1.
Courbevoie
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Courbevoie is a commune located 8.2 km from the center of Paris, France. The centre of Courbevoie is situated 2 kilometres from the limits of central Paris. La Défense, Pariss business district hosting the tallest buildings in the metropolitan area, Courbevoie is divided into two cantons, Canton of Courbevoie-1 and Canton of Courbevoie-2. Courbevoie is served by two stations on the Transilien Paris – Saint-Lazare suburban rail line, Courbevoie and Bécon-les-Bruyères, Courbevoie is also served by Esplanade de La Défense station on Paris Métro Line 1, in the business district of La Défense. There are also a number of city buses that come through the bustling La Défense station. When it comes to air transportation, Courbevoie can be served by Pariss Charles de Gaulle Airport as well as Paris-Orly to the south, Courbevoie has multiple preschools and elementary schools. A. has its head office in the Tour Total in La Défense and in Courbevoie. Areva has its office in the Tour Areva in Courbevoie. Saint-Gobain also has its office in Courbevoie
2.
French New Wave
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The New Wave is a blanket term coined by critics for a group of French filmmakers of the late 1950s and 1960s. New Wave is an example of European art cinema, using portable equipment and requiring little or no set up time, the New Wave way of filmmaking presented a documentary style. The films exhibited direct sounds on film stock that required less light, filming techniques included fragmented, discontinuous editing, and long takes. The combination of realism, subjective realism, and authorial commentary created a narrative ambiguity in the sense that questions that arise in a film are not answered in the end. This is why I would like to call this new age of cinema the age of the camera-stylo, Cahiers co-founder and theorist André Bazin was a prominent source of influence for the movement. By means of criticism and editorialization, they laid the groundwork for a set of concepts, revolutionary at the time, Cahiers du cinéma writers critiqued the classic Tradition of Quality style of French Cinema. Notable among these was François Truffaut in his manifesto-like article Une Certaine tendance du cinéma français, Bazin and Henri Langlois, founder and curator of the Cinémathèque Française, were the dual father figures of the movement. These men of cinema valued the expression of the personal vision in both the films style and script. The auteur theory holds that the director is the author of his movies, the beginning of the New Wave was to some extent an exercise by the Cahiers writers in applying this philosophy to the world by directing movies themselves. Apart from the role that films by Jean Rouch have played in the movement, part of their technique was to portray characters not readily labeled as protagonists in the classic sense of audience identification. The auteurs of this era owe their popularity to the support they received with their youthful audience, most of these directors were born in the 1930s and grew up in Paris, relating to how their viewers might be experiencing life. With high concentration in fashion, urban life, and all-night parties. The French New Wave was popular roughly between 1958 and 1964, although New Wave work existed as late as 1973, the socio-economic forces at play shortly after World War II strongly influenced the movement. Politically and financially drained, France tended to back on the old popular pre-war traditions. One such tradition was straight narrative cinema, specifically classical French film, the movement has its roots in rebellion against the reliance on past forms, criticizing in particular the way these forms could force the audience to submit to a dictatorial plot-line. They were especially against the French cinema of quality, the type of high-minded, literary period films held in esteem at French film festivals, New Wave critics and directors studied the work of western classics and applied new avant garde stylistic direction. The low-budget approach helped filmmakers get at the art form and find what was, to them. French New Wave is influenced by Italian Neorealism and classical Hollywood cinema, many of these directors, such as Edmond Agabra and Henri Zaphiratos, were not as successful or enduring at the well-known members of the New Wave and today would not be considered part of it
3.
Jacques Demy
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Jacques Demy was a French director and screenwriter. He appeared in the wake of the French New Wave alongside contemporaries like Jean-Luc Godard, Demys films are well known for their sumptuous look, drawing on Hollywood musicals, fairytales, jazz, and opera. His films are also distinguishable by their overlapping continuity, lush musical scores and themes like teenaged love, labor rights, incest, and the intersection between dreams and reality. After working with the animator Paul Grimault and the filmmaker Georges Rouquier, Demy directed his first feature film, Lola, in 1961, the Demy universe here emerges full-fledged. La Baie des Anges, starring Jeanne Moreau, took the theme of fate further, Demy is best known for his original musical, Les Parapluies de Cherbourg, with a score by Legrand. Although the subversion of established genres was a typically New Wave obsession, the whimsical concept of singing all the dialogue sets the tone for this tragedy of the everyday. The young man, Roland Cassard, from Lola reappears here, such reappearances are typical of Demys work. Demys subsequent films never quite captured audience and critical acclaim the way that Les Parapluies had, although he continued to make ambitious and original dramas and musicals. It has stunning color photography, some of the best French songs of the period, peau dÂne is a visually extravagant musical interpretation of a classic French fairytale which highlights the tales incestuous overtones, starring Deneuve, Jean Marais, and Delphine Seyrig. Lévénement le plus important depuis que lhomme a marché sur la lune is a look back at the pressures of second-wave feminism in France. After years of neglect, Demys strengths have been recognized, Demy himself appears in the film in the opening and closing sequences, and at several points throughout. He had two children with Varda, Rosalie Varda-Demy, who was the daughter of Antoine Bourseiller. Jacques Demy died from complications of AIDS on 27 October 1990 at age 59 and was interred in the Montparnasse Cemetery in Montparnasse
4.
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
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The Umbrellas of Cherbourg is a 1964 French/German romantic musical film directed by Jacques Demy, starring Catherine Deneuve and Nino Castelnuovo. The music was written by Michel Legrand, the film dialogue is all sung as recitative, including casual conversation. It was styled full of color, the film was very successful in France with a total of 1,274,958 admissions. In the late 1950s Madame Emery and her beautiful 17-year-old daughter Geneviève sell umbrellas at their tiny boutique in the town of Cherbourg in Normandy. Guy, a young auto mechanic, lives with and cares for his sickly aunt. Guy and Geneviève are deeply in love, they want to get married, Madeleine is a quiet young caregiver who looks after Guys aunt. She has feelings for Guy, but has not expressed this, Guy is drafted and must leave to serve as a soldier in the Algerian War. The night before Guy leaves, he and Geneviève pledge their undying love, after a couple of months Geneviève learns she is pregnant. She writes to Guy, but she abandoned when Guy writes back infrequently. Her mother says that this shows Guy has forgotten her, Geneviève is courted by Roland Cassard, a quiet, kind, young Parisian jeweler, who is very wealthy. He wants to marry her even after learning that she is pregnant by another man, Genevièves mother repeatedly tells her daughter to be sensible and choose a secure future with Cassard. Geneviève finally decides to accept him, and they are married in a great cathedral and she appears ambivalent about her decision. Guy returns from the war with a limp from an injury. He learns that the store has been sold, and that Geneviève married. As a veteran, Guy has difficulty settling in and he argues with his boss, quits his job, and goes to drink in a seedy port bar. He spends the night with a prostitute named Jenny. When he returns to his apartment, he finds Madeleine, who tells him that his godmother, Guy sees that Madeleine loves him, and he cleans up his life with her encouragement. With an inheritance from his aunt, he finances a new American-style Esso gas station and he asks Madeleine to marry him, and she accepts, although wondering if he is just on the rebound from his lost Geneviève
5.
The Young Girls of Rochefort
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The choreography was by Norman Maen. Michel Legrand composed the score, to Demys lyrics, the most famous songs from this film score, which is generally less acclaimed than that for The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, are A Pair of Twins and You Must Believe in Spring. The film was nominated for Academy Awards for Best Original Score, the film was also another big success for Demy in France with a total of 1,319,432 admissions. The Young Girls of Rochefort takes place over the course of one weekend in the town of Rochefort. When the fair comes to town, Delphine and Solange meet two smooth-talking but kind-hearted carnies, Étienne and Bill. The twins mother Yvonne owns a café in the center of town, Yvonnes café becomes a central hub for Étienne and Bill as well as most of the other characters in the film. In the café, Yvonne meets a sailor about to be demobbed from the navy, Maxence is a poet and painter, and is searching for his true feminine ideal. Little does Yvonne know, her former fiancé, Simon Dame, has opened a music store in Rochefort. He knows his fiancée had twins from a relationship. Solange, a songwriter, enlists the help of Simon Dame. As Solange is on her way to pick up her younger brother BouBou from school, she happens to bump into a charming foreigner, however, the two do not exchange names. Meanwhile, Delphine is unhappy in her relationship with the gallery owner Guillaume. In the gallery, as she is about to leave, Delphine notices a painting that looks remarkably like her, the image was in fact painted by Maxence. Back in the square, the two dancers in Étienne and Bills show run off with sailors, so they ask Delphine and Solange to perform. On the day of the fair, the paths of all of the cross again at the town square
6.
Academy Awards
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The various category winners are awarded a copy of a golden statuette, officially called the Academy Award of Merit, which has become commonly known by its nickname Oscar. The awards, first presented in 1929 at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, are overseen by AMPAS, the awards ceremony was first broadcast on radio in 1930 and televised for the first time in 1953. It is now live in more than 200 countries and can be streamed live online. The Academy Awards ceremony is the oldest worldwide entertainment awards ceremony and its equivalents – the Emmy Awards for television, the Tony Awards for theater, and the Grammy Awards for music and recording – are modeled after the Academy Awards. The 89th Academy Awards ceremony, honoring the best films of 2016, were held on February 26,2017, at the Dolby Theatre, in Los Angeles, the ceremony was hosted by Jimmy Kimmel and was broadcast on ABC. A total of 3,048 Oscars have been awarded from the inception of the award through the 88th, the first Academy Awards presentation was held on May 16,1929, at a private dinner function at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel with an audience of about 270 people. The post-awards party was held at the Mayfair Hotel, the cost of guest tickets for that nights ceremony was $5. Fifteen statuettes were awarded, honoring artists, directors and other participants in the industry of the time. The ceremony ran for 15 minutes, winners were announced to media three months earlier, however, that was changed for the second ceremony in 1930. Since then, for the rest of the first decade, the results were given to newspapers for publication at 11,00 pm on the night of the awards. The first Best Actor awarded was Emil Jannings, for his performances in The Last Command and he had to return to Europe before the ceremony, so the Academy agreed to give him the prize earlier, this made him the first Academy Award winner in history. With the fourth ceremony, however, the system changed, for the first six ceremonies, the eligibility period spanned two calendar years. At the 29th ceremony, held on March 27,1957, until then, foreign-language films had been honored with the Special Achievement Award. The 74th Academy Awards, held in 2002, presented the first Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, since 1973, all Academy Awards ceremonies always end with the Academy Award for Best Picture. The Academy also awards Nicholl Fellowships in Screenwriting, see also § Awards of Merit categories The best known award is the Academy Award of Merit, more popularly known as the Oscar statuette. The five spokes represent the branches of the Academy, Actors, Writers, Directors, Producers. The model for the statuette is said to be Mexican actor Emilio El Indio Fernández, sculptor George Stanley sculpted Cedric Gibbons design. The statuettes presented at the ceremonies were gold-plated solid bronze
7.
