The Lady and Her Music

Background:

“My identity is very clear to me now. I am a black woman. I'm not alone. I'm free. I say I'm free because I no longer have to be a credit. I don't have to be a symbol to anybody. I don't have to be a first to anybody. I don't have to be an imitation of a white woman that Hollywood sort of hoped I'd become. I'm me and I'm like nobody else.” Len Horne

American singer, actress and dancer Lena Horne (born in 1917, died in 2010) began her career as a dancer. She became a nightclub performer before appearing in small roes in a number of films and more significant parts in MGM's “Cabin in the Sky” (1943) and 20th Century Fox's “Stormy Weather” (1943). In the early 1950s, she was blacklisted by the television and film industry for her political beliefs and focused on her nightclub career. She also recorded and enjoyed success with RCA -Victor. Her albums “Lena at the Sands” (1961) and “Porgy and Bess” (1959) received Grammy nominations for Female Solo Vocal Performance and Best Female Vocal Performance, respectively. In March 1980, Horne announced her retirement but made a triumphant comeback the next year with the highly successful one woman show “Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music,” which ran for over 300 performances on Broadway. She picked up a Drama Desk Award, a Tony Special Award and a New York Drama Critics' Circle Special Award for her performance on the show, while the recording album brought her two Grammy Awards. She went on to receive Grammy nominations for her jazz album “The Men in My Life” and the jazz single “I Won't Leave You Again” (both 1988) and a Grammy Award for the 1995 jazz album “An Evening with Lena Horne.” Horne vanished from the public eye in 2000 and died in 2010.

Horne was inducted into the Big Band and Jazz Hall of Fame in 1991. She had two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and in 1984 received the Kennedy Center Honors from the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts for extraordinary talent, creativity, and perseverance. In 1987, she earned the ASCAP Pied Piper Award from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, an award given to entertainers who have made significant contributions to words and music. She also received the Sammy Cahn Lifetime Achievement Award and the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Jazz Artist. In 2006, she was inducted into the International Civil Rights Walk of Fame.

Dropout

Childhood and Family:

Lena Mary Calhoun Horne was born on June 30, 1917, in Brooklyn, New York, to a singer and dancer mother, Edna Scotchron, and Edwin “Teddy” Horne. Her parents divorced in 1920 and her father left when Lena was three years old. While her mother was pursuing a career as an actress, Lena was raised by her grandparents, Cora Calhoun and Edwin Horne. It was her grandmother Cora, an active member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), Urban League, and Suffragette organizations, who introduced young Lena to the fight for civil and women’s rights.

Lena was sent to live with her mother in Georgia when she was 5 and began accompanying her on tour the next year. After several years traveling with her mom, Lena lived with her uncle Frank S. Horne, who was the dean of students at the Fort Valley Junior Industrial Institute in Fort Valley, Georgia. She was then reunited with her mother and after briefly living in Atlanta, the two moved back to New York City when Lorna was 12 years old. She then attended Girls High School in Brooklyn, but quit school at age 16 to help support her sickly mother.

On January 13, 1937, Lena married Louis Jordan Jones and lived in Pittsburgh. She gave birth to her daughter, Gail, in 1937 and her son, Edwin, on February 7, 1940. Edwin died of kidney failure in 1970 at age 30. Lena and her husband separated in 1940 and divorced on June 15, 1944. She then married Lennie Hayton, one of the early musical conductors and arrangers at MGM, on December 14, 1947, in Paris. The couple became estranged in the early 1960s, but never divorced. Hayton died on April 24, 1971.

On May 9, 2010, at age 93, Lena passed away in New York City because of heart failure.

Cabin in the Sky

Career:

After dropping out of school, 16 year old Lena Horne landed work as a dancer at Harlem's legendary Cotton Club. At the Cotton Club, she met and was introduced to jazz performers like Billie Holiday, Duke Ellington, Cab Calloway, and Harold Arlen. In 1934, Horne made her stage debut when she was cast in “Dance with Your Gods,” a short lived drama written by Kenneth Perkins and directed by Robert B. Sinclair. Two years later, she joined Noble Sissle's Orchestra, with which she toured and recorded a single released by Decca Records. Lena Horne was credited as Helena Horne for this recording.

In 1938, Horne appeared on the big screen in “The Duke Is Tops,” a musical film helmed by William Nolte. The next year, she made her Broadway debut in Lew Leslie's musical “Blackbirds” (1939).

Horne's career gained a boost when she had the opportunity to tour with Charlie Barnet’s band in 1940 and 1941. At the time, she created history by becoming the first African American to tour with an all white band. Unhappy with the travel, she left the band and worked at the Café Society in New York. Around the same time, Horne received national exposure with her performances in the NBC hit jazz series “The Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street,” where she replaced Dinah Shore as a featured vocalist. In June 1941, she recorded with Henry Levine and Paul Laval for RCA Victor. Horne, however, left the show after six months to headline a nightclub on the west coast.

Horne moved to Los Angeles in 1942 and worked primarily as a club performer during this period. In 1943, after a performance in Hollywood, she caught the attention of talent scouts and eventually signed with MGM. She became the first African American artist to receive a contract with a major film studio. Her debut film with the studio was the big screen version of Cole Porter's play “Panama Hattie” (1942), in which she had an unaccredited role. Although brief, her performance in the film impressed the studio and she then received a bigger part in “Thousands Cheer” (1943), where she performed “Honeysuckle Rose.” The same year, she was also cast in “Cabin in the Sky” and featured in MGM's musical comedy “I Do it.” Also in 1943, Horne starred as singer Selina Rogers in the 20th Century Fox musical film “Stormy Weather.” She also performed the title song.

