbet's life as a painter, seen as a heroic venture, in which he is flanked by friends and admirers on the right, and challenges and opposition to the left. Friends on the right include the art critics Champfleury, and Charles Baudelaire, and art collector Alfred Bruyas. On the left are figures (priest, prostitute, grave digger, merchant and others) who represent what Courbet described in a letter to Champfleury as "the other world of trivial life, the people, misery, poverty, wealth, the exploited and the exploiters, the people who live off death."
In the foreground of the left-hand side is a man with dogs, who was not mentioned in Courbet's letter to Champfleury. X-rays show he was painted in later, but his role in the painting is important: he is an allegory of the then current French Emperor, Napoleon III, identified by his famous hunting dogs and iconic twirled moustache. By placing him on the left, Courbet publicly shows his disdain for the emperor and depicts him as a criminal, suggesting that his "ownership" of France is an illegal one.
Although artists like Eugène Delacroix were ardent champions of his effort, the public went to the show mostly out of curiosity and to deride him. Attendance and sales were disappointing, but Courbet's status as a hero to the French avant-garde became assured. He was admired by the American James Abbott McNeill Whistler, and he became an inspiration to the younger generation of French artists including Édouard Manet and the Impressionist painters. The Artist's Studio was recognized as a masterpiece by Delacroix, Baudelaire, and Champfleury, if not by the public.
Realist manifesto
Courbet wrote a Realist manifesto for the introduction to the catalogue of this independent, personal exhibition, echoing the tone of the period's political manifestos. In it he asserts his goal as an artist "to translate the customs, the ideas, the appearance of my epoch according to my own estimation."
Notoriety
In the Salon of 1857, Courbet showed six paintings. These included Young Ladies on the Banks of the Seine (Summer), depicting two prostitutes under a tree, as well as the first of many hunting scenes Courbet was to paint during the remainder of his life: Hind at Bay in the Snow and The Quarry.
Young Ladies on the Banks of the Seine, painted in 1856, provoked a scandal. Art critics accustomed to conventional, "timeless" nude women in landscapes were shocked by Courbet's depiction of modern women casually displaying their undergarments.
By exhibiting sensational works alongside hunting scenes, of the sort that had brought popular success to the English painter Edwin Landseer, Courbet guaranteed himself "both notoriety and sales". During the 1860s, Courbet painted a series of increasingly erotic works such as Femme nue couchée.
This culminated in The Origin of the World (L'Origine du monde) (1866), which depicts female genitalia and was not publicly exhibited until 1988, and Sleep (1866), featuring two women in bed. The latter painting became the subject of a police report when it was exhibited by a picture dealer in 1872.
Until about 1861, Napoléon's regime had exhibited authoritarian characteristics, using press censorship to prevent the spread of opposition, manipulating elections, and depriving Parliament of the right to free debate or any real power. In the 1860s, however, Napoléon III made more concessions to placate his liberal opponents. This change began by allowing free debates in Parliament and public reports of parliamentary debates. Press censorship, too, was relaxed and culminated in the appointment of the Liberal Émile Ollivier, previously a leader of the opposition to Napoléon's regime, as the de facto Prime Minister in 1870. As a sign of appeasement to the Liberals who admired Courbet, Napoleon III nominated him to the Legion of Honour in 1870. His refusal of the cross of the Legion of Honour angered those in power but made him immensely popular with those who opposed the prevailing regime.
Courbet and the Paris Commune
On 4 September 1870, during the Franco-Prussian War, Courbet made a proposal that later came back to haunt him. He wrote a letter to the Government of National Defense, proposing that the column in the Place Vendôme, erected by Napoleon I to honour the victories of the French Army, be taken down. He wrote:
Courbet proposed that the Column be moved to a more appropriate place, such as the Hotel des Invalides, a military hospital. He also wrote an open letter addressed to the German Army and to German artists, proposing that German and French cannons should be melted down and crowned with a liberty cap, and made into a new monument on Place Vendôme, dedicated to the federation of the German and French people. The Government of National Defense did nothing about his suggestion to tear down the column, but it was not forgotten.
On 18 March, in the aftermath of the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, a revolutionary government called the Paris Commune briefly took power in the city. Courbet played an active part, and organized a Federation of Artists, which held its first meeting on 5 April in the Grand Amphitheater of the School of Medicine. Some three hundred to four hundred painters, sculptors, architects, and decorators attended. There were some famous names on the list of members, including André Gill, Honoré Daumier, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Eugène Pottier, Jules Dalou, and Édouard Manet. Manet was not in Paris during the Commune, and did not attend, and Corot, who was seventy-five years old, stayed in a country house and in his studio during the Commune, not taking part in the political events.
Courbet chaired the meeting and proposed that the Louvre and the Museum of the Luxembourg Palace, the two major art museums of Paris, closed during the uprising, be reopened as soon as possible, and that the traditional annual exhibit called the Salon be held as in years past, but with radical differences. He proposed that the Salon should be free of any government interference or rewards to preferred artists; there would be no medals or government commissions given. Furthermore, he called for the abolition of the most famous state institutions of French art; the École des Beaux-Arts, the School of Rome, the School of Athens, and the Fine Arts section of the Institute of France.
On 12 April, the Executive Committee of the Commune gave Courbet, though he was not yet officially a member of the Commune, the assignment of opening the museums and organizing the Salon. At the same meeting, they issued the following decree: "The Column of the Place Vendôme will be demolished." On 16 April, special elections were held to replace more moderate members of the Commune who had resigned their seats, and Courbet was elected as a delegate for the 6th arrondissement. He was given the title of Delegate of Fine Arts, and on 21 April he was also made a member of the Commission on Education. At the meeting of the Commission on 27 April, the minutes reported that Courbet requested the demolition of the Vendôme column be carried out, and that the column would be replaced by an allegorical figure representing the taking of power of the Commune on 18 March.
Nonetheless, Courbet was a dissident by nature, and he was soon in opposition with the majority of the Commune members on some of its measures. He was one of a minority of Commune Members which opposed the creation of a Committee on Public Safety, modeled on the committee of the same name which carried out the Reign of Terror during the French Revolution.
Courbet opposed the Commune on another more serious matter; the arrest of his friend Gustave Chaudey, a prominent socialist, magistrate, and journalist, whose portrait Courbet had painted. The popular Commune newspaper, Le Père Duchesne, accused Chaudey, when he was briefly deputy mayor of the 9th arrondissement before the Commune was formed, of ordering soldiers to fire on a crowd that had surrounded the Hotel de Ville. Courbet's opposition was of no use; on 23 May 1871, in the final days of the Commune, Chaudey was shot by a Commune firing squad. According to some sources Courbet resigned from the Commune in protest.
On 13 May, on the proposal of Courbet, the Paris house of Adolphe Thiers, the chief executive of the French government, was demolished, and his art collection confiscated. Courbet proposed that the confiscated art be given to the Louvre and other museums, but the director of the Louvre refused to accept it. On 16 May, just nine days before the fall of the Commune, in a large ceremony with military bands and photographers, the Vendôme column was pulled down and broke into pieces. Some witnesses said Courbet was there, others denied it. The following day, the Federation of Artists debated dismissing directors of the Louvre and of the Luxembourg museums, suspected by some in the Commune of having secret contacts with the French government, and appointed new heads of the museums.
According to one legend, Courbet defended the Louvre and other museums against "looting mobs", but there are no records of any such attacks on the museums. The only real threat to the Louvre came during "Bloody Week", 21–28 May 1871, when a unit of Communards, led by a Commune general, Jules Bergeret, set fire to the Tuileries Palace, next to the Louvre. The fire spread to the library of the Louvre, which was completely destroyed, but the efforts of museum curators and firemen saved the art gallery.
After the final suppression of the Commune by the French army on 28 May, Courbet went into hiding in apartments of different friends. He was arrested on 7 June. At his trial before a military tribunal on 14 August, Courbet argued that he had only joined the Commune to pacify it, and that he had wanted to move the Vendôme Column, not destroy it. He said he had only belonged to the Commune for a short period of time, and rarely attended its meetings. He was convicted, but given a lighter sentence than other Commune leaders; six months in prison and a fine of five hundred Francs. Serving part of his sentence in the prison of Saint-Pelagie in Paris, he was allowed an easel and paints, but he could not have models pose for him. He did a famous series of still-life paintings of flowers and fruit.
Exile and death
Courbet completed his prison sentence on 2 March 1872, but his problems caused by the destruction of the Vendôme Column were still not over. In 1873, the newly elected president of the Republic, Patrice Mac-Mahon, announced plans to rebuild the column, with the cost to be paid by Courbet. Unable to pay, Courbet went into a self-imposed exile in Switzerland to avoid bankruptcy. In the following years, he participated in Swiss regional and national exhibitions. Surveilled by the Swiss intelligence service, he enjoyed in the small Swiss art world the reputation as head of the "realist school" and inspired younger artists such as Auguste Baud-Bovy and Ferdinand Hodler.
Important works from this period include several paintings of trout, "hooked and bleeding from the gills", that have been interpreted as allegorical self-portraits of the exiled artist. In his final years, Courbet painted landscapes, including several scenes of water mysteriously emerging from the depths of the earth in the Jura Mountains of the France–Switzerland border. Courbet also worked on sculpture during his exile. Previously, in the early 1860s, he had produced a few sculptures, one of which – the Fisherman of Chavots (1862) – he donated to Ornans for a public fountain, but it was removed after Courbet's arrest.
On 4 May 1877, Courbet was told the estimated cost of reconstructing the Vendôme Column; 323,091 francs and 68 centimes. He was given the option of paying the fine in yearly installments of 10,000 francs for the next 33 years, until his 91st birthday. On 31 December 1877, a day before the first installment was due, Courbet died, aged 58, in La Tour-de-Peilz, Switzerland, of a liver disease aggravated by heavy drinking.
Gallery
Legacy
Courbet was admired by many younger artists. Claude Monet included a portrait of Courbet in his own version of Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe from 1865–1866 (Musée d'Orsay, Paris). Courbet's particular kind of realism influenced many artists to follow, notably among them the German painters of the Leibl circle, James McNeill Whistler, and Paul Cézanne. Courbet's influence can also be seen in the work of Edward Hopper, whose Bridge in Paris (1906) and Approaching a City (1946) have been described as Freudian echoes of Courbet's The Source of the Loue and The Origin of the World. His pupils included Henri Fantin-Latour, Hector Hanoteau and Olaf Isaachsen.
Courbet once wrote this in a letter:
Nazi-looted art
During the Third Reich (1933-1945) Jewish art collectors throughout Europe had their property seized as part of the Holocaust. Many artworks created by Courbet were looted by Nazis and their agents during this period and have only recently been reclaimed by the families of the previous owners.
Courbet's La falaise d’Etretat was owned by the Jewish collector Marc Wolfson and his wife Erna, who both were murdered in Auschwitz. After disappearing during the Nazi Occupation of France, it reappeared years later at the musée d’Orsay
The great Hungarian Jewish collector Baron Mor Lipot Herzog owned several Courbet artworks, including Le Chateau de Blonay (Neige) (circa 1875,"The Chateau of Blonay (Snow)", now at the Budapest Museum of Fine Arts), and Courbet's most infamous work — L'Origine du monde ("The Origin of the World"), His collection of 2000-2500 pieces was looted by Nazis and many are still missing.
Gustav Courbet's paintings Village Girl With Goat, The Father, and Landscape With Rocks were discovered in the Gurlitt Trove of art stashed in Munich. It is not known to whom they belonged.
Josephine Weinmann and her family, who were German Jews, had owned Le Grand Pont before they were forced to flee. The Nazi militant Herbert Schaefer acquired it, and loaned it to the Yale University Art Gallery, against whom the Weinmanns filed a claim.
The French Database of Art Objects at the Jeu de Paume (Cultural Plunder by the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg) has 41 entries for Courbet.
Courbet and Cubism
Two 19th-century artists prepared the way for the emergence of Cubism in the 20th century: Courbet and Cézanne. Cézanne's contributions are well-known. Courbet's importance was announced by Guillaume Apollinaire, poet-spokesperson for the Cubists. Writing in Les Peintres Cubistes, Méditations Esthétiques (1913) he declared, "Courbet is the father of the new painters." Jean Metzinger and Albert Gleizes often portrayed Courbet as the father of all modern art.
Both artists sought to transcend the conventional methods of rendering nature; Cézanne through a dialectical method revealing the process of seeing, Courbet by his materialism. The Cubists would combine these two approaches in developing a revolution in art.
On a formal level, Courbet wished to convey the physical characteristics of what he was painting: its density, weight and texture. Art critic John Berger said: "No painter before Courbet was ever able to emphasize so uncompromisingly the density and weight of what he was painting." This emphasis on material reality endowed his subjects with dignity. Berger observed that the Cubist painters "were at great pains to establish the physical presence of what they were representing. And in this they are the heirs of Courbet."
See also
History of painting
Léonce Bénédite
List of Orientalist artists
Lost artworks
Orientalism
Western painting
References
Notes
Citations
Works cited
Further reading
Monographs on the art and life of Courbet have been written by Estignard (Paris, 1874), D'Ideville, (Paris, 1878), Silvestre in Les artistes français, (Paris, 1878), Isham in Van Dyke's Modern French Masters (New York, 1896), Meier-Graefe, Corot and Courbet, (Leipzig, 1905), Cazier (Paris, 1906), Riat, (Paris, 1906), Muther, (Berlin, 1906), Robin, (Paris, 1909), Benedite, (Paris, 1911) and Lazár Béla (Paris, 1911). Consult also Muther, History of Modern Painting, volume ii (London, 1896, 1907); Patoux, "Courbet" in Les artistes célèbres and La vérité sur Courbet (Paris, 1879); Le Men, Courbet (New York, 2008).
Bond, Anthony, "Embodying the Real", Body. The Art Gallery of New South Wales (1997).
Champfleury, Les Grandes Figures d'hier et d'aujourd'hui (Paris, 1861)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate. Courbet in Perspective. (Prentice Hall, 1977)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate and Gustave Courbet. Letters of Gustave Courbet. (Chicago: Univ Chicago Press, 1992)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate. The Most Arrogant Man in France: Gustave Courbet and the Nineteenth-Century Media Culture. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2007)
Clark, Timothy J., Image of the People: Gustave Courbet and the 1848 Revolution, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999); (Originally published 1973. Based on his doctoral dissertation along with The Absolute Bourgeois: Artists and Politics in France, 1848–1851), 208pp. . (Considered the definitive treatment of Courbet's politics and painting in 1848, and a foundational text of Marxist art history.)
Faunce, Sara, "Feminist in Spite of Himself", Body. The Art Gallery of New South Wales (1997).
Griffiths, Harriet & Alister Mill, Courbet's early Salon exhibition record, Database of Salon Artists, 1827–1850
Howe, Jeffery (ed.), Courbet. Mapping Realism. Paintings from the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium and American Collections, exhibition catalogue, McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College, 1 September – 8 December 2013 [distributed by the University of Chicago Press]
Hutchinson, Mark, "The history of The Origin of the World", Times Literary Supplement, 8 Aug. 2007.
Lemonnier, C, Les Peintres de la Vie (Paris, 1888).
Lindsay, Jack. Gustave Courbet his life and art. Publ. Jupiter Books (London) Limited 1977.
Mantz, "G. Courbet," Gaz. des beaux-arts (Paris, 1878)
Nochlin, Linda, Courbet, (London: Thames & Hudson, 2007)
Nochlin, Linda, Realism: Style and Civilization (New York: Penguin, 1972).
Savatier, Thierry, El origen del mundo. Historia de un cuadro de Gustave Courbet. Ediciones TREA (Gijón, 2009).
Tennant Jackson, Jenny, "Courbet's Trauerspiel: Trouble with Women in the Painter's Studio." in G. Pollock (ed.), Visual Politics of Psychoanalysis, London: I.B.Tauris, 2013.
Zola, Émile, Mes Haines (Paris, 1879)
External links
Gustave Courbet papers at the University of Maryland Libraries
Gustave Courbet, works at Musée d'Orsay, Paris
Joconde, Portail des collections des musées de France
Union List of Artist Names, Getty Vocabularies. ULAN Full Record Display for Gustave Courbet. Getty Vocabulary Program, Getty Research Institute. Los Angeles, California
The Painter's Studio (L'atelier du peintre), on-line, in increased reality, Musée d'Orsay
'Le chef de l'école du laid': Gustave Courbet in 19th-century caricatures. European Studies Blog, British Library.
Jennifer A. Thompson, "Marine by Gustave Courbet (cat. 948)," in The John G. Johnson Collection: A History and Selected Works, a Philadelphia Museum of Art free digital publication
1819 births
1877 deaths
19th-century French painters
French male painters
French Realist painters
French anarchists
French socialists
Orientalist painters
Légion d'honneur refusals
People from Doubs
People from Riviera-Pays-d'Enhaut District
Deaths from cirrhosis
Communards | true | [
"The Studio was the name of a small artists' loft commune formed in 1975 by four comic book artists/commercial illustrators/painters in Manhattan's Chelsea district. These artists were Barry Windsor-Smith, Jeff Jones, Michael Kaluta, and Bernie Wrightson — known colloquially as the \"Fab Four\". The purpose of The Studio was to provide the group with a space where they could pursue creative products outside the constraints of comic book commercialism.\n\nThe studio space was a converted machine shop with high ceilings.\n\nIndustry journalist Tom Spurgeon commented on the broader significance and influence of The Studio in his 2011 obituary of Jones at The Comics Reporter:\nThe legacy of that much talent doing what was collectively very good work at a point of almost monolithic and degrading corporate influence over the kind of art they wanted to do has provided The Studio with a legacy that can be embraced even by those that didn't particularly care for the artists' output. The idea of a dedicated workplace that would allow for coercive influence one artist to another has been carried over into very nearly ever cartoonists' collective space initiative since.\n\nBy 1979, the \"Fab Four\" had produced enough material to issue an art book under the name The Studio, which was published by Dragon's Dream. That same year the members of The Studio moved on to independent projects and separate work spaces.\n\nSee also \n Upstart Associates \n Fab Four\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Information about The Studio at BarryWindsor-Smith.com\n\nCommunes\nAmerican artist groups and collectives\nComics groups and collectives\nCulture of Manhattan\nChelsea, Manhattan\n1975 establishments in New York City",
"ABN or Assholes by Nature is an American hip hop duo, composed of Houston, Texas-based rappers Trae tha Truth and Z-Ro. They have so far released two studio albums Assholes by Nature (2003) and It Is What It Is (2008).\n\nHistory\nThe duo is a collaboration between Z-Ro and Trae, both of whom are well established solo recording artists within Texas' underground hip hop scene. Their first collaboration was on Z-Ro's debut album Look What You Did to Me (1998), with them regularly appearing on each other's albums thereafter. Z-Ro and Trae grew apart in subsequent years and parted ways altogether after their last (and so far final) album in 2008 due to personal and creative differences.\n\nDiscography\nABN's first release was a double CD titled Assholes by Nature. It was released in 2003 by the independent label G-Maab Records and was produced by P.K. Johnson.\n\nIn 2008 the duo released It Is What It Is which turned out to be the biggest commercial success for both artists. The album was released on Rap-A-Lot Records and produced by Brandon Crear. The album reached number 62 on the Billboard 200, 10 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums, and 7 on the Top Rap Albums charts. Previously the artists had 13 appearances on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart between them; this was the first in the top 10.\n\nStudio albums\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n \n\nAfrican-American musical groups\nAmerican musical duos\nMusical groups established in 2003\nMusical groups from Texas\nSouthern hip hop groups\nHip hop duos\nFamily musical groups\nGangsta rap groups"
] |
[
"Gustave Courbet",
"The Artist's Studio",
"What was The Artists studio?",
"his paintings, including The Artist's Studio,"
] | C_844f4ddfe7ba4b7ca989631723998286_1 | What made this painting special? | 2 | What made The Artist's Studio special? | Gustave Courbet | In 1855, Courbet submitted fourteen paintings for exhibition at the Exposition Universelle. Three were rejected for lack of space, including A Burial at Ornans and his other monumental canvas The Artist's Studio. Refusing to be denied, Courbet took matters into his own hands. He displayed forty of his paintings, including The Artist's Studio, in his own gallery called The Pavilion of Realism (Pavillon du Realisme) which was a temporary structure that he erected next door to the official Salon-like Exposition Universelle. The work is an allegory of Courbet's life as a painter, seen as an heroic venture, in which he is flanked by friends and admirers on the right, and challenges and opposition to the left. Friends on the right include the art critics Champfleury, and Charles Baudelaire, and art collector Alfred Bruyas. On the left are figures (priest, prostitute, grave digger, merchant and others) who represent what Courbet described in a letter to Champfleury as "the other world of trivial life, the people, misery, poverty, wealth, the exploited and the exploiters, the people who live off death." In the foreground of the left-hand side is a man with dogs, who was not mentioned in Courbet's letter to Champfleury. X-rays show he was painted in later, but his role in the painting is important: he is an allegory of the then current French Emperor, Napoleon III, identified by his famous hunting dogs and iconic twirled moustache. By placing him on the left, Courbet publicly shows his disdain for the emperor and depicts him as a criminal, suggesting that his "ownership" of France is an illegal one. Although artists like Eugene Delacroix were ardent champions of his effort, the public went to the show mostly out of curiosity and to deride him. Attendance and sales were disappointing, but Courbet's status as a hero to the French avant-garde became assured. He was admired by the American James McNeill Whistler, and he became an inspiration to the younger generation of French artists including Edouard Manet and the Impressionist painters. The Artist's Studio was recognized as a masterpiece by Delacroix, Baudelaire, and Champfleury, if not by the public. CANNOTANSWER | The work is an allegory of Courbet's life as a painter, | Jean Désiré Gustave Courbet ( , , ; 10 June 1819 – 31 December 1877) was a French painter who led the Realism movement in 19th-century French painting. Committed to painting only what he could see, he rejected academic convention and the Romanticism of the previous generation of visual artists. His independence set an example that was important to later artists, such as the Impressionists and the Cubists. Courbet occupies an important place in 19th-century French painting as an innovator and as an artist willing to make bold social statements through his work.
Courbet's paintings of the late 1840s and early 1850s brought him his first recognition. They challenged convention by depicting unidealized peasants and workers, often on a grand scale traditionally reserved for paintings of religious or historical subjects. Courbet's subsequent paintings were mostly of a less overtly political character: landscapes, seascapes, hunting scenes, nudes, and still lifes. Courbet, a socialist, was active in the political developments of France. He was imprisoned for six months in 1871 for his involvement with the Paris Commune, and lived in exile in Switzerland from 1873 until his death.
Biography
Gustave Courbet was born in 1819 to Régis and Sylvie Oudot Courbet in Ornans (department of Doubs). Being a prosperous farming family, anti-monarchical feelings prevailed in the household. (His maternal grandfather fought in the French Revolution.) Courbet's sisters, Zoé, Zélie, and Juliette, were his first models for drawing and painting. After moving to Paris he often returned home to Ornans to hunt, fish and find inspiration.
Courbet went to Paris in 1839 and worked at the studio of Steuben and Hesse. An independent spirit, he soon left, preferring to develop his own style by studying the paintings of Spanish, Flemish and French masters in the Louvre, and painting copies of their work.
Courbet's first works were an Odalisque inspired by the writing of Victor Hugo and a Lélia illustrating George Sand, but he soon abandoned literary influences, choosing instead to base his paintings on observed reality. Among his paintings of the early 1840s are several self-portraits, Romantic in conception, in which the artist portrayed himself in various roles. These include Self-Portrait with Black Dog (c. 1842–44, accepted for exhibition at the 1844 Paris Salon), the theatrical Self-Portrait which is also known as Desperate Man (c. 1843–45), Lovers in the Countryside (1844, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Lyon), The Sculptor (1845), The Wounded Man (1844–54, Musée d'Orsay, Paris), The Cellist, Self-Portrait (1847, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, shown at the 1848 Salon), and Man with a Pipe (1848–49, Musée Fabre, Montpellier).
Trips to the Netherlands and Belgium in 1846–47 strengthened Courbet's belief that painters should portray the life around them, as Rembrandt, Hals and other Dutch masters had. By 1848, he had gained supporters among the younger critics, the Neo-romantics and Realists, notably Champfleury.
Courbet achieved his first Salon success in 1849 with his painting After Dinner at Ornans. The work, reminiscent of Chardin and Le Nain, earned Courbet a gold medal and was purchased by the state. The gold medal meant that his works would no longer require jury approval for exhibition at the Salon—an exemption Courbet enjoyed until 1857 (when the rule changed).
In 1849–50, Courbet painted The Stone Breakers (destroyed in the Allied Bombing of Dresden in 1945), which Proudhon admired as an icon of peasant life; it has been called "the first of his great works". The painting was inspired by a scene Courbet witnessed on the roadside. He later explained to Champfleury and the writer Francis Wey: "It is not often that one encounters so complete an expression of poverty and so, right then and there I got the idea for a painting. I told them to come to my studio the next morning."
Realism
Courbet's work belonged neither to the predominant Romantic nor Neoclassical schools. History painting, which the Paris Salon esteemed as a painter's highest calling, did not interest him, for he believed that "the artists of one century [are] basically incapable of reproducing the aspect of a past or future century ..." Instead, he maintained that the only possible source for living art is the artist's own experience. He and Jean-François Millet would find inspiration painting the life of peasants and workers.
Courbet painted figurative compositions, landscapes, seascapes, and still lifes. He courted controversy by addressing social issues in his work, and by painting subjects that were considered vulgar, such as the rural bourgeoisie, peasants, and working conditions of the poor. His work, along with that of Honoré Daumier and Jean-François Millet, became known as Realism. For Courbet realism dealt not with the perfection of line and form, but entailed spontaneous and rough handling of paint, suggesting direct observation by the artist while portraying the irregularities in nature. He depicted the harshness in life, and in doing so challenged contemporary academic ideas of art.
The Stone Breakers
Considered to be the first of Courbet's great works, The Stone Breakers of 1849 is an example of social realism that caused a sensation when it was first exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1850. The work was based on two men, one young and one old, whom Courbet discovered engaged in backbreaking labor on the side of the road when he returned to Ornans for an eight-month visit in October 1848. On his inspiration, Courbet told his friends and art critics Francis Wey and Jules Champfleury, "It is not often that one encounters so complete an expression of poverty and so, right then and there I got the idea for a painting."
While other artists had depicted the plight of the rural poor, Courbet's peasants are not idealized like those in works such as Millet's The Gleaners.
In February 1945, the work was destroyed during World War II, along with 154 other pictures, when a transport vehicle moving the pictures to the castle of Königstein, near Dresden, was bombed by Allied forces.
A Burial at Ornans
The Salon of 1850–1851 found him triumphant with The Stone Breakers, the Peasants of Flagey and A Burial at Ornans. The Burial, one of Courbet's most important works, records the funeral of his grand uncle which he attended in September 1848. People who attended the funeral were the models for the painting. Previously, models had been used as actors in historical narratives, but in Burial Courbet said he "painted the very people who had been present at the interment, all the townspeople". The result is a realistic presentation of them, and of life in Ornans.
The vast painting, measuring , drew both praise and fierce denunciations from critics and the public, in part because it upset convention by depicting a prosaic ritual on a scale which would previously have been reserved for a religious or royal subject.
According to art historian Sarah Faunce, "In Paris the Burial was judged as a work that had thrust itself into the grand tradition of history painting, like an upstart in dirty boots crashing a genteel party, and in terms of that tradition it was of course found wanting." The painting lacks the sentimental rhetoric that was expected in a genre work: Courbet's mourners make no theatrical gestures of grief, and their faces seemed more caricatured than ennobled. The critics accused Courbet of a deliberate pursuit of ugliness.
Eventually, the public grew more interested in the new Realist approach, and the lavish, decadent fantasy of Romanticism lost popularity. Courbet well understood the importance of the painting, and said of it, "The Burial at Ornans was in reality the burial of Romanticism."
Courbet became a celebrity, and was spoken of as a genius, a "terrible socialist" and a "savage". He actively encouraged the public's perception of him as an unschooled peasant, while his ambition, his bold pronouncements to journalists, and his insistence on depicting his own life in his art gave him a reputation for unbridled vanity.
Courbet associated his ideas of realism in art with political anarchism, and, having gained an audience, he promoted democratic and socialist ideas by writing politically motivated essays and dissertations. His familiar visage was the object of frequent caricature in the popular French press.
In 1850, Courbet wrote to a friend:
During the 1850s, Courbet painted numerous figurative works using common folk and friends as his subjects, such as Village Damsels (1852), The Wrestlers (1853), The Bathers (1853), The Sleeping Spinner (1853), and The Wheat Sifters (1854).
The Artist's Studio
In 1855, Courbet submitted fourteen paintings for exhibition at the Exposition Universelle. Three were rejected for lack of space, including A Burial at Ornans and his other monumental canvas The Artist's Studio. Refusing to be denied, Courbet took matters into his own hands. He displayed forty of his paintings, including The Artist's Studio, in his own gallery called The Pavilion of Realism (Pavillon du Réalisme) which was a temporary structure that he erected next door to the official Salon-like Exposition Universelle.
The work is an allegory of Courbet's life as a painter, seen as a heroic venture, in which he is flanked by friends and admirers on the right, and challenges and opposition to the left. Friends on the right include the art critics Champfleury, and Charles Baudelaire, and art collector Alfred Bruyas. On the left are figures (priest, prostitute, grave digger, merchant and others) who represent what Courbet described in a letter to Champfleury as "the other world of trivial life, the people, misery, poverty, wealth, the exploited and the exploiters, the people who live off death."
In the foreground of the left-hand side is a man with dogs, who was not mentioned in Courbet's letter to Champfleury. X-rays show he was painted in later, but his role in the painting is important: he is an allegory of the then current French Emperor, Napoleon III, identified by his famous hunting dogs and iconic twirled moustache. By placing him on the left, Courbet publicly shows his disdain for the emperor and depicts him as a criminal, suggesting that his "ownership" of France is an illegal one.
Although artists like Eugène Delacroix were ardent champions of his effort, the public went to the show mostly out of curiosity and to deride him. Attendance and sales were disappointing, but Courbet's status as a hero to the French avant-garde became assured. He was admired by the American James Abbott McNeill Whistler, and he became an inspiration to the younger generation of French artists including Édouard Manet and the Impressionist painters. The Artist's Studio was recognized as a masterpiece by Delacroix, Baudelaire, and Champfleury, if not by the public.
Realist manifesto
Courbet wrote a Realist manifesto for the introduction to the catalogue of this independent, personal exhibition, echoing the tone of the period's political manifestos. In it he asserts his goal as an artist "to translate the customs, the ideas, the appearance of my epoch according to my own estimation."
Notoriety
In the Salon of 1857, Courbet showed six paintings. These included Young Ladies on the Banks of the Seine (Summer), depicting two prostitutes under a tree, as well as the first of many hunting scenes Courbet was to paint during the remainder of his life: Hind at Bay in the Snow and The Quarry.
Young Ladies on the Banks of the Seine, painted in 1856, provoked a scandal. Art critics accustomed to conventional, "timeless" nude women in landscapes were shocked by Courbet's depiction of modern women casually displaying their undergarments.
By exhibiting sensational works alongside hunting scenes, of the sort that had brought popular success to the English painter Edwin Landseer, Courbet guaranteed himself "both notoriety and sales". During the 1860s, Courbet painted a series of increasingly erotic works such as Femme nue couchée.
This culminated in The Origin of the World (L'Origine du monde) (1866), which depicts female genitalia and was not publicly exhibited until 1988, and Sleep (1866), featuring two women in bed. The latter painting became the subject of a police report when it was exhibited by a picture dealer in 1872.
Until about 1861, Napoléon's regime had exhibited authoritarian characteristics, using press censorship to prevent the spread of opposition, manipulating elections, and depriving Parliament of the right to free debate or any real power. In the 1860s, however, Napoléon III made more concessions to placate his liberal opponents. This change began by allowing free debates in Parliament and public reports of parliamentary debates. Press censorship, too, was relaxed and culminated in the appointment of the Liberal Émile Ollivier, previously a leader of the opposition to Napoléon's regime, as the de facto Prime Minister in 1870. As a sign of appeasement to the Liberals who admired Courbet, Napoleon III nominated him to the Legion of Honour in 1870. His refusal of the cross of the Legion of Honour angered those in power but made him immensely popular with those who opposed the prevailing regime.
Courbet and the Paris Commune
On 4 September 1870, during the Franco-Prussian War, Courbet made a proposal that later came back to haunt him. He wrote a letter to the Government of National Defense, proposing that the column in the Place Vendôme, erected by Napoleon I to honour the victories of the French Army, be taken down. He wrote:
Courbet proposed that the Column be moved to a more appropriate place, such as the Hotel des Invalides, a military hospital. He also wrote an open letter addressed to the German Army and to German artists, proposing that German and French cannons should be melted down and crowned with a liberty cap, and made into a new monument on Place Vendôme, dedicated to the federation of the German and French people. The Government of National Defense did nothing about his suggestion to tear down the column, but it was not forgotten.
On 18 March, in the aftermath of the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, a revolutionary government called the Paris Commune briefly took power in the city. Courbet played an active part, and organized a Federation of Artists, which held its first meeting on 5 April in the Grand Amphitheater of the School of Medicine. Some three hundred to four hundred painters, sculptors, architects, and decorators attended. There were some famous names on the list of members, including André Gill, Honoré Daumier, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Eugène Pottier, Jules Dalou, and Édouard Manet. Manet was not in Paris during the Commune, and did not attend, and Corot, who was seventy-five years old, stayed in a country house and in his studio during the Commune, not taking part in the political events.
Courbet chaired the meeting and proposed that the Louvre and the Museum of the Luxembourg Palace, the two major art museums of Paris, closed during the uprising, be reopened as soon as possible, and that the traditional annual exhibit called the Salon be held as in years past, but with radical differences. He proposed that the Salon should be free of any government interference or rewards to preferred artists; there would be no medals or government commissions given. Furthermore, he called for the abolition of the most famous state institutions of French art; the École des Beaux-Arts, the School of Rome, the School of Athens, and the Fine Arts section of the Institute of France.
On 12 April, the Executive Committee of the Commune gave Courbet, though he was not yet officially a member of the Commune, the assignment of opening the museums and organizing the Salon. At the same meeting, they issued the following decree: "The Column of the Place Vendôme will be demolished." On 16 April, special elections were held to replace more moderate members of the Commune who had resigned their seats, and Courbet was elected as a delegate for the 6th arrondissement. He was given the title of Delegate of Fine Arts, and on 21 April he was also made a member of the Commission on Education. At the meeting of the Commission on 27 April, the minutes reported that Courbet requested the demolition of the Vendôme column be carried out, and that the column would be replaced by an allegorical figure representing the taking of power of the Commune on 18 March.
Nonetheless, Courbet was a dissident by nature, and he was soon in opposition with the majority of the Commune members on some of its measures. He was one of a minority of Commune Members which opposed the creation of a Committee on Public Safety, modeled on the committee of the same name which carried out the Reign of Terror during the French Revolution.
Courbet opposed the Commune on another more serious matter; the arrest of his friend Gustave Chaudey, a prominent socialist, magistrate, and journalist, whose portrait Courbet had painted. The popular Commune newspaper, Le Père Duchesne, accused Chaudey, when he was briefly deputy mayor of the 9th arrondissement before the Commune was formed, of ordering soldiers to fire on a crowd that had surrounded the Hotel de Ville. Courbet's opposition was of no use; on 23 May 1871, in the final days of the Commune, Chaudey was shot by a Commune firing squad. According to some sources Courbet resigned from the Commune in protest.
On 13 May, on the proposal of Courbet, the Paris house of Adolphe Thiers, the chief executive of the French government, was demolished, and his art collection confiscated. Courbet proposed that the confiscated art be given to the Louvre and other museums, but the director of the Louvre refused to accept it. On 16 May, just nine days before the fall of the Commune, in a large ceremony with military bands and photographers, the Vendôme column was pulled down and broke into pieces. Some witnesses said Courbet was there, others denied it. The following day, the Federation of Artists debated dismissing directors of the Louvre and of the Luxembourg museums, suspected by some in the Commune of having secret contacts with the French government, and appointed new heads of the museums.
According to one legend, Courbet defended the Louvre and other museums against "looting mobs", but there are no records of any such attacks on the museums. The only real threat to the Louvre came during "Bloody Week", 21–28 May 1871, when a unit of Communards, led by a Commune general, Jules Bergeret, set fire to the Tuileries Palace, next to the Louvre. The fire spread to the library of the Louvre, which was completely destroyed, but the efforts of museum curators and firemen saved the art gallery.
After the final suppression of the Commune by the French army on 28 May, Courbet went into hiding in apartments of different friends. He was arrested on 7 June. At his trial before a military tribunal on 14 August, Courbet argued that he had only joined the Commune to pacify it, and that he had wanted to move the Vendôme Column, not destroy it. He said he had only belonged to the Commune for a short period of time, and rarely attended its meetings. He was convicted, but given a lighter sentence than other Commune leaders; six months in prison and a fine of five hundred Francs. Serving part of his sentence in the prison of Saint-Pelagie in Paris, he was allowed an easel and paints, but he could not have models pose for him. He did a famous series of still-life paintings of flowers and fruit.
Exile and death
Courbet completed his prison sentence on 2 March 1872, but his problems caused by the destruction of the Vendôme Column were still not over. In 1873, the newly elected president of the Republic, Patrice Mac-Mahon, announced plans to rebuild the column, with the cost to be paid by Courbet. Unable to pay, Courbet went into a self-imposed exile in Switzerland to avoid bankruptcy. In the following years, he participated in Swiss regional and national exhibitions. Surveilled by the Swiss intelligence service, he enjoyed in the small Swiss art world the reputation as head of the "realist school" and inspired younger artists such as Auguste Baud-Bovy and Ferdinand Hodler.
Important works from this period include several paintings of trout, "hooked and bleeding from the gills", that have been interpreted as allegorical self-portraits of the exiled artist. In his final years, Courbet painted landscapes, including several scenes of water mysteriously emerging from the depths of the earth in the Jura Mountains of the France–Switzerland border. Courbet also worked on sculpture during his exile. Previously, in the early 1860s, he had produced a few sculptures, one of which – the Fisherman of Chavots (1862) – he donated to Ornans for a public fountain, but it was removed after Courbet's arrest.
On 4 May 1877, Courbet was told the estimated cost of reconstructing the Vendôme Column; 323,091 francs and 68 centimes. He was given the option of paying the fine in yearly installments of 10,000 francs for the next 33 years, until his 91st birthday. On 31 December 1877, a day before the first installment was due, Courbet died, aged 58, in La Tour-de-Peilz, Switzerland, of a liver disease aggravated by heavy drinking.
Gallery
Legacy
Courbet was admired by many younger artists. Claude Monet included a portrait of Courbet in his own version of Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe from 1865–1866 (Musée d'Orsay, Paris). Courbet's particular kind of realism influenced many artists to follow, notably among them the German painters of the Leibl circle, James McNeill Whistler, and Paul Cézanne. Courbet's influence can also be seen in the work of Edward Hopper, whose Bridge in Paris (1906) and Approaching a City (1946) have been described as Freudian echoes of Courbet's The Source of the Loue and The Origin of the World. His pupils included Henri Fantin-Latour, Hector Hanoteau and Olaf Isaachsen.
Courbet once wrote this in a letter:
Nazi-looted art
During the Third Reich (1933-1945) Jewish art collectors throughout Europe had their property seized as part of the Holocaust. Many artworks created by Courbet were looted by Nazis and their agents during this period and have only recently been reclaimed by the families of the previous owners.
Courbet's La falaise d’Etretat was owned by the Jewish collector Marc Wolfson and his wife Erna, who both were murdered in Auschwitz. After disappearing during the Nazi Occupation of France, it reappeared years later at the musée d’Orsay
The great Hungarian Jewish collector Baron Mor Lipot Herzog owned several Courbet artworks, including Le Chateau de Blonay (Neige) (circa 1875,"The Chateau of Blonay (Snow)", now at the Budapest Museum of Fine Arts), and Courbet's most infamous work — L'Origine du monde ("The Origin of the World"), His collection of 2000-2500 pieces was looted by Nazis and many are still missing.
Gustav Courbet's paintings Village Girl With Goat, The Father, and Landscape With Rocks were discovered in the Gurlitt Trove of art stashed in Munich. It is not known to whom they belonged.
Josephine Weinmann and her family, who were German Jews, had owned Le Grand Pont before they were forced to flee. The Nazi militant Herbert Schaefer acquired it, and loaned it to the Yale University Art Gallery, against whom the Weinmanns filed a claim.
The French Database of Art Objects at the Jeu de Paume (Cultural Plunder by the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg) has 41 entries for Courbet.
Courbet and Cubism
Two 19th-century artists prepared the way for the emergence of Cubism in the 20th century: Courbet and Cézanne. Cézanne's contributions are well-known. Courbet's importance was announced by Guillaume Apollinaire, poet-spokesperson for the Cubists. Writing in Les Peintres Cubistes, Méditations Esthétiques (1913) he declared, "Courbet is the father of the new painters." Jean Metzinger and Albert Gleizes often portrayed Courbet as the father of all modern art.
Both artists sought to transcend the conventional methods of rendering nature; Cézanne through a dialectical method revealing the process of seeing, Courbet by his materialism. The Cubists would combine these two approaches in developing a revolution in art.
On a formal level, Courbet wished to convey the physical characteristics of what he was painting: its density, weight and texture. Art critic John Berger said: "No painter before Courbet was ever able to emphasize so uncompromisingly the density and weight of what he was painting." This emphasis on material reality endowed his subjects with dignity. Berger observed that the Cubist painters "were at great pains to establish the physical presence of what they were representing. And in this they are the heirs of Courbet."
See also
History of painting
Léonce Bénédite
List of Orientalist artists
Lost artworks
Orientalism
Western painting
References
Notes
Citations
Works cited
Further reading
Monographs on the art and life of Courbet have been written by Estignard (Paris, 1874), D'Ideville, (Paris, 1878), Silvestre in Les artistes français, (Paris, 1878), Isham in Van Dyke's Modern French Masters (New York, 1896), Meier-Graefe, Corot and Courbet, (Leipzig, 1905), Cazier (Paris, 1906), Riat, (Paris, 1906), Muther, (Berlin, 1906), Robin, (Paris, 1909), Benedite, (Paris, 1911) and Lazár Béla (Paris, 1911). Consult also Muther, History of Modern Painting, volume ii (London, 1896, 1907); Patoux, "Courbet" in Les artistes célèbres and La vérité sur Courbet (Paris, 1879); Le Men, Courbet (New York, 2008).
Bond, Anthony, "Embodying the Real", Body. The Art Gallery of New South Wales (1997).
Champfleury, Les Grandes Figures d'hier et d'aujourd'hui (Paris, 1861)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate. Courbet in Perspective. (Prentice Hall, 1977)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate and Gustave Courbet. Letters of Gustave Courbet. (Chicago: Univ Chicago Press, 1992)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate. The Most Arrogant Man in France: Gustave Courbet and the Nineteenth-Century Media Culture. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2007)
Clark, Timothy J., Image of the People: Gustave Courbet and the 1848 Revolution, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999); (Originally published 1973. Based on his doctoral dissertation along with The Absolute Bourgeois: Artists and Politics in France, 1848–1851), 208pp. . (Considered the definitive treatment of Courbet's politics and painting in 1848, and a foundational text of Marxist art history.)
Faunce, Sara, "Feminist in Spite of Himself", Body. The Art Gallery of New South Wales (1997).
Griffiths, Harriet & Alister Mill, Courbet's early Salon exhibition record, Database of Salon Artists, 1827–1850
Howe, Jeffery (ed.), Courbet. Mapping Realism. Paintings from the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium and American Collections, exhibition catalogue, McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College, 1 September – 8 December 2013 [distributed by the University of Chicago Press]
Hutchinson, Mark, "The history of The Origin of the World", Times Literary Supplement, 8 Aug. 2007.
Lemonnier, C, Les Peintres de la Vie (Paris, 1888).
Lindsay, Jack. Gustave Courbet his life and art. Publ. Jupiter Books (London) Limited 1977.
Mantz, "G. Courbet," Gaz. des beaux-arts (Paris, 1878)
Nochlin, Linda, Courbet, (London: Thames & Hudson, 2007)
Nochlin, Linda, Realism: Style and Civilization (New York: Penguin, 1972).
Savatier, Thierry, El origen del mundo. Historia de un cuadro de Gustave Courbet. Ediciones TREA (Gijón, 2009).
Tennant Jackson, Jenny, "Courbet's Trauerspiel: Trouble with Women in the Painter's Studio." in G. Pollock (ed.), Visual Politics of Psychoanalysis, London: I.B.Tauris, 2013.
Zola, Émile, Mes Haines (Paris, 1879)
External links
Gustave Courbet papers at the University of Maryland Libraries
Gustave Courbet, works at Musée d'Orsay, Paris
Joconde, Portail des collections des musées de France
Union List of Artist Names, Getty Vocabularies. ULAN Full Record Display for Gustave Courbet. Getty Vocabulary Program, Getty Research Institute. Los Angeles, California
The Painter's Studio (L'atelier du peintre), on-line, in increased reality, Musée d'Orsay
'Le chef de l'école du laid': Gustave Courbet in 19th-century caricatures. European Studies Blog, British Library.
Jennifer A. Thompson, "Marine by Gustave Courbet (cat. 948)," in The John G. Johnson Collection: A History and Selected Works, a Philadelphia Museum of Art free digital publication
1819 births
1877 deaths
19th-century French painters
French male painters
French Realist painters
French anarchists
French socialists
Orientalist painters
Légion d'honneur refusals
People from Doubs
People from Riviera-Pays-d'Enhaut District
Deaths from cirrhosis
Communards | true | [
"Light Painting World Alliance (LPWA) is a nonprofit organization (NPO). Its goal is to offer the light painting community a cross-border platform to show its art, to set up networks and to promote social concerns and further training by means of light painting.\n\nFor this purpose LPWA established a network of local representatives from currently 30 countries worldwide.\nIt was founded in December 2011 by Russian artist Sergey B. Churkin.\nLPWA showcases light painting works of its members in the context of exhibitions, conferences and special events using an advisory board of lightpainters for selection.\n\nIn September 2014 LPWA was awarded status as an official Collaborating Partner of the International Year of Light and Light-based Technologies 2015 (IYL2015) by UNESCO.\nThis happened in accordance with the proclaimed International Year of Light and Light-based Technologies 2015 by UNESCO.\nAs representatives of LPWA artists Sergey Churkin, Eric Mellinger, Hugo Baptista and JanLeonardo were officially invited to attend opening ceremonies at UNESCO Headquarters Paris.\n\nSelected events and exhibitions\n 2012: Central House of Artists Moscow - 1st Light Painting World Exhibition\n 2013: LPWA Mumbai 2013 International Light Painting Show\n 2013: G8 Gallery Moscow) - Positive In My Mind\n 2013: Espace Pierre Cardin Paris - 2nd Light Painting World Exhibition\n 2014: World Light Painting Mega Animation Project\n 2014: Oviedo - 1st International LightArt Congress & 3rd World Light Painting Exhibition\n 2014: Embarcadère Culture Center Aubervilliers - Special Event\n 2014: New Town Plaza Hong Kong - Waves of Shining Light Special Event \n 2014: LPWA Contest -Light Painted World\n 2015: Madrid - THE BODY ART WEEKEND Special Event\n 2015: UNESCO Paris - Light Painted World Exhibition\n\nExternal links\n\nReferences\n\nCultural organizations",
"Aha Oe Feii? or Are You Jealous? is a painting by Paul Gauguin from 1892, based on a real-life episode during his stay on Tahiti which he later described in the diary Noa Noa: \"On the shore two sisters are lying after bathing, in the graceful poses of resting animals; they speak of yesterday's love and tomorrow's conquests. The recollection causes them to quarrel, \"What? Are you jealous?\" Gauguin titled the painting in Tahitian language, Aha Oe Feii?, in the lower left corner of the canvas.\n\nThe painting evokes a sense of Pacific paradise in which sexual relations are playful and harmless. According to Professor Peter Toohey, \"this jealousy is not the product of a threat to an exclusive sexual relationship or jilted love affair - it is the result of one of the sisters having enjoyed more sex than the other the night before\". In a letter to his friend from 1892, Gauguin wrote about the painting: \"I think this is the best of what I've made so far\".\n\nThe painting is housed in the Pushkin Museum, Moscow, Russia.\n\nReferences\n\nPaintings by Paul Gauguin\n1892 paintings\nNude art\nPaintings in the collection of the Pushkin Museum"
] |
[
"Gustave Courbet",
"The Artist's Studio",
"What was The Artists studio?",
"his paintings, including The Artist's Studio,",
"What made this painting special?",
"The work is an allegory of Courbet's life as a painter,"
] | C_844f4ddfe7ba4b7ca989631723998286_1 | What type of detail does it share? | 3 | What type of detail does The Artist's Studio share? | Gustave Courbet | In 1855, Courbet submitted fourteen paintings for exhibition at the Exposition Universelle. Three were rejected for lack of space, including A Burial at Ornans and his other monumental canvas The Artist's Studio. Refusing to be denied, Courbet took matters into his own hands. He displayed forty of his paintings, including The Artist's Studio, in his own gallery called The Pavilion of Realism (Pavillon du Realisme) which was a temporary structure that he erected next door to the official Salon-like Exposition Universelle. The work is an allegory of Courbet's life as a painter, seen as an heroic venture, in which he is flanked by friends and admirers on the right, and challenges and opposition to the left. Friends on the right include the art critics Champfleury, and Charles Baudelaire, and art collector Alfred Bruyas. On the left are figures (priest, prostitute, grave digger, merchant and others) who represent what Courbet described in a letter to Champfleury as "the other world of trivial life, the people, misery, poverty, wealth, the exploited and the exploiters, the people who live off death." In the foreground of the left-hand side is a man with dogs, who was not mentioned in Courbet's letter to Champfleury. X-rays show he was painted in later, but his role in the painting is important: he is an allegory of the then current French Emperor, Napoleon III, identified by his famous hunting dogs and iconic twirled moustache. By placing him on the left, Courbet publicly shows his disdain for the emperor and depicts him as a criminal, suggesting that his "ownership" of France is an illegal one. Although artists like Eugene Delacroix were ardent champions of his effort, the public went to the show mostly out of curiosity and to deride him. Attendance and sales were disappointing, but Courbet's status as a hero to the French avant-garde became assured. He was admired by the American James McNeill Whistler, and he became an inspiration to the younger generation of French artists including Edouard Manet and the Impressionist painters. The Artist's Studio was recognized as a masterpiece by Delacroix, Baudelaire, and Champfleury, if not by the public. CANNOTANSWER | seen as an heroic venture, in which he is flanked by friends and admirers on the right, and challenges and opposition to the left. | Jean Désiré Gustave Courbet ( , , ; 10 June 1819 – 31 December 1877) was a French painter who led the Realism movement in 19th-century French painting. Committed to painting only what he could see, he rejected academic convention and the Romanticism of the previous generation of visual artists. His independence set an example that was important to later artists, such as the Impressionists and the Cubists. Courbet occupies an important place in 19th-century French painting as an innovator and as an artist willing to make bold social statements through his work.
Courbet's paintings of the late 1840s and early 1850s brought him his first recognition. They challenged convention by depicting unidealized peasants and workers, often on a grand scale traditionally reserved for paintings of religious or historical subjects. Courbet's subsequent paintings were mostly of a less overtly political character: landscapes, seascapes, hunting scenes, nudes, and still lifes. Courbet, a socialist, was active in the political developments of France. He was imprisoned for six months in 1871 for his involvement with the Paris Commune, and lived in exile in Switzerland from 1873 until his death.
Biography
Gustave Courbet was born in 1819 to Régis and Sylvie Oudot Courbet in Ornans (department of Doubs). Being a prosperous farming family, anti-monarchical feelings prevailed in the household. (His maternal grandfather fought in the French Revolution.) Courbet's sisters, Zoé, Zélie, and Juliette, were his first models for drawing and painting. After moving to Paris he often returned home to Ornans to hunt, fish and find inspiration.
Courbet went to Paris in 1839 and worked at the studio of Steuben and Hesse. An independent spirit, he soon left, preferring to develop his own style by studying the paintings of Spanish, Flemish and French masters in the Louvre, and painting copies of their work.
Courbet's first works were an Odalisque inspired by the writing of Victor Hugo and a Lélia illustrating George Sand, but he soon abandoned literary influences, choosing instead to base his paintings on observed reality. Among his paintings of the early 1840s are several self-portraits, Romantic in conception, in which the artist portrayed himself in various roles. These include Self-Portrait with Black Dog (c. 1842–44, accepted for exhibition at the 1844 Paris Salon), the theatrical Self-Portrait which is also known as Desperate Man (c. 1843–45), Lovers in the Countryside (1844, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Lyon), The Sculptor (1845), The Wounded Man (1844–54, Musée d'Orsay, Paris), The Cellist, Self-Portrait (1847, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, shown at the 1848 Salon), and Man with a Pipe (1848–49, Musée Fabre, Montpellier).
Trips to the Netherlands and Belgium in 1846–47 strengthened Courbet's belief that painters should portray the life around them, as Rembrandt, Hals and other Dutch masters had. By 1848, he had gained supporters among the younger critics, the Neo-romantics and Realists, notably Champfleury.
