The International Sweethearts Of Rhythm
During the big band era, among the many big bands that were active, were also a handful of all-female bands. The Harlem Harlicans, formed by Lil Armstrong in 1932, Ina Ray Hutton and her Melodears, the Parisian Redheads and others were famous in their time, yet none survived history as the International Sweethearts Of Rhythm. Their story is a complex one, especially as the founding members are now deceased, and no one knows who is right and who¡¦s wrong. One thing is for certain: The band was the first integrated female band, and the most famous female band of their time .
The sweethearts were formed in Piney Woods Country Life School near Jackson, Mississippi in 1937, by the school's principal, Laurence C. Jones, with the idea of creating a band that will tour the country and raise funds for the school. The school, consisting of a thousand boys and girls, many of them orphans, was extremely low-funded, and Jones was constantly in search of different ways to fund the school.
The sweethearts was one such project.
Most girls were already adequate musicians, as they were taught music since a young age, and playing in the school's marching band, but Jones had set a higher ramp for the sweethearts. They were taught the art of playing in a big band, and soon had concert dates in the area, playing high school dances in gymnasiums and dance halls.
The band was no more than a novelty school band in those days. They were taught to play chords, and read stock arrangements. With this limited repertoire they toured the south for almost a year .
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As the tours got longer and longer, questions were raised, mostly by the girls themselves, about the value of touring, co...
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...he recording is proof enough that the band was swinging, as well as any other band of that time.
Works Cited,,h Dickerson, James. Just For A Thrill: Lil Armstrong, First Lady of Jazz. Cooper Square Press. 2002,,h Handy, D. Antoinette. The International Sweethearts Of Rhythm. The Scarecrow Press, INC, 1983. P. 174,,h McPartland, Marian. ¡§The Untold Story of the International Sweethearts of Rhythm.¡¨ Reading Jazz: a gathering of autobiography, reportage, and criticism from 1919 to Now. Ed. Gottlieb, Robert. Random House, 1996. P. 638-651,,h The Vocal Group Harmony Web Site
http://www.group-harmony.com/JumpChil.htm,,h The Kit McClure Band Sweethearts Project http://www.redhotrecords.com/sweethearts.html
Originally, the group was composed of two quartets and a pianist, a woman named Wells, under the direction of the University musical director, George L. White. In 1871 this small group set out to raise money for the struggling little university (founded in 1866). Over the next decade they had toured most of the northern states, had performed at the White House, toured England and much of Europe and had played for Queen Victoria.
The Beatles consisted of four talented men: Paul McCartney, John Lennon, George Harrison and Richard Starkey. They had met at all different times and had one thing in common. They all loved music. McCartney, Lennon and Harrison all played guitar and Starkey, also known as Ringo Starr, played the drums. They started out as The Quarry Men, but eventually they changed the name to The Beatles. They played a lot together over the years and at many different places. They started out as a “teenybopper” band, as Russell Gibb put it. They were like the Jonas Brothers of the fifties. When they made their way to America, they became more popular. Gibb also noted that they grew up with their fans. They did well all through the sixties, but around 1965 tension gre...
The band consist of 8 members, Nathan East bassist/vocals, Andy Fairweather-Low, lead guitar/vocals, Steve Ferrone- drums, Chuck Leavell-key boardist, Ray Cooper- tambourines, Katie Kissoon and Tessa Niles- vocals, and Eric Clapton- composer, rock n roll guitarist, lead vocalist. The band members dressed in casual attire. The band members were professionals, they knew exactly how to orchestrate every chord, they collaborated with the lead singer and each other in ways that wasn’t so noticeable to the audience but they knew which chords to use for every song, the band was a top notch team. The tempo of the songs were a mixture of fast, slow, to a medium style beat. The texture of the songs was homophonic and well put together lyrics. The style of the music was from the 1960s-1970s which genres were rock, blues rock, psychedelic rock, hard rock, jazz and blues.
Yarberry, G.A. (1979). An overview of the past, present and future of the band movementin America. Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education, 14(2), 1-9.
for big bands playing this new swing music was in intense demand. Later on Duke
Lewis Armstrong was to jazz music, Bach is to classical music, Presley is to rock music (Berrett 230). This essay will have an introduction to the king of jazz music—— Lewis Armstrong and his great influence on jazz history. It could not be examined when and by whom Jazz music was found. People began hearing jazz music in the early 1900s. It originated from the American in New Orleans city and Jazz founders were mostly black people.
Music nurtured the African American tradition and their struggle towards equality in the same century.... ... middle of paper ... ... Greensboro, N.C.: Morgan Reynolds Pub. Carter, D. (2009).
It is argued that the start of the “Swing Era” started the day that Louis Armstrong joined Fletcher Henderson’s band in 1924. The style Armstrong played on the trumpet, which was shown off to the world after joining Henderson’s band was the main thing that would lead to swing jazz. The official start of the swing era began ten years after Armstrong joined the band and almost a full ten years after the first swing dance, the Lindy Hop.
George Helmholtz, as the head of the music department at Lincoln High School, is very determined with his regular students and the gifted musicians of the band. Each semester and year at school he dreams of “leading as fine a band as there was on the face of the earth. And each year it came true”. His certainty that it was true was because he believed there was no greater dream than his. His students were just as confident and in response, they played their hearts out for them. Even the students with “no talent played on guts alone” for Helmholtz.
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By the end of World War I, Black Americans were facing their lowest point in history since slavery. Most of the blacks migrated to the northern states such as New York and Chicago. It was in New York where the “Harlem Renaissance” was born. This movement with jazz was used to rid of the restraints held against African Americans. One of the main reasons that jazz was so popular was that it allowed the performer to create the rhythm. With This in Mind performers realized that there could no...
Also known as the Jazz Age and the Roaring Twenties, the American people felt that they deserved to have some fun in order to forget the emotional toll and social scars left from the war. The Jazz Age was appropriately named due to the illegal activities and good times, which included music, parties, and flapper girls. Jazz was a new style of music that originated out of the New Orleans area, where one of the greatest jazz musicians of all time – Louis Armstrong – began his career. The energy of jazz was a very new and almost uncomfortable style for the very traditional, rigid family of the 1920s. Young people in particular seemed to enjoy this new music the most, as it made them feel carefree. The energy of jazz was symbolic of the era’s trans...
Women’s sufferage was at it’s peak with the ratification of the United States Nineteenth Amendment. Women recived more independence after the end of the First World War and took a greater part in the work force. In the 1920s, there were many famous women Jazz artists such as Lovie Austin, a piano player and band leader, Lil Hardin Armstrong, a pianist who was originally a member of King Oliver’s band, and Bessie Smith, an African-American blues singer who inspired women like Billie Holiday and Janis Joplin. Although women were also making a difference in the Jazz industry, it wasn’t until the 1930s when they were recongnized as successful artists in the music world.
jazz/) Works Cited:.. Andrews, John. The. a. The adage of the adage of the adage of the adage of the adage of What bebop means to jazz history. A review of Scott Devine’s book “The Birth of the Bebop: A Social and Musical History.”
Cahoon, B. (2004, January 1). Rhythm and Blues Music: Overview. . Retrieved May 28, 2014, from http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/arts-culture/rhythm-and-blues-music-overview.