Horne went on to appear in MGM's films “Broadway Rhythm” (1944), “Two Girls and a Sailor” (1944), “Till the Clouds Roll By” (1946), “Ziegfeld Follies” (1946) and “Words and Music” (1948). By the mid 1940s, Horne had emerged as the highest paid African American performer in America. Her renditions of “Deed I Do,” “As Long as I Live” and Cole Porter’s “Just One of Those Things” became classics.

However, in the early 1950s, Horne was blacklisted by Hollywood because of her progressive political views and only appeared in “Duchess of Idaho” (1950), where she sang “Baby Come Out of the Clouds,” and “Meet Me in Las Vegas” (1956). Horne responded to the blacklist by concentrating on her nightclub career and became a headliner at clubs and hotels throughout the U.S, Canada and Europe. In 1955, she released “It's Love,” her debut album for RCA Victor Records and her first complete studio album. It was followed by a hit live album titled “Lena Horne at the Waldorf Astoria” in 1957. The same year, she also released the studio album “Stormy Weather” and the live album “Lena Horne at the Cocoanut Grove.” It was also in 1957 that Horne returned to Broadway when she was cast as Savannah in the musical “Jamaica.” Her performance was critically applauded and she was nominated for a Tony Award in the category of Best Actress in a Musical. Horne went on to release the albums “Lena Horne at the Cocoanut Grove” in 1958 and “Porgy & Bess,” with Harry Belafonte, in 1959. The latter album brought her a 1962 Grammy nomination for Best Female Vocal Performance.

Horne recorded more albums in the 1960s. After “Songs by Burke and Van Heusen” (1960), she received a Grammy nomination for Female Solo Vocal Performance for her live album “Lena Horne at the Sands” (1960). She produced two more albums for RCA records, “Lena on the Blue Side” and “Lena...Lovely and Alive” (both 1962), before moving to the lesser known Charter Records. Her partnership with Charter resulted in only two albums, “Lena Horne Sings Your Requests” (1963) and “Lena Like Latin” (later re-titled “Lena Goes Latin,” 1963). She then recorded the albums “Here's Lena Now” (1964; 20th Century), “Feelin' Good” (1965), “Lena in Hollywood” (1966), “Merry from Lena” (1966) and “Soul (1966, all for United Artists).

Horne returned to films with a dramatic role in “Death of a Gunfighter” (1969), in which she costarred with Richard Widmark and Carroll O'Connor. The same year, she also starred in the television special “Monsanto Night Presents Lena Horne” and recorded the album “Lena and Gabor.” accompanied by guitarist Gábor Szabó. She returned to the charts with the single “Watch What Happens.”

In 1970, Horne recorded the studio album “Harry & Lena,” with Harry Belafonte, on RCA Records. They went on to costar in the hour long special “Harry & Lena: For The Love Life,” which first aired on ABC on March 22, 1970. In 1973, she costarred with Tony Bennett in “Tony and Lena.” They went on to tour England and the U.S. In 1975, she released the album “Lena & Michael,” arranged by Michel Legrand, on RCA Records. It was followed by 1976's “Lena: A New Album.” In 1976, Horne appeared in “America Salutes Richard Rodger,” where she sang a medley of Rodgers songs with Peggy Lee and Vic Damone. In 1978, Horne was cast as Glinda the Good Witch in the musical film “The Wiz,” based on the 1975 Broadway play of the same name.

In 1981, Horne starred on Broadway in the one woman concert show “Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music,” which was produced by Michael Frazier and Fred Walker. The show opened on May 12, 1981, and closed on Horne's 65th birthday on June 30, 1982. She then toured the show in the U.S. and Canada and performed in London and Stockholm in the summer of 1984. Horne won a Drama Desk for Outstanding Actress in a Musical for her performance in the show. She also won a 1981 Tony's Special Citation and a special award from the New York Drama Critics' Circle. The musical soundtrack, produced by Quincy Jones, won Grammys for Best Cast Show Album and Best Pop Vocal Performance, Female.

In 1988, Horne released the album “The Men in My Life,” featuring Horne in duets with Joe Williams and Sammy Davis, Jr., on Three Cherries Records. She was nominated for a 1998 Grammy for Best Jazz Vocal Performance - Female for her performance on the album. The song “I Won't Leave You Again,” with Williams, was nominated for a Grammy for Best Jazz Vocal Performance - Duo or Group. In 1989, she was awarded a Grammy Award for Lifetime Achievement.

On May 17, 1994, Horne released the studio album “We'll Be Together Again” on Blue Note Records. The year also found her co-hosting the documentary compilation “That's Entertainment III” and appearing in the feature documentary “Entertaining the Troops.” The same year, she made her final concert performances at New York's Supper Club and Carnegie Hall. A live album of these concerts were released the following year under the title “An Evening with Lena Horne” (1995; Blue Note), which won a 1995 Grammy for Best Jazz Vocal Album. In 1998, Horne released her final studio album, “Being Myself,” on Blue Note. After that, she retired from performing and retreated from public view.

In 2000, Horne briefly returned to the recording studio to contribute vocal tracks on Simon Rattle's “Classic Ellington” album. In 2004, she appeared in “The Masters Behind the Musicals.” On January 24, 2006, Blue Note released a collection of rare and unreleased recordings by Lena Horne called “Seasons of a Life.”

Awards:

• NAACP Image: Outstanding Jazz Artist, 1999

• Grammy: Best Jazz Vocal Performance, “An Evening with Lena Horne,” 1995

• Grammy: Lifetime Achievement Award, 1989

• Grammy: Best Pop Vocal Performance, Female, “Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music,” 1981

• Grammy: Best Cast Show Album, “Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music,” 1981

• Tony: Special Citation, “Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music,” 1981

• Drama Desk: Outstanding Actress - Musical, “Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music,” 1980

• New York Drama Critics Circle: Special Citation, “Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music,” 1980