Courbet achieved his first Salon success in 1849 with his painting After Dinner at Ornans. The work, reminiscent of Chardin and Le Nain, earned Courbet a gold medal and was purchased by the state. The gold medal meant that his works would no longer require jury approval for exhibition at the Salon—an exemption Courbet enjoyed until 1857 (when the rule changed).
In 1849–50, Courbet painted The Stone Breakers (destroyed in the Allied Bombing of Dresden in 1945), which Proudhon admired as an icon of peasant life; it has been called "the first of his great works". The painting was inspired by a scene Courbet witnessed on the roadside. He later explained to Champfleury and the writer Francis Wey: "It is not often that one encounters so complete an expression of poverty and so, right then and there I got the idea for a painting. I told them to come to my studio the next morning."
Realism
Courbet's work belonged neither to the predominant Romantic nor Neoclassical schools. History painting, which the Paris Salon esteemed as a painter's highest calling, did not interest him, for he believed that "the artists of one century [are] basically incapable of reproducing the aspect of a past or future century ..." Instead, he maintained that the only possible source for living art is the artist's own experience. He and Jean-François Millet would find inspiration painting the life of peasants and workers.
Courbet painted figurative compositions, landscapes, seascapes, and still lifes. He courted controversy by addressing social issues in his work, and by painting subjects that were considered vulgar, such as the rural bourgeoisie, peasants, and working conditions of the poor. His work, along with that of Honoré Daumier and Jean-François Millet, became known as Realism. For Courbet realism dealt not with the perfection of line and form, but entailed spontaneous and rough handling of paint, suggesting direct observation by the artist while portraying the irregularities in nature. He depicted the harshness in life, and in doing so challenged contemporary academic ideas of art.
The Stone Breakers
Considered to be the first of Courbet's great works, The Stone Breakers of 1849 is an example of social realism that caused a sensation when it was first exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1850. The work was based on two men, one young and one old, whom Courbet discovered engaged in backbreaking labor on the side of the road when he returned to Ornans for an eight-month visit in October 1848. On his inspiration, Courbet told his friends and art critics Francis Wey and Jules Champfleury, "It is not often that one encounters so complete an expression of poverty and so, right then and there I got the idea for a painting."
While other artists had depicted the plight of the rural poor, Courbet's peasants are not idealized like those in works such as Millet's The Gleaners.
In February 1945, the work was destroyed during World War II, along with 154 other pictures, when a transport vehicle moving the pictures to the castle of Königstein, near Dresden, was bombed by Allied forces.
A Burial at Ornans
The Salon of 1850–1851 found him triumphant with The Stone Breakers, the Peasants of Flagey and A Burial at Ornans. The Burial, one of Courbet's most important works, records the funeral of his grand uncle which he attended in September 1848. People who attended the funeral were the models for the painting. Previously, models had been used as actors in historical narratives, but in Burial Courbet said he "painted the very people who had been present at the interment, all the townspeople". The result is a realistic presentation of them, and of life in Ornans.
The vast painting, measuring , drew both praise and fierce denunciations from critics and the public, in part because it upset convention by depicting a prosaic ritual on a scale which would previously have been reserved for a religious or royal subject.
According to art historian Sarah Faunce, "In Paris the Burial was judged as a work that had thrust itself into the grand tradition of history painting, like an upstart in dirty boots crashing a genteel party, and in terms of that tradition it was of course found wanting." The painting lacks the sentimental rhetoric that was expected in a genre work: Courbet's mourners make no theatrical gestures of grief, and their faces seemed more caricatured than ennobled. The critics accused Courbet of a deliberate pursuit of ugliness.
Eventually, the public grew more interested in the new Realist approach, and the lavish, decadent fantasy of Romanticism lost popularity. Courbet well understood the importance of the painting, and said of it, "The Burial at Ornans was in reality the burial of Romanticism."
Courbet became a celebrity, and was spoken of as a genius, a "terrible socialist" and a "savage". He actively encouraged the public's perception of him as an unschooled peasant, while his ambition, his bold pronouncements to journalists, and his insistence on depicting his own life in his art gave him a reputation for unbridled vanity.
Courbet associated his ideas of realism in art with political anarchism, and, having gained an audience, he promoted democratic and socialist ideas by writing politically motivated essays and dissertations. His familiar visage was the object of frequent caricature in the popular French press.
In 1850, Courbet wrote to a friend:
During the 1850s, Courbet painted numerous figurative works using common folk and friends as his subjects, such as Village Damsels (1852), The Wrestlers (1853), The Bathers (1853), The Sleeping Spinner (1853), and The Wheat Sifters (1854).
The Artist's Studio
In 1855, Courbet submitted fourteen paintings for exhibition at the Exposition Universelle. Three were rejected for lack of space, including A Burial at Ornans and his other monumental canvas The Artist's Studio. Refusing to be denied, Courbet took matters into his own hands. He displayed forty of his paintings, including The Artist's Studio, in his own gallery called The Pavilion of Realism (Pavillon du Réalisme) which was a temporary structure that he erected next door to the official Salon-like Exposition Universelle.
The work is an allegory of Courbet's life as a painter, seen as a heroic venture, in which he is flanked by friends and admirers on the right, and challenges and opposition to the left. Friends on the right include the art critics Champfleury, and Charles Baudelaire, and art collector Alfred Bruyas. On the left are figures (priest, prostitute, grave digger, merchant and others) who represent what Courbet described in a letter to Champfleury as "the other world of trivial life, the people, misery, poverty, wealth, the exploited and the exploiters, the people who live off death."
In the foreground of the left-hand side is a man with dogs, who was not mentioned in Courbet's letter to Champfleury. X-rays show he was painted in later, but his role in the painting is important: he is an allegory of the then current French Emperor, Napoleon III, identified by his famous hunting dogs and iconic twirled moustache. By placing him on the left, Courbet publicly shows his disdain for the emperor and depicts him as a criminal, suggesting that his "ownership" of France is an illegal one.
Although artists like Eugène Delacroix were ardent champions of his effort, the public went to the show mostly out of curiosity and to deride him. Attendance and sales were disappointing, but Courbet's status as a hero to the French avant-garde became assured. He was admired by the American James Abbott McNeill Whistler, and he became an inspiration to the younger generation of French artists including Édouard Manet and the Impressionist painters. The Artist's Studio was recognized as a masterpiece by Delacroix, Baudelaire, and Champfleury, if not by the public.
Realist manifesto
Courbet wrote a Realist manifesto for the introduction to the catalogue of this independent, personal exhibition, echoing the tone of the period's political manifestos. In it he asserts his goal as an artist "to translate the customs, the ideas, the appearance of my epoch according to my own estimation."
Notoriety
In the Salon of 1857, Courbet showed six paintings. These included Young Ladies on the Banks of the Seine (Summer), depicting two prostitutes under a tree, as well as the first of many hunting scenes Courbet was to paint during the remainder of his life: Hind at Bay in the Snow and The Quarry.
Young Ladies on the Banks of the Seine, painted in 1856, provoked a scandal. Art critics accustomed to conventional, "timeless" nude women in landscapes were shocked by Courbet's depiction of modern women casually displaying their undergarments.
By exhibiting sensational works alongside hunting scenes, of the sort that had brought popular success to the English painter Edwin Landseer, Courbet guaranteed himself "both notoriety and sales". During the 1860s, Courbet painted a series of increasingly erotic works such as Femme nue couchée.
This culminated in The Origin of the World (L'Origine du monde) (1866), which depicts female genitalia and was not publicly exhibited until 1988, and Sleep (1866), featuring two women in bed. The latter painting became the subject of a police report when it was exhibited by a picture dealer in 1872.
Until about 1861, Napoléon's regime had exhibited authoritarian characteristics, using press censorship to prevent the spread of opposition, manipulating elections, and depriving Parliament of the right to free debate or any real power. In the 1860s, however, Napoléon III made more concessions to placate his liberal opponents. This change began by allowing free debates in Parliament and public reports of parliamentary debates. Press censorship, too, was relaxed and culminated in the appointment of the Liberal Émile Ollivier, previously a leader of the opposition to Napoléon's regime, as the de facto Prime Minister in 1870. As a sign of appeasement to the Liberals who admired Courbet, Napoleon III nominated him to the Legion of Honour in 1870. His refusal of the cross of the Legion of Honour angered those in power but made him immensely popular with those who opposed the prevailing regime.
Courbet and the Paris Commune
On 4 September 1870, during the Franco-Prussian War, Courbet made a proposal that later came back to haunt him. He wrote a letter to the Government of National Defense, proposing that the column in the Place Vendôme, erected by Napoleon I to honour the victories of the French Army, be taken down. He wrote:
Courbet proposed that the Column be moved to a more appropriate place, such as the Hotel des Invalides, a military hospital. He also wrote an open letter addressed to the German Army and to German artists, proposing that German and French cannons should be melted down and crowned with a liberty cap, and made into a new monument on Place Vendôme, dedicated to the federation of the German and French people. The Government of National Defense did nothing about his suggestion to tear down the column, but it was not forgotten.
On 18 March, in the aftermath of the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, a revolutionary government called the Paris Commune briefly took power in the city. Courbet played an active part, and organized a Federation of Artists, which held its first meeting on 5 April in the Grand Amphitheater of the School of Medicine. Some three hundred to four hundred painters, sculptors, architects, and decorators attended. There were some famous names on the list of members, including André Gill, Honoré Daumier, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Eugène Pottier, Jules Dalou, and Édouard Manet. Manet was not in Paris during the Commune, and did not attend, and Corot, who was seventy-five years old, stayed in a country house and in his studio during the Commune, not taking part in the political events.
Courbet chaired the meeting and proposed that the Louvre and the Museum of the Luxembourg Palace, the two major art museums of Paris, closed during the uprising, be reopened as soon as possible, and that the traditional annual exhibit called the Salon be held as in years past, but with radical differences. He proposed that the Salon should be free of any government interference or rewards to preferred artists; there would be no medals or government commissions given. Furthermore, he called for the abolition of the most famous state institutions of French art; the École des Beaux-Arts, the School of Rome, the School of Athens, and the Fine Arts section of the Institute of France.
On 12 April, the Executive Committee of the Commune gave Courbet, though he was not yet officially a member of the Commune, the assignment of opening the museums and organizing the Salon. At the same meeting, they issued the following decree: "The Column of the Place Vendôme will be demolished." On 16 April, special elections were held to replace more moderate members of the Commune who had resigned their seats, and Courbet was elected as a delegate for the 6th arrondissement. He was given the title of Delegate of Fine Arts, and on 21 April he was also made a member of the Commission on Education. At the meeting of the Commission on 27 April, the minutes reported that Courbet requested the demolition of the Vendôme column be carried out, and that the column would be replaced by an allegorical figure representing the taking of power of the Commune on 18 March.
Nonetheless, Courbet was a dissident by nature, and he was soon in opposition with the majority of the Commune members on some of its measures. He was one of a minority of Commune Members which opposed the creation of a Committee on Public Safety, modeled on the committee of the same name which carried out the Reign of Terror during the French Revolution.
Courbet opposed the Commune on another more serious matter; the arrest of his friend Gustave Chaudey, a prominent socialist, magistrate, and journalist, whose portrait Courbet had painted. The popular Commune newspaper, Le Père Duchesne, accused Chaudey, when he was briefly deputy mayor of the 9th arrondissement before the Commune was formed, of ordering soldiers to fire on a crowd that had surrounded the Hotel de Ville. Courbet's opposition was of no use; on 23 May 1871, in the final days of the Commune, Chaudey was shot by a Commune firing squad. According to some sources Courbet resigned from the Commune in protest.
On 13 May, on the proposal of Courbet, the Paris house of Adolphe Thiers, the chief executive of the French government, was demolished, and his art collection confiscated. Courbet proposed that the confiscated art be given to the Louvre and other museums, but the director of the Louvre refused to accept it. On 16 May, just nine days before the fall of the Commune, in a large ceremony with military bands and photographers, the Vendôme column was pulled down and broke into pieces. Some witnesses said Courbet was there, others denied it. The following day, the Federation of Artists debated dismissing directors of the Louvre and of the Luxembourg museums, suspected by some in the Commune of having secret contacts with the French government, and appointed new heads of the museums.
According to one legend, Courbet defended the Louvre and other museums against "looting mobs", but there are no records of any such attacks on the museums. The only real threat to the Louvre came during "Bloody Week", 21–28 May 1871, when a unit of Communards, led by a Commune general, Jules Bergeret, set fire to the Tuileries Palace, next to the Louvre. The fire spread to the library of the Louvre, which was completely destroyed, but the efforts of museum curators and firemen saved the art gallery.
After the final suppression of the Commune by the French army on 28 May, Courbet went into hiding in apartments of different friends. He was arrested on 7 June. At his trial before a military tribunal on 14 August, Courbet argued that he had only joined the Commune to pacify it, and that he had wanted to move the Vendôme Column, not destroy it. He said he had only belonged to the Commune for a short period of time, and rarely attended its meetings. He was convicted, but given a lighter sentence than other Commune leaders; six months in prison and a fine of five hundred Francs. Serving part of his sentence in the prison of Saint-Pelagie in Paris, he was allowed an easel and paints, but he could not have models pose for him. He did a famous series of still-life paintings of flowers and fruit.
Exile and death
Courbet completed his prison sentence on 2 March 1872, but his problems caused by the destruction of the Vendôme Column were still not over. In 1873, the newly elected president of the Republic, Patrice Mac-Mahon, announced plans to rebuild the column, with the cost to be paid by Courbet. Unable to pay, Courbet went into a self-imposed exile in Switzerland to avoid bankruptcy. In the following years, he participated in Swiss regional and national exhibitions. Surveilled by the Swiss intelligence service, he enjoyed in the small Swiss art world the reputation as head of the "realist school" and inspired younger artists such as Auguste Baud-Bovy and Ferdinand Hodler.
Important works from this period include several paintings of trout, "hooked and bleeding from the gills", that have been interpreted as allegorical self-portraits of the exiled artist. In his final years, Courbet painted landscapes, including several scenes of water mysteriously emerging from the depths of the earth in the Jura Mountains of the France–Switzerland border. Courbet also worked on sculpture during his exile. Previously, in the early 1860s, he had produced a few sculptures, one of which – the Fisherman of Chavots (1862) – he donated to Ornans for a public fountain, but it was removed after Courbet's arrest.
On 4 May 1877, Courbet was told the estimated cost of reconstructing the Vendôme Column; 323,091 francs and 68 centimes. He was given the option of paying the fine in yearly installments of 10,000 francs for the next 33 years, until his 91st birthday. On 31 December 1877, a day before the first installment was due, Courbet died, aged 58, in La Tour-de-Peilz, Switzerland, of a liver disease aggravated by heavy drinking.
Gallery
Legacy
Courbet was admired by many younger artists. Claude Monet included a portrait of Courbet in his own version of Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe from 1865–1866 (Musée d'Orsay, Paris). Courbet's particular kind of realism influenced many artists to follow, notably among them the German painters of the Leibl circle, James McNeill Whistler, and Paul Cézanne. Courbet's influence can also be seen in the work of Edward Hopper, whose Bridge in Paris (1906) and Approaching a City (1946) have been described as Freudian echoes of Courbet's The Source of the Loue and The Origin of the World. His pupils included Henri Fantin-Latour, Hector Hanoteau and Olaf Isaachsen.
Courbet once wrote this in a letter:
Nazi-looted art
During the Third Reich (1933-1945) Jewish art collectors throughout Europe had their property seized as part of the Holocaust. Many artworks created by Courbet were looted by Nazis and their agents during this period and have only recently been reclaimed by the families of the previous owners.
Courbet's La falaise d’Etretat was owned by the Jewish collector Marc Wolfson and his wife Erna, who both were murdered in Auschwitz. After disappearing during the Nazi Occupation of France, it reappeared years later at the musée d’Orsay
The great Hungarian Jewish collector Baron Mor Lipot Herzog owned several Courbet artworks, including Le Chateau de Blonay (Neige) (circa 1875,"The Chateau of Blonay (Snow)", now at the Budapest Museum of Fine Arts), and Courbet's most infamous work — L'Origine du monde ("The Origin of the World"), His collection of 2000-2500 pieces was looted by Nazis and many are still missing.
Gustav Courbet's paintings Village Girl With Goat, The Father, and Landscape With Rocks were discovered in the Gurlitt Trove of art stashed in Munich. It is not known to whom they belonged.
Josephine Weinmann and her family, who were German Jews, had owned Le Grand Pont before they were forced to flee. The Nazi militant Herbert Schaefer acquired it, and loaned it to the Yale University Art Gallery, against whom the Weinmanns filed a claim.
The French Database of Art Objects at the Jeu de Paume (Cultural Plunder by the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg) has 41 entries for Courbet.
Courbet and Cubism
Two 19th-century artists prepared the way for the emergence of Cubism in the 20th century: Courbet and Cézanne. Cézanne's contributions are well-known. Courbet's importance was announced by Guillaume Apollinaire, poet-spokesperson for the Cubists. Writing in Les Peintres Cubistes, Méditations Esthétiques (1913) he declared, "Courbet is the father of the new painters." Jean Metzinger and Albert Gleizes often portrayed Courbet as the father of all modern art.
Both artists sought to transcend the conventional methods of rendering nature; Cézanne through a dialectical method revealing the process of seeing, Courbet by his materialism. The Cubists would combine these two approaches in developing a revolution in art.
On a formal level, Courbet wished to convey the physical characteristics of what he was painting: its density, weight and texture. Art critic John Berger said: "No painter before Courbet was ever able to emphasize so uncompromisingly the density and weight of what he was painting." This emphasis on material reality endowed his subjects with dignity. Berger observed that the Cubist painters "were at great pains to establish the physical presence of what they were representing. And in this they are the heirs of Courbet."
See also
History of painting
Léonce Bénédite
List of Orientalist artists
Lost artworks
Orientalism
Western painting
References
Notes
Citations
Works cited
Further reading
Monographs on the art and life of Courbet have been written by Estignard (Paris, 1874), D'Ideville, (Paris, 1878), Silvestre in Les artistes français, (Paris, 1878), Isham in Van Dyke's Modern French Masters (New York, 1896), Meier-Graefe, Corot and Courbet, (Leipzig, 1905), Cazier (Paris, 1906), Riat, (Paris, 1906), Muther, (Berlin, 1906), Robin, (Paris, 1909), Benedite, (Paris, 1911) and Lazár Béla (Paris, 1911). Consult also Muther, History of Modern Painting, volume ii (London, 1896, 1907); Patoux, "Courbet" in Les artistes célèbres and La vérité sur Courbet (Paris, 1879); Le Men, Courbet (New York, 2008).
Bond, Anthony, "Embodying the Real", Body. The Art Gallery of New South Wales (1997).
Champfleury, Les Grandes Figures d'hier et d'aujourd'hui (Paris, 1861)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate. Courbet in Perspective. (Prentice Hall, 1977)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate and Gustave Courbet. Letters of Gustave Courbet. (Chicago: Univ Chicago Press, 1992)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate. The Most Arrogant Man in France: Gustave Courbet and the Nineteenth-Century Media Culture. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2007)
Clark, Timothy J., Image of the People: Gustave Courbet and the 1848 Revolution, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999); (Originally published 1973. Based on his doctoral dissertation along with The Absolute Bourgeois: Artists and Politics in France, 1848–1851), 208pp. . (Considered the definitive treatment of Courbet's politics and painting in 1848, and a foundational text of Marxist art history.)
Faunce, Sara, "Feminist in Spite of Himself", Body. The Art Gallery of New South Wales (1997).
Griffiths, Harriet & Alister Mill, Courbet's early Salon exhibition record, Database of Salon Artists, 1827–1850
Howe, Jeffery (ed.), Courbet. Mapping Realism. Paintings from the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium and American Collections, exhibition catalogue, McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College, 1 September – 8 December 2013 [distributed by the University of Chicago Press]
Hutchinson, Mark, "The history of The Origin of the World", Times Literary Supplement, 8 Aug. 2007.
Lemonnier, C, Les Peintres de la Vie (Paris, 1888).
Lindsay, Jack. Gustave Courbet his life and art. Publ. Jupiter Books (London) Limited 1977.
Mantz, "G. Courbet," Gaz. des beaux-arts (Paris, 1878)
Nochlin, Linda, Courbet, (London: Thames & Hudson, 2007)
Nochlin, Linda, Realism: Style and Civilization (New York: Penguin, 1972).
Savatier, Thierry, El origen del mundo. Historia de un cuadro de Gustave Courbet. Ediciones TREA (Gijón, 2009).
Tennant Jackson, Jenny, "Courbet's Trauerspiel: Trouble with Women in the Painter's Studio." in G. Pollock (ed.), Visual Politics of Psychoanalysis, London: I.B.Tauris, 2013.
Zola, Émile, Mes Haines (Paris, 1879)
External links
Gustave Courbet papers at the University of Maryland Libraries
Gustave Courbet, works at Musée d'Orsay, Paris
Joconde, Portail des collections des musées de France
Union List of Artist Names, Getty Vocabularies. ULAN Full Record Display for Gustave Courbet. Getty Vocabulary Program, Getty Research Institute. Los Angeles, California
The Painter's Studio (L'atelier du peintre), on-line, in increased reality, Musée d'Orsay
'Le chef de l'école du laid': Gustave Courbet in 19th-century caricatures. European Studies Blog, British Library.
Jennifer A. Thompson, "Marine by Gustave Courbet (cat. 948)," in The John G. Johnson Collection: A History and Selected Works, a Philadelphia Museum of Art free digital publication
1819 births
1877 deaths
19th-century French painters
French male painters
French Realist painters
French anarchists
French socialists
Orientalist painters
Légion d'honneur refusals
People from Doubs
People from Riviera-Pays-d'Enhaut District
Deaths from cirrhosis
Communards | false | [
"Just My Type: A Book About Fonts is a nonfiction book by Simon Garfield, a British journalist and non-fiction author. The book touches on typography in our daily lives, specifically why people dislike Comic Sans, Papyrus, and Trajan Capitals; the overwhelming European popularity of Helvetica; and how a font can make a person seem such a way, such as masculine, feminine, American, British, German, or Jewish.\n\nOverview \nThe first chapter, \"We Don't Serve Your Type\", is about why people dislike the font Comic Sans. Other widely disliked fonts are discussed in chapter 21, \"The Worst Fonts in the World\". Chapter 2, \"Capital Offence\", details font etiquette, while chapter 3, \"Legibility vs. Readability\", details the difference between a font being \"legible\" and a font being \"readable.\" Chapters 4, \"Can a font make me popular?\"; 9, \"What is it about the Swiss?\"; 13, \"Can a font be German, or Jewish?\"; and 14, \"American Scottish\", detail how a font can make somebody or something look. Chapter 7, \"Baskerville is Dead (Long Live Baskerville)\", and various \"fontbreaks\" detail the histories of specific fonts.\n\nCritical reception \nReception of Just My Type by non-professional reviewers was overwhelmingly positive. The New York Times praised the book, saying that it \"does for typography what Lynne Truss's best-selling Eats, Shoots & Leaves did for punctuation\" and that it is a \"smart, funny, and accessible book\". BBC declared it a \"well-written, anecdote-filled romp through the highs and lows of fontdom\". The Guardian declared it \"bouncy, well-informed, and wittily-designed\".\n\nOn the other hand, historian of typography Paul Shaw, in a review of the US edition, while admitting the book is \"full of fascinating stories and trivia about type\" stated that \"[u]nfortunately, many of these stories are incomplete or superficial and the trivia often more odd than informative\". He goes on to list in detail numerous errors in the book.\n\nJust My Type was named one of the Amazon.com Best Books of the Month for September 2011.\n\nReferences \n\n2010 books\nTypography",
"A call detail record (CDR) is a data record produced by a telephone exchange or other telecommunications equipment that documents the details of a telephone call or other telecommunications transactions (e.g., text message) that passes through that facility or device. The record contains various attributes of the call, such as time, duration, completion status, source number, and destination number. It is the automated equivalent of the paper toll tickets that were written and timed by operators for long-distance calls in a manual telephone exchange.\n\nCDR contents\nA call detail record contains data fields that describe a specific instance of a telecommunication transaction, but does not include the content of that transaction. By way of simplistic example, a call detail record describing a particular phone call might include the phone numbers of both the calling and receiving parties, the start time, and duration of that call. In actual modern practice, call detail records are much more detailed, and contain attributes such as:\n the phone number of the subscriber originating the call (calling party, A-party)\n the phone number receiving the call (called party, B-party)\n the starting time of the call (date and time)\n the call duration\n the billing phone number that is charged for the call\n the identification of the telephone exchange or equipment writing the record\n a unique sequence number identifying the record\n additional digits on the called number used to route or charge the call\n the disposition or the results of the call, indicating, for example, whether or not the call was connected\n the route by which the call entered the exchange\n the route by which the call left the exchange\n call type (voice, SMS, etc.) \n voice call type (call setup, call continue, call operation, call end, call idle, call busy, out of service call)\n any fault condition encountered\n\nEach exchange manufacturer decides which information is emitted on the tickets and how it is formatted. Examples: \n Send the timestamp of the end of call instead of duration\n Voice-only machines may not send call type\n Some small PBX does not send the calling party\n\nIn some corporate private branch exchange (PBX) systems, a call detail record is termed a station messaging detail record (SMDR).\n\nUses\nCall detail records serve a variety of functions. For telephone service providers, they are critical to the production of revenue, in that they provide the basis for the generation of telephone bills. For law enforcement, call detail records provide a wealth of information that can help to identify suspects, in that they can reveal details as to an individual's relationships with associates, communication and behavior patterns, and even location data that can establish the whereabouts of an individual during the entirety of the call. For companies with PBX telephone systems, call detail records provide a means of tracking long-distance access, can monitor telephone usage by department or office, and can create listing of incoming and outgoing calls.\n\nPrivacy\nThe U.S. Supreme Court has held the records of numbers called are not protected by the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States because the caller \"voluntarily conveyed numerical information to the telephone company.\" But there is limited protection under the Electronic Communications Privacy Act. The revelation that call metadata records are being universally collected and stored in the U.S. and elsewhere has generated considerable controversy.\n\nIn June 2013, a top secret order of the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court was leaked to the public. That order referenced and defined call detail records as follows:\n\nUsage in research\nCDRs have found various uses in academic research, with topics ranging from social networks to human mobility.\n\nSee also\n Charging data record\n Customer proprietary network information\n NSA call database\n Telecommunications data retention\n Pen register\n Internet Protocol Detail Record\n Communications data\n Datacom\n Average call duration\nAnswer/seizure ratio\nTelecommunication transaction processing systems\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Visualize/playback 6-months' Call Detail Records – records of German politician Malte Spitz (ZeitOnline)\n\nTelephony\nTelecommunications economics"
] |
[
"Gustave Courbet",
"The Artist's Studio",
"What was The Artists studio?",
"his paintings, including The Artist's Studio,",
"What made this painting special?",
"The work is an allegory of Courbet's life as a painter,",
"What type of detail does it share?",
"seen as an heroic venture, in which he is flanked by friends and admirers on the right, and challenges and opposition to the left."
] | C_844f4ddfe7ba4b7ca989631723998286_1 | Did it win any awards? | 4 | Did The Artist's Studio win any awards? | Gustave Courbet | In 1855, Courbet submitted fourteen paintings for exhibition at the Exposition Universelle. Three were rejected for lack of space, including A Burial at Ornans and his other monumental canvas The Artist's Studio. Refusing to be denied, Courbet took matters into his own hands. He displayed forty of his paintings, including The Artist's Studio, in his own gallery called The Pavilion of Realism (Pavillon du Realisme) which was a temporary structure that he erected next door to the official Salon-like Exposition Universelle. The work is an allegory of Courbet's life as a painter, seen as an heroic venture, in which he is flanked by friends and admirers on the right, and challenges and opposition to the left. Friends on the right include the art critics Champfleury, and Charles Baudelaire, and art collector Alfred Bruyas. On the left are figures (priest, prostitute, grave digger, merchant and others) who represent what Courbet described in a letter to Champfleury as "the other world of trivial life, the people, misery, poverty, wealth, the exploited and the exploiters, the people who live off death." In the foreground of the left-hand side is a man with dogs, who was not mentioned in Courbet's letter to Champfleury. X-rays show he was painted in later, but his role in the painting is important: he is an allegory of the then current French Emperor, Napoleon III, identified by his famous hunting dogs and iconic twirled moustache. By placing him on the left, Courbet publicly shows his disdain for the emperor and depicts him as a criminal, suggesting that his "ownership" of France is an illegal one. Although artists like Eugene Delacroix were ardent champions of his effort, the public went to the show mostly out of curiosity and to deride him. Attendance and sales were disappointing, but Courbet's status as a hero to the French avant-garde became assured. He was admired by the American James McNeill Whistler, and he became an inspiration to the younger generation of French artists including Edouard Manet and the Impressionist painters. The Artist's Studio was recognized as a masterpiece by Delacroix, Baudelaire, and Champfleury, if not by the public. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Jean Désiré Gustave Courbet ( , , ; 10 June 1819 – 31 December 1877) was a French painter who led the Realism movement in 19th-century French painting. Committed to painting only what he could see, he rejected academic convention and the Romanticism of the previous generation of visual artists. His independence set an example that was important to later artists, such as the Impressionists and the Cubists. Courbet occupies an important place in 19th-century French painting as an innovator and as an artist willing to make bold social statements through his work.
Courbet's paintings of the late 1840s and early 1850s brought him his first recognition. They challenged convention by depicting unidealized peasants and workers, often on a grand scale traditionally reserved for paintings of religious or historical subjects. Courbet's subsequent paintings were mostly of a less overtly political character: landscapes, seascapes, hunting scenes, nudes, and still lifes. Courbet, a socialist, was active in the political developments of France. He was imprisoned for six months in 1871 for his involvement with the Paris Commune, and lived in exile in Switzerland from 1873 until his death.
Biography
Gustave Courbet was born in 1819 to Régis and Sylvie Oudot Courbet in Ornans (department of Doubs). Being a prosperous farming family, anti-monarchical feelings prevailed in the household. (His maternal grandfather fought in the French Revolution.) Courbet's sisters, Zoé, Zélie, and Juliette, were his first models for drawing and painting. After moving to Paris he often returned home to Ornans to hunt, fish and find inspiration.
Courbet went to Paris in 1839 and worked at the studio of Steuben and Hesse. An independent spirit, he soon left, preferring to develop his own style by studying the paintings of Spanish, Flemish and French masters in the Louvre, and painting copies of their work.
Courbet's first works were an Odalisque inspired by the writing of Victor Hugo and a Lélia illustrating George Sand, but he soon abandoned literary influences, choosing instead to base his paintings on observed reality. Among his paintings of the early 1840s are several self-portraits, Romantic in conception, in which the artist portrayed himself in various roles. These include Self-Portrait with Black Dog (c. 1842–44, accepted for exhibition at the 1844 Paris Salon), the theatrical Self-Portrait which is also known as Desperate Man (c. 1843–45), Lovers in the Countryside (1844, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Lyon), The Sculptor (1845), The Wounded Man (1844–54, Musée d'Orsay, Paris), The Cellist, Self-Portrait (1847, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, shown at the 1848 Salon), and Man with a Pipe (1848–49, Musée Fabre, Montpellier).
Trips to the Netherlands and Belgium in 1846–47 strengthened Courbet's belief that painters should portray the life around them, as Rembrandt, Hals and other Dutch masters had. By 1848, he had gained supporters among the younger critics, the Neo-romantics and Realists, notably Champfleury.
Courbet achieved his first Salon success in 1849 with his painting After Dinner at Ornans. The work, reminiscent of Chardin and Le Nain, earned Courbet a gold medal and was purchased by the state. The gold medal meant that his works would no longer require jury approval for exhibition at the Salon—an exemption Courbet enjoyed until 1857 (when the rule changed).
In 1849–50, Courbet painted The Stone Breakers (destroyed in the Allied Bombing of Dresden in 1945), which Proudhon admired as an icon of peasant life; it has been called "the first of his great works". The painting was inspired by a scene Courbet witnessed on the roadside. He later explained to Champfleury and the writer Francis Wey: "It is not often that one encounters so complete an expression of poverty and so, right then and there I got the idea for a painting. I told them to come to my studio the next morning."
Realism
Courbet's work belonged neither to the predominant Romantic nor Neoclassical schools. History painting, which the Paris Salon esteemed as a painter's highest calling, did not interest him, for he believed that "the artists of one century [are] basically incapable of reproducing the aspect of a past or future century ..." Instead, he maintained that the only possible source for living art is the artist's own experience. He and Jean-François Millet would find inspiration painting the life of peasants and workers.
Courbet painted figurative compositions, landscapes, seascapes, and still lifes. He courted controversy by addressing social issues in his work, and by painting subjects that were considered vulgar, such as the rural bourgeoisie, peasants, and working conditions of the poor. His work, along with that of Honoré Daumier and Jean-François Millet, became known as Realism. For Courbet realism dealt not with the perfection of line and form, but entailed spontaneous and rough handling of paint, suggesting direct observation by the artist while portraying the irregularities in nature. He depicted the harshness in life, and in doing so challenged contemporary academic ideas of art.
The Stone Breakers
Considered to be the first of Courbet's great works, The Stone Breakers of 1849 is an example of social realism that caused a sensation when it was first exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1850. The work was based on two men, one young and one old, whom Courbet discovered engaged in backbreaking labor on the side of the road when he returned to Ornans for an eight-month visit in October 1848. On his inspiration, Courbet told his friends and art critics Francis Wey and Jules Champfleury, "It is not often that one encounters so complete an expression of poverty and so, right then and there I got the idea for a painting."
While other artists had depicted the plight of the rural poor, Courbet's peasants are not idealized like those in works such as Millet's The Gleaners.
In February 1945, the work was destroyed during World War II, along with 154 other pictures, when a transport vehicle moving the pictures to the castle of Königstein, near Dresden, was bombed by Allied forces.
A Burial at Ornans
The Salon of 1850–1851 found him triumphant with The Stone Breakers, the Peasants of Flagey and A Burial at Ornans. The Burial, one of Courbet's most important works, records the funeral of his grand uncle which he attended in September 1848. People who attended the funeral were the models for the painting. Previously, models had been used as actors in historical narratives, but in Burial Courbet said he "painted the very people who had been present at the interment, all the townspeople". The result is a realistic presentation of them, and of life in Ornans.
The vast painting, measuring , drew both praise and fierce denunciations from critics and the public, in part because it upset convention by depicting a prosaic ritual on a scale which would previously have been reserved for a religious or royal subject.
According to art historian Sarah Faunce, "In Paris the Burial was judged as a work that had thrust itself into the grand tradition of history painting, like an upstart in dirty boots crashing a genteel party, and in terms of that tradition it was of course found wanting." The painting lacks the sentimental rhetoric that was expected in a genre work: Courbet's mourners make no theatrical gestures of grief, and their faces seemed more caricatured than ennobled. The critics accused Courbet of a deliberate pursuit of ugliness.
Eventually, the public grew more interested in the new Realist approach, and the lavish, decadent fantasy of Romanticism lost popularity. Courbet well understood the importance of the painting, and said of it, "The Burial at Ornans was in reality the burial of Romanticism."
Courbet became a celebrity, and was spoken of as a genius, a "terrible socialist" and a "savage". He actively encouraged the public's perception of him as an unschooled peasant, while his ambition, his bold pronouncements to journalists, and his insistence on depicting his own life in his art gave him a reputation for unbridled vanity.
Courbet associated his ideas of realism in art with political anarchism, and, having gained an audience, he promoted democratic and socialist ideas by writing politically motivated essays and dissertations. His familiar visage was the object of frequent caricature in the popular French press.
In 1850, Courbet wrote to a friend:
During the 1850s, Courbet painted numerous figurative works using common folk and friends as his subjects, such as Village Damsels (1852), The Wrestlers (1853), The Bathers (1853), The Sleeping Spinner (1853), and The Wheat Sifters (1854).
The Artist's Studio
In 1855, Courbet submitted fourteen paintings for exhibition at the Exposition Universelle. Three were rejected for lack of space, including A Burial at Ornans and his other monumental canvas The Artist's Studio. Refusing to be denied, Courbet took matters into his own hands. He displayed forty of his paintings, including The Artist's Studio, in his own gallery called The Pavilion of Realism (Pavillon du Réalisme) which was a temporary structure that he erected next door to the official Salon-like Exposition Universelle.
The work is an allegory of Courbet's life as a painter, seen as a heroic venture, in which he is flanked by friends and admirers on the right, and challenges and opposition to the left. Friends on the right include the art critics Champfleury, and Charles Baudelaire, and art collector Alfred Bruyas. On the left are figures (priest, prostitute, grave digger, merchant and others) who represent what Courbet described in a letter to Champfleury as "the other world of trivial life, the people, misery, poverty, wealth, the exploited and the exploiters, the people who live off death."
In the foreground of the left-hand side is a man with dogs, who was not mentioned in Courbet's letter to Champfleury. X-rays show he was painted in later, but his role in the painting is important: he is an allegory of the then current French Emperor, Napoleon III, identified by his famous hunting dogs and iconic twirled moustache. By placing him on the left, Courbet publicly shows his disdain for the emperor and depicts him as a criminal, suggesting that his "ownership" of France is an illegal one.
Although artists like Eugène Delacroix were ardent champions of his effort, the public went to the show mostly out of curiosity and to deride him. Attendance and sales were disappointing, but Courbet's status as a hero to the French avant-garde became assured. He was admired by the American James Abbott McNeill Whistler, and he became an inspiration to the younger generation of French artists including Édouard Manet and the Impressionist painters. The Artist's Studio was recognized as a masterpiece by Delacroix, Baudelaire, and Champfleury, if not by the public.
Realist manifesto
Courbet wrote a Realist manifesto for the introduction to the catalogue of this independent, personal exhibition, echoing the tone of the period's political manifestos. In it he asserts his goal as an artist "to translate the customs, the ideas, the appearance of my epoch according to my own estimation."
Notoriety
In the Salon of 1857, Courbet showed six paintings. These included Young Ladies on the Banks of the Seine (Summer), depicting two prostitutes under a tree, as well as the first of many hunting scenes Courbet was to paint during the remainder of his life: Hind at Bay in the Snow and The Quarry.
Young Ladies on the Banks of the Seine, painted in 1856, provoked a scandal. Art critics accustomed to conventional, "timeless" nude women in landscapes were shocked by Courbet's depiction of modern women casually displaying their undergarments.
By exhibiting sensational works alongside hunting scenes, of the sort that had brought popular success to the English painter Edwin Landseer, Courbet guaranteed himself "both notoriety and sales". During the 1860s, Courbet painted a series of increasingly erotic works such as Femme nue couchée.
This culminated in The Origin of the World (L'Origine du monde) (1866), which depicts female genitalia and was not publicly exhibited until 1988, and Sleep (1866), featuring two women in bed. The latter painting became the subject of a police report when it was exhibited by a picture dealer in 1872.
Until about 1861, Napoléon's regime had exhibited authoritarian characteristics, using press censorship to prevent the spread of opposition, manipulating elections, and depriving Parliament of the right to free debate or any real power. In the 1860s, however, Napoléon III made more concessions to placate his liberal opponents. This change began by allowing free debates in Parliament and public reports of parliamentary debates. Press censorship, too, was relaxed and culminated in the appointment of the Liberal Émile Ollivier, previously a leader of the opposition to Napoléon's regime, as the de facto Prime Minister in 1870. As a sign of appeasement to the Liberals who admired Courbet, Napoleon III nominated him to the Legion of Honour in 1870. His refusal of the cross of the Legion of Honour angered those in power but made him immensely popular with those who opposed the prevailing regime.
Courbet and the Paris Commune
On 4 September 1870, during the Franco-Prussian War, Courbet made a proposal that later came back to haunt him. He wrote a letter to the Government of National Defense, proposing that the column in the Place Vendôme, erected by Napoleon I to honour the victories of the French Army, be taken down. He wrote:
Courbet proposed that the Column be moved to a more appropriate place, such as the Hotel des Invalides, a military hospital. He also wrote an open letter addressed to the German Army and to German artists, proposing that German and French cannons should be melted down and crowned with a liberty cap, and made into a new monument on Place Vendôme, dedicated to the federation of the German and French people. The Government of National Defense did nothing about his suggestion to tear down the column, but it was not forgotten.
On 18 March, in the aftermath of the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, a revolutionary government called the Paris Commune briefly took power in the city. Courbet played an active part, and organized a Federation of Artists, which held its first meeting on 5 April in the Grand Amphitheater of the School of Medicine. Some three hundred to four hundred painters, sculptors, architects, and decorators attended. There were some famous names on the list of members, including André Gill, Honoré Daumier, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Eugène Pottier, Jules Dalou, and Édouard Manet. Manet was not in Paris during the Commune, and did not attend, and Corot, who was seventy-five years old, stayed in a country house and in his studio during the Commune, not taking part in the political events.
Courbet chaired the meeting and proposed that the Louvre and the Museum of the Luxembourg Palace, the two major art museums of Paris, closed during the uprising, be reopened as soon as possible, and that the traditional annual exhibit called the Salon be held as in years past, but with radical differences. He proposed that the Salon should be free of any government interference or rewards to preferred artists; there would be no medals or government commissions given. Furthermore, he called for the abolition of the most famous state institutions of French art; the École des Beaux-Arts, the School of Rome, the School of Athens, and the Fine Arts section of the Institute of France.
On 12 April, the Executive Committee of the Commune gave Courbet, though he was not yet officially a member of the Commune, the assignment of opening the museums and organizing the Salon. At the same meeting, they issued the following decree: "The Column of the Place Vendôme will be demolished." On 16 April, special elections were held to replace more moderate members of the Commune who had resigned their seats, and Courbet was elected as a delegate for the 6th arrondissement. He was given the title of Delegate of Fine Arts, and on 21 April he was also made a member of the Commission on Education. At the meeting of the Commission on 27 April, the minutes reported that Courbet requested the demolition of the Vendôme column be carried out, and that the column would be replaced by an allegorical figure representing the taking of power of the Commune on 18 March.
Nonetheless, Courbet was a dissident by nature, and he was soon in opposition with the majority of the Commune members on some of its measures. He was one of a minority of Commune Members which opposed the creation of a Committee on Public Safety, modeled on the committee of the same name which carried out the Reign of Terror during the French Revolution.
Courbet opposed the Commune on another more serious matter; the arrest of his friend Gustave Chaudey, a prominent socialist, magistrate, and journalist, whose portrait Courbet had painted. The popular Commune newspaper, Le Père Duchesne, accused Chaudey, when he was briefly deputy mayor of the 9th arrondissement before the Commune was formed, of ordering soldiers to fire on a crowd that had surrounded the Hotel de Ville. Courbet's opposition was of no use; on 23 May 1871, in the final days of the Commune, Chaudey was shot by a Commune firing squad. According to some sources Courbet resigned from the Commune in protest.
On 13 May, on the proposal of Courbet, the Paris house of Adolphe Thiers, the chief executive of the French government, was demolished, and his art collection confiscated. Courbet proposed that the confiscated art be given to the Louvre and other museums, but the director of the Louvre refused to accept it. On 16 May, just nine days before the fall of the Commune, in a large ceremony with military bands and photographers, the Vendôme column was pulled down and broke into pieces. Some witnesses said Courbet was there, others denied it. The following day, the Federation of Artists debated dismissing directors of the Louvre and of the Luxembourg museums, suspected by some in the Commune of having secret contacts with the French government, and appointed new heads of the museums.
According to one legend, Courbet defended the Louvre and other museums against "looting mobs", but there are no records of any such attacks on the museums. The only real threat to the Louvre came during "Bloody Week", 21–28 May 1871, when a unit of Communards, led by a Commune general, Jules Bergeret, set fire to the Tuileries Palace, next to the Louvre. The fire spread to the library of the Louvre, which was completely destroyed, but the efforts of museum curators and firemen saved the art gallery.
After the final suppression of the Commune by the French army on 28 May, Courbet went into hiding in apartments of different friends. He was arrested on 7 June. At his trial before a military tribunal on 14 August, Courbet argued that he had only joined the Commune to pacify it, and that he had wanted to move the Vendôme Column, not destroy it. He said he had only belonged to the Commune for a short period of time, and rarely attended its meetings. He was convicted, but given a lighter sentence than other Commune leaders; six months in prison and a fine of five hundred Francs. Serving part of his sentence in the prison of Saint-Pelagie in Paris, he was allowed an easel and paints, but he could not have models pose for him. He did a famous series of still-life paintings of flowers and fruit.
Exile and death
Courbet completed his prison sentence on 2 March 1872, but his problems caused by the destruction of the Vendôme Column were still not over. In 1873, the newly elected president of the Republic, Patrice Mac-Mahon, announced plans to rebuild the column, with the cost to be paid by Courbet. Unable to pay, Courbet went into a self-imposed exile in Switzerland to avoid bankruptcy. In the following years, he participated in Swiss regional and national exhibitions. Surveilled by the Swiss intelligence service, he enjoyed in the small Swiss art world the reputation as head of the "realist school" and inspired younger artists such as Auguste Baud-Bovy and Ferdinand Hodler.
Important works from this period include several paintings of trout, "hooked and bleeding from the gills", that have been interpreted as allegorical self-portraits of the exiled artist. In his final years, Courbet painted landscapes, including several scenes of water mysteriously emerging from the depths of the earth in the Jura Mountains of the France–Switzerland border. Courbet also worked on sculpture during his exile. Previously, in the early 1860s, he had produced a few sculptures, one of which – the Fisherman of Chavots (1862) – he donated to Ornans for a public fountain, but it was removed after Courbet's arrest.
On 4 May 1877, Courbet was told the estimated cost of reconstructing the Vendôme Column; 323,091 francs and 68 centimes. He was given the option of paying the fine in yearly installments of 10,000 francs for the next 33 years, until his 91st birthday. On 31 December 1877, a day before the first installment was due, Courbet died, aged 58, in La Tour-de-Peilz, Switzerland, of a liver disease aggravated by heavy drinking.
Gallery
Legacy
Courbet was admired by many younger artists. Claude Monet included a portrait of Courbet in his own version of Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe from 1865–1866 (Musée d'Orsay, Paris). Courbet's particular kind of realism influenced many artists to follow, notably among them the German painters of the Leibl circle, James McNeill Whistler, and Paul Cézanne. Courbet's influence can also be seen in the work of Edward Hopper, whose Bridge in Paris (1906) and Approaching a City (1946) have been described as Freudian echoes of Courbet's The Source of the Loue and The Origin of the World. His pupils included Henri Fantin-Latour, Hector Hanoteau and Olaf Isaachsen.
Courbet once wrote this in a letter:
Nazi-looted art
During the Third Reich (1933-1945) Jewish art collectors throughout Europe had their property seized as part of the Holocaust. Many artworks created by Courbet were looted by Nazis and their agents during this period and have only recently been reclaimed by the families of the previous owners.
Courbet's La falaise d’Etretat was owned by the Jewish collector Marc Wolfson and his wife Erna, who both were murdered in Auschwitz. After disappearing during the Nazi Occupation of France, it reappeared years later at the musée d’Orsay
The great Hungarian Jewish collector Baron Mor Lipot Herzog owned several Courbet artworks, including Le Chateau de Blonay (Neige) (circa 1875,"The Chateau of Blonay (Snow)", now at the Budapest Museum of Fine Arts), and Courbet's most infamous work — L'Origine du monde ("The Origin of the World"), His collection of 2000-2500 pieces was looted by Nazis and many are still missing.
Gustav Courbet's paintings Village Girl With Goat, The Father, and Landscape With Rocks were discovered in the Gurlitt Trove of art stashed in Munich. It is not known to whom they belonged.
Josephine Weinmann and her family, who were German Jews, had owned Le Grand Pont before they were forced to flee. The Nazi militant Herbert Schaefer acquired it, and loaned it to the Yale University Art Gallery, against whom the Weinmanns filed a claim.
The French Database of Art Objects at the Jeu de Paume (Cultural Plunder by the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg) has 41 entries for Courbet.
Courbet and Cubism
Two 19th-century artists prepared the way for the emergence of Cubism in the 20th century: Courbet and Cézanne. Cézanne's contributions are well-known. Courbet's importance was announced by Guillaume Apollinaire, poet-spokesperson for the Cubists. Writing in Les Peintres Cubistes, Méditations Esthétiques (1913) he declared, "Courbet is the father of the new painters." Jean Metzinger and Albert Gleizes often portrayed Courbet as the father of all modern art.
Both artists sought to transcend the conventional methods of rendering nature; Cézanne through a dialectical method revealing the process of seeing, Courbet by his materialism. The Cubists would combine these two approaches in developing a revolution in art.
On a formal level, Courbet wished to convey the physical characteristics of what he was painting: its density, weight and texture. Art critic John Berger said: "No painter before Courbet was ever able to emphasize so uncompromisingly the density and weight of what he was painting." This emphasis on material reality endowed his subjects with dignity. Berger observed that the Cubist painters "were at great pains to establish the physical presence of what they were representing. And in this they are the heirs of Courbet."
See also
History of painting
Léonce Bénédite
List of Orientalist artists
Lost artworks
Orientalism
Western painting
References
Notes
Citations
Works cited
Further reading
Monographs on the art and life of Courbet have been written by Estignard (Paris, 1874), D'Ideville, (Paris, 1878), Silvestre in Les artistes français, (Paris, 1878), Isham in Van Dyke's Modern French Masters (New York, 1896), Meier-Graefe, Corot and Courbet, (Leipzig, 1905), Cazier (Paris, 1906), Riat, (Paris, 1906), Muther, (Berlin, 1906), Robin, (Paris, 1909), Benedite, (Paris, 1911) and Lazár Béla (Paris, 1911). Consult also Muther, History of Modern Painting, volume ii (London, 1896, 1907); Patoux, "Courbet" in Les artistes célèbres and La vérité sur Courbet (Paris, 1879); Le Men, Courbet (New York, 2008).
Bond, Anthony, "Embodying the Real", Body. The Art Gallery of New South Wales (1997).
Champfleury, Les Grandes Figures d'hier et d'aujourd'hui (Paris, 1861)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate. Courbet in Perspective. (Prentice Hall, 1977)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate and Gustave Courbet. Letters of Gustave Courbet. (Chicago: Univ Chicago Press, 1992)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate. The Most Arrogant Man in France: Gustave Courbet and the Nineteenth-Century Media Culture. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2007)
Clark, Timothy J., Image of the People: Gustave Courbet and the 1848 Revolution, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999); (Originally published 1973. Based on his doctoral dissertation along with The Absolute Bourgeois: Artists and Politics in France, 1848–1851), 208pp. . (Considered the definitive treatment of Courbet's politics and painting in 1848, and a foundational text of Marxist art history.)
Faunce, Sara, "Feminist in Spite of Himself", Body. The Art Gallery of New South Wales (1997).
Griffiths, Harriet & Alister Mill, Courbet's early Salon exhibition record, Database of Salon Artists, 1827–1850
Howe, Jeffery (ed.), Courbet. Mapping Realism. Paintings from the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium and American Collections, exhibition catalogue, McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College, 1 September – 8 December 2013 [distributed by the University of Chicago Press]
Hutchinson, Mark, "The history of The Origin of the World", Times Literary Supplement, 8 Aug. 2007.
Lemonnier, C, Les Peintres de la Vie (Paris, 1888).
Lindsay, Jack. Gustave Courbet his life and art. Publ. Jupiter Books (London) Limited 1977.
Mantz, "G. Courbet," Gaz. des beaux-arts (Paris, 1878)
Nochlin, Linda, Courbet, (London: Thames & Hudson, 2007)
Nochlin, Linda, Realism: Style and Civilization (New York: Penguin, 1972).
Savatier, Thierry, El origen del mundo. Historia de un cuadro de Gustave Courbet. Ediciones TREA (Gijón, 2009).
Tennant Jackson, Jenny, "Courbet's Trauerspiel: Trouble with Women in the Painter's Studio." in G. Pollock (ed.), Visual Politics of Psychoanalysis, London: I.B.Tauris, 2013.
Zola, Émile, Mes Haines (Paris, 1879)
External links
Gustave Courbet papers at the University of Maryland Libraries
Gustave Courbet, works at Musée d'Orsay, Paris
Joconde, Portail des collections des musées de France
Union List of Artist Names, Getty Vocabularies. ULAN Full Record Display for Gustave Courbet. Getty Vocabulary Program, Getty Research Institute. Los Angeles, California
The Painter's Studio (L'atelier du peintre), on-line, in increased reality, Musée d'Orsay
'Le chef de l'école du laid': Gustave Courbet in 19th-century caricatures. European Studies Blog, British Library.
Jennifer A. Thompson, "Marine by Gustave Courbet (cat. 948)," in The John G. Johnson Collection: A History and Selected Works, a Philadelphia Museum of Art free digital publication
1819 births
1877 deaths
19th-century French painters
French male painters
French Realist painters
French anarchists
French socialists
Orientalist painters
Légion d'honneur refusals
People from Doubs
People from Riviera-Pays-d'Enhaut District
Deaths from cirrhosis
Communards | false | [
"Le Cousin is a 1997 French film directed by Alain Corneau.\n\nPlot \nThe film deals with the relationship of the police and an informant in the drug scene.\n\nAwards and nominations\nLe Cousin was nominated for 5 César Awards but did not win in any category.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1997 films\n1997 crime films\nFilms about drugs\nFilms directed by Alain Corneau\nFrench crime films\nFrench films\nFrench-language films",
"The 23rd Fangoria Chainsaw Awards is an award ceremony presented for horror films that were released in 2020. The nominees were announced on January 20, 2021. The film The Invisible Man won five of its five nominations, including Best Wide Release, as well as the write-in poll of Best Kill. Color Out Of Space and Possessor each took two awards. His House did not win any of its seven nominations. The ceremony was exclusively livestreamed for the first time on the SHUDDER horror streaming service.\n\nWinners and nominees\n\nReferences\n\nFangoria Chainsaw Awards"
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[
"Gustave Courbet",
"The Artist's Studio",
"What was The Artists studio?",
"his paintings, including The Artist's Studio,",
"What made this painting special?",
"The work is an allegory of Courbet's life as a painter,",
"What type of detail does it share?",
"seen as an heroic venture, in which he is flanked by friends and admirers on the right, and challenges and opposition to the left.",
"Did it win any awards?",
"I don't know."
