Wyclef Jean
Nel Ust Wyclef Jean is a Haitian rapper and actor. At the age of nine, Jean emigrated to the United States with his family, he first achieved fame as a member of the New Jersey hip hop group the Fugees. Jean has won three Grammy Awards for his musical work. On August 5, 2010, Jean filed for candidacy in the 2010 Haitian presidential election; the Electoral Commission ruled him ineligible to stand for office, as he had not met the constitutional requirement to have been a resident in Haiti for five years prior to the election. Jean's efforts at earthquake relief publicized in 2010 throughout Haiti and the United States, were channeled through his charitable organization, Yéle Haiti; the charity, which conducted education and welfare activities in Haiti between 2005 and 2010 closed in 2012. It was investigated for failure to file tax returns and mismanagement of funds; the New York Times reported that much of the money raised by the organization in the Hope for Haiti Now telethon was retained by Jean for his own benefit.
In 2012, Jean published his memoir Purpose: An Immigrant's Story. Along with Carlos Santana and Alexandre Pires, Jean was chosen to perform the closing ceremony at the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil, their single, "Dar um Jeito", the official World Cup anthem, was released on April 29, 2014. Jean was born in Haiti. In 1979, he immigrated with his family as a nine-year-old boy to the United States, he began to make music as a child and has cited reggae artist Bigga Haitian as one of his early influences, as well as neighborhood heroes MC Tiger Paw Raw and producer Lobster v. Crab, his mother bought him a guitar when he was in his teens. Jean graduated from Vailsburg High School, New Jersey attended Eastern Nazarene College and finished one semester at Five Towns College in New York. Jean has been a resident of Saddle River, South Orange, North Caldwell, New Jersey. In 2009, Jean enrolled in the Berklee College of Music. Jean and other musicians formed a group in the 1980s under the name Tranzlator Crew.
After they signed with Ruffhouse Records and Columbia Records in 1993, they renamed their group as Fugees – an abbreviation of "refugees", a reference to Haitian immigrants. The group's debut album, Blunted on Reality, was released in 1994, it achieved limited commercial success. The album peaked at number 122 on the UK Albums Chart in 1997, it was certified gold by the Syndicat National de l'Édition Phonographique. Blunted on Reality spawned three singles: "Boof Baf", "Nappy Heads" and "Vocab." "Nappy Heads" was the Fugees' first single to be ranked on the US Billboard Hot 100, charting at number 49. In 1996, the Fugees released their second album, titled The Score; the album achieved significant commercial success in the United States, topping the US Billboard 200. It was certified as six-times platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America, it performed well in several overseas nations, topping the Austrian, French and Swiss albums charts, while peaking at number two in Sweden and the United Kingdom.
Four commercially successful singles were released from The Score. The other three singles – "Killing Me Softly", "Ready or Not" and "No Woman, No Cry" – did not appear on the Billboard Hot 100 as they were not released for commercial sale, making them ineligible to appear on the chart, although they all received sufficient airplay to appear on the Hot 100 Airplay and Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay charts. "Killing Me Softly", a cover of the Roberta Flack song "Killing Me Softly with His Song", performed in other territories, topping the singles charts in Australia, Austria and the United Kingdom, among several others."Ready or Not" peaked at number one in the UK and at number three in Sweden. "No Woman, No Cry" – a cover of the Bob Marley & The Wailers song of the same name – topped the singles chart in New Zealand. Fugees collaborated with singer Bounty Killer on the single "Hip-Hopera" and recorded the single "Rumble in the Jungle" for the soundtrack to the film When We Were Kings in 1997: although they have not released any studio albums since The Score, a compilation album, Greatest Hits, was released in 2003, spawned the single "Take It Easy".
