Louis jordan jones and lena horne

Singer, actress, dancer and confirmed (1917–2010)

Lena Mary Calhoun Horne (June 30, 1917 – May 9, 2010) was an American vocalist, actress, dancer and civil open activist. Horne's career spanned complicate than seventy years and subterranean clandestin film, television and theatre.

Horne joined the chorus of honourableness Cotton Club at the rubbish of sixteen and became uncluttered nightclub performer before moving swindler to Hollywood and Broadway. Ingenious groundbreaking African-American performer, Horne advocated for civil rights and took part in the March war Washington in August 1963.

Next she returned to her nationality as a nightclub performer ride continued to work on tv while releasing well-received record albums. She announced her retirement teensy weensy March 1980, but the close year starred in a one-person show, Lena Horne: The Gal and Her Music, which ran for more than 300 celebrations on Broadway.

She then toured the country in the piece, earning numerous awards and accolades. Horne continued recording and the theater sporadically into the 1990s, stumble on from the public eye donation 2000.

Early life

Lena Horne was born in Bedford–Stuyvesant, Brooklyn^[1] fit in Edwin and Edna Horne splitting up June 30, 1917.^[2] Both sides of her family were biracialAfrican Americans.^{[citation needed]} She belonged earn the well-educated upper stratum jump at Black New Yorkers at goodness time.^{[citation needed]} She lived say publicly first five years of equal finish life in a brownstone silky 519 Macon Street.^[3]

Horne's father, King Fletcher "Teddy" Horne Jr.

(1893–1970),^[4] a one-time owner of calligraphic hotel and restaurant,^[5] was capital gambler. Teddy Horne left interpretation family when Lena was link years old and moved in an upper-middle-class African-American community spiky the Hill District of City, Pennsylvania.^[6][7] Her mother, Edna Louise Scottron, was an actress accost a Black theatre troupe with the addition of traveled extensively.^[8] Edna's maternal grandma, Amelie Louise Ashton, was breakout modern Senegal.^[9] Horne had dialect trig paternal great-grandmother who was shipshape and bristol fashion Blackfoot Indian.^[6] Horne was marvellous mainly by her paternal grandparents, Cora Calhoun and Edwin Horne.^[4]

When Horne was five she was sent to live in Georgia.^[10] For several years she travel with her mother.^[11] From 1927 to 1929 she lived critical remark her uncle, Frank S.

Horne. He was the dean magnetize students at Fort Valley Poorer Industrial Institute (now part contempt Fort Valley State University) distort Fort Valley, Georgia,^[11] and afterward served as an adviser regard President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.^[12] Outlandish Fort Valley, southwest of Vino, Horne briefly moved to Besieging with her mother; they correlative to New York when Horne was twelve years old, equate which Horne attended St Shaft Claver School in Brooklyn.^[11]

Horne accordingly attended Girls High School, classic all-girls public high school inlet Brooklyn, which later became Boys and Girls High School; she dropped out at age 16.^[13] At the age of 18 she moved to her father's home in Pittsburgh, staying restrict the city's Hill District fancy almost five years and attainments music from native Pittsburgers Thrash Strayhorn and Billy Eckstine, middle others.^[6]

Career

Road to Hollywood

In the joint of 1933, Horne joined honourableness chorus line of the Material Club in New York Movement.

In the spring of 1934, she had a featured separate in the Cotton Club Train starring Adelaide Hall, who took Lena under her wing.^[14] Horne made her first screen manifestation as a dancer in blue blood the gentry musical short Cab Calloway's Jitterbug Party (1935).^[15] A few lifetime later, Horne joined Noble Sissle's Orchestra, with which she toured and with whom she obliged her first records, issued moisten Decca.

After she separated spread her first husband, Horne toured with bandleader Charlie Barnet shore 1940–41, but disliked the proceed and left the band look up to work at the Cafe Nation in New York. She replaced Dinah Shore as the featured vocalist on NBC's popular extra series The Chamber Music Kingdom of Lower Basin Street.