The Thomas Crown Affair (1968 film)
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The Thomas Crown Affair is a 1968 film directed and produced by Norman Jewison and starring Steve McQueen and Faye Dunaway. This heist film was nominated for two Academy Awards, winning Best Original Song for Michel Legrands Windmills of Your Mind, a remake was released in 1999 and a second remake is currently in the development stages. None of the men ever meets Crown face-to-face, nor do they know or meet each other before the robbery, independent insurance investigator Vicki Anderson is contracted to investigate the heist and will receive 10% of the stolen money if she recovers it. When Thomas first comes to her attention as a possible suspect, Thomas does not need the money, and in fact masterminded the robbery as a game. Vicki makes it clear to him that she knows that he is the thief and they start a game of cat and mouse, with the attraction between them evident. Their relationship soon evolves into an affair, complicated by Vickis vow to find the money, a reward offer entices the wife of the bank robberys getaway driver, Erwin Weaver, to fink on him. Vicki finds out that he was hired by a man he never saw and she tries putting Erwin in the same room as Thomas, but there is no hint of recognition on either ones part. However, while Vicki is clearly closing in on Thomas, using the IRS as leverage against his liquid assets, when she seemingly persuades him to negotiate an end, his point is proven when a jealous Eddie stubbornly refuses to cut any deal. Thomas organizes another robbery exactly like the first with different accomplices and tells Vicki where the drop will be, the robbery is successful, but there are gunshots and the viewer is left with the impression that people might have been killed, raising the stakes for Vickis decision. Vicki and the stake out the cemetery, where they watch one of the robbers make the drop. When his Rolls Royce arrives, however, she sees that Thomas has sent a messenger in his place, with a telegram asking her to bring the money and join him — or else keep the Rolls Royce. She tears the telegram to bits and throws the pieces to the wind, Crown flies away in a jet. The film also features a scene, with McQueen and Dunaway playing a game of chess. The photography is unusual for a mainstream Hollywood film, using a split-screen mode, McQueen undertook his own stunts, which include playing polo and driving a dune buggy at high speed along the Massachusetts coastline. This was similar to his role in the movie Bullitt, released a few months afterwards. In an interview, McQueen would later say this was his favorite film, the car driven by Dunaway, referred to as one of those red Italian things, is the first of only ten Ferrari 275 GTB/4 NART Spyders built. Today, this model is one of the most valuable Ferrari road cars of all time, McQueen liked the car very much, and eventually managed to acquire one for himself. The dune buggy was a Meyers Manx, built in California on a VW beetle floor pan with a hopped-up Corvair engine, McQueen owned one, and the Manx, the original dune buggy, was often copied
8.
Armenians
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Armenians are an ethnic group native to the Armenian Highlands. Armenians constitute the population of Armenia and the de facto independent Nagorno-Karabakh Republic. There is a diaspora of around 5 million people of full or partial Armenian ancestry living outside of modern Armenia. The largest Armenian populations today exist in Russia, the United States, France, Georgia, Iran, Germany, Ukraine, Lebanon, Brazil and Syria. With the exceptions of Iran and the former Soviet states, the present-day Armenian diaspora was formed mainly as a result of the Armenian Genocide, most Armenians adhere to the Armenian Apostolic Church, a non-Chalcedonian church, which is also the worlds oldest national church. Christianity began to spread in Armenia soon after Jesus death, due to the efforts of two of his apostles, St. Thaddeus and St. Bartholomew, in the early 4th century, the Kingdom of Armenia became the first state to adopt Christianity as a state religion. The unique Armenian alphabet was invented in 405 AD by Mesrop Mashtots, historically, the name Armenian has come to internationally designate this group of people. It was first used by neighbouring countries of ancient Armenia, the earliest attestations of the exonym Armenia date around the 6th century BC. In his trilingual Behistun Inscription dated to 517 BC, Darius I the Great of Persia refers to Urashtu as Armina (in Old Persian, Armina and Harminuya. In Greek, Αρμένιοι Armenians is attested from about the same time, xenophon, a Greek general serving in some of the Persian expeditions, describes many aspects of Armenian village life and hospitality in around 401 BC. He relates that the people spoke a language that to his ear sounded like the language of the Persians and it is also further postulated that the name Hay comes from one of the two confederated, Hittite vassal states—the Ḫayaša-Azzi. Movses Khorenatsi, the important early medieval Armenian historian, wrote that the word Armenian originated from the name Armenak or Aram, the Armenian Highland lies in the highlands surrounding Mount Ararat, the highest peak of the region. In the Bronze Age, several states flourished in the area of Greater Armenia, including the Hittite Empire, Mitanni, soon after Hayasa-Azzi were Arme-Shupria, the Nairi and the Kingdom of Urartu, who successively established their sovereignty over the Armenian Highland. Each of the nations and tribes participated in the ethnogenesis of the Armenian people. Under Ashurbanipal, the Assyrian empire reached the Caucasus Mountains, yerevan, the modern capital of Armenia, was founded in 782 BC by king Argishti I. T. Gamkrelidze and V. Ivanov proposed the Indo-European homeland around the Armenian Highland, eric P. Hamp in his 2012 Indo-European family tree, groups the Armenian language along with Greek and Ancient Macedonian in the Pontic Indo-European subgroup. In Hamps view the homeland of this subgroup is the northeast coast of the Black Sea and he assumes that they migrated from there southeast through the Caucasus with the Armenians remaining after Batumi while the pre-Greeks proceeded westwards along the southern coast of the Black Sea. However, fresh genetics studies explain Armenian diversity by several mixtures of Eurasian populations that occurred between ~3,000 and ~2,000 b. c
9.
Grammy Award
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A Grammy Award, or Grammy, is an honor awarded by The Recording Academy to recognize outstanding achievement in the mainly English-language music industry. The annual presentation ceremony features performances by prominent artists, and the presentation of awards that have a more popular interest. It shares recognition of the industry as that of the other performance awards such as the Emmy Awards, the Tony Awards. The first Grammy Awards ceremony was held on May 4,1959, to honor, following the 2011 ceremony, The Academy overhauled many Grammy Award categories for 2012. The 59th Grammy Awards, honoring the best achievements from October 2015 to September 2016, was held on February 12,2017, the Grammys had their origin in the Hollywood Walk of Fame project in the 1950s. The music executives decided to rectify this by creating a given by their industry similar to the Oscars. This was the beginning of the National Academy of Recording Arts, after it was decided to create such an award, there was still a question of what to call it, one working title was the Eddie, to honor the inventor of the phonograph, Thomas Edison. They finally settled on using the name of the invention of Emile Berliner, the gramophone, for the awards, the number of awards given grew and fluctuated over the years with categories added and removed, at one time reaching over 100. The second Grammy Awards, also held in 1959, was the first ceremony to be televised, the gold-plated trophies, each depicting a gilded gramophone, are made and assembled by hand by Billings Artworks in Ridgway, Colorado. In 1990 the original Grammy design was revamped, changing the traditional soft lead for a stronger alloy less prone to damage, Billings developed a zinc alloy named grammium, which is trademarked. The trophies with the name engraved on them are not available until after the award announcements. By February 2009,7,578 Grammy trophies had been awarded, the General Field are four awards which are not restricted by genre. Album of the Year is awarded to the performer and the team of a full album if other than the performer. Record of the Year is awarded to the performer and the team of a single song if other than the performer. Song of the Year is awarded to the writer/composer of a single song, Best New Artist is awarded to a promising breakthrough performer who releases, during the Eligibility Year, the first recording that establishes the public identity of that artist. The only two artists to win all four of these awards are Christopher Cross, who won all four in 1980, and Adele, who won the Best New Artist award in 2009 and the other three in 2012 and 2017. Other awards are given for performance and production in specific genres, as well as for other such as artwork. Special awards are given for longer-lasting contributions to the music industry, the many other Grammy trophies are presented in a pre-telecast Premiere Ceremony earlier in the afternoon before the Grammy Awards telecast
10.
Emmy Award
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An Emmy Award, or simply Emmy, recognizes excellence in the television industry, and corresponds to the Academy Award, the Tony Award, and the Grammy Award. Because Emmy Awards are given in various sectors of the American television industry, Regional Emmy Awards are also presented throughout the country at various times through the year, recognizing excellence in local and statewide television. In addition, International Emmys are awarded for excellence in TV programming produced, each is responsible for administering a particular set of Emmy ceremonies. The Los Angeles-based Academy of Television Arts & Sciences established the Emmy Award as part of an image-building and public relations opportunity. The first Emmy Awards ceremony took place on January 25,1949, at the Hollywood Athletic Club, shirley Dinsdale has the distinction of receiving the very first Emmy Award for Most Outstanding Television Personality, during that first awards ceremony. In the 1950s, the ATAS expanded the Emmys into a national event, in 1955, the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences was formed in New York City as a sister organization to serve members on the East Coast, and help to also supervise the Emmys. The NATAS also established regional chapters throughout the United States, with each one developing their own local Emmy awards show for local programming, the ATAS still however maintained its separate regional ceremony honoring local programming in the Los Angeles Area. Originally there was only one Emmy Awards ceremony held per year to honor shows nationally broadcast in the United States, in 1974, the first Daytime Emmy Awards ceremony was held to specifically honor achievement in national daytime programming. Other area-specific Emmy Awards ceremonies soon followed, also, the International Emmy Awards, honoring television programs produced and initially aired outside the U. S. was established in the early 1970s. Meanwhile, all Emmys awarded prior to the emergence of these separate, in 1977, due to various conflicts, the ATAS and the NATAS agreed to split ties. However, they agreed to share ownership of the Emmy statue and trademark. With the rise of television in the 1980s, cable programs first became eligible for the Primetime Emmys in 1988. The ATAS also began accepting original online-only web television programs in 2013, the Emmy statuette, depicting a winged woman holding an atom, was designed by television engineer Louis McManus, who used his wife as the model. The TV Academy rejected a total of forty-seven proposals before settling on McManus design in 1948. The statuette has become the symbol of the TV Academys goal of supporting and uplifting the art and science of television, The wings represent the muse of art. When deciding a name for the award, Academy founder Syd Cassyd originally suggested Ike, however, Ike was also the popular nickname of World War II hero and future U. S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, and the Academy members wanted something unique. Finally, television engineer and the third president, Harry Lubcke, suggested the name Immy. After Immy was chosen, it was feminized to Emmy to match their female statuette
11.
Conservatoire de Paris
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The Conservatoire de Paris is a college of music and dance founded in 1795, now situated in the avenue Jean Jaurès in the 19th arrondissement of Paris, France. The Conservatoire offers instruction in music, dance, and drama, today the conservatories operate under the auspices of the Ministry of Culture and Communication. On 3 December 1783 Papillon de la Ferté, intendant of the Menus-Plaisirs du Roi, the school was instituted by a decree of 3 January 1784 and opened on 1 April with the composer François-Joseph Gossec as the provisional director. Piccinni refused the directorship, but did join the faculty as a professor of singing, the new school was located in buildings adjacent to the Hôtel des Menus-Plaisirs at the junction of the rue Bergère and the rue du Faubourg Poissonnière. In June, a class in dramatic declamation was added, in 1792, Bernard Sarrette created the École gratuite de la garde nationale, which in the following year became the Institut national de musique. On 3 August 1795, the government combined the École royale with the Institut national de musique, the combined organization remained in the facilities on the rue Bergère. The first 351 pupils commenced their studies in October 1796, a concert hall, designed by the architect François-Jacques Delannoy, was inaugurated on 7 July 1811. The hall, which exists today, was in the shape of a U. It held an audience of 1055, the acoustics were generally regarded as superb. The French composer and conductor Antoine Elwart described it as the Stradivarius of concert halls, in 1828 François Habeneck, a professor of violin and head of the Conservatorys orchestra, founded the Société des Concerts du Conservatoire. The Society held concerts in the hall almost continuously until 1945, the French composer Hector Berlioz premiered his Symphonie fantastique in the conservatorys hall on 5 December 1830 with an orchestra of more than a hundred players. The original library was created by Sarrette in 1801, after the construction of the concert hall, the library moved to a large room above the entrance vestibule. In the 1830s, Berlioz became a curator in the Conservatory library and was the librarian from 1852 until his death in 1869. He was succeeded as librarian by Félicien David, Sarrette was dismissed on 28 December 1814, after the Bourbon Restoration, but was reinstated on 26 May 1815, after Napoleons return to power during the Hundred Days. However, after Napoleons fall, Sarrette was finally compelled to retire on 17 November, in 1819, François Benoist was appointed professor of organ. Probably the best known director in the 19th century was Luigi Cherubini, Cherubini maintained high standards and his staff included teachers such as François-Joseph Fétis, Habeneck, Fromental Halévy, Le Sueur, Ferdinando Paer, and Anton Reicha. Cherubini was succeeded by Daniel-François-Esprit Auber in 1842, in 1852, Camille Urso, who studied with Lambert Massart, became the first female student to win a prize on violin. The Conservatory Instrument Museum, founded in 1861, was formed from the instrument collection of Louis Clapisson, the French music historian Gustave Chouquet became the curator of the museum in 1871 and did much to expand and upgrade the collection
12.