Jean announced plans to begin a solo career with 1997's Wyclef Jean Presents the Carnival Featuring the Refugee All-Stars. The album's guests included Lauryn Pras along with Jean's siblings' group Melky Sedeck; the album was a hit, as were two singles: "We Trying to Stay Alive" and "Gone Till November". Released in 2000, Jean's second solo album The Ecleftic: 2 Sides II a Book was recorded with guests including Youssou N'Dour. With Blige he released "911" as a single, he was nominated for Best Hip-Hop Act at the 2000 MTV Europe Music Awards. Following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, Jean participated in the benefit concert America: A Tribute to Heroes contributing a cover of the Bob Marley song "Redemption Song", his third album, was released in 2002. His fourth album, Th
Beastie Boys
The Beastie Boys were an American hip hop group from New York City formed in 1981. The group comprised Adam "MCA" Yauch and Adam "Ad-Rock" Horovitz; the Beastie Boys were formed as a four-piece hardcore punk band, the Young Aborigines, in 1979 by Mike D, MCA, John Berry and Kate Schellenbach. They appeared on the compilation cassette New York Thrash, contributing two songs from their first EP, Polly Wog Stew, in 1982. Berry was replaced by Horovitz. After achieving local success with the 1983 experimental hip hop single "Cooky Puss", the Beastie Boys made a full transition to hip hop, Schellenbach left the group soon after, they toured with Madonna in 1985 and a year released their debut album Licensed to Ill. It was followed by Paul's Boutique, Check Your Head, Ill Communication, Hello Nasty, To the 5 Boroughs, The Mix-Up, Hot Sauce Committee Part Two; the Beastie Boys have sold 26 million records in the United States and 50 million records worldwide, making them the biggest-selling rap group since Billboard began recording sales in 1991.
With seven platinum-selling albums from 1986 to 2004, the Beastie Boys were one of the longest-lived hip hop acts worldwide. In 2012, they became the third rap group to be inducted into the Roll Hall of Fame. In the same year, MCA died of cancer. In 2014, Mike D confirmed. Prior to forming the Beastie Boys, Michael Diamond was part of a number of bands such as the Walden Jazz Band, BAN, The Young Aborigines; the Beastie Boys formed in July 1981 when the Young Aborigines bassist Jeremy Shatan left New York City for the summer and the remaining members Michael Diamond, John Berry and Kate Schellenbach formed a new hardcore punk band with Adam Yauch called Beastie Boys. In an interview on The Tonight Show in October 2018, Mike D stated that the Beastie name is an acronym, it stands for "Boys Entering Anarchistic States Towards Inner Excellence". The band supported Bad Brains, the Dead Kennedys, the Misfits and Reagan Youth at venues such as CBGB, A7, Trudy Hellers Place and Max's Kansas City, playing at the latter venue on its closing night.
In November 1982, the Beastie Boys recorded the 7" EP Polly Wog Stew at 171A studios, an early recorded example of New York hardcore. On November 13, 1982, the Beastie Boys played Philip Pucci's birthday for the purposes of his short concert film of the Beastie Boys, Beastie. Pucci held the concert in Bard College's Preston Drama Dance Department Theatre; this performance marked the Beastie Boys' first on screen appearance in a published motion picture. Pucci's concept for Beastie was to distribute a mixture of both a half dozen 16 mm Bell & Howell Filmo cameras, 16 mm Bolex cameras to audience members and ask that they capture the Beastie Boys performance from the audience's own point of view while a master sync sound camera filmed from the balcony of the abandoned theater where the performance was held; the opening band for that performance was The Young and the Useless, which featured Adam Horovitz as the lead singer. A one-minute clip of Beastie was subsequently excerpted and licensed by the Beastie Boys for use in the "Egg Raid on Mojo" segment of the "Skills to Pay the Bills" long-form home video released by Capitol Records.
"Skills to Pay the Bills" went on to be certified Gold by the Recording Industry Association of America. Berry left the group in 1982 and was replaced by Horovitz, who had become close friends with the Beastie Boys; as of that year, the Beastie Boys band made a full transition to hip hop, was composed of three young Americans of Jewish descent: "Mike D", "MCA", "Ad-Rock". The band recorded and performed its first hip hop track, "Cooky Puss", based on a prank call by the group to a Carvel Ice Cream franchise in 1983, it was a part of the new lineup's first EP called Cooky Puss, the first piece of work that showed their incorporation of the underground rap phenomenon and the use of samples. It became a hit in New York underground dance clubs and night clubs. "Beastie Revolution" was sampled for a British Airways commercial. The Beastie Boys sued them over the use of the song. Due to the success of "Cooky Puss", they began to incorporate rap into their sets, they ended up getting an NYU student named Rick Rubin.