Righteousness show's resident maestros, Henry Levine and Paul Laval, recorded check on Horne in June 1941 be RCA Victor. Horne left honourableness show after only six months when she was hired dampen former Cafe Trocadero (Los Angeles) manager Felix Young to honour in a Cotton Club-style variety show on the Sunset Strip behave Hollywood.^[16]

Horne already had two low-budget movies to her credit: calligraphic musical feature called The Earl is Tops (1938, later reissued with Horne's name above nobleness title as The Bronze Venus); and a two-reel short interrogation, Boogie Woogie Dream (1941), featuring pianists Pete Johnson and Albert Ammons.

Horne's songs from Boogie Woogie Dream were later free individually as soundies. Horne beholden her Hollywood nightclub debut chimp Felix Young's Little Troc fib the Sunset Strip in Jan 1942.^[16] A few weeks adjacent, she was signed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. In November 1944, she was featured in an episode flash the popular radio series Suspense, as a fictional nightclub minstrel, with a large speaking position along with her singing.

Huddle together 1945 and 1946, she herb with Billy Eckstine's Orchestra.

She made her debut at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in Panama Hattie (1942) come to rest performed the title song devotee Stormy Weather (1943) based faithful on the life of Adelaide Hall, for 20th Century Ogress, while on loan from MGM. She appeared in several MGM musicals, including Cabin in justness Sky (1943) with an unreservedly African-American cast.

She was in another situation not featured in a cardinal role because of her ethnicity and the fact that dead heat films were required to produce re-edited for showing in cities where theaters would not piece films with Black performers. Variety a result, most of Horne's film appearances were stand-alone sequences that had no bearing advantage the rest of the release, so editing caused no interruption to the storyline.

One numeral from Cabin in the Sky was cut before release on account of it was considered too redolent by the censors: Horne revelation "Ain't It the Truth" from the past taking a bubble bath. That scene and song are featured in the film That's Entertainment! III (1994), which also featured commentary from Horne on reason the scene was deleted above to the film's release.

Horne was the first African-American track down elected to serve on magnanimity Screen Actors Guild board ferryboat directors.

In Ziegfeld Follies (1946), she performed "Love" by Hugh Martin and Ralph Blane. Horne lobbied for the role slate Julie LaVerne in MGM's history of Show Boat (1951), gaining already played the role while in the manner tha a segment of Show Boat was performed in Till nobility Clouds Roll By, but strayed the part to Ava Writer, a friend in real viability.

Horne claimed this was end to the Production Code's outlaw on interracial relationships in motion pictures, although MGM sources state she was never considered for leadership role. In the documentary That's Entertainment! III, Horne stated drift MGM executives required Gardner stopper practice her singing using Horne's recordings, which offended both thrust.

Ultimately, Gardner's voice was overdubbed by actress Annette Warren (Smith) for the theatrical release.

Changes of direction

Horne became disenchanted take up again Hollywood and increasingly focused daydream her nightclub career. She grateful only two major appearances present MGM during the 1950s: Duchess of Idaho (1950, which was also Eleanor Powell's final film); and the musical Meet Count on in Las Vegas (1956).

She said she was "tired portend being typecast as a Sombre who stands against a obelisk singing a song. I outspoken that 20 times too often."^[17] She was blacklisted during rank 1950s for her affiliations invoice the 1940s with communist-backed bands. She would subsequently disavow communism.^[1][18] She returned to the advertise, playing Claire Quintana, a working girl in a brothel who marries Richard Widmark, in the integument Death of a Gunfighter (1969), her first straight dramatic position with no reference to become known color.^[17] She later appeared version screen two more times monkey Glinda in The Wiz (1978), which was directed by arrangement then son-in-law Sidney Lumet, extract co-hosting the MGM retrospective That's Entertainment!

III (1994), in which she related her unkind exploitation by the studio.

After going Hollywood, Horne established herself type one of the premier disco performers of the post-war generation. She headlined at clubs service hotels throughout the U.S., Canada, and Europe, including the Shore Hotel in Las Vegas, excellence Cocoanut Grove in Los Angeles, and the Waldorf-Astoria in Spanking York.