] | C_844f4ddfe7ba4b7ca989631723998286_1 | What else did you find interesting? | 5 | In addition to being a heroic venture, what else was interesting about The Artist's Studio? | Gustave Courbet | In 1855, Courbet submitted fourteen paintings for exhibition at the Exposition Universelle. Three were rejected for lack of space, including A Burial at Ornans and his other monumental canvas The Artist's Studio. Refusing to be denied, Courbet took matters into his own hands. He displayed forty of his paintings, including The Artist's Studio, in his own gallery called The Pavilion of Realism (Pavillon du Realisme) which was a temporary structure that he erected next door to the official Salon-like Exposition Universelle. The work is an allegory of Courbet's life as a painter, seen as an heroic venture, in which he is flanked by friends and admirers on the right, and challenges and opposition to the left. Friends on the right include the art critics Champfleury, and Charles Baudelaire, and art collector Alfred Bruyas. On the left are figures (priest, prostitute, grave digger, merchant and others) who represent what Courbet described in a letter to Champfleury as "the other world of trivial life, the people, misery, poverty, wealth, the exploited and the exploiters, the people who live off death." In the foreground of the left-hand side is a man with dogs, who was not mentioned in Courbet's letter to Champfleury. X-rays show he was painted in later, but his role in the painting is important: he is an allegory of the then current French Emperor, Napoleon III, identified by his famous hunting dogs and iconic twirled moustache. By placing him on the left, Courbet publicly shows his disdain for the emperor and depicts him as a criminal, suggesting that his "ownership" of France is an illegal one. Although artists like Eugene Delacroix were ardent champions of his effort, the public went to the show mostly out of curiosity and to deride him. Attendance and sales were disappointing, but Courbet's status as a hero to the French avant-garde became assured. He was admired by the American James McNeill Whistler, and he became an inspiration to the younger generation of French artists including Edouard Manet and the Impressionist painters. The Artist's Studio was recognized as a masterpiece by Delacroix, Baudelaire, and Champfleury, if not by the public. CANNOTANSWER | Courbet described in a letter to Champfleury | Jean Désiré Gustave Courbet ( , , ; 10 June 1819 – 31 December 1877) was a French painter who led the Realism movement in 19th-century French painting. Committed to painting only what he could see, he rejected academic convention and the Romanticism of the previous generation of visual artists. His independence set an example that was important to later artists, such as the Impressionists and the Cubists. Courbet occupies an important place in 19th-century French painting as an innovator and as an artist willing to make bold social statements through his work.
Courbet's paintings of the late 1840s and early 1850s brought him his first recognition. They challenged convention by depicting unidealized peasants and workers, often on a grand scale traditionally reserved for paintings of religious or historical subjects. Courbet's subsequent paintings were mostly of a less overtly political character: landscapes, seascapes, hunting scenes, nudes, and still lifes. Courbet, a socialist, was active in the political developments of France. He was imprisoned for six months in 1871 for his involvement with the Paris Commune, and lived in exile in Switzerland from 1873 until his death.
Biography
Gustave Courbet was born in 1819 to Régis and Sylvie Oudot Courbet in Ornans (department of Doubs). Being a prosperous farming family, anti-monarchical feelings prevailed in the household. (His maternal grandfather fought in the French Revolution.) Courbet's sisters, Zoé, Zélie, and Juliette, were his first models for drawing and painting. After moving to Paris he often returned home to Ornans to hunt, fish and find inspiration.
Courbet went to Paris in 1839 and worked at the studio of Steuben and Hesse. An independent spirit, he soon left, preferring to develop his own style by studying the paintings of Spanish, Flemish and French masters in the Louvre, and painting copies of their work.
Courbet's first works were an Odalisque inspired by the writing of Victor Hugo and a Lélia illustrating George Sand, but he soon abandoned literary influences, choosing instead to base his paintings on observed reality. Among his paintings of the early 1840s are several self-portraits, Romantic in conception, in which the artist portrayed himself in various roles. These include Self-Portrait with Black Dog (c. 1842–44, accepted for exhibition at the 1844 Paris Salon), the theatrical Self-Portrait which is also known as Desperate Man (c. 1843–45), Lovers in the Countryside (1844, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Lyon), The Sculptor (1845), The Wounded Man (1844–54, Musée d'Orsay, Paris), The Cellist, Self-Portrait (1847, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, shown at the 1848 Salon), and Man with a Pipe (1848–49, Musée Fabre, Montpellier).
Trips to the Netherlands and Belgium in 1846–47 strengthened Courbet's belief that painters should portray the life around them, as Rembrandt, Hals and other Dutch masters had. By 1848, he had gained supporters among the younger critics, the Neo-romantics and Realists, notably Champfleury.
Courbet achieved his first Salon success in 1849 with his painting After Dinner at Ornans. The work, reminiscent of Chardin and Le Nain, earned Courbet a gold medal and was purchased by the state. The gold medal meant that his works would no longer require jury approval for exhibition at the Salon—an exemption Courbet enjoyed until 1857 (when the rule changed).
In 1849–50, Courbet painted The Stone Breakers (destroyed in the Allied Bombing of Dresden in 1945), which Proudhon admired as an icon of peasant life; it has been called "the first of his great works". The painting was inspired by a scene Courbet witnessed on the roadside. He later explained to Champfleury and the writer Francis Wey: "It is not often that one encounters so complete an expression of poverty and so, right then and there I got the idea for a painting. I told them to come to my studio the next morning."
Realism
Courbet's work belonged neither to the predominant Romantic nor Neoclassical schools. History painting, which the Paris Salon esteemed as a painter's highest calling, did not interest him, for he believed that "the artists of one century [are] basically incapable of reproducing the aspect of a past or future century ..." Instead, he maintained that the only possible source for living art is the artist's own experience. He and Jean-François Millet would find inspiration painting the life of peasants and workers.
Courbet painted figurative compositions, landscapes, seascapes, and still lifes. He courted controversy by addressing social issues in his work, and by painting subjects that were considered vulgar, such as the rural bourgeoisie, peasants, and working conditions of the poor. His work, along with that of Honoré Daumier and Jean-François Millet, became known as Realism. For Courbet realism dealt not with the perfection of line and form, but entailed spontaneous and rough handling of paint, suggesting direct observation by the artist while portraying the irregularities in nature. He depicted the harshness in life, and in doing so challenged contemporary academic ideas of art.
The Stone Breakers
Considered to be the first of Courbet's great works, The Stone Breakers of 1849 is an example of social realism that caused a sensation when it was first exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1850. The work was based on two men, one young and one old, whom Courbet discovered engaged in backbreaking labor on the side of the road when he returned to Ornans for an eight-month visit in October 1848. On his inspiration, Courbet told his friends and art critics Francis Wey and Jules Champfleury, "It is not often that one encounters so complete an expression of poverty and so, right then and there I got the idea for a painting."
While other artists had depicted the plight of the rural poor, Courbet's peasants are not idealized like those in works such as Millet's The Gleaners.
In February 1945, the work was destroyed during World War II, along with 154 other pictures, when a transport vehicle moving the pictures to the castle of Königstein, near Dresden, was bombed by Allied forces.
A Burial at Ornans
The Salon of 1850–1851 found him triumphant with The Stone Breakers, the Peasants of Flagey and A Burial at Ornans. The Burial, one of Courbet's most important works, records the funeral of his grand uncle which he attended in September 1848. People who attended the funeral were the models for the painting. Previously, models had been used as actors in historical narratives, but in Burial Courbet said he "painted the very people who had been present at the interment, all the townspeople". The result is a realistic presentation of them, and of life in Ornans.
The vast painting, measuring , drew both praise and fierce denunciations from critics and the public, in part because it upset convention by depicting a prosaic ritual on a scale which would previously have been reserved for a religious or royal subject.
According to art historian Sarah Faunce, "In Paris the Burial was judged as a work that had thrust itself into the grand tradition of history painting, like an upstart in dirty boots crashing a genteel party, and in terms of that tradition it was of course found wanting." The painting lacks the sentimental rhetoric that was expected in a genre work: Courbet's mourners make no theatrical gestures of grief, and their faces seemed more caricatured than ennobled. The critics accused Courbet of a deliberate pursuit of ugliness.
Eventually, the public grew more interested in the new Realist approach, and the lavish, decadent fantasy of Romanticism lost popularity. Courbet well understood the importance of the painting, and said of it, "The Burial at Ornans was in reality the burial of Romanticism."
Courbet became a celebrity, and was spoken of as a genius, a "terrible socialist" and a "savage". He actively encouraged the public's perception of him as an unschooled peasant, while his ambition, his bold pronouncements to journalists, and his insistence on depicting his own life in his art gave him a reputation for unbridled vanity.
Courbet associated his ideas of realism in art with political anarchism, and, having gained an audience, he promoted democratic and socialist ideas by writing politically motivated essays and dissertations. His familiar visage was the object of frequent caricature in the popular French press.
In 1850, Courbet wrote to a friend:
During the 1850s, Courbet painted numerous figurative works using common folk and friends as his subjects, such as Village Damsels (1852), The Wrestlers (1853), The Bathers (1853), The Sleeping Spinner (1853), and The Wheat Sifters (1854).
The Artist's Studio
In 1855, Courbet submitted fourteen paintings for exhibition at the Exposition Universelle. Three were rejected for lack of space, including A Burial at Ornans and his other monumental canvas The Artist's Studio. Refusing to be denied, Courbet took matters into his own hands. He displayed forty of his paintings, including The Artist's Studio, in his own gallery called The Pavilion of Realism (Pavillon du Réalisme) which was a temporary structure that he erected next door to the official Salon-like Exposition Universelle.
The work is an allegory of Courbet's life as a painter, seen as a heroic venture, in which he is flanked by friends and admirers on the right, and challenges and opposition to the left. Friends on the right include the art critics Champfleury, and Charles Baudelaire, and art collector Alfred Bruyas. On the left are figures (priest, prostitute, grave digger, merchant and others) who represent what Courbet described in a letter to Champfleury as "the other world of trivial life, the people, misery, poverty, wealth, the exploited and the exploiters, the people who live off death."
In the foreground of the left-hand side is a man with dogs, who was not mentioned in Courbet's letter to Champfleury. X-rays show he was painted in later, but his role in the painting is important: he is an allegory of the then current French Emperor, Napoleon III, identified by his famous hunting dogs and iconic twirled moustache. By placing him on the left, Courbet publicly shows his disdain for the emperor and depicts him as a criminal, suggesting that his "ownership" of France is an illegal one.
Although artists like Eugène Delacroix were ardent champions of his effort, the public went to the show mostly out of curiosity and to deride him. Attendance and sales were disappointing, but Courbet's status as a hero to the French avant-garde became assured. He was admired by the American James Abbott McNeill Whistler, and he became an inspiration to the younger generation of French artists including Édouard Manet and the Impressionist painters. The Artist's Studio was recognized as a masterpiece by Delacroix, Baudelaire, and Champfleury, if not by the public.
Realist manifesto
Courbet wrote a Realist manifesto for the introduction to the catalogue of this independent, personal exhibition, echoing the tone of the period's political manifestos. In it he asserts his goal as an artist "to translate the customs, the ideas, the appearance of my epoch according to my own estimation."
Notoriety
In the Salon of 1857, Courbet showed six paintings. These included Young Ladies on the Banks of the Seine (Summer), depicting two prostitutes under a tree, as well as the first of many hunting scenes Courbet was to paint during the remainder of his life: Hind at Bay in the Snow and The Quarry.
Young Ladies on the Banks of the Seine, painted in 1856, provoked a scandal. Art critics accustomed to conventional, "timeless" nude women in landscapes were shocked by Courbet's depiction of modern women casually displaying their undergarments.
By exhibiting sensational works alongside hunting scenes, of the sort that had brought popular success to the English painter Edwin Landseer, Courbet guaranteed himself "both notoriety and sales". During the 1860s, Courbet painted a series of increasingly erotic works such as Femme nue couchée.
This culminated in The Origin of the World (L'Origine du monde) (1866), which depicts female genitalia and was not publicly exhibited until 1988, and Sleep (1866), featuring two women in bed. The latter painting became the subject of a police report when it was exhibited by a picture dealer in 1872.
Until about 1861, Napoléon's regime had exhibited authoritarian characteristics, using press censorship to prevent the spread of opposition, manipulating elections, and depriving Parliament of the right to free debate or any real power. In the 1860s, however, Napoléon III made more concessions to placate his liberal opponents. This change began by allowing free debates in Parliament and public reports of parliamentary debates. Press censorship, too, was relaxed and culminated in the appointment of the Liberal Émile Ollivier, previously a leader of the opposition to Napoléon's regime, as the de facto Prime Minister in 1870. As a sign of appeasement to the Liberals who admired Courbet, Napoleon III nominated him to the Legion of Honour in 1870. His refusal of the cross of the Legion of Honour angered those in power but made him immensely popular with those who opposed the prevailing regime.
Courbet and the Paris Commune
On 4 September 1870, during the Franco-Prussian War, Courbet made a proposal that later came back to haunt him. He wrote a letter to the Government of National Defense, proposing that the column in the Place Vendôme, erected by Napoleon I to honour the victories of the French Army, be taken down. He wrote:
Courbet proposed that the Column be moved to a more appropriate place, such as the Hotel des Invalides, a military hospital. He also wrote an open letter addressed to the German Army and to German artists, proposing that German and French cannons should be melted down and crowned with a liberty cap, and made into a new monument on Place Vendôme, dedicated to the federation of the German and French people. The Government of National Defense did nothing about his suggestion to tear down the column, but it was not forgotten.
On 18 March, in the aftermath of the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, a revolutionary government called the Paris Commune briefly took power in the city. Courbet played an active part, and organized a Federation of Artists, which held its first meeting on 5 April in the Grand Amphitheater of the School of Medicine. Some three hundred to four hundred painters, sculptors, architects, and decorators attended. There were some famous names on the list of members, including André Gill, Honoré Daumier, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Eugène Pottier, Jules Dalou, and Édouard Manet. Manet was not in Paris during the Commune, and did not attend, and Corot, who was seventy-five years old, stayed in a country house and in his studio during the Commune, not taking part in the political events.
Courbet chaired the meeting and proposed that the Louvre and the Museum of the Luxembourg Palace, the two major art museums of Paris, closed during the uprising, be reopened as soon as possible, and that the traditional annual exhibit called the Salon be held as in years past, but with radical differences. He proposed that the Salon should be free of any government interference or rewards to preferred artists; there would be no medals or government commissions given. Furthermore, he called for the abolition of the most famous state institutions of French art; the École des Beaux-Arts, the School of Rome, the School of Athens, and the Fine Arts section of the Institute of France.
On 12 April, the Executive Committee of the Commune gave Courbet, though he was not yet officially a member of the Commune, the assignment of opening the museums and organizing the Salon. At the same meeting, they issued the following decree: "The Column of the Place Vendôme will be demolished." On 16 April, special elections were held to replace more moderate members of the Commune who had resigned their seats, and Courbet was elected as a delegate for the 6th arrondissement. He was given the title of Delegate of Fine Arts, and on 21 April he was also made a member of the Commission on Education. At the meeting of the Commission on 27 April, the minutes reported that Courbet requested the demolition of the Vendôme column be carried out, and that the column would be replaced by an allegorical figure representing the taking of power of the Commune on 18 March.
Nonetheless, Courbet was a dissident by nature, and he was soon in opposition with the majority of the Commune members on some of its measures. He was one of a minority of Commune Members which opposed the creation of a Committee on Public Safety, modeled on the committee of the same name which carried out the Reign of Terror during the French Revolution.
Courbet opposed the Commune on another more serious matter; the arrest of his friend Gustave Chaudey, a prominent socialist, magistrate, and journalist, whose portrait Courbet had painted. The popular Commune newspaper, Le Père Duchesne, accused Chaudey, when he was briefly deputy mayor of the 9th arrondissement before the Commune was formed, of ordering soldiers to fire on a crowd that had surrounded the Hotel de Ville. Courbet's opposition was of no use; on 23 May 1871, in the final days of the Commune, Chaudey was shot by a Commune firing squad. According to some sources Courbet resigned from the Commune in protest.
On 13 May, on the proposal of Courbet, the Paris house of Adolphe Thiers, the chief executive of the French government, was demolished, and his art collection confiscated. Courbet proposed that the confiscated art be given to the Louvre and other museums, but the director of the Louvre refused to accept it. On 16 May, just nine days before the fall of the Commune, in a large ceremony with military bands and photographers, the Vendôme column was pulled down and broke into pieces. Some witnesses said Courbet was there, others denied it. The following day, the Federation of Artists debated dismissing directors of the Louvre and of the Luxembourg museums, suspected by some in the Commune of having secret contacts with the French government, and appointed new heads of the museums.
According to one legend, Courbet defended the Louvre and other museums against "looting mobs", but there are no records of any such attacks on the museums. The only real threat to the Louvre came during "Bloody Week", 21–28 May 1871, when a unit of Communards, led by a Commune general, Jules Bergeret, set fire to the Tuileries Palace, next to the Louvre. The fire spread to the library of the Louvre, which was completely destroyed, but the efforts of museum curators and firemen saved the art gallery.
After the final suppression of the Commune by the French army on 28 May, Courbet went into hiding in apartments of different friends. He was arrested on 7 June. At his trial before a military tribunal on 14 August, Courbet argued that he had only joined the Commune to pacify it, and that he had wanted to move the Vendôme Column, not destroy it. He said he had only belonged to the Commune for a short period of time, and rarely attended its meetings. He was convicted, but given a lighter sentence than other Commune leaders; six months in prison and a fine of five hundred Francs. Serving part of his sentence in the prison of Saint-Pelagie in Paris, he was allowed an easel and paints, but he could not have models pose for him. He did a famous series of still-life paintings of flowers and fruit.
Exile and death
Courbet completed his prison sentence on 2 March 1872, but his problems caused by the destruction of the Vendôme Column were still not over. In 1873, the newly elected president of the Republic, Patrice Mac-Mahon, announced plans to rebuild the column, with the cost to be paid by Courbet. Unable to pay, Courbet went into a self-imposed exile in Switzerland to avoid bankruptcy. In the following years, he participated in Swiss regional and national exhibitions. Surveilled by the Swiss intelligence service, he enjoyed in the small Swiss art world the reputation as head of the "realist school" and inspired younger artists such as Auguste Baud-Bovy and Ferdinand Hodler.
Important works from this period include several paintings of trout, "hooked and bleeding from the gills", that have been interpreted as allegorical self-portraits of the exiled artist. In his final years, Courbet painted landscapes, including several scenes of water mysteriously emerging from the depths of the earth in the Jura Mountains of the France–Switzerland border. Courbet also worked on sculpture during his exile. Previously, in the early 1860s, he had produced a few sculptures, one of which – the Fisherman of Chavots (1862) – he donated to Ornans for a public fountain, but it was removed after Courbet's arrest.
On 4 May 1877, Courbet was told the estimated cost of reconstructing the Vendôme Column; 323,091 francs and 68 centimes. He was given the option of paying the fine in yearly installments of 10,000 francs for the next 33 years, until his 91st birthday. On 31 December 1877, a day before the first installment was due, Courbet died, aged 58, in La Tour-de-Peilz, Switzerland, of a liver disease aggravated by heavy drinking.
Gallery
Legacy
Courbet was admired by many younger artists. Claude Monet included a portrait of Courbet in his own version of Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe from 1865–1866 (Musée d'Orsay, Paris). Courbet's particular kind of realism influenced many artists to follow, notably among them the German painters of the Leibl circle, James McNeill Whistler, and Paul Cézanne. Courbet's influence can also be seen in the work of Edward Hopper, whose Bridge in Paris (1906) and Approaching a City (1946) have been described as Freudian echoes of Courbet's The Source of the Loue and The Origin of the World. His pupils included Henri Fantin-Latour, Hector Hanoteau and Olaf Isaachsen.
Courbet once wrote this in a letter:
Nazi-looted art
During the Third Reich (1933-1945) Jewish art collectors throughout Europe had their property seized as part of the Holocaust. Many artworks created by Courbet were looted by Nazis and their agents during this period and have only recently been reclaimed by the families of the previous owners.
Courbet's La falaise d’Etretat was owned by the Jewish collector Marc Wolfson and his wife Erna, who both were murdered in Auschwitz. After disappearing during the Nazi Occupation of France, it reappeared years later at the musée d’Orsay
The great Hungarian Jewish collector Baron Mor Lipot Herzog owned several Courbet artworks, including Le Chateau de Blonay (Neige) (circa 1875,"The Chateau of Blonay (Snow)", now at the Budapest Museum of Fine Arts), and Courbet's most infamous work — L'Origine du monde ("The Origin of the World"), His collection of 2000-2500 pieces was looted by Nazis and many are still missing.
Gustav Courbet's paintings Village Girl With Goat, The Father, and Landscape With Rocks were discovered in the Gurlitt Trove of art stashed in Munich. It is not known to whom they belonged.
Josephine Weinmann and her family, who were German Jews, had owned Le Grand Pont before they were forced to flee. The Nazi militant Herbert Schaefer acquired it, and loaned it to the Yale University Art Gallery, against whom the Weinmanns filed a claim.
The French Database of Art Objects at the Jeu de Paume (Cultural Plunder by the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg) has 41 entries for Courbet.
Courbet and Cubism
Two 19th-century artists prepared the way for the emergence of Cubism in the 20th century: Courbet and Cézanne. Cézanne's contributions are well-known. Courbet's importance was announced by Guillaume Apollinaire, poet-spokesperson for the Cubists. Writing in Les Peintres Cubistes, Méditations Esthétiques (1913) he declared, "Courbet is the father of the new painters." Jean Metzinger and Albert Gleizes often portrayed Courbet as the father of all modern art.
Both artists sought to transcend the conventional methods of rendering nature; Cézanne through a dialectical method revealing the process of seeing, Courbet by his materialism. The Cubists would combine these two approaches in developing a revolution in art.
On a formal level, Courbet wished to convey the physical characteristics of what he was painting: its density, weight and texture. Art critic John Berger said: "No painter before Courbet was ever able to emphasize so uncompromisingly the density and weight of what he was painting." This emphasis on material reality endowed his subjects with dignity. Berger observed that the Cubist painters "were at great pains to establish the physical presence of what they were representing. And in this they are the heirs of Courbet."
See also
History of painting
Léonce Bénédite
List of Orientalist artists
Lost artworks
Orientalism
Western painting
References
Notes
Citations
Works cited
Further reading
Monographs on the art and life of Courbet have been written by Estignard (Paris, 1874), D'Ideville, (Paris, 1878), Silvestre in Les artistes français, (Paris, 1878), Isham in Van Dyke's Modern French Masters (New York, 1896), Meier-Graefe, Corot and Courbet, (Leipzig, 1905), Cazier (Paris, 1906), Riat, (Paris, 1906), Muther, (Berlin, 1906), Robin, (Paris, 1909), Benedite, (Paris, 1911) and Lazár Béla (Paris, 1911). Consult also Muther, History of Modern Painting, volume ii (London, 1896, 1907); Patoux, "Courbet" in Les artistes célèbres and La vérité sur Courbet (Paris, 1879); Le Men, Courbet (New York, 2008).
Bond, Anthony, "Embodying the Real", Body. The Art Gallery of New South Wales (1997).
Champfleury, Les Grandes Figures d'hier et d'aujourd'hui (Paris, 1861)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate. Courbet in Perspective. (Prentice Hall, 1977)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate and Gustave Courbet. Letters of Gustave Courbet. (Chicago: Univ Chicago Press, 1992)
Chu, Petra ten Doesschate. The Most Arrogant Man in France: Gustave Courbet and the Nineteenth-Century Media Culture. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2007)
Clark, Timothy J., Image of the People: Gustave Courbet and the 1848 Revolution, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999); (Originally published 1973. Based on his doctoral dissertation along with The Absolute Bourgeois: Artists and Politics in France, 1848–1851), 208pp. . (Considered the definitive treatment of Courbet's politics and painting in 1848, and a foundational text of Marxist art history.)
Faunce, Sara, "Feminist in Spite of Himself", Body. The Art Gallery of New South Wales (1997).
Griffiths, Harriet & Alister Mill, Courbet's early Salon exhibition record, Database of Salon Artists, 1827–1850
Howe, Jeffery (ed.), Courbet. Mapping Realism. Paintings from the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium and American Collections, exhibition catalogue, McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College, 1 September – 8 December 2013 [distributed by the University of Chicago Press]
Hutchinson, Mark, "The history of The Origin of the World", Times Literary Supplement, 8 Aug. 2007.
Lemonnier, C, Les Peintres de la Vie (Paris, 1888).
Lindsay, Jack. Gustave Courbet his life and art. Publ. Jupiter Books (London) Limited 1977.
Mantz, "G. Courbet," Gaz. des beaux-arts (Paris, 1878)
Nochlin, Linda, Courbet, (London: Thames & Hudson, 2007)
Nochlin, Linda, Realism: Style and Civilization (New York: Penguin, 1972).
Savatier, Thierry, El origen del mundo. Historia de un cuadro de Gustave Courbet. Ediciones TREA (Gijón, 2009).
Tennant Jackson, Jenny, "Courbet's Trauerspiel: Trouble with Women in the Painter's Studio." in G. Pollock (ed.), Visual Politics of Psychoanalysis, London: I.B.Tauris, 2013.
Zola, Émile, Mes Haines (Paris, 1879)
External links
Gustave Courbet papers at the University of Maryland Libraries
Gustave Courbet, works at Musée d'Orsay, Paris
Joconde, Portail des collections des musées de France
Union List of Artist Names, Getty Vocabularies. ULAN Full Record Display for Gustave Courbet. Getty Vocabulary Program, Getty Research Institute. Los Angeles, California
The Painter's Studio (L'atelier du peintre), on-line, in increased reality, Musée d'Orsay
'Le chef de l'école du laid': Gustave Courbet in 19th-century caricatures. European Studies Blog, British Library.
Jennifer A. Thompson, "Marine by Gustave Courbet (cat. 948)," in The John G. Johnson Collection: A History and Selected Works, a Philadelphia Museum of Art free digital publication
1819 births
1877 deaths
19th-century French painters
French male painters
French Realist painters
French anarchists
French socialists
Orientalist painters
Légion d'honneur refusals
People from Doubs
People from Riviera-Pays-d'Enhaut District
Deaths from cirrhosis
Communards | true | [
"\"Find What You Love and Let It Kill You\" may refer to:\n\nMusic \n Find What You Love and Let It Kill You (Jonny Craig album)\n Find What You Love and Let It Kill You (Hurricane No. 1 album)\n \"Find What You Love and Let It Kill You\", a song by Linus Pauling Quartet\n Find What You Love and Let It Kill You, a 2019 short film",
"Finally Awake is the fifth studio album released by Christian rock band Seventh Day Slumber. It was released on March 20, 2007 under Tooth & Nail Records. Finally Awake reached its peak on the Top Christian Albums chart at No. 16 in 2007.\n\nMeaning \nWhen Joseph Rojas was asked about the meaning behind Finally Awake, he responded: \"The message of this album is clear. We want to empower kids to stop looking to the media, to what the world tells them they have to be, to find identity. You don’t have to be what everyone else tells you to. Be what you were created to be.\"\n\nTrack listing \n \"Awake\" - 3:42\n \"Last Regret\" - 3:08\n \"Missing Pages\" - 3:53\n \"My Only Hope\" - 3:45\n \"Always\" - 4:40\n \"Breaking Away\" - 3:35\n \"Burning Bridges\" - 3:54\n \"Undone\" - 3:26\n \"On My Way Home\" - 3:43\n \"Broken Buildings\" - 4:21\n \"Every Saturday\" - 4:20\n\nReferences \n\n2007 albums\nTooth & Nail Records albums\nSeventh Day Slumber albums"
] |
[
"The Cult",
"The Cult (1994-1995)"
] | C_669b70745be5429da8c672a9282a7461_0 | What was the Cult? | 1 | What was the Cult? | The Cult | With the same line-up still in place, the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. The self-titled 'Cult' album is commonly referred to as the 'Black Sheep' album by fans of the group. Astbury referred to the record as "very personal and very revealing" songs about his life, with the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, to his directionless years spent in Glasgow in the late 1970s. The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. Duffy remarked that he thought that the record wouldn't sell well due to the offensive lyrics. The record went to number one in Portugal also, but quickly dropped out of sight. The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" was released with the band going on tour in support of the new album. Only one more single, "Star", was officially released with a live appearance on UK TV show The Word. "Star" began life in 1986 as "Tom Petty" and was recorded at the "Sonic Temple" demo sessions as "Starchild", being dropped by the band during rehearsals. In 1993 the song was resurrected and was finally completed for the record in 1994 as, just simply, "Star". When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. As with the Ceremony record several years earlier, no other official singles were released, but several other songs were released on a strictly limited basis: "Sacred Life" was released in Spain and the Netherlands, "Be Free" was issued in Canada and France, "Saints Are Down" was issued in Greece, but none of the songs gained much commercial success. During this tour, the Cult made their first ever appearance in Norway. CANNOTANSWER | the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. | The Cult are an English rock band formed in 1983 in Bradford, West Yorkshire. Before settling on their current name in January 1984, the band performed under the name Death Cult, which was an evolution of the name of lead singer Ian Astbury's previous band Southern Death Cult. They gained a dedicated following in the United Kingdom in the mid-1980s as a post-punk/gothic rock band, with singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary", before breaking into the mainstream in the United States in the late 1980s establishing themselves as a hard rock band with singles such as "Love Removal Machine". Since its initial formation in 1983, the band have had various line-ups; the longest-serving members are Astbury and guitarist Billy Duffy, who are also the band's two songwriters.
The Cult's debut studio album Dreamtime was released in 1984 to moderate success, with its lead single "Spiritwalker" reaching No. 1 on the UK Indie Chart. Their second studio album, Love (1985), was even more successful, charting at No. 4 in the UK and including singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary" and "Rain". The band's third album, Electric (1987), launched them new heights of success, also peaking at No. 4 in the UK and charting highly in other territories, and spawned the hit singles "Love Removal Machine", "Lil' Devil" and "Wild Flower". On that album, The Cult supplemented their post-punk sound with hard rock; the polish on this new sound was facilitated by producer Rick Rubin. After moving to Los Angeles, California, where the band has been based for the remainder of their career, The Cult continued the musical experimentation of Electric with its follow-up album Sonic Temple (1989), which marked their first collaboration with Bob Rock, who would produce several of the band's subsequent albums. Sonic Temple was their most successful album to that point, entering the Top 10 on the UK and US charts, and included one of the band's most popular songs "Fire Woman".
By the time of their fifth album Ceremony (1991), tensions and creative differences began to surface among the band members. This resulted in the recording sessions for Ceremony being held without a stable lineup, leaving Astbury and Duffy as the only two official members left, and featuring support from session musicians on bass and drums. The ongoing tension had carried over within the next four years, during which they released one more studio album, The Cult (1994), and called it quits in 1995. The Cult reformed in 1999 and released their seventh album Beyond Good and Evil two years later. The commercial failure of the album and resurfaced tensions led to the band going back on hiatus in 2002. They resumed activity in 2006, and have since released three more studio albums: Born into This (2007), Choice of Weapon (2012), and Hidden City (2016).
History
Early history (1981–1984)
The band's origins can be traced to 1981, in Bradford, Yorkshire, where vocalist and songwriter Ian Astbury formed a band called Southern Death Cult. The name was chosen with a double meaning, and was derived from the 14th-century Native American religion, the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex or Southern Death Cult as it was sometimes known, from the Mississippi delta area, but it was also a stab at what the band viewed was the centralisation of power in Southern England (including that of the music industry); there has long been a perceived notion of a North–South divide based on social, historic and economic reasons. Astbury was joined by Buzz Burrows (guitar), Barry Jepson (bass) and Aki Nawaz Qureshi (drums); they performed their first show at the Queen's Hall in their hometown of Bradford on 29 October 1981. The band were at the forefront of an emerging style of music, in the form of post-punk and gothic rock, they achieved critical acclaim from the press and music fans.
The band signed to independent record label Situation Two, an offshoot of Beggars Banquet Records, and released a three-track, triple A-side single, Moya, during this period. They toured through England headlining some shows and touring with Bauhaus and Theatre of Hate. The band played their final performance in Manchester during February 1983, meaning after only sixteen months the band was over. A compilation named The Southern Death Cult was released, this being a collection of the single, radio sessions with John Peel for Radio One and live performances - one of which an audience member recorded with a tape recorder.
In April 1983, Astbury teamed up with guitarist Billy Duffy and formed the band "Death Cult". Duffy had been in the Nosebleeds (along with Morrissey), Lonesome No More and then Theatre of Hate. In addition to Astbury and Duffy, the band also included Jamie Stewart (bass) and Raymond Taylor Smith (later known as Ray Mondo) (drums), both from the Harrow, London based post-punk band, Ritual. Death Cult made their live debut in Oslo, Norway on 25 July 1983 and also released the Death Cult EP in the same month, then toured through mainland Europe and Scotland. In September 1983, Mondo was deported to his home country of Sierra Leone and replaced by Nigel Preston, formerly of Theatre of Hate. The single "Gods Zoo" was released in October 1983. Another European tour, with UK dates, followed that autumn. To tone down their name's gothic connotations and gain broader appeal, the band changed its name to "the Cult" in January 1984 before appearing on the (UK) Channel 4 television show, The Tube.
The Cult's first studio record, Dreamtime, was recorded at Rockfield Studios, in Monmouth, Wales in 1984. The record was to be produced by Joe Julian, but after recording the drum tracks, the band decided to replace him with John Brand. Brand produced the record, but guitarist Duffy has said the drum tracks were produced by Julian, as Preston had become unreliable.
The band recorded the songs which later became known as "Butterflies", "(The) Gimmick", "A Flower in the Desert", "Horse Nation", "Spiritwalker", "Bad Medicine (Waltz)", "Dreamtime", "With Love" (later known as "Ship of Fools", and also "Sea and Sky"), "Bone Bag", "Too Young", "83rd Dream", and one untitled outtake. It is unknown what the outtake was, or whether it was developed into a song at a later date. Songs like "Horse Nation" showed Astbury's intense interest in Native American issues, with the lyrics to "Horse Nation", "See them prancing, they come neighing, to a horse nation", taken almost verbatim from the book Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, while "Spiritwalker" dealt with shamanism, and the record's title and title track are overtly influenced by Australian Aboriginal beliefs.
On 4 April 1984, the Cult released the single "Spiritwalker", which reached No. 1 on the independent charts in the UK, and acted as a teaser for their forthcoming album Dreamtime. This was followed that summer by a second single, "Go West (Crazy Spinning Circles)", before the release of Dreamtime in September; the album reached No. 21 in the UK, and sold over 100,000 copies in the UK alone. On 12 July 1984, the band recorded five songs at the BBC Maida Vale 5 studio for a Richard Skinner session. Before and after the album's release, the Cult toured throughout Europe and England before recording another single, "Ressurection Joe" (UK No. 74), released that December. Following a Christmas support slot with Big Country, the Cult toured Europe with support from the Mission (then called the Sisterhood). Dreamtime was released initially only in the UK, but after its success, and as the Cult's popularity grew worldwide, it was issued in approximately 30 countries.
Mainstream success (1985–1990)
In May 1985, the Cult released their fourth single, "She Sells Sanctuary", which peaked at No. 15 in the UK and spent 23 weeks in the Top 100. The song was recently voted No. 18 in VH1's Indie 100. In June 1985, following his increasingly erratic behaviour, Preston was fired from the band. Big Country's drummer Mark Brzezicki was picked to replace Preston, and was also included in the video for "She Sells Sanctuary". The Cult then finished recording their second album, Love in July and August 1985. The band's music and image shifted from their punk-oriented roots to 1960s psychedelia influences. Love was a chart success, peaking at No. 4 in the UK and selling 100,000 copies there toward a total of 500,000 copies throughout Europe, as well as 100,000 in Australia and 500,000 copies in the United States. Love reached number 20 on the charts in The Netherlands, where it remained for 32 weeks. To date, the record has sold over two and a half million copies worldwide.
From late September 1985 to June 1986, the band went on a worldwide tour with new drummer Les Warner (who had played with Julian Lennon and Johnny Thunders). Two more singles from the Love album followed; "Rain" (charting in the UK at No. 17) and "Revolution" (charting in the UK at No. 30). Neither charted in the US. Another single, "Nirvana", was issued only in Poland. The album version of "Rain", as well as the remix "(Here Comes the) Rain", were used in the Italian horror film Dèmoni 2. Once back in England, the band booked themselves into the Manor Studios in Oxfordshire, with producer Steve Brown (who had produced Love), and recorded over a dozen new songs. The band were unhappy with the sound of their new album, titled Peace, and they decided to go to New York so producer Rick Rubin could remix the first single, "Love Removal Machine".
Rubin agreed to work with the band, but only if they rerecorded the song. Rubin eventually talked them into rerecording the entire album. The band's record company, Beggars Banquet, was displeased with this, as two months and £250,000 had already been spent on the record. However, after hearing the initial New York recording, Beggars Banquet agreed to proceed. The first single, "Love Removal Machine", was released in February 1987, and the new version of the album appeared in April that year, now renamed as Electric, reaching No. 4 and eventually outselling Love. The band toured with Kid Chaos (also known as "Haggis" and "The Kid") on bass, with Stewart on rhythm guitar. Two more singles, "Lil Devil" and "Wild Flower", were released during 1987. A few tracks from the original Peace album appeared on the single versions of "Love Removal Machine", and "Lil Devil". The full Peace album would not be released until 2000, when it was included as Disc 3 of the Rare Cult box set.
In the US, the Cult, now consisting of Astbury, Duffy, Stewart, Warner and Kid Chaos, were supported by the then-unknown Guns N' Roses. The band also appeared at Roskilde Festival in Denmark in June 1987. When the world tour wound through Australia, the band wrecked £30,000 worth of equipment, and as a result they could not tour Japan, as no company would rent them new equipment. At the end of the tour the Electric album had been certified Gold in the UK, and sold roughly 3 million copies worldwide, but the band were barely speaking to each other by then. Haggis left the band at the end of the Electric tour to form the Four Horsemen for Rubin's Def American label. Astbury and Duffy fired Warner and their management team Grant/Edwards, and moved to Los Angeles with original bassist Stewart. Warner sued the band several times for his firing, as well as for what he felt were unpaid royalties due to him for his performance on the Electric album, resulting in lengthy court battles. The Cult signed a new management deal and wrote 21 new songs for their next record.
For the next album, Stewart returned to playing bass, and John Webster was brought in to play keyboards. The band used Chris Taylor to play drums during rehearsals and record the demos, with future Kiss drummer Eric Singer performing during the second demo recording sessions. The Cult eventually recruited session-drummer Mickey Curry to fill the drumming role and Aerosmith sound engineer, Bob Rock, to produce. Recorded in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada from October to December 1988, the Sonic Temple record went Top 10 in both the UK and the US, where it was certified Gold and Platinum respectively. The band went on tour in support of the new album and new single "Fire Woman" (UK No. 15) (NZ No. 1), with yet another new drummer, Matt Sorum, and Webster as keyboard player. The next single, "Edie (Ciao Baby)" (UK No. 25) has become a regular song at concerts for many years.
In Europe, the band toured with Aerosmith, and in the US, after releasing another single "Sun King" (UK No. 42), they spent 1989 touring in support of Metallica before heading out on their own headlining tour later that same year. A fourth single, "Sweet Soul Sister" (UK No. 38), was released in February 1990, with the video having been filmed at Wembley Arena, London, on 25 November 1989. "Sweet Soul Sister" was partially written in Paris and was inspired by the bohemian lifestyle of that city. Released as a single in February 1990, the song was another hit in the UK, and reportedly reached number one on the rock charts in Brazil. After playing a show in Atlanta, Georgia, in February 1990, the band's management told Astbury that his father had just died of cancer. As a result, the remainder of the tour was cancelled after a final leg of shows were performed in April. After the tour ended, the band were on the verge of splitting due to Stewart retiring and moving to Canada to be with his wife, and Sorum leaving to join Guns N' Roses.
In 1990, Astbury organized the Gathering of the Tribes festival in Los Angeles and San Francisco with artists such as Soundgarden, Ice-T, Indigo Girls, Queen Latifah, Iggy Pop, the Charlatans, the Cramps and Public Enemy appearing. This two-day festival drew 40,000 people. Also in 1990, a ten CD box set was released in the UK, containing rare songs from the Cult's singles. The CDs in this box set were all issued as picture discs with rice paper covers, housed in a white box called "Singles Collection", or a black box called "E.P. Collection '84 - '90". In 1991, director Oliver Stone offered Astbury the role of Jim Morrison in Stone's film The Doors. He declined the role because he was not happy with the way Morrison was represented in the film, and the role was ultimately played by Val Kilmer.
Ceremony and the lawsuit (1991–1993)
In 1991, Astbury and Duffy were writing again for their next album. During the demo recordings, Todd Hoffman and James Kottak played bass and drums, respectively. During the actual album recording sessions, Curry was recruited again to play drums, with Charley Drayton on bass, and various other performers. Astbury and Duffy's working relationship had disintegrated by that time, with the two men reportedly rarely even being in the studio together during recording. The resulting album Ceremony was released to mixed responses. The album climbed to US No. 34, but sales were not as impressive as the previous three records, only selling around one million copies worldwide. Only two official singles were released from the record: "Wild Hearted Son" (UK No. 34, Canada No. 41) and "Heart of Soul" (UK No. 50), although "White" was released as a single only in Canada, "Sweet Salvation" was released as a single (as "Dulce Salvación") in Argentina in 1992, and the title track "Ceremony" was released in Spain.
The Cult's Ceremonial Stomp tour went through Europe in 1991 and North America in 1992. In 1991 the Cult played a show at the Marquee Club in London, which was recorded and released in February 1993, packaged with some vinyl UK copies of their first greatest hits release. Only a handful of CD copies of it were ever manufactured originally, however it was subsequently reissued on CD in 1999. An incomplete bootleg video of this show is also in circulation.
The band were sued by the parents of the Native American boy pictured on the cover of Ceremony, for alleged exploitation and for the unauthorized use of the child's image. The parents stated that the boy felt he had been cursed by the band's burning of his image, and was "emotionally scarred." This image of the boy is also burned in the video for "Wild Hearted Son". This lawsuit delayed the release of Ceremony in many countries including South Korea and Thailand, which did not see the record's release until late 1992, and it was unreleased in Turkey until the Cult played several shows in Istanbul in June 1993.
A world tour followed with backing from drummer Michael Lee (Page & Plant, Little Angels), bassist Kinley "Barney" Wolfe (Lord Tracy, Black Oak Arkansas), and keyboardist John Sinclair (Ozzy Osbourne, Uriah Heep) returning one last time, and the Gathering of the Tribes moved to the UK. Here artists such as Pearl Jam performed. The warm-up gig to the show, in a small nightclub, was dedicated to the memory of Nigel Preston, who had died a few weeks earlier at the age of 28. Following the release of the single "The Witch" (#9 in Australia) and the performance of a song for the 1992 Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie soundtrack entitled "Zap City", produced by Steve Brown and originally a B-side to "Lil' Devil", two volumes of remixes of "She Sells Sanctuary", called Sanctuary Mixes MCMXCIII, volumes one and two, and in support of Pure Cult: for Rockers, Ravers, Lovers, and Sinners, a greatest hits compilation which debuted at No. 1 on the British charts and later went to number one in Portugal, Astbury and Duffy fired the "backing band" and recruited Craig Adams (the Mission) and Scott Garrett for performances across Europe in 1993, with some shows featuring Mike Dimkich on rhythm guitar. This tour marked the first time the band performed in Turkey, Greece, and the Slovak Republic.
The Cult and first breakup (1994–1998)
With the same line-up still in place, the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. The self-titled album is commonly referred to as the "Black Sheep" album by fans of the group, due to the image of a black sheep on the front cover. Astbury referred to the record as a collection of "very personal and very revealing" songs about his life, with the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, to his directionless years spent in Glasgow in the late 1970s.
The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. Duffy remarked that he thought that the record wouldn't sell well due to the offensive lyrics. The record went to number one in Portugal also, but quickly dropped out of sight. The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" was released with the band going on tour in support of the new album. Only one more single, "Star", was officially released with a live appearance on UK TV show The Word. "Star" began life in 1986 as "Tom Petty" and was recorded at the "Sonic Temple" demo sessions as "Starchild", being dropped by the band during rehearsals. In 1993 the song was resurrected and was finally completed for the record in 1994 as, just simply, "Star".
When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. As with the Ceremony record several years earlier, no other official singles were released, but several other songs were released on a strictly limited basis: "Sacred Life" was released in Spain and the Netherlands, "Be Free" was issued in Canada and France, "Saints Are Down" was issued in Greece, but none of the songs gained much commercial success. During this tour, the Cult made their first ever appearance in Norway.
During the Black Rain tour of South America in spring of 1995, despite the fact that several more new songs had already been recorded, the tour was cancelled after an appearance in Rio de Janeiro in March, and the band split up citing unspecified problems on a recent South American tour. Astbury started up a garage band called Holy Barbarians a few months later. The band made their debut at the 100 Club in London in February 1996 and released their first (and only) record in May 1996, and toured throughout North America and Europe for the rest of 1996. The band started writing material for a second record in 1997, but the band was dissolved and Astbury began writing and recording a solo record. Throughout 1997 and 1998 Astbury recorded his solo record, originally to be titled Natural Born Guerilla, later called High Time Amplifier. Ultimately the record remained unreleased until June 2000 when it was released under the name Spirit\Light\Speed. Astbury played one solo concert in 1999.
In November 1996, a number of CD reissues were released: the band's American record company released High Octane Cult, a slightly updated greatest hits compilation released only in the US and Japan; The Southern Death Cult, a remastered edition of the fifteen-song compilation CD; a ten-song compilation CD by Death Cult called Ghost Dance, consisting of the untitled four-song EP, the single "God's Zoo", and four unreleased songs from a radio broadcast; and a remastered repackaging of the Dreamtime album, containing only the ten original songs from the record in their original playing order and almost completely different but original artwork. Dreamtime Live at the Lyceum was also remastered and issued on video and for the first time on CD, with the one unreleased song from the concert, "Gimmick".
First reunion, Beyond Good and Evil and second hiatus (1999–2005)
In 1999, Astbury and Duffy reformed the Cult with Matt Sorum and ex-Porno for Pyros bassist Martyn LeNoble. Their first official concert was at the Tibetan Freedom Concert in June 1999, after having rehearsed at shows in the Los Angeles area. The band's 1999 Cult Rising reunion tour resulted in a sold out 30 date tour of the US, ending with 8 consecutive sold out nights at the LA House of Blues. In 2000, the band toured South Africa for the first time, and North and South America, and contributed the song "Painted on My Heart" to the soundtrack of the movie Gone In 60 Seconds. The song was featured prominently and the melody was fused into parts of the score. In June, Astbury's long-delayed solo record was finally released as Spirit\Light\Speed, but it failed to gain much success. In November 2000, another authorised greatest hits compilation was released, Pure Cult: The Singles 1984–1995, along with an accompanying DVD, which was later certified gold in Canada. The Cult, as well as Ian Astbury, performed on separate tracks on the Doors tribute album, Stoned Immaculate: The Music of The Doors, covering "Wild Child" and "Touch Me".
In November 2000, Beggars Banquet released 15,000 copies of a six-disc boxset (with a bonus seventh disc of remixes for the first 5000 copies) titled Rare Cult. The box set consists of album out-takes, demos, radio broadcasts, and album B-sides. It is most notable for including the previously unreleased "Peace" album in its entirety. In 2001, the band signed to Atlantic Records and recorded a new album, Beyond Good and Evil, originally being produced by Mick Jones of Foreigner, until Jones bowed out to tour with Foreigner. Astbury and Duffy co-wrote a song with Jones, an odd occurrence, as in the past, neither Astbury or Duffy would co-write their material. Bob Rock was the producer, with Martyn LeNoble and Chris Wyse as recording bassists, as Mike Dimkich played rhythm guitar on tour, and Matt Sorum returning as drummer. Although Sorum has previously toured with the band on the Sonic Temple tour in 1989, this was the first time that he had recorded a studio album with the band.
However Beyond Good and Evil was not the comeback record the band had hoped for. Despite reaching No. 37 in the US, No. 22 in Canada, and No. 25 in Spain, sales quickly dropped, only selling roughly 500,000 copies worldwide. The first single "Rise", reached No. 41 in the US, and No. 2 on the mainstream rock charts, but Atlantic Records quickly pulled the song from radio playlists. Astbury would later describe the experience with Atlantic to be "soul destroying", after Atlantic tried to tamper with the lyrics, the record cover, and choice of singles from the record.
After the first single from the record, the band's working relationship with Atlantic was on paper only, with Atlantic pulling "Rise" from the radio stations playlists, and stopping all promotion of the record. The second single "Breathe" was only released as a radio station promo, and the final single "True Believers" was only on a compilation sampler disc released in January 2002 (after the Cult's tour had already ended). Despite "True Believers" receiving radio airplay in Australia, both singles went largely unnoticed, and both Astbury and Duffy walked away from the project. LeNoble rejoined the band for the initial dates in early 2001, and Billy Morrison filled in on bass for the majority of the 2001 tour.
The European tour of 2001 was canceled, largely due to security concerns after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the band flew back to the US to tour again with Aerosmith. But the eleven-week tour was considered by fans to be a disaster, as the band played only a brief rundown of their greatest hits. In October 2001, a show at the Grand Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles was filmed for release on DVD. After the tour ended in December 2001, the band took most of 2002 off, apart from a few shows in the US to promote the release of the DVD, with Scott Garrett and Craig Adams rejoining the band.
Despite the commercial disappointment of Beyond Good and Evil and the supporting tour, the band was voted "Comeback of the Year" by Metal Edge readers in the magazine's 2001 Readers' Choice Awards.
In late 2002, Ian Astbury declared the Cult to be "on ice" indefinitely, after performing a brief series of dates in October 2002 to promote the release of the Music Without Fear DVD. During this second hiatus, Astbury performed as a member of the Doors (later dubbed the Doors of the 21st Century, later still renamed D21c, and most recently known as Riders on the Storm) with two of the original members of that group. D21c was sued numerous times, both by Jim Morrison's family and by drummer John Densmore. Astbury supposedly started work on recording another solo album that later became the backbone for the Cult's Born into This.
At the same time, Duffy was part of Coloursound with bassist Craig Adams and ex-Alarm frontman Mike Peters, then Dead Men Walking (again with Peters) and later Cardboard Vampyres. Sorum became a member of the hard rock supergroup Velvet Revolver. In 2003, all of the Cult's records were issued on CD, with several bonus tracks being issued on the Russian, Belarusian, and Lithuanian versions. These eastern European releases had many printing mistakes on the jacket sleeves and lyric inserts. In October 2004, all of the Cult's records were again remastered and issued again on CD, this time in Japan in different cardboard foldout sleeves. "She Sells Sanctuary" appeared in the 2002 video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, playing on rock station V-Rock.
Second reunion, Born Into This and Capsule EPs (2006–2010)
Despite Astbury's previous statement from 2004 that a reunion would not happen, The Cult announced in January 2006 that they were reuniting for "some limited gigs" throughout the year. A month later, the band made their first live appearance in three-and-a-half years on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson. Their lineup consisted of Astbury (vocals), Duffy (lead guitar), John Tempesta (drums), Dimkich (rhythm guitar) and Wyse (returning as bassist). Their first stage show was held in March 2006 in San Francisco, California, at The Fillmore. The entire tour was recorded by Instant Live and sold after each show. In May, they did an eight date tour in Canada. Later that summer, they toured central and eastern Europe and played their first concerts in Bulgaria, Poland and Serbia. An eleven-date UK tour followed as well as several more dates in the United States, finishing with a South American tour in December. That year, Duffy began the band Circus Diablo with Billy Morrison, Sorum, Brett Scallions and Ricky Warwick.
During these tours, the band occasionally played an extended set, including several songs the band had not performed in decades: "King Contrary Man" and "Hollow Man", neither of which had been performed since 1987; also, "Libertine" was performed approximately three times, for the first time since 2000, and "Brother Wolf, Sister Moon", which was only performed one time since 1986 (for this particular song, the band played an abridged version which has never been performed before or since)
Astbury announced in February 2007 that he was leaving Riders on the Storm and returning to the Cult. He stated: "I have decided to move on and focus on my own music and legacy." The Cult was featured on Stuffmagazine.com's list of ultimate air guitar players. On 21 March 2007, it was announced that the band would be touring Europe with the Who. The first confirmed tour date was in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, in early June, with at least a dozen shows set to follow. The band played a gig in London's West End at the CC Club on 7 June 2007, along with nearly two dozen shows across continental Europe during summer. The tour also includes the first performance in Romania and Croatia.
