It’s nearing the end of 2023. In light of Benjamin Zephaniah’s death last week (7th December), I thought it appropriate to write add additional companion piece to Rest In Power playlist. I’ve also updated the playlist to add some of his songs to the playlist.
Harry Belafonte – March 1st 1927 to 25st March
I remember a family friend being a big fan of Belafonte. So, his music is a big part of my memories of the first time I went abroad as a child.
During breakfast, my mother’s friends would play the Greatest Hits album- by then a lot of the music was already decades old. It didn’t occur to me until adulthood that I knew plenty of his music, as will you! It’s extremely very likely you’ve danced to calypso music at some point in your life without even realising.
Just like his friend, Sir Sidney Poitier, he wasn’t just an actor breaking the colour barrier in Hollywood, he became part of the civil rights movement, including being a confidant of Martin Luther King Jr.
Belafonte’s live performances were always electric and full of emotion, something not always captured within the studio recordings.
He popularised one of Trinidad & Tobago’s most important additions to music, the genre Calypso. The 1956 album of the same name was the first ever to sell 1 million copies in the space of a year. He was also the first Jamaican American to win an Emmy. Songs like ‘Banana Boat (Day-O)’ and ‘Jump The In Line’ are everywhere and have been everywhere for decades on end. And they feel woven into the fabric of… well everywhere.
While working to pay for acting school, His first performance in front of an audience included being in a band with Miles Davis. By the 60s he was big within televised variety shows and entertainment. Belafonte was a part of the Rat Pack era too, being recruited by Sinatra. in February of ‘68 saw him temporarily host ‘the Tonight Show’ interviewing Bobby Kennedy. By 1969 he was performing on US television with Julie Andrews.
Belafonte was a pioneer in entertainment, and after starring in several Hollywood received plenty of the highest accolades. His most recent screen credit being as an elderly civil rights activist in Spike Lee’s ‘BlacKkKlasman’. A film loosely based on former police officer Ron Stallworth who infiltrated the KKK. The role in 2018 would be his last.
Tina Turner – November 26th 1939 to May 24th
100 million records sold worldwide; she was the first artist to have a top 10 in 7 consecutive decades in the UK. 35 of them. I don’t even have to mention the songs on the playlist that are hers, we all know them.
In 2021, during a lockdown 200 miles apart, my mother and I watched ‘Tina’, a new documentary about her life in her own words, from the perspective of Anna May Bullock. who had lived an extraordinary life. Her music was near the top of the list of getting my mother through a divorce after an abusive marriage. And her stoic outlook on life during and after abuse is something I identify with myself.
So, upon hearing of Tina Turner’s death – with her voice breaking – my mother left me a voice message making sure I was aware. I too was nearing tears. Later in the day, we chatted for hours about her, her music, and our own experiences.
In a written interview with the Today [Show] in the US, when asked if she was, “What do you want your legacy to be?” she answered:
That I’ve created hope where there was none, and kept moving forward, no matter what, with my chin held high. I’ve created a happy life by believing in myself. And I’ve done my best to bring love and inspiration to other people, to show everyone there is more joy in their hearts, more they can do, more they can be, when they believe in themselves too.
The Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll has died. Long live her music, her spirit to survive in seemingly inescapable adversity. Long live the building of something out of nothing. Long live the energy on stage, the love for her fans, the iconography.
Here’s a bonus playlist of Tina Turner favourites, starting with my own favourite: Typical Male.
Bobby Caldwell – Aug 15th 1951 to 24th March
If you’d like to understand why black music lost a giant when Bobby Caldwell died, just search on YouTube for “Black people reacting to What You Won’t Do For Love”. Released in 1978, It became, and still is, a staple in Black households everywhere.
The reactions are both hilarious and heart-warming, “What?! What?! He’s white?!” “How much soul does this man have in his voice?!”. This is in part due to the record company trying to hide the fact that he was a white man, oppositely to Madonna for her first album some 5 years later.
Being exposed to plenty of different genres of music via his parents’ local TV variety show, Caldwell learnt guitar and piano at 12. In the early 70s, he was back rhythm guitarist for Little Richard, his first big job in music. He also happened to make friends with Bob Marley, a client of his mother’s real estate business.
The blue-eyed soul king’s contribution to Black music is wide-ranging. And he always acknowledged the Black origins of his music. Many went on to influence and be sampled by many of hip hop’s biggest rappers and producers, with the biggest being 2Pac’s – Do For Love.
Gordy Harmon – 1943 to Jan. 5
One of the founding members of one of the most iconic groups of 20th century, The Whispers, Harmon was a member from 63 to 73 and was partly responsible for shaping what was to become by working on the first 3 of 32 studio albums. He injured his larynx in which led to him leaving the group.
As The Beat Goes On by the Los Angles group – peaked at 2 in the UK, while keeping there signature style he’d previously contributed to.
Fred White and Sheldon Reynolds (of Earth Wind & Fire)
Earth Wind and Fire is truly a family affair. Fred White was a founding member of the funk boogie R’n’B group alongside bandleader and producer, Maurice White (d. 2018,) and Verdine White (still an active member since the beginning in 1969). Phillip Bailey – the main singer the group – confirmed Fred White’s death via social media. Reynolds, a child prodigy guitarist, and joined in the group 1987, after being part of the Commodores.
