On October 10th, we celebrated the life and times of Oscar Brown, Jr (October 10, 1926 – May 29, 2005); an African-American singer, songwriter, playwright, poet, civil rights activist, and actor. He ran unsuccessfully for office in both the Illinois state legislature and the U.S. Congress. Brown wrote at least 1,000 songs (only 125 have been published), twelve albums, and more than a dozen musical plays. Born and raised on the south side of Chicago, he was named after his father Oscar Brown, Sr., a successful attorney and real estate broker. His singing debut was on the radio show Secret City at the age of 15. Brown attended Englewood High School in Chicago, the University of Wisconsin–Madison, and Lincoln University but did not obtain a degree. He also served a stint in the U.S. Army. Browns father had intended for him to follow in his footsteps and become a practicing lawyer. While he did help his father at his practice, he ventured off into other careers, such as advertising and serving in the army in the mid-1950s and writing songs. When Mahalia Jackson recorded one of his songs, he began to focus on a career in music. His first major contribution to a recorded work was a collaboration with Max Roach, We Insist!, which was an early record celebrating the black freedom movement in the United States. Columbia Records signed Brown as a solo artist, who was by now in his mid-thirties and married with five children. In 1960, Brown released his first LP, Sin & Soul, recorded from June 20 to October 23, 1960. Printed on the cover of the album were personal reviews by well-known celebrities and jazz musicians of the time, including Steve Allen, Lorraine Hansberry, Nat Hentoff, Dorothy Killgallen, Max Roach and Nina Simone (Simone would later cover his Work Song and Steve Allen would later hire him for his Jazz Scene USA television program). The album is regarded as a true classic for openly tackling the experiences of African-Americans with songs such as Bid Em In and Afro Blue. Sin & Soul is also significant because Brown took several popular jazz instrumentals and combined them with self-penned lyrics on songs such as Dat Dere, Afro Blue and Work Song. This began a trend that would continue with several other major jazz vocalists. Jon Hendricks, for example, three years later composed lyrics for the Mongo Santamaría song Yeh Yeh (later a hit for Georgie Fame). Bob Dorough similarly composed lyrics for Mel Tormés version of Comin Home Baby! and musicians Larry Williams and Johnny Guitar Watson would also go on to compose lyrics for Cannonball Adderleys Mercy, Mercy, Mercy (the music composed by Joe Zawinul, Adderleys pianist) for Marlena Shaw. Several of the tracks from Sin & Soul were embraced by the 1960s Mod movement, such as Humdrum Blues, Work Song and Watermelon Man. Sin & Soul was followed by Between Heaven and Hell (1962). The success of Sin & Soul meant that much more money was spent on production and Quincy Jones and Ralph Burns were bought in to handle the arrangements. However, Brown was soon to fall down the pecking order at Columbia following a rearrangement of the management at the company. His third album was notable for the lack of any self-composed songs, and Columbia was having a hard time packaging Brown as an artist. They were unsure whether he was suited to middle-of-the-road/easy listening nightclubs or alternatively should be presented as a jazz artist. He was given much more creative freedom for his fourth album, Tells It Like It Is (1963) and he was back to his creative best, composing songs such as The Snake, which became a Northern Soul classic when it was covered by Al Wilson, and has featured on several adverts. Despite this return to form, and having been told by the new head of Columbia that he was high on the companys priorities, his contract at Columbia was not renewed. He attempted to mount a major musical stage show in New York City called Kicks & Co. in 1961. Host Dave Garroway turned over an entire broadcast of the Today show to Brown to perform numbers from the show and try to raise the necessary funds to launch it on the stage. Kicks & Co. is set on an all-African-American college campus in the American South during the early days of attempted desegregation. The character Mr. Kicks is an emissary of Satan, sent to try to derail these efforts in which the plays protagonist, Ernest Black, has become involved. This was the first of several theatrical endeavors by Brown, and like all of them, the public was not won over sufficiently to allow financial success, despite acclaim by some critics. His longest-running relative success, thanks to the participation of Muhammad Ali, was Big-Time Buck White. Another notable musical show, Joy, saw two incarnations (in 1966 and 1969) and again addressed social issues. Appearing with Brown were his wife, Jean Pace, and the Brazilian singer/accordionist Sivuca. RCA released the original cast recording around 1970; it is long out of print. In 1962, he worked on the Westinghouse syndicated television program Jazz Scene USA, produced by Steve Allen. Brown was the shows presenter and it featured a new musical guest each week. Browns son, Oscar BoBo Brown III, was an instrumental musician who died in a car crash. His daughter Maggie Brown is a singer, songwriter, actress, educator and mother of three. Along with Africa Brown, these three of his seven children carry out his legacy in singing and acting. His other four children are David Napoleon Brown, Jone Brown, Donna Brown Kane, and Iantha Brown. He founded The Oscar Brown, Jr. H.I.P. Legacy Foundation to carry on his humanitarian work. He also took part at an anti-apartheid protest rally in Compton College in 1976. Brown died in Chicago, from complications of osteomyelitis in May 2005, aged 78. Browns lyrics and original compositions have been performed by a variety of other artists. Somebody Buy Me a Drink, a track from Sin & Soul, was covered by David Johansen and the Harry Smiths on their eponymous first album. Pianist Wynton Kelly recorded Strongman with his trio in the late 1950s. Nina Simone popularized Browns lyrics to Work Song and Afro Blue, as well as his song Bid Em In. Browns Afro Blue lyrics have since been performed by numerous contemporary jazz vocalists, including Dianne Reeves, Dee Dee Bridgewater, and Lizz Wright. Vocalist Karrin Allyson has cited Brown as a particular inspiration, and has performed his compositions on several of her albums. Brown was scheduled to contribute new lyrics to Allysons 2006 album, Footprints, but died before the project was complete; Allyson instead recorded Browns songs A Tree and Me and But I Was Cool as a tribute. Browns work has also been the focus of full-length tribute albums by lesser-known jazz artists, including cabaret singer Linda Kosut and Browns own daughter, Maggie Brown. Photo 2: Oscar Brown Jr. and daughter, Maggie Brown.
Posted on: Sun, 19 Oct 2014 16:28:37 +0000
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