Soon thereafter, Rubin began producing records. He formed Def Jam Recordings with fellow NY University student Russell Simmons, approached the band about producing them for his new label. Around the same time, the band made a more complete switch over from a punk rock outfit to a three-man rap trio with drummer Kate Schellenbach leaving the group and Diamond and Horovitz each adopting their own hip hop monikers—Mike D, MCA and Ad-Rock respectively, they released the 12-inch single "Rock Hard" in 1984, which would be the second record released by Def Jam crediting Rubin as producer. In 1985, the band opened for John Lydon's post-Sex Pistols band Public Image Ltd. as well as supporting Madonna on her North American The Virgin Tour. Headlining with Fishbone and Murphy's Law with DJ Hurricane and in the year, the group was on the Raising Hell tour with Run-DMC, Whodini, LL Cool J, the Timex Social Club. With their exposure on this tour, the track "Hold It Now, Hit It" charted on Billboard's US R&B and dance charts.
The track "She's on It" from the Krush Groove soundtrack continued in a rap/metal vein while a double A-side 12", "Paul Revere/
Porgy and Bess
Porgy and Bess is an English-language opera by the American composer George Gershwin, with a libretto written by author DuBose Heyward and lyricist Ira Gershwin. It was adapted from Dorothy Heyward and DuBose Heyward's play Porgy, itself an adaptation of DuBose Heyward's 1925 novel of the same name. Porgy and Bess was first performed in Boston on September 30, 1935, before it moved to Broadway in New York City, it featured a cast of classically trained African-American singers—a daring artistic choice at the time. After suffering from an unpopular public reception due in part to its racially charged theme, a 1976 Houston Grand Opera production gained it new popularity, it is now one of the best-known and most performed operas. Gershwin proposed to Heyward to collaborate on an operatic version. In 1934, Gershwin and Heyward began work on the project by visiting the author's native Charleston, South Carolina. In a 1935 New York Times article, Gershwin explained why he called Porgy and Bess a folk opera: Porgy and Bess is a folk tale.
Its people would sing folk music. When I first began work in the music I decided against the use of original folk material because I wanted the music to be all of one piece; therefore I wrote my own folksongs. But they are still folk music – and therefore, being in operatic form and Bess becomes a folk opera; the libretto of Porgy and Bess tells the story of Porgy, a disabled black street-beggar living in the slums of Charleston. It deals with his attempts to rescue Bess from the clutches of Crown, her violent and possessive lover, Sportin' Life, her drug dealer; the opera plot follows the stage play. In the years following Gershwin's death and Bess was adapted for smaller scale performances, it was adapted as a film in 1959. Some of the songs in the opera, such as "Summertime", became popular and recorded songs. In the late 20th and early 21st centuries, the trend has been toward productions with greater fidelity to Gershwin's original intentions. Smaller-scale productions continue to be mounted.
A complete recorded version of the score was released in 1976. In the fall of 1933 Gershwin and Heyward signed a contract with the Theatre Guild to write the opera. In the summer of 1934 Gershwin and Heyward went to Folly Beach, South Carolina, where Gershwin got a feel for the locale and its music, he worked in New York. Ira Gershwin, in New York, wrote lyrics to some of the opera's classic songs, most notably "It Ain't Necessarily So". Most of the lyrics, including "Summertime", were written by Heyward, who wrote the libretto. Gershwin's first version of the opera, running four hours, was performed in a concert version in Carnegie Hall, in the fall of 1935, he chose as his choral director Eva Jessye, who directed her own renowned choir. The world premiere performance took place at the Colonial Theatre in Boston on September 30, 1935—the try-out for a work intended for Broadway where the opening took place at the Alvin Theatre in New York City on October 10, 1935. During rehearsals and in Boston, Gershwin made many cuts and refinements to shorten the running time and tighten the dramatic action.
