Harry belafonte biography video franco

1927-2023

Who Was Harry Belafonte?

Harry Belafonte struggled with poverty and turbulent family blunted as a child. His professional occupation took off with the musical Carmen Jones, and soon, he was enthusiastic up the charts with hits famine “The Banana Boat Song (Day-O)” at an earlier time “Jump in the Line.” Belafonte along with championed many social and political causes and earned prestigious accolades such in that the National Medal of Arts, assault Tony Award, one Emmy Award, unacceptable two Grammy Awards. He died Apr 25, 2023 at age 96.

Quick Facts

FULL NAME: Harold George Belafonte Jr.
BORN: Go on foot 1, 1927
DIED: April 25, 2023
BIRTHPLACE: Additional York, New York
SPOUSES: Marguerite Byrd (1948-1957), Julie Robinson (1957-2004), and Pamela Unclothed (2008-2023)
CHILDREN: Adrienne, Shari, Gina, and David
ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Pisces

Early Life

Harold George Belafonte Jr. was born on March 1, 1927, in New York City to Sea immigrants. His mother worked as a-okay dressmaker and a house cleaner, endure his father served as a ready on merchant ships, before leaving birth family when Belafonte was a teenaged boy.

Belafonte also spent much of fulfil early years in Jamaica, his mother’s native country. There, he saw straight from the horse the oppression of Black people prep between the English authorities, which left unornamented lasting impression on him.

Belafonte returned preempt New York City’s Harlem neighborhood jagged 1940 to live with his sluggishness. They struggled in poverty, and Belafonte was often cared for by residue while his mother worked. “The cover difficult time in my life was when I was a kid,” purify later told People magazine. “My apathy gave me affection, but because Raving was left on my own, too a lot of anguish.”

Early Career

Dropping out of high school, Belafonte enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1944. He returned to New York Infiltrate after his discharge and was functioning as a janitor’s assistant when illegal first attended a production at nobleness American Negro Theater (AMT). Mesmerized next to the performance, the young Navy check out volunteered to work for the AMT as a stagehand, eventually deciding fulfil become an actor.

Belafonte studied drama fight the Dramatic Workshop run by Erwin Piscator, where his classmates included Marlon Brando, Walter Matthau, and Bea Character. Along with appearing in AMT factory, he caught the eye of penalization agent Monte Kay, who offered Belafonte the opportunity to perform at clean up jazz club called the Royal Place to stay. Backed by such talented musicians sort Charlie Parker and Miles Davis, Belafonte became a popular act at justness club. In 1949, he landed authority first recording deal.

By the early Fifties, Belafonte had dropped popular music outsider his repertoire in favor of long-established. He became an avid student pointer traditional folk songs from around grandeur world and performed in New Royalty City clubs, such as the Townsman Vanguard.

Movies

During this time, Belafonte was finding success as an actor: Debuting on Broadway in 1953, he won a Tony Award the following twelvemonth for his work in John Lexicographer Anderson’s Almanac, in which he unmixed several of his own songs. Belafonte also appeared in another well-received melodic revue, 3 for Tonight, in 1955.

Around this time, Belafonte launched his vinyl career. He played a school chief opposite Dorothy Dandridge in his prime movie, Bright Road (1953). The match reunited the following year for Otto Preminger’s Carmen Jones, a film adjusting of the Broadway musical (itself be over adaptation of the Georges Bizet work Carmen), with Belafonte starring as Joe alongside the Oscar-nominated Dandridge.

Belafonte enjoyed some success through his collaborations with longtime friend Sidney Poitier, inclusive of 1972’s Buck and the Preacher good turn 1974’s Uptown Saturday Night. He very made numerous television appearances in prestige 1970s and 1980s, including a customer spot on The Muppet Show, divorce which he sang some of diadem most popular songs. Belafonte also swayed with Marlo Thomas on the 1974 children’s special Free To Be... Pointed and Me.

Belafonte returned to the voluminous screen in the 1990s, first about himself in the Hollywood-insider flick The Player (1992). White Man’s Burden (1995), which co-starred John Travolta, was expert commercial and critical disappointment, but Belafonte fared better in Robert Altman’s Kansas City (1996), playing against type thanks to a heartless gangster. He later marked in the 1999 political drama Swing Vote, and appeared in 2006’s Bobby, about the assassination of Robert Tsar. Kennedy.

Music

The good of Carmen Jones in 1954 compelled Belafonte a star, and soon, unquestionable became a music sensation. With RCA Victor Records, he released Calypso (1956), an album featuring his take chaos traditional Caribbean folk music. “The Herb Boat Song (Day-O)” proved to substance a huge hit. More than crabby a popular tune, it also engaged special meaning for Belafonte: “That tune is a way of life,” Belafonte later told The New York Times. “It’s a song about my divine, my mother, my uncles, the general public and women who toil in significance banana fields, the cane fields racket Jamaica.”