On 29 May 2007, the band signed a deal with major metal label Roadrunner Records. Their 8th studio album, titled Born into This was released on 16 October, and was produced by Martin "Youth" Glover, bass player for Killing Joke. Born into This was released as regular single disc and limited edition double disc, the second disk being a bonus 5-track CD holding the following tracks: "Stand Alone", "War Pony Destroyer", "I Assassin (Demo)", "Sound of Destruction (Demo)" and "Savages (Extended Version)". Prior to the album's release, the band played festival and headline dates, and supported the Who in Europe through summer 2007, with a US headline tour to follow.
The band's appearance at Irving Plaza in New York City in early November 2006 was filmed and was released in 2007. The Cult New York City, issued by Fontana North and is the Cult's first high definition DVD release. Meanwhile, Astbury lent vocals on two tracks of the 2007 Unkle album "War Stories", one of them being the first single from the album, "Burn My Shadow".
The band performed a UK and European tour in late-February and early-March 2008. On 24 March, they began their North American tour including a major 13-city tour in Canada. During September 2008, the Cult did a brief series of dates in the northeast United States, and they toured in Brazil as part of the South American tour in October 2008. As of May 2008, according to The Gauntlet, the Cult are currently unsigned and no longer under contract with Roadrunner Records. In October 2008, it was announced that the Cult would headline the inaugural Rock 'n' Roll Marathon in San Antonio, to be run 16 November 2008. The Cult announced plans for a tour showcasing their 1985 Love album across the US and then the UK in October where they will play at the Royal Albert Hall.
Coinciding with the remastered Love album and four-disc Omnibus boxed set, the Cult kicked off the long-awaited Love Live Tour in late summer. Performing their classic Love album in its entirety, each show was played with the Love tracks opening with "Nirvana" to "Black Angel". A quick intermission followed, then other Cult hits were played (varying by venue): "Sun King", "Dirty Little Rock Star", "Electric Ocean", "Illuminated". Then followed the favorites "Fire Woman", "Lil Devil", "Wild Flower", and lastly "Love Removal Machine". In the evening of 10 October 2009 at the Royal Albert Hall in London, the band performed a second encore with original Cult bassist Jamie Stewart and drummer Mark Brzezicki, who played drums with the band during the Love album recording sessions in July and August 1985. The band sold Love Live USB flash drives for each show during the tour.
The Cult entered 2010 continuing their Love Live Tour and announcing more dates in the United States, New Zealand, Australia, and Japan. The band finished recording a four-track "Capsule" with producer Chris Goss. Capsule 1 was said to be the first of three or four to be released sometime in summer 2010. Release formats include CD-DVD dualdisc, 12-inch vinyl, and digital downloads. Capsule 1 was released on 14 September 2010. The band officially announced the release of its first new studio recording since 2007, "Every Man And Woman Is A Star". The new single was released through the iTunes Store on 31 July 2010.
On 1 August 2010, the band played the sold-out music festival Sonisphere, which marked their first UK performance since the tour for their Love album. During the performance they debuted their new single, "Every Man and Woman is a Star", which was released on 1 August 2010. On 14 September 2010 the band embarked on a new U.S. tour and released Capsule 1 in conjunction with media technology company Aderra Inc. and made it available in multiple formats including a CD-DVD DualDisc, USB flash drive, 12 inch vinyl, FLAC download and MP3 download. The collection includes a short film made by singer Ian Astbury and Rick Rogers.
On 26 October 2010 the band and Aderra Inc. announced the release of a new song, "Embers", for 1 November 2010 and Capsule 2 available through their web store on 16 November 2010. Pictures from the Cult's tour stop in Chicago on 28 October 2010 can be seen at a local radio station website.
On 17 September 2010, the band performed live at the Fall Frenzy concert at the Tempe Beach Park in Tempe, Arizona. Other bands that played at this concert were Stone Temple Pilots, Shinedown, and Sevendust.
On 4 December 2010, the band performed a live set for Guitar Center Sessions on DirecTV. The episode included an interview with the band by program host, Nic Harcourt.
Choice of Weapon and Hidden City (2011–2017)
During the Cult's concert at the Hammersmith Apollo in London on 21 January 2011 Ian Astbury declared that the Cult would be recording a new album directly after the tour. They also announced that they would be working with Chris Goss, who performed with Masters of Reality as a supporting act the same evening. On 11 May 2011, it was announced that the Cult were signed to Cooking Vinyl Records, who will release the new album in early 2012. Commented guitarist Billy Duffy: "We are very much looking forward to returning to our U.K. roots in many ways working with Cooking Vinyl." Vocalist Ian Astbury added, "We look forward to a long and fruitful relationship with Cooking Vinyl." By May 2011, the band had been writing and recording new demos at its Witch Mountain studio hideaway in the Hollywood Hills, and began recording their new album at Hollywood Recording Studios. In October 2011, bassist Chris Wyse stated the album was almost finished and expected to be released in April 2012. Chris also described it as a "Zep/Stooges mix of energy."
On 29 November 2011, it was announced that the album would be produced by Bob Rock, who provided the same role on Sonic Temple, The Cult and Beyond Good and Evil. The album, entitled Choice of Weapon, was released on 22 May 2012. The band partnered with Rolling Stone to premiere the first song from the album titled Lucifer on 30 January. On 5 February 2012, the Cult song "She Sells Sanctuary" was used as the soundtrack for a Budweiser commercial in a mashup with Flo Rida aired during Super Bowl XLVI. In May 2012 the Cult appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and played "For The Animals".
On 28 September 2012, it was announced that the band would release Weapon of Choice, a "prequel" album to accompany the band's latest album, Choice of Weapon. The digital-only release, available exclusively on iTunes for two months only beginning 16 October, features the songs that were ultimately included in "Choice Of Weapon" at an earlier stage of development. Explaining the motivations behind the release, singer Ian Astbury said that "These songs were turned over and over, forged in long rehearsals and writing sessions, and emanated from challenges both personal and professional. We put our guts into this; [Producer Chris] Goss was able to create an environment where the songs were born through playing and turning over lyrics, through hard work and intense sessions." Astbury added "These songs have an integrity and rawness of their own. In many ways it's a different album to the one we released and reveals the foundations of 'Choice Of Weapon'. We were able to close the doors and begin to explore spaces we had not been in for a while." The song "Twisted and Bleeding" was made available for free download at the band's website ahead of the full digital release.
On 20 June 2013, the band announced the release of Electric-Peace which comprises the entire Electric album plus the Peace album which was previously released on the now discontinued Rare Cult box set in 2000. It is due for release in the US on 30 July. In 2013 Mike Dimkich left the band and joined Bad Religion to cover for guitarist Greg Hetson. James Stevenson, from the Beauty's On The Streets tour in 1994, replaced Dimkich as the Cult's rhythm guitarist.
In March 2013, Billy Duffy told the Argentinan journalist Fabrizio Pedrotti that the Cult had begun work on a new album for a 2014 release. The band were expected to begin work on the album after they finish their 2013 world tour, where they played the Electric album in its entirety. In August 2014, Billy added that the next album, which was not expected to be released before 2015 at the earliest, "will be more guitar heavy".
On 5 November 2015, it was announced that The Cult would release their new album, entitled Hidden City, on 5 February 2016. The album is said to be the final part of a trilogy that began with Born into This, and marks the fifth time Bob Rock had produced a Cult album. The band also announced that they had hired Australian-born bassist Grant Fitzpatrick (ex-Mink) as the replacement for Chris Wyse. Chris Chaney (Jane's Addiction, Camp Freddy) and producer Bob Rock performed session bass on the album. In support of Hidden City, The Cult opened for Guns N' Roses on the Not in This Lifetime... Tour.
In an October 2016 interview with PopMatters journalist J.C. Maçek III, Cult guitarist Billy Duffy spoke of the band's playlist while on tour, saying "Obviously you want to make an impactful [show]," he continues. "There are some practical, pragmatic decisions made. If you're playing to a crowd who are not very familiar with you, there's no point of going too deep but we do always make sure we play a new song. Like on Guns N' Roses' [tour] we had fifty minutes which is ten songs all in. So, you know we just made sure that in those ten songs we played 'Deeply Ordered Chaos' which we’re proud of and it makes a certain statement. And it just alerts people to the fact that, yes, we have made a record in the last 30 years. You know and that's a good thing. Psychologically, that's the blood transfusion that we need. And we're very mindful, we have a very loyal fan base. We don't pander as you well know."
Upcoming eleventh studio album (2018–present)
In an April 2018 interview with Guitar World, guitarist Billy Duffy was asked if another album from The Cult was in the works. He replied, "Never say never! Ian and I enjoy the process of making new music, and we feel it's vital to keep the band healthy, even if it's pretty much in the law of diminishing returns area now. Who knows if it will be a whole album a series of singles or an EP? I can say new Cult music will be forthcoming, but these days we don't rush it as there's no point. Quality is key. We are past the point of having to release stuff so if we feel it's good enough, then we will release it in some shape or another."
On 2 April 2018, a tour of the United States of America called "Revolution 3 Tour" was announced for the summer. They performed as one of the three headliners, along with Stone Temple Pilots and Bush.
In April 2019, The Cult announced that they would celebrate the 30th anniversary of the release of their fourth album Sonic Temple with a world tour, which began on 2 May in Houston, Texas and was expected to wrap up in 2020.
In a June 2019 interview with LA Weekly, vocalist Ian Astbury stated that The Cult were "long overdue" to release new music. He was quoted as saying: "We do have some stuff we've been working on, but it's yet to see the light of day." Six months later, Astbury told Atlantic City Weekly that the band was going to start working on new music in 2020: "We've got a few pieces lying around in various stages of completion. The intention is to get together in the New Year and take a look at what we've got and decide how we are going to go about moving forward. It's an essential part of any creative lifeblood." On May 6, 2020, The Cult announced on their Twitter page that they had signed to Black Hill Records.
On August 15, 2020, Duffy announced on his Twitter that the band were recording their new album with producer Tom Dalgety at Rockfield Studios, where The Cult had recorded their debut album Dreamtime 36 years earlier.
In support of their new album, The Cult will embark on a co-headlining six-date UK tour with Alice Cooper in May and June 2022.
Influences
Duffy and Astbury cited among their influences a lot of different bands "from the Doors to Led Zeppelin. We literally went from the front of our record collections to the back. And then along the way we were drawn in by the likes of Public Image Ltd, Joy Division and Siouxsie and the Banshees. You might not hear it in the music but it's there." They also cited Bauhaus among many other post-punk influences. Duffy also praised Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers for a major performance he attended in 1977 and Siouxsie and the Banshees whom "always had great guitar players with killer riffs." Duffy also hailed AC/DC for "the power of a good three chord riff", Pete Townshend of the Who "in terms of commitment to stage performing" and Brian May of Queen for using "‘echoplex’ tape delays to orchestrate his own solo".
Musical style
According to music critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the band fuse a "hardcore punk revivalist" sound with the "pseudo-mysticism ... of the Doors and Uriah Heep and the guitar-orchestrations of Led Zeppelin and The Cure ... while adding touches of post-punk goth rock". In 1985 Astbury said, "Our music is just melodies and guitars. We're like Big Country and U2, only better!".
Members
Current members
Ian Astbury – lead vocals, occasional percussion/guitar
Billy Duffy – lead and rhythm guitars, backing vocals
John Tempesta – drums, percussion
Grant Fitzpatrick – bass, backing vocals
Damon Fox – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals
Discography
Dreamtime (1984)
Love (1985)
Electric (1987)
Sonic Temple (1989)
Ceremony (1991)
The Cult (1994)
Beyond Good and Evil (2001)
Born into This (2007)
Choice of Weapon (2012)
Hidden City (2016)
References
External links
Official website
Billy Duffy official website
Musical groups established in 1983
Situation Two artists
Beggars Banquet Records artists
Sire Records artists
Musical groups from Bradford
English post-punk music groups
English gothic rock groups
English hard rock musical groups
English heavy metal musical groups
English glam metal musical groups | true | [
"See Sami shamanism for shamanism in northern Scandinavia, which is technically in Europe, but culturally part of the Finno-Ugric traditions of Northern Asia.\n\nThe first historian to posit the existence of European shamanic ideas within popular beliefs of otherwise Christian Europeans was Carlo Ginzburg, who examined the Benandanti, an agrarian cult found in Friuli, Italy, whose members underwent shamanic trances in which they believed they battled witches in order to save their crops.\n\nHistorians following Ginzburg identified what they saw as shamanic elements in the accusations of the witch trials of the Early Modern period. These included Eva Pocs and Emma Wilby. This group of authors proposes what is known as the \"witch-cult hypothesis\", arguing that there was a religious cult with continuity reaching into the pre-Christian period behind what became identified as \"witchcraft\" in the Early Modern period.\n\nThe idea of shamanism's existence in Ancient Greece was advanced by E. R. Dodds and criticized by Michael J. Puett.\n\nSee also\nShamanistic remnants in Hungarian folklore\n\nReferences\n\n \nAnthropology of religion",
"\"Gods Zoo\" is a single by the English post-punk/gothic rock band Death Cult (who later shortened their name to the Cult), released on 23 October 1983 by Situation Two. The song is often, erroneously, spelled \"God's Zoo\" (with an apostrophe in the word \"Gods\", indicating possessive case).\n\nPicture sleeve\nNo credit is given to the design of the picture sleeve for the single. The front features the group's name centered between four stereoscopic printed television sets. Within each television is an image. Clockwise from top left the images are as follows: (1) the group's Mickey Mouse \"skull\" logo; (2) a nude female drawing (artist unknown, but the image is often credited to singer Ian Astbury, even though this has never been confirmed); (3) a portion of a Tim Page photograph of ARVN soldiers interrogating a Viet Cong suspect (the group's first release, the eponymous Death Cult EP, also featured a Tim Page Vietnam photograph on its picture sleeve, and both Astbury and guitarist Billy Duffy have expressed an interest in the history of the Vietnam War, which was also apparently a trend in the United Kingdom at the time); (4) a portion of a photograph of Jimi Hendrix (one of the group's influences).\n\nB-side\nThe single is labeled A SIDE, and AA SIDE (for the B-side), which is an extended and remixed version of the title track titled \"Gods Zoo (These Times)\".\n\nHistory\n\"Gods Zoo\" was released while the group was still recording and performing as Death Cult (they would not change their name to the Cult until 13 January 1984) and was intended to be the lead single for Death Cult's first album (tentatively titled A Flower in the Desert). A joint 4AD and Beggars Banquet 7\" promotional EP, titled A Sampling Above the Rest (catalogue number VTO 1), featured \"Gods Zoo (These Times)\" as a promotional track with the following description: \"taken from the forthcoming Death Cult cassette and album\".\n\nA full-length Death Cult album never materialized. The group's developed material was eventually incorporated into what would become the Dreamtime album, which was released nearly a year later and under the group's new name. Conspicuously missing from the finalized album was \"Gods Zoo\", making it a stand-alone single.\n\nChart positions\n\nTrack listing \nRelease information pertains to the United Kingdom release only.\n\n7\": Situation Two SIT 29\n \"Gods Zoo\" – 3:26\n \"Gods Zoo (These Times)\" – 5:09\n\n12\": Situation Two SIT 29T\n \"Gods Zoo\" – 3:26\n \"Gods Zoo (These Times)\" – 5:09\n\nAustralian release\n\"Gods Zoo\", as a single, was released only in the UK and Australia. The Australian version was only issued in the 7\" format and was distributed by the Powderworks Records label (catalogue number POW 0179). It was released in 1983, but the specific day and month of the release is unknown. The track listing was the same as the UK single.\n\nPersonnel\n Ian Astbury - vocals\n Billy Duffy - guitars\n Jamie Stewart - bass guitar\n Nigel Preston - drums\n\nAlso credited:\n Jeremy Green - producer and engineer\n\n\"Gods Zoo\" marked the debut of Death Cult's new drummer, Nigel Preston. Preston replaced the group's previous drummer, Ray Mondo, just prior to entering the studio to record the single. \n\nPreston had previously worked with Duffy in Theatre of Hate. After his departure from Theatre of Hate, Preston joined Sex Gang Children in September 1982. When Preston was recruited to join Death Cult in September 1983, he essentially \"swapped\" with Ray Mondo. Ray Mondo played his last gig with Death Cult on 19 September 1983 at the Brixton Ace in London. Shortly afterwards, he filled the vacant drummer position with Sex Gang Children.\n\nDeath Cult EP\nBoth tracks from the \"Gods Zoo\" single were collected, along with the contents of the earlier eponymous EP, on a single compact disc in 1988, simply titled Death Cult. The same material was remastered and reissued (along with some radio session material) in 1996 as Ghost Dance.\n\nA Historical Debt\nIn 1991, the Cult donated the track \"Gods Zoo\", royalty free, for the compilation album A Historical Debt. released by Beechwood Music Limited. The album's intent was to help independent groups and labels caught in the wake of the Rough Trade Distribution collapse.\n\nFootnotes\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nDeath Cult at Death Rock\nDeath Cult at Discogs\n\nThe Cult songs"
] |
[
"The Cult",
"The Cult (1994-1995)",
"What was the Cult?",
"the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock."
] | C_669b70745be5429da8c672a9282a7461_0 | How did i do in the charts? | 2 | How did The Cult do in the charts? | The Cult | With the same line-up still in place, the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. The self-titled 'Cult' album is commonly referred to as the 'Black Sheep' album by fans of the group. Astbury referred to the record as "very personal and very revealing" songs about his life, with the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, to his directionless years spent in Glasgow in the late 1970s. The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. Duffy remarked that he thought that the record wouldn't sell well due to the offensive lyrics. The record went to number one in Portugal also, but quickly dropped out of sight. The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" was released with the band going on tour in support of the new album. Only one more single, "Star", was officially released with a live appearance on UK TV show The Word. "Star" began life in 1986 as "Tom Petty" and was recorded at the "Sonic Temple" demo sessions as "Starchild", being dropped by the band during rehearsals. In 1993 the song was resurrected and was finally completed for the record in 1994 as, just simply, "Star". When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. As with the Ceremony record several years earlier, no other official singles were released, but several other songs were released on a strictly limited basis: "Sacred Life" was released in Spain and the Netherlands, "Be Free" was issued in Canada and France, "Saints Are Down" was issued in Greece, but none of the songs gained much commercial success. During this tour, the Cult made their first ever appearance in Norway. CANNOTANSWER | The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. | The Cult are an English rock band formed in 1983 in Bradford, West Yorkshire. Before settling on their current name in January 1984, the band performed under the name Death Cult, which was an evolution of the name of lead singer Ian Astbury's previous band Southern Death Cult. They gained a dedicated following in the United Kingdom in the mid-1980s as a post-punk/gothic rock band, with singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary", before breaking into the mainstream in the United States in the late 1980s establishing themselves as a hard rock band with singles such as "Love Removal Machine". Since its initial formation in 1983, the band have had various line-ups; the longest-serving members are Astbury and guitarist Billy Duffy, who are also the band's two songwriters.
The Cult's debut studio album Dreamtime was released in 1984 to moderate success, with its lead single "Spiritwalker" reaching No. 1 on the UK Indie Chart. Their second studio album, Love (1985), was even more successful, charting at No. 4 in the UK and including singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary" and "Rain". The band's third album, Electric (1987), launched them new heights of success, also peaking at No. 4 in the UK and charting highly in other territories, and spawned the hit singles "Love Removal Machine", "Lil' Devil" and "Wild Flower". On that album, The Cult supplemented their post-punk sound with hard rock; the polish on this new sound was facilitated by producer Rick Rubin. After moving to Los Angeles, California, where the band has been based for the remainder of their career, The Cult continued the musical experimentation of Electric with its follow-up album Sonic Temple (1989), which marked their first collaboration with Bob Rock, who would produce several of the band's subsequent albums. Sonic Temple was their most successful album to that point, entering the Top 10 on the UK and US charts, and included one of the band's most popular songs "Fire Woman".
By the time of their fifth album Ceremony (1991), tensions and creative differences began to surface among the band members. This resulted in the recording sessions for Ceremony being held without a stable lineup, leaving Astbury and Duffy as the only two official members left, and featuring support from session musicians on bass and drums. The ongoing tension had carried over within the next four years, during which they released one more studio album, The Cult (1994), and called it quits in 1995. The Cult reformed in 1999 and released their seventh album Beyond Good and Evil two years later. The commercial failure of the album and resurfaced tensions led to the band going back on hiatus in 2002. They resumed activity in 2006, and have since released three more studio albums: Born into This (2007), Choice of Weapon (2012), and Hidden City (2016).
History
Early history (1981–1984)
The band's origins can be traced to 1981, in Bradford, Yorkshire, where vocalist and songwriter Ian Astbury formed a band called Southern Death Cult. The name was chosen with a double meaning, and was derived from the 14th-century Native American religion, the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex or Southern Death Cult as it was sometimes known, from the Mississippi delta area, but it was also a stab at what the band viewed was the centralisation of power in Southern England (including that of the music industry); there has long been a perceived notion of a North–South divide based on social, historic and economic reasons. Astbury was joined by Buzz Burrows (guitar), Barry Jepson (bass) and Aki Nawaz Qureshi (drums); they performed their first show at the Queen's Hall in their hometown of Bradford on 29 October 1981. The band were at the forefront of an emerging style of music, in the form of post-punk and gothic rock, they achieved critical acclaim from the press and music fans.
The band signed to independent record label Situation Two, an offshoot of Beggars Banquet Records, and released a three-track, triple A-side single, Moya, during this period. They toured through England headlining some shows and touring with Bauhaus and Theatre of Hate. The band played their final performance in Manchester during February 1983, meaning after only sixteen months the band was over. A compilation named The Southern Death Cult was released, this being a collection of the single, radio sessions with John Peel for Radio One and live performances - one of which an audience member recorded with a tape recorder.
In April 1983, Astbury teamed up with guitarist Billy Duffy and formed the band "Death Cult". Duffy had been in the Nosebleeds (along with Morrissey), Lonesome No More and then Theatre of Hate. In addition to Astbury and Duffy, the band also included Jamie Stewart (bass) and Raymond Taylor Smith (later known as Ray Mondo) (drums), both from the Harrow, London based post-punk band, Ritual. Death Cult made their live debut in Oslo, Norway on 25 July 1983 and also released the Death Cult EP in the same month, then toured through mainland Europe and Scotland. In September 1983, Mondo was deported to his home country of Sierra Leone and replaced by Nigel Preston, formerly of Theatre of Hate. The single "Gods Zoo" was released in October 1983. Another European tour, with UK dates, followed that autumn. To tone down their name's gothic connotations and gain broader appeal, the band changed its name to "the Cult" in January 1984 before appearing on the (UK) Channel 4 television show, The Tube.
The Cult's first studio record, Dreamtime, was recorded at Rockfield Studios, in Monmouth, Wales in 1984. The record was to be produced by Joe Julian, but after recording the drum tracks, the band decided to replace him with John Brand. Brand produced the record, but guitarist Duffy has said the drum tracks were produced by Julian, as Preston had become unreliable.
The band recorded the songs which later became known as "Butterflies", "(The) Gimmick", "A Flower in the Desert", "Horse Nation", "Spiritwalker", "Bad Medicine (Waltz)", "Dreamtime", "With Love" (later known as "Ship of Fools", and also "Sea and Sky"), "Bone Bag", "Too Young", "83rd Dream", and one untitled outtake. It is unknown what the outtake was, or whether it was developed into a song at a later date. Songs like "Horse Nation" showed Astbury's intense interest in Native American issues, with the lyrics to "Horse Nation", "See them prancing, they come neighing, to a horse nation", taken almost verbatim from the book Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, while "Spiritwalker" dealt with shamanism, and the record's title and title track are overtly influenced by Australian Aboriginal beliefs.
On 4 April 1984, the Cult released the single "Spiritwalker", which reached No. 1 on the independent charts in the UK, and acted as a teaser for their forthcoming album Dreamtime. This was followed that summer by a second single, "Go West (Crazy Spinning Circles)", before the release of Dreamtime in September; the album reached No. 21 in the UK, and sold over 100,000 copies in the UK alone. On 12 July 1984, the band recorded five songs at the BBC Maida Vale 5 studio for a Richard Skinner session. Before and after the album's release, the Cult toured throughout Europe and England before recording another single, "Ressurection Joe" (UK No. 74), released that December. Following a Christmas support slot with Big Country, the Cult toured Europe with support from the Mission (then called the Sisterhood). Dreamtime was released initially only in the UK, but after its success, and as the Cult's popularity grew worldwide, it was issued in approximately 30 countries.
Mainstream success (1985–1990)
In May 1985, the Cult released their fourth single, "She Sells Sanctuary", which peaked at No. 15 in the UK and spent 23 weeks in the Top 100. The song was recently voted No. 18 in VH1's Indie 100. In June 1985, following his increasingly erratic behaviour, Preston was fired from the band. Big Country's drummer Mark Brzezicki was picked to replace Preston, and was also included in the video for "She Sells Sanctuary". The Cult then finished recording their second album, Love in July and August 1985. The band's music and image shifted from their punk-oriented roots to 1960s psychedelia influences. Love was a chart success, peaking at No. 4 in the UK and selling 100,000 copies there toward a total of 500,000 copies throughout Europe, as well as 100,000 in Australia and 500,000 copies in the United States. Love reached number 20 on the charts in The Netherlands, where it remained for 32 weeks. To date, the record has sold over two and a half million copies worldwide.
From late September 1985 to June 1986, the band went on a worldwide tour with new drummer Les Warner (who had played with Julian Lennon and Johnny Thunders). Two more singles from the Love album followed; "Rain" (charting in the UK at No. 17) and "Revolution" (charting in the UK at No. 30). Neither charted in the US. Another single, "Nirvana", was issued only in Poland. The album version of "Rain", as well as the remix "(Here Comes the) Rain", were used in the Italian horror film Dèmoni 2. Once back in England, the band booked themselves into the Manor Studios in Oxfordshire, with producer Steve Brown (who had produced Love), and recorded over a dozen new songs. The band were unhappy with the sound of their new album, titled Peace, and they decided to go to New York so producer Rick Rubin could remix the first single, "Love Removal Machine".
Rubin agreed to work with the band, but only if they rerecorded the song. Rubin eventually talked them into rerecording the entire album. The band's record company, Beggars Banquet, was displeased with this, as two months and £250,000 had already been spent on the record. However, after hearing the initial New York recording, Beggars Banquet agreed to proceed. The first single, "Love Removal Machine", was released in February 1987, and the new version of the album appeared in April that year, now renamed as Electric, reaching No. 4 and eventually outselling Love. The band toured with Kid Chaos (also known as "Haggis" and "The Kid") on bass, with Stewart on rhythm guitar. Two more singles, "Lil Devil" and "Wild Flower", were released during 1987. A few tracks from the original Peace album appeared on the single versions of "Love Removal Machine", and "Lil Devil". The full Peace album would not be released until 2000, when it was included as Disc 3 of the Rare Cult box set.
In the US, the Cult, now consisting of Astbury, Duffy, Stewart, Warner and Kid Chaos, were supported by the then-unknown Guns N' Roses. The band also appeared at Roskilde Festival in Denmark in June 1987. When the world tour wound through Australia, the band wrecked £30,000 worth of equipment, and as a result they could not tour Japan, as no company would rent them new equipment. At the end of the tour the Electric album had been certified Gold in the UK, and sold roughly 3 million copies worldwide, but the band were barely speaking to each other by then. Haggis left the band at the end of the Electric tour to form the Four Horsemen for Rubin's Def American label. Astbury and Duffy fired Warner and their management team Grant/Edwards, and moved to Los Angeles with original bassist Stewart. Warner sued the band several times for his firing, as well as for what he felt were unpaid royalties due to him for his performance on the Electric album, resulting in lengthy court battles. The Cult signed a new management deal and wrote 21 new songs for their next record.
For the next album, Stewart returned to playing bass, and John Webster was brought in to play keyboards. The band used Chris Taylor to play drums during rehearsals and record the demos, with future Kiss drummer Eric Singer performing during the second demo recording sessions. The Cult eventually recruited session-drummer Mickey Curry to fill the drumming role and Aerosmith sound engineer, Bob Rock, to produce. Recorded in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada from October to December 1988, the Sonic Temple record went Top 10 in both the UK and the US, where it was certified Gold and Platinum respectively. The band went on tour in support of the new album and new single "Fire Woman" (UK No. 15) (NZ No. 1), with yet another new drummer, Matt Sorum, and Webster as keyboard player. The next single, "Edie (Ciao Baby)" (UK No. 25) has become a regular song at concerts for many years.
In Europe, the band toured with Aerosmith, and in the US, after releasing another single "Sun King" (UK No. 42), they spent 1989 touring in support of Metallica before heading out on their own headlining tour later that same year. A fourth single, "Sweet Soul Sister" (UK No. 38), was released in February 1990, with the video having been filmed at Wembley Arena, London, on 25 November 1989. "Sweet Soul Sister" was partially written in Paris and was inspired by the bohemian lifestyle of that city. Released as a single in February 1990, the song was another hit in the UK, and reportedly reached number one on the rock charts in Brazil. After playing a show in Atlanta, Georgia, in February 1990, the band's management told Astbury that his father had just died of cancer. As a result, the remainder of the tour was cancelled after a final leg of shows were performed in April. After the tour ended, the band were on the verge of splitting due to Stewart retiring and moving to Canada to be with his wife, and Sorum leaving to join Guns N' Roses.
In 1990, Astbury organized the Gathering of the Tribes festival in Los Angeles and San Francisco with artists such as Soundgarden, Ice-T, Indigo Girls, Queen Latifah, Iggy Pop, the Charlatans, the Cramps and Public Enemy appearing. This two-day festival drew 40,000 people. Also in 1990, a ten CD box set was released in the UK, containing rare songs from the Cult's singles. The CDs in this box set were all issued as picture discs with rice paper covers, housed in a white box called "Singles Collection", or a black box called "E.P. Collection '84 - '90". In 1991, director Oliver Stone offered Astbury the role of Jim Morrison in Stone's film The Doors. He declined the role because he was not happy with the way Morrison was represented in the film, and the role was ultimately played by Val Kilmer.
Ceremony and the lawsuit (1991–1993)
In 1991, Astbury and Duffy were writing again for their next album. During the demo recordings, Todd Hoffman and James Kottak played bass and drums, respectively. During the actual album recording sessions, Curry was recruited again to play drums, with Charley Drayton on bass, and various other performers. Astbury and Duffy's working relationship had disintegrated by that time, with the two men reportedly rarely even being in the studio together during recording. The resulting album Ceremony was released to mixed responses. The album climbed to US No. 34, but sales were not as impressive as the previous three records, only selling around one million copies worldwide. Only two official singles were released from the record: "Wild Hearted Son" (UK No. 34, Canada No. 41) and "Heart of Soul" (UK No. 50), although "White" was released as a single only in Canada, "Sweet Salvation" was released as a single (as "Dulce Salvación") in Argentina in 1992, and the title track "Ceremony" was released in Spain.
The Cult's Ceremonial Stomp tour went through Europe in 1991 and North America in 1992. In 1991 the Cult played a show at the Marquee Club in London, which was recorded and released in February 1993, packaged with some vinyl UK copies of their first greatest hits release. Only a handful of CD copies of it were ever manufactured originally, however it was subsequently reissued on CD in 1999. An incomplete bootleg video of this show is also in circulation.
The band were sued by the parents of the Native American boy pictured on the cover of Ceremony, for alleged exploitation and for the unauthorized use of the child's image. The parents stated that the boy felt he had been cursed by the band's burning of his image, and was "emotionally scarred." This image of the boy is also burned in the video for "Wild Hearted Son". This lawsuit delayed the release of Ceremony in many countries including South Korea and Thailand, which did not see the record's release until late 1992, and it was unreleased in Turkey until the Cult played several shows in Istanbul in June 1993.
A world tour followed with backing from drummer Michael Lee (Page & Plant, Little Angels), bassist Kinley "Barney" Wolfe (Lord Tracy, Black Oak Arkansas), and keyboardist John Sinclair (Ozzy Osbourne, Uriah Heep) returning one last time, and the Gathering of the Tribes moved to the UK. Here artists such as Pearl Jam performed. The warm-up gig to the show, in a small nightclub, was dedicated to the memory of Nigel Preston, who had died a few weeks earlier at the age of 28. Following the release of the single "The Witch" (#9 in Australia) and the performance of a song for the 1992 Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie soundtrack entitled "Zap City", produced by Steve Brown and originally a B-side to "Lil' Devil", two volumes of remixes of "She Sells Sanctuary", called Sanctuary Mixes MCMXCIII, volumes one and two, and in support of Pure Cult: for Rockers, Ravers, Lovers, and Sinners, a greatest hits compilation which debuted at No. 1 on the British charts and later went to number one in Portugal, Astbury and Duffy fired the "backing band" and recruited Craig Adams (the Mission) and Scott Garrett for performances across Europe in 1993, with some shows featuring Mike Dimkich on rhythm guitar. This tour marked the first time the band performed in Turkey, Greece, and the Slovak Republic.
The Cult and first breakup (1994–1998)
With the same line-up still in place, the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. The self-titled album is commonly referred to as the "Black Sheep" album by fans of the group, due to the image of a black sheep on the front cover. Astbury referred to the record as a collection of "very personal and very revealing" songs about his life, with the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, to his directionless years spent in Glasgow in the late 1970s.
The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. Duffy remarked that he thought that the record wouldn't sell well due to the offensive lyrics. The record went to number one in Portugal also, but quickly dropped out of sight. The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" was released with the band going on tour in support of the new album. Only one more single, "Star", was officially released with a live appearance on UK TV show The Word. "Star" began life in 1986 as "Tom Petty" and was recorded at the "Sonic Temple" demo sessions as "Starchild", being dropped by the band during rehearsals. In 1993 the song was resurrected and was finally completed for the record in 1994 as, just simply, "Star".
When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. As with the Ceremony record several years earlier, no other official singles were released, but several other songs were released on a strictly limited basis: "Sacred Life" was released in Spain and the Netherlands, "Be Free" was issued in Canada and France, "Saints Are Down" was issued in Greece, but none of the songs gained much commercial success. During this tour, the Cult made their first ever appearance in Norway.
During the Black Rain tour of South America in spring of 1995, despite the fact that several more new songs had already been recorded, the tour was cancelled after an appearance in Rio de Janeiro in March, and the band split up citing unspecified problems on a recent South American tour. Astbury started up a garage band called Holy Barbarians a few months later. The band made their debut at the 100 Club in London in February 1996 and released their first (and only) record in May 1996, and toured throughout North America and Europe for the rest of 1996. The band started writing material for a second record in 1997, but the band was dissolved and Astbury began writing and recording a solo record. Throughout 1997 and 1998 Astbury recorded his solo record, originally to be titled Natural Born Guerilla, later called High Time Amplifier. Ultimately the record remained unreleased until June 2000 when it was released under the name Spirit\Light\Speed. Astbury played one solo concert in 1999.
In November 1996, a number of CD reissues were released: the band's American record company released High Octane Cult, a slightly updated greatest hits compilation released only in the US and Japan; The Southern Death Cult, a remastered edition of the fifteen-song compilation CD; a ten-song compilation CD by Death Cult called Ghost Dance, consisting of the untitled four-song EP, the single "God's Zoo", and four unreleased songs from a radio broadcast; and a remastered repackaging of the Dreamtime album, containing only the ten original songs from the record in their original playing order and almost completely different but original artwork. Dreamtime Live at the Lyceum was also remastered and issued on video and for the first time on CD, with the one unreleased song from the concert, "Gimmick".
First reunion, Beyond Good and Evil and second hiatus (1999–2005)
In 1999, Astbury and Duffy reformed the Cult with Matt Sorum and ex-Porno for Pyros bassist Martyn LeNoble. Their first official concert was at the Tibetan Freedom Concert in June 1999, after having rehearsed at shows in the Los Angeles area. The band's 1999 Cult Rising reunion tour resulted in a sold out 30 date tour of the US, ending with 8 consecutive sold out nights at the LA House of Blues. In 2000, the band toured South Africa for the first time, and North and South America, and contributed the song "Painted on My Heart" to the soundtrack of the movie Gone In 60 Seconds. The song was featured prominently and the melody was fused into parts of the score. In June, Astbury's long-delayed solo record was finally released as Spirit\Light\Speed, but it failed to gain much success. In November 2000, another authorised greatest hits compilation was released, Pure Cult: The Singles 1984–1995, along with an accompanying DVD, which was later certified gold in Canada. The Cult, as well as Ian Astbury, performed on separate tracks on the Doors tribute album, Stoned Immaculate: The Music of The Doors, covering "Wild Child" and "Touch Me".
In November 2000, Beggars Banquet released 15,000 copies of a six-disc boxset (with a bonus seventh disc of remixes for the first 5000 copies) titled Rare Cult. The box set consists of album out-takes, demos, radio broadcasts, and album B-sides. It is most notable for including the previously unreleased "Peace" album in its entirety. In 2001, the band signed to Atlantic Records and recorded a new album, Beyond Good and Evil, originally being produced by Mick Jones of Foreigner, until Jones bowed out to tour with Foreigner. Astbury and Duffy co-wrote a song with Jones, an odd occurrence, as in the past, neither Astbury or Duffy would co-write their material. Bob Rock was the producer, with Martyn LeNoble and Chris Wyse as recording bassists, as Mike Dimkich played rhythm guitar on tour, and Matt Sorum returning as drummer. Although Sorum has previously toured with the band on the Sonic Temple tour in 1989, this was the first time that he had recorded a studio album with the band.
However Beyond Good and Evil was not the comeback record the band had hoped for. Despite reaching No. 37 in the US, No. 22 in Canada, and No. 25 in Spain, sales quickly dropped, only selling roughly 500,000 copies worldwide. The first single "Rise", reached No. 41 in the US, and No. 2 on the mainstream rock charts, but Atlantic Records quickly pulled the song from radio playlists. Astbury would later describe the experience with Atlantic to be "soul destroying", after Atlantic tried to tamper with the lyrics, the record cover, and choice of singles from the record.
After the first single from the record, the band's working relationship with Atlantic was on paper only, with Atlantic pulling "Rise" from the radio stations playlists, and stopping all promotion of the record. The second single "Breathe" was only released as a radio station promo, and the final single "True Believers" was only on a compilation sampler disc released in January 2002 (after the Cult's tour had already ended). Despite "True Believers" receiving radio airplay in Australia, both singles went largely unnoticed, and both Astbury and Duffy walked away from the project. LeNoble rejoined the band for the initial dates in early 2001, and Billy Morrison filled in on bass for the majority of the 2001 tour.
The European tour of 2001 was canceled, largely due to security concerns after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the band flew back to the US to tour again with Aerosmith. But the eleven-week tour was considered by fans to be a disaster, as the band played only a brief rundown of their greatest hits. In October 2001, a show at the Grand Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles was filmed for release on DVD. After the tour ended in December 2001, the band took most of 2002 off, apart from a few shows in the US to promote the release of the DVD, with Scott Garrett and Craig Adams rejoining the band.
Despite the commercial disappointment of Beyond Good and Evil and the supporting tour, the band was voted "Comeback of the Year" by Metal Edge readers in the magazine's 2001 Readers' Choice Awards.
In late 2002, Ian Astbury declared the Cult to be "on ice" indefinitely, after performing a brief series of dates in October 2002 to promote the release of the Music Without Fear DVD. During this second hiatus, Astbury performed as a member of the Doors (later dubbed the Doors of the 21st Century, later still renamed D21c, and most recently known as Riders on the Storm) with two of the original members of that group. D21c was sued numerous times, both by Jim Morrison's family and by drummer John Densmore. Astbury supposedly started work on recording another solo album that later became the backbone for the Cult's Born into This.
At the same time, Duffy was part of Coloursound with bassist Craig Adams and ex-Alarm frontman Mike Peters, then Dead Men Walking (again with Peters) and later Cardboard Vampyres. Sorum became a member of the hard rock supergroup Velvet Revolver. In 2003, all of the Cult's records were issued on CD, with several bonus tracks being issued on the Russian, Belarusian, and Lithuanian versions. These eastern European releases had many printing mistakes on the jacket sleeves and lyric inserts. In October 2004, all of the Cult's records were again remastered and issued again on CD, this time in Japan in different cardboard foldout sleeves. "She Sells Sanctuary" appeared in the 2002 video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, playing on rock station V-Rock.
Second reunion, Born Into This and Capsule EPs (2006–2010)
Despite Astbury's previous statement from 2004 that a reunion would not happen, The Cult announced in January 2006 that they were reuniting for "some limited gigs" throughout the year. A month later, the band made their first live appearance in three-and-a-half years on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson. Their lineup consisted of Astbury (vocals), Duffy (lead guitar), John Tempesta (drums), Dimkich (rhythm guitar) and Wyse (returning as bassist). Their first stage show was held in March 2006 in San Francisco, California, at The Fillmore. The entire tour was recorded by Instant Live and sold after each show. In May, they did an eight date tour in Canada. Later that summer, they toured central and eastern Europe and played their first concerts in Bulgaria, Poland and Serbia. An eleven-date UK tour followed as well as several more dates in the United States, finishing with a South American tour in December. That year, Duffy began the band Circus Diablo with Billy Morrison, Sorum, Brett Scallions and Ricky Warwick.
During these tours, the band occasionally played an extended set, including several songs the band had not performed in decades: "King Contrary Man" and "Hollow Man", neither of which had been performed since 1987; also, "Libertine" was performed approximately three times, for the first time since 2000, and "Brother Wolf, Sister Moon", which was only performed one time since 1986 (for this particular song, the band played an abridged version which has never been performed before or since)
Astbury announced in February 2007 that he was leaving Riders on the Storm and returning to the Cult. He stated: "I have decided to move on and focus on my own music and legacy." The Cult was featured on Stuffmagazine.com's list of ultimate air guitar players. On 21 March 2007, it was announced that the band would be touring Europe with the Who. The first confirmed tour date was in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, in early June, with at least a dozen shows set to follow. The band played a gig in London's West End at the CC Club on 7 June 2007, along with nearly two dozen shows across continental Europe during summer. The tour also includes the first performance in Romania and Croatia.
On 29 May 2007, the band signed a deal with major metal label Roadrunner Records. Their 8th studio album, titled Born into This was released on 16 October, and was produced by Martin "Youth" Glover, bass player for Killing Joke. Born into This was released as regular single disc and limited edition double disc, the second disk being a bonus 5-track CD holding the following tracks: "Stand Alone", "War Pony Destroyer", "I Assassin (Demo)", "Sound of Destruction (Demo)" and "Savages (Extended Version)". Prior to the album's release, the band played festival and headline dates, and supported the Who in Europe through summer 2007, with a US headline tour to follow.
The band's appearance at Irving Plaza in New York City in early November 2006 was filmed and was released in 2007. The Cult New York City, issued by Fontana North and is the Cult's first high definition DVD release. Meanwhile, Astbury lent vocals on two tracks of the 2007 Unkle album "War Stories", one of them being the first single from the album, "Burn My Shadow".
The band performed a UK and European tour in late-February and early-March 2008. On 24 March, they began their North American tour including a major 13-city tour in Canada. During September 2008, the Cult did a brief series of dates in the northeast United States, and they toured in Brazil as part of the South American tour in October 2008. As of May 2008, according to The Gauntlet, the Cult are currently unsigned and no longer under contract with Roadrunner Records. In October 2008, it was announced that the Cult would headline the inaugural Rock 'n' Roll Marathon in San Antonio, to be run 16 November 2008. The Cult announced plans for a tour showcasing their 1985 Love album across the US and then the UK in October where they will play at the Royal Albert Hall.
Coinciding with the remastered Love album and four-disc Omnibus boxed set, the Cult kicked off the long-awaited Love Live Tour in late summer. Performing their classic Love album in its entirety, each show was played with the Love tracks opening with "Nirvana" to "Black Angel". A quick intermission followed, then other Cult hits were played (varying by venue): "Sun King", "Dirty Little Rock Star", "Electric Ocean", "Illuminated". Then followed the favorites "Fire Woman", "Lil Devil", "Wild Flower", and lastly "Love Removal Machine". In the evening of 10 October 2009 at the Royal Albert Hall in London, the band performed a second encore with original Cult bassist Jamie Stewart and drummer Mark Brzezicki, who played drums with the band during the Love album recording sessions in July and August 1985. The band sold Love Live USB flash drives for each show during the tour.
The Cult entered 2010 continuing their Love Live Tour and announcing more dates in the United States, New Zealand, Australia, and Japan. The band finished recording a four-track "Capsule" with producer Chris Goss. Capsule 1 was said to be the first of three or four to be released sometime in summer 2010. Release formats include CD-DVD dualdisc, 12-inch vinyl, and digital downloads. Capsule 1 was released on 14 September 2010. The band officially announced the release of its first new studio recording since 2007, "Every Man And Woman Is A Star". The new single was released through the iTunes Store on 31 July 2010.
On 1 August 2010, the band played the sold-out music festival Sonisphere, which marked their first UK performance since the tour for their Love album. During the performance they debuted their new single, "Every Man and Woman is a Star", which was released on 1 August 2010. On 14 September 2010 the band embarked on a new U.S. tour and released Capsule 1 in conjunction with media technology company Aderra Inc. and made it available in multiple formats including a CD-DVD DualDisc, USB flash drive, 12 inch vinyl, FLAC download and MP3 download. The collection includes a short film made by singer Ian Astbury and Rick Rogers.
On 26 October 2010 the band and Aderra Inc. announced the release of a new song, "Embers", for 1 November 2010 and Capsule 2 available through their web store on 16 November 2010. Pictures from the Cult's tour stop in Chicago on 28 October 2010 can be seen at a local radio station website.
On 17 September 2010, the band performed live at the Fall Frenzy concert at the Tempe Beach Park in Tempe, Arizona. Other bands that played at this concert were Stone Temple Pilots, Shinedown, and Sevendust.
On 4 December 2010, the band performed a live set for Guitar Center Sessions on DirecTV. The episode included an interview with the band by program host, Nic Harcourt.
Choice of Weapon and Hidden City (2011–2017)
During the Cult's concert at the Hammersmith Apollo in London on 21 January 2011 Ian Astbury declared that the Cult would be recording a new album directly after the tour. They also announced that they would be working with Chris Goss, who performed with Masters of Reality as a supporting act the same evening. On 11 May 2011, it was announced that the Cult were signed to Cooking Vinyl Records, who will release the new album in early 2012. Commented guitarist Billy Duffy: "We are very much looking forward to returning to our U.K. roots in many ways working with Cooking Vinyl." Vocalist Ian Astbury added, "We look forward to a long and fruitful relationship with Cooking Vinyl." By May 2011, the band had been writing and recording new demos at its Witch Mountain studio hideaway in the Hollywood Hills, and began recording their new album at Hollywood Recording Studios. In October 2011, bassist Chris Wyse stated the album was almost finished and expected to be released in April 2012. Chris also described it as a "Zep/Stooges mix of energy."
On 29 November 2011, it was announced that the album would be produced by Bob Rock, who provided the same role on Sonic Temple, The Cult and Beyond Good and Evil. The album, entitled Choice of Weapon, was released on 22 May 2012. The band partnered with Rolling Stone to premiere the first song from the album titled Lucifer on 30 January. On 5 February 2012, the Cult song "She Sells Sanctuary" was used as the soundtrack for a Budweiser commercial in a mashup with Flo Rida aired during Super Bowl XLVI. In May 2012 the Cult appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and played "For The Animals".
On 28 September 2012, it was announced that the band would release Weapon of Choice, a "prequel" album to accompany the band's latest album, Choice of Weapon. The digital-only release, available exclusively on iTunes for two months only beginning 16 October, features the songs that were ultimately included in "Choice Of Weapon" at an earlier stage of development. Explaining the motivations behind the release, singer Ian Astbury said that "These songs were turned over and over, forged in long rehearsals and writing sessions, and emanated from challenges both personal and professional. We put our guts into this; [Producer Chris] Goss was able to create an environment where the songs were born through playing and turning over lyrics, through hard work and intense sessions." Astbury added "These songs have an integrity and rawness of their own. In many ways it's a different album to the one we released and reveals the foundations of 'Choice Of Weapon'. We were able to close the doors and begin to explore spaces we had not been in for a while." The song "Twisted and Bleeding" was made available for free download at the band's website ahead of the full digital release.
On 20 June 2013, the band announced the release of Electric-Peace which comprises the entire Electric album plus the Peace album which was previously released on the now discontinued Rare Cult box set in 2000. It is due for release in the US on 30 July. In 2013 Mike Dimkich left the band and joined Bad Religion to cover for guitarist Greg Hetson. James Stevenson, from the Beauty's On The Streets tour in 1994, replaced Dimkich as the Cult's rhythm guitarist.
In March 2013, Billy Duffy told the Argentinan journalist Fabrizio Pedrotti that the Cult had begun work on a new album for a 2014 release. The band were expected to begin work on the album after they finish their 2013 world tour, where they played the Electric album in its entirety. In August 2014, Billy added that the next album, which was not expected to be released before 2015 at the earliest, "will be more guitar heavy".
On 5 November 2015, it was announced that The Cult would release their new album, entitled Hidden City, on 5 February 2016. The album is said to be the final part of a trilogy that began with Born into This, and marks the fifth time Bob Rock had produced a Cult album. The band also announced that they had hired Australian-born bassist Grant Fitzpatrick (ex-Mink) as the replacement for Chris Wyse. Chris Chaney (Jane's Addiction, Camp Freddy) and producer Bob Rock performed session bass on the album. In support of Hidden City, The Cult opened for Guns N' Roses on the Not in This Lifetime... Tour.
In an October 2016 interview with PopMatters journalist J.C. Maçek III, Cult guitarist Billy Duffy spoke of the band's playlist while on tour, saying "Obviously you want to make an impactful [show]," he continues. "There are some practical, pragmatic decisions made. If you're playing to a crowd who are not very familiar with you, there's no point of going too deep but we do always make sure we play a new song. Like on Guns N' Roses' [tour] we had fifty minutes which is ten songs all in. So, you know we just made sure that in those ten songs we played 'Deeply Ordered Chaos' which we’re proud of and it makes a certain statement. And it just alerts people to the fact that, yes, we have made a record in the last 30 years. You know and that's a good thing. Psychologically, that's the blood transfusion that we need. And we're very mindful, we have a very loyal fan base. We don't pander as you well know."
Upcoming eleventh studio album (2018–present)
In an April 2018 interview with Guitar World, guitarist Billy Duffy was asked if another album from The Cult was in the works. He replied, "Never say never! Ian and I enjoy the process of making new music, and we feel it's vital to keep the band healthy, even if it's pretty much in the law of diminishing returns area now. Who knows if it will be a whole album a series of singles or an EP? I can say new Cult music will be forthcoming, but these days we don't rush it as there's no point. Quality is key. We are past the point of having to release stuff so if we feel it's good enough, then we will release it in some shape or another."
On 2 April 2018, a tour of the United States of America called "Revolution 3 Tour" was announced for the summer. They performed as one of the three headliners, along with Stone Temple Pilots and Bush.
In April 2019, The Cult announced that they would celebrate the 30th anniversary of the release of their fourth album Sonic Temple with a world tour, which began on 2 May in Houston, Texas and was expected to wrap up in 2020.
In a June 2019 interview with LA Weekly, vocalist Ian Astbury stated that The Cult were "long overdue" to release new music. He was quoted as saying: "We do have some stuff we've been working on, but it's yet to see the light of day." Six months later, Astbury told Atlantic City Weekly that the band was going to start working on new music in 2020: "We've got a few pieces lying around in various stages of completion. The intention is to get together in the New Year and take a look at what we've got and decide how we are going to go about moving forward. It's an essential part of any creative lifeblood." On May 6, 2020, The Cult announced on their Twitter page that they had signed to Black Hill Records.
On August 15, 2020, Duffy announced on his Twitter that the band were recording their new album with producer Tom Dalgety at Rockfield Studios, where The Cult had recorded their debut album Dreamtime 36 years earlier.
In support of their new album, The Cult will embark on a co-headlining six-date UK tour with Alice Cooper in May and June 2022.
Influences
Duffy and Astbury cited among their influences a lot of different bands "from the Doors to Led Zeppelin. We literally went from the front of our record collections to the back. And then along the way we were drawn in by the likes of Public Image Ltd, Joy Division and Siouxsie and the Banshees. You might not hear it in the music but it's there." They also cited Bauhaus among many other post-punk influences. Duffy also praised Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers for a major performance he attended in 1977 and Siouxsie and the Banshees whom "always had great guitar players with killer riffs." Duffy also hailed AC/DC for "the power of a good three chord riff", Pete Townshend of the Who "in terms of commitment to stage performing" and Brian May of Queen for using "‘echoplex’ tape delays to orchestrate his own solo".
Musical style
According to music critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the band fuse a "hardcore punk revivalist" sound with the "pseudo-mysticism ... of the Doors and Uriah Heep and the guitar-orchestrations of Led Zeppelin and The Cure ... while adding touches of post-punk goth rock". In 1985 Astbury said, "Our music is just melodies and guitars. We're like Big Country and U2, only better!".