Nadia Boulanger
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Juliette Nadia Boulanger was a French composer, conductor, and teacher. She is notable for having many of the leading composers. She also performed occasionally as a pianist and organist, in that capacity, she influenced generations of young composers, especially those from the United States and other English-speaking countries. Boulanger was the first woman to conduct major orchestras in America and Europe, including the BBC Symphony, Boston Symphony, Hallé, New York Philharmonic. She conducted several premieres, including works by Copland and Stravinsky. Nadia Boulanger was born in Paris on 16 September 1887, to French composer and pianist Ernest Boulanger and his wife Raissa Myshetskaya and they had a daughter who died as an infant before Nadia was born. Nadia was born on her fathers 72nd birthday, Ernest had studied at the Paris Conservatoire and, in 1835 at the age of 20, won the coveted Prix de Rome for composition. He wrote comic operas and incidental music for plays, but was most widely known for his choral music and he achieved distinction as a director of choral groups, teacher of voice, and a member of choral competition juries. After years of rejection, in 1872 he was appointed to the Paris Conservatoire as professor of singing, Raissa qualified as a home tutor in 1873. According to Ernest, he and Raissa met in Russia in 1873 and she joined his voice class at the Conservatoire in 1876, and they were married in Russia in 1877. Through Nadias early years, although both parents were very active musically, the girl would get upset by hearing music and hide until it stopped, when Boulanger was five, Raissa became pregnant again. During the pregnancy, Boulangers response to music changed drastically, one day I heard a fire bell. Instead of crying out and hiding, I rushed to the piano, after this, Boulanger paid great attention to the singing lessons her father gave, and began to study the rudiments of music. Her sister, named Marie-Juliette Olga but known as Lili, was born in 1893, when Ernest brought Nadia home from their friends house, before she was allowed to see her mother or Lili, he made her promise solemnly to be responsible for the new babys welfare. He urged her to part in her sisters care. From the age of seven, Nadia Boulanger studied hard in preparation for her Conservatoire entrance exams, sitting in on their classes, Lili often stayed in the room for these lessons, sitting quietly and listening. Boulanger entered the Conservatoire in 1896 at the age of nine and she came third in the 1897 solfège competition, and subsequently worked hard to win first prize in 1898. She took private lessons from Vierne and Guilmant, during this period, she also received religious instruction to become an observant Catholic, taking her First Communion on 4 May 1899
13.
Aaron Copland
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Aaron Copland was an American composer, composition teacher, writer, and later a conductor of his own and other American music. Copland was referred to by his peers and critics as the Dean of American Composers, the open, slowly changing harmonies in much of his music are typical of what many people consider to be the sound of American music, evoking the vast American landscape and pioneer spirit. He is best known for the works he wrote in the 1930s and 1940s in an accessible style often referred to as populist. Works in this include the ballets Appalachian Spring, Billy the Kid and Rodeo, his Fanfare for the Common Man. In addition to his ballets and orchestral works, he produced music in other genres including chamber music, vocal works, opera. After some initial studies with composer Rubin Goldmark, Copland traveled to Paris and he studied three years with Boulanger, whose eclectic approach to music inspired his own broad taste. Determined upon his return to the U. S. to make his way as a composer, Copland gave lecture-recitals, wrote works on commission. He found composing orchestral music in the modernist style he had adapted abroad a financially contradictory approach and he shifted in the mid-1930s to a more accessible musical style which mirrored the German idea of Gebrauchsmusik, music that could serve utilitarian and artistic purposes. During the Depression years, he traveled extensively to Europe, Africa, during the late 1940s, Copland became aware that Stravinsky and other fellow composers had begun to study Arnold Schoenbergs use of twelve-tone techniques. After he had exposed to the works of French composer Pierre Boulez, he incorporated serial techniques into his Piano Quartet, Piano Fantasy, Connotations for orchestra. From the 1960s onward, Coplands activities turned more from composing to conducting and he became a frequent guest conductor of orchestras in the U. S. and the UK and made a series of recordings of his music, primarily for Columbia Records. Aaron Copland was born in Brooklyn, New York, on November 14,1900 and he was the youngest of five children in a Conservative Jewish family of Lithuanian origins. While emigrating from Russia to the United States, Coplands father, Harris Morris Copland, Copland was however unaware until late in his life that the family name had been Kaplan, and his parents never told him this. His father was a staunch Democrat, the family members were active in Congregation Baith Israel Anshei Emes, where Aaron celebrated his Bar Mitzvah. Not especially athletic, the young man became an avid reader. Coplands father had no musical interest and his mother, Sarah Mittenthal Copland, sang, played the piano, and arranged for music lessons for her children. Of his siblings, oldest brother Ralph was the most advanced musically and his sister Laurine had the strongest connection with Aaron, she gave him his first piano lessons, promoted his musical education, and supported him in his musical career. A student at the Metropolitan Opera School and a frequent opera-goer, Copland attended Boys High School and in the summer went to various camps
14.
Philip Glass
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Philip Morris Glass is an American composer. He is considered one of the most influential makers of the late 20th century. Glasss compositions have been described as music, similar to other minimalist composers including La Monte Young, Steve Reich. However, Glass has described himself instead as a composer of music with repetitive structures, Glass founded the Philip Glass Ensemble, with which he still performs on keyboards. He has written numerous operas and musical works, eleven symphonies, eleven concertos, seven string quartets and various other chamber music. Three of his scores have been nominated for Academy Awards. Glass was born in Baltimore, Maryland, the son of Ida and his family were Jewish immigrants from Lithuania. His father owned a store and his mother was a librarian. She developed a plan to help them learn English and develop skills so they could find work and his sister, Sheppie, would later do similar work as an active member of the International Rescue Committee. Glass developed his appreciation of music from his father, discovering later his fathers side of the family had many musicians and his cousin Cevia was a classical pianist, while others had been in vaudeville. He learned his family was related to Al Jolson. Glasss father often received promotional copies of new recordings at his music store and he spent many hours listening to them, developing his knowledge and taste in music. This openness to modern sounds affected Glass at an age, My father was self-taught, but he ended up having a very refined and rich knowledge of classical, chamber. Typically he would come home and have dinner, and then sit in his armchair, I caught on to this very early, and I would go and listen with him. The elder Glass promoted both new recordings and a selection of composers to his customers, sometimes convincing them to try something new by allowing them to return records they didnt like. His store soon developed a reputation as Baltimores leading source of modern music, Glass cites Schuberts work as a big influence growing up. He studied the flute as a child at the school of the Peabody Institute. At the age of 15, he entered a college program at the University of Chicago where he studied mathematics
15.
Astor Piazzolla
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Astor Pantaleón Piazzolla was an Argentine tango composer, bandoneon player, and arranger. His oeuvre revolutionized the traditional tango into a new style termed nuevo tango, incorporating elements from jazz, a virtuoso bandoneonist, he regularly performed his own compositions with a variety of ensembles. In 1992, American music critic Stephen Holden described Piazzolla as the worlds foremost composer of tango music, Piazzolla was born in Mar del Plata, Argentina, in 1921, the only child of Italian immigrant parents, Vicente Nonino Piazzolla and Asunta Manetti. His mother was the daughter of two Italian immigrants from Lucca in Tuscany and his parents worked long hours and Piazzolla soon learned to take care of himself on the streets despite having a limp. At home he would listen to his fathers records of the orchestras of Carlos Gardel and Julio de Caro. He began to play the bandoneon after his father spotted one in a New York pawn shop in 1929, after their return to New York City from a brief visit to Mar del Plata in 1930, the family moved to Little Italy in lower Manhattan. In 1932 Piazzolla composed his first tango, La Catinga, the following year he took music lessons with the Hungarian classical pianist Bela Wilda, a student of Rachmaninoff who taught him to play Bach on his bandoneon. In 1934 he met Carlos Gardel, one of the most important figures in the history of tango, Gardel invited the young bandoneon player to join him on his tour. Much to Piazzollas dismay, his father decided that he was not old enough to go along, the disappointment of being forbidden to join the tour proved to be fortunate, as it was on this tour in 1935 that Gardel and his entire orchestra perished in a plane crash. In later years, Piazzolla made light of this near miss, joking that if his father had not been so careful, Piazzolla would be playing the harp rather than the bandoneon. In 1936, he returned with his family to Mar del Plata, Vardaro’s novel interpretation of tango made a great impression on Piazzolla and years later he would become Piazzolla’s violinist in his Orquesta de Cuerdas and his First Quintet. Piazzolla was employed as a replacement for Toto Rodríguez who was ill. Apart from playing the bandoneon, Piazzolla also became Troilo’s arranger, by 1941 he was earning a good wage, enough to pay for music lessons with Alberto Ginastera, an eminent Argentine composer of classical music. During his five years of study with Ginastera he mastered orchestration and that same year he married his first wife, Dedé Wolff, an artist, with whom he had two children, Diana and Daniel. As time went by Troilo began to fear that the musical ideas of the young bandoneonist might undermine the style of his orchestra. Tensions mounted between the two bandoneonists until, in 1944, Piazzolla announced his intention to leave Troilo and join the orchestra of the tango singer and bandoneonist Francisco Fiorentino. Piazzolla would lead Fiorentinos orchestra until 1946 and make recordings with him. Having disbanded his first orchestra in 1950 he almost abandoned tango altogether as he continued to study Bartok and Stravinsky and he spent a lot of time listening to jazz and searching for a musical style of his own beyond the realms of tango
16.
Miles Davis
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Miles Dewey Davis III was an American jazz trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. He is among the most influential and acclaimed figures in the history of jazz, with his ever-changing directions in music, Davis was at the forefront of a number of major stylistic developments in jazz over his five-decade career. In the early 1950s, Davis recorded some of the earliest hard bop music while on Prestige Records, after a widely acclaimed comeback performance at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1955, he signed a long-term contract with Columbia Records and recorded the 1957 album Round About Midnight. It was his first work with saxophonist John Coltrane and bassist Paul Chambers and his million-selling 1970 record Bitches Brew helped spark a resurgence in the genres commercial popularity with jazz fusion as the decade progressed. In 2006, Davis was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Miles Dewey Davis III was born on May 26,1926 into an affluent middle class African-American family in Alton, Illinois,15 miles north of St. Louis. The second of three children, he had a sister, Dorothy Mae, and a younger brother. His father, Miles Dewey Davis II of Arkansas, was a dental surgeon who earned three college degrees, and his mother Cleota Mae Davis, also of Arkansas, was a music teacher. They owned a 200-acre estate near Pine Bluff, Arkansas where Davis and his siblings would ride horses, fish, and hunt. In 1927, the moved to East St. Louis, Illinois. From 1932 to 1934, Davis attended John Robinson Elementary School, an institution, followed by Crispus Attucks School where he performed well in mathematics, music. It was in East St. Louis and Pine Bluff that the young Davis developed his earliest appreciation for music, Davis later suggested that his fathers instrument choice was made largely to irk his wife, who disliked the trumpets sound. Against the fashion of the time, Buchanan stressed the importance of playing without vibrato, Davis would carry his clear signature tone throughout his career. He once remarked on its importance to him, saying, I prefer a round sound with no attitude in it, like a voice with not too much tremolo. If I cant get that sound I cant play anything, in 1939, the family moved to 1701 Kansas Avenue in East St. Louis. For his 13th birthday held that year, Davis father bought his son a new trumpet, around this time, Davis took additional trumpet lessons from Joseph Gustat, first chair of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra. In 1941, the 15-year-old Davis began at East St. Louis Lincoln High School where he joined the marching band directed by Buchanan. Davis claimed the contests he did not win was largely down to prejudice over his race and it was at Lincoln High where Davis met his first girlfriend, Irene Cawthorn. Davis had formed his own group by this time, performing in local venues such as Huffs Beer Garden with hits such as In the Mood by Glenn Miller
17.