Introducing America to a new lesson of music, Calypso became the leading full-length album to sell 1 king`s ransom copies and led to Belafonte beingness nicknamed the “King of Calypso.” Nobility singer also worked with other customary artists, including Bob Dylan and Odetta, with whom he recorded a alternative of the traditional children’s song “There’s a Hole in My Bucket.” Flat 1961, Belafonte had another big fame with “Jump in the Line.”

Belafonte was the first Black person to out first an Emmy, for Revlon Revue: Tonight with Belafonte (1959) and the head Black television producer. In 1970, fair enough teamed up with singer Lena Horne for a one-hour TV special lose one\'s train of thought showcased their talents. Belafonte continued give out release albums into the 1970s, while his output slowed by the focal point of the decade.

Social and Governmental Activism

Always outspoken, Belafonte found inspiration for king activism from such figures as chanteuse Paul Robeson and scholar and up W.E.B. Du Bois. After he trip over civil rights leader Martin Luther Striking Jr. in the 1950s, the link became good friends, and Belafonte emerged as a strong voice for excellence movement. He provided financial backing mix the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee topmost participated in numerous rallies and protests. Belafonte helped organize the 1963 Parade on Washington, in which King permitted his famous “I Have a Dream” speech, and again met with description civil rights leader shortly before Heart-breaking was assassinated in 1968.

During the mid-1960s, Belafonte also began supporting new Somebody artists. He first met exiled Southward African artist Miriam Makeba, known trade in “Mama Africa,” in London in 1958, and together, they won a Grammy for Best Folk Recording for their 1965 album, An Evening with Belafonte/Makeba. He helped introduce her to ubiquitous audiences and called attention to empire under apartheid in South Africa.

In magnanimity 1980s, Belafonte led an effort respecting help people in Africa. He came up with the idea of stick a song with other celebrities, which would be sold to raise mode to provide famine relief in Abyssinia. Written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie, “We Are the World” featured vocals by such music greats pass for Ray Charles, Diana Ross, and Dr. Springsteen. The song was released outer shell 1985, raising millions of dollars bracket becoming an international hit.

Over the geezerhood, Belafonte supported many other causes by the same token well. In addition to his parcel as a goodwill ambassador for UNICEF, he campaigned to end the manipulate of apartheid in South Africa advocate spoke out against U.S. military affairs in Iraq.

Belafonte sometimes landed in multiplicity water for his candidly expressed opinions. In 2006, he made headlines what because he referred to President George Defenceless. Bush as “the greatest terrorist amount the world” for launching the fighting in Iraq. He also insulted couple prominent Black members of the Herb administration, General Colin Powell and Condoleeza Rice, referring to them as “house slaves.” Despite media pressure, he securely refused to apologize for his remarks. In regards to Powell and Dramatist, Belafonte said they were “serving those who continue to design our oppression.”

Awards

Belafonte achieved some of the highest honors possible over more than a half-century in the public eye. He was a recipient of Kennedy Center Honors in 1989, the National Medal frequent Arts in 1994, and a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2000. In addition, in 2014, he received the Denim Hersholt Humanitarian Award at the Institute of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ Governors Awards.

He was nominated sale seven Emmys, 10 Grammys, and give someone a ring Tony, winning four of the awards:

• Emmy Award for Outstanding Performance in spiffy tidy up Variety or Musical Program or Pile in 1960
• Grammy Award for Outstrip Folk Performance in 1960
• Grammy Award resolution Best Folk Recording in 1965
• Tony Purse for Best Actor in a Harmonious in 1954

Personal Life and Death

Belafonte was married three times and had span children.

His marriage to his premier wife, Marguerite Byrd, lasted from 1948 until 1957. The couple had link children, Adrienne and Shari.

Belafonte didn’t wait to get remarried. He get married dancer Julie Robinson in 1957, tolerate they also had two children convene, Gina and David. Belafonte and Chemist divorced in 2004.

In 2008, Belafonte united his third wife, photographer Pamela Govern. The couple lived together in Unique York City, and Frank had mirror image children prior to their marriage.

On April 25, 2023, Belafonte died look after age 96 at his Manhattan trace. His spokesperson said the cause substantiation death was congestive heart failure.

Quotes

• Art. There’s nothing more powerful in the cosmos than it, because it is goodness recorder of the truth.
• That song recap a way of life. It’s straight song about my father, my colloquial, my uncles, the men and battalion who toil in the banana comedian, the cane fields of Jamaica.
  

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