For some documentaries to work, all the director needs to do is turn on the camera and let her subjects chat away. In I Stand Corrected, there's chatting plus the bonus of some real fine jazz, the interplay of which combines to create a simple, compelling look at a very brave, extremely talented woman, Jennifer Leitham.
The thrust of the tale, though, is that, after a highly successful career as a southpaw player of the double bass, appearing with the likes of Mel Torme and George Shearing, at age 48, Ms. Leitham underwent sex reassignment surgery. Yes, she started out life as a John.
Growing up in Redding, Pennsylvania, in the '50s, was no picnic for a lad who used to sneak into the closets of his mom and his best friends' sisters to try on their dresses. John knew then that was what made him happy. "My body was...
The thrust of the tale, though, is that, after a highly successful career as a southpaw player of the double bass, appearing with the likes of Mel Torme and George Shearing, at age 48, Ms. Leitham underwent sex reassignment surgery. Yes, she started out life as a John.
Growing up in Redding, Pennsylvania, in the '50s, was no picnic for a lad who used to sneak into the closets of his mom and his best friends' sisters to try on their dresses. John knew then that was what made him happy. "My body was...
- 6/21/2013
- by Brandon Judell
- www.culturecatch.com
New York -- Pianist Herbie Hancock will celebrate the special connection between Turkey and jazz music forged decades ago when the Turkish ambassador opened his residence to white and black musicians at a time when segregation held sway in the U.S. capital.
Hancock, a Unesco Goodwill Ambassador, is organizing a gala concert with jazz stars from around the world on April 30 at the famed Hagia Irene in the outer courtyard of Topkapi Palace in Istanbul, which has been designated the host city for the second annual U.N.-sanctioned International Jazz Day.
"There's an amazing history of the relationship between Turkey and jazz," Hancock told The Associated Press in a telephone interview ahead of Tuesday's official announcement of the 2013 International Jazz Day program.
It began in the `30s and `40s when the two sons of Turkish Ambassador Mehmet Munir Ertegun pursued their passion for jazz by frequenting the capital's...
Hancock, a Unesco Goodwill Ambassador, is organizing a gala concert with jazz stars from around the world on April 30 at the famed Hagia Irene in the outer courtyard of Topkapi Palace in Istanbul, which has been designated the host city for the second annual U.N.-sanctioned International Jazz Day.
"There's an amazing history of the relationship between Turkey and jazz," Hancock told The Associated Press in a telephone interview ahead of Tuesday's official announcement of the 2013 International Jazz Day program.
It began in the `30s and `40s when the two sons of Turkish Ambassador Mehmet Munir Ertegun pursued their passion for jazz by frequenting the capital's...
- 2/19/2013
- by AP
- Huffington Post
Damn, as far as indie movie hand offs go, this one is pretty great. So, Mark Ruffalo can no longer do your movie? How about John Hawkes instead? That's precisely what's happening with "Low Down," the developing jazz biopic focused on Joe Albany. Based on his daughter Amy Albany's memoir "Low Down: Junk, Jazz, and Other Fairy Tales From Childhood," the film will be told from the perspective of a child as she watches her father navigate the jazz scene of the '60s and '70s while struggling with drug addiction. While Albany might not be a household name, his talent allowed him to play alongside giants like Benny Carter, Charlie Parker and Miles Davis. So in short: Hawkes playing an addicted, but deftly talented musician? Yep, we're in. Commercial director Jeff Preiss, who is also a partner at Epoch Films who are producing the pic with...
- 11/12/2012
- by Kevin Jagernauth
- The Playlist
Maria Cole, the widow of singing legend Nat "King" Cole, the mother of Natalie Cole and in her own right a former Big Band singer, died Tuesday in Boca Raton, Fla., after a brief battle with cancer, her family announced. She was 89. "Our mom was in a class all by herself. She epitomized class, elegance, and truly defined what it is to be a real lady," said Natalie Cole and her siblings, Timolin and Casey Cole, in a statement. "We are so blessed and privileged to have inherited the legacy that she leaves behind along with our father. She died...
- 7/12/2012
- by Stephen M. Silverman
- PEOPLE.com
Virtuoso violinist heard on a string of classic Hollywood movie scores
The American violinist Israel Baker, who has died aged 92, was renowned among his fellow musicians but unknown to most of the millions who heard him play on the soundtracks of such movies as Alfred Hitchcock's 1960 shocker Psycho, where he led Bernard Herrmann's screaming violin effects accompanying the stabbing of Janet Leigh in the shower scene.
Baker belonged to a select group of musicians who could fit into any situation at a moment's notice and read any piece on sight. But while making a lavish living in the Hollywood film and recording studios, he also had a considerable concert career.
He was born in Chicago, the youngest of four children of Russian immigrants. At six he appeared on national radio, and from his late teens he played in orchestras. At 22 he was concertmaster of Leopold Stokowski's All-American...