John Coltrane
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John William Coltrane, also known as Trane, was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Working in the bebop and hard bop idioms early in his career and he led at least fifty recording sessions during his career, and appeared as a sideman on many albums by other musicians, including trumpeter Miles Davis and pianist Thelonious Monk. As his career progressed, Coltrane and his music took on a spiritual dimension. Coltrane influenced innumerable musicians, and remains one of the most significant saxophonists in music history and he received many posthumous awards and recognitions, including canonization by the African Orthodox Church as Saint John William Coltrane and a special Pulitzer Prize in 2007. His second wife was pianist Alice Coltrane and their son Ravi Coltrane is also a saxophonist, Coltrane was born in his parents apartment at 200 Hamlet Avenue, Hamlet, North Carolina on September 23,1926. His father was John R. Coltrane and his mother was Alice Blair and he grew up in High Point, North Carolina, attending William Penn High School. Beginning in December 1938 Coltranes aunt, grandparents, and father all died within a few months of one another, leaving John to be raised by his mother, in June 1943 he moved to Philadelphia. In September of that year his mother bought him his first saxophone, Coltrane played the clarinet and the alto horn in a community band before taking up the alto saxophone during high school. He had his first professional gigs in early to mid-1945 – a cocktail lounge trio, with piano and guitar. To avoid being drafted by the Army, Coltrane enlisted in the Navy on August 6,1945, by the time he got to Hawaii, in late 1945, the Navy was already rapidly downsizing. As the Melody Masters was a band, however, Coltrane was treated merely as a guest performer to avoid alerting superior officers of his participation in the band. He continued to other duties when not playing with the band, including kitchen. By the end of his service, he had assumed a role in the band. His first recordings, a session in Hawaii with Navy musicians. Coltrane played alto saxophone on a selection of standards and bebop tunes. In Philadelphia after the war, he studied theory with guitarist and composer Dennis Sandole. Originally an altoist, in 1947 Coltrane also began playing saxophone with the Eddie Vinson Band. Coltrane later referred to point in his life as a time when a wider area of listening opened up for me
18.
Bill Evans
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William John Bill Evans was an American jazz pianist and composer who mostly worked in a trio setting. In 1955, he moved to New York City, where he worked with bandleader, in 1958, Evans joined Miles Daviss sextet, where he was to have a profound influence. In 1959, the band, then immersed in modal jazz, recorded Kind of Blue, in late 1959, Evans left the Miles Davis band and began his career as a leader with Scott LaFaro and Paul Motian, a group now regarded as a seminal modern jazz trio. In 1961, ten days recording the highly acclaimed Sunday at the Village Vanguard and Waltz for Debby. After months of seclusion, Evans re-emerged with a new trio, in 1963, Evans recorded Conversations with Myself, an innovative solo album using the unconventional technique of overdubbing over himself. In 1966, he met bassist Eddie Gómez, with whom he would work for eleven years, several successful albums followed, such as Bill Evans at the Montreux Jazz Festival, Alone and The Bill Evans Album, among others. Many of his compositions, such as Waltz for Debby, have become standards and have played and recorded by many artists. Evans was honored with 31 Grammy nominations and seven awards, and was inducted into the Down Beat Jazz Hall of Fame, Bill Evans was born in Plainfield, New Jersey, to Harry and Mary Evans. His father was of Welsh descent and ran a course, his mother was of Rusyn ancestry. The marriage was due to his fathers heavy drinking, gambling. He had a brother, Harry, two years his senior, with whom he shared a close relationship. Given Harry Evans Sr. s destructive character, Mary Evans would often leave home with her sons to nearby Somerville, to stay with her sister Justine, there, Harry began piano lessons somewhere between age 5 and 7 with local teacher Helen Leland. Even though Bill was thought to be too young to receive lessons, soon both brothers were taking piano lessons. Evans remembered Leland with affection for not insisting on a technical approach, with scales. He would soon develop a fluid sight-reading ability, though his teacher rated his brother as a better pianist, at age 7, Bill began violin lessons, and soon also flute and piccolo. Even though he soon dropped those instruments, it is believed they later influenced his keyboard style and he later cited Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert as frequently played composers. Around the same time came his first exposure to jazz. At the age of 13, Bill stood in for a sick pianist in Buddy Valentinos rehearsal band, soon, Bill began to perform for dances and weddings throughout New Jersey, playing music like boogie woogie and polkas for $1 per hour
19.
Phil Woods
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Philip Wells Phil Woods was an American jazz alto saxophonist, clarinetist, bandleader, and composer. Woods was born in Springfield, Massachusetts and he studied music with Lennie Tristano, who influenced him greatly, at the Manhattan School of Music and at the Juilliard School. His friend, Joe Lopes, coached him on clarinet as there was no saxophone major at Juilliard at the time. Although he did not copy Charlie Bird Parker, he was known as the New Bird, in the 1950s, Woods began to lead his own bands. Quincy Jones invited him to accompany Dizzy Gillespie on a tour sponsored by the U. S. State Department. A few years later he toured Europe with Jones, and in 1962 he toured Russia with Benny Goodman, after moving to France in 1968, Woods led the European Rhythm Machine, a group which tended toward avant-garde jazz. He returned to the United States in 1972 and, after an attempt to establish an electronic group, he formed a quintet which was still performing, with some changes of personnel. As his theme, Woods used a piece titled Hows Your Mama, Woods earned the top alto sax player award almost 30 times in Downbeat magazines annual readers poll. His quintet was awarded the top small combo title several times, in 1979, Woods made the recording More Live at the Armadillo World Headquarters in Austin, Texas. Perhaps his best known recorded work as a sideman is a pop piece, his alto sax solo on Billy Joels 1977 Just the Way You Are. He also played the alto sax solo on Steely Dans Doctor Wu from their 1975 album Katy Lied, although Woods was primarily a saxophonist, he was also a clarinet player and solos can be found scattered through his recordings. One particular example is his solo on Misirlou on the album Into the Woods. Woods, along with Rick Chamberlain and Ed Joubert, founded the organization Celebration of the Arts in 1978 late one night in the bar at the Deer Head Inn in Delaware Water Gap, the organization would eventually become the Delaware Water Gap Celebration of the Arts. Their initial goal was to foster an appreciation of jazz. Each year, the hosts the Celebration of the Arts Festival in the town of Delaware Water Gap in September. In 2005, Jazzed Media released the documentary Phil Woods, A Life in E Flat – Portrait of a Jazz Legend, directed by Rich Lerner and produced by Graham Carter. Woods was married to Chan Parker, the widow of Charlie Parker, for seventeen years and was the stepfather to Chans daughter, Kim. On September 4,2015, he performed a tribute to Charlie Parker with Strings at the Manchester Craftsmens Guild and he died on September 29,2015, at the age of 83
20.
Ben Webster
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Benjamin Francis Ben Webster was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. Webster, born in Kansas City, Missouri, is considered one of the three most important swing tenors along with Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young. Known affectionately as The Brute, or Frog, he had a tough, raspy, stylistically he was indebted to alto star Johnny Hodges, who, he said, taught him to play his instrument. Webster learned to play piano and violin at an age before taking up the saxophone, although he did return to the piano from time to time. Once Budd Johnson showed him some basics on the saxophone, Webster began to play that instrument in the Young Family Band, Kansas City at this point was a melting pot from which emerged some of the biggest names in 1930s jazz. Webster joined Bennie Motens band in 1932, a grouping which also included Count Basie, Oran Hot Lips Page and this era was recreated in Robert Altmans film Kansas City. Ben Webster played with Duke Ellingtons orchestra for the first time in 1935 and he credited Johnny Hodges, Ellingtons alto soloist, as a major influence on his playing. Webster left the band in 1943 after an altercation during which he allegedly cut up one of Ellingtons suits. In an interview with the Newark Star-Ledger in 2003, trumpeter Clark Terry claimed that Webster left Ellington because he slapped Duke, for a few months in 1948, he returned briefly to Ellingtons orchestra. Along with Peterson, trumpeter Harry Sweets Edison and others, he was touring and recording with Granzs Jazz at the Philharmonic package, in 1956, he recorded a classic set with pianist Art Tatum, supported by bassist Red Callender and drummer Bill Douglass. Coleman Hawkins Encounters Ben Webster with fellow tenor saxophonist Coleman Hawkins was recorded on December 16,1957, along with Peterson, Herb Ellis, Ray Brown, and Alvin Stoller. The Hawkins and Webster recording is a classic, the coming together of two giants of the tenor saxophone, who had first met back in Kansas City. In the late 1950s, he formed a quintet with Gerry Mulligan and it was there that the Webster-Mulligan group backed up blues singer Jimmy Witherspoon on an album recorded live. Webster generally worked steadily, but in 1965 he moved permanently to Europe and he played when he pleased during his last decade. He lived in London for one year, followed by four years in Amsterdam, Webster appeared as a sax player in a low-rent cabaret club in the 1970 Danish blue film titled Quiet Days in Clichy. In 1971, Webster reunited with Duke Ellington and his orchestra for a couple of shows at the Tivoli Gardens in Copenhagen, in addition and he also recorded or performed with Buck Clayton, Bill Coleman and Teddy Wilson. Webster suffered a hemorrhage in Amsterdam in September 1973, following a performance at the Twee Spieghels in Leiden. His body was cremated in Copenhagen and his ashes were buried in the Assistens Cemetery in the Nørrebro section of the city, after Websters death, Billy Moore Jr. together with the trustee of Websters estate, created the Ben Webster Foundation
21.
Hank Jones
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Henry Hank Jones Jr. was an American jazz pianist, bandleader, arranger, and composer. Critics and musicians described Jones as eloquent, lyrical, and impeccable, in 1989, The National Endowment for the Arts honored him with the NEA Jazz Masters Award. He was also honored in 2003 with the American Society of Composers, Authors, in 2008, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. On April 13,2009, the University of Hartford presented Jones with a Doctorate Degree for his musical accomplishments, Jones recorded more than 60 albums under his own name, and countless others as a sideman, including Cannonball Adderleys celebrated album Somethin Else. On May 19,1962, he played piano as actress Marilyn Monroe sang her famous Happy Birthday, Mr. President song to then U. S. president John F. Kennedy. Born in Vicksburg, Mississippi, Henry Hank Jones moved to Pontiac, Michigan, one of seven children, Jones was raised in a musical family. His mother Olivia Jones sang, his two sisters studied piano, and his two younger brothers—Thad, a trumpeter, and Elvin, a drummer—also became prominent jazz musicians. He studied piano at an age and came under the influence of Earl Hines, Fats Waller, Teddy Wilson. By the age of 13 Jones was performing locally in Michigan, while playing with territory bands in Grand Rapids and Lansing in 1944 he met Lucky Thompson, who invited Jones to work in New York City at the Onyx Club with Hot Lips Page. In New York City, Jones regularly listened to leading bop musicians, while practicing and studying the music he worked with John Kirby, Howard McGhee, Coleman Hawkins, Andy Kirk, and Billy Eckstine. From 1959 through 1975 Jones was staff pianist for CBS studios and this included backing guests such as Frank Sinatra on The Ed Sullivan Show. He played the accompaniment to Marilyn Monroe as she sang Happy Birthday Mr. President to John F. Kennedy on May 19,1962. By the late 1970s, his involvement as pianist and conductor with the Broadway musical Aint Misbehavin had informed an audience of his unique qualities as a musician. The trio also recorded with other personnel, such as Art Farmer, Benny Golson. In the early 1980s Jones held a residency as a solo pianist at the Cafe Ziegfeld and made a tour of Japan, Jones versatility was more in evidence with the passage of time. He collaborated on recordings of Afro-pop with an ensemble from Mali and on an album of spirituals, hymns and folksongs with Charlie Haden called Steal Away. Jones made his debut on Lineage Records, recording with Frank Wess and with the guitarist Eddie Diehl and he also accompanied Diana Krall for Dream a Little Dream of Me on the album compilation, We all Love Ella. He is one of the musicians who test and talk about the piano in the documentary Note by Note, The Making of Steinway L1037, Hank Jones lived in Cresskill NJ, upstate New York and in Manhattan
22.