Members
Current members
Ian Astbury – lead vocals, occasional percussion/guitar
Billy Duffy – lead and rhythm guitars, backing vocals
John Tempesta – drums, percussion
Grant Fitzpatrick – bass, backing vocals
Damon Fox – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals
Discography
Dreamtime (1984)
Love (1985)
Electric (1987)
Sonic Temple (1989)
Ceremony (1991)
The Cult (1994)
Beyond Good and Evil (2001)
Born into This (2007)
Choice of Weapon (2012)
Hidden City (2016)
References
External links
Official website
Billy Duffy official website
Musical groups established in 1983
Situation Two artists
Beggars Banquet Records artists
Sire Records artists
Musical groups from Bradford
English post-punk music groups
English gothic rock groups
English hard rock musical groups
English heavy metal musical groups
English glam metal musical groups | false | [
"\"How Do I Deal\" is a song by American actress Jennifer Love Hewitt from the soundtrack to the film I Still Know What You Did Last Summer. The song was released as a single on November 17, 1998, with an accompanying music video. The single became Hewitt's one and only appearance on the US Billboard Hot 100 singles chart, peaking at number 59 in a seven-week run. Although not a big success in America, the single reached number five in New Zealand and peaked at number eight in Australia, where it is certified gold.\n\nTrack listings\nUS CD, 7-inch, and cassette single\n \"How Do I Deal\" (single version) – 3:23\n \"Try to Say Goodbye\" (performed by Jory Eve) – 3:36\n\nEuropean CD single\n \"How Do I Deal\" – 3:24\n \"Sugar Is Sweeter\" (performed by CJ Bolland) – 5:34\n\nAustralian CD single\n \"How Do I Deal\" – 3:23\n \"Sugar Is Sweeter\" (Danny Saber Remix featuring Justin Warfield, performed by CJ Bolland) – 4:57\n \"Try to Say Goodbye\" (performed by Jory Eve) – 3:35\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nCertifications\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\n143 Records singles\n1998 songs\n1999 singles\nJennifer Love Hewitt songs\nI Know What You Did Last Summer (franchise)\nMusic videos directed by Joseph Kahn\nSong recordings produced by Bruce Fairbairn\nSong recordings produced by David Foster\nSongs written for films\nWarner Records singles",
"\"How Do You Do It?\" was the debut single by Liverpudlian band Gerry and the Pacemakers. It was written by Mitch Murray. The song reached number one in the UK Singles Chart on 11 April 1963, where it stayed for three weeks.\n\nHistory\nThe song was written by Mitch Murray, who offered it to Adam Faith and Brian Poole but was turned down. George Martin of EMI, feeling the song had enormous hit potential, decided to pick it up for the new group he was producing, the Beatles, as the A-side of their first single. The Beatles recorded the song on 4 September 1962 with Ringo Starr on drums. The group was initially opposed to recording it, feeling that it did not fit their sound, but worked out changes from Murray's demo-disc version. These included a new introduction, vocal harmony, an instrumental interlude, small lyric changes and removal of the half-step modulation for the last verse. Although Murray disliked their changes, the decision not to release the Beatles' version was primarily a business one. In fact, George Martin came very close to issuing \"How Do You Do It?\" as the Beatles' first single before settling instead on \"Love Me Do\", recorded during the same sessions. Martin commented later: \"I looked very hard at 'How Do You Do It?', but in the end I went with 'Love Me Do', it was quite a good record.\" McCartney would remark: \"We knew that the peer pressure back in Liverpool would not allow us to do 'How Do You Do It'.\"\n\nThe Beatles' version of \"How Do You Do It?\" was officially unissued for over 30 years, finally seeing release in November 1995 on the retrospective Anthology 1.\n\nWhile the Beatles' recording remained in the vaults, Martin still had faith in the song's appeal. Consequently, he had another new client, Gerry and the Pacemakers, record \"How Do You Do It?\" as their debut single in early 1963. This version of \"How Do You Do It?\", also produced by Martin, became a number-one hit in the UK until it was replaced by \"From Me to You\" (the Beatles' third single). It was the title song of a 7-inch EP that also featured \"Away From You\", \"I Like It\" and \"It's Happened to Me\" (Columbia SEG8257, released July 1963).\n\nChart performance\nGerry and the Pacemakers' version of \"How Do You Do It?\" was initially issued in the US and Canada in the spring of 1963, but made no impact on the charts. After the group had issued several chart singles in North America, the track was reissued in the summer of 1964. \"How Do You Do It?\" entered the US charts on 5 July 1964, eventually reaching number nine; it did even better in Canada, peaking at number six. Billboard described the song as a \"top-rated teen ballad\" with a \"great beat for dancing.\" Cash Box described it as a \"bright jumper...that's sure to get chart action right off the bat\" and also as \"a charming, teen-angled stomp-atwist’er...that the outfit knocks out in very commercial solo vocal and combo instrumental manner.\"\n\nIn their native UK, the single reached number one in the charts, staying there for three weeks in total.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nGerry Marsden fan site\nClassic Bands history page\n\n1963 songs\n1963 debut singles\nSongs written by Mitch Murray\nGerry and the Pacemakers songs\nThe Beatles songs\nDick and Dee Dee songs\nSong recordings produced by George Martin\nUK Singles Chart number-one singles\nColumbia Graphophone Company singles"
] |
[
"The Cult",
"The Cult (1994-1995)",
"What was the Cult?",
"the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock.",
"How did i do in the charts?",
"The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK."
] | C_669b70745be5429da8c672a9282a7461_0 | Was there any hit songs released on that album? | 3 | Were there any hit songs released on The Cult album that reached no. 69 in the US? | The Cult | With the same line-up still in place, the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. The self-titled 'Cult' album is commonly referred to as the 'Black Sheep' album by fans of the group. Astbury referred to the record as "very personal and very revealing" songs about his life, with the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, to his directionless years spent in Glasgow in the late 1970s. The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. Duffy remarked that he thought that the record wouldn't sell well due to the offensive lyrics. The record went to number one in Portugal also, but quickly dropped out of sight. The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" was released with the band going on tour in support of the new album. Only one more single, "Star", was officially released with a live appearance on UK TV show The Word. "Star" began life in 1986 as "Tom Petty" and was recorded at the "Sonic Temple" demo sessions as "Starchild", being dropped by the band during rehearsals. In 1993 the song was resurrected and was finally completed for the record in 1994 as, just simply, "Star". When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. As with the Ceremony record several years earlier, no other official singles were released, but several other songs were released on a strictly limited basis: "Sacred Life" was released in Spain and the Netherlands, "Be Free" was issued in Canada and France, "Saints Are Down" was issued in Greece, but none of the songs gained much commercial success. During this tour, the Cult made their first ever appearance in Norway. CANNOTANSWER | The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" | The Cult are an English rock band formed in 1983 in Bradford, West Yorkshire. Before settling on their current name in January 1984, the band performed under the name Death Cult, which was an evolution of the name of lead singer Ian Astbury's previous band Southern Death Cult. They gained a dedicated following in the United Kingdom in the mid-1980s as a post-punk/gothic rock band, with singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary", before breaking into the mainstream in the United States in the late 1980s establishing themselves as a hard rock band with singles such as "Love Removal Machine". Since its initial formation in 1983, the band have had various line-ups; the longest-serving members are Astbury and guitarist Billy Duffy, who are also the band's two songwriters.
The Cult's debut studio album Dreamtime was released in 1984 to moderate success, with its lead single "Spiritwalker" reaching No. 1 on the UK Indie Chart. Their second studio album, Love (1985), was even more successful, charting at No. 4 in the UK and including singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary" and "Rain". The band's third album, Electric (1987), launched them new heights of success, also peaking at No. 4 in the UK and charting highly in other territories, and spawned the hit singles "Love Removal Machine", "Lil' Devil" and "Wild Flower". On that album, The Cult supplemented their post-punk sound with hard rock; the polish on this new sound was facilitated by producer Rick Rubin. After moving to Los Angeles, California, where the band has been based for the remainder of their career, The Cult continued the musical experimentation of Electric with its follow-up album Sonic Temple (1989), which marked their first collaboration with Bob Rock, who would produce several of the band's subsequent albums. Sonic Temple was their most successful album to that point, entering the Top 10 on the UK and US charts, and included one of the band's most popular songs "Fire Woman".
By the time of their fifth album Ceremony (1991), tensions and creative differences began to surface among the band members. This resulted in the recording sessions for Ceremony being held without a stable lineup, leaving Astbury and Duffy as the only two official members left, and featuring support from session musicians on bass and drums. The ongoing tension had carried over within the next four years, during which they released one more studio album, The Cult (1994), and called it quits in 1995. The Cult reformed in 1999 and released their seventh album Beyond Good and Evil two years later. The commercial failure of the album and resurfaced tensions led to the band going back on hiatus in 2002. They resumed activity in 2006, and have since released three more studio albums: Born into This (2007), Choice of Weapon (2012), and Hidden City (2016).
History
Early history (1981–1984)
The band's origins can be traced to 1981, in Bradford, Yorkshire, where vocalist and songwriter Ian Astbury formed a band called Southern Death Cult. The name was chosen with a double meaning, and was derived from the 14th-century Native American religion, the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex or Southern Death Cult as it was sometimes known, from the Mississippi delta area, but it was also a stab at what the band viewed was the centralisation of power in Southern England (including that of the music industry); there has long been a perceived notion of a North–South divide based on social, historic and economic reasons. Astbury was joined by Buzz Burrows (guitar), Barry Jepson (bass) and Aki Nawaz Qureshi (drums); they performed their first show at the Queen's Hall in their hometown of Bradford on 29 October 1981. The band were at the forefront of an emerging style of music, in the form of post-punk and gothic rock, they achieved critical acclaim from the press and music fans.
The band signed to independent record label Situation Two, an offshoot of Beggars Banquet Records, and released a three-track, triple A-side single, Moya, during this period. They toured through England headlining some shows and touring with Bauhaus and Theatre of Hate. The band played their final performance in Manchester during February 1983, meaning after only sixteen months the band was over. A compilation named The Southern Death Cult was released, this being a collection of the single, radio sessions with John Peel for Radio One and live performances - one of which an audience member recorded with a tape recorder.
In April 1983, Astbury teamed up with guitarist Billy Duffy and formed the band "Death Cult". Duffy had been in the Nosebleeds (along with Morrissey), Lonesome No More and then Theatre of Hate. In addition to Astbury and Duffy, the band also included Jamie Stewart (bass) and Raymond Taylor Smith (later known as Ray Mondo) (drums), both from the Harrow, London based post-punk band, Ritual. Death Cult made their live debut in Oslo, Norway on 25 July 1983 and also released the Death Cult EP in the same month, then toured through mainland Europe and Scotland. In September 1983, Mondo was deported to his home country of Sierra Leone and replaced by Nigel Preston, formerly of Theatre of Hate. The single "Gods Zoo" was released in October 1983. Another European tour, with UK dates, followed that autumn. To tone down their name's gothic connotations and gain broader appeal, the band changed its name to "the Cult" in January 1984 before appearing on the (UK) Channel 4 television show, The Tube.
The Cult's first studio record, Dreamtime, was recorded at Rockfield Studios, in Monmouth, Wales in 1984. The record was to be produced by Joe Julian, but after recording the drum tracks, the band decided to replace him with John Brand. Brand produced the record, but guitarist Duffy has said the drum tracks were produced by Julian, as Preston had become unreliable.
The band recorded the songs which later became known as "Butterflies", "(The) Gimmick", "A Flower in the Desert", "Horse Nation", "Spiritwalker", "Bad Medicine (Waltz)", "Dreamtime", "With Love" (later known as "Ship of Fools", and also "Sea and Sky"), "Bone Bag", "Too Young", "83rd Dream", and one untitled outtake. It is unknown what the outtake was, or whether it was developed into a song at a later date. Songs like "Horse Nation" showed Astbury's intense interest in Native American issues, with the lyrics to "Horse Nation", "See them prancing, they come neighing, to a horse nation", taken almost verbatim from the book Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, while "Spiritwalker" dealt with shamanism, and the record's title and title track are overtly influenced by Australian Aboriginal beliefs.
On 4 April 1984, the Cult released the single "Spiritwalker", which reached No. 1 on the independent charts in the UK, and acted as a teaser for their forthcoming album Dreamtime. This was followed that summer by a second single, "Go West (Crazy Spinning Circles)", before the release of Dreamtime in September; the album reached No. 21 in the UK, and sold over 100,000 copies in the UK alone. On 12 July 1984, the band recorded five songs at the BBC Maida Vale 5 studio for a Richard Skinner session. Before and after the album's release, the Cult toured throughout Europe and England before recording another single, "Ressurection Joe" (UK No. 74), released that December. Following a Christmas support slot with Big Country, the Cult toured Europe with support from the Mission (then called the Sisterhood). Dreamtime was released initially only in the UK, but after its success, and as the Cult's popularity grew worldwide, it was issued in approximately 30 countries.
Mainstream success (1985–1990)
In May 1985, the Cult released their fourth single, "She Sells Sanctuary", which peaked at No. 15 in the UK and spent 23 weeks in the Top 100. The song was recently voted No. 18 in VH1's Indie 100. In June 1985, following his increasingly erratic behaviour, Preston was fired from the band. Big Country's drummer Mark Brzezicki was picked to replace Preston, and was also included in the video for "She Sells Sanctuary". The Cult then finished recording their second album, Love in July and August 1985. The band's music and image shifted from their punk-oriented roots to 1960s psychedelia influences. Love was a chart success, peaking at No. 4 in the UK and selling 100,000 copies there toward a total of 500,000 copies throughout Europe, as well as 100,000 in Australia and 500,000 copies in the United States. Love reached number 20 on the charts in The Netherlands, where it remained for 32 weeks. To date, the record has sold over two and a half million copies worldwide.
From late September 1985 to June 1986, the band went on a worldwide tour with new drummer Les Warner (who had played with Julian Lennon and Johnny Thunders). Two more singles from the Love album followed; "Rain" (charting in the UK at No. 17) and "Revolution" (charting in the UK at No. 30). Neither charted in the US. Another single, "Nirvana", was issued only in Poland. The album version of "Rain", as well as the remix "(Here Comes the) Rain", were used in the Italian horror film Dèmoni 2. Once back in England, the band booked themselves into the Manor Studios in Oxfordshire, with producer Steve Brown (who had produced Love), and recorded over a dozen new songs. The band were unhappy with the sound of their new album, titled Peace, and they decided to go to New York so producer Rick Rubin could remix the first single, "Love Removal Machine".
Rubin agreed to work with the band, but only if they rerecorded the song. Rubin eventually talked them into rerecording the entire album. The band's record company, Beggars Banquet, was displeased with this, as two months and £250,000 had already been spent on the record. However, after hearing the initial New York recording, Beggars Banquet agreed to proceed. The first single, "Love Removal Machine", was released in February 1987, and the new version of the album appeared in April that year, now renamed as Electric, reaching No. 4 and eventually outselling Love. The band toured with Kid Chaos (also known as "Haggis" and "The Kid") on bass, with Stewart on rhythm guitar. Two more singles, "Lil Devil" and "Wild Flower", were released during 1987. A few tracks from the original Peace album appeared on the single versions of "Love Removal Machine", and "Lil Devil". The full Peace album would not be released until 2000, when it was included as Disc 3 of the Rare Cult box set.
In the US, the Cult, now consisting of Astbury, Duffy, Stewart, Warner and Kid Chaos, were supported by the then-unknown Guns N' Roses. The band also appeared at Roskilde Festival in Denmark in June 1987. When the world tour wound through Australia, the band wrecked £30,000 worth of equipment, and as a result they could not tour Japan, as no company would rent them new equipment. At the end of the tour the Electric album had been certified Gold in the UK, and sold roughly 3 million copies worldwide, but the band were barely speaking to each other by then. Haggis left the band at the end of the Electric tour to form the Four Horsemen for Rubin's Def American label. Astbury and Duffy fired Warner and their management team Grant/Edwards, and moved to Los Angeles with original bassist Stewart. Warner sued the band several times for his firing, as well as for what he felt were unpaid royalties due to him for his performance on the Electric album, resulting in lengthy court battles. The Cult signed a new management deal and wrote 21 new songs for their next record.
For the next album, Stewart returned to playing bass, and John Webster was brought in to play keyboards. The band used Chris Taylor to play drums during rehearsals and record the demos, with future Kiss drummer Eric Singer performing during the second demo recording sessions. The Cult eventually recruited session-drummer Mickey Curry to fill the drumming role and Aerosmith sound engineer, Bob Rock, to produce. Recorded in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada from October to December 1988, the Sonic Temple record went Top 10 in both the UK and the US, where it was certified Gold and Platinum respectively. The band went on tour in support of the new album and new single "Fire Woman" (UK No. 15) (NZ No. 1), with yet another new drummer, Matt Sorum, and Webster as keyboard player. The next single, "Edie (Ciao Baby)" (UK No. 25) has become a regular song at concerts for many years.
In Europe, the band toured with Aerosmith, and in the US, after releasing another single "Sun King" (UK No. 42), they spent 1989 touring in support of Metallica before heading out on their own headlining tour later that same year. A fourth single, "Sweet Soul Sister" (UK No. 38), was released in February 1990, with the video having been filmed at Wembley Arena, London, on 25 November 1989. "Sweet Soul Sister" was partially written in Paris and was inspired by the bohemian lifestyle of that city. Released as a single in February 1990, the song was another hit in the UK, and reportedly reached number one on the rock charts in Brazil. After playing a show in Atlanta, Georgia, in February 1990, the band's management told Astbury that his father had just died of cancer. As a result, the remainder of the tour was cancelled after a final leg of shows were performed in April. After the tour ended, the band were on the verge of splitting due to Stewart retiring and moving to Canada to be with his wife, and Sorum leaving to join Guns N' Roses.
In 1990, Astbury organized the Gathering of the Tribes festival in Los Angeles and San Francisco with artists such as Soundgarden, Ice-T, Indigo Girls, Queen Latifah, Iggy Pop, the Charlatans, the Cramps and Public Enemy appearing. This two-day festival drew 40,000 people. Also in 1990, a ten CD box set was released in the UK, containing rare songs from the Cult's singles. The CDs in this box set were all issued as picture discs with rice paper covers, housed in a white box called "Singles Collection", or a black box called "E.P. Collection '84 - '90". In 1991, director Oliver Stone offered Astbury the role of Jim Morrison in Stone's film The Doors. He declined the role because he was not happy with the way Morrison was represented in the film, and the role was ultimately played by Val Kilmer.
Ceremony and the lawsuit (1991–1993)
In 1991, Astbury and Duffy were writing again for their next album. During the demo recordings, Todd Hoffman and James Kottak played bass and drums, respectively. During the actual album recording sessions, Curry was recruited again to play drums, with Charley Drayton on bass, and various other performers. Astbury and Duffy's working relationship had disintegrated by that time, with the two men reportedly rarely even being in the studio together during recording. The resulting album Ceremony was released to mixed responses. The album climbed to US No. 34, but sales were not as impressive as the previous three records, only selling around one million copies worldwide. Only two official singles were released from the record: "Wild Hearted Son" (UK No. 34, Canada No. 41) and "Heart of Soul" (UK No. 50), although "White" was released as a single only in Canada, "Sweet Salvation" was released as a single (as "Dulce Salvación") in Argentina in 1992, and the title track "Ceremony" was released in Spain.
The Cult's Ceremonial Stomp tour went through Europe in 1991 and North America in 1992. In 1991 the Cult played a show at the Marquee Club in London, which was recorded and released in February 1993, packaged with some vinyl UK copies of their first greatest hits release. Only a handful of CD copies of it were ever manufactured originally, however it was subsequently reissued on CD in 1999. An incomplete bootleg video of this show is also in circulation.
The band were sued by the parents of the Native American boy pictured on the cover of Ceremony, for alleged exploitation and for the unauthorized use of the child's image. The parents stated that the boy felt he had been cursed by the band's burning of his image, and was "emotionally scarred." This image of the boy is also burned in the video for "Wild Hearted Son". This lawsuit delayed the release of Ceremony in many countries including South Korea and Thailand, which did not see the record's release until late 1992, and it was unreleased in Turkey until the Cult played several shows in Istanbul in June 1993.
A world tour followed with backing from drummer Michael Lee (Page & Plant, Little Angels), bassist Kinley "Barney" Wolfe (Lord Tracy, Black Oak Arkansas), and keyboardist John Sinclair (Ozzy Osbourne, Uriah Heep) returning one last time, and the Gathering of the Tribes moved to the UK. Here artists such as Pearl Jam performed. The warm-up gig to the show, in a small nightclub, was dedicated to the memory of Nigel Preston, who had died a few weeks earlier at the age of 28. Following the release of the single "The Witch" (#9 in Australia) and the performance of a song for the 1992 Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie soundtrack entitled "Zap City", produced by Steve Brown and originally a B-side to "Lil' Devil", two volumes of remixes of "She Sells Sanctuary", called Sanctuary Mixes MCMXCIII, volumes one and two, and in support of Pure Cult: for Rockers, Ravers, Lovers, and Sinners, a greatest hits compilation which debuted at No. 1 on the British charts and later went to number one in Portugal, Astbury and Duffy fired the "backing band" and recruited Craig Adams (the Mission) and Scott Garrett for performances across Europe in 1993, with some shows featuring Mike Dimkich on rhythm guitar. This tour marked the first time the band performed in Turkey, Greece, and the Slovak Republic.
The Cult and first breakup (1994–1998)
With the same line-up still in place, the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. The self-titled album is commonly referred to as the "Black Sheep" album by fans of the group, due to the image of a black sheep on the front cover. Astbury referred to the record as a collection of "very personal and very revealing" songs about his life, with the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, to his directionless years spent in Glasgow in the late 1970s.
The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. Duffy remarked that he thought that the record wouldn't sell well due to the offensive lyrics. The record went to number one in Portugal also, but quickly dropped out of sight. The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" was released with the band going on tour in support of the new album. Only one more single, "Star", was officially released with a live appearance on UK TV show The Word. "Star" began life in 1986 as "Tom Petty" and was recorded at the "Sonic Temple" demo sessions as "Starchild", being dropped by the band during rehearsals. In 1993 the song was resurrected and was finally completed for the record in 1994 as, just simply, "Star".
When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. As with the Ceremony record several years earlier, no other official singles were released, but several other songs were released on a strictly limited basis: "Sacred Life" was released in Spain and the Netherlands, "Be Free" was issued in Canada and France, "Saints Are Down" was issued in Greece, but none of the songs gained much commercial success. During this tour, the Cult made their first ever appearance in Norway.
During the Black Rain tour of South America in spring of 1995, despite the fact that several more new songs had already been recorded, the tour was cancelled after an appearance in Rio de Janeiro in March, and the band split up citing unspecified problems on a recent South American tour. Astbury started up a garage band called Holy Barbarians a few months later. The band made their debut at the 100 Club in London in February 1996 and released their first (and only) record in May 1996, and toured throughout North America and Europe for the rest of 1996. The band started writing material for a second record in 1997, but the band was dissolved and Astbury began writing and recording a solo record. Throughout 1997 and 1998 Astbury recorded his solo record, originally to be titled Natural Born Guerilla, later called High Time Amplifier. Ultimately the record remained unreleased until June 2000 when it was released under the name Spirit\Light\Speed. Astbury played one solo concert in 1999.
In November 1996, a number of CD reissues were released: the band's American record company released High Octane Cult, a slightly updated greatest hits compilation released only in the US and Japan; The Southern Death Cult, a remastered edition of the fifteen-song compilation CD; a ten-song compilation CD by Death Cult called Ghost Dance, consisting of the untitled four-song EP, the single "God's Zoo", and four unreleased songs from a radio broadcast; and a remastered repackaging of the Dreamtime album, containing only the ten original songs from the record in their original playing order and almost completely different but original artwork. Dreamtime Live at the Lyceum was also remastered and issued on video and for the first time on CD, with the one unreleased song from the concert, "Gimmick".
First reunion, Beyond Good and Evil and second hiatus (1999–2005)
In 1999, Astbury and Duffy reformed the Cult with Matt Sorum and ex-Porno for Pyros bassist Martyn LeNoble. Their first official concert was at the Tibetan Freedom Concert in June 1999, after having rehearsed at shows in the Los Angeles area. The band's 1999 Cult Rising reunion tour resulted in a sold out 30 date tour of the US, ending with 8 consecutive sold out nights at the LA House of Blues. In 2000, the band toured South Africa for the first time, and North and South America, and contributed the song "Painted on My Heart" to the soundtrack of the movie Gone In 60 Seconds. The song was featured prominently and the melody was fused into parts of the score. In June, Astbury's long-delayed solo record was finally released as Spirit\Light\Speed, but it failed to gain much success. In November 2000, another authorised greatest hits compilation was released, Pure Cult: The Singles 1984–1995, along with an accompanying DVD, which was later certified gold in Canada. The Cult, as well as Ian Astbury, performed on separate tracks on the Doors tribute album, Stoned Immaculate: The Music of The Doors, covering "Wild Child" and "Touch Me".
In November 2000, Beggars Banquet released 15,000 copies of a six-disc boxset (with a bonus seventh disc of remixes for the first 5000 copies) titled Rare Cult. The box set consists of album out-takes, demos, radio broadcasts, and album B-sides. It is most notable for including the previously unreleased "Peace" album in its entirety. In 2001, the band signed to Atlantic Records and recorded a new album, Beyond Good and Evil, originally being produced by Mick Jones of Foreigner, until Jones bowed out to tour with Foreigner. Astbury and Duffy co-wrote a song with Jones, an odd occurrence, as in the past, neither Astbury or Duffy would co-write their material. Bob Rock was the producer, with Martyn LeNoble and Chris Wyse as recording bassists, as Mike Dimkich played rhythm guitar on tour, and Matt Sorum returning as drummer. Although Sorum has previously toured with the band on the Sonic Temple tour in 1989, this was the first time that he had recorded a studio album with the band.
However Beyond Good and Evil was not the comeback record the band had hoped for. Despite reaching No. 37 in the US, No. 22 in Canada, and No. 25 in Spain, sales quickly dropped, only selling roughly 500,000 copies worldwide. The first single "Rise", reached No. 41 in the US, and No. 2 on the mainstream rock charts, but Atlantic Records quickly pulled the song from radio playlists. Astbury would later describe the experience with Atlantic to be "soul destroying", after Atlantic tried to tamper with the lyrics, the record cover, and choice of singles from the record.
After the first single from the record, the band's working relationship with Atlantic was on paper only, with Atlantic pulling "Rise" from the radio stations playlists, and stopping all promotion of the record. The second single "Breathe" was only released as a radio station promo, and the final single "True Believers" was only on a compilation sampler disc released in January 2002 (after the Cult's tour had already ended). Despite "True Believers" receiving radio airplay in Australia, both singles went largely unnoticed, and both Astbury and Duffy walked away from the project. LeNoble rejoined the band for the initial dates in early 2001, and Billy Morrison filled in on bass for the majority of the 2001 tour.
The European tour of 2001 was canceled, largely due to security concerns after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the band flew back to the US to tour again with Aerosmith. But the eleven-week tour was considered by fans to be a disaster, as the band played only a brief rundown of their greatest hits. In October 2001, a show at the Grand Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles was filmed for release on DVD. After the tour ended in December 2001, the band took most of 2002 off, apart from a few shows in the US to promote the release of the DVD, with Scott Garrett and Craig Adams rejoining the band.
Despite the commercial disappointment of Beyond Good and Evil and the supporting tour, the band was voted "Comeback of the Year" by Metal Edge readers in the magazine's 2001 Readers' Choice Awards.
In late 2002, Ian Astbury declared the Cult to be "on ice" indefinitely, after performing a brief series of dates in October 2002 to promote the release of the Music Without Fear DVD. During this second hiatus, Astbury performed as a member of the Doors (later dubbed the Doors of the 21st Century, later still renamed D21c, and most recently known as Riders on the Storm) with two of the original members of that group. D21c was sued numerous times, both by Jim Morrison's family and by drummer John Densmore. Astbury supposedly started work on recording another solo album that later became the backbone for the Cult's Born into This.
At the same time, Duffy was part of Coloursound with bassist Craig Adams and ex-Alarm frontman Mike Peters, then Dead Men Walking (again with Peters) and later Cardboard Vampyres. Sorum became a member of the hard rock supergroup Velvet Revolver. In 2003, all of the Cult's records were issued on CD, with several bonus tracks being issued on the Russian, Belarusian, and Lithuanian versions. These eastern European releases had many printing mistakes on the jacket sleeves and lyric inserts. In October 2004, all of the Cult's records were again remastered and issued again on CD, this time in Japan in different cardboard foldout sleeves. "She Sells Sanctuary" appeared in the 2002 video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, playing on rock station V-Rock.
Second reunion, Born Into This and Capsule EPs (2006–2010)
Despite Astbury's previous statement from 2004 that a reunion would not happen, The Cult announced in January 2006 that they were reuniting for "some limited gigs" throughout the year. A month later, the band made their first live appearance in three-and-a-half years on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson. Their lineup consisted of Astbury (vocals), Duffy (lead guitar), John Tempesta (drums), Dimkich (rhythm guitar) and Wyse (returning as bassist). Their first stage show was held in March 2006 in San Francisco, California, at The Fillmore. The entire tour was recorded by Instant Live and sold after each show. In May, they did an eight date tour in Canada. Later that summer, they toured central and eastern Europe and played their first concerts in Bulgaria, Poland and Serbia. An eleven-date UK tour followed as well as several more dates in the United States, finishing with a South American tour in December. That year, Duffy began the band Circus Diablo with Billy Morrison, Sorum, Brett Scallions and Ricky Warwick.
During these tours, the band occasionally played an extended set, including several songs the band had not performed in decades: "King Contrary Man" and "Hollow Man", neither of which had been performed since 1987; also, "Libertine" was performed approximately three times, for the first time since 2000, and "Brother Wolf, Sister Moon", which was only performed one time since 1986 (for this particular song, the band played an abridged version which has never been performed before or since)
Astbury announced in February 2007 that he was leaving Riders on the Storm and returning to the Cult. He stated: "I have decided to move on and focus on my own music and legacy." The Cult was featured on Stuffmagazine.com's list of ultimate air guitar players. On 21 March 2007, it was announced that the band would be touring Europe with the Who. The first confirmed tour date was in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, in early June, with at least a dozen shows set to follow. The band played a gig in London's West End at the CC Club on 7 June 2007, along with nearly two dozen shows across continental Europe during summer. The tour also includes the first performance in Romania and Croatia.
On 29 May 2007, the band signed a deal with major metal label Roadrunner Records. Their 8th studio album, titled Born into This was released on 16 October, and was produced by Martin "Youth" Glover, bass player for Killing Joke. Born into This was released as regular single disc and limited edition double disc, the second disk being a bonus 5-track CD holding the following tracks: "Stand Alone", "War Pony Destroyer", "I Assassin (Demo)", "Sound of Destruction (Demo)" and "Savages (Extended Version)". Prior to the album's release, the band played festival and headline dates, and supported the Who in Europe through summer 2007, with a US headline tour to follow.
The band's appearance at Irving Plaza in New York City in early November 2006 was filmed and was released in 2007. The Cult New York City, issued by Fontana North and is the Cult's first high definition DVD release. Meanwhile, Astbury lent vocals on two tracks of the 2007 Unkle album "War Stories", one of them being the first single from the album, "Burn My Shadow".
The band performed a UK and European tour in late-February and early-March 2008. On 24 March, they began their North American tour including a major 13-city tour in Canada. During September 2008, the Cult did a brief series of dates in the northeast United States, and they toured in Brazil as part of the South American tour in October 2008. As of May 2008, according to The Gauntlet, the Cult are currently unsigned and no longer under contract with Roadrunner Records. In October 2008, it was announced that the Cult would headline the inaugural Rock 'n' Roll Marathon in San Antonio, to be run 16 November 2008. The Cult announced plans for a tour showcasing their 1985 Love album across the US and then the UK in October where they will play at the Royal Albert Hall.
Coinciding with the remastered Love album and four-disc Omnibus boxed set, the Cult kicked off the long-awaited Love Live Tour in late summer. Performing their classic Love album in its entirety, each show was played with the Love tracks opening with "Nirvana" to "Black Angel". A quick intermission followed, then other Cult hits were played (varying by venue): "Sun King", "Dirty Little Rock Star", "Electric Ocean", "Illuminated". Then followed the favorites "Fire Woman", "Lil Devil", "Wild Flower", and lastly "Love Removal Machine". In the evening of 10 October 2009 at the Royal Albert Hall in London, the band performed a second encore with original Cult bassist Jamie Stewart and drummer Mark Brzezicki, who played drums with the band during the Love album recording sessions in July and August 1985. The band sold Love Live USB flash drives for each show during the tour.
The Cult entered 2010 continuing their Love Live Tour and announcing more dates in the United States, New Zealand, Australia, and Japan. The band finished recording a four-track "Capsule" with producer Chris Goss. Capsule 1 was said to be the first of three or four to be released sometime in summer 2010. Release formats include CD-DVD dualdisc, 12-inch vinyl, and digital downloads. Capsule 1 was released on 14 September 2010. The band officially announced the release of its first new studio recording since 2007, "Every Man And Woman Is A Star". The new single was released through the iTunes Store on 31 July 2010.
On 1 August 2010, the band played the sold-out music festival Sonisphere, which marked their first UK performance since the tour for their Love album. During the performance they debuted their new single, "Every Man and Woman is a Star", which was released on 1 August 2010. On 14 September 2010 the band embarked on a new U.S. tour and released Capsule 1 in conjunction with media technology company Aderra Inc. and made it available in multiple formats including a CD-DVD DualDisc, USB flash drive, 12 inch vinyl, FLAC download and MP3 download. The collection includes a short film made by singer Ian Astbury and Rick Rogers.
On 26 October 2010 the band and Aderra Inc. announced the release of a new song, "Embers", for 1 November 2010 and Capsule 2 available through their web store on 16 November 2010. Pictures from the Cult's tour stop in Chicago on 28 October 2010 can be seen at a local radio station website.
On 17 September 2010, the band performed live at the Fall Frenzy concert at the Tempe Beach Park in Tempe, Arizona. Other bands that played at this concert were Stone Temple Pilots, Shinedown, and Sevendust.
On 4 December 2010, the band performed a live set for Guitar Center Sessions on DirecTV. The episode included an interview with the band by program host, Nic Harcourt.
Choice of Weapon and Hidden City (2011–2017)
During the Cult's concert at the Hammersmith Apollo in London on 21 January 2011 Ian Astbury declared that the Cult would be recording a new album directly after the tour. They also announced that they would be working with Chris Goss, who performed with Masters of Reality as a supporting act the same evening. On 11 May 2011, it was announced that the Cult were signed to Cooking Vinyl Records, who will release the new album in early 2012. Commented guitarist Billy Duffy: "We are very much looking forward to returning to our U.K. roots in many ways working with Cooking Vinyl." Vocalist Ian Astbury added, "We look forward to a long and fruitful relationship with Cooking Vinyl." By May 2011, the band had been writing and recording new demos at its Witch Mountain studio hideaway in the Hollywood Hills, and began recording their new album at Hollywood Recording Studios. In October 2011, bassist Chris Wyse stated the album was almost finished and expected to be released in April 2012. Chris also described it as a "Zep/Stooges mix of energy."
On 29 November 2011, it was announced that the album would be produced by Bob Rock, who provided the same role on Sonic Temple, The Cult and Beyond Good and Evil. The album, entitled Choice of Weapon, was released on 22 May 2012. The band partnered with Rolling Stone to premiere the first song from the album titled Lucifer on 30 January. On 5 February 2012, the Cult song "She Sells Sanctuary" was used as the soundtrack for a Budweiser commercial in a mashup with Flo Rida aired during Super Bowl XLVI. In May 2012 the Cult appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and played "For The Animals".
On 28 September 2012, it was announced that the band would release Weapon of Choice, a "prequel" album to accompany the band's latest album, Choice of Weapon. The digital-only release, available exclusively on iTunes for two months only beginning 16 October, features the songs that were ultimately included in "Choice Of Weapon" at an earlier stage of development. Explaining the motivations behind the release, singer Ian Astbury said that "These songs were turned over and over, forged in long rehearsals and writing sessions, and emanated from challenges both personal and professional. We put our guts into this; [Producer Chris] Goss was able to create an environment where the songs were born through playing and turning over lyrics, through hard work and intense sessions." Astbury added "These songs have an integrity and rawness of their own. In many ways it's a different album to the one we released and reveals the foundations of 'Choice Of Weapon'. We were able to close the doors and begin to explore spaces we had not been in for a while." The song "Twisted and Bleeding" was made available for free download at the band's website ahead of the full digital release.
On 20 June 2013, the band announced the release of Electric-Peace which comprises the entire Electric album plus the Peace album which was previously released on the now discontinued Rare Cult box set in 2000. It is due for release in the US on 30 July. In 2013 Mike Dimkich left the band and joined Bad Religion to cover for guitarist Greg Hetson. James Stevenson, from the Beauty's On The Streets tour in 1994, replaced Dimkich as the Cult's rhythm guitarist.
In March 2013, Billy Duffy told the Argentinan journalist Fabrizio Pedrotti that the Cult had begun work on a new album for a 2014 release. The band were expected to begin work on the album after they finish their 2013 world tour, where they played the Electric album in its entirety. In August 2014, Billy added that the next album, which was not expected to be released before 2015 at the earliest, "will be more guitar heavy".
On 5 November 2015, it was announced that The Cult would release their new album, entitled Hidden City, on 5 February 2016. The album is said to be the final part of a trilogy that began with Born into This, and marks the fifth time Bob Rock had produced a Cult album. The band also announced that they had hired Australian-born bassist Grant Fitzpatrick (ex-Mink) as the replacement for Chris Wyse. Chris Chaney (Jane's Addiction, Camp Freddy) and producer Bob Rock performed session bass on the album. In support of Hidden City, The Cult opened for Guns N' Roses on the Not in This Lifetime... Tour.
In an October 2016 interview with PopMatters journalist J.C. Maçek III, Cult guitarist Billy Duffy spoke of the band's playlist while on tour, saying "Obviously you want to make an impactful [show]," he continues. "There are some practical, pragmatic decisions made. If you're playing to a crowd who are not very familiar with you, there's no point of going too deep but we do always make sure we play a new song. Like on Guns N' Roses' [tour] we had fifty minutes which is ten songs all in. So, you know we just made sure that in those ten songs we played 'Deeply Ordered Chaos' which we’re proud of and it makes a certain statement. And it just alerts people to the fact that, yes, we have made a record in the last 30 years. You know and that's a good thing. Psychologically, that's the blood transfusion that we need. And we're very mindful, we have a very loyal fan base. We don't pander as you well know."
Upcoming eleventh studio album (2018–present)
In an April 2018 interview with Guitar World, guitarist Billy Duffy was asked if another album from The Cult was in the works. He replied, "Never say never! Ian and I enjoy the process of making new music, and we feel it's vital to keep the band healthy, even if it's pretty much in the law of diminishing returns area now. Who knows if it will be a whole album a series of singles or an EP? I can say new Cult music will be forthcoming, but these days we don't rush it as there's no point. Quality is key. We are past the point of having to release stuff so if we feel it's good enough, then we will release it in some shape or another."
On 2 April 2018, a tour of the United States of America called "Revolution 3 Tour" was announced for the summer. They performed as one of the three headliners, along with Stone Temple Pilots and Bush.
In April 2019, The Cult announced that they would celebrate the 30th anniversary of the release of their fourth album Sonic Temple with a world tour, which began on 2 May in Houston, Texas and was expected to wrap up in 2020.
In a June 2019 interview with LA Weekly, vocalist Ian Astbury stated that The Cult were "long overdue" to release new music. He was quoted as saying: "We do have some stuff we've been working on, but it's yet to see the light of day." Six months later, Astbury told Atlantic City Weekly that the band was going to start working on new music in 2020: "We've got a few pieces lying around in various stages of completion. The intention is to get together in the New Year and take a look at what we've got and decide how we are going to go about moving forward. It's an essential part of any creative lifeblood." On May 6, 2020, The Cult announced on their Twitter page that they had signed to Black Hill Records.
On August 15, 2020, Duffy announced on his Twitter that the band were recording their new album with producer Tom Dalgety at Rockfield Studios, where The Cult had recorded their debut album Dreamtime 36 years earlier.
In support of their new album, The Cult will embark on a co-headlining six-date UK tour with Alice Cooper in May and June 2022.
Influences
Duffy and Astbury cited among their influences a lot of different bands "from the Doors to Led Zeppelin. We literally went from the front of our record collections to the back. And then along the way we were drawn in by the likes of Public Image Ltd, Joy Division and Siouxsie and the Banshees. You might not hear it in the music but it's there." They also cited Bauhaus among many other post-punk influences. Duffy also praised Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers for a major performance he attended in 1977 and Siouxsie and the Banshees whom "always had great guitar players with killer riffs." Duffy also hailed AC/DC for "the power of a good three chord riff", Pete Townshend of the Who "in terms of commitment to stage performing" and Brian May of Queen for using "‘echoplex’ tape delays to orchestrate his own solo".
Musical style
According to music critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the band fuse a "hardcore punk revivalist" sound with the "pseudo-mysticism ... of the Doors and Uriah Heep and the guitar-orchestrations of Led Zeppelin and The Cure ... while adding touches of post-punk goth rock". In 1985 Astbury said, "Our music is just melodies and guitars. We're like Big Country and U2, only better!".
Members
Current members
Ian Astbury – lead vocals, occasional percussion/guitar
Billy Duffy – lead and rhythm guitars, backing vocals
John Tempesta – drums, percussion
Grant Fitzpatrick – bass, backing vocals
Damon Fox – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals
Discography
Dreamtime (1984)
Love (1985)
Electric (1987)
Sonic Temple (1989)
Ceremony (1991)
The Cult (1994)
Beyond Good and Evil (2001)
Born into This (2007)
Choice of Weapon (2012)
Hidden City (2016)
References
External links
Official website
Billy Duffy official website
Musical groups established in 1983
Situation Two artists
Beggars Banquet Records artists
Sire Records artists
Musical groups from Bradford
English post-punk music groups
English gothic rock groups
English hard rock musical groups
English heavy metal musical groups
English glam metal musical groups | true | [
"\"Paper Mansions\" is a song written by Ted Harris, recorded by American country music artist by Dottie West. The single was first a 45 RPM. It was released in February 1967 as the first single from her With All My Heart and Soul album (which sold quite well). This song was West's last Top 10 hit of the decade as a solo act. This song is an example of one of the few songs not written by West herself. The song was the last single released in 1967 and became a Top 10 hit in 1968, reaching No. 8 on the Hot Country Songs list on Billboard's chart. It didn't do as well on Cashbox's chart, only making the Top 15 there, at No. 13.\n\nThis song is one of West's better-known hits from the 1960s. This was virtually impossible to find on any Dottie West album until 1996, when RCA records released a compilation album of all her hits under RCA titled The Essential Dottie West. Lynn Anderson released a recording of this song on her album Promises, Promises.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n1967 singles\nDottie West songs\nRCA Records singles\n1967 songs",
"\"For You to Love\" is a 1988 song by the American recording artist Luther Vandross. The single was released in 1989 in support of his hit album Any Love. The song was a top five U.S. R&B hit that peaked to No. 3 on the R&B singles. Vandross' Any Love album charted three top-five singles on the Billboard Hot R&B Singles chart.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n www.luthervandross.com\n\n1988 songs\nLuther Vandross songs\n1989 singles\nSongs written by Marcus Miller\nSongs written by Luther Vandross\nEpic Records singles"
] |
[
"The Cult",
"The Cult (1994-1995)",
"What was the Cult?",
"the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock.",
"How did i do in the charts?",
"The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK.",
"Was there any hit songs released on that album?",
"The single \"Coming Down (Drug Tongue)\""
] | C_669b70745be5429da8c672a9282a7461_0 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | 4 | Are there any other interesting aspects about The Cult besides their song "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)"? | The Cult | With the same line-up still in place, the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. The self-titled 'Cult' album is commonly referred to as the 'Black Sheep' album by fans of the group. Astbury referred to the record as "very personal and very revealing" songs about his life, with the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, to his directionless years spent in Glasgow in the late 1970s. The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. Duffy remarked that he thought that the record wouldn't sell well due to the offensive lyrics. The record went to number one in Portugal also, but quickly dropped out of sight. The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" was released with the band going on tour in support of the new album. Only one more single, "Star", was officially released with a live appearance on UK TV show The Word. "Star" began life in 1986 as "Tom Petty" and was recorded at the "Sonic Temple" demo sessions as "Starchild", being dropped by the band during rehearsals. In 1993 the song was resurrected and was finally completed for the record in 1994 as, just simply, "Star". When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. As with the Ceremony record several years earlier, no other official singles were released, but several other songs were released on a strictly limited basis: "Sacred Life" was released in Spain and the Netherlands, "Be Free" was issued in Canada and France, "Saints Are Down" was issued in Greece, but none of the songs gained much commercial success. During this tour, the Cult made their first ever appearance in Norway. CANNOTANSWER | When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. | The Cult are an English rock band formed in 1983 in Bradford, West Yorkshire. Before settling on their current name in January 1984, the band performed under the name Death Cult, which was an evolution of the name of lead singer Ian Astbury's previous band Southern Death Cult. They gained a dedicated following in the United Kingdom in the mid-1980s as a post-punk/gothic rock band, with singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary", before breaking into the mainstream in the United States in the late 1980s establishing themselves as a hard rock band with singles such as "Love Removal Machine". Since its initial formation in 1983, the band have had various line-ups; the longest-serving members are Astbury and guitarist Billy Duffy, who are also the band's two songwriters.
The Cult's debut studio album Dreamtime was released in 1984 to moderate success, with its lead single "Spiritwalker" reaching No. 1 on the UK Indie Chart. Their second studio album, Love (1985), was even more successful, charting at No. 4 in the UK and including singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary" and "Rain". The band's third album, Electric (1987), launched them new heights of success, also peaking at No. 4 in the UK and charting highly in other territories, and spawned the hit singles "Love Removal Machine", "Lil' Devil" and "Wild Flower". On that album, The Cult supplemented their post-punk sound with hard rock; the polish on this new sound was facilitated by producer Rick Rubin. After moving to Los Angeles, California, where the band has been based for the remainder of their career, The Cult continued the musical experimentation of Electric with its follow-up album Sonic Temple (1989), which marked their first collaboration with Bob Rock, who would produce several of the band's subsequent albums. Sonic Temple was their most successful album to that point, entering the Top 10 on the UK and US charts, and included one of the band's most popular songs "Fire Woman".
By the time of their fifth album Ceremony (1991), tensions and creative differences began to surface among the band members. This resulted in the recording sessions for Ceremony being held without a stable lineup, leaving Astbury and Duffy as the only two official members left, and featuring support from session musicians on bass and drums. The ongoing tension had carried over within the next four years, during which they released one more studio album, The Cult (1994), and called it quits in 1995. The Cult reformed in 1999 and released their seventh album Beyond Good and Evil two years later. The commercial failure of the album and resurfaced tensions led to the band going back on hiatus in 2002. They resumed activity in 2006, and have since released three more studio albums: Born into This (2007), Choice of Weapon (2012), and Hidden City (2016).
History
Early history (1981–1984)
The band's origins can be traced to 1981, in Bradford, Yorkshire, where vocalist and songwriter Ian Astbury formed a band called Southern Death Cult. The name was chosen with a double meaning, and was derived from the 14th-century Native American religion, the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex or Southern Death Cult as it was sometimes known, from the Mississippi delta area, but it was also a stab at what the band viewed was the centralisation of power in Southern England (including that of the music industry); there has long been a perceived notion of a North–South divide based on social, historic and economic reasons. Astbury was joined by Buzz Burrows (guitar), Barry Jepson (bass) and Aki Nawaz Qureshi (drums); they performed their first show at the Queen's Hall in their hometown of Bradford on 29 October 1981. The band were at the forefront of an emerging style of music, in the form of post-punk and gothic rock, they achieved critical acclaim from the press and music fans.
The band signed to independent record label Situation Two, an offshoot of Beggars Banquet Records, and released a three-track, triple A-side single, Moya, during this period. They toured through England headlining some shows and touring with Bauhaus and Theatre of Hate. The band played their final performance in Manchester during February 1983, meaning after only sixteen months the band was over. A compilation named The Southern Death Cult was released, this being a collection of the single, radio sessions with John Peel for Radio One and live performances - one of which an audience member recorded with a tape recorder.
In April 1983, Astbury teamed up with guitarist Billy Duffy and formed the band "Death Cult". Duffy had been in the Nosebleeds (along with Morrissey), Lonesome No More and then Theatre of Hate. In addition to Astbury and Duffy, the band also included Jamie Stewart (bass) and Raymond Taylor Smith (later known as Ray Mondo) (drums), both from the Harrow, London based post-punk band, Ritual. Death Cult made their live debut in Oslo, Norway on 25 July 1983 and also released the Death Cult EP in the same month, then toured through mainland Europe and Scotland. In September 1983, Mondo was deported to his home country of Sierra Leone and replaced by Nigel Preston, formerly of Theatre of Hate. The single "Gods Zoo" was released in October 1983. Another European tour, with UK dates, followed that autumn. To tone down their name's gothic connotations and gain broader appeal, the band changed its name to "the Cult" in January 1984 before appearing on the (UK) Channel 4 television show, The Tube.
The Cult's first studio record, Dreamtime, was recorded at Rockfield Studios, in Monmouth, Wales in 1984. The record was to be produced by Joe Julian, but after recording the drum tracks, the band decided to replace him with John Brand. Brand produced the record, but guitarist Duffy has said the drum tracks were produced by Julian, as Preston had become unreliable.
The band recorded the songs which later became known as "Butterflies", "(The) Gimmick", "A Flower in the Desert", "Horse Nation", "Spiritwalker", "Bad Medicine (Waltz)", "Dreamtime", "With Love" (later known as "Ship of Fools", and also "Sea and Sky"), "Bone Bag", "Too Young", "83rd Dream", and one untitled outtake. It is unknown what the outtake was, or whether it was developed into a song at a later date. Songs like "Horse Nation" showed Astbury's intense interest in Native American issues, with the lyrics to "Horse Nation", "See them prancing, they come neighing, to a horse nation", taken almost verbatim from the book Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, while "Spiritwalker" dealt with shamanism, and the record's title and title track are overtly influenced by Australian Aboriginal beliefs.
On 4 April 1984, the Cult released the single "Spiritwalker", which reached No. 1 on the independent charts in the UK, and acted as a teaser for their forthcoming album Dreamtime. This was followed that summer by a second single, "Go West (Crazy Spinning Circles)", before the release of Dreamtime in September; the album reached No. 21 in the UK, and sold over 100,000 copies in the UK alone. On 12 July 1984, the band recorded five songs at the BBC Maida Vale 5 studio for a Richard Skinner session. Before and after the album's release, the Cult toured throughout Europe and England before recording another single, "Ressurection Joe" (UK No. 74), released that December. Following a Christmas support slot with Big Country, the Cult toured Europe with support from the Mission (then called the Sisterhood). Dreamtime was released initially only in the UK, but after its success, and as the Cult's popularity grew worldwide, it was issued in approximately 30 countries.
Mainstream success (1985–1990)
In May 1985, the Cult released their fourth single, "She Sells Sanctuary", which peaked at No. 15 in the UK and spent 23 weeks in the Top 100. The song was recently voted No. 18 in VH1's Indie 100. In June 1985, following his increasingly erratic behaviour, Preston was fired from the band. Big Country's drummer Mark Brzezicki was picked to replace Preston, and was also included in the video for "She Sells Sanctuary". The Cult then finished recording their second album, Love in July and August 1985. The band's music and image shifted from their punk-oriented roots to 1960s psychedelia influences. Love was a chart success, peaking at No. 4 in the UK and selling 100,000 copies there toward a total of 500,000 copies throughout Europe, as well as 100,000 in Australia and 500,000 copies in the United States. Love reached number 20 on the charts in The Netherlands, where it remained for 32 weeks. To date, the record has sold over two and a half million copies worldwide.
From late September 1985 to June 1986, the band went on a worldwide tour with new drummer Les Warner (who had played with Julian Lennon and Johnny Thunders). Two more singles from the Love album followed; "Rain" (charting in the UK at No. 17) and "Revolution" (charting in the UK at No. 30). Neither charted in the US. Another single, "Nirvana", was issued only in Poland. The album version of "Rain", as well as the remix "(Here Comes the) Rain", were used in the Italian horror film Dèmoni 2. Once back in England, the band booked themselves into the Manor Studios in Oxfordshire, with producer Steve Brown (who had produced Love), and recorded over a dozen new songs. The band were unhappy with the sound of their new album, titled Peace, and they decided to go to New York so producer Rick Rubin could remix the first single, "Love Removal Machine".
Rubin agreed to work with the band, but only if they rerecorded the song. Rubin eventually talked them into rerecording the entire album. The band's record company, Beggars Banquet, was displeased with this, as two months and £250,000 had already been spent on the record. However, after hearing the initial New York recording, Beggars Banquet agreed to proceed. The first single, "Love Removal Machine", was released in February 1987, and the new version of the album appeared in April that year, now renamed as Electric, reaching No. 4 and eventually outselling Love. The band toured with Kid Chaos (also known as "Haggis" and "The Kid") on bass, with Stewart on rhythm guitar. Two more singles, "Lil Devil" and "Wild Flower", were released during 1987. A few tracks from the original Peace album appeared on the single versions of "Love Removal Machine", and "Lil Devil". The full Peace album would not be released until 2000, when it was included as Disc 3 of the Rare Cult box set.
In the US, the Cult, now consisting of Astbury, Duffy, Stewart, Warner and Kid Chaos, were supported by the then-unknown Guns N' Roses. The band also appeared at Roskilde Festival in Denmark in June 1987. When the world tour wound through Australia, the band wrecked £30,000 worth of equipment, and as a result they could not tour Japan, as no company would rent them new equipment. At the end of the tour the Electric album had been certified Gold in the UK, and sold roughly 3 million copies worldwide, but the band were barely speaking to each other by then. Haggis left the band at the end of the Electric tour to form the Four Horsemen for Rubin's Def American label. Astbury and Duffy fired Warner and their management team Grant/Edwards, and moved to Los Angeles with original bassist Stewart. Warner sued the band several times for his firing, as well as for what he felt were unpaid royalties due to him for his performance on the Electric album, resulting in lengthy court battles. The Cult signed a new management deal and wrote 21 new songs for their next record.