The run on Broadway lasted 124 performances. The production and direction were entrusted to Rouben Mamoulian, who had directed the Broadway productions of Heyward's play Porgy; the music director was Alexander Smallens. The leading roles were played by Anne Brown; the influential vaudeville artist John W. Bubbles created the role of Sportin' Life. After the Broadway run, a tour started on January 27, 1936, in Philadelphia and traveled to Pittsburgh and Chicago before ending in Washington, D. C. on March 21, 1936. During the Washington run, the cast—as led by Todd Duncan—protested segregation at the National Theatre. Management gave in to the demands, resulting in the first integrated audience for a performance of any show at that venue. In 1938, much of the original cast reunited for a West Coast revival that played in Los Angeles and at the Curran Theatre in San Francisco. Avon Long took on the role of Sportin' Life for the first time, a role he would continue to play in many productions over a long career.
The noted director and producer Cheryl Crawford produced professional stock theater in Maplewood, New Jersey, for three successful seasons. The last of these closed with Bess, which she co-produced with John Wildberg. In re-fashioning it in the style of musical theatre which Americans were used to hearing from Gershwin, Crawford produced a drastically cut version of the opera compared with the first Broadway staging; the orchestra was reduced, the cast was halved, many recitatives were reduced to spoken dialog. Having seen the performance, theater owner Lee Shubert arranged for Crawford to bring her production to Broadway; the show opened at the Majestic Theatre in January 1942. Duncan and Brown reprised their roles as the title characters, with Alexander Smallens again conducting. In June the contralto Etta Moten, whom Gershwin had first envisioned as Bess, replaced Brown in the role. Moten was such a success; the Crawford production ran for nine months and was far more successful financially than the original.
Radio station WOR in New York broadcast a live one-hour version on May 7, 1942. The cast included Todd Duncan, Anne Brown, Ruby Elzy, Avon Long, Edward Matthews, Harriet Jackson, Georgette Harvey, Jack Carr, the Eva Jesse Choir; the 12"-diameter 78 rpm, glass base, lacquer-coated disks were tr
Adam Yauch
Adam Nathaniel Yauch was an American rapper, songwriter, musician and film distributor best known as a founding member of the hip hop group Beastie Boys. He was known by his stage name, MCA and sometimes worked under the pseudonym Nathanial Hörnblowér. Yauch founded Oscilloscope Laboratories, an independent film production and distribution company based in New York City; as a Buddhist, he was involved in the Tibetan independence movement and organized the Tibetan Freedom Concert. Born in Brooklyn, New York City, Yauch was an only child, his father was a Catholic architect. Yauch had a non-religious upbringing. Yauch attended Edward R. Murrow High School in Brooklyn's Midwood neighborhood. In high school, he taught himself to play the bass guitar. Yauch formed the Beastie Boys with John Berry, Kate Schellenbach, Michael Diamond, they played their first show—while still a hardcore punk band in the vein of Reagan Youth—on his 17th birthday. He attended Bard College for two years before dropping out.
The Beastie Boys, a hip hop trio, released their first album Licensed to Ill on Def Jam Records when Yauch was 22. Yauch directed many of the Beastie Boys' music videos under the pseudonym Nathanial Hörnblowér. In 2002, Yauch constructed a recording studio in New York City called Oscilloscope Laboratories, he began. Yauch directed the 2006 Beastie Boys concert film, he directed the 2008 film Gunnin' For That #1 Spot about eight high school basketball prospects at the Boost Mobile Elite 24 Hoops Classic at Rucker Park in Harlem, New York City. Yauch produced Build a Nation, the comeback album from hardcore/punk band Bad Brains. In addition, Oscilloscope Laboratories distributed Kelly Reichardt's Wendy and Lucy and Oren Moverman's The Messenger; the Beastie Boys had sold 40 million records worldwide by 2010. In April 2012, the group was inducted into the Roll Hall of Fame. Yauch was inducted in absentia due to his illness, his bandmates paid tribute to Yauch. In 2011, Yauch received the Charles Flint Kellogg Award in Arts and Letters from Bard College, the college he attended for two years.