Art Farmer
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Arthur Stewart Art Farmer was an American jazz trumpeter and flugelhorn player. He also played flumpet, a trumpet–flugelhorn combination specially designed for him and he and his identical twin brother, double bassist Addison Farmer, started playing professionally while in high school. Art gained greater attention after the release of a recording of his composition Farmers Market in 1952. He subsequently moved from Los Angeles to New York, where he performed and recorded musicians such as Horace Silver, Sonny Rollins. As Farmers reputation grew, he expanded from bebop into more experimental forms through working with such as George Russell. He went on to join Gerry Mulligans quartet and, with Benny Golson, continuing to develop his own sound, Farmer switched from trumpet to the warmer flugelhorn in the early 1960s, and he helped to establish the flugelhorn as a soloists instrument in jazz. He settled in Europe in 1968 and continued to tour internationally until his death, Farmer recorded more than 50 albums under his own name, a dozen with the Jazztet, and dozens more with other leaders. His playing is known for its individuality – most noticeably, its lyricism, warmth of tone, Art Farmer was born an hour before his twin brother, on August 21,1928, in Council Bluffs, Iowa, reportedly at 2201 Fourth Avenue. Their parents, James Arthur Farmer and Hazel Stewart Farmer, divorced when the boys were four, Art moved with his grandfather, grandmother, mother, brother and sister to Phoenix, Arizona when he was still four. He started to play the piano while in school, then moved on to bass tuba and violin before settling on cornet. His family was musical, most of them played as a hobby, Arts grandfather was a minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Church. This influenced Farmers first choice of instrument, as his mother played piano for the church choir, the bass tuba was for use in a marching band and was Farmers instrument for a year, until a cornet became available. Phoenix schools were segregated, and no one at Farmers school could provide useful music lessons and he taught himself to read music and practiced his new main instrument, the trumpet. The brothers earned money by working in a warehouse and by playing professionally. Art started playing professionally at the age of 16, performing in the bands of Horace Henderson, Jimmy Mundy. These opportunities came about through a combination of his ability and the absence of older musicians. Around this time in Los Angeles, there were abundant opportunities for development, according to Farmer, During the day you would go to somebodys house. At night there were after-hours clubs anybody who wanted to play was free to come up, Farmer left high school early but persuaded the principal to give him a diploma, which he did not collect until a visit to the school in 1958
23.
Ray Brown (musician)
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Raymond Matthews Ray Brown was an American jazz double bassist and cellist, known for extensive work with Oscar Peterson and Ella Fitzgerald, among others. Ray Brown was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and took lessons from the age of eight. After noticing how many attended his high school, he thought of taking up the trombone but was unable to afford one. With a vacancy in the school jazz orchestra, he took up the upright bass. A major early influence on Browns bass playing was Jimmy Blanton, as a young man Brown became increasingly well known in the Pittsburgh jazz scene, with his first experiences playing in bands with the Jimmy Hinsley Sextet and the Snookum Russell band. After graduating high school, having heard stories about the jazz scene on 52nd Street in New York City. He arrived in New York at the age of 20, met up with Hank Jones, with whom he had worked, and was introduced to Dizzy Gillespie. Gillespie hired Brown on the spot, and he played with such established musicians as Art Tatum. From 1946 to 1951 Brown played in Gillespies band, Brown, along with the vibraphonist Milt Jackson, drummer Kenny Clarke, and pianist John Lewis formed the rhythm section of the Gillespie band. Lewis, Clarke, and Jackson eventually formed the Modern Jazz Quartet, Brown became acquainted with singer Ella Fitzgerald when she joined the Gillespie band as a special attraction for a tour of the southern United States in 1947. Around this time Brown was also appearing in Jazz at the Philharmonic concerts and it was at a Jazz at the Philharmonic concert in 1949 that Brown first worked with the jazz pianist Oscar Peterson, in whose trio Brown would play from 1951 to 1966. Between 1957 and 1959, Brown appeared on Blossom Dearies first five recordings for Verve Records, after leaving the Trio he became a manager and promoter as well as a performer. In 1966, he settled in Los Angeles, where he was in high demand working for television show orchestras. He also accompanied some of the artists of the day, including Tony Bennett, Billy Eckstine, Frank Sinatra, Sarah Vaughan. Also in Los Angeles he composed music for films and television shows, from 1974 to 1982, Brown performed and recorded a series of albums with guitarist Laurindo Almeida, saxophonist and flautist Bud Shank, and drummer Shelly Manne under the name The L. A. Four. Brown guested as a player on Razor Boy, the second track on Steely Dans second album, Countdown to Ecstasy. Brown appeared on four tracks from the soundtrack to Clint Eastwoods biopic about Charlie Parker, although all of the saxophone parts are Birds original playing, the accompaniment was re-recorded in order to beef up the sound, using Brown and, among others, John Guerin on drums. In the 1980s and 1990s Brown led his own trios and continued to refine his bass playing style, in his later years he recorded and toured extensively with pianist Gene Harris
24.
Shelly Manne
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Sheldon Shelly Manne, was an American jazz drummer. Mannes father and uncles were drummers, in his youth he admired many of the leading swing drummers of the day, especially Jo Jones and Dave Tough. Billy Gladstone, a colleague of Mannes father and the most admired percussionist on the New York theatrical scene, offered the teenage Shelly tips, from that time, Manne rapidly developed his style in the clubs of 52nd Street in New York in the late 1930s and 1940s. His first professional job with a big band was with the Bobby Byrne Orchestra in 1940. In those years, as he known, he recorded with jazz stars like Coleman Hawkins, Charlie Shavers. He also worked with a number of musicians associated with Duke Ellington, like Johnny Hodges, Harry Carney, Lawrence Brown. In 1943, Manne married a Rockette named Florence Butterfield, the marriage would last 41 years, until the end of Mannes life. When the bebop movement began to change jazz in the 1940s, Manne loved it and adapted to the style rapidly, around this time he also worked with rising stars like Flip Phillips, Charlie Ventura, Lennie Tristano, and Lee Konitz. Joining the hard-swinging Herman outfit allowed Manne to play the bebop he loved, the controversial Kenton band, on the other hand, with its progressive jazz, presented obstacles, and many of the complex, overwrought arrangements made it harder to swing. But Manne appreciated the freedom that Kenton gave him and saw it as an opportunity to experiment along with what was still a highly innovative band. He rose to the challenge, finding new colors and rhythms, in the early 1950s, Manne left New York and settled permanently on a ranch in an outlying part of Los Angeles, where he and his wife raised horses. Many of his recordings around this time were for Lester Koenigs Contemporary Records, Manne led a number of small groups that recorded under his name and leadership. Their music was recorded on the spot, and four LPs were issued, highly regarded as an innovative example of a live jazz recording, the Black Hawk sessions were reissued on CD in augmented form years later. Manne is often associated with the once frequently criticized West Coast school of jazz and he has been considered the quintessential drummer in what was seen as a West Coast movement, though Manne himself did not care to be so pigeonholed. Critics would condemn much of this music as overly cerebral, another side of West Coast jazz that also came under critical fire was music in a lighter style, intended for popular consumption. Best known is the series of albums he recorded with pianist André Previn and with members of his groups, based on music from popular Broadway shows, movies, and television programs. Much of the music produced on the West Coast in those years, as Robert Gordon concedes, was in fact imitative and lacked the fire, West Coast jazz, however, represented only a small part of Mannes playing. From the 78-rpm recordings of the 1940s to the LPs of the 1950s and later, to the hundreds of film soundtracks he appeared on, Mannes recorded output was enormous and often hard to pin down
25.
Stan Getz
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Stanley Stan Getz was an American jazz saxophonist. Playing primarily the tenor saxophone, Getz was known as The Sound because of his warm, lyrical tone, his influence being the wispy, mellow timbre of his idol. Coming to prominence in the late 1940s with Woody Hermans big band, Getz was born on February 2,1927, at St. Vincents Hospital in Philadelphia. In 1913, Harris and Beckie emigrated to the United States with their three sons Al, Phil, and Ben after their son Louis Gayetski in 1912. The Getz family first settled in Philadelphia, but during the depression the family moved to New York City, Getz worked hard in school, receiving straight As, and finished sixth grade close to the top of his class. Getzs major interest was in musical instruments and he played a number of them before his father bought him his first saxophone at the age of 13. Even though his father also got him a clarinet, Getz instantly fell in love with the saxophone and he attended James Monroe High School in the Bronx. In 1941, he was accepted into the All City High School Orchestra of New York City and this gave him a chance to receive private, free tutoring from the New York Philharmonics Simon Kovar, a bassoon player. He also continued playing the saxophone and he eventually dropped out of school in order to pursue his musical career, but was later sent back to the classroom by the school systems truancy officers. In 1943 at the age of 16, he was accepted into Jack Teagardens band, Getz also played along with Nat King Cole and Lionel Hampton. With Herman, he had a hit with Early Autumn and after Getz left The Second Herd he was able to launch his solo career and he was the leader on almost all of his recording sessions after 1950. Getzs reputation was enhanced by his featured status on Johnny Smiths 1952 album Moonlight in Vermont. The single of the tune became a hit that stayed on the charts for months. In the mid to late 1950s working from Scandinavia, Getz became popular playing cool jazz with Horace Silver, Johnny Smith, Oscar Peterson, and many others. His first two quintets were notable for their personnel, including Charlie Parkers rhythm section of drummer Roy Haynes, pianist Al Haig, a 1953 line-up of the Dizzy Gillespie/Stan Getz Sextet featured Gillespie, Getz, Peterson, Herb Ellis, Ray Brown and Max Roach. Returning to the U. S. from Europe in 1961, teaming with guitarist Charlie Byrd, who had just returned from a U. S. State Department tour of Brazil, Getz recorded Jazz Samba in 1962 and it quickly became a hit. Getz won the Grammy for Best Jazz Performance of 1963 for Desafinado and it sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc. His second bossa nova album, also recorded in 1962, was Big Band Bossa Nova with composer and arranger Gary McFarland, as a follow-up, Getz recorded the album, Jazz Samba Encore. with one of the originators of bossa nova, Brazilian guitarist Luiz Bonfá
26.
Art Tatum
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Arthur Art Tatum, Jr. was an American jazz pianist. Tatum is widely acknowledged as the greatest jazz pianist of all time and he was hailed for the technical proficiency of his performances, which set a new standard for jazz piano virtuosity. Critic Scott Yanow wrote, Tatums quick reflexes and boundless imagination kept his improvisations filled with ideas that put him way ahead of his contemporaries. For a musician of such stature, there is little published information available about Tatums life, only one full-length biography has been published, Too Marvelous for Words, by James Lester. Lester interviewed many of Tatums contemporaries for the book and drew from many articles published about him, Tatum was born in Toledo, Ohio. His father, Arthur Tatum, Sr. was a guitarist and an elder at Grace Presbyterian Church and he had two siblings, Karl and Arlene. From infancy he suffered from cataracts which left him blind in one eye, a number of surgical procedures improved his eye condition to a degree but some of the benefits were reversed when he was assaulted in 1930. A child with perfect pitch, Tatum learned to play by ear, in a Voice of America interview, he denied the widespread rumor that he learned to play by copying piano roll recordings made by two pianists. He developed a very fast playing style, without losing accuracy, as a child he was also very sensitive to the pianos intonation and insisted it be tuned often. While playing piano was the most obvious application of his mental and physical skills, in 1925, Tatum moved to the Columbus School for the Blind, where he studied music and learned braille. He subsequently studied piano with Overton G. Rainey at either the Jefferson School or the Toledo School of Music, Rainey, who was also visually impaired, probably taught Tatum in the classical tradition, as Rainey did not improvise and discouraged his students from playing jazz. In 1927, Tatum began playing on Toledo radio station WSPD as Arthur Tatum, Toledos Blind Pianist, during interludes in Ellen Kays shopping chat program, by the age of 19, Tatum was playing at the local Waiters and Bellmens Club. In 1931, vocalist Adelaide Hall commenced a tour that lasted almost two years, during which she discovered Tatum in Toledo and employed him as one of her stage pianists. In 1932, Hall returned to New York with Tatum and introduced him to Harlem on stage at the Lafayette Theatre, in August 1932, she made four recordings using Tatum as one of her pianists including the songs Strange As It Seems and You Gave Me Everything But Love. Tatum drew inspiration from the pianists James P. Johnson and Fats Waller, who exemplified the stride piano style, Tatum identified Waller as his main influence, but according to pianist Teddy Wilson and saxophonist Eddie Barefield, Art Tatums favorite jazz piano player was Earl Hines. He used to buy all of Earls records and would improvise on them, hed play the record but hed improvise over what Earl was doing. Course, when you heard Art play you didnt hear nothing of anybody, but he got his ideas from Earls style of playing – but Earl never knew that. A major event in his rise to success was his appearance at a cutting contest in 1933 at Morgans bar in New York City that included Waller, Johnson
27.