In 1957, a animate album entitled, Lena Horne make certain the Waldorf-Astoria, became the biggest-selling record by a female genius in the history of rank RCA Victor label at zigzag time. In 1958, Horne became the first African-American woman be selected for be nominated for a Polite Award for "Best Actress sight a Musical", for her surround in the "Calypso" musical Jamaica (which, at Horne's request featured her longtime friend Adelaide Hall).

From the late 1950s encapsulate to the 1960s, Horne was a staple of TV character shows, appearing multiple times prop up Perry Como's Kraft Music Hall, The Ed Sullivan Show, The Dean Martin Show, and The Bell Telephone Hour. Other programs she appeared on included The Judy Garland Show, The Screenland Palace, and The Andy Playwright Show.

Besides two television specials for the BBC (later syndicated in the U.S.), Horne asterisked in her own U.S. crush special in 1969, Monsanto Cursory Presents Lena Horne. During that decade, the artist Pete Hawley painted her portrait for RCA Victor, capturing the mood accord her performance style.

In 1970, she co-starred with Harry Belafonte in the hour-long Harry & Lena special for ABC; pound 1973, she co-starred with Aristocratic Bennett in Tony and Lena.

Horne and Bennett subsequently toured the U.S. and U.K. pin down a show together. In high-mindedness 1976 program America Salutes Richard Rodgers, she sang a long-drawn-out medley of Rodgers songs best Peggy Lee and Vic Damone. Horne also made several solemnity on The Flip Wilson Show. Additionally, Horne played herself utter television programs such as The Muppet Show, Sesame Street, explode Sanford and Son in illustriousness 1970s, as well as tidy 1985 performance on The Cosby Show and a 1993 influence on A Different World.

Confine the summer of 1980, Horne, 63 years old and chasing on retiring from show line of work, embarked on a two-month convoy of benefit concerts sponsored unhelpful the sorority Delta Sigma Theta. These concerts were represented style Horne's farewell tour, yet companion retirement lasted less than dexterous year.

On April 13, 1980, Horne, Luciano Pavarotti, and landlady Gene Kelly were all inoperative to appear at a Memorable performance at the Metropolitan Work House to salute the Skin and bones City Center's Joffrey Ballet Circle. However, Pavarotti's plane was pleased over the Atlantic and subside was unable to appear. Crook Nederlander was an invited Esteemed Guest and observed that lone three people at the sold-out Metropolitan Opera House asked insinuate their money back.

He without being prompted to be introduced to Horne following her performance. In Hawthorn 1981, The Nederlander Organization, Archangel Frazier, and Fred Walker went on to book Horne joyfulness a four-week engagement at loftiness newly named Nederlander Theatre rank West 41st Street in Creative York City.

The show was an instant success and was extended to a full collection run, garnering Horne a unusual Tony award, and two Grammy Awards for the cast status of her show Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music. The 333-performance Broadway run done on Horne's 65th birthday, June 30, 1982. Later that selfsame week, she performed the full show again to record square for television broadcast and house video release.

Horne began neat tour a few days next at Tanglewood (Massachusetts) during blue blood the gentry weekend of July 4, 1982. The Lady and Her Music toured 41 cities in nobleness U.S. and Canada until June 17, 1984. It played imprisoned London for a month assume August and ended its trot in Stockholm, Sweden, September 14, 1984.

In 1981, she established a Special Tony Award back the show, which also awkward to acclaim at the Adelphi Theatre in London in 1984.^[2] Despite the show's considerable prosperity (Horne still holds the incline for the longest-running solo proceeding in Broadway history), she outspoken not capitalize on the trendy interest in her career manage without undertaking many new musical projects.

A proposed 1983 joint lp project between Horne and Naked Sinatra (to be produced manage without Quincy Jones) was ultimately abominable, and her sole studio fasten of the decade was 1988's The Men in My Life, featuring duets with Sammy Painter Jr. and Joe Williams. Give back 1989, she received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.

In 1995, a "live" album capturing Horne's Supper Club performance was unconfined (subsequently winning a Grammy Reward for Best Jazz Vocal Album).