For the next album, Stewart returned to playing bass, and John Webster was brought in to play keyboards. The band used Chris Taylor to play drums during rehearsals and record the demos, with future Kiss drummer Eric Singer performing during the second demo recording sessions. The Cult eventually recruited session-drummer Mickey Curry to fill the drumming role and Aerosmith sound engineer, Bob Rock, to produce. Recorded in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada from October to December 1988, the Sonic Temple record went Top 10 in both the UK and the US, where it was certified Gold and Platinum respectively. The band went on tour in support of the new album and new single "Fire Woman" (UK No. 15) (NZ No. 1), with yet another new drummer, Matt Sorum, and Webster as keyboard player. The next single, "Edie (Ciao Baby)" (UK No. 25) has become a regular song at concerts for many years.
In Europe, the band toured with Aerosmith, and in the US, after releasing another single "Sun King" (UK No. 42), they spent 1989 touring in support of Metallica before heading out on their own headlining tour later that same year. A fourth single, "Sweet Soul Sister" (UK No. 38), was released in February 1990, with the video having been filmed at Wembley Arena, London, on 25 November 1989. "Sweet Soul Sister" was partially written in Paris and was inspired by the bohemian lifestyle of that city. Released as a single in February 1990, the song was another hit in the UK, and reportedly reached number one on the rock charts in Brazil. After playing a show in Atlanta, Georgia, in February 1990, the band's management told Astbury that his father had just died of cancer. As a result, the remainder of the tour was cancelled after a final leg of shows were performed in April. After the tour ended, the band were on the verge of splitting due to Stewart retiring and moving to Canada to be with his wife, and Sorum leaving to join Guns N' Roses.
In 1990, Astbury organized the Gathering of the Tribes festival in Los Angeles and San Francisco with artists such as Soundgarden, Ice-T, Indigo Girls, Queen Latifah, Iggy Pop, the Charlatans, the Cramps and Public Enemy appearing. This two-day festival drew 40,000 people. Also in 1990, a ten CD box set was released in the UK, containing rare songs from the Cult's singles. The CDs in this box set were all issued as picture discs with rice paper covers, housed in a white box called "Singles Collection", or a black box called "E.P. Collection '84 - '90". In 1991, director Oliver Stone offered Astbury the role of Jim Morrison in Stone's film The Doors. He declined the role because he was not happy with the way Morrison was represented in the film, and the role was ultimately played by Val Kilmer.
Ceremony and the lawsuit (1991–1993)
In 1991, Astbury and Duffy were writing again for their next album. During the demo recordings, Todd Hoffman and James Kottak played bass and drums, respectively. During the actual album recording sessions, Curry was recruited again to play drums, with Charley Drayton on bass, and various other performers. Astbury and Duffy's working relationship had disintegrated by that time, with the two men reportedly rarely even being in the studio together during recording. The resulting album Ceremony was released to mixed responses. The album climbed to US No. 34, but sales were not as impressive as the previous three records, only selling around one million copies worldwide. Only two official singles were released from the record: "Wild Hearted Son" (UK No. 34, Canada No. 41) and "Heart of Soul" (UK No. 50), although "White" was released as a single only in Canada, "Sweet Salvation" was released as a single (as "Dulce Salvación") in Argentina in 1992, and the title track "Ceremony" was released in Spain.
The Cult's Ceremonial Stomp tour went through Europe in 1991 and North America in 1992. In 1991 the Cult played a show at the Marquee Club in London, which was recorded and released in February 1993, packaged with some vinyl UK copies of their first greatest hits release. Only a handful of CD copies of it were ever manufactured originally, however it was subsequently reissued on CD in 1999. An incomplete bootleg video of this show is also in circulation.
The band were sued by the parents of the Native American boy pictured on the cover of Ceremony, for alleged exploitation and for the unauthorized use of the child's image. The parents stated that the boy felt he had been cursed by the band's burning of his image, and was "emotionally scarred." This image of the boy is also burned in the video for "Wild Hearted Son". This lawsuit delayed the release of Ceremony in many countries including South Korea and Thailand, which did not see the record's release until late 1992, and it was unreleased in Turkey until the Cult played several shows in Istanbul in June 1993.
A world tour followed with backing from drummer Michael Lee (Page & Plant, Little Angels), bassist Kinley "Barney" Wolfe (Lord Tracy, Black Oak Arkansas), and keyboardist John Sinclair (Ozzy Osbourne, Uriah Heep) returning one last time, and the Gathering of the Tribes moved to the UK. Here artists such as Pearl Jam performed. The warm-up gig to the show, in a small nightclub, was dedicated to the memory of Nigel Preston, who had died a few weeks earlier at the age of 28. Following the release of the single "The Witch" (#9 in Australia) and the performance of a song for the 1992 Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie soundtrack entitled "Zap City", produced by Steve Brown and originally a B-side to "Lil' Devil", two volumes of remixes of "She Sells Sanctuary", called Sanctuary Mixes MCMXCIII, volumes one and two, and in support of Pure Cult: for Rockers, Ravers, Lovers, and Sinners, a greatest hits compilation which debuted at No. 1 on the British charts and later went to number one in Portugal, Astbury and Duffy fired the "backing band" and recruited Craig Adams (the Mission) and Scott Garrett for performances across Europe in 1993, with some shows featuring Mike Dimkich on rhythm guitar. This tour marked the first time the band performed in Turkey, Greece, and the Slovak Republic.
The Cult and first breakup (1994–1998)
With the same line-up still in place, the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. The self-titled album is commonly referred to as the "Black Sheep" album by fans of the group, due to the image of a black sheep on the front cover. Astbury referred to the record as a collection of "very personal and very revealing" songs about his life, with the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, to his directionless years spent in Glasgow in the late 1970s.
The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. Duffy remarked that he thought that the record wouldn't sell well due to the offensive lyrics. The record went to number one in Portugal also, but quickly dropped out of sight. The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" was released with the band going on tour in support of the new album. Only one more single, "Star", was officially released with a live appearance on UK TV show The Word. "Star" began life in 1986 as "Tom Petty" and was recorded at the "Sonic Temple" demo sessions as "Starchild", being dropped by the band during rehearsals. In 1993 the song was resurrected and was finally completed for the record in 1994 as, just simply, "Star".
When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. As with the Ceremony record several years earlier, no other official singles were released, but several other songs were released on a strictly limited basis: "Sacred Life" was released in Spain and the Netherlands, "Be Free" was issued in Canada and France, "Saints Are Down" was issued in Greece, but none of the songs gained much commercial success. During this tour, the Cult made their first ever appearance in Norway.
During the Black Rain tour of South America in spring of 1995, despite the fact that several more new songs had already been recorded, the tour was cancelled after an appearance in Rio de Janeiro in March, and the band split up citing unspecified problems on a recent South American tour. Astbury started up a garage band called Holy Barbarians a few months later. The band made their debut at the 100 Club in London in February 1996 and released their first (and only) record in May 1996, and toured throughout North America and Europe for the rest of 1996. The band started writing material for a second record in 1997, but the band was dissolved and Astbury began writing and recording a solo record. Throughout 1997 and 1998 Astbury recorded his solo record, originally to be titled Natural Born Guerilla, later called High Time Amplifier. Ultimately the record remained unreleased until June 2000 when it was released under the name Spirit\Light\Speed. Astbury played one solo concert in 1999.
In November 1996, a number of CD reissues were released: the band's American record company released High Octane Cult, a slightly updated greatest hits compilation released only in the US and Japan; The Southern Death Cult, a remastered edition of the fifteen-song compilation CD; a ten-song compilation CD by Death Cult called Ghost Dance, consisting of the untitled four-song EP, the single "God's Zoo", and four unreleased songs from a radio broadcast; and a remastered repackaging of the Dreamtime album, containing only the ten original songs from the record in their original playing order and almost completely different but original artwork. Dreamtime Live at the Lyceum was also remastered and issued on video and for the first time on CD, with the one unreleased song from the concert, "Gimmick".
First reunion, Beyond Good and Evil and second hiatus (1999–2005)
In 1999, Astbury and Duffy reformed the Cult with Matt Sorum and ex-Porno for Pyros bassist Martyn LeNoble. Their first official concert was at the Tibetan Freedom Concert in June 1999, after having rehearsed at shows in the Los Angeles area. The band's 1999 Cult Rising reunion tour resulted in a sold out 30 date tour of the US, ending with 8 consecutive sold out nights at the LA House of Blues. In 2000, the band toured South Africa for the first time, and North and South America, and contributed the song "Painted on My Heart" to the soundtrack of the movie Gone In 60 Seconds. The song was featured prominently and the melody was fused into parts of the score. In June, Astbury's long-delayed solo record was finally released as Spirit\Light\Speed, but it failed to gain much success. In November 2000, another authorised greatest hits compilation was released, Pure Cult: The Singles 1984–1995, along with an accompanying DVD, which was later certified gold in Canada. The Cult, as well as Ian Astbury, performed on separate tracks on the Doors tribute album, Stoned Immaculate: The Music of The Doors, covering "Wild Child" and "Touch Me".
In November 2000, Beggars Banquet released 15,000 copies of a six-disc boxset (with a bonus seventh disc of remixes for the first 5000 copies) titled Rare Cult. The box set consists of album out-takes, demos, radio broadcasts, and album B-sides. It is most notable for including the previously unreleased "Peace" album in its entirety. In 2001, the band signed to Atlantic Records and recorded a new album, Beyond Good and Evil, originally being produced by Mick Jones of Foreigner, until Jones bowed out to tour with Foreigner. Astbury and Duffy co-wrote a song with Jones, an odd occurrence, as in the past, neither Astbury or Duffy would co-write their material. Bob Rock was the producer, with Martyn LeNoble and Chris Wyse as recording bassists, as Mike Dimkich played rhythm guitar on tour, and Matt Sorum returning as drummer. Although Sorum has previously toured with the band on the Sonic Temple tour in 1989, this was the first time that he had recorded a studio album with the band.
However Beyond Good and Evil was not the comeback record the band had hoped for. Despite reaching No. 37 in the US, No. 22 in Canada, and No. 25 in Spain, sales quickly dropped, only selling roughly 500,000 copies worldwide. The first single "Rise", reached No. 41 in the US, and No. 2 on the mainstream rock charts, but Atlantic Records quickly pulled the song from radio playlists. Astbury would later describe the experience with Atlantic to be "soul destroying", after Atlantic tried to tamper with the lyrics, the record cover, and choice of singles from the record.
After the first single from the record, the band's working relationship with Atlantic was on paper only, with Atlantic pulling "Rise" from the radio stations playlists, and stopping all promotion of the record. The second single "Breathe" was only released as a radio station promo, and the final single "True Believers" was only on a compilation sampler disc released in January 2002 (after the Cult's tour had already ended). Despite "True Believers" receiving radio airplay in Australia, both singles went largely unnoticed, and both Astbury and Duffy walked away from the project. LeNoble rejoined the band for the initial dates in early 2001, and Billy Morrison filled in on bass for the majority of the 2001 tour.
The European tour of 2001 was canceled, largely due to security concerns after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the band flew back to the US to tour again with Aerosmith. But the eleven-week tour was considered by fans to be a disaster, as the band played only a brief rundown of their greatest hits. In October 2001, a show at the Grand Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles was filmed for release on DVD. After the tour ended in December 2001, the band took most of 2002 off, apart from a few shows in the US to promote the release of the DVD, with Scott Garrett and Craig Adams rejoining the band.
Despite the commercial disappointment of Beyond Good and Evil and the supporting tour, the band was voted "Comeback of the Year" by Metal Edge readers in the magazine's 2001 Readers' Choice Awards.
In late 2002, Ian Astbury declared the Cult to be "on ice" indefinitely, after performing a brief series of dates in October 2002 to promote the release of the Music Without Fear DVD. During this second hiatus, Astbury performed as a member of the Doors (later dubbed the Doors of the 21st Century, later still renamed D21c, and most recently known as Riders on the Storm) with two of the original members of that group. D21c was sued numerous times, both by Jim Morrison's family and by drummer John Densmore. Astbury supposedly started work on recording another solo album that later became the backbone for the Cult's Born into This.
At the same time, Duffy was part of Coloursound with bassist Craig Adams and ex-Alarm frontman Mike Peters, then Dead Men Walking (again with Peters) and later Cardboard Vampyres. Sorum became a member of the hard rock supergroup Velvet Revolver. In 2003, all of the Cult's records were issued on CD, with several bonus tracks being issued on the Russian, Belarusian, and Lithuanian versions. These eastern European releases had many printing mistakes on the jacket sleeves and lyric inserts. In October 2004, all of the Cult's records were again remastered and issued again on CD, this time in Japan in different cardboard foldout sleeves. "She Sells Sanctuary" appeared in the 2002 video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, playing on rock station V-Rock.
Second reunion, Born Into This and Capsule EPs (2006–2010)
Despite Astbury's previous statement from 2004 that a reunion would not happen, The Cult announced in January 2006 that they were reuniting for "some limited gigs" throughout the year. A month later, the band made their first live appearance in three-and-a-half years on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson. Their lineup consisted of Astbury (vocals), Duffy (lead guitar), John Tempesta (drums), Dimkich (rhythm guitar) and Wyse (returning as bassist). Their first stage show was held in March 2006 in San Francisco, California, at The Fillmore. The entire tour was recorded by Instant Live and sold after each show. In May, they did an eight date tour in Canada. Later that summer, they toured central and eastern Europe and played their first concerts in Bulgaria, Poland and Serbia. An eleven-date UK tour followed as well as several more dates in the United States, finishing with a South American tour in December. That year, Duffy began the band Circus Diablo with Billy Morrison, Sorum, Brett Scallions and Ricky Warwick.
During these tours, the band occasionally played an extended set, including several songs the band had not performed in decades: "King Contrary Man" and "Hollow Man", neither of which had been performed since 1987; also, "Libertine" was performed approximately three times, for the first time since 2000, and "Brother Wolf, Sister Moon", which was only performed one time since 1986 (for this particular song, the band played an abridged version which has never been performed before or since)
Astbury announced in February 2007 that he was leaving Riders on the Storm and returning to the Cult. He stated: "I have decided to move on and focus on my own music and legacy." The Cult was featured on Stuffmagazine.com's list of ultimate air guitar players. On 21 March 2007, it was announced that the band would be touring Europe with the Who. The first confirmed tour date was in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, in early June, with at least a dozen shows set to follow. The band played a gig in London's West End at the CC Club on 7 June 2007, along with nearly two dozen shows across continental Europe during summer. The tour also includes the first performance in Romania and Croatia.
On 29 May 2007, the band signed a deal with major metal label Roadrunner Records. Their 8th studio album, titled Born into This was released on 16 October, and was produced by Martin "Youth" Glover, bass player for Killing Joke. Born into This was released as regular single disc and limited edition double disc, the second disk being a bonus 5-track CD holding the following tracks: "Stand Alone", "War Pony Destroyer", "I Assassin (Demo)", "Sound of Destruction (Demo)" and "Savages (Extended Version)". Prior to the album's release, the band played festival and headline dates, and supported the Who in Europe through summer 2007, with a US headline tour to follow.
The band's appearance at Irving Plaza in New York City in early November 2006 was filmed and was released in 2007. The Cult New York City, issued by Fontana North and is the Cult's first high definition DVD release. Meanwhile, Astbury lent vocals on two tracks of the 2007 Unkle album "War Stories", one of them being the first single from the album, "Burn My Shadow".
The band performed a UK and European tour in late-February and early-March 2008. On 24 March, they began their North American tour including a major 13-city tour in Canada. During September 2008, the Cult did a brief series of dates in the northeast United States, and they toured in Brazil as part of the South American tour in October 2008. As of May 2008, according to The Gauntlet, the Cult are currently unsigned and no longer under contract with Roadrunner Records. In October 2008, it was announced that the Cult would headline the inaugural Rock 'n' Roll Marathon in San Antonio, to be run 16 November 2008. The Cult announced plans for a tour showcasing their 1985 Love album across the US and then the UK in October where they will play at the Royal Albert Hall.
Coinciding with the remastered Love album and four-disc Omnibus boxed set, the Cult kicked off the long-awaited Love Live Tour in late summer. Performing their classic Love album in its entirety, each show was played with the Love tracks opening with "Nirvana" to "Black Angel". A quick intermission followed, then other Cult hits were played (varying by venue): "Sun King", "Dirty Little Rock Star", "Electric Ocean", "Illuminated". Then followed the favorites "Fire Woman", "Lil Devil", "Wild Flower", and lastly "Love Removal Machine". In the evening of 10 October 2009 at the Royal Albert Hall in London, the band performed a second encore with original Cult bassist Jamie Stewart and drummer Mark Brzezicki, who played drums with the band during the Love album recording sessions in July and August 1985. The band sold Love Live USB flash drives for each show during the tour.
The Cult entered 2010 continuing their Love Live Tour and announcing more dates in the United States, New Zealand, Australia, and Japan. The band finished recording a four-track "Capsule" with producer Chris Goss. Capsule 1 was said to be the first of three or four to be released sometime in summer 2010. Release formats include CD-DVD dualdisc, 12-inch vinyl, and digital downloads. Capsule 1 was released on 14 September 2010. The band officially announced the release of its first new studio recording since 2007, "Every Man And Woman Is A Star". The new single was released through the iTunes Store on 31 July 2010.
On 1 August 2010, the band played the sold-out music festival Sonisphere, which marked their first UK performance since the tour for their Love album. During the performance they debuted their new single, "Every Man and Woman is a Star", which was released on 1 August 2010. On 14 September 2010 the band embarked on a new U.S. tour and released Capsule 1 in conjunction with media technology company Aderra Inc. and made it available in multiple formats including a CD-DVD DualDisc, USB flash drive, 12 inch vinyl, FLAC download and MP3 download. The collection includes a short film made by singer Ian Astbury and Rick Rogers.
On 26 October 2010 the band and Aderra Inc. announced the release of a new song, "Embers", for 1 November 2010 and Capsule 2 available through their web store on 16 November 2010. Pictures from the Cult's tour stop in Chicago on 28 October 2010 can be seen at a local radio station website.
On 17 September 2010, the band performed live at the Fall Frenzy concert at the Tempe Beach Park in Tempe, Arizona. Other bands that played at this concert were Stone Temple Pilots, Shinedown, and Sevendust.
On 4 December 2010, the band performed a live set for Guitar Center Sessions on DirecTV. The episode included an interview with the band by program host, Nic Harcourt.
Choice of Weapon and Hidden City (2011–2017)
During the Cult's concert at the Hammersmith Apollo in London on 21 January 2011 Ian Astbury declared that the Cult would be recording a new album directly after the tour. They also announced that they would be working with Chris Goss, who performed with Masters of Reality as a supporting act the same evening. On 11 May 2011, it was announced that the Cult were signed to Cooking Vinyl Records, who will release the new album in early 2012. Commented guitarist Billy Duffy: "We are very much looking forward to returning to our U.K. roots in many ways working with Cooking Vinyl." Vocalist Ian Astbury added, "We look forward to a long and fruitful relationship with Cooking Vinyl." By May 2011, the band had been writing and recording new demos at its Witch Mountain studio hideaway in the Hollywood Hills, and began recording their new album at Hollywood Recording Studios. In October 2011, bassist Chris Wyse stated the album was almost finished and expected to be released in April 2012. Chris also described it as a "Zep/Stooges mix of energy."
On 29 November 2011, it was announced that the album would be produced by Bob Rock, who provided the same role on Sonic Temple, The Cult and Beyond Good and Evil. The album, entitled Choice of Weapon, was released on 22 May 2012. The band partnered with Rolling Stone to premiere the first song from the album titled Lucifer on 30 January. On 5 February 2012, the Cult song "She Sells Sanctuary" was used as the soundtrack for a Budweiser commercial in a mashup with Flo Rida aired during Super Bowl XLVI. In May 2012 the Cult appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and played "For The Animals".
On 28 September 2012, it was announced that the band would release Weapon of Choice, a "prequel" album to accompany the band's latest album, Choice of Weapon. The digital-only release, available exclusively on iTunes for two months only beginning 16 October, features the songs that were ultimately included in "Choice Of Weapon" at an earlier stage of development. Explaining the motivations behind the release, singer Ian Astbury said that "These songs were turned over and over, forged in long rehearsals and writing sessions, and emanated from challenges both personal and professional. We put our guts into this; [Producer Chris] Goss was able to create an environment where the songs were born through playing and turning over lyrics, through hard work and intense sessions." Astbury added "These songs have an integrity and rawness of their own. In many ways it's a different album to the one we released and reveals the foundations of 'Choice Of Weapon'. We were able to close the doors and begin to explore spaces we had not been in for a while." The song "Twisted and Bleeding" was made available for free download at the band's website ahead of the full digital release.
On 20 June 2013, the band announced the release of Electric-Peace which comprises the entire Electric album plus the Peace album which was previously released on the now discontinued Rare Cult box set in 2000. It is due for release in the US on 30 July. In 2013 Mike Dimkich left the band and joined Bad Religion to cover for guitarist Greg Hetson. James Stevenson, from the Beauty's On The Streets tour in 1994, replaced Dimkich as the Cult's rhythm guitarist.
In March 2013, Billy Duffy told the Argentinan journalist Fabrizio Pedrotti that the Cult had begun work on a new album for a 2014 release. The band were expected to begin work on the album after they finish their 2013 world tour, where they played the Electric album in its entirety. In August 2014, Billy added that the next album, which was not expected to be released before 2015 at the earliest, "will be more guitar heavy".
On 5 November 2015, it was announced that The Cult would release their new album, entitled Hidden City, on 5 February 2016. The album is said to be the final part of a trilogy that began with Born into This, and marks the fifth time Bob Rock had produced a Cult album. The band also announced that they had hired Australian-born bassist Grant Fitzpatrick (ex-Mink) as the replacement for Chris Wyse. Chris Chaney (Jane's Addiction, Camp Freddy) and producer Bob Rock performed session bass on the album. In support of Hidden City, The Cult opened for Guns N' Roses on the Not in This Lifetime... Tour.
In an October 2016 interview with PopMatters journalist J.C. Maçek III, Cult guitarist Billy Duffy spoke of the band's playlist while on tour, saying "Obviously you want to make an impactful [show]," he continues. "There are some practical, pragmatic decisions made. If you're playing to a crowd who are not very familiar with you, there's no point of going too deep but we do always make sure we play a new song. Like on Guns N' Roses' [tour] we had fifty minutes which is ten songs all in. So, you know we just made sure that in those ten songs we played 'Deeply Ordered Chaos' which we’re proud of and it makes a certain statement. And it just alerts people to the fact that, yes, we have made a record in the last 30 years. You know and that's a good thing. Psychologically, that's the blood transfusion that we need. And we're very mindful, we have a very loyal fan base. We don't pander as you well know."
Upcoming eleventh studio album (2018–present)
In an April 2018 interview with Guitar World, guitarist Billy Duffy was asked if another album from The Cult was in the works. He replied, "Never say never! Ian and I enjoy the process of making new music, and we feel it's vital to keep the band healthy, even if it's pretty much in the law of diminishing returns area now. Who knows if it will be a whole album a series of singles or an EP? I can say new Cult music will be forthcoming, but these days we don't rush it as there's no point. Quality is key. We are past the point of having to release stuff so if we feel it's good enough, then we will release it in some shape or another."
On 2 April 2018, a tour of the United States of America called "Revolution 3 Tour" was announced for the summer. They performed as one of the three headliners, along with Stone Temple Pilots and Bush.
In April 2019, The Cult announced that they would celebrate the 30th anniversary of the release of their fourth album Sonic Temple with a world tour, which began on 2 May in Houston, Texas and was expected to wrap up in 2020.
In a June 2019 interview with LA Weekly, vocalist Ian Astbury stated that The Cult were "long overdue" to release new music. He was quoted as saying: "We do have some stuff we've been working on, but it's yet to see the light of day." Six months later, Astbury told Atlantic City Weekly that the band was going to start working on new music in 2020: "We've got a few pieces lying around in various stages of completion. The intention is to get together in the New Year and take a look at what we've got and decide how we are going to go about moving forward. It's an essential part of any creative lifeblood." On May 6, 2020, The Cult announced on their Twitter page that they had signed to Black Hill Records.
On August 15, 2020, Duffy announced on his Twitter that the band were recording their new album with producer Tom Dalgety at Rockfield Studios, where The Cult had recorded their debut album Dreamtime 36 years earlier.
In support of their new album, The Cult will embark on a co-headlining six-date UK tour with Alice Cooper in May and June 2022.
Influences
Duffy and Astbury cited among their influences a lot of different bands "from the Doors to Led Zeppelin. We literally went from the front of our record collections to the back. And then along the way we were drawn in by the likes of Public Image Ltd, Joy Division and Siouxsie and the Banshees. You might not hear it in the music but it's there." They also cited Bauhaus among many other post-punk influences. Duffy also praised Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers for a major performance he attended in 1977 and Siouxsie and the Banshees whom "always had great guitar players with killer riffs." Duffy also hailed AC/DC for "the power of a good three chord riff", Pete Townshend of the Who "in terms of commitment to stage performing" and Brian May of Queen for using "‘echoplex’ tape delays to orchestrate his own solo".
Musical style
According to music critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the band fuse a "hardcore punk revivalist" sound with the "pseudo-mysticism ... of the Doors and Uriah Heep and the guitar-orchestrations of Led Zeppelin and The Cure ... while adding touches of post-punk goth rock". In 1985 Astbury said, "Our music is just melodies and guitars. We're like Big Country and U2, only better!".
Members
Current members
Ian Astbury – lead vocals, occasional percussion/guitar
Billy Duffy – lead and rhythm guitars, backing vocals
John Tempesta – drums, percussion
Grant Fitzpatrick – bass, backing vocals
Damon Fox – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals
Discography
Dreamtime (1984)
Love (1985)
Electric (1987)
Sonic Temple (1989)
Ceremony (1991)
The Cult (1994)
Beyond Good and Evil (2001)
Born into This (2007)
Choice of Weapon (2012)
Hidden City (2016)
References
External links
Official website
Billy Duffy official website
Musical groups established in 1983
Situation Two artists
Beggars Banquet Records artists
Sire Records artists
Musical groups from Bradford
English post-punk music groups
English gothic rock groups
English hard rock musical groups
English heavy metal musical groups
English glam metal musical groups | 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"
] |
[
"The Cult",
"The Cult (1994-1995)",
"What was the Cult?",
"the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock.",
"How did i do in the charts?",
"The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK.",
"Was there any hit songs released on that album?",
"The single \"Coming Down (Drug Tongue)\"",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar."
] | C_669b70745be5429da8c672a9282a7461_0 | Did they win any awards? | 5 | Did The Cult win any awards? | The Cult | With the same line-up still in place, the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. The self-titled 'Cult' album is commonly referred to as the 'Black Sheep' album by fans of the group. Astbury referred to the record as "very personal and very revealing" songs about his life, with the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, to his directionless years spent in Glasgow in the late 1970s. The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. Duffy remarked that he thought that the record wouldn't sell well due to the offensive lyrics. The record went to number one in Portugal also, but quickly dropped out of sight. The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" was released with the band going on tour in support of the new album. Only one more single, "Star", was officially released with a live appearance on UK TV show The Word. "Star" began life in 1986 as "Tom Petty" and was recorded at the "Sonic Temple" demo sessions as "Starchild", being dropped by the band during rehearsals. In 1993 the song was resurrected and was finally completed for the record in 1994 as, just simply, "Star". When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. As with the Ceremony record several years earlier, no other official singles were released, but several other songs were released on a strictly limited basis: "Sacred Life" was released in Spain and the Netherlands, "Be Free" was issued in Canada and France, "Saints Are Down" was issued in Greece, but none of the songs gained much commercial success. During this tour, the Cult made their first ever appearance in Norway. CANNOTANSWER | none of the songs gained much commercial success. | The Cult are an English rock band formed in 1983 in Bradford, West Yorkshire. Before settling on their current name in January 1984, the band performed under the name Death Cult, which was an evolution of the name of lead singer Ian Astbury's previous band Southern Death Cult. They gained a dedicated following in the United Kingdom in the mid-1980s as a post-punk/gothic rock band, with singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary", before breaking into the mainstream in the United States in the late 1980s establishing themselves as a hard rock band with singles such as "Love Removal Machine". Since its initial formation in 1983, the band have had various line-ups; the longest-serving members are Astbury and guitarist Billy Duffy, who are also the band's two songwriters.
The Cult's debut studio album Dreamtime was released in 1984 to moderate success, with its lead single "Spiritwalker" reaching No. 1 on the UK Indie Chart. Their second studio album, Love (1985), was even more successful, charting at No. 4 in the UK and including singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary" and "Rain". The band's third album, Electric (1987), launched them new heights of success, also peaking at No. 4 in the UK and charting highly in other territories, and spawned the hit singles "Love Removal Machine", "Lil' Devil" and "Wild Flower". On that album, The Cult supplemented their post-punk sound with hard rock; the polish on this new sound was facilitated by producer Rick Rubin. After moving to Los Angeles, California, where the band has been based for the remainder of their career, The Cult continued the musical experimentation of Electric with its follow-up album Sonic Temple (1989), which marked their first collaboration with Bob Rock, who would produce several of the band's subsequent albums. Sonic Temple was their most successful album to that point, entering the Top 10 on the UK and US charts, and included one of the band's most popular songs "Fire Woman".
By the time of their fifth album Ceremony (1991), tensions and creative differences began to surface among the band members. This resulted in the recording sessions for Ceremony being held without a stable lineup, leaving Astbury and Duffy as the only two official members left, and featuring support from session musicians on bass and drums. The ongoing tension had carried over within the next four years, during which they released one more studio album, The Cult (1994), and called it quits in 1995. The Cult reformed in 1999 and released their seventh album Beyond Good and Evil two years later. The commercial failure of the album and resurfaced tensions led to the band going back on hiatus in 2002. They resumed activity in 2006, and have since released three more studio albums: Born into This (2007), Choice of Weapon (2012), and Hidden City (2016).
History
Early history (1981–1984)
The band's origins can be traced to 1981, in Bradford, Yorkshire, where vocalist and songwriter Ian Astbury formed a band called Southern Death Cult. The name was chosen with a double meaning, and was derived from the 14th-century Native American religion, the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex or Southern Death Cult as it was sometimes known, from the Mississippi delta area, but it was also a stab at what the band viewed was the centralisation of power in Southern England (including that of the music industry); there has long been a perceived notion of a North–South divide based on social, historic and economic reasons. Astbury was joined by Buzz Burrows (guitar), Barry Jepson (bass) and Aki Nawaz Qureshi (drums); they performed their first show at the Queen's Hall in their hometown of Bradford on 29 October 1981. The band were at the forefront of an emerging style of music, in the form of post-punk and gothic rock, they achieved critical acclaim from the press and music fans.
The band signed to independent record label Situation Two, an offshoot of Beggars Banquet Records, and released a three-track, triple A-side single, Moya, during this period. They toured through England headlining some shows and touring with Bauhaus and Theatre of Hate. The band played their final performance in Manchester during February 1983, meaning after only sixteen months the band was over. A compilation named The Southern Death Cult was released, this being a collection of the single, radio sessions with John Peel for Radio One and live performances - one of which an audience member recorded with a tape recorder.
In April 1983, Astbury teamed up with guitarist Billy Duffy and formed the band "Death Cult". Duffy had been in the Nosebleeds (along with Morrissey), Lonesome No More and then Theatre of Hate. In addition to Astbury and Duffy, the band also included Jamie Stewart (bass) and Raymond Taylor Smith (later known as Ray Mondo) (drums), both from the Harrow, London based post-punk band, Ritual. Death Cult made their live debut in Oslo, Norway on 25 July 1983 and also released the Death Cult EP in the same month, then toured through mainland Europe and Scotland. In September 1983, Mondo was deported to his home country of Sierra Leone and replaced by Nigel Preston, formerly of Theatre of Hate. The single "Gods Zoo" was released in October 1983. Another European tour, with UK dates, followed that autumn. To tone down their name's gothic connotations and gain broader appeal, the band changed its name to "the Cult" in January 1984 before appearing on the (UK) Channel 4 television show, The Tube.
The Cult's first studio record, Dreamtime, was recorded at Rockfield Studios, in Monmouth, Wales in 1984. The record was to be produced by Joe Julian, but after recording the drum tracks, the band decided to replace him with John Brand. Brand produced the record, but guitarist Duffy has said the drum tracks were produced by Julian, as Preston had become unreliable.
The band recorded the songs which later became known as "Butterflies", "(The) Gimmick", "A Flower in the Desert", "Horse Nation", "Spiritwalker", "Bad Medicine (Waltz)", "Dreamtime", "With Love" (later known as "Ship of Fools", and also "Sea and Sky"), "Bone Bag", "Too Young", "83rd Dream", and one untitled outtake. It is unknown what the outtake was, or whether it was developed into a song at a later date. Songs like "Horse Nation" showed Astbury's intense interest in Native American issues, with the lyrics to "Horse Nation", "See them prancing, they come neighing, to a horse nation", taken almost verbatim from the book Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, while "Spiritwalker" dealt with shamanism, and the record's title and title track are overtly influenced by Australian Aboriginal beliefs.
On 4 April 1984, the Cult released the single "Spiritwalker", which reached No. 1 on the independent charts in the UK, and acted as a teaser for their forthcoming album Dreamtime. This was followed that summer by a second single, "Go West (Crazy Spinning Circles)", before the release of Dreamtime in September; the album reached No. 21 in the UK, and sold over 100,000 copies in the UK alone. On 12 July 1984, the band recorded five songs at the BBC Maida Vale 5 studio for a Richard Skinner session. Before and after the album's release, the Cult toured throughout Europe and England before recording another single, "Ressurection Joe" (UK No. 74), released that December. Following a Christmas support slot with Big Country, the Cult toured Europe with support from the Mission (then called the Sisterhood). Dreamtime was released initially only in the UK, but after its success, and as the Cult's popularity grew worldwide, it was issued in approximately 30 countries.
Mainstream success (1985–1990)
In May 1985, the Cult released their fourth single, "She Sells Sanctuary", which peaked at No. 15 in the UK and spent 23 weeks in the Top 100. The song was recently voted No. 18 in VH1's Indie 100. In June 1985, following his increasingly erratic behaviour, Preston was fired from the band. Big Country's drummer Mark Brzezicki was picked to replace Preston, and was also included in the video for "She Sells Sanctuary". The Cult then finished recording their second album, Love in July and August 1985. The band's music and image shifted from their punk-oriented roots to 1960s psychedelia influences. Love was a chart success, peaking at No. 4 in the UK and selling 100,000 copies there toward a total of 500,000 copies throughout Europe, as well as 100,000 in Australia and 500,000 copies in the United States. Love reached number 20 on the charts in The Netherlands, where it remained for 32 weeks. To date, the record has sold over two and a half million copies worldwide.
From late September 1985 to June 1986, the band went on a worldwide tour with new drummer Les Warner (who had played with Julian Lennon and Johnny Thunders). Two more singles from the Love album followed; "Rain" (charting in the UK at No. 17) and "Revolution" (charting in the UK at No. 30). Neither charted in the US. Another single, "Nirvana", was issued only in Poland. The album version of "Rain", as well as the remix "(Here Comes the) Rain", were used in the Italian horror film Dèmoni 2. Once back in England, the band booked themselves into the Manor Studios in Oxfordshire, with producer Steve Brown (who had produced Love), and recorded over a dozen new songs. The band were unhappy with the sound of their new album, titled Peace, and they decided to go to New York so producer Rick Rubin could remix the first single, "Love Removal Machine".
Rubin agreed to work with the band, but only if they rerecorded the song. Rubin eventually talked them into rerecording the entire album. The band's record company, Beggars Banquet, was displeased with this, as two months and £250,000 had already been spent on the record. However, after hearing the initial New York recording, Beggars Banquet agreed to proceed. The first single, "Love Removal Machine", was released in February 1987, and the new version of the album appeared in April that year, now renamed as Electric, reaching No. 4 and eventually outselling Love. The band toured with Kid Chaos (also known as "Haggis" and "The Kid") on bass, with Stewart on rhythm guitar. Two more singles, "Lil Devil" and "Wild Flower", were released during 1987. A few tracks from the original Peace album appeared on the single versions of "Love Removal Machine", and "Lil Devil". The full Peace album would not be released until 2000, when it was included as Disc 3 of the Rare Cult box set.
In the US, the Cult, now consisting of Astbury, Duffy, Stewart, Warner and Kid Chaos, were supported by the then-unknown Guns N' Roses. The band also appeared at Roskilde Festival in Denmark in June 1987. When the world tour wound through Australia, the band wrecked £30,000 worth of equipment, and as a result they could not tour Japan, as no company would rent them new equipment. At the end of the tour the Electric album had been certified Gold in the UK, and sold roughly 3 million copies worldwide, but the band were barely speaking to each other by then. Haggis left the band at the end of the Electric tour to form the Four Horsemen for Rubin's Def American label. Astbury and Duffy fired Warner and their management team Grant/Edwards, and moved to Los Angeles with original bassist Stewart. Warner sued the band several times for his firing, as well as for what he felt were unpaid royalties due to him for his performance on the Electric album, resulting in lengthy court battles. The Cult signed a new management deal and wrote 21 new songs for their next record.
For the next album, Stewart returned to playing bass, and John Webster was brought in to play keyboards. The band used Chris Taylor to play drums during rehearsals and record the demos, with future Kiss drummer Eric Singer performing during the second demo recording sessions. The Cult eventually recruited session-drummer Mickey Curry to fill the drumming role and Aerosmith sound engineer, Bob Rock, to produce. Recorded in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada from October to December 1988, the Sonic Temple record went Top 10 in both the UK and the US, where it was certified Gold and Platinum respectively. The band went on tour in support of the new album and new single "Fire Woman" (UK No. 15) (NZ No. 1), with yet another new drummer, Matt Sorum, and Webster as keyboard player. The next single, "Edie (Ciao Baby)" (UK No. 25) has become a regular song at concerts for many years.
In Europe, the band toured with Aerosmith, and in the US, after releasing another single "Sun King" (UK No. 42), they spent 1989 touring in support of Metallica before heading out on their own headlining tour later that same year. A fourth single, "Sweet Soul Sister" (UK No. 38), was released in February 1990, with the video having been filmed at Wembley Arena, London, on 25 November 1989. "Sweet Soul Sister" was partially written in Paris and was inspired by the bohemian lifestyle of that city. Released as a single in February 1990, the song was another hit in the UK, and reportedly reached number one on the rock charts in Brazil. After playing a show in Atlanta, Georgia, in February 1990, the band's management told Astbury that his father had just died of cancer. As a result, the remainder of the tour was cancelled after a final leg of shows were performed in April. After the tour ended, the band were on the verge of splitting due to Stewart retiring and moving to Canada to be with his wife, and Sorum leaving to join Guns N' Roses.
In 1990, Astbury organized the Gathering of the Tribes festival in Los Angeles and San Francisco with artists such as Soundgarden, Ice-T, Indigo Girls, Queen Latifah, Iggy Pop, the Charlatans, the Cramps and Public Enemy appearing. This two-day festival drew 40,000 people. Also in 1990, a ten CD box set was released in the UK, containing rare songs from the Cult's singles. The CDs in this box set were all issued as picture discs with rice paper covers, housed in a white box called "Singles Collection", or a black box called "E.P. Collection '84 - '90". In 1991, director Oliver Stone offered Astbury the role of Jim Morrison in Stone's film The Doors. He declined the role because he was not happy with the way Morrison was represented in the film, and the role was ultimately played by Val Kilmer.
Ceremony and the lawsuit (1991–1993)
In 1991, Astbury and Duffy were writing again for their next album. During the demo recordings, Todd Hoffman and James Kottak played bass and drums, respectively. During the actual album recording sessions, Curry was recruited again to play drums, with Charley Drayton on bass, and various other performers. Astbury and Duffy's working relationship had disintegrated by that time, with the two men reportedly rarely even being in the studio together during recording. The resulting album Ceremony was released to mixed responses. The album climbed to US No. 34, but sales were not as impressive as the previous three records, only selling around one million copies worldwide. Only two official singles were released from the record: "Wild Hearted Son" (UK No. 34, Canada No. 41) and "Heart of Soul" (UK No. 50), although "White" was released as a single only in Canada, "Sweet Salvation" was released as a single (as "Dulce Salvación") in Argentina in 1992, and the title track "Ceremony" was released in Spain.
The Cult's Ceremonial Stomp tour went through Europe in 1991 and North America in 1992. In 1991 the Cult played a show at the Marquee Club in London, which was recorded and released in February 1993, packaged with some vinyl UK copies of their first greatest hits release. Only a handful of CD copies of it were ever manufactured originally, however it was subsequently reissued on CD in 1999. An incomplete bootleg video of this show is also in circulation.
The band were sued by the parents of the Native American boy pictured on the cover of Ceremony, for alleged exploitation and for the unauthorized use of the child's image. The parents stated that the boy felt he had been cursed by the band's burning of his image, and was "emotionally scarred." This image of the boy is also burned in the video for "Wild Hearted Son". This lawsuit delayed the release of Ceremony in many countries including South Korea and Thailand, which did not see the record's release until late 1992, and it was unreleased in Turkey until the Cult played several shows in Istanbul in June 1993.
A world tour followed with backing from drummer Michael Lee (Page & Plant, Little Angels), bassist Kinley "Barney" Wolfe (Lord Tracy, Black Oak Arkansas), and keyboardist John Sinclair (Ozzy Osbourne, Uriah Heep) returning one last time, and the Gathering of the Tribes moved to the UK. Here artists such as Pearl Jam performed. The warm-up gig to the show, in a small nightclub, was dedicated to the memory of Nigel Preston, who had died a few weeks earlier at the age of 28. Following the release of the single "The Witch" (#9 in Australia) and the performance of a song for the 1992 Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie soundtrack entitled "Zap City", produced by Steve Brown and originally a B-side to "Lil' Devil", two volumes of remixes of "She Sells Sanctuary", called Sanctuary Mixes MCMXCIII, volumes one and two, and in support of Pure Cult: for Rockers, Ravers, Lovers, and Sinners, a greatest hits compilation which debuted at No. 1 on the British charts and later went to number one in Portugal, Astbury and Duffy fired the "backing band" and recruited Craig Adams (the Mission) and Scott Garrett for performances across Europe in 1993, with some shows featuring Mike Dimkich on rhythm guitar. This tour marked the first time the band performed in Turkey, Greece, and the Slovak Republic.
The Cult and first breakup (1994–1998)
With the same line-up still in place, the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. The self-titled album is commonly referred to as the "Black Sheep" album by fans of the group, due to the image of a black sheep on the front cover. Astbury referred to the record as a collection of "very personal and very revealing" songs about his life, with the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, to his directionless years spent in Glasgow in the late 1970s.
The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. Duffy remarked that he thought that the record wouldn't sell well due to the offensive lyrics. The record went to number one in Portugal also, but quickly dropped out of sight. The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" was released with the band going on tour in support of the new album. Only one more single, "Star", was officially released with a live appearance on UK TV show The Word. "Star" began life in 1986 as "Tom Petty" and was recorded at the "Sonic Temple" demo sessions as "Starchild", being dropped by the band during rehearsals. In 1993 the song was resurrected and was finally completed for the record in 1994 as, just simply, "Star".
When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. As with the Ceremony record several years earlier, no other official singles were released, but several other songs were released on a strictly limited basis: "Sacred Life" was released in Spain and the Netherlands, "Be Free" was issued in Canada and France, "Saints Are Down" was issued in Greece, but none of the songs gained much commercial success. During this tour, the Cult made their first ever appearance in Norway.
During the Black Rain tour of South America in spring of 1995, despite the fact that several more new songs had already been recorded, the tour was cancelled after an appearance in Rio de Janeiro in March, and the band split up citing unspecified problems on a recent South American tour. Astbury started up a garage band called Holy Barbarians a few months later. The band made their debut at the 100 Club in London in February 1996 and released their first (and only) record in May 1996, and toured throughout North America and Europe for the rest of 1996. The band started writing material for a second record in 1997, but the band was dissolved and Astbury began writing and recording a solo record. Throughout 1997 and 1998 Astbury recorded his solo record, originally to be titled Natural Born Guerilla, later called High Time Amplifier. Ultimately the record remained unreleased until June 2000 when it was released under the name Spirit\Light\Speed. Astbury played one solo concert in 1999.
In November 1996, a number of CD reissues were released: the band's American record company released High Octane Cult, a slightly updated greatest hits compilation released only in the US and Japan; The Southern Death Cult, a remastered edition of the fifteen-song compilation CD; a ten-song compilation CD by Death Cult called Ghost Dance, consisting of the untitled four-song EP, the single "God's Zoo", and four unreleased songs from a radio broadcast; and a remastered repackaging of the Dreamtime album, containing only the ten original songs from the record in their original playing order and almost completely different but original artwork. Dreamtime Live at the Lyceum was also remastered and issued on video and for the first time on CD, with the one unreleased song from the concert, "Gimmick".
First reunion, Beyond Good and Evil and second hiatus (1999–2005)
In 1999, Astbury and Duffy reformed the Cult with Matt Sorum and ex-Porno for Pyros bassist Martyn LeNoble. Their first official concert was at the Tibetan Freedom Concert in June 1999, after having rehearsed at shows in the Los Angeles area. The band's 1999 Cult Rising reunion tour resulted in a sold out 30 date tour of the US, ending with 8 consecutive sold out nights at the LA House of Blues. In 2000, the band toured South Africa for the first time, and North and South America, and contributed the song "Painted on My Heart" to the soundtrack of the movie Gone In 60 Seconds. The song was featured prominently and the melody was fused into parts of the score. In June, Astbury's long-delayed solo record was finally released as Spirit\Light\Speed, but it failed to gain much success. In November 2000, another authorised greatest hits compilation was released, Pure Cult: The Singles 1984–1995, along with an accompanying DVD, which was later certified gold in Canada. The Cult, as well as Ian Astbury, performed on separate tracks on the Doors tribute album, Stoned Immaculate: The Music of The Doors, covering "Wild Child" and "Touch Me".
In November 2000, Beggars Banquet released 15,000 copies of a six-disc boxset (with a bonus seventh disc of remixes for the first 5000 copies) titled Rare Cult. The box set consists of album out-takes, demos, radio broadcasts, and album B-sides. It is most notable for including the previously unreleased "Peace" album in its entirety. In 2001, the band signed to Atlantic Records and recorded a new album, Beyond Good and Evil, originally being produced by Mick Jones of Foreigner, until Jones bowed out to tour with Foreigner. Astbury and Duffy co-wrote a song with Jones, an odd occurrence, as in the past, neither Astbury or Duffy would co-write their material. Bob Rock was the producer, with Martyn LeNoble and Chris Wyse as recording bassists, as Mike Dimkich played rhythm guitar on tour, and Matt Sorum returning as drummer. Although Sorum has previously toured with the band on the Sonic Temple tour in 1989, this was the first time that he had recorded a studio album with the band.
However Beyond Good and Evil was not the comeback record the band had hoped for. Despite reaching No. 37 in the US, No. 22 in Canada, and No. 25 in Spain, sales quickly dropped, only selling roughly 500,000 copies worldwide. The first single "Rise", reached No. 41 in the US, and No. 2 on the mainstream rock charts, but Atlantic Records quickly pulled the song from radio playlists. Astbury would later describe the experience with Atlantic to be "soul destroying", after Atlantic tried to tamper with the lyrics, the record cover, and choice of singles from the record.
After the first single from the record, the band's working relationship with Atlantic was on paper only, with Atlantic pulling "Rise" from the radio stations playlists, and stopping all promotion of the record. The second single "Breathe" was only released as a radio station promo, and the final single "True Believers" was only on a compilation sampler disc released in January 2002 (after the Cult's tour had already ended). Despite "True Believers" receiving radio airplay in Australia, both singles went largely unnoticed, and both Astbury and Duffy walked away from the project. LeNoble rejoined the band for the initial dates in early 2001, and Billy Morrison filled in on bass for the majority of the 2001 tour.
The European tour of 2001 was canceled, largely due to security concerns after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the band flew back to the US to tour again with Aerosmith. But the eleven-week tour was considered by fans to be a disaster, as the band played only a brief rundown of their greatest hits. In October 2001, a show at the Grand Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles was filmed for release on DVD. After the tour ended in December 2001, the band took most of 2002 off, apart from a few shows in the US to promote the release of the DVD, with Scott Garrett and Craig Adams rejoining the band.
Despite the commercial disappointment of Beyond Good and Evil and the supporting tour, the band was voted "Comeback of the Year" by Metal Edge readers in the magazine's 2001 Readers' Choice Awards.
In late 2002, Ian Astbury declared the Cult to be "on ice" indefinitely, after performing a brief series of dates in October 2002 to promote the release of the Music Without Fear DVD. During this second hiatus, Astbury performed as a member of the Doors (later dubbed the Doors of the 21st Century, later still renamed D21c, and most recently known as Riders on the Storm) with two of the original members of that group. D21c was sued numerous times, both by Jim Morrison's family and by drummer John Densmore. Astbury supposedly started work on recording another solo album that later became the backbone for the Cult's Born into This.
At the same time, Duffy was part of Coloursound with bassist Craig Adams and ex-Alarm frontman Mike Peters, then Dead Men Walking (again with Peters) and later Cardboard Vampyres. Sorum became a member of the hard rock supergroup Velvet Revolver. In 2003, all of the Cult's records were issued on CD, with several bonus tracks being issued on the Russian, Belarusian, and Lithuanian versions. These eastern European releases had many printing mistakes on the jacket sleeves and lyric inserts. In October 2004, all of the Cult's records were again remastered and issued again on CD, this time in Japan in different cardboard foldout sleeves. "She Sells Sanctuary" appeared in the 2002 video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, playing on rock station V-Rock.
Second reunion, Born Into This and Capsule EPs (2006–2010)
Despite Astbury's previous statement from 2004 that a reunion would not happen, The Cult announced in January 2006 that they were reuniting for "some limited gigs" throughout the year. A month later, the band made their first live appearance in three-and-a-half years on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson. Their lineup consisted of Astbury (vocals), Duffy (lead guitar), John Tempesta (drums), Dimkich (rhythm guitar) and Wyse (returning as bassist). Their first stage show was held in March 2006 in San Francisco, California, at The Fillmore. The entire tour was recorded by Instant Live and sold after each show. In May, they did an eight date tour in Canada. Later that summer, they toured central and eastern Europe and played their first concerts in Bulgaria, Poland and Serbia. An eleven-date UK tour followed as well as several more dates in the United States, finishing with a South American tour in December. That year, Duffy began the band Circus Diablo with Billy Morrison, Sorum, Brett Scallions and Ricky Warwick.
During these tours, the band occasionally played an extended set, including several songs the band had not performed in decades: "King Contrary Man" and "Hollow Man", neither of which had been performed since 1987; also, "Libertine" was performed approximately three times, for the first time since 2000, and "Brother Wolf, Sister Moon", which was only performed one time since 1986 (for this particular song, the band played an abridged version which has never been performed before or since)
Astbury announced in February 2007 that he was leaving Riders on the Storm and returning to the Cult. He stated: "I have decided to move on and focus on my own music and legacy." The Cult was featured on Stuffmagazine.com's list of ultimate air guitar players. On 21 March 2007, it was announced that the band would be touring Europe with the Who. The first confirmed tour date was in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, in early June, with at least a dozen shows set to follow. The band played a gig in London's West End at the CC Club on 7 June 2007, along with nearly two dozen shows across continental Europe during summer. The tour also includes the first performance in Romania and Croatia.
On 29 May 2007, the band signed a deal with major metal label Roadrunner Records. Their 8th studio album, titled Born into This was released on 16 October, and was produced by Martin "Youth" Glover, bass player for Killing Joke. Born into This was released as regular single disc and limited edition double disc, the second disk being a bonus 5-track CD holding the following tracks: "Stand Alone", "War Pony Destroyer", "I Assassin (Demo)", "Sound of Destruction (Demo)" and "Savages (Extended Version)". Prior to the album's release, the band played festival and headline dates, and supported the Who in Europe through summer 2007, with a US headline tour to follow.
The band's appearance at Irving Plaza in New York City in early November 2006 was filmed and was released in 2007. The Cult New York City, issued by Fontana North and is the Cult's first high definition DVD release. Meanwhile, Astbury lent vocals on two tracks of the 2007 Unkle album "War Stories", one of them being the first single from the album, "Burn My Shadow".
The band performed a UK and European tour in late-February and early-March 2008. On 24 March, they began their North American tour including a major 13-city tour in Canada. During September 2008, the Cult did a brief series of dates in the northeast United States, and they toured in Brazil as part of the South American tour in October 2008. As of May 2008, according to The Gauntlet, the Cult are currently unsigned and no longer under contract with Roadrunner Records. In October 2008, it was announced that the Cult would headline the inaugural Rock 'n' Roll Marathon in San Antonio, to be run 16 November 2008. The Cult announced plans for a tour showcasing their 1985 Love album across the US and then the UK in October where they will play at the Royal Albert Hall.