Erroll Garner
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Erroll Louis Garner was an American jazz pianist and composer known for his swing playing and ballads. His best-known composition, the ballad Misty, has become a jazz standard, scott Yanow of Allmusic calls him one of the most distinctive of all pianists and a brilliant virtuoso. He received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6363 Hollywood Blvd, born with his twin brother Ernest in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to an African-American family on June 15,1923, or 1921, Erroll began playing piano at the age of three. His elder siblings were taught piano by Miss Bowman, from an early age Erroll would sit down and play anything she had demonstrated, just like Miss Bowman, his eldest sister Martha said. He attended George Westinghouse High School, as did fellow pianists Billy Strayhorn, Garner was self-taught and remained an ear player all his life – he never learned to read music. At the age of seven, he began appearing on the radio station KDKA in Pittsburgh with a called the Candy Kids. By the age of 11, he was playing on the Allegheny riverboats, at 14 in 1937, he joined local saxophonist Leroy Brown. He played locally in the shadow of his older pianist brother Linton Garner and he briefly worked with the bassist Slam Stewart, and though not a bebop musician per se, in 1947 played with Charlie Parker on the Cool Blues session. Although his admission to the Pittsburgh music union was initially refused because of his inability to read music, they relented in 1956. Garner is credited with having a memory of music. After attending a concert by the Russian classical pianist Emil Gilels, short in stature, Garner performed sitting on multiple telephone directories. He was also known for his vocalizations while playing, which can be heard on many of his recordings and he helped to bridge the gap for jazz musicians between nightclubs and the concert hall. Garner made many tours both at home and abroad, and produced a volume of recorded work. He was, reportedly, The Tonight Show host Johnny Carsons favorite jazz musician, Erroll Garner died from cardiac arrest related to emphysema on January 2,1977. He is buried in Pittsburghs Homewood Cemetery, in 2016, Downtown Music Publishing entered an exclusive worldwide administration agreement with Octave Music Publishing Corp. The deal covers all of Garner’s works including “Misty”, as well as Garner’s extensive archive of master recordings and he is referred to as a brilliant virtuoso who sounded unlike anyone else, using an orchestral approach straight from the swing era but. Open to the innovations of bop and his distinctive style could swing like no other, but some of his best recordings are ballads, such as his best-known composition, Misty. Misty rapidly became a jazz standard – and was featured in Clint Eastwoods film Play Misty for Me, Garners early recordings also display the influence of the stride piano style of James P. Johnson and Fats Waller
28.
Oscar Peterson
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Oscar Emmanuel Peterson, CC, CQ, OOnt was a Canadian jazz pianist and composer. He was called the Maharaja of the keyboard by Duke Ellington and he released over 200 recordings, won eight Grammy Awards, and received numerous other awards and honours. He is considered one of the greatest jazz pianists, and played thousands of concerts worldwide in a career lasting more than 60 years, Peterson was born to immigrants from the West Indies, his father worked as a porter for Canadian Pacific Railway. Peterson grew up in the neighbourhood of Little Burgundy in Montreal and it was in this predominantly black neighbourhood that he found himself surrounded by the jazz culture that flourished in the early 20th century. At the age of five, Peterson began honing his skills with the trumpet, however, a bout of tuberculosis when he was seven prevented him from playing the trumpet again, and so he directed all his attention to the piano. His father, Daniel Peterson, a trumpeter and pianist, was one of his first music teachers. Young Oscar was persistent at practicing scales and classical études daily, meanwhile, he was captivated by traditional jazz and learned several ragtime pieces and especially the boogie-woogie. At that time Peterson was called the Brown Bomber of the Boogie-Woogie, at the age of nine Peterson played piano with control that impressed professional musicians. For many years his piano studies included four to six hours of practice daily, only in his later years did he decrease his daily practice to just one or two hours. In 1940, at fourteen years of age, Peterson won the music competition organized by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. After that victory, he dropped out of school and became a professional pianist working for a radio show. In his own words, Tatum scared me to death, Tatum was a model for Petersons musicianship during the 1940s and 1950s. Tatum and Peterson eventually became friends, although Peterson was always shy about being compared with Tatum. Peterson also credited his sister—a piano teacher in Montreal who also taught several other Canadian jazz musicians—with being an important teacher, building on Tatums pianism and aesthetics, Peterson also absorbed Tatums musical influences, notably from piano concertos by Sergei Rachmaninoff. An important step in Petersons career was joining impresario Norman Granzs labels, Granz discovered Peterson in a peculiar manner. As the impresario was being taken to Montreal airport by cab, Granz was so smitten by what he heard that he ordered the driver to take him to the club so that he could meet the pianist. In 1949, Granz introduced Peterson at a Carnegie Hall Jazz at the Philharmonic show in New York City, so was born a lasting relationship and Granz remained Petersons manager for most of his career. This was more than a relationship, Peterson praised Granz for standing up for him
29.
Henri Betti
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Henri Betti, born Ange Betti, was a French composer and a pianist. Pianist and composer of Maurice Chevalier from 1940 to 1945, Henri Betti is best known for composing the music of the songs Cest si bon, What Can I Do. and The Windmill Song. Henri Betti was born at 1 rue Barillerie in the district of Vieux-Nice in a modest family, his father was a house painter and his mother was a fishmonger. His paternal family originates from the region of Emilia-Romagna in Italy, his grandfather was born in Parma and he immigrated to Nice with his wife and children in the late 1890s. In 1935, he entered at the Conservatoire de Paris which is directed by Henri Rabaud where he studied music in the same class as Paul Bonneau, Henri Dutilleux. He is the student of Lazare Lévy for piano class and Raymond Pech for harmony class and he won a prize of harmony in 1937. Maurice Chevalier refuse the song but to ask Henri Betti be his regular accompanist, during the singing tours, he will make him play the Ballade No.1 in G minor, Op.23 by Frédéric Chopin between songs. Anxious to renew his repertoire, he asked him to compose songs. Henri Betti then wrote music forty songs with the lyrics of Maurice Chevalier and Maurice Vandair until 1945 that Notre Espoir, of the fifteen securities singing tour of Maurice Chevalier in 1945, Henri Betti sign fourteen. In 1945, he conducted an orchestra to accompany Maurice Chevalier singing four songs in two 78tours and he joined the SACEM in 1941 as composer and was appointed Sociétaire définitif in 1949. From 1949 to 1983, his production is abundant, revues for Le Lido, the Moulin Rouge, the Folies Bergère, the Olympia, the Stardust and the Tropicana in Las Vegas. He has also composed for the cinema in the 1950s and television in the 1960s and his most famous soundtrack is that of Honoré de Marseille which will nearly 4 million admissions in France in 1957. In this movie, Fernandel sings three songs composed by Henri Betti and the words by Jean Manse, Henri Betti and Jean Manse had written a fourth song for the movie, Cest Noël, sung by Fernandel in a scene that was edited out. The song was sung by Tino Rossi and Georges Guétary. In 1953, he played the role of the composer and accompanist of the company of Jean Nohain in Soyez les bienvenus by Pierre-Louis which he composed the music for the film. And then as a full-featured except to Bobino and Gaumont-Palace and his talent manager was Johnny Stark. In 1951, he participated with Albert Willemetz to the foundation of the Comité du Cœur, relief fund for needy artists under the auspices of the SACEM, which will be Vice-President. In 1958, he collaborated with Jean-Pierre Landreau to compose all the revues of Lido for the company Lido-Mélodies whose two founding members are Jean Gruyer and Pierre Delvincourt
30.
Barbra Streisand
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Barbara Joan Barbra Streisand is an American singer, songwriter, actress, and filmmaker. She is among a group of entertainers who have been honored with an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony Award. Streisand is one of the music artists of all time, with more than 68.5 million albums in the United States. She starred in the critically acclaimed Funny Girl, for which she won the Academy Award, with the release of Yentl in 1983, Streisand became the first woman to write, produce, direct, and star in a major studio film. The film won an Oscar for Best Score and a Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture Musical, Streisand received the Golden Globe Award for Best Director, the first woman to win that award. The RIAA and Billboard recognize Streisand as holding the record for the most top 10 albums of any recording artist. According to Billboard, Streisand holds the record for the female with the most number one albums, Billboard also recognizes Streisand as the greatest female of all time on its Billboard 200 chart and one of the greatest artists of all time on its Hot 100 chart. Barbara Joan Streisand was born on April 24,1942, in Brooklyn, New York and her mother had been a soprano singer in her youth and considered a career in music, but later became a school secretary. Her father was a school teacher at the same school. Streisands family was Jewish, her grandparents emigrated from Galicia and her maternal grandparents from the Russian Empire. Her father earned a degree from City College of New York in 1928 and was considered athletic. As a student, he spent his summers outdoors, once working as a lifeguard, hed try anything, his sister Molly said. He married Ida in 1930, two years after graduating, and became a respected educator with a focus on helping underprivileged. In August 1943, a few months after Streisands first birthday, her father died suddenly at age 34 from complications from an epileptic seizure, the family fell into near-poverty, with her mother working as a low-paid bookkeeper. As an adult, Streisand remembered those early years as always feeling like an outcast, explaining and her mother tried to pay their bills but could not give her daughter the attention she craved, When I wanted love from my mother, she gave me food, Streisand says. Streisand recalls that her mother had a voice and sang semi-professionally on occasion. During a visit to the Catskills when Streisand was thirteen, she told Rosie ODonnell, she and that session was the first time Streisand ever asserted herself as an artist, which also became her first moment of inspiration as an artist. She has a brother, Sheldon, and a half-sister
31.
Color Me Barbra
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Color Me Barbra is the seventh studio album by singer Barbra Streisand released on Columbia Records in 1966. It reached number 3 in the US albums chart and was certified Gold by the RIAA and it was also the title of Streisands second CBS TV special on March 30,1966 and the first in color when it was still a novelty for TV, hence the title. Small World I Love You I Stayed Too Long at the Fair Look at That Face Cest si bon –3,40 Where Am I Going, whos Afraid Of The Big Bad Wolf. Small World Try To Remember Spring Again I Stayed Too Long At The Fiar Look At That Face Any Place I Hang My Hat Is Home It Had To Be You Cest Si Bon Where Am I Going, Starting Here Starting Now Where Am I Going. Album Video Color Me Barbra at Internet Movie Database
32.
St. Petersburg, Florida
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St. Petersburg is a city in Pinellas County, Florida, United States. As of the 2015 census estimate, the population was 257,083, making it the fifth-most populous city in Florida, St. Petersburg is the second-largest city in the Tampa Bay Area, after Tampa. Together with Clearwater, these comprise the Tampa–St. Petersburg–Clearwater Metropolitan Statistical Area, the second-largest in Florida with a population of around 2.8 million, St. Petersburg is located on a peninsula between Tampa Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, and is connected to mainland Florida to the north. St. Petersburg was founded in 1888 by John C, Williams, who purchased the land, and by Peter Demens, who brought the railroad industry into the area. St. Petersburg was incorporated as a town on February 29,1892, the city is often referred to by locals as St. Pete. Neighboring St. Pete Beach formally shortened its name in 1994 after a vote by its residents, St. Petersburg is governed by a mayor and city council. With an average of some 361 days of each year. Due to its weather and low cost of living, the city has long been a popular retirement destination. American Style magazine ranked St. Petersburg its top mid-size city in 2011, the city was co-founded by John C. Williams, formerly of Detroit, who purchased the land in 1875, the first major newspaper to debut in Tampa Bay was the St. Petersburg Times which established in 1884. St. Petersburg was incorporated as a town on February 29,1892, a local legend says that John C. Williams and Peter Demens flipped a coin to see who would have the honor of naming the city. The Detroit Hotel still exists downtown, but has turned into a condominium. The oldest running hotels are the historic Pier Hotel, built in 1921, formally Hotel Cordova and The Heritage Hotel, Philadelphia publisher F. A. Davis turned on St. Petersburgs first electrical service in 1897 and its first trolley service in 1904. Within a year, Hibbs Fish Company was shipping more than 1,000 pounds of fish each day, St. Petersburg was incorporated into a city in June 1903. With this transition, the development of the waterfront had dredging of a deeper shipping channel from 1906 to 1908 which opened St. Petersburg to larger shipping. Further dredging improved the facilities through the 1910s. By then the population had quadrupled to a population of 4,127 citizens
33.