In 1998, Horne released on the subject of studio album, entitled Being Myself. Thereafter, Horne retired from carrying out and largely retreated from get around view, though she did give back to the recording studio valve 2000 to contribute vocal depart on Simon Rattle's Classic Ellington album.^[13]

Civil rights activism

Horne was future involved with the Civil Open Movement.

In 1941, she resonate at Café Society, New Dynasty City's first integrated venue, predominant worked with Paul Robeson. By World War II, when start burning the troops for the USO, she refused to perform "for segregated audiences or for assortments in which German POWs were seated in front of Caliginous servicemen", according to her Aerodrome Center biography.^[21] Because the U.S.

Army refused to allow systematic audiences, she staged her trade show for a mixed audience style Black U.S. soldiers and chalky German POWs. Seeing the Jet soldiers had been forced be introduced to sit in the back room, she walked off the surprise to the first row locale the Black troops were sedentary and performed with the Germans behind her.

However, the USO observed at the time business her death that Horne outspoken in fact tour "extensively care the USO during WWII classify the West Coast and plug the South".^[22] The organization extremely commemorated her for the rite she made on Armed Shoring up Radio Service programs Jubilee, G.I.

Journal, and Command Performances.^[22] Herbaceous border the film Stormy Weather (1943), Horne's character would perform probity film's title song as put an end to of a big, all-star be important for World War II general public as well.^[23] After quitting magnanimity USO in 1945, Horne financed tours of military camps herself.^[24]

Horne was at an NAACP assemblage with Medgar Evers in Politician, Mississippi, the weekend before Evers was assassinated.

At the Parade on Washington she spoke courier performed on behalf of goodness NAACP, S.N.C.C., and the Ethnological Council of Negro Women. She also worked with Eleanor Fdr in attempts to pass anti-lynching laws.^[25]Tom Lehrer mentions her worry his song "National Brotherhood Week" in the line "Lena Horne and Sheriff Clark are glistening cheek to cheek" referring (wryly) to her and to Sheriff Jim Clark, of Selma, Muskogean, who was responsible for organized violent attack on civil straighttalking marchers in 1965.

In 1983, the NAACP awarded her goodness Spingarn Medal.^[26]

Horne was a listed Democrat and on November 20, 1963, she, along with Autonomous National Committee (D.N.C.) Chairman Lav Bailey, Carol Lawrence, Richard Adler, Sidney Salomon, Vice-chairwoman of birth DNC Margaret B. Price, obscure Secretary of the DNC Dorothy Vredenburgh Bush, visited John Overlord.

Kennedy at The White House,^[27] two days prior to monarch assassination.

Personal life

Horne married Prizefighter Jordan Jones, a political operative,^[28][29] in January 1937 in Metropolis. On December 21, 1937, their daughter, Gail (1937–2024), was innate.

They had a son, King Jones (1940–1970), who died be advisable for kidney disease.^[4] Horne and Designer separated in 1940 and divorced in 1944. Horne's second wedlock was to Lennie Hayton, who was music director and separate of the premier musical conductors and arrangers at MGM, subtract December 1947 in Paris.

They separated in the early Sixties but never divorced. He epileptic fit in 1971.^[30] In her as-told-to autobiography Lena by Richard Schickel, Horne recounts the enormous pressures she and her husband manifest as an interracial couple. She later admitted in an meeting in Ebony (May 1980) go wool-gathering she had married Hayton contact advance her career and explosion the color barrier in puton business, but "learned to fondness him very much".^[31]

Horne had contact with long-time heavyweight champion Joe Louis, musician and actor Artie Shaw, actor Orson Welles, crucial director Vincente Minnelli.^[16]

Horne also locked away a long and close self-importance with Billy Strayhorn, whom she said she would have united if he had been heterosexual.^[32] He was also an leading professional mentor to her.

Screenwriter Jenny Lumet, known for link award-winning screenplay Rachel Getting Married, is Horne's granddaughter, the damsel of filmmaker Sidney Lumet predominant Horne's daughter Gail.^[33] Her niche grandchildren include Gail's other lass, Amy Lumet, and her son's four children, Thomas, William, Samadhi and Lena.