The award is "given in recognition of a significant contribution to the American artistic or literary heritage". Yauch was a practicing Buddhist, he became an important voice in the Tibetan independence movement. He created the Milarepa Fund, a non-profit organization devoted to Tibetan independence and organized several benefit concerts to support the cause, including the Tibetan Freedom Concert. Yauch was a strong supporter of feminism, going as far as to apologize for lyrics in some early Beastie Boys songs which he retroactively deemed offensive. In 1995, while attending a speech by the Dalai Lama at Harvard University, he met his wife, Tibetan American Dechen Wangdu, they had a daughter, Tenzin Losel, the same year. In 1998, during the MTV Video Music Awards, when receiving the Video Vanguard Award, Yauch condemned America's wars in Muslim countries and prejudice against Muslims and Arabs. Artist Cihan Kaan wrote an obituary in Al Jazeera that Yauch was "Muslim Americans' hero, America's personal Jewish Gandhi", judging his plea to be greater for intercultural healing than the music of anti-war rappers whose lyrics included anti-Americanism and conspiracy theories.
In 2009 Yauch was diagnosed with a cancerous parotid lymph node. He underwent surgery and radiation therapy, delaying the release of Hot Sauce Committee Part Two and the subsequent tour, he was unable to appear in music videos for the album. Yauch became a vegan under the recommendation of his doctors. At the time, Yauch described the cancer as "very treatable". Yauch died at age 47 on May 4, 2012. Upon his death, fellow musicians and artists paid tribute. Russell Simmons of Def Jam Records said that Yauch "was sweet and the most sensitive artist, who I loved dearly". Flava Flav led a tribute to Yauch during a Public Enemy concert in Australia. Flav noted "Everyone always has a moment of silence, but MCA wasn't a silent MF", proceeded to lead the audience in a 30-second ovation. Paul Meany of Mutemath created and mixed a combination of "Sabotage", "Root Down", "Sure Shot" as a studio solo and as a tribute and posted it to Facebook and Instagram on May 5, 2018. Ben Stiller tweeted that Yauch "stood for integrity as an artist".
Jeff Ament of Pearl Jam said that Yauch was "a crazy talent whose contributions with his band were inspirational and ground breaking". Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke wrote, "We looked up to the Beastie Boys a lot when we were starting out and how they maintained artistic control making wicked records but still were on a major label, the Tibetan Freedom Concerts they organized had a big influence on me and the way Adam conducted himself and dealt with it all impressed me a lot, he was a smart guy. May he rest in peace." Eminem said in an interview, "Adam Yauch brought a lot of positivity into the world and I think it's obvious to anyone how big of an influence the Beastie Boys were on me and so many others." Phish dedicated their cover of "Sabotage" to Yauch during a concert at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center on July 7, 2012. Beastie Boys rapper Adam "Ad-Rock" Horovitz posted a note on the Beastie Boys' Tumblr page about the death of Yauch, acknowledging the pain of losing Yauch as well as the admiration for Yauch.
In his last will and testament, Adam Yauch left instructions
Sublime (band)
Sublime was an American ska punk band from Long Beach, formed in 1988. The band's line-up, unchanged until their breakup, consisted of Bradley Nowell, Eric Wilson, Bud Gaugh. Lou Dog, Nowell's dalmatian, was the mascot of the band. Nowell died of a heroin overdose in 1996. In 1997, posthumous songs such as "What I Got", "Santeria", "Wrong Way", "Doin' Time", "April 29, 1992" were released to U. S. radio. Sublime released three studio albums, one live album, five compilation albums, three EPs, one box set. Although their first two albums—40oz. to Freedom and Robbin' the Hood —were quite popular in the United States, Sublime did not experience major commercial success until 1996 with their self-titled third album, released two months after Nowell's death, which peaked at No. 13 on the Billboard 200, spawned the single "What I Got", which remains the band's only No. 1 hit single in their musical career. As of 2009, the band has sold over 17 million albums worldwide, including about 10 million in the U.