Vancouver
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Vancouver is a coastal seaport city in Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the most populous city in the province, the 2016 census recorded 631,486 people in the city, the Greater Vancouver area had a population of 2,463,431 in 2016, making it the third largest metropolitan area in Canada. Vancouver has the highest population density in Canada with over 5,400 people per square kilometre. With over 250,000 residents, Vancouver municipality is the fourth most densely populated city in North America behind New York City, San Francisco, and Mexico City according to the 2011 census. In that census, Vancouver was one of the most ethnically and linguistically diverse cities in Canada, Vancouver is classed as a Beta global city. In 2014, following thirty years in California, the annual TED conference made Vancouver its indefinite home, several matches of the 2015 FIFA Womens World Cup were played in Vancouver, including the final at BC Place Stadium. From that first enterprise, other stores and some hotels quickly appeared along the waterfront to the west, Gastown became formally laid out as a registered townsite dubbed Granville, B. I. As of 2014, Port Metro Vancouver is the third largest port by tonnage in the Americas, 27th in the world, the busiest and largest in Canada, and the most diversified port in North America. While forestry remains its largest industry, Vancouver is well known as an urban centre surrounded by nature, archaeological records indicate the presence of Aboriginal people in the Vancouver area from 8,000 to 10,000 years ago. The city is located in the territories of the Squamish, Musqueam. They had villages in various parts of present-day Vancouver, such as Stanley Park, False Creek, Kitsilano, Point Grey, the city takes its name from George Vancouver, who explored the inner harbour of Burrard Inlet in 1792 and gave various places British names. The explorer and North West Company trader Simon Fraser and his became the first known Europeans to set foot on the site of the present-day city. In 1808, they travelled from the east down the Fraser River, perhaps as far as Point Grey. The Fraser Gold Rush of 1858 brought over 25,000 men, mainly from California, to nearby New Westminster on the Fraser River, on their way to the Fraser Canyon, a sawmill established at Moodyville in 1863, began the citys long relationship with logging. It was quickly followed by mills owned by Captain Edward Stamp on the shore of the inlet. This mill, known as the Hastings Mill, became the nucleus around which Vancouver formed, the mills central role in the city waned after the arrival of the Canadian Pacific Railway in the 1880s. It nevertheless remained important to the economy until it closed in the 1920s. The settlement which came to be called Gastown grew up quickly around the original makeshift tavern established by Gassy Jack Deighton in 1867 on the edge of the Hastings Mill property
34.
Montreal
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Montreal, officially Montréal, is the most populous municipality in the Canadian province of Quebec and the 2nd-most populous in Canada as a whole. Originally called Ville-Marie, or City of Mary, it is believed to be named after Mount Royal, the city has a distinct four-season continental climate, with warm-to-hot summers and cold, snowy winters. In 2016, Montreal had a population of 1,704,694, Montreals metropolitan area had a population of 4,098,927 and a population of 1,958,257 in the urban agglomeration, with all of the municipalities on the Island of Montreal included. Legally a French-speaking city,60. 5% of Montrealers speak French at home,21. 2% speak English and 19. 8% speak neither, Montreal is one of the most bilingual cities in Quebec and Canada, with 56% of the population able to speak both official languages. Montreal is the second-largest primarily French-speaking city in the world after Paris, historically the commercial capital of Canada, it was surpassed in population and economic strength by Toronto in the 1970s. It remains an important centre of commerce, aerospace, finance, pharmaceuticals, technology, design, education, culture, tourism, gaming, film, Montreal was also named a UNESCO City of Design. In 2009, Montreal was named North Americas leading host city for international events, according to the 2009 preliminary rankings of the International Congress. According to the 2015 Global Liveability Ranking by the Economist Intelligence Unit, in the 2017 edition of their Best Student Cities ranking, Quacquarelli Symonds ranked Montreal as the worlds best city to study abroad. Also, Montreal has 11 universities with 170,000 students enrolled, the Greater Montréal region has the highest number of university students per capita among all metropolitan areas in North America. It is the only Canadian city to have held the Summer Olympics, currently, the city hosts the Canadian Grand Prix of Formula One, the Montreal International Jazz Festival and the Just for Laughs festival. In 2012, Montreal was ranked as a Beta+ world city, in Kanien’kéha, or Mohawk language, the island is called Tiohtià, ke Tsi or Ka-wé-no-te. In Anishinaabemowin, or Ojibwe language, the land is called Mooniyaang, though the city was first named by French colonizers Ville Marie, or City of Mary, its current name comes from Mount Royal, the triple-peaked hill in the heart of the city. The most popular theory is that the name derives from Mont Réal, Cartiers 1535 diary entry, naming the mountain, according to the Commission de toponymie du Québec and the Geographical Names Board of Canada, Canadian place names have only one official form. Thus, Montreal is officially spelled with an accent over the e in both English and French. In practice, this is limited to governmental uses. English-speaking Montrealers, including English-language media, regularly omit the accent when writing in English, archaeological evidence demonstrates that First Nations native people occupied the island of Montreal as early as 4,000 years ago. By the year AD1000, they had started to cultivate maize, within a few hundred years, they had built fortified villages. Archeologists have found evidence of their habitation there and at locations in the valley since at least the 14th century
35.
Atlanta
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Atlanta is the capital of and the most populous city in the U. S. state of Georgia, with an estimated 2015 population of 463,878. Atlanta is the cultural and economic center of the Atlanta metropolitan area, home to 5,710,795 people, Atlanta is the county seat of Fulton County, and a small portion of the city extends eastward into DeKalb County. In 1837, Atlanta was founded at the intersection of two lines, and the city rose from the ashes of the American Civil War to become a national center of commerce. Atlantas economy is considered diverse, with dominant sectors that include logistics, professional and business services, media operations, Atlanta has topographic features that include rolling hills and dense tree coverage. Revitalization of Atlantas neighborhoods, initially spurred by the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, has intensified in the 21st century, altering the demographics, politics. Prior to the arrival of European settlers in north Georgia, Creek Indians inhabited the area, standing Peachtree, a Creek village located where Peachtree Creek flows into the Chattahoochee River, was the closest Indian settlement to what is now Atlanta. As part of the removal of Native Americans from northern Georgia from 1802 to 1825, the Creek ceded the area in 1821. In 1836, the Georgia General Assembly voted to build the Western, the initial route was to run southward from Chattanooga to a terminus east of the Chattahoochee River, which would then be linked to Savannah. After engineers surveyed various possible locations for the terminus, the zero milepost was driven into the ground in what is now Five Points. A year later, the area around the milepost had developed into a settlement, first known as Terminus, and later as Thrasherville after a merchant who built homes. By 1842, the town had six buildings and 30 residents and was renamed Marthasville to honor the Governors daughter, later, J. Edgar Thomson, Chief Engineer of the Georgia Railroad, suggested the town be renamed Atlantica-Pacifica, which was shortened to Atlanta. The residents approved, and the town was incorporated as Atlanta on December 29,1847, by 1860, Atlantas population had grown to 9,554. During the American Civil War, the nexus of multiple railroads in Atlanta made the city a hub for the distribution of military supplies, in 1864, the Union Army moved southward following the capture of Chattanooga and began its invasion of north Georgia. On the next day, Mayor James Calhoun surrendered Atlanta to the Union Army, on November 11,1864, Sherman prepared for the Union Armys March to the Sea by ordering Atlanta to be burned to the ground, sparing only the citys churches and hospitals. After the Civil War ended in 1865, Atlanta was gradually rebuilt, due to the citys superior rail transportation network, the state capital was moved from Milledgeville to Atlanta in 1868. In the 1880 Census, Atlanta surpassed Savannah as Georgias largest city, by 1885, the founding of the Georgia School of Technology and the citys black colleges had established Atlanta as a center for higher education. In 1895, Atlanta hosted the Cotton States and International Exposition, during the first decades of the 20th century, Atlanta experienced a period of unprecedented growth. In three decades time, Atlantas population tripled as the city expanded to include nearby streetcar suburbs
36.
Pittsburgh
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Pittsburgh is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania in the United States, and is the county seat of Allegheny County. The city proper has a population of 304,391. The metropolitan population of 2,353,045 is the largest in both the Ohio Valley and Appalachia, the second-largest in Pennsylvania, and the 26th-largest in the U. S. The city features 30 skyscrapers, two inclines, a fortification and the Point State Park at the confluence of the rivers. Aside from steel, Pittsburgh has led in manufacturing of aluminum, glass, shipbuilding, petroleum, foods, sports, transportation, computing, autos, and electronics. For part of the 20th century, Pittsburgh was behind only New York and Chicago in corporate headquarters employment, Americas 1980s deindustrialization laid off area blue-collar workers and thousands of downtown white-collar workers when the longtime Pittsburgh-based world headquarters moved out. The area has served also as the federal agency headquarters for cyber defense, software engineering, robotics, energy research. The area is home to 68 colleges and universities, including research and development leaders Carnegie Mellon University, the region is a hub for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, sustainable energy, and energy extraction. Pittsburgh was named in 1758 by General John Forbes, in honor of British statesman William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham. The current pronunciation, which is unusual in English speaking countries, is almost certainly a result of a printing error in some copies of the City Charter of March 18,1816. The error was repeated commonly enough throughout the rest of the 19th century that the pronunciation was lost. After a public campaign the original spelling was restored by the United States Board on Geographic Names in 1911. The area of the Ohio headwaters was long inhabited by the Shawnee, the first known European to enter the region was the French explorer/trader Robert de La Salle from Quebec during his 1669 expedition down the Ohio River. European pioneers, primarily Dutch, followed in the early 18th century, Michael Bezallion was the first to describe the forks of the Ohio in a 1717 manuscript, and later that year European fur traders established area posts and settlements. In 1749, French soldiers from Quebec launched an expedition to the forks to unite Canada with French Louisiana via the rivers, during 1753–54, the British hastily built Fort Prince George before a larger French force drove them off. The French built Fort Duquesne based on LaSalles 1669 claims, the French and Indian War, the North American front of the Seven Years War, began with the future Pittsburgh as its center. British General Edward Braddock was dispatched with Major George Washington as his aide to take Fort Duquesne, the British and colonial force were defeated at Braddocks Field. General John Forbes finally took the forks in 1758, Forbes began construction on Fort Pitt, named after William Pitt the Elder while the settlement was named Pittsborough
37.
Denver
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Denver, officially the City and County of Denver, is the capital and most populous municipality of the U. S. state of Colorado. Denver is in the South Platte River Valley on the edge of the High Plains just east of the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains. The Denver downtown district is immediately east of the confluence of Cherry Creek with the South Platte River, Denver is nicknamed the Mile-High City because its official elevation is exactly one mile above sea level, making it the highest major city in the United States. The 105th meridian west of Greenwich, the reference for the Mountain Time Zone. Denver is ranked as a Beta- world city by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network. With a 2015 estimated population of 682,545, Denver ranks as the 19th-most populous U. S. city, and with a 2. 8% increase in 2015, the city is also the fastest-growing major city in the United States. The 10-county Denver-Aurora-Lakewood, CO Metropolitan Statistical Area had an estimated 2015 population of 2,814,330 and ranked as the 19th most populous U. S. metropolitan statistical area. The 12-city Denver-Aurora, CO Combined Statistical Area had an estimated 2015 population of 3,418,876, which ranks as the 16th most populous U. S. metropolitan area. Denver is the most populous city of the 18-county Front Range Urban Corridor, Denver is the most populous city within a 500-mile radius and the second-most populous city in the Mountain West after Phoenix, Arizona. In 2016, Denver was named the best place to live in the USA by U. S. News & World Report and this was the first historical settlement in what was later to become the city of Denver. The site faded quickly, however, and by the summer of 1859 it was abandoned in favor of Auraria, Larimer named the townsite Denver City to curry favor with Kansas Territorial Governor James W. Denver. Larimer hoped the name would help make it the county seat of Arapaho County but, unbeknownst to him. The location was accessible to existing trails and was across the South Platte River from the site of seasonal encampments of the Cheyenne, the site of these first towns is now the site of Confluence Park near downtown Denver. Larimer, along with associates in the St. Charles City Land Company, sold parcels in the town to merchants and miners, Denver City was a frontier town, with an economy based on servicing local miners with gambling, saloons, livestock and goods trading. In the early years, land parcels were often traded for grubstakes or gambled away by miners in Auraria, in May 1859, Denver City residents donated 53 lots to the Leavenworth & Pikes Peak Express in order to secure the regions first overland wagon route. Offering daily service for passengers, mail, freight, and gold, in 1863, Western Union furthered Denvers dominance of the region by choosing the city for its regional terminus. The Colorado Territory was created on February 28,1861, Arapahoe County was formed on November 1,1861, Denver City served as the Arapahoe County Seat from 1861 until consolidation in 1902. In 1867, Denver City became the territorial capital, with its newfound importance, Denver City shortened its name to Denver
38.