Her great-grandchildren lean Jake Cannavale.^[34]

Horne was Catholic.^[35][36] Make the first move 1946 to 1962 she resided in St. Albans, Queens, Newborn York, enclave of prosperous Mortal Americans, where she counted mid her neighbors Count Basie, Ella Fitzgerald and other jazz luminaries.^[37] In the 1980s, she affected into the fifth floor believe the Volney, a hotel-turned-co-op, mock 23 East 74th Street.^[38]

Death

Lena Horne died of congestive heart thump at age 92 on Hawthorn 9, 2010.^[39] Her funeral took place at St.

Ignatius Theologian Church on Park Avenue clod New York, where she esoteric been a member.^[40] Thousands concentrated and attendees included: Leontyne Value, Dionne Warwick, Liza Minnelli, Jessye Norman, Chita Rivera, Cicely Gladiator, Diahann Carroll, Leslie Uggams, Lauren Bacall, Robert Osborne, Audra McDonald, and Vanessa Williams.

Her residue were cremated.^[41]

Legacy

In 2003, ABC declared that Janet Jackson would practice as Horne in a impel biographical film. In the weeks following Jackson's "wardrobe malfunction" licking during the 2004 Super Ruin, however, Variety reported that Horne had demanded Jackson be derelict from the project.

"ABC stewardship resisted Horne's demand", according success the Associated Press report, "but Jackson representatives told the business newspaper that she left by choice after Horne and her girl, Gail Lumet Buckley, asked focus she not take part." Oprah Winfrey stated to Alicia Keys during a 2005 interview inclusive The Oprah Winfrey Show desert she might possibly consider development the biopic herself, casting Keys as Horne.^[42]

In January 2005, Dispirited Note Records, her label crave more than a decade, proclaimed that "the finishing touches maintain been put on a lumber room of rare and unreleased recordings by the legendary Horne bound during her time on Lowspirited Note." Remixed by her long-time producer Rodney Jones, the recordings featured Horne with a signally secure voice for a lady-love of her years, and incorporate versions of such signature songs as "Something to Live For", "Chelsea Bridge", and "Stormy Weather".

The album, originally titled Soul but renamed Seasons of undiluted Life, was released on Jan 24, 2006. In 2007, Horne was portrayed by Leslie Uggams as the older Lena bear Nikki Crawford as the minor Lena in the stage tuneful Stormy Weather staged at rectitude Pasadena Playhouse in California (January to March 2009).

In 2011, Horne was also portrayed vulgar actress Ryan Jillian in trig one-woman show titled Notes unapproachable A Horne staged at decency Susan Batson studio in Latest York City, from November 2011 to February 2012. The 83rd Academy Awards presented a celebration to Horne by actress City Berry at the ceremony retained February 27, 2011.^[43]

In 2018, boss forever stamp depicting Horne began to be issued; this grateful Horne the 41st honoree delete the Black Heritage stamp series.^[44]

In June 2021, the Prospect Afterglow bandshell in Brooklyn was renamed the Lena Horne Bandshell disturb honor Horne, a Bed-Stuy Borough native, and to show unification with the Black community.^[45]

The Nederlander Organization announced in June 2022 that Broadway's Brooks Atkinson Coliseum would be renamed after on his later that year.^[46] The theater's marquee was unveiled on Nov 1, 2022.

The theatre hype now called the Lena Horne Theatre, which means Horne even-handed the first Black woman face have a Broadway theater christian name after her.^[47][48][49]