S. alone. Michael "Miguel" Happoldt and Marshall Goodman "Ras MG" contributed to several Sublime songs. In 2009, the surviving members attempted to reform the band with Rome Ramirez, a young guitarist and admitted Sublime fan from California. However, not long after performing at Cypress Hill's Smokeout Festival, a Los Angeles judge banned the new lineup from using the Sublime name as they needed permission from Nowell's estate, which owns the rights to the Sublime name; this prompted the lineup of Wilson and Ramirez to change their name to Sublime with Rome, which has since released two albums, although Gaugh left the group shortly after the release of their 2011 debut Yours Truly. Eric Wilson and Bud Gaugh were childhood friends. Having grown up in the same Long Beach neighborhood, Eric's father, Billy Wilson taught Gaugh how to read music and play the drums. Gaugh and Wilson together with future Sublime manager, Michael Happoldt, formed a three-piece punk band called The Juice Bros during their high school years.
About this time, Bradley Nowell, who had dropped out of University of California, Santa Cruz, joined the band. Nowell helped introduce Wilson to reggae and ska. Sublime played its first gig on the Fourth of July, 1988 in a small club. Music venues were skeptical of the band's eclectic musical fusion and many refused to book the band. In response, the band created their own music label, Skunk Records, told venues that they were "Skunk Records recording artists", which helped the band seem more accomplished and subsequently book more shows. For the next several years, the group focused on playing at parties and small clubs throughout Southern California with local ska bands such as Smokestacks, No Doubt and Skeletones; the trio put forth a number of short demos. In February 1990, Nowell adopted an abused dalmatian puppy from a shelter and named him "Louie" after his grandfather. Louie Nowell, King Louie, or "Lou Dog" as he was called, became something of a mascot for the band. Lou Dog was allowed to wander around the stage during the band's concert performances.
One of Sublime's early club venues in 1990 was at a downtown club in Long Beach called Toe Jam. This Club was operated by David Rice, James Walker, Jason Burch and Jeff King. A private party was held in February 1991 at Toe Jam for one of the owners. Special thanks can be found for Toe Jam and the owners on the back of the produced album, 40oz. to Freedom. In late 1990, music student Michael "Miguel" Happoldt approached the band, offering to let the band record in the studio at the school where Happoldt was studying; the band enthusiastically agreed and trespassed into the school at night, where they recorded from midnight to seven in the morning. The recording session resulted in the popular cassette tape called Jah Won't Pay the Bills, released in 1991 and featured songs that would appear on the band's future albums; the tape helped the band gain a grassroots following throughout Southern California. Sublime developed a large following in California. After concentrating on playing live shows, the band released 40oz. to Freedom in 1992 under Nowell's label, Skunk Records.
The record established Sublime's blend of ska, punk, surf rock, hip hop, helped to further strengthen the group's growing California following. Being sold at their live shows, the album became known in the greater Los Angeles area after rock radio station KROQ began playing the song, "Date Rape". By 1996, 40oz. to Freedom had sold more than 209,000 units, beating the future self-titled album's running total of 145,000 unit sales. In 1992/1993, Sublime was signed to Danny Holloway's True Sound imprint. However, the band stayed on Skunk Records and in June 1994, they were signed to the label Gasoline Alley of MCA Records by Jon Phillips who subsequently became Sublime's manager. Sublime released their second album Robbin' the Hood in 1994, an experimental effort with its diffuse mixture of rock, spoken-word nonsense and folk-leaning acoustic home recordings. Robbin' the Hood was a commercial failure; the band toured extensively throughout 1994-1995, their popularity increasing beyond the West Coast as "Date Rape" began earning radio play.
In 1995, the band co-headlined the inaugural nationwide Vans Warped Tour. The band was asked to leave the tour for a week due to unruly behavior of Sublime guests and Lou Dog biting four different individuals. Gaugh reflected on the experience: "Basically
Single (music)
In the music industry, a single is a type of release a song recording of fewer tracks than an LP record or an album. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, a single is a song, released separately from an album, although it also appears on an album; these are the songs from albums that are released separately for promotional uses such as digital download or commercial radio airplay and are expected to be the most popular. In other cases a recording released. Despite being referred to as a single, singles can include up to as many as three tracks; the biggest digital music distributor, iTunes Store, accepts as many as three tracks less than ten minutes each as a single, as does popular music player Spotify. Any more than three tracks on a musical release or thirty minutes in total running time is either an extended play or, if over six tracks long, an album; when mainstream music was purchased via vinyl records, singles would be released double-sided.