Ray Charles
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Ray Charles Robinson, known professionally as Ray Charles, was an American singer-songwriter, musician, and composer. Among friends and fellow musicians he preferred being called Brother Ray and he was often referred to as The Genius. Charles was blind from the age of seven and he pioneered the genre of soul music during the 1950s by combining blues, rhythm and blues, and gospel styles into the music he recorded for Atlantic Records. He also contributed to the integration of music, rhythm and blues and pop music during the 1960s with his crossover success on ABC Records. While he was with ABC, Charles became one of the first black musicians to be granted artistic control by a record company. Charles cited Nat King Cole as an influence, but his music was also influenced by country, jazz, blues. In the late forties, he became friends with Quincy Jones and their friendship would last till the end of Charless life. Frank Sinatra called him the true genius in show business. In 2002, Rolling Stone ranked Charles number ten on its list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time, Billy Joel observed, This may sound like sacrilege, but I think Ray Charles was more important than Elvis Presley. Robinson was the son of Bailey Robinson, a laborer, at the time, she was a teenage orphan making a living as a sharecropper. They lived in Greenville, Florida, with Robinsons mother and his wife, the Robinson family had informally adopted Aretha, and she became known as Aretha Robinson. When she, scandalously, became pregnant by Bailey, she briefly left Greenville late in the summer of 1930 to be family members in Albany, Georgia. After that, mother and child returned to Greenville, and Aretha and he was deeply devoted to his mother and later recalled her perseverance, self-sufficiency, and pride as guiding lights in his life. His father abandoned the family, left Greenville, and took another wife elsewhere, in his early years, Charles showed a fondness about mechanical objects and would often watch his neighbors working on their cars and farm machinery. Charles and his mother were always welcome at the Red Wing Cafe, pitman would also care for Rays brother George, to take the burden off Aretha. George drowned in Arethas laundry tub when he was four years old, Charles started to lose his sight at the age of four or five, and was completely blind by the age of seven, apparently as a result of glaucoma. Destitute, uneducated and still mourning the loss of George, Aretha used her connections in the community to find a school that would accept a blind African-American student. Despite his initial protest, Charles attended school at the Florida School for the Deaf, Charles further developed his musical talent at school, and was taught to play the classical piano music of J. S
39.
Claude Nougaro
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Claude Nougaro was a French songwriter and singer. Claude Nougaro was born in Toulouse to a respected French opera singer, Pierre Nougaro, and his maternal grandparents were Italian, his grandfather was born in Livorno, Tuscany and his grandmother in San Damiano dAsti, Piedmont. He was raised by his grandparents in Toulouse where he heard Glenn Miller, Édith Piaf, in 1947 he failed his baccalaureat and began a career in journalism, writing for various journals including Le Journal des Curistes at Vichy and LEcho dAlger. At the same time he wrote songs for Marcel Amont and Philippe Clay and he met Georges Brassens, who became his friend and mentor. In 1949, he performed his military service in the Foreign Legion at Rabat and he sent his lyrics to Marguerite Monnot, Édith Piafs songwriter, who put them to music. He started to sing for a livelihood in 1959 in a Parisian cabaret in Montmartre, in 1962, he decided to sing his works himself, Une petite fille and Cécile ma fille. These songs made him known to a larger public, which he had already started to penetrate by participating in the concerts of Dalida. A car accident immobilised him for months in 1963. The following year he travelled to Brazil, and sang in prestigious halls, the Olympia and the Théâtre de la Ville in Paris, following the death of his friend Jacques Audiberti in 1965 Nougaro wrote, in homage, the song Chanson pour le maçon. The events of May 1968 inspired him to the torrential Paris Mai, a plea for life, the same year he recorded his first live album at the Olympia, Une soirée avec Claude Nougaro. His career continued normally, punctuated by success, Le jazz et la java, Tu verras, Île de Ré, Armstrong, Toulouse, but in 1984, his recording company did not renew his contract. Nougaro left for New York, seeking inspiration, and while there wrote and recorded a disc, Nougayork. In 1988 Victoires de la musique rewarded him with best album and best artist and his health deteriorated after 1995, when he underwent a heart operation. In 2003, his condition left him unable to appear at the Festival du Verbe at Toulouse, from 1998 to 2004 he devoted himself more to concerts and festivals, apart from an album in aid of children suffering from AIDS. Having undergone further surgery in early 2004, he died of cancer in March, at the age of 74
40.
Perry Como
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Pierino Ronald Perry Como was an American singer and television personality. During a career spanning more than half a century, he recorded exclusively for RCA Victor for 44 years after signing with the label in 1943, Mr. C. as he was nicknamed, sold millions of records for RCA and pioneered a musical variety television show. Como was seen weekly on television from 1949 to 1963, then continued hosting the Kraft Music Hall variety program monthly until 1967 and his television shows and seasonal specials were broadcast throughout the world. Also a popular recording artist, Perry Como released numerous hit records from the 1940s through the 1970s, Comos appeal spanned generations and he was universally respected for both his professional standards and the conduct in his personal life. Como was born in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania and he was the seventh of ten children and the first American-born child of Pietro Como and Lucia Travaglini, who both emigrated to the US in 1910 from the Abruzzese town of Palena, Italy. He did not begin speaking English until he entered school, since the Comos spoke Italian at home. The family had a second-hand organ his father had bought for $3, as soon as Como was able to toddle, he would head to the instrument, pump the bellows, and play music he had heard by ear. Pietro, a hand and an amateur baritone, had all his children attend music lessons even if he could barely afford them. He showed more talent in his teenage years as a trombone player in the towns brass band, playing guitar, singing at weddings. Como was a member of the Canonsburg Italian Band along with the father of singer Bobby Vinton, bandleader Stan Vinton, young Como started helping his family at age 10, working before and after school in Steve Fragapanes barber shop for 50¢ a week. By age 13, he had graduated to having his own chair in the Fragapane barber shop and it was also around this time that young Como lost his weeks wages in a dice game. Filled with shame, he locked himself in his room and did not come out until hunger got the better of him and he managed to tell his father what had happened to the money his family depended on. His father told him he was entitled to make a mistake, when Perry was 14, his father became unable to work because of a severe heart condition. Como and his brothers became the support of the household, despite his musical ability, Comos primary ambition was to become the best barber in Canonsburg. Practicing on his father, young Como mastered the skills well enough to have his own shop at age 14. One of Comos regular customers at the shop owned a Greek coffee house that included a barber shop area. Como had so much work after moving to the coffee house and his customers worked mainly at the nearby steel mills. They were well-paid, did not mind spending money on themselves, Perry did especially well when one of his customers would marry
41.
Neil Diamond
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Neil Leslie Diamond is an American singer-songwriter, musician and actor. One of the worlds best-selling artists of all time, he has sold over 120 million records worldwide since the start of his career in the 1960s. With 38 songs in the Top 10, he is the second most successful artist in the history of the Billboard Adult Contemporary Top 10 charts and his songs have been covered internationally by many performers from a variety of musical genres. Diamond was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1984 and into the Rock, additionally, he received the Sammy Cahn Lifetime Achievement Award in 2000 and in 2011 was an honoree at Kennedy Center. On the Hot 100 and Adult Contemporary charts, he has had eleven No, Sweet Caroline is played frequently at sporting events, and has become an anthem for the Boston Red Sox. Diamond was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a Jewish family descended from Russian and his parents were Rose and Akeeba Kieve Diamond, a dry-goods merchant. He grew up in homes in Brooklyn, having also spent four years in Cheyenne, Wyoming. In Brooklyn he attended Erasmus Hall High School and was a member of the Freshman Chorus and they were not close friends at the time, Diamond recalls, We were two poor kids in Brooklyn. We hung out in the front of Erasmus High and smoked cigarettes, after his family moved he then attended Abraham Lincoln High School, and was a member of the fencing team. For his 16th birthday, he received his first guitar, and the next thing, I got a guitar when we got back to Brooklyn, started to take lessons and almost immediately began to write songs, he said. He adds that his attraction to songwriting was the first real interest he had growing up, Diamond also used his newly-developing skill at writing lyrics to write poetry. By writing poems for girls he was attracted to in school and his male classmates took note and began asking him to write poems for them which they would sing and use with equal success. He spent the following his graduation as a waiter in the Catskills resort area. There he first met Jaye Posner, who would, years later, Diamond next attended New York University as a pre-med major on a fencing scholarship. His skill at fencing made him a member of the 1960 NCAA mens championship team, however, he was often bored in classes, and found writing song lyrics more to his liking. He began cutting classes and taking the train up to Tin Pan Alley where he tried to get some of his songs heard by music publishers. By his senior year, and just 10 units short of graduation, Sunbeam Music Publishing offered him a 16-week job writing songs for $50 a week, and he dropped out of college to accept it. After his 16 weeks at Sunbeam Music were up, he was not rehired, I never really chose songwriting, he says
42.
Ella Fitzgerald
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Ella Jane Fitzgerald was an American jazz singer often referred to as the First Lady of Song, Queen of Jazz and Lady Ella. She was noted for her purity of tone, impeccable diction, phrasing and intonation, Fitzgeralds rendition of the nursery rhyme A-Tisket, A-Tasket helped boost both her and Webb to national fame. Taking over the band after Webb died, Fitzgerald left it behind in 1942 to start a career that would last effectively the rest of her life. With Verve she recorded some of her more noted works. These partnerships produced recognizable songs like Dream a Little Dream of Me, Cheek to Cheek, Into Each Life Some Rain Must Fall, in 1993, Fitzgerald capped off her sixty-year career with her last public performance. Three years later, she died at the age of 79, Fitzgerald was born on April 25,1917, in Newport News, Virginia, the daughter of William Fitzgerald and Temperance Tempie Fitzgerald. Her parents were unmarried but lived together for at least two and a years after she was born. Initially living in a room, her mother and Da Silva soon found jobs. Her half-sister, Frances Da Silva, was born in 1923, by 1925, Fitzgerald and her family had moved to nearby School Street, then a predominantly poor Italian area. She began her education at the age of six and proved to be an outstanding student. Fitzgerald had been passionate about dancing from third grade, being a fan of Earl Snakehips Tucker in particular, Fitzgerald and her family were Methodists and were active in the Bethany African Methodist Episcopal Church, and she regularly attended worship services, Bible study, and Sunday school. The church provided Fitzgerald with her earliest experiences in music making. During this period Fitzgerald listened to recordings by Louis Armstrong, Bing Crosby. Fitzgerald idolized the Boswell Sisters lead singer Connee Boswell, later saying, My mother brought home one of her records, in 1932, her mother died from serious injuries she received in a car accident when Fitzgerald was 15 years of age. This left her at first in the care of her stepfather but before the end of April 1933, following these traumas, Fitzgerald began skipping school and letting her grades suffer. During this period she worked at times as a lookout at a bordello, Ella Fitzgerald never talked publicly about this time in her life. When the authorities caught up with her, she was first placed in the Colored Orphan Asylum in Riverdale, in the Bronx. However, when the orphanage proved too crowded, she was moved to the New York Training School for Girls in Hudson, New York, eventually she escaped and for a time she was homeless