The American violinist Israel Baker, who has died aged 92, was renowned among his fellow musicians but unknown to most of the millions who heard him play on the soundtracks of such movies as Alfred Hitchcock's 1960 shocker Psycho, where he led Bernard Herrmann's screaming violin effects accompanying the stabbing of Janet Leigh in the shower scene.
Baker belonged to a select group of musicians who could fit into any situation at a moment's notice and read any piece on sight. But while making a lavish living in the Hollywood film and recording studios, he also had a considerable concert career.
He was born in Chicago, the youngest of four children of Russian immigrants. At six he appeared on national radio, and from his late teens he played in orchestras. At 22 he was concertmaster of Leopold Stokowski's All-American...
- 1/11/2012
- by Tully Potter
- The Guardian - Film News
The Kennedy Center Honors have been handed out since 1978. Recipients hail from various branches of the American performance art world — including film, stage, music, and dance — even though performers more closely associated with British show business have managed to sneak in every now and then, e.g., Paul McCartney, Roger Daltrey, Elton John, Pete Townshend. Since recipients are supposed to attend the Washington, D.C., ceremony in order to take home their Kennedy awards, Doris Day has remained unhonored by the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Katharine Hepburn kept putting it off until she finally relented in 1990. (Irene Dunne, see above photo, was one who managed to be honored though absent due to ill health.) Ginger Rogers, for her part, was present at the ceremony, but her films with Fred Astaire weren't — because Astaire's widow, Robyn Astaire, demanded payment for the televised clips. At the time, Kennedy Center Honors...
- 9/7/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Jazz singer, actor and civil rights activist strongly influenced by Billie Holiday
If Abbey Lincoln was overwhelmed by the responsibility of being proclaimed "the last of the jazz singers", she never let it show. As her great contemporaries and principal influences among the classic female jazz vocalists fell away – with Billie Holiday the first to go, in 1959, and Betty Carter the last, in 1998 – Lincoln steadfastly maintained her dignified, almost solemn, focus; her tart, deftly timed Holiday-like inflections, and her commitment to songs that dug deeper into life's meanings than the usual lost-love exhalations.
And, like Ella Fitzgerald, who all her life took to a stage as if she were surprised to find anyone had come to see her, Lincoln became the opposite of a celebrated jazz diva. In some of her London performances during the 1990s, she would sit quietly beside the piano, tugging at her clothes, like someone who...
If Abbey Lincoln was overwhelmed by the responsibility of being proclaimed "the last of the jazz singers", she never let it show. As her great contemporaries and principal influences among the classic female jazz vocalists fell away – with Billie Holiday the first to go, in 1959, and Betty Carter the last, in 1998 – Lincoln steadfastly maintained her dignified, almost solemn, focus; her tart, deftly timed Holiday-like inflections, and her commitment to songs that dug deeper into life's meanings than the usual lost-love exhalations.
And, like Ella Fitzgerald, who all her life took to a stage as if she were surprised to find anyone had come to see her, Lincoln became the opposite of a celebrated jazz diva. In some of her London performances during the 1990s, she would sit quietly beside the piano, tugging at her clothes, like someone who...
- 8/15/2010
- by John Fordham
- The Guardian - Film News
In honor of Apollo's 75th Anniversary there will be a Kick-Off Amateur Night's 75th Birth Day Party with Special Guest Ron Browz. The Party will be held Wednesday, January 28th, 7:30Pm Anniversary Special - The First 750 tickets, only $7.50! The night will honor the starting place for some of our most famous and treasured artists like Ella Fitzgerald, James Brown, George Clinton and Stevie Wonder. The Apollo Theater Foundation, Inc., a not-for-profit organization established in 1991, is dedicated to the preservation and development of the legendary Apollo Theater through the Apollo Experience of world-class live performances and education programs that: Honor the influence and advance the contributions of African-American artists; and Advance emerging creative voices across cultural and artistic media. It all started in 1914 when the theater was constructed on 125th Street, the heart of Harlem. Originally, it was named Hurtig and Seamon's New Burlesque Theatre and African-Americans were not allowed in the audience.
- 1/27/2009
- BroadwayWorld.com
The latest is the seemingly endless string of irresistible DVD collections comes from the good folks at Timeless Video, who have distinguished themselves with some first-class releases of vintage TV series. The latest is their most impressive yet: the 1950s crime series M Squad which helped groom Lee Marvin from supporting actor to leading man presence. Marvin is the stalwart Lt. Frank Ballinger, a Chicago cop who is so unrelentingly serious that he makes Jack Webb look like Richard Simmons. The series was part of the wave of crime shows that flooded the networks during this era, and M Squad was one of the best. The show ran three seasons and was compromised only by the half-hour time running time which made for some abbreviated storylines. The series is a gem in terms of the kinds of cornball cliches that have become part of our pop culture. I always assumed...
- 12/9/2008
- by nospam@example.com (Cinema Retro)
- Cinemaretro.com
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