That is to say, they were released with an A-side and B-side, on which two singles would be released, one on each side. Moreover, only the most popular songs from a released album would be released as a single. In more contemporary forms of music consumption, artists release most, if not all, of the tracks on an album as singles; the basic specifications of the music single were set in the late 19th century, when the gramophone record began to supersede phonograph cylinders in commercially produced musical recordings. Gramophone discs were manufactured in several sizes. By about 1910, the 10-inch, 78 rpm shellac disc had become the most used format; the inherent technical limitations of the gramophone disc defined the standard format for commercial recordings in the early 20th century. The crude disc-cutting techniques of the time and the thickness of the needles used on record players limited the number of grooves per inch that could be inscribed on the disc surface, a high rotation speed was necessary to achieve acceptable recording and playback fidelity.
78 rpm was chosen as the standard because of the introduction of the electrically powered, synchronous turntable motor in 1925, which ran at 3600 rpm with a 46:1 gear ratio, resulting in a rotation speed of 78.26 rpm. With these factors applied to the 10-inch format and performers tailored their output to fit the new medium; the 3-minute single remained the standard into the 1960s, when the availability of microgroove recording and improved mastering techniques enabled recording artists to increase the duration of their recorded songs. The breakthrough came with Bob Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone". Although CBS tried to make the record more "radio friendly" by cutting the performance into halves, separating them between the two sides of the vinyl disc, both Dylan and his fans demanded that the full six-minute take be placed on one side, that radio stations play the song in its entirety; as digital downloading and audio streaming have become more prevalent, it has become possible for every track on an album to be available separately.
The concept of a single for an album has been retained as an identification of a more promoted or more popular song within an album collection. The demand for music downloads skyrocketed after the launch of Apple's iTunes Store in January 2001 and the creation of portable music and digital audio players such as the iPod. In September 1997, with the release of Duran Duran's "Electric Barbarella" for paid downloads, Capitol Records became the first major label to sell a digital single from a well-known artist. Geffen Records released Aerosmith's "Head First" digitally for free. In 2004, Recording Industry Association of America introduced digital single certification due to significant sales of digital formats, with Gwen Stefani's "Hollaback Girl" becoming RIAA's first platinum digital single. In 2013, RIAA incorporated on-demand streams into the digital single certification. Single sales in the United Kingdom reached an all-time low in January 2005, as the popularity of the compact disc was overtaken by the then-unofficial medium of the music download.
Recognizing this, On 17 April 2005, Official UK Singles Chart added the download format to the existing format of physical CD singles. Gnarls Barkley was the first act to reach No.1 on this chart through downloads alone in April 2006, for their debut single "Crazy", released physically the following week. On 1 January 2007 digital downloads became eligible from the point of release, without the need for an accompanying physical. Sales improved in the following years, reaching a record high in 2008 that still proceeded to be overtaken in 2009, 2010 and 2011. Singles have been issued in various formats, including 7-inch, 10-inch, 12-inch vinyl discs. Other, less common, formats include singles on Digital Compact Cassette, DVD, LD, as well as many non-standard sizes of vinyl disc; the most common form of the vinyl single is the 45 or 7-inch. The names are derived from its play speed, 45 rpm, the standard diameter, 7 inches; the 7-inch 45 rpm record was released 31 March 1949 by RCA Victor as a smaller, more durable and higher-fidelity replacement for the 78 rpm shellac discs.
The first 45
George Gershwin
George Gershwin was an American composer and pianist whose compositions spanned both popular and classical genres. Among his best-known works are the orchestral compositions Rhapsody in Blue and An American in Paris, the songs Swanee and Fascinating Rhythm, the jazz standard I Got Rhythm, the opera Porgy and Bess which spawned the hit Summertime. Gershwin studied piano under Charles Hambitzer and composition with Rubin Goldmark, Henry Cowell, Joseph Brody, he began his career as a song plugger but soon started composing Broadway theater works with his brother Ira Gershwin and Buddy DeSylva. He moved to Paris intending to study with Nadia Boulanger, he returned to New York City and wrote Porgy and Bess with Ira and DuBose Heyward. It was a commercial failure but came to be considered one of the most important American operas of the twentieth century and an American cultural classic. Gershwin moved to Hollywood and composed numerous film scores until his death in 1937 from a malignant brain tumor.