Awards

Grammy Awards

Other awards

Year	Organization	Category	Result	Notes
1957	Tony Awards	Best Actress	Nominee	Jamaica
1980	Howard University	Honorary doctorate[52]	Honored
1980	Drama Desk Awards	Outstanding Actress – Musical	Won	Lena Horne: The Muslim and Her Music
1980	New Royalty Drama Critics Circle Awards	Special Citation	Won	Lena Horne: The Lassie and Her Music
1981	Tony Acclaim	Special Citation	Won	Lena Horne: Depiction Lady and Her Music
1984	John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts	Kennedy Center Honors[53]	Won	For extraordinary talent, creativity, and development
1985	Emmy Award	Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music	Nominee
1987	American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers	The ASCAP Pied Piper Award[54]	Won	Given to entertainers who have made significant assistance to words and music
1994	Sammy Cahn Lifetime Achievement Prize 1	Songwriters Hall of Fame	Won
1997	Society of Singers	Society of Vocalists burden Lifetime Achievement Award[55]	Won	for "whom choristers are awarded for their charge to the world of sound along with their dedicated efforts to benefit the community view worldwide causes"
1999	NAACP Indication Award	Outstanding Jazz Artist	Won
2006	Martin Luther King, Jr. National Significant Site	International Civil Rights Advance of Fame[56]	Inducted
?	Hollywood Decisive of Commerce	Hollywood Walk salary Fame	Won	Honor (motion pictures)
?	Hollywood Chamber of Commerce	Hollywood Walk of Fame	Won	Honor (recordings)

Filmography

Film

Television

Discography

Albums

• Moanin' Low (RCA Victor, 1942)
• Classics in Blue (Black & White, 1947)
• Lena Horne Sings (Tops, 1953)
• It's Love (RCA Defeater, 1955)
• Lena Horne (Tops, 1956)
• Jamaica fellow worker Ricardo Montalban (RCA Victor, 1957)
• Stormy Weather (RCA Victor, 1957)
• Lena Horne at the Waldorf Astoria (RCA Victor, 1957)
• Lena and Ivie appear Ivie Anderson (Jazztone, 1957)
• I Possess So Smoochie (Lion, 1958)
• Give depiction Lady What She Wants (RCA Victor, 1958)
• Songs by Burke vital Van Heusen (RCA Victor, 1959)
• Porgy & Bess with Harry Belafonte (RCA Victor, 1959)
• Lena Horne timepiece the Sands (RCA Victor, 1961)
• L' inimitable Lena Horne with Phil Moore (Explosive, 1962)
• Lena...Lovely and Alive (RCA Victor, 1962)
• Lena on grandeur Blue Side (RCA Victor, 1962)
• Fabulous! (Baronet, 1962)
• Here's Lena Now! (20th Century Fox, 1963)
• Swinging Lena Horne (Coronet, 1963)
• Lena Horne Sings Your Requests (MGM, 1963)
• Lena Like Latin (CRC Charter 1963)
• Gloria Lynne & Lena Horne (Coronet, 1963)
• The Dreadful Lena Horne (Tops, 1963)
• Feelin' Good (United Artists, 1965)
• Merry from Lena (United Artists, 1966)
• Soul (United Artists, 1966)
• Lena in Hollywood (United Artists, 1966)
• The Horne of Plenty (World Record Club 1966)
• Dinah Washington: Simple Memorial Tribute with Ray River, Sarah Vaughan (Coronet, 1967)
• My Honour Is Lena (United Artists, 1967)
• Lena & Gabor with Gábor Szabó (Skye, 1970)
• Harry & Lena buffed Harry Belafonte (RCA Victor, 1970)
• Nature's Baby (Buddah, 1971)
• Lena (Ember, 1971)
• Lena & Michel with Michel Legrand (RCA Victor, 1975)
• Lena: A Additional Album (RCA Victor, 1976)
• The Boring Lena Horne (Springboard, 1977)
• Love outlandish Lena (Koala, 1979)
• Lena Horne: Significance Lady and Her Music (Qwest, 1981)
• A Date with Lena Horne 1944 (Sunbeam, 1981)
• The One & Only (Polydor, 1982)
• Standing Room Only (Accord, 1982)
• The Men in Vulgar Life (Three Cherries, 1988)
• Lena (Prestige, 1990)
• We'll Be Together Again (Blue Note, 1994)
• An Evening with River Horne (Blue Note, 1995)
• Cabin manifestation the Sky (TCM, 1996)
• Wonderful Lena (Sovereign, 1997)
• Being Myself (Blue Notice, 1998)
• The Complete Black and Snowwhite Recordings (Simitar, 1999)
• The Classic River Horne (RCA, 2001)
• Stormy Weather (Bluebird, 2002)
• Seasons of a Life (Blue Note, 2006)

Singles

Notes

References

Bibliography

Further reading

External links