One of the best-selling groups of all time, we all know the hits: September; Let’s Groove Boogie Wonderland with The Emotions.
These guys are also responsible for the viral TikTok song: Lil Bo Thang Paul Russell. And Fred White’s tight bass-boosted drum playing can be heard. “How?” I hear you ask. Well, via the hit upbeat disco song that Russell samples: Best of My Love. The song, by the one of most influential girl groups of all time, The Emotions, released this song 1977. Maurice White – band leader of EWF, wrote and produced the song. And provided some of backing vocal harmonies too.
Burt Bacharach – May 12, 1928 – February 8
Many don’t tend to know that Aretha Franklin’s I Say A Little Prayer is a cover of Dionne Warwick. It was written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David (died: 2012).
Bacharach is mostly known for his songs for musicals and himself is Black or African American. So, what is he doing on this list? For is discovering Warwick in 1961, the trio would go on to craft some of the most pioneering and memorable pop songs of the 20th century.
Dionne Warwick is one of the most influential pop singers of all time. Her fashion sense, he style of singing, and stage performances set the standard that singers followed to follow in the footsteps of. Warwick and Bacharach’s songs are responsible for the careers of likes of Lulu, Sandie Shaw, and Cilia Black. All off which adopted not just her singing style but were influenced by her fashion. The first cross-over pop artist, before Whitney Houston got the “she does white music”, it was Dionne being accused of this. This year in particular popular singer/rapper Doja Cat sampled the trio’s most famous song: Walk On By.
Warwick – responsible for hits like Heartbreaker (1982) and Promises Promises (1968), dubbed one of the hardest songs to sing in pop music – sued Bacharach for in the 70s for breach of contract but the settled out of court and in 1985 marked their rekindling with the hit That’s What Friends are For.
Oh, I should add, although Bacharach didn’t like the song. However, I Say A Little Prayer went on to sell 1 million in its first iteration. It was only by accident that Aretha Franklin’s cover came about. She and her backing singers were practising the song for warming up, when Jerry Wexter decided it would make a great cover. Aretha’s version also went on gold selling 1 million, and peaked at No4, making it one of her biggest hits in the UK other than Knew You Were Waiting, With George Michael.
Bacharach, born in Kansas, and raised in Queen NYC, his artist mother encouraged him to learn piano, cello and drums. He was heavily influenced by Bobop jazz artist and incorporated this in his writing. As a teen often attended shows of Count Basie and Dizzy Gisspse. He remains one of the most influential writers in history, penning 52 and 35 top 40 hits in the UK and US respectively.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9M744rDd40
Dionne Warwick – setting the standard for pop singers since the early 60s
Yukihiro Takahashi* & Ryuichi Sakamoto** of Yellow Magic Orchestra. (June 6, 1952 – January 11, 2023* January 17, 1952)
Takahashi and Ryuichi are two out of the three main members of the Japanese Band Yellow Magic Orchestra, alongside Haruomi Hosono.
Sakamoto is responsible for Riot In Lagos (1980) – an instrumental track like the vast majority of their Yellow Magic Orchestra sound – was instrumental in the development of hip-hop and dance music (one I’d argue is of the biggest influences on the famous signature top of the hour music for BBC News https://davidlowemusic.com/project/bbc-news/). YMO always cited music of Black origin as a particular influence for them. So much so there were on the Soul Train doing their version of soul song Archie Bell & Billy Buttier’s “Tighten Up”. Tong Poo” / “Firecracker.
Their songs went on to be sampled by the likes of Afrika Bambaataa, Michael Jackson, De La Soul, and most famously, JLo’s 2001 hit: I’m Real.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yxep-gS-Btg
Benjamin Zephaniah (15th April 1958 – Dec 7)
From Birmingham, Zephaniah was a single man’d cultural powerhouse. A national treasure, he left school aged 13 not knowing he was severely dyslexic, only learning to read and becoming an academic as a young adult. In the 1982 he released an album called Rasta, featuring the Wailers, (their first songs without Bob Marley). The album became popular in many places, including topping the charts in Yugoslavia. It was a tribute to Nelson Mandela – imprisoned at the time – who in 1996 invited Zephaniah to perform at the Royal Albert Hall. He decided he aimed to bring poetry to those who felt it was boring, popularised dub (reggae) poetry. Taking up the causes of anti-racism, equality, and the legacy of the British empire.
Refused an MBE in 2003 for New Year’s Honours that year for services to the arts. Writing a scathing piece in the Guardian he set out his clear reasons for refusing such an award.
He did, however, clock up 16 honorary degrees. In recent years he starred in the British drama Peaky Blinders playing Jeremiah Jesus, a WWI veteran turned street preacher.
As a child newly diagnosed with dyslexia, Zephaniah was lorded as an example of a fellow dyslexic who was able to thrive. It felt shoehorned for me. However, the older I got the more I could appreciate adults’ attempts around me to show me examples of high-profile people with dyslexia who have excelled in their field.