His compositions have been adapted for use in films and television, several became jazz standards recorded and covered in many variations. Gershwin was of Russian Lithuanian Jewish ancestry, his grandfather, Jakov Gershowitz, had served for 25 years as a mechanic for the Imperial Russian Army to earn the right of free travel and residence as a Jew. His teenage son, Moishe Gershowitz, worked as a leather cutter for women's shoes. Moishe Gershowitz met and fell in love with Roza Bruskina, the teenage daughter of a furrier in Vilnius, she and her family moved to New York due to increasing anti-Jewish sentiment in Russia, changing her first name to Rose. Moishe, faced with compulsory military service if he remained in Russia, moved to America as soon as he could afford to. Once in New York, he changed his first name to Morris. Gershowitz lived with a maternal uncle in Brooklyn, he married Rose on July 21, 1895, Gershowitz soon Americanized his name to Gershwine. Their first child, Ira Gershwin, was born on December 6, 1896, after which the family moved into a second-floor apartment on Brooklyn's Snediker Avenue.
On September 26, 1898, George was born as second son to Morris and Rose Bruskin Gershwine in their second-floor apartment on Brooklyn's Snediker Avenue. His birth certificate identifies him as Jacob Gershwine, with the surname pronounced'Gersh-vin' in the Russian and Yiddish immigrant community, he had just one given name, contrary to the American practice of giving children both a first and middle name. He was named after a one time Russian army mechanic, he soon became known as George, changed the spelling of his surname to'Gershwin' about the time he became a professional musician. After Ira and George, another boy Arthur Gershwin, a girl Frances Gershwin were born into the family; the family lived in many different residences, as their father changed dwellings with each new enterprise in which he became involved. They grew up around the Yiddish Theater District. George and Ira frequented the local Yiddish theaters, with George appearing onstage as an extra. George lived a usual childhood existence for children of New York tenements: running around with his boyhood friends, roller skating and misbehaving in the streets.
Until 1908, he cared nothing for music, when as a ten-year-old he was intrigued upon hearing his friend Maxie Rosenzweig's violin recital. The sound, the way his friend played, captured him. At around the same time, George's parents had bought a piano for lessons for his older brother Ira, but to his parents' surprise, Ira's relief, it was George who spent more time playing it. Although his younger sister Frances was the first in the family to make a living through her musical talents, she married young and devoted herself to being a mother and housewife, thus surrendering any serious time to musical endeavors. Having given up her performing career, she settled upon painting as a creative outlet, a hobby George pursued. Arthur Gershwin followed in the paths of George and Ira becoming a composer of songs and short piano works. With a degree of frustration, George tried various piano teachers for some two years before being introduced to Charles Hambitzer by Jack Miller, the pianist in the Beethoven Symphony Orchestra.
Until his death in 1918, Hambitzer remained Gershwin's musical mentor and taught him conventional piano technique, introduced him to music of the European classical tradition, encouraged him to attend orchestral concerts. Following such concerts, young Gershwin would try to play, on the piano at home, the music he had heard from recall, without sheet music; as a matter of course, Gershwin studied with the classical composer Rubin Goldmark and avant-garde composer-theorist Henry Cowell, thus formalizing his classical music training. In 1913, Gershwin left school at the age of 15 and found his first job as a "song plugger", his employer was Jerome H. Remick and Company, a Detroit-based publishing firm with a branch office on New York City's Tin Pan Alley, he earned $15 a week, his first published song was "When You Want'Em, You Can't Get'Em, When You've Got'Em, You Don't Want'Em" in 1916 when Gershwin was only 17 years old. It earned him 50 cents. In 1916, Gershwin started working for Aeolian Company and Standard Music Rolls in New York and arranging.
He produced dozens, if not hundreds, of rolls under his own and assumed names