Coinciding with the remastered Love album and four-disc Omnibus boxed set, the Cult kicked off the long-awaited Love Live Tour in late summer. Performing their classic Love album in its entirety, each show was played with the Love tracks opening with "Nirvana" to "Black Angel". A quick intermission followed, then other Cult hits were played (varying by venue): "Sun King", "Dirty Little Rock Star", "Electric Ocean", "Illuminated". Then followed the favorites "Fire Woman", "Lil Devil", "Wild Flower", and lastly "Love Removal Machine". In the evening of 10 October 2009 at the Royal Albert Hall in London, the band performed a second encore with original Cult bassist Jamie Stewart and drummer Mark Brzezicki, who played drums with the band during the Love album recording sessions in July and August 1985. The band sold Love Live USB flash drives for each show during the tour.
The Cult entered 2010 continuing their Love Live Tour and announcing more dates in the United States, New Zealand, Australia, and Japan. The band finished recording a four-track "Capsule" with producer Chris Goss. Capsule 1 was said to be the first of three or four to be released sometime in summer 2010. Release formats include CD-DVD dualdisc, 12-inch vinyl, and digital downloads. Capsule 1 was released on 14 September 2010. The band officially announced the release of its first new studio recording since 2007, "Every Man And Woman Is A Star". The new single was released through the iTunes Store on 31 July 2010.
On 1 August 2010, the band played the sold-out music festival Sonisphere, which marked their first UK performance since the tour for their Love album. During the performance they debuted their new single, "Every Man and Woman is a Star", which was released on 1 August 2010. On 14 September 2010 the band embarked on a new U.S. tour and released Capsule 1 in conjunction with media technology company Aderra Inc. and made it available in multiple formats including a CD-DVD DualDisc, USB flash drive, 12 inch vinyl, FLAC download and MP3 download. The collection includes a short film made by singer Ian Astbury and Rick Rogers.
On 26 October 2010 the band and Aderra Inc. announced the release of a new song, "Embers", for 1 November 2010 and Capsule 2 available through their web store on 16 November 2010. Pictures from the Cult's tour stop in Chicago on 28 October 2010 can be seen at a local radio station website.
On 17 September 2010, the band performed live at the Fall Frenzy concert at the Tempe Beach Park in Tempe, Arizona. Other bands that played at this concert were Stone Temple Pilots, Shinedown, and Sevendust.
On 4 December 2010, the band performed a live set for Guitar Center Sessions on DirecTV. The episode included an interview with the band by program host, Nic Harcourt.
Choice of Weapon and Hidden City (2011–2017)
During the Cult's concert at the Hammersmith Apollo in London on 21 January 2011 Ian Astbury declared that the Cult would be recording a new album directly after the tour. They also announced that they would be working with Chris Goss, who performed with Masters of Reality as a supporting act the same evening. On 11 May 2011, it was announced that the Cult were signed to Cooking Vinyl Records, who will release the new album in early 2012. Commented guitarist Billy Duffy: "We are very much looking forward to returning to our U.K. roots in many ways working with Cooking Vinyl." Vocalist Ian Astbury added, "We look forward to a long and fruitful relationship with Cooking Vinyl." By May 2011, the band had been writing and recording new demos at its Witch Mountain studio hideaway in the Hollywood Hills, and began recording their new album at Hollywood Recording Studios. In October 2011, bassist Chris Wyse stated the album was almost finished and expected to be released in April 2012. Chris also described it as a "Zep/Stooges mix of energy."
On 29 November 2011, it was announced that the album would be produced by Bob Rock, who provided the same role on Sonic Temple, The Cult and Beyond Good and Evil. The album, entitled Choice of Weapon, was released on 22 May 2012. The band partnered with Rolling Stone to premiere the first song from the album titled Lucifer on 30 January. On 5 February 2012, the Cult song "She Sells Sanctuary" was used as the soundtrack for a Budweiser commercial in a mashup with Flo Rida aired during Super Bowl XLVI. In May 2012 the Cult appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and played "For The Animals".
On 28 September 2012, it was announced that the band would release Weapon of Choice, a "prequel" album to accompany the band's latest album, Choice of Weapon. The digital-only release, available exclusively on iTunes for two months only beginning 16 October, features the songs that were ultimately included in "Choice Of Weapon" at an earlier stage of development. Explaining the motivations behind the release, singer Ian Astbury said that "These songs were turned over and over, forged in long rehearsals and writing sessions, and emanated from challenges both personal and professional. We put our guts into this; [Producer Chris] Goss was able to create an environment where the songs were born through playing and turning over lyrics, through hard work and intense sessions." Astbury added "These songs have an integrity and rawness of their own. In many ways it's a different album to the one we released and reveals the foundations of 'Choice Of Weapon'. We were able to close the doors and begin to explore spaces we had not been in for a while." The song "Twisted and Bleeding" was made available for free download at the band's website ahead of the full digital release.
On 20 June 2013, the band announced the release of Electric-Peace which comprises the entire Electric album plus the Peace album which was previously released on the now discontinued Rare Cult box set in 2000. It is due for release in the US on 30 July. In 2013 Mike Dimkich left the band and joined Bad Religion to cover for guitarist Greg Hetson. James Stevenson, from the Beauty's On The Streets tour in 1994, replaced Dimkich as the Cult's rhythm guitarist.
In March 2013, Billy Duffy told the Argentinan journalist Fabrizio Pedrotti that the Cult had begun work on a new album for a 2014 release. The band were expected to begin work on the album after they finish their 2013 world tour, where they played the Electric album in its entirety. In August 2014, Billy added that the next album, which was not expected to be released before 2015 at the earliest, "will be more guitar heavy".
On 5 November 2015, it was announced that The Cult would release their new album, entitled Hidden City, on 5 February 2016. The album is said to be the final part of a trilogy that began with Born into This, and marks the fifth time Bob Rock had produced a Cult album. The band also announced that they had hired Australian-born bassist Grant Fitzpatrick (ex-Mink) as the replacement for Chris Wyse. Chris Chaney (Jane's Addiction, Camp Freddy) and producer Bob Rock performed session bass on the album. In support of Hidden City, The Cult opened for Guns N' Roses on the Not in This Lifetime... Tour.
In an October 2016 interview with PopMatters journalist J.C. Maçek III, Cult guitarist Billy Duffy spoke of the band's playlist while on tour, saying "Obviously you want to make an impactful [show]," he continues. "There are some practical, pragmatic decisions made. If you're playing to a crowd who are not very familiar with you, there's no point of going too deep but we do always make sure we play a new song. Like on Guns N' Roses' [tour] we had fifty minutes which is ten songs all in. So, you know we just made sure that in those ten songs we played 'Deeply Ordered Chaos' which we’re proud of and it makes a certain statement. And it just alerts people to the fact that, yes, we have made a record in the last 30 years. You know and that's a good thing. Psychologically, that's the blood transfusion that we need. And we're very mindful, we have a very loyal fan base. We don't pander as you well know."
Upcoming eleventh studio album (2018–present)
In an April 2018 interview with Guitar World, guitarist Billy Duffy was asked if another album from The Cult was in the works. He replied, "Never say never! Ian and I enjoy the process of making new music, and we feel it's vital to keep the band healthy, even if it's pretty much in the law of diminishing returns area now. Who knows if it will be a whole album a series of singles or an EP? I can say new Cult music will be forthcoming, but these days we don't rush it as there's no point. Quality is key. We are past the point of having to release stuff so if we feel it's good enough, then we will release it in some shape or another."
On 2 April 2018, a tour of the United States of America called "Revolution 3 Tour" was announced for the summer. They performed as one of the three headliners, along with Stone Temple Pilots and Bush.
In April 2019, The Cult announced that they would celebrate the 30th anniversary of the release of their fourth album Sonic Temple with a world tour, which began on 2 May in Houston, Texas and was expected to wrap up in 2020.
In a June 2019 interview with LA Weekly, vocalist Ian Astbury stated that The Cult were "long overdue" to release new music. He was quoted as saying: "We do have some stuff we've been working on, but it's yet to see the light of day." Six months later, Astbury told Atlantic City Weekly that the band was going to start working on new music in 2020: "We've got a few pieces lying around in various stages of completion. The intention is to get together in the New Year and take a look at what we've got and decide how we are going to go about moving forward. It's an essential part of any creative lifeblood." On May 6, 2020, The Cult announced on their Twitter page that they had signed to Black Hill Records.
On August 15, 2020, Duffy announced on his Twitter that the band were recording their new album with producer Tom Dalgety at Rockfield Studios, where The Cult had recorded their debut album Dreamtime 36 years earlier.
In support of their new album, The Cult will embark on a co-headlining six-date UK tour with Alice Cooper in May and June 2022.
Influences
Duffy and Astbury cited among their influences a lot of different bands "from the Doors to Led Zeppelin. We literally went from the front of our record collections to the back. And then along the way we were drawn in by the likes of Public Image Ltd, Joy Division and Siouxsie and the Banshees. You might not hear it in the music but it's there." They also cited Bauhaus among many other post-punk influences. Duffy also praised Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers for a major performance he attended in 1977 and Siouxsie and the Banshees whom "always had great guitar players with killer riffs." Duffy also hailed AC/DC for "the power of a good three chord riff", Pete Townshend of the Who "in terms of commitment to stage performing" and Brian May of Queen for using "‘echoplex’ tape delays to orchestrate his own solo".
Musical style
According to music critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the band fuse a "hardcore punk revivalist" sound with the "pseudo-mysticism ... of the Doors and Uriah Heep and the guitar-orchestrations of Led Zeppelin and The Cure ... while adding touches of post-punk goth rock". In 1985 Astbury said, "Our music is just melodies and guitars. We're like Big Country and U2, only better!".
Members
Current members
Ian Astbury – lead vocals, occasional percussion/guitar
Billy Duffy – lead and rhythm guitars, backing vocals
John Tempesta – drums, percussion
Grant Fitzpatrick – bass, backing vocals
Damon Fox – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals
Discography
Dreamtime (1984)
Love (1985)
Electric (1987)
Sonic Temple (1989)
Ceremony (1991)
The Cult (1994)
Beyond Good and Evil (2001)
Born into This (2007)
Choice of Weapon (2012)
Hidden City (2016)
References
External links
Official website
Billy Duffy official website
Musical groups established in 1983
Situation Two artists
Beggars Banquet Records artists
Sire Records artists
Musical groups from Bradford
English post-punk music groups
English gothic rock groups
English hard rock musical groups
English heavy metal musical groups
English glam metal musical groups | true | [
"Le Cousin is a 1997 French film directed by Alain Corneau.\n\nPlot \nThe film deals with the relationship of the police and an informant in the drug scene.\n\nAwards and nominations\nLe Cousin was nominated for 5 César Awards but did not win in any category.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1997 films\n1997 crime films\nFilms about drugs\nFilms directed by Alain Corneau\nFrench crime films\nFrench films\nFrench-language films",
"The African National Congress was a political party in Trinidad and Tobago. The party first contested national elections in 1961, when it received just 0.5% of the vote and failed to win a seat. They did not put forward any candidates for the 1966 elections, but returned for the 1971 elections, in which they received 2.4% of the vote, but again failed to win a seat as the People's National Movement won all 36. The party did not contest any further elections.\n\nReferences\n\nDefunct political parties in Trinidad and Tobago"
] |
[
"The Cult",
"The Cult (1994-1995)",
"What was the Cult?",
"the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock.",
"How did i do in the charts?",
"The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK.",
"Was there any hit songs released on that album?",
"The single \"Coming Down (Drug Tongue)\"",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar.",
"Did they win any awards?",
"none of the songs gained much commercial success."
] | C_669b70745be5429da8c672a9282a7461_0 | Did the band split up? | 6 | Did The Cult split up? | The Cult | With the same line-up still in place, the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. The self-titled 'Cult' album is commonly referred to as the 'Black Sheep' album by fans of the group. Astbury referred to the record as "very personal and very revealing" songs about his life, with the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, to his directionless years spent in Glasgow in the late 1970s. The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. Duffy remarked that he thought that the record wouldn't sell well due to the offensive lyrics. The record went to number one in Portugal also, but quickly dropped out of sight. The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" was released with the band going on tour in support of the new album. Only one more single, "Star", was officially released with a live appearance on UK TV show The Word. "Star" began life in 1986 as "Tom Petty" and was recorded at the "Sonic Temple" demo sessions as "Starchild", being dropped by the band during rehearsals. In 1993 the song was resurrected and was finally completed for the record in 1994 as, just simply, "Star". When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. As with the Ceremony record several years earlier, no other official singles were released, but several other songs were released on a strictly limited basis: "Sacred Life" was released in Spain and the Netherlands, "Be Free" was issued in Canada and France, "Saints Are Down" was issued in Greece, but none of the songs gained much commercial success. During this tour, the Cult made their first ever appearance in Norway. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | The Cult are an English rock band formed in 1983 in Bradford, West Yorkshire. Before settling on their current name in January 1984, the band performed under the name Death Cult, which was an evolution of the name of lead singer Ian Astbury's previous band Southern Death Cult. They gained a dedicated following in the United Kingdom in the mid-1980s as a post-punk/gothic rock band, with singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary", before breaking into the mainstream in the United States in the late 1980s establishing themselves as a hard rock band with singles such as "Love Removal Machine". Since its initial formation in 1983, the band have had various line-ups; the longest-serving members are Astbury and guitarist Billy Duffy, who are also the band's two songwriters.
The Cult's debut studio album Dreamtime was released in 1984 to moderate success, with its lead single "Spiritwalker" reaching No. 1 on the UK Indie Chart. Their second studio album, Love (1985), was even more successful, charting at No. 4 in the UK and including singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary" and "Rain". The band's third album, Electric (1987), launched them new heights of success, also peaking at No. 4 in the UK and charting highly in other territories, and spawned the hit singles "Love Removal Machine", "Lil' Devil" and "Wild Flower". On that album, The Cult supplemented their post-punk sound with hard rock; the polish on this new sound was facilitated by producer Rick Rubin. After moving to Los Angeles, California, where the band has been based for the remainder of their career, The Cult continued the musical experimentation of Electric with its follow-up album Sonic Temple (1989), which marked their first collaboration with Bob Rock, who would produce several of the band's subsequent albums. Sonic Temple was their most successful album to that point, entering the Top 10 on the UK and US charts, and included one of the band's most popular songs "Fire Woman".
By the time of their fifth album Ceremony (1991), tensions and creative differences began to surface among the band members. This resulted in the recording sessions for Ceremony being held without a stable lineup, leaving Astbury and Duffy as the only two official members left, and featuring support from session musicians on bass and drums. The ongoing tension had carried over within the next four years, during which they released one more studio album, The Cult (1994), and called it quits in 1995. The Cult reformed in 1999 and released their seventh album Beyond Good and Evil two years later. The commercial failure of the album and resurfaced tensions led to the band going back on hiatus in 2002. They resumed activity in 2006, and have since released three more studio albums: Born into This (2007), Choice of Weapon (2012), and Hidden City (2016).
History
Early history (1981–1984)
The band's origins can be traced to 1981, in Bradford, Yorkshire, where vocalist and songwriter Ian Astbury formed a band called Southern Death Cult. The name was chosen with a double meaning, and was derived from the 14th-century Native American religion, the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex or Southern Death Cult as it was sometimes known, from the Mississippi delta area, but it was also a stab at what the band viewed was the centralisation of power in Southern England (including that of the music industry); there has long been a perceived notion of a North–South divide based on social, historic and economic reasons. Astbury was joined by Buzz Burrows (guitar), Barry Jepson (bass) and Aki Nawaz Qureshi (drums); they performed their first show at the Queen's Hall in their hometown of Bradford on 29 October 1981. The band were at the forefront of an emerging style of music, in the form of post-punk and gothic rock, they achieved critical acclaim from the press and music fans.
The band signed to independent record label Situation Two, an offshoot of Beggars Banquet Records, and released a three-track, triple A-side single, Moya, during this period. They toured through England headlining some shows and touring with Bauhaus and Theatre of Hate. The band played their final performance in Manchester during February 1983, meaning after only sixteen months the band was over. A compilation named The Southern Death Cult was released, this being a collection of the single, radio sessions with John Peel for Radio One and live performances - one of which an audience member recorded with a tape recorder.
In April 1983, Astbury teamed up with guitarist Billy Duffy and formed the band "Death Cult". Duffy had been in the Nosebleeds (along with Morrissey), Lonesome No More and then Theatre of Hate. In addition to Astbury and Duffy, the band also included Jamie Stewart (bass) and Raymond Taylor Smith (later known as Ray Mondo) (drums), both from the Harrow, London based post-punk band, Ritual. Death Cult made their live debut in Oslo, Norway on 25 July 1983 and also released the Death Cult EP in the same month, then toured through mainland Europe and Scotland. In September 1983, Mondo was deported to his home country of Sierra Leone and replaced by Nigel Preston, formerly of Theatre of Hate. The single "Gods Zoo" was released in October 1983. Another European tour, with UK dates, followed that autumn. To tone down their name's gothic connotations and gain broader appeal, the band changed its name to "the Cult" in January 1984 before appearing on the (UK) Channel 4 television show, The Tube.
The Cult's first studio record, Dreamtime, was recorded at Rockfield Studios, in Monmouth, Wales in 1984. The record was to be produced by Joe Julian, but after recording the drum tracks, the band decided to replace him with John Brand. Brand produced the record, but guitarist Duffy has said the drum tracks were produced by Julian, as Preston had become unreliable.
The band recorded the songs which later became known as "Butterflies", "(The) Gimmick", "A Flower in the Desert", "Horse Nation", "Spiritwalker", "Bad Medicine (Waltz)", "Dreamtime", "With Love" (later known as "Ship of Fools", and also "Sea and Sky"), "Bone Bag", "Too Young", "83rd Dream", and one untitled outtake. It is unknown what the outtake was, or whether it was developed into a song at a later date. Songs like "Horse Nation" showed Astbury's intense interest in Native American issues, with the lyrics to "Horse Nation", "See them prancing, they come neighing, to a horse nation", taken almost verbatim from the book Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, while "Spiritwalker" dealt with shamanism, and the record's title and title track are overtly influenced by Australian Aboriginal beliefs.
On 4 April 1984, the Cult released the single "Spiritwalker", which reached No. 1 on the independent charts in the UK, and acted as a teaser for their forthcoming album Dreamtime. This was followed that summer by a second single, "Go West (Crazy Spinning Circles)", before the release of Dreamtime in September; the album reached No. 21 in the UK, and sold over 100,000 copies in the UK alone. On 12 July 1984, the band recorded five songs at the BBC Maida Vale 5 studio for a Richard Skinner session. Before and after the album's release, the Cult toured throughout Europe and England before recording another single, "Ressurection Joe" (UK No. 74), released that December. Following a Christmas support slot with Big Country, the Cult toured Europe with support from the Mission (then called the Sisterhood). Dreamtime was released initially only in the UK, but after its success, and as the Cult's popularity grew worldwide, it was issued in approximately 30 countries.
Mainstream success (1985–1990)
In May 1985, the Cult released their fourth single, "She Sells Sanctuary", which peaked at No. 15 in the UK and spent 23 weeks in the Top 100. The song was recently voted No. 18 in VH1's Indie 100. In June 1985, following his increasingly erratic behaviour, Preston was fired from the band. Big Country's drummer Mark Brzezicki was picked to replace Preston, and was also included in the video for "She Sells Sanctuary". The Cult then finished recording their second album, Love in July and August 1985. The band's music and image shifted from their punk-oriented roots to 1960s psychedelia influences. Love was a chart success, peaking at No. 4 in the UK and selling 100,000 copies there toward a total of 500,000 copies throughout Europe, as well as 100,000 in Australia and 500,000 copies in the United States. Love reached number 20 on the charts in The Netherlands, where it remained for 32 weeks. To date, the record has sold over two and a half million copies worldwide.
From late September 1985 to June 1986, the band went on a worldwide tour with new drummer Les Warner (who had played with Julian Lennon and Johnny Thunders). Two more singles from the Love album followed; "Rain" (charting in the UK at No. 17) and "Revolution" (charting in the UK at No. 30). Neither charted in the US. Another single, "Nirvana", was issued only in Poland. The album version of "Rain", as well as the remix "(Here Comes the) Rain", were used in the Italian horror film Dèmoni 2. Once back in England, the band booked themselves into the Manor Studios in Oxfordshire, with producer Steve Brown (who had produced Love), and recorded over a dozen new songs. The band were unhappy with the sound of their new album, titled Peace, and they decided to go to New York so producer Rick Rubin could remix the first single, "Love Removal Machine".
Rubin agreed to work with the band, but only if they rerecorded the song. Rubin eventually talked them into rerecording the entire album. The band's record company, Beggars Banquet, was displeased with this, as two months and £250,000 had already been spent on the record. However, after hearing the initial New York recording, Beggars Banquet agreed to proceed. The first single, "Love Removal Machine", was released in February 1987, and the new version of the album appeared in April that year, now renamed as Electric, reaching No. 4 and eventually outselling Love. The band toured with Kid Chaos (also known as "Haggis" and "The Kid") on bass, with Stewart on rhythm guitar. Two more singles, "Lil Devil" and "Wild Flower", were released during 1987. A few tracks from the original Peace album appeared on the single versions of "Love Removal Machine", and "Lil Devil". The full Peace album would not be released until 2000, when it was included as Disc 3 of the Rare Cult box set.
In the US, the Cult, now consisting of Astbury, Duffy, Stewart, Warner and Kid Chaos, were supported by the then-unknown Guns N' Roses. The band also appeared at Roskilde Festival in Denmark in June 1987. When the world tour wound through Australia, the band wrecked £30,000 worth of equipment, and as a result they could not tour Japan, as no company would rent them new equipment. At the end of the tour the Electric album had been certified Gold in the UK, and sold roughly 3 million copies worldwide, but the band were barely speaking to each other by then. Haggis left the band at the end of the Electric tour to form the Four Horsemen for Rubin's Def American label. Astbury and Duffy fired Warner and their management team Grant/Edwards, and moved to Los Angeles with original bassist Stewart. Warner sued the band several times for his firing, as well as for what he felt were unpaid royalties due to him for his performance on the Electric album, resulting in lengthy court battles. The Cult signed a new management deal and wrote 21 new songs for their next record.
For the next album, Stewart returned to playing bass, and John Webster was brought in to play keyboards. The band used Chris Taylor to play drums during rehearsals and record the demos, with future Kiss drummer Eric Singer performing during the second demo recording sessions. The Cult eventually recruited session-drummer Mickey Curry to fill the drumming role and Aerosmith sound engineer, Bob Rock, to produce. Recorded in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada from October to December 1988, the Sonic Temple record went Top 10 in both the UK and the US, where it was certified Gold and Platinum respectively. The band went on tour in support of the new album and new single "Fire Woman" (UK No. 15) (NZ No. 1), with yet another new drummer, Matt Sorum, and Webster as keyboard player. The next single, "Edie (Ciao Baby)" (UK No. 25) has become a regular song at concerts for many years.
In Europe, the band toured with Aerosmith, and in the US, after releasing another single "Sun King" (UK No. 42), they spent 1989 touring in support of Metallica before heading out on their own headlining tour later that same year. A fourth single, "Sweet Soul Sister" (UK No. 38), was released in February 1990, with the video having been filmed at Wembley Arena, London, on 25 November 1989. "Sweet Soul Sister" was partially written in Paris and was inspired by the bohemian lifestyle of that city. Released as a single in February 1990, the song was another hit in the UK, and reportedly reached number one on the rock charts in Brazil. After playing a show in Atlanta, Georgia, in February 1990, the band's management told Astbury that his father had just died of cancer. As a result, the remainder of the tour was cancelled after a final leg of shows were performed in April. After the tour ended, the band were on the verge of splitting due to Stewart retiring and moving to Canada to be with his wife, and Sorum leaving to join Guns N' Roses.
In 1990, Astbury organized the Gathering of the Tribes festival in Los Angeles and San Francisco with artists such as Soundgarden, Ice-T, Indigo Girls, Queen Latifah, Iggy Pop, the Charlatans, the Cramps and Public Enemy appearing. This two-day festival drew 40,000 people. Also in 1990, a ten CD box set was released in the UK, containing rare songs from the Cult's singles. The CDs in this box set were all issued as picture discs with rice paper covers, housed in a white box called "Singles Collection", or a black box called "E.P. Collection '84 - '90". In 1991, director Oliver Stone offered Astbury the role of Jim Morrison in Stone's film The Doors. He declined the role because he was not happy with the way Morrison was represented in the film, and the role was ultimately played by Val Kilmer.
Ceremony and the lawsuit (1991–1993)
In 1991, Astbury and Duffy were writing again for their next album. During the demo recordings, Todd Hoffman and James Kottak played bass and drums, respectively. During the actual album recording sessions, Curry was recruited again to play drums, with Charley Drayton on bass, and various other performers. Astbury and Duffy's working relationship had disintegrated by that time, with the two men reportedly rarely even being in the studio together during recording. The resulting album Ceremony was released to mixed responses. The album climbed to US No. 34, but sales were not as impressive as the previous three records, only selling around one million copies worldwide. Only two official singles were released from the record: "Wild Hearted Son" (UK No. 34, Canada No. 41) and "Heart of Soul" (UK No. 50), although "White" was released as a single only in Canada, "Sweet Salvation" was released as a single (as "Dulce Salvación") in Argentina in 1992, and the title track "Ceremony" was released in Spain.
The Cult's Ceremonial Stomp tour went through Europe in 1991 and North America in 1992. In 1991 the Cult played a show at the Marquee Club in London, which was recorded and released in February 1993, packaged with some vinyl UK copies of their first greatest hits release. Only a handful of CD copies of it were ever manufactured originally, however it was subsequently reissued on CD in 1999. An incomplete bootleg video of this show is also in circulation.
The band were sued by the parents of the Native American boy pictured on the cover of Ceremony, for alleged exploitation and for the unauthorized use of the child's image. The parents stated that the boy felt he had been cursed by the band's burning of his image, and was "emotionally scarred." This image of the boy is also burned in the video for "Wild Hearted Son". This lawsuit delayed the release of Ceremony in many countries including South Korea and Thailand, which did not see the record's release until late 1992, and it was unreleased in Turkey until the Cult played several shows in Istanbul in June 1993.
A world tour followed with backing from drummer Michael Lee (Page & Plant, Little Angels), bassist Kinley "Barney" Wolfe (Lord Tracy, Black Oak Arkansas), and keyboardist John Sinclair (Ozzy Osbourne, Uriah Heep) returning one last time, and the Gathering of the Tribes moved to the UK. Here artists such as Pearl Jam performed. The warm-up gig to the show, in a small nightclub, was dedicated to the memory of Nigel Preston, who had died a few weeks earlier at the age of 28. Following the release of the single "The Witch" (#9 in Australia) and the performance of a song for the 1992 Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie soundtrack entitled "Zap City", produced by Steve Brown and originally a B-side to "Lil' Devil", two volumes of remixes of "She Sells Sanctuary", called Sanctuary Mixes MCMXCIII, volumes one and two, and in support of Pure Cult: for Rockers, Ravers, Lovers, and Sinners, a greatest hits compilation which debuted at No. 1 on the British charts and later went to number one in Portugal, Astbury and Duffy fired the "backing band" and recruited Craig Adams (the Mission) and Scott Garrett for performances across Europe in 1993, with some shows featuring Mike Dimkich on rhythm guitar. This tour marked the first time the band performed in Turkey, Greece, and the Slovak Republic.
The Cult and first breakup (1994–1998)
With the same line-up still in place, the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. The self-titled album is commonly referred to as the "Black Sheep" album by fans of the group, due to the image of a black sheep on the front cover. Astbury referred to the record as a collection of "very personal and very revealing" songs about his life, with the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, to his directionless years spent in Glasgow in the late 1970s.
The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. Duffy remarked that he thought that the record wouldn't sell well due to the offensive lyrics. The record went to number one in Portugal also, but quickly dropped out of sight. The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" was released with the band going on tour in support of the new album. Only one more single, "Star", was officially released with a live appearance on UK TV show The Word. "Star" began life in 1986 as "Tom Petty" and was recorded at the "Sonic Temple" demo sessions as "Starchild", being dropped by the band during rehearsals. In 1993 the song was resurrected and was finally completed for the record in 1994 as, just simply, "Star".
When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. As with the Ceremony record several years earlier, no other official singles were released, but several other songs were released on a strictly limited basis: "Sacred Life" was released in Spain and the Netherlands, "Be Free" was issued in Canada and France, "Saints Are Down" was issued in Greece, but none of the songs gained much commercial success. During this tour, the Cult made their first ever appearance in Norway.
During the Black Rain tour of South America in spring of 1995, despite the fact that several more new songs had already been recorded, the tour was cancelled after an appearance in Rio de Janeiro in March, and the band split up citing unspecified problems on a recent South American tour. Astbury started up a garage band called Holy Barbarians a few months later. The band made their debut at the 100 Club in London in February 1996 and released their first (and only) record in May 1996, and toured throughout North America and Europe for the rest of 1996. The band started writing material for a second record in 1997, but the band was dissolved and Astbury began writing and recording a solo record. Throughout 1997 and 1998 Astbury recorded his solo record, originally to be titled Natural Born Guerilla, later called High Time Amplifier. Ultimately the record remained unreleased until June 2000 when it was released under the name Spirit\Light\Speed. Astbury played one solo concert in 1999.
In November 1996, a number of CD reissues were released: the band's American record company released High Octane Cult, a slightly updated greatest hits compilation released only in the US and Japan; The Southern Death Cult, a remastered edition of the fifteen-song compilation CD; a ten-song compilation CD by Death Cult called Ghost Dance, consisting of the untitled four-song EP, the single "God's Zoo", and four unreleased songs from a radio broadcast; and a remastered repackaging of the Dreamtime album, containing only the ten original songs from the record in their original playing order and almost completely different but original artwork. Dreamtime Live at the Lyceum was also remastered and issued on video and for the first time on CD, with the one unreleased song from the concert, "Gimmick".
First reunion, Beyond Good and Evil and second hiatus (1999–2005)
In 1999, Astbury and Duffy reformed the Cult with Matt Sorum and ex-Porno for Pyros bassist Martyn LeNoble. Their first official concert was at the Tibetan Freedom Concert in June 1999, after having rehearsed at shows in the Los Angeles area. The band's 1999 Cult Rising reunion tour resulted in a sold out 30 date tour of the US, ending with 8 consecutive sold out nights at the LA House of Blues. In 2000, the band toured South Africa for the first time, and North and South America, and contributed the song "Painted on My Heart" to the soundtrack of the movie Gone In 60 Seconds. The song was featured prominently and the melody was fused into parts of the score. In June, Astbury's long-delayed solo record was finally released as Spirit\Light\Speed, but it failed to gain much success. In November 2000, another authorised greatest hits compilation was released, Pure Cult: The Singles 1984–1995, along with an accompanying DVD, which was later certified gold in Canada. The Cult, as well as Ian Astbury, performed on separate tracks on the Doors tribute album, Stoned Immaculate: The Music of The Doors, covering "Wild Child" and "Touch Me".
In November 2000, Beggars Banquet released 15,000 copies of a six-disc boxset (with a bonus seventh disc of remixes for the first 5000 copies) titled Rare Cult. The box set consists of album out-takes, demos, radio broadcasts, and album B-sides. It is most notable for including the previously unreleased "Peace" album in its entirety. In 2001, the band signed to Atlantic Records and recorded a new album, Beyond Good and Evil, originally being produced by Mick Jones of Foreigner, until Jones bowed out to tour with Foreigner. Astbury and Duffy co-wrote a song with Jones, an odd occurrence, as in the past, neither Astbury or Duffy would co-write their material. Bob Rock was the producer, with Martyn LeNoble and Chris Wyse as recording bassists, as Mike Dimkich played rhythm guitar on tour, and Matt Sorum returning as drummer. Although Sorum has previously toured with the band on the Sonic Temple tour in 1989, this was the first time that he had recorded a studio album with the band.
However Beyond Good and Evil was not the comeback record the band had hoped for. Despite reaching No. 37 in the US, No. 22 in Canada, and No. 25 in Spain, sales quickly dropped, only selling roughly 500,000 copies worldwide. The first single "Rise", reached No. 41 in the US, and No. 2 on the mainstream rock charts, but Atlantic Records quickly pulled the song from radio playlists. Astbury would later describe the experience with Atlantic to be "soul destroying", after Atlantic tried to tamper with the lyrics, the record cover, and choice of singles from the record.
After the first single from the record, the band's working relationship with Atlantic was on paper only, with Atlantic pulling "Rise" from the radio stations playlists, and stopping all promotion of the record. The second single "Breathe" was only released as a radio station promo, and the final single "True Believers" was only on a compilation sampler disc released in January 2002 (after the Cult's tour had already ended). Despite "True Believers" receiving radio airplay in Australia, both singles went largely unnoticed, and both Astbury and Duffy walked away from the project. LeNoble rejoined the band for the initial dates in early 2001, and Billy Morrison filled in on bass for the majority of the 2001 tour.
The European tour of 2001 was canceled, largely due to security concerns after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the band flew back to the US to tour again with Aerosmith. But the eleven-week tour was considered by fans to be a disaster, as the band played only a brief rundown of their greatest hits. In October 2001, a show at the Grand Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles was filmed for release on DVD. After the tour ended in December 2001, the band took most of 2002 off, apart from a few shows in the US to promote the release of the DVD, with Scott Garrett and Craig Adams rejoining the band.
Despite the commercial disappointment of Beyond Good and Evil and the supporting tour, the band was voted "Comeback of the Year" by Metal Edge readers in the magazine's 2001 Readers' Choice Awards.
In late 2002, Ian Astbury declared the Cult to be "on ice" indefinitely, after performing a brief series of dates in October 2002 to promote the release of the Music Without Fear DVD. During this second hiatus, Astbury performed as a member of the Doors (later dubbed the Doors of the 21st Century, later still renamed D21c, and most recently known as Riders on the Storm) with two of the original members of that group. D21c was sued numerous times, both by Jim Morrison's family and by drummer John Densmore. Astbury supposedly started work on recording another solo album that later became the backbone for the Cult's Born into This.
At the same time, Duffy was part of Coloursound with bassist Craig Adams and ex-Alarm frontman Mike Peters, then Dead Men Walking (again with Peters) and later Cardboard Vampyres. Sorum became a member of the hard rock supergroup Velvet Revolver. In 2003, all of the Cult's records were issued on CD, with several bonus tracks being issued on the Russian, Belarusian, and Lithuanian versions. These eastern European releases had many printing mistakes on the jacket sleeves and lyric inserts. In October 2004, all of the Cult's records were again remastered and issued again on CD, this time in Japan in different cardboard foldout sleeves. "She Sells Sanctuary" appeared in the 2002 video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, playing on rock station V-Rock.
Second reunion, Born Into This and Capsule EPs (2006–2010)
Despite Astbury's previous statement from 2004 that a reunion would not happen, The Cult announced in January 2006 that they were reuniting for "some limited gigs" throughout the year. A month later, the band made their first live appearance in three-and-a-half years on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson. Their lineup consisted of Astbury (vocals), Duffy (lead guitar), John Tempesta (drums), Dimkich (rhythm guitar) and Wyse (returning as bassist). Their first stage show was held in March 2006 in San Francisco, California, at The Fillmore. The entire tour was recorded by Instant Live and sold after each show. In May, they did an eight date tour in Canada. Later that summer, they toured central and eastern Europe and played their first concerts in Bulgaria, Poland and Serbia. An eleven-date UK tour followed as well as several more dates in the United States, finishing with a South American tour in December. That year, Duffy began the band Circus Diablo with Billy Morrison, Sorum, Brett Scallions and Ricky Warwick.
During these tours, the band occasionally played an extended set, including several songs the band had not performed in decades: "King Contrary Man" and "Hollow Man", neither of which had been performed since 1987; also, "Libertine" was performed approximately three times, for the first time since 2000, and "Brother Wolf, Sister Moon", which was only performed one time since 1986 (for this particular song, the band played an abridged version which has never been performed before or since)
Astbury announced in February 2007 that he was leaving Riders on the Storm and returning to the Cult. He stated: "I have decided to move on and focus on my own music and legacy." The Cult was featured on Stuffmagazine.com's list of ultimate air guitar players. On 21 March 2007, it was announced that the band would be touring Europe with the Who. The first confirmed tour date was in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, in early June, with at least a dozen shows set to follow. The band played a gig in London's West End at the CC Club on 7 June 2007, along with nearly two dozen shows across continental Europe during summer. The tour also includes the first performance in Romania and Croatia.
On 29 May 2007, the band signed a deal with major metal label Roadrunner Records. Their 8th studio album, titled Born into This was released on 16 October, and was produced by Martin "Youth" Glover, bass player for Killing Joke. Born into This was released as regular single disc and limited edition double disc, the second disk being a bonus 5-track CD holding the following tracks: "Stand Alone", "War Pony Destroyer", "I Assassin (Demo)", "Sound of Destruction (Demo)" and "Savages (Extended Version)". Prior to the album's release, the band played festival and headline dates, and supported the Who in Europe through summer 2007, with a US headline tour to follow.
The band's appearance at Irving Plaza in New York City in early November 2006 was filmed and was released in 2007. The Cult New York City, issued by Fontana North and is the Cult's first high definition DVD release. Meanwhile, Astbury lent vocals on two tracks of the 2007 Unkle album "War Stories", one of them being the first single from the album, "Burn My Shadow".
The band performed a UK and European tour in late-February and early-March 2008. On 24 March, they began their North American tour including a major 13-city tour in Canada. During September 2008, the Cult did a brief series of dates in the northeast United States, and they toured in Brazil as part of the South American tour in October 2008. As of May 2008, according to The Gauntlet, the Cult are currently unsigned and no longer under contract with Roadrunner Records. In October 2008, it was announced that the Cult would headline the inaugural Rock 'n' Roll Marathon in San Antonio, to be run 16 November 2008. The Cult announced plans for a tour showcasing their 1985 Love album across the US and then the UK in October where they will play at the Royal Albert Hall.
Coinciding with the remastered Love album and four-disc Omnibus boxed set, the Cult kicked off the long-awaited Love Live Tour in late summer. Performing their classic Love album in its entirety, each show was played with the Love tracks opening with "Nirvana" to "Black Angel". A quick intermission followed, then other Cult hits were played (varying by venue): "Sun King", "Dirty Little Rock Star", "Electric Ocean", "Illuminated". Then followed the favorites "Fire Woman", "Lil Devil", "Wild Flower", and lastly "Love Removal Machine". In the evening of 10 October 2009 at the Royal Albert Hall in London, the band performed a second encore with original Cult bassist Jamie Stewart and drummer Mark Brzezicki, who played drums with the band during the Love album recording sessions in July and August 1985. The band sold Love Live USB flash drives for each show during the tour.
The Cult entered 2010 continuing their Love Live Tour and announcing more dates in the United States, New Zealand, Australia, and Japan. The band finished recording a four-track "Capsule" with producer Chris Goss. Capsule 1 was said to be the first of three or four to be released sometime in summer 2010. Release formats include CD-DVD dualdisc, 12-inch vinyl, and digital downloads. Capsule 1 was released on 14 September 2010. The band officially announced the release of its first new studio recording since 2007, "Every Man And Woman Is A Star". The new single was released through the iTunes Store on 31 July 2010.
On 1 August 2010, the band played the sold-out music festival Sonisphere, which marked their first UK performance since the tour for their Love album. During the performance they debuted their new single, "Every Man and Woman is a Star", which was released on 1 August 2010. On 14 September 2010 the band embarked on a new U.S. tour and released Capsule 1 in conjunction with media technology company Aderra Inc. and made it available in multiple formats including a CD-DVD DualDisc, USB flash drive, 12 inch vinyl, FLAC download and MP3 download. The collection includes a short film made by singer Ian Astbury and Rick Rogers.
On 26 October 2010 the band and Aderra Inc. announced the release of a new song, "Embers", for 1 November 2010 and Capsule 2 available through their web store on 16 November 2010. Pictures from the Cult's tour stop in Chicago on 28 October 2010 can be seen at a local radio station website.
On 17 September 2010, the band performed live at the Fall Frenzy concert at the Tempe Beach Park in Tempe, Arizona. Other bands that played at this concert were Stone Temple Pilots, Shinedown, and Sevendust.
On 4 December 2010, the band performed a live set for Guitar Center Sessions on DirecTV. The episode included an interview with the band by program host, Nic Harcourt.
Choice of Weapon and Hidden City (2011–2017)
During the Cult's concert at the Hammersmith Apollo in London on 21 January 2011 Ian Astbury declared that the Cult would be recording a new album directly after the tour. They also announced that they would be working with Chris Goss, who performed with Masters of Reality as a supporting act the same evening. On 11 May 2011, it was announced that the Cult were signed to Cooking Vinyl Records, who will release the new album in early 2012. Commented guitarist Billy Duffy: "We are very much looking forward to returning to our U.K. roots in many ways working with Cooking Vinyl." Vocalist Ian Astbury added, "We look forward to a long and fruitful relationship with Cooking Vinyl." By May 2011, the band had been writing and recording new demos at its Witch Mountain studio hideaway in the Hollywood Hills, and began recording their new album at Hollywood Recording Studios. In October 2011, bassist Chris Wyse stated the album was almost finished and expected to be released in April 2012. Chris also described it as a "Zep/Stooges mix of energy."
On 29 November 2011, it was announced that the album would be produced by Bob Rock, who provided the same role on Sonic Temple, The Cult and Beyond Good and Evil. The album, entitled Choice of Weapon, was released on 22 May 2012. The band partnered with Rolling Stone to premiere the first song from the album titled Lucifer on 30 January. On 5 February 2012, the Cult song "She Sells Sanctuary" was used as the soundtrack for a Budweiser commercial in a mashup with Flo Rida aired during Super Bowl XLVI. In May 2012 the Cult appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and played "For The Animals".
On 28 September 2012, it was announced that the band would release Weapon of Choice, a "prequel" album to accompany the band's latest album, Choice of Weapon. The digital-only release, available exclusively on iTunes for two months only beginning 16 October, features the songs that were ultimately included in "Choice Of Weapon" at an earlier stage of development. Explaining the motivations behind the release, singer Ian Astbury said that "These songs were turned over and over, forged in long rehearsals and writing sessions, and emanated from challenges both personal and professional. We put our guts into this; [Producer Chris] Goss was able to create an environment where the songs were born through playing and turning over lyrics, through hard work and intense sessions." Astbury added "These songs have an integrity and rawness of their own. In many ways it's a different album to the one we released and reveals the foundations of 'Choice Of Weapon'. We were able to close the doors and begin to explore spaces we had not been in for a while." The song "Twisted and Bleeding" was made available for free download at the band's website ahead of the full digital release.
On 20 June 2013, the band announced the release of Electric-Peace which comprises the entire Electric album plus the Peace album which was previously released on the now discontinued Rare Cult box set in 2000. It is due for release in the US on 30 July. In 2013 Mike Dimkich left the band and joined Bad Religion to cover for guitarist Greg Hetson. James Stevenson, from the Beauty's On The Streets tour in 1994, replaced Dimkich as the Cult's rhythm guitarist.
In March 2013, Billy Duffy told the Argentinan journalist Fabrizio Pedrotti that the Cult had begun work on a new album for a 2014 release. The band were expected to begin work on the album after they finish their 2013 world tour, where they played the Electric album in its entirety. In August 2014, Billy added that the next album, which was not expected to be released before 2015 at the earliest, "will be more guitar heavy".
On 5 November 2015, it was announced that The Cult would release their new album, entitled Hidden City, on 5 February 2016. The album is said to be the final part of a trilogy that began with Born into This, and marks the fifth time Bob Rock had produced a Cult album. The band also announced that they had hired Australian-born bassist Grant Fitzpatrick (ex-Mink) as the replacement for Chris Wyse. Chris Chaney (Jane's Addiction, Camp Freddy) and producer Bob Rock performed session bass on the album. In support of Hidden City, The Cult opened for Guns N' Roses on the Not in This Lifetime... Tour.
In an October 2016 interview with PopMatters journalist J.C. Maçek III, Cult guitarist Billy Duffy spoke of the band's playlist while on tour, saying "Obviously you want to make an impactful [show]," he continues. "There are some practical, pragmatic decisions made. If you're playing to a crowd who are not very familiar with you, there's no point of going too deep but we do always make sure we play a new song. Like on Guns N' Roses' [tour] we had fifty minutes which is ten songs all in. So, you know we just made sure that in those ten songs we played 'Deeply Ordered Chaos' which we’re proud of and it makes a certain statement. And it just alerts people to the fact that, yes, we have made a record in the last 30 years. You know and that's a good thing. Psychologically, that's the blood transfusion that we need. And we're very mindful, we have a very loyal fan base. We don't pander as you well know."
Upcoming eleventh studio album (2018–present)
In an April 2018 interview with Guitar World, guitarist Billy Duffy was asked if another album from The Cult was in the works. He replied, "Never say never! Ian and I enjoy the process of making new music, and we feel it's vital to keep the band healthy, even if it's pretty much in the law of diminishing returns area now. Who knows if it will be a whole album a series of singles or an EP? I can say new Cult music will be forthcoming, but these days we don't rush it as there's no point. Quality is key. We are past the point of having to release stuff so if we feel it's good enough, then we will release it in some shape or another."
On 2 April 2018, a tour of the United States of America called "Revolution 3 Tour" was announced for the summer. They performed as one of the three headliners, along with Stone Temple Pilots and Bush.
In April 2019, The Cult announced that they would celebrate the 30th anniversary of the release of their fourth album Sonic Temple with a world tour, which began on 2 May in Houston, Texas and was expected to wrap up in 2020.
In a June 2019 interview with LA Weekly, vocalist Ian Astbury stated that The Cult were "long overdue" to release new music. He was quoted as saying: "We do have some stuff we've been working on, but it's yet to see the light of day." Six months later, Astbury told Atlantic City Weekly that the band was going to start working on new music in 2020: "We've got a few pieces lying around in various stages of completion. The intention is to get together in the New Year and take a look at what we've got and decide how we are going to go about moving forward. It's an essential part of any creative lifeblood." On May 6, 2020, The Cult announced on their Twitter page that they had signed to Black Hill Records.
On August 15, 2020, Duffy announced on his Twitter that the band were recording their new album with producer Tom Dalgety at Rockfield Studios, where The Cult had recorded their debut album Dreamtime 36 years earlier.
In support of their new album, The Cult will embark on a co-headlining six-date UK tour with Alice Cooper in May and June 2022.
Influences
Duffy and Astbury cited among their influences a lot of different bands "from the Doors to Led Zeppelin. We literally went from the front of our record collections to the back. And then along the way we were drawn in by the likes of Public Image Ltd, Joy Division and Siouxsie and the Banshees. You might not hear it in the music but it's there." They also cited Bauhaus among many other post-punk influences. Duffy also praised Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers for a major performance he attended in 1977 and Siouxsie and the Banshees whom "always had great guitar players with killer riffs." Duffy also hailed AC/DC for "the power of a good three chord riff", Pete Townshend of the Who "in terms of commitment to stage performing" and Brian May of Queen for using "‘echoplex’ tape delays to orchestrate his own solo".
Musical style
According to music critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the band fuse a "hardcore punk revivalist" sound with the "pseudo-mysticism ... of the Doors and Uriah Heep and the guitar-orchestrations of Led Zeppelin and The Cure ... while adding touches of post-punk goth rock". In 1985 Astbury said, "Our music is just melodies and guitars. We're like Big Country and U2, only better!".
Members
Current members
Ian Astbury – lead vocals, occasional percussion/guitar
Billy Duffy – lead and rhythm guitars, backing vocals
John Tempesta – drums, percussion
Grant Fitzpatrick – bass, backing vocals
Damon Fox – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals
Discography
Dreamtime (1984)
Love (1985)
Electric (1987)
Sonic Temple (1989)
Ceremony (1991)
The Cult (1994)
Beyond Good and Evil (2001)
Born into This (2007)
Choice of Weapon (2012)
Hidden City (2016)
References
External links
Official website
Billy Duffy official website
Musical groups established in 1983
Situation Two artists
Beggars Banquet Records artists
Sire Records artists
Musical groups from Bradford
English post-punk music groups
English gothic rock groups
English hard rock musical groups
English heavy metal musical groups
English glam metal musical groups | false | [
"Supernatural was a Swedish pop group that consisted of the winners of the second season of the Swedish reality TV show Popstars. In Sweden the show was broadcast on Kanal5 in 2003.\nThe band had several hits with songs like Supernatural and Rock U. Supernatural was expected to take part in the Swedish precursor selections for the Eurovision Song Contest in 2003 but its record label did not publicize the band sufficiently and the members subsequently split up in 2004 after arguments with their record label.\n\nMembers\nMathilda Carmbrant\nLinda Eriksson (aka Linda Varg)\nSandra Leto\nRobert Skowronski\nSebastian Zelle\n\nAfter split-up\nThe members of Supernatural started a new band, this time with the name Caught Up, but it did not experience the same success.\n\nDiscography\n\nAlbums\n\nSingles\n\nReferences\n\nPopstars winners\nSwedish pop music groups",
"Agathocles is a Belgian political grindcore band that began in 1985. They are mainly known for producing a large quantity of split seven-inch EPs. They play a style of grindcore that they have dubbed \"mincecore\". Lyrical themes of the band have focused on anti-fascism, animal liberation and anarchism. All members of Agathocles are vegetarian.\n\nTheir lineup has changed numerous times since they first started, the only consistent member being Jan Frederickx (also known as Jan AG).\n\nBiography\n\n1980s\nAgathocles formed in the Belgian city of Mol, aspiring to sound like bands such as Lärm or Hellhammer. Although the band itself did not form until 1985, its original members (Jan and Erwin) had been involved in the underground metal/punk scene since the beginning of the decade, releasing compilation tapes and zines. Most of the rehearsal tapes they recorded during their first year together have now been lost, although a few survive, mainly in the form of appearances on compilations from the time.\n\nAgathocles first started playing concerts a year later, in 1985, although audiences were always limited due to there only being a small minority who listened to the type of extreme music the band was producing. That year, the band had an on-air interview on the local radio station.\n\nBy 1987, the band's line-up had begun to settle, albeit temporarily, in the form of Jan, Ronny and Erwin. The band had also found a long-term rehearsal space, where they would not receive complaints (or even get kicked out) because of the noise as they had made in earlier rehearsal rooms. This was in a youth club in Mol, \"Jam\", where they recorded more compilation tracks and organised more small concerts. They even played gigs with other bands who would become equally famous in later years, such as Napalm Death and Pestilence (and later Extreme Noise Terror, as well as smaller bands such as Violent Mosquitos and Total Mosh Project.)\n\nThe first Agathocles releases were issued in 1988, which saw the arrival of a split EP with Riek Boois, as well as their first solo outing, Cabbalic Gnosticism, both of which were originally issued on cassette. Other material was recorded at the same time, although this was not released until later. By this time the band had 4 members, as Jakke had joined on guitar in December the year before, allowing Jan to concentrate on vocals.\n\nAnother guitarist, Guy, joined a year later, in 1989, and the split LP with the band Drudge was recorded and released on Deaf Records, as well as several other EPs. Towards the end of the year, the line-up changed yet again, with the bassist, Ronny, leaving the band and guitarist Jakke taking over from him.\n\n1990s\nA major line-up change occurred at the beginning of the decade, in May 1990, when Jan got rid of all the other members of the band and found two new members instead - Domingo on guitar and Burt on drums, with Jan now playing bass. Domingo and Burt were both from little-known Belgian grindcore band Necrosis, who recorded only one demo, in 1990. With the new line-up, the band ceased rehearsing in Mol, moving instead to the drummer's home town of Zichem. Several more EPs were released in the same year and, with the band growing in popularity, they played gigs in Denmark as well as Belgium and went on a mini tour with the Japanese grindcore band SxOxB.\n\nMore line-up changes occurred throughout the next few years. Ex-Agathocles drummer Erwin briefly returned in 1991, now playing bass guitar. After only a few months with this line-up, Domingo left the band, leaving the band as a three-piece group during the recording of their Agarchy EP in July. However, the band soon had four members again when Domingo was replaced by Chris. It was with this line-up that they recorded Theatric Symbolisation Of Life, but towards the end of the year, Erwin left the band again and Agathocles got a new bassist called Dirk.\n\nIn the summer of 1991, Agathocles also went on another tour, this time in East Germany, with vocalist Tuur from fellow Belgian mincecore band Reign Of Terror. Tuur did vocals for this tour because guitarist Chris was unable to tour with the band, so Jan had to take over his guitarist duties.\n\nThe band's line-up changed again in May 1992 when guitarist Chris and bassist Dirk left to form their own band. Agathocles found a new guitarist to take over from Chris - Steve (from Belgian grindcore band Intestinal Disease) - and Jan played bass guitar (as well as doing vocals). Two of the band's LPs (Cliché? and Use Your Anger) were recorded with this new line-up and they also played one gig in Italy for the first time in a small town named Macomer (Sardinia).\n\nThe band remained a 3-piece group throughout 1993, with the line-up staying consistent as Jan, Burt and Steve. It was with this line-up that Agathocles went on a major European tour, visiting Belgium, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Germany and the Netherlands, as well as recording several more split EPs. In 1994, the band retained the same line-up, this time touring in Spain (in July of that year), where they recorded the Mince Mongers In Barna EP in the rehearsal room of Spanish mincecore band Violent Headache. The Black Clouds Determinate CD was also recorded in this year.\n\nThe line-up stayed the same during the first half of 1995, during which time Agathocles recorded their album Razor Sharp Daggers, as well as featuring on the compilation Metalopolis, which was released by the Belgian radio station Studio Brussel. In the summer, however, the line-up changed again, with Matty replacing Steve on guitar.\n\nThis line-up would stay constant through 1996 and for most of 1997, two years in which Agathocles did a lot more touring. This started at the beginning of 1996, when the band visited Turkey, playing alongside the band Radical Noise, and then they toured the Czech Republic with the mincecore band Malignant Tumour. During this tour, the band recorded a video as a benefit for a Czech animal rights group. As well as recording the album Thanks For Your Hostility and several more split EPs, Agathocles also recorded a studio session in 1996 on the radio station Studio Brussel. Another such session was done the year later, this time in the BBC studios in England, where they recorded a Peel Session, in the same way that many other famous grindcore bands have done. 1997 was also the year that the Humarrogance album was recorded (as well as even more split EPs) and the band also toured in Germany with Swedish band Driller Killer. In November, the line-up changed again, when the band returned to being a four-piece, with Vince joining as the bass guitarist.\n\nWith this new line-up, the band toured again in Germany with Driller Killer in 1998 before Matty and Vince left the band in June and Dirk rejoined as the guitarist, with Jan playing bass again. This new line-up, of Jan, Burt and Dirk recorded several more split EPs, and toured in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. They also played gigs with other bands in the underground scene such as Unholy Grave, My Minds Mine and Malignant Tumour. The band ended the decade with a line-up that would last for several years into the new millennium.\n\n2000s \nIn 2000, Agathocles released their sixth full-length, To Serve… to Protect, that was distributed through the Italian label Vacation House (later re-released with bonus tracks by the Brazilian labels No Fashion HC and Heavy Metal Rock).\n\nMembers\nJan Frederickx - guitar, vocals (1985-)\nNils Laureys - drums, vocals (2007-)\nKoen - guitar (2012-)\n\nPast members \nErwin Vandenbergh - drums (1985-1990) bass (1991)\nRonny - bass (1987-1989)\nJakke - guitar (1987-1990)\nGuy - guitar (1989-1990)\nDomingo Smets - guitar (1990)\nBurt Beyens - drums (1990-2002)\nChris - guitar (1991-1992)\nDirk - bass (1991-1992)\nSteve Houtmeyers - guitar (1992-1995)\nMatty Dupont - guitar (1995-1998)\nDirk Cuyks - guitar (1998-2007)\nRoel Tulleneers - drums (2002-2007)\nTony Schepkens - bass (2007-2008)\nBram Criekemans - bass (2008-2012)\n\nDiscography\n\nCDs\nKeizershof disaster* 1986-2016 punk/straight edge/hardcore/crust\nTheatric Symbolisation of Life''' 1992Use Your Anger 1992Black Clouds Determinate 1994Razor Sharp Daggers 1995The LPs: 1989-1991 1996Thanks For Your Hostility 1996Humarrogance 1997Split with Axed Up Conformist 1999 To Serve... to Protect... 2000Superiority Overdose 20014-Way Split with Abortion, Din-Addict and Malignant Tumour 2001Bomb Brussels (Live Album) 2001Alive & Mincing (Live Album) 2003Mincemania In Bulgaria 2004Mincer 2006Get Off your Ass/In Noise we Noise Split with Ruido Genital 2007Night Train To Terror split with Saul Turteltaub 2007Split with The Vanishing Act 2008Split with Armatura 2008Abstract split with Cü Sujo 2008Grind is Protest 2009Split with Crowd Control 2009\"Imaginary Boundaries\" 4-way split with Detrua Ideo/Violenta Dizimacao/Pissdeads 2009This is Not a Threat, It's a Promise 20104 way split with Kerenaneko, Prosuck and Rvota 2011Kanpai!! 2012Agathocles/Nauseate - Split CD 2014Commence to Mince 2016We Just Don't Fit 2018Baltimore Mince Massacre 2020\n\nLPsSupposed It Was You (split with Drudge) 1989Split with Lunatic Invasion 1991Theatric Symbolisation Of Life 1992Agarchy / Use Your Anger 1997Split with Deadmocracy 1998Until It Bleeds (Best Of) 1997Live and Noisy (Live) 1997Mincecore (Compilation) 1998To Serve... To Protect 1999Live in Leipzig, Germany 1991 (Live) 1999Mincecore History 1985-1990 (Compilation) 2000Keep Mincing (Compilation) 2001Superiority Overdose 2001Mincecore History 1989-1993 (Best of) 2001Chop Off Their Trust (Split) 2002Live Aalst Belgium 1989 (Split) 2002Until It Bleeds Again (1994-1999) (Best of) 2002\nSplit With Sterbe Hilfe - Emoc T'now Modcnik Yht! (Split Album) 2003To Serve... To Protect / Leads To... (Best of) 2003\n\nEPsIf This Is Gore, What's Meat Then (split with Riek Boois) 1988Split with Disgorge 1989Split with V.N.A. 1989Fascination of Mutilation 1989If This Is Cruel What's Vivisection Then? 1989Who Profits? Who Dies? (split with Morbid Organs Mutilation (M.O.M.)) 1989Split with Blood 1990Split with Smegma 1991Split with Putrid Offal 1991Split with Psycho 1991Agarchy 1991Cliché? 1992Split with Social Genocide 1993Blind World (split with Nasum) 1993Split with Starvation 1993War Scars (split with Kompost) 1993Distrust And Abuse 1993Split with Nyctophobic 1993Split with Bad Acid Trip 1993No Use ...For Hatred 1993Split with Patareni 1993Split with Smash The Brain 1993Split with Man Is The Bastard 1993Split with Plastic Grave 1994Split with Audiorrea 1994Split with Averno 1994Split with Punisher 1994Mince-Mongers in Barna 1994Split with Carcass Grinder 1994Split with Rot 1994Back To 1987 (Best Of Album) 1994Split with Notoken 1995Split with Voltifobia 1996Split with Vomit Fall 1996Split with Preparation H 1996Split with Autoritor 1996Split with Krush 1996Bomb Brussels 1996Minced Alive 1996Split with Black Army Jacket 1996Split with No Gain - Just Pain 1996Split with Respect 1997Split with Böses Blut 1997Split with PP7 Gaftzeb 1997Split with Looking For Answer 1997Split with Monolith (grindcore) 1997Split with Shikabane 1997Split with Malignant Tumour 1997Split with D.I.E. 1997Split with BWF 1997Split with Abstain 1997Split with Mitten Spider 1997Split with Comrades 1998Split with Spud 1998Split with Bloodsucker 1998Split with Depressor 1998Split with Hunt Hunters 1999Split with Glass Eyes 1999Split with Disreantiyouthhellchristbastardassmanx 1999Split with Grind Buto 1999Split with Piles Left to Rot 2000Split with Kontatto 2000Split with Din-Addict 2000Split with Brutal Headache 2000Kicked and Whipped/Keep On Selling Cocaine to Angels 2000Split with Disculpa 2000Split with Jan AG 2002Split with Front Beast 2003Split with Sodan Sankareita 2003Split EP with The Mad Thrashers 2004Split EP with Kadaverficker 2004Split with ... Our Last Beer(s) 2004Split with dios hastío 2005Split with Archagathus 2006Split with Seven Minutes of Nausea 2007Split with J. Briglia, L. Butler, D. Schoonmaker & J. Williams 2008Split with SMG 2008Split with Armatura 2008Split with Crowd Control 2008Split with I Hope You Suffer 2008Split with Repulsione 2008Split with Disleksick 2009Split with ShitFuckingShit and GAPSplit with Jandek (collaboration) Split with Sposa In Alto Mare (7 inches) 2011Split with Kurws (5 inches) 2013Split with Necrology 2015Split EP with G.I. Joke 2015Split with GodCum 2018\n Split with LtxDan 2017Split with Antikult 2019Split with Terminal Filth Wimpcore Killer (7 inch) 2021\n\nDTsCabbalic Gnosticism 1988Live In Gierle 1989\n\nDVDsSuperiority Overdose'' 2002\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Agathocles Interview at Diabolical Conquest Webzine\n\nBelgian grindcore musical groups\nMusical groups established in 1985\nBelgian musical trios\nGeel\n1985 establishments in Belgium"
] |
[
"The Cult",
"The Cult (1994-1995)",
"What was the Cult?",
"the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock.",
"How did i do in the charts?",
"The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK.",
"Was there any hit songs released on that album?",
"The single \"Coming Down (Drug Tongue)\"",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar.",
"Did they win any awards?",
"none of the songs gained much commercial success.",
"Did the band split up?",
"I don't know."
] | C_669b70745be5429da8c672a9282a7461_0 | Was there any tension between the team mates? | 7 | Was there any tension between the band mates in The Cult? | The Cult | With the same line-up still in place, the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. The self-titled 'Cult' album is commonly referred to as the 'Black Sheep' album by fans of the group. Astbury referred to the record as "very personal and very revealing" songs about his life, with the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, to his directionless years spent in Glasgow in the late 1970s. The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. Duffy remarked that he thought that the record wouldn't sell well due to the offensive lyrics. The record went to number one in Portugal also, but quickly dropped out of sight. The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" was released with the band going on tour in support of the new album. Only one more single, "Star", was officially released with a live appearance on UK TV show The Word. "Star" began life in 1986 as "Tom Petty" and was recorded at the "Sonic Temple" demo sessions as "Starchild", being dropped by the band during rehearsals. In 1993 the song was resurrected and was finally completed for the record in 1994 as, just simply, "Star". When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. As with the Ceremony record several years earlier, no other official singles were released, but several other songs were released on a strictly limited basis: "Sacred Life" was released in Spain and the Netherlands, "Be Free" was issued in Canada and France, "Saints Are Down" was issued in Greece, but none of the songs gained much commercial success. During this tour, the Cult made their first ever appearance in Norway. CANNOTANSWER | the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, | The Cult are an English rock band formed in 1983 in Bradford, West Yorkshire. Before settling on their current name in January 1984, the band performed under the name Death Cult, which was an evolution of the name of lead singer Ian Astbury's previous band Southern Death Cult. They gained a dedicated following in the United Kingdom in the mid-1980s as a post-punk/gothic rock band, with singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary", before breaking into the mainstream in the United States in the late 1980s establishing themselves as a hard rock band with singles such as "Love Removal Machine". Since its initial formation in 1983, the band have had various line-ups; the longest-serving members are Astbury and guitarist Billy Duffy, who are also the band's two songwriters.
The Cult's debut studio album Dreamtime was released in 1984 to moderate success, with its lead single "Spiritwalker" reaching No. 1 on the UK Indie Chart. Their second studio album, Love (1985), was even more successful, charting at No. 4 in the UK and including singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary" and "Rain". The band's third album, Electric (1987), launched them new heights of success, also peaking at No. 4 in the UK and charting highly in other territories, and spawned the hit singles "Love Removal Machine", "Lil' Devil" and "Wild Flower". On that album, The Cult supplemented their post-punk sound with hard rock; the polish on this new sound was facilitated by producer Rick Rubin. After moving to Los Angeles, California, where the band has been based for the remainder of their career, The Cult continued the musical experimentation of Electric with its follow-up album Sonic Temple (1989), which marked their first collaboration with Bob Rock, who would produce several of the band's subsequent albums. Sonic Temple was their most successful album to that point, entering the Top 10 on the UK and US charts, and included one of the band's most popular songs "Fire Woman".
By the time of their fifth album Ceremony (1991), tensions and creative differences began to surface among the band members. This resulted in the recording sessions for Ceremony being held without a stable lineup, leaving Astbury and Duffy as the only two official members left, and featuring support from session musicians on bass and drums. The ongoing tension had carried over within the next four years, during which they released one more studio album, The Cult (1994), and called it quits in 1995. The Cult reformed in 1999 and released their seventh album Beyond Good and Evil two years later. The commercial failure of the album and resurfaced tensions led to the band going back on hiatus in 2002. They resumed activity in 2006, and have since released three more studio albums: Born into This (2007), Choice of Weapon (2012), and Hidden City (2016).
History
Early history (1981–1984)
The band's origins can be traced to 1981, in Bradford, Yorkshire, where vocalist and songwriter Ian Astbury formed a band called Southern Death Cult. The name was chosen with a double meaning, and was derived from the 14th-century Native American religion, the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex or Southern Death Cult as it was sometimes known, from the Mississippi delta area, but it was also a stab at what the band viewed was the centralisation of power in Southern England (including that of the music industry); there has long been a perceived notion of a North–South divide based on social, historic and economic reasons. Astbury was joined by Buzz Burrows (guitar), Barry Jepson (bass) and Aki Nawaz Qureshi (drums); they performed their first show at the Queen's Hall in their hometown of Bradford on 29 October 1981. The band were at the forefront of an emerging style of music, in the form of post-punk and gothic rock, they achieved critical acclaim from the press and music fans.
The band signed to independent record label Situation Two, an offshoot of Beggars Banquet Records, and released a three-track, triple A-side single, Moya, during this period. They toured through England headlining some shows and touring with Bauhaus and Theatre of Hate. The band played their final performance in Manchester during February 1983, meaning after only sixteen months the band was over. A compilation named The Southern Death Cult was released, this being a collection of the single, radio sessions with John Peel for Radio One and live performances - one of which an audience member recorded with a tape recorder.
In April 1983, Astbury teamed up with guitarist Billy Duffy and formed the band "Death Cult". Duffy had been in the Nosebleeds (along with Morrissey), Lonesome No More and then Theatre of Hate. In addition to Astbury and Duffy, the band also included Jamie Stewart (bass) and Raymond Taylor Smith (later known as Ray Mondo) (drums), both from the Harrow, London based post-punk band, Ritual. Death Cult made their live debut in Oslo, Norway on 25 July 1983 and also released the Death Cult EP in the same month, then toured through mainland Europe and Scotland. In September 1983, Mondo was deported to his home country of Sierra Leone and replaced by Nigel Preston, formerly of Theatre of Hate. The single "Gods Zoo" was released in October 1983. Another European tour, with UK dates, followed that autumn. To tone down their name's gothic connotations and gain broader appeal, the band changed its name to "the Cult" in January 1984 before appearing on the (UK) Channel 4 television show, The Tube.
The Cult's first studio record, Dreamtime, was recorded at Rockfield Studios, in Monmouth, Wales in 1984. The record was to be produced by Joe Julian, but after recording the drum tracks, the band decided to replace him with John Brand. Brand produced the record, but guitarist Duffy has said the drum tracks were produced by Julian, as Preston had become unreliable.
The band recorded the songs which later became known as "Butterflies", "(The) Gimmick", "A Flower in the Desert", "Horse Nation", "Spiritwalker", "Bad Medicine (Waltz)", "Dreamtime", "With Love" (later known as "Ship of Fools", and also "Sea and Sky"), "Bone Bag", "Too Young", "83rd Dream", and one untitled outtake. It is unknown what the outtake was, or whether it was developed into a song at a later date. Songs like "Horse Nation" showed Astbury's intense interest in Native American issues, with the lyrics to "Horse Nation", "See them prancing, they come neighing, to a horse nation", taken almost verbatim from the book Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, while "Spiritwalker" dealt with shamanism, and the record's title and title track are overtly influenced by Australian Aboriginal beliefs.
On 4 April 1984, the Cult released the single "Spiritwalker", which reached No. 1 on the independent charts in the UK, and acted as a teaser for their forthcoming album Dreamtime. This was followed that summer by a second single, "Go West (Crazy Spinning Circles)", before the release of Dreamtime in September; the album reached No. 21 in the UK, and sold over 100,000 copies in the UK alone. On 12 July 1984, the band recorded five songs at the BBC Maida Vale 5 studio for a Richard Skinner session. Before and after the album's release, the Cult toured throughout Europe and England before recording another single, "Ressurection Joe" (UK No. 74), released that December. Following a Christmas support slot with Big Country, the Cult toured Europe with support from the Mission (then called the Sisterhood). Dreamtime was released initially only in the UK, but after its success, and as the Cult's popularity grew worldwide, it was issued in approximately 30 countries.
Mainstream success (1985–1990)
In May 1985, the Cult released their fourth single, "She Sells Sanctuary", which peaked at No. 15 in the UK and spent 23 weeks in the Top 100. The song was recently voted No. 18 in VH1's Indie 100. In June 1985, following his increasingly erratic behaviour, Preston was fired from the band. Big Country's drummer Mark Brzezicki was picked to replace Preston, and was also included in the video for "She Sells Sanctuary". The Cult then finished recording their second album, Love in July and August 1985. The band's music and image shifted from their punk-oriented roots to 1960s psychedelia influences. Love was a chart success, peaking at No. 4 in the UK and selling 100,000 copies there toward a total of 500,000 copies throughout Europe, as well as 100,000 in Australia and 500,000 copies in the United States. Love reached number 20 on the charts in The Netherlands, where it remained for 32 weeks. To date, the record has sold over two and a half million copies worldwide.
From late September 1985 to June 1986, the band went on a worldwide tour with new drummer Les Warner (who had played with Julian Lennon and Johnny Thunders). Two more singles from the Love album followed; "Rain" (charting in the UK at No. 17) and "Revolution" (charting in the UK at No. 30). Neither charted in the US. Another single, "Nirvana", was issued only in Poland. The album version of "Rain", as well as the remix "(Here Comes the) Rain", were used in the Italian horror film Dèmoni 2. Once back in England, the band booked themselves into the Manor Studios in Oxfordshire, with producer Steve Brown (who had produced Love), and recorded over a dozen new songs. The band were unhappy with the sound of their new album, titled Peace, and they decided to go to New York so producer Rick Rubin could remix the first single, "Love Removal Machine".
Rubin agreed to work with the band, but only if they rerecorded the song. Rubin eventually talked them into rerecording the entire album. The band's record company, Beggars Banquet, was displeased with this, as two months and £250,000 had already been spent on the record. However, after hearing the initial New York recording, Beggars Banquet agreed to proceed. The first single, "Love Removal Machine", was released in February 1987, and the new version of the album appeared in April that year, now renamed as Electric, reaching No. 4 and eventually outselling Love. The band toured with Kid Chaos (also known as "Haggis" and "The Kid") on bass, with Stewart on rhythm guitar. Two more singles, "Lil Devil" and "Wild Flower", were released during 1987. A few tracks from the original Peace album appeared on the single versions of "Love Removal Machine", and "Lil Devil". The full Peace album would not be released until 2000, when it was included as Disc 3 of the Rare Cult box set.
In the US, the Cult, now consisting of Astbury, Duffy, Stewart, Warner and Kid Chaos, were supported by the then-unknown Guns N' Roses. The band also appeared at Roskilde Festival in Denmark in June 1987. When the world tour wound through Australia, the band wrecked £30,000 worth of equipment, and as a result they could not tour Japan, as no company would rent them new equipment. At the end of the tour the Electric album had been certified Gold in the UK, and sold roughly 3 million copies worldwide, but the band were barely speaking to each other by then. Haggis left the band at the end of the Electric tour to form the Four Horsemen for Rubin's Def American label. Astbury and Duffy fired Warner and their management team Grant/Edwards, and moved to Los Angeles with original bassist Stewart. Warner sued the band several times for his firing, as well as for what he felt were unpaid royalties due to him for his performance on the Electric album, resulting in lengthy court battles. The Cult signed a new management deal and wrote 21 new songs for their next record.
For the next album, Stewart returned to playing bass, and John Webster was brought in to play keyboards. The band used Chris Taylor to play drums during rehearsals and record the demos, with future Kiss drummer Eric Singer performing during the second demo recording sessions. The Cult eventually recruited session-drummer Mickey Curry to fill the drumming role and Aerosmith sound engineer, Bob Rock, to produce. Recorded in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada from October to December 1988, the Sonic Temple record went Top 10 in both the UK and the US, where it was certified Gold and Platinum respectively. The band went on tour in support of the new album and new single "Fire Woman" (UK No. 15) (NZ No. 1), with yet another new drummer, Matt Sorum, and Webster as keyboard player. The next single, "Edie (Ciao Baby)" (UK No. 25) has become a regular song at concerts for many years.
In Europe, the band toured with Aerosmith, and in the US, after releasing another single "Sun King" (UK No. 42), they spent 1989 touring in support of Metallica before heading out on their own headlining tour later that same year. A fourth single, "Sweet Soul Sister" (UK No. 38), was released in February 1990, with the video having been filmed at Wembley Arena, London, on 25 November 1989. "Sweet Soul Sister" was partially written in Paris and was inspired by the bohemian lifestyle of that city. Released as a single in February 1990, the song was another hit in the UK, and reportedly reached number one on the rock charts in Brazil. After playing a show in Atlanta, Georgia, in February 1990, the band's management told Astbury that his father had just died of cancer. As a result, the remainder of the tour was cancelled after a final leg of shows were performed in April. After the tour ended, the band were on the verge of splitting due to Stewart retiring and moving to Canada to be with his wife, and Sorum leaving to join Guns N' Roses.
In 1990, Astbury organized the Gathering of the Tribes festival in Los Angeles and San Francisco with artists such as Soundgarden, Ice-T, Indigo Girls, Queen Latifah, Iggy Pop, the Charlatans, the Cramps and Public Enemy appearing. This two-day festival drew 40,000 people. Also in 1990, a ten CD box set was released in the UK, containing rare songs from the Cult's singles. The CDs in this box set were all issued as picture discs with rice paper covers, housed in a white box called "Singles Collection", or a black box called "E.P. Collection '84 - '90". In 1991, director Oliver Stone offered Astbury the role of Jim Morrison in Stone's film The Doors. He declined the role because he was not happy with the way Morrison was represented in the film, and the role was ultimately played by Val Kilmer.
Ceremony and the lawsuit (1991–1993)
In 1991, Astbury and Duffy were writing again for their next album. During the demo recordings, Todd Hoffman and James Kottak played bass and drums, respectively. During the actual album recording sessions, Curry was recruited again to play drums, with Charley Drayton on bass, and various other performers. Astbury and Duffy's working relationship had disintegrated by that time, with the two men reportedly rarely even being in the studio together during recording. The resulting album Ceremony was released to mixed responses. The album climbed to US No. 34, but sales were not as impressive as the previous three records, only selling around one million copies worldwide. Only two official singles were released from the record: "Wild Hearted Son" (UK No. 34, Canada No. 41) and "Heart of Soul" (UK No. 50), although "White" was released as a single only in Canada, "Sweet Salvation" was released as a single (as "Dulce Salvación") in Argentina in 1992, and the title track "Ceremony" was released in Spain.
The Cult's Ceremonial Stomp tour went through Europe in 1991 and North America in 1992. In 1991 the Cult played a show at the Marquee Club in London, which was recorded and released in February 1993, packaged with some vinyl UK copies of their first greatest hits release. Only a handful of CD copies of it were ever manufactured originally, however it was subsequently reissued on CD in 1999. An incomplete bootleg video of this show is also in circulation.
The band were sued by the parents of the Native American boy pictured on the cover of Ceremony, for alleged exploitation and for the unauthorized use of the child's image. The parents stated that the boy felt he had been cursed by the band's burning of his image, and was "emotionally scarred." This image of the boy is also burned in the video for "Wild Hearted Son". This lawsuit delayed the release of Ceremony in many countries including South Korea and Thailand, which did not see the record's release until late 1992, and it was unreleased in Turkey until the Cult played several shows in Istanbul in June 1993.
A world tour followed with backing from drummer Michael Lee (Page & Plant, Little Angels), bassist Kinley "Barney" Wolfe (Lord Tracy, Black Oak Arkansas), and keyboardist John Sinclair (Ozzy Osbourne, Uriah Heep) returning one last time, and the Gathering of the Tribes moved to the UK. Here artists such as Pearl Jam performed. The warm-up gig to the show, in a small nightclub, was dedicated to the memory of Nigel Preston, who had died a few weeks earlier at the age of 28. Following the release of the single "The Witch" (#9 in Australia) and the performance of a song for the 1992 Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie soundtrack entitled "Zap City", produced by Steve Brown and originally a B-side to "Lil' Devil", two volumes of remixes of "She Sells Sanctuary", called Sanctuary Mixes MCMXCIII, volumes one and two, and in support of Pure Cult: for Rockers, Ravers, Lovers, and Sinners, a greatest hits compilation which debuted at No. 1 on the British charts and later went to number one in Portugal, Astbury and Duffy fired the "backing band" and recruited Craig Adams (the Mission) and Scott Garrett for performances across Europe in 1993, with some shows featuring Mike Dimkich on rhythm guitar. This tour marked the first time the band performed in Turkey, Greece, and the Slovak Republic.
The Cult and first breakup (1994–1998)
With the same line-up still in place, the band released The Cult in October 1994, produced by Bob Rock. The self-titled album is commonly referred to as the "Black Sheep" album by fans of the group, due to the image of a black sheep on the front cover. Astbury referred to the record as a collection of "very personal and very revealing" songs about his life, with the subject matter ranging from sexual abuse at the age of 15, to the death of Nigel Preston, to his directionless years spent in Glasgow in the late 1970s.
The record achieved little success, only reaching No. 69 in the US and No. 21 in the UK. Duffy remarked that he thought that the record wouldn't sell well due to the offensive lyrics. The record went to number one in Portugal also, but quickly dropped out of sight. The single "Coming Down (Drug Tongue)" was released with the band going on tour in support of the new album. Only one more single, "Star", was officially released with a live appearance on UK TV show The Word. "Star" began life in 1986 as "Tom Petty" and was recorded at the "Sonic Temple" demo sessions as "Starchild", being dropped by the band during rehearsals. In 1993 the song was resurrected and was finally completed for the record in 1994 as, just simply, "Star".
When the band began the Beauty's On The Streets tour in winter 1994, they augmented the line up with James Stevenson on rhythm guitar. As with the Ceremony record several years earlier, no other official singles were released, but several other songs were released on a strictly limited basis: "Sacred Life" was released in Spain and the Netherlands, "Be Free" was issued in Canada and France, "Saints Are Down" was issued in Greece, but none of the songs gained much commercial success. During this tour, the Cult made their first ever appearance in Norway.
During the Black Rain tour of South America in spring of 1995, despite the fact that several more new songs had already been recorded, the tour was cancelled after an appearance in Rio de Janeiro in March, and the band split up citing unspecified problems on a recent South American tour. Astbury started up a garage band called Holy Barbarians a few months later. The band made their debut at the 100 Club in London in February 1996 and released their first (and only) record in May 1996, and toured throughout North America and Europe for the rest of 1996. The band started writing material for a second record in 1997, but the band was dissolved and Astbury began writing and recording a solo record. Throughout 1997 and 1998 Astbury recorded his solo record, originally to be titled Natural Born Guerilla, later called High Time Amplifier. Ultimately the record remained unreleased until June 2000 when it was released under the name Spirit\Light\Speed. Astbury played one solo concert in 1999.
In November 1996, a number of CD reissues were released: the band's American record company released High Octane Cult, a slightly updated greatest hits compilation released only in the US and Japan; The Southern Death Cult, a remastered edition of the fifteen-song compilation CD; a ten-song compilation CD by Death Cult called Ghost Dance, consisting of the untitled four-song EP, the single "God's Zoo", and four unreleased songs from a radio broadcast; and a remastered repackaging of the Dreamtime album, containing only the ten original songs from the record in their original playing order and almost completely different but original artwork. Dreamtime Live at the Lyceum was also remastered and issued on video and for the first time on CD, with the one unreleased song from the concert, "Gimmick".
First reunion, Beyond Good and Evil and second hiatus (1999–2005)
In 1999, Astbury and Duffy reformed the Cult with Matt Sorum and ex-Porno for Pyros bassist Martyn LeNoble. Their first official concert was at the Tibetan Freedom Concert in June 1999, after having rehearsed at shows in the Los Angeles area. The band's 1999 Cult Rising reunion tour resulted in a sold out 30 date tour of the US, ending with 8 consecutive sold out nights at the LA House of Blues. In 2000, the band toured South Africa for the first time, and North and South America, and contributed the song "Painted on My Heart" to the soundtrack of the movie Gone In 60 Seconds. The song was featured prominently and the melody was fused into parts of the score. In June, Astbury's long-delayed solo record was finally released as Spirit\Light\Speed, but it failed to gain much success. In November 2000, another authorised greatest hits compilation was released, Pure Cult: The Singles 1984–1995, along with an accompanying DVD, which was later certified gold in Canada. The Cult, as well as Ian Astbury, performed on separate tracks on the Doors tribute album, Stoned Immaculate: The Music of The Doors, covering "Wild Child" and "Touch Me".
In November 2000, Beggars Banquet released 15,000 copies of a six-disc boxset (with a bonus seventh disc of remixes for the first 5000 copies) titled Rare Cult. The box set consists of album out-takes, demos, radio broadcasts, and album B-sides. It is most notable for including the previously unreleased "Peace" album in its entirety. In 2001, the band signed to Atlantic Records and recorded a new album, Beyond Good and Evil, originally being produced by Mick Jones of Foreigner, until Jones bowed out to tour with Foreigner. Astbury and Duffy co-wrote a song with Jones, an odd occurrence, as in the past, neither Astbury or Duffy would co-write their material. Bob Rock was the producer, with Martyn LeNoble and Chris Wyse as recording bassists, as Mike Dimkich played rhythm guitar on tour, and Matt Sorum returning as drummer. Although Sorum has previously toured with the band on the Sonic Temple tour in 1989, this was the first time that he had recorded a studio album with the band.
However Beyond Good and Evil was not the comeback record the band had hoped for. Despite reaching No. 37 in the US, No. 22 in Canada, and No. 25 in Spain, sales quickly dropped, only selling roughly 500,000 copies worldwide. The first single "Rise", reached No. 41 in the US, and No. 2 on the mainstream rock charts, but Atlantic Records quickly pulled the song from radio playlists. Astbury would later describe the experience with Atlantic to be "soul destroying", after Atlantic tried to tamper with the lyrics, the record cover, and choice of singles from the record.
After the first single from the record, the band's working relationship with Atlantic was on paper only, with Atlantic pulling "Rise" from the radio stations playlists, and stopping all promotion of the record. The second single "Breathe" was only released as a radio station promo, and the final single "True Believers" was only on a compilation sampler disc released in January 2002 (after the Cult's tour had already ended). Despite "True Believers" receiving radio airplay in Australia, both singles went largely unnoticed, and both Astbury and Duffy walked away from the project. LeNoble rejoined the band for the initial dates in early 2001, and Billy Morrison filled in on bass for the majority of the 2001 tour.
The European tour of 2001 was canceled, largely due to security concerns after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the band flew back to the US to tour again with Aerosmith. But the eleven-week tour was considered by fans to be a disaster, as the band played only a brief rundown of their greatest hits. In October 2001, a show at the Grand Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles was filmed for release on DVD. After the tour ended in December 2001, the band took most of 2002 off, apart from a few shows in the US to promote the release of the DVD, with Scott Garrett and Craig Adams rejoining the band.
Despite the commercial disappointment of Beyond Good and Evil and the supporting tour, the band was voted "Comeback of the Year" by Metal Edge readers in the magazine's 2001 Readers' Choice Awards.
In late 2002, Ian Astbury declared the Cult to be "on ice" indefinitely, after performing a brief series of dates in October 2002 to promote the release of the Music Without Fear DVD. During this second hiatus, Astbury performed as a member of the Doors (later dubbed the Doors of the 21st Century, later still renamed D21c, and most recently known as Riders on the Storm) with two of the original members of that group. D21c was sued numerous times, both by Jim Morrison's family and by drummer John Densmore. Astbury supposedly started work on recording another solo album that later became the backbone for the Cult's Born into This.
At the same time, Duffy was part of Coloursound with bassist Craig Adams and ex-Alarm frontman Mike Peters, then Dead Men Walking (again with Peters) and later Cardboard Vampyres. Sorum became a member of the hard rock supergroup Velvet Revolver. In 2003, all of the Cult's records were issued on CD, with several bonus tracks being issued on the Russian, Belarusian, and Lithuanian versions. These eastern European releases had many printing mistakes on the jacket sleeves and lyric inserts. In October 2004, all of the Cult's records were again remastered and issued again on CD, this time in Japan in different cardboard foldout sleeves. "She Sells Sanctuary" appeared in the 2002 video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, playing on rock station V-Rock.
Second reunion, Born Into This and Capsule EPs (2006–2010)
Despite Astbury's previous statement from 2004 that a reunion would not happen, The Cult announced in January 2006 that they were reuniting for "some limited gigs" throughout the year. A month later, the band made their first live appearance in three-and-a-half years on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson. Their lineup consisted of Astbury (vocals), Duffy (lead guitar), John Tempesta (drums), Dimkich (rhythm guitar) and Wyse (returning as bassist). Their first stage show was held in March 2006 in San Francisco, California, at The Fillmore. The entire tour was recorded by Instant Live and sold after each show. In May, they did an eight date tour in Canada. Later that summer, they toured central and eastern Europe and played their first concerts in Bulgaria, Poland and Serbia. An eleven-date UK tour followed as well as several more dates in the United States, finishing with a South American tour in December. That year, Duffy began the band Circus Diablo with Billy Morrison, Sorum, Brett Scallions and Ricky Warwick.
During these tours, the band occasionally played an extended set, including several songs the band had not performed in decades: "King Contrary Man" and "Hollow Man", neither of which had been performed since 1987; also, "Libertine" was performed approximately three times, for the first time since 2000, and "Brother Wolf, Sister Moon", which was only performed one time since 1986 (for this particular song, the band played an abridged version which has never been performed before or since)
Astbury announced in February 2007 that he was leaving Riders on the Storm and returning to the Cult. He stated: "I have decided to move on and focus on my own music and legacy." The Cult was featured on Stuffmagazine.com's list of ultimate air guitar players. On 21 March 2007, it was announced that the band would be touring Europe with the Who. The first confirmed tour date was in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, in early June, with at least a dozen shows set to follow. The band played a gig in London's West End at the CC Club on 7 June 2007, along with nearly two dozen shows across continental Europe during summer. The tour also includes the first performance in Romania and Croatia.
On 29 May 2007, the band signed a deal with major metal label Roadrunner Records. Their 8th studio album, titled Born into This was released on 16 October, and was produced by Martin "Youth" Glover, bass player for Killing Joke. Born into This was released as regular single disc and limited edition double disc, the second disk being a bonus 5-track CD holding the following tracks: "Stand Alone", "War Pony Destroyer", "I Assassin (Demo)", "Sound of Destruction (Demo)" and "Savages (Extended Version)". Prior to the album's release, the band played festival and headline dates, and supported the Who in Europe through summer 2007, with a US headline tour to follow.
The band's appearance at Irving Plaza in New York City in early November 2006 was filmed and was released in 2007. The Cult New York City, issued by Fontana North and is the Cult's first high definition DVD release. Meanwhile, Astbury lent vocals on two tracks of the 2007 Unkle album "War Stories", one of them being the first single from the album, "Burn My Shadow".
The band performed a UK and European tour in late-February and early-March 2008. On 24 March, they began their North American tour including a major 13-city tour in Canada. During September 2008, the Cult did a brief series of dates in the northeast United States, and they toured in Brazil as part of the South American tour in October 2008. As of May 2008, according to The Gauntlet, the Cult are currently unsigned and no longer under contract with Roadrunner Records. In October 2008, it was announced that the Cult would headline the inaugural Rock 'n' Roll Marathon in San Antonio, to be run 16 November 2008. The Cult announced plans for a tour showcasing their 1985 Love album across the US and then the UK in October where they will play at the Royal Albert Hall.
Coinciding with the remastered Love album and four-disc Omnibus boxed set, the Cult kicked off the long-awaited Love Live Tour in late summer. Performing their classic Love album in its entirety, each show was played with the Love tracks opening with "Nirvana" to "Black Angel". A quick intermission followed, then other Cult hits were played (varying by venue): "Sun King", "Dirty Little Rock Star", "Electric Ocean", "Illuminated". Then followed the favorites "Fire Woman", "Lil Devil", "Wild Flower", and lastly "Love Removal Machine". In the evening of 10 October 2009 at the Royal Albert Hall in London, the band performed a second encore with original Cult bassist Jamie Stewart and drummer Mark Brzezicki, who played drums with the band during the Love album recording sessions in July and August 1985. The band sold Love Live USB flash drives for each show during the tour.
The Cult entered 2010 continuing their Love Live Tour and announcing more dates in the United States, New Zealand, Australia, and Japan. The band finished recording a four-track "Capsule" with producer Chris Goss. Capsule 1 was said to be the first of three or four to be released sometime in summer 2010. Release formats include CD-DVD dualdisc, 12-inch vinyl, and digital downloads. Capsule 1 was released on 14 September 2010. The band officially announced the release of its first new studio recording since 2007, "Every Man And Woman Is A Star". The new single was released through the iTunes Store on 31 July 2010.
On 1 August 2010, the band played the sold-out music festival Sonisphere, which marked their first UK performance since the tour for their Love album. During the performance they debuted their new single, "Every Man and Woman is a Star", which was released on 1 August 2010. On 14 September 2010 the band embarked on a new U.S. tour and released Capsule 1 in conjunction with media technology company Aderra Inc. and made it available in multiple formats including a CD-DVD DualDisc, USB flash drive, 12 inch vinyl, FLAC download and MP3 download. The collection includes a short film made by singer Ian Astbury and Rick Rogers.
On 26 October 2010 the band and Aderra Inc. announced the release of a new song, "Embers", for 1 November 2010 and Capsule 2 available through their web store on 16 November 2010. Pictures from the Cult's tour stop in Chicago on 28 October 2010 can be seen at a local radio station website.
On 17 September 2010, the band performed live at the Fall Frenzy concert at the Tempe Beach Park in Tempe, Arizona. Other bands that played at this concert were Stone Temple Pilots, Shinedown, and Sevendust.
On 4 December 2010, the band performed a live set for Guitar Center Sessions on DirecTV. The episode included an interview with the band by program host, Nic Harcourt.
Choice of Weapon and Hidden City (2011–2017)
During the Cult's concert at the Hammersmith Apollo in London on 21 January 2011 Ian Astbury declared that the Cult would be recording a new album directly after the tour. They also announced that they would be working with Chris Goss, who performed with Masters of Reality as a supporting act the same evening. On 11 May 2011, it was announced that the Cult were signed to Cooking Vinyl Records, who will release the new album in early 2012. Commented guitarist Billy Duffy: "We are very much looking forward to returning to our U.K. roots in many ways working with Cooking Vinyl." Vocalist Ian Astbury added, "We look forward to a long and fruitful relationship with Cooking Vinyl." By May 2011, the band had been writing and recording new demos at its Witch Mountain studio hideaway in the Hollywood Hills, and began recording their new album at Hollywood Recording Studios. In October 2011, bassist Chris Wyse stated the album was almost finished and expected to be released in April 2012. Chris also described it as a "Zep/Stooges mix of energy."
On 29 November 2011, it was announced that the album would be produced by Bob Rock, who provided the same role on Sonic Temple, The Cult and Beyond Good and Evil. The album, entitled Choice of Weapon, was released on 22 May 2012. The band partnered with Rolling Stone to premiere the first song from the album titled Lucifer on 30 January. On 5 February 2012, the Cult song "She Sells Sanctuary" was used as the soundtrack for a Budweiser commercial in a mashup with Flo Rida aired during Super Bowl XLVI. In May 2012 the Cult appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and played "For The Animals".
On 28 September 2012, it was announced that the band would release Weapon of Choice, a "prequel" album to accompany the band's latest album, Choice of Weapon. The digital-only release, available exclusively on iTunes for two months only beginning 16 October, features the songs that were ultimately included in "Choice Of Weapon" at an earlier stage of development. Explaining the motivations behind the release, singer Ian Astbury said that "These songs were turned over and over, forged in long rehearsals and writing sessions, and emanated from challenges both personal and professional. We put our guts into this; [Producer Chris] Goss was able to create an environment where the songs were born through playing and turning over lyrics, through hard work and intense sessions." Astbury added "These songs have an integrity and rawness of their own. In many ways it's a different album to the one we released and reveals the foundations of 'Choice Of Weapon'. We were able to close the doors and begin to explore spaces we had not been in for a while." The song "Twisted and Bleeding" was made available for free download at the band's website ahead of the full digital release.
On 20 June 2013, the band announced the release of Electric-Peace which comprises the entire Electric album plus the Peace album which was previously released on the now discontinued Rare Cult box set in 2000. It is due for release in the US on 30 July. In 2013 Mike Dimkich left the band and joined Bad Religion to cover for guitarist Greg Hetson. James Stevenson, from the Beauty's On The Streets tour in 1994, replaced Dimkich as the Cult's rhythm guitarist.
In March 2013, Billy Duffy told the Argentinan journalist Fabrizio Pedrotti that the Cult had begun work on a new album for a 2014 release. The band were expected to begin work on the album after they finish their 2013 world tour, where they played the Electric album in its entirety. In August 2014, Billy added that the next album, which was not expected to be released before 2015 at the earliest, "will be more guitar heavy".
On 5 November 2015, it was announced that The Cult would release their new album, entitled Hidden City, on 5 February 2016. The album is said to be the final part of a trilogy that began with Born into This, and marks the fifth time Bob Rock had produced a Cult album. The band also announced that they had hired Australian-born bassist Grant Fitzpatrick (ex-Mink) as the replacement for Chris Wyse. Chris Chaney (Jane's Addiction, Camp Freddy) and producer Bob Rock performed session bass on the album. In support of Hidden City, The Cult opened for Guns N' Roses on the Not in This Lifetime... Tour.
In an October 2016 interview with PopMatters journalist J.C. Maçek III, Cult guitarist Billy Duffy spoke of the band's playlist while on tour, saying "Obviously you want to make an impactful [show]," he continues. "There are some practical, pragmatic decisions made. If you're playing to a crowd who are not very familiar with you, there's no point of going too deep but we do always make sure we play a new song. Like on Guns N' Roses' [tour] we had fifty minutes which is ten songs all in. So, you know we just made sure that in those ten songs we played 'Deeply Ordered Chaos' which we’re proud of and it makes a certain statement. And it just alerts people to the fact that, yes, we have made a record in the last 30 years. You know and that's a good thing. Psychologically, that's the blood transfusion that we need. And we're very mindful, we have a very loyal fan base. We don't pander as you well know."
Upcoming eleventh studio album (2018–present)
In an April 2018 interview with Guitar World, guitarist Billy Duffy was asked if another album from The Cult was in the works. He replied, "Never say never! Ian and I enjoy the process of making new music, and we feel it's vital to keep the band healthy, even if it's pretty much in the law of diminishing returns area now. Who knows if it will be a whole album a series of singles or an EP? I can say new Cult music will be forthcoming, but these days we don't rush it as there's no point. Quality is key. We are past the point of having to release stuff so if we feel it's good enough, then we will release it in some shape or another."
On 2 April 2018, a tour of the United States of America called "Revolution 3 Tour" was announced for the summer. They performed as one of the three headliners, along with Stone Temple Pilots and Bush.
In April 2019, The Cult announced that they would celebrate the 30th anniversary of the release of their fourth album Sonic Temple with a world tour, which began on 2 May in Houston, Texas and was expected to wrap up in 2020.
In a June 2019 interview with LA Weekly, vocalist Ian Astbury stated that The Cult were "long overdue" to release new music. He was quoted as saying: "We do have some stuff we've been working on, but it's yet to see the light of day." Six months later, Astbury told Atlantic City Weekly that the band was going to start working on new music in 2020: "We've got a few pieces lying around in various stages of completion. The intention is to get together in the New Year and take a look at what we've got and decide how we are going to go about moving forward. It's an essential part of any creative lifeblood." On May 6, 2020, The Cult announced on their Twitter page that they had signed to Black Hill Records.
On August 15, 2020, Duffy announced on his Twitter that the band were recording their new album with producer Tom Dalgety at Rockfield Studios, where The Cult had recorded their debut album Dreamtime 36 years earlier.
In support of their new album, The Cult will embark on a co-headlining six-date UK tour with Alice Cooper in May and June 2022.
Influences
Duffy and Astbury cited among their influences a lot of different bands "from the Doors to Led Zeppelin. We literally went from the front of our record collections to the back. And then along the way we were drawn in by the likes of Public Image Ltd, Joy Division and Siouxsie and the Banshees. You might not hear it in the music but it's there." They also cited Bauhaus among many other post-punk influences. Duffy also praised Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers for a major performance he attended in 1977 and Siouxsie and the Banshees whom "always had great guitar players with killer riffs." Duffy also hailed AC/DC for "the power of a good three chord riff", Pete Townshend of the Who "in terms of commitment to stage performing" and Brian May of Queen for using "‘echoplex’ tape delays to orchestrate his own solo".
Musical style
According to music critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the band fuse a "hardcore punk revivalist" sound with the "pseudo-mysticism ... of the Doors and Uriah Heep and the guitar-orchestrations of Led Zeppelin and The Cure ... while adding touches of post-punk goth rock". In 1985 Astbury said, "Our music is just melodies and guitars. We're like Big Country and U2, only better!".
Members
Current members
Ian Astbury – lead vocals, occasional percussion/guitar
Billy Duffy – lead and rhythm guitars, backing vocals
John Tempesta – drums, percussion
Grant Fitzpatrick – bass, backing vocals
Damon Fox – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals
Discography
Dreamtime (1984)
Love (1985)
Electric (1987)
Sonic Temple (1989)
Ceremony (1991)
The Cult (1994)
Beyond Good and Evil (2001)
Born into This (2007)
Choice of Weapon (2012)
Hidden City (2016)
References
External links
Official website
Billy Duffy official website
Musical groups established in 1983
Situation Two artists
Beggars Banquet Records artists
Sire Records artists
Musical groups from Bradford
English post-punk music groups
English gothic rock groups
English hard rock musical groups
English heavy metal musical groups
English glam metal musical groups | true | [
"Master's mate is an obsolete rating which was used by the Royal Navy, United States Navy and merchant services in both countries for a senior petty officer who assisted the master. Master's mates evolved into the modern rank of Sub-Lieutenant in the Royal Navy, while in the merchant service they evolved into the numbered mates or officers.\n\nRoyal Navy\nOriginally, a master's mate was an experienced petty officer who assisted the master but was not in line for promotion to lieutenant. By the mid-eighteenth century, he was far more likely to be a superior midshipman, still waiting to pass his examination for lieutenant or to receive his commission, but taking rather more responsibility aboard ship. Six master's mates were allowed on a first rate, three on a third rate, and two on most frigates.\n\nDuties\n\nMaster's mates were experienced seamen, and were usually selected from the ranks of the quartermasters, who they supervised, or from the ranks of midshipmen who wanted more responsibility aboard ship; they were less commonly selected from other mates of warrant officers and able seamen. Master's mates were allowed to command vessels, walk the quarterdeck, and mess in the gunroom with the other warrant officers. \n\nMaster's mates were responsible for fitting out the ship, and making sure they had all the sailing supplies necessary for the voyage. They hoisted and lowered the anchor, and docked and undocked the ship. They would examine the ship daily, notifying the master if there were problems with the sails, masts, ropes, or pulleys. They executed the orders of the master, and would command in his place if he was sick or absent.\n\nNormally master's mates worked on a three-watch system, with the lieutenants, so that one served as the deputy to the lieutenant on each watch. Master's mates generally assisted the master in navigating the ship and directly supervised the quartermasters in steering the ship. The master's mate with the highest seniority was appointed the head of the midshipman's berth and was responsible for teaching mathematics, navigation, and sailing lore. Master's mates had to keep detailed logs similar to midshipmen. They were also responsible for the division of the crew that included the petty officers.\n\nSecond master \n\nSecond master was a rating introduced in 1753 that indicated a deputy master on 3rd rate ships of the line or larger. Master's mates also acted as Second Master of vessels too small to be allocated a warranted Master. They were paid significantly more than master's mates, £5 5s per month. A second master was generally a master's mate who had passed his examination for master and was deemed worthy of being master of a vessel. Second masters were given the first opportunity for master vacancies as they occurred.\n\nMate \n\nPassed midshipmen awaiting promotion often elected to become master's mates. Though formally the rating did not lead to promotion to lieutenant, master's mates were paid more than any other rating and were the only ratings allowed to command any sort of vessel. A midshipman who became master's mate earned an increase in pay from £1 13s 6p to £3 16s per month, but initially reduced his chances at a commission. Over time, however, an appointment of master's mate became considered a normal part of the path to a commission; the situation caused some confusion during the last part of the 18th century, when two parallel roles - master's mates trying to become masters, and former midshipmen working toward a commission - held the same title and responsibilities aboard ship.\n\nBy the first years of the nineteenth century, the prefix \"master's\" was dropped for passed midshipman, to distinguish them from master's mates in the navigator's branch. In 1824 two further grades were also introduced, consisting of master's assistants and second-class volunteers. These corresponded to midshipmen and first-class volunteers respectively in the executive line. From this point, passed midshipmen had the rating master's mate, abbreviated as mate, and prospective masters had the rating master's assistant. These changes helped eliminate the confusion caused by the mingling of midshipmen in the navigator's branch. In 1838 a Royal Commission, presided over by the Duke of Wellington, recommended the institution of the rank of mate as an official step between midshipman and lieutenant. \n\nBy 1840 there were two completely separate \"ladders\" for promotion:\n\nRenaming and later use \n\nIn 1861 mate was abolished in favor of sub-lieutenant. This made no practical difference to the officers in question since they continued to receive the same pay as before. But the new title was more distinctive; it brought them into line with their opposite numbers in the Army and established them as commissioned officers. In 1867, master was renamed navigating-lieutenant, so at the same time second master was renamed navigating sub-lieutenant and the master's assistant was renamed navigating midshipman.\n\nMate was revived in 1913 for the accelerated promotion of promising ratings, and mates ranked with sub-lieutenants but messed separately. In 1931 the title was abandoned again, and mates were re-mustered as sub-lieutenants.\n\nUS Navy\n\nAs a warrant officer \n\nIn the U.S. Navy, the rank of master's mate was established 1797 as a warrant officer rank, but it was disestablished in 1813. After 1843 no more warrants were issued but those who had been appointed continued to hold their office and received their pay. In 1865, it was replaced by the rating mate. \n\nBy an act of the United States Congress in 1906, the mates on the U.S. Navy retired list were promoted to the next higher grade if they had creditable American Civil War service, which most of them had. They were given warrant rank and rated with the lowest grade of warrant officer.\n\nAs a seaman \n\nMaster's mate was re-established in 1838 as a rating for experienced seamen, and was not considered a Warrant rank. At the same time sailing master was renamed master, master commandant was renamed commander, and some masters were commissioned as officers, formally \"Master in line for Promotion\" to distinguish them from the warrant masters who would not be promoted. \n\nIn 1865, master's Mate was changed to \"mate\", and the United States Secretary of the Navy was authorized to increase their pay and to rate them from Seaman to Ordinary Seaman who had enlisted in the naval service for not less than two years. The act of 15 July 1870 gave formal recognition to mates as part of the naval forces and their pay was fixed at $900 when at sea, $700 on shore duty, and $500 on leave or awaiting orders. \n\nThe quota of mates in the Navy was not fixed, but there was maximum of about 842 on 1 January 1865, during the Civil War. The Navy stopped making appointments to the rank of mate in 1870 but allowed those in serving in the position to remain in service. The U.S. Navy Register of Commissioned Officers of 1871 shows there were 130 mates on active duty as of January 1st. The number gradually diminished until 1 July 1894 when there were only 27 remaining. \n\nThe Navy resumed appointing mates in 1897 in limited quantities. The 1899 Register shows a total of 34 mates on active duty with 12 being appointed in 1870 or earlier, 6 in 1897 and 16 in 1898. The revival of the rank of mate was only temporary as most of the remaining mates were promoted to the warrant officer rank of Boatswain in 1899. In the Navy Register of 1903 only 7 mates were listed as being on active duty. The Navy started appointing mates that year and by January 1, 1907, there were 39 on active duty. The revival was short lived as by January 1, 1908, there were no mates on active duty.\n\nRetirement and pensions \n\nBefore 1 August 1894 there had been no authority for retirement of these men, but on that date a law was passed increasing the pay of those in the Navy and providing that they should have the same benefits of retirement as warrant officers. One purpose of the act was to make the retired pay of mates large enough to induce them to retire. By an act of Congress in 1906, the mates on the U.S. Navy retired list were promoted to the next higher grade if they had creditable Civil War service, which most of them had. They were given warrant rank and rated with the lowest grade of warrant officer. They were still called mates, but whether they were officers or enlisted men apparently was not clear. A year after the passage of this act the Attorney General of the United States published the legal opinion that mates \"occupy the status of both officers in the Navy and enlisted men\".\n\nMerchant service \n\nIn the merchant service, master's mates were the officers immediately subordinate to the master and frequently divided by seniority into first, second, third (etc.) mate which evolved into the modern terms First Mate, Second Mate and Third Mate. Since the 1930s, there has been a tendency in the merchant service to replace mate with officer (e.g. First Officer).\n\nSee also\nMaster (naval)\nMidshipman\nSub-lieutenant\nWarrant Officer\n\nReferences\n\nNaval ranks\nMilitary ranks of the Royal Navy\nMilitary ranks of the United States Navy",
"Jack Mates ( – date of death unknown) was a Welsh international footballer. He was part of the Wales national football team between 1891 and 1897, playing 3 matches.\n\nMates was a member of the Chirk team that won the Welsh Cup in 1889–90, and was one of twenty internationals to have originated from the club. He played his first match for Wales on 7 February 1891 against Ireland and his last match on 29 March 1897 against England.\n\nSee also\n List of Wales international footballers (alphabetical)\n\nReferences\n\n1870 births\nWelsh footballers\nWales international footballers\nChirk AAA F.C. players\nPlace of birth missing\nYear of death missing\nAssociation footballers not categorized by position"
] |
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