Phylicia Rashad (Photo credit: Shutterstock.com / lev radin) By Michael “Ice-Blue” Harris Rolling Out (NNPA Newswire) — With COVID-19 restrictions fading away, Phylicia Rashad is returning to Broadway in December and will star in Manhattan Theatre Club’s “Skeleton Crew.”Written by Dominique Morisseau and directed by Ruben Santiago-Hudson, “Skeleton Crew” will begin previews on Tuesday, Dec. […]
Category: Arts & Culture
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BOOK REVIEW: ‘Traveling Black’ captures experiences of Blacks during their journeys in the U.S.
By Glenn C. Altschuler Special to the Florida Courier (NNPA Newswire) – “Personal liberty consists in the power of locomotion, of changing situation, or removing one’s person to whatever places one’s inclination may direct, without restraint,” Supreme Court Justice John Marshal Harlan declared in 1883. “But of what value is this right of locomotion if […]
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Tina Turner had me at ‘Proud Mary’
Tina Turner has been performing since she was a teenager and she always leaves her fans wanting more. (Photo/Shutterstock) By Katrina Y. Nelson Special to the AFRO Although I was born in the late 1960s, by 1970 a profound performance had changed my life. I will never forget watching the Ike and Tina Turner Revue […]
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Thank you, Earl Klugh: The soundtrack of our meeting and marriage
Earl Klugh has been nominated for Grammys dozens of times and has sold millions of records. In his lifetime he has recorded 30 albums, including some 23 top ten songs on the jazz charts. (AFRO Archive) By Ralph E. Moore Jr. Remember when you could hang out in a record store back in the 70s […]
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The greatness, genius of Marvin Gaye
He is as big an influence on modern performers across genres as anybody who has had a voice over the last 50 years. (Courtesy shutterstock) By Sean Yoes Special to the AFRO April 1, 1984, felt like the cruelest April Fools prank I had ever heard; Marvin Pentz Gaye Jr., had been gunned down by […]
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Berry Gordy: The Pied Piper of Motown
Berry Gordy Jr. is known for being Motown’s legendary founder and producer but few know that he was also a songwriter early on for many of the hits prior to the founding of the label. By Ralph E. Moore Jr. Special to the AFRO After research on him, I realize there’s a lot I didn’t […]
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Black Films Glow at the 2021 Tribeca Film Festival Part I
By Dwight Brown, NNPA News Wire Film Critic For the 20th annual Tribeca Film Festival necessity was the mother of invention. To accommodate social distancing and other COVID concerns, the innovative fest took its screenings outdoors. Venues like Battery Park in Lower Manhattan, Pier 76 on the Hudson River, Brooklyn’s MetroTech campus and other open-air […]
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Elton John and my coming of age
By Mylika Scatliffe Special to the AFRO Elton John was making music and becoming popular probably about five years before I was born. He’s one of those artists whose songs I’d hear on the car radio while riding shotgun with my father. I learned most of the lyrics but had absolutely no idea who was […]
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Stevie Wonder: The artist, the activist, the Wonder(ful)
Stevie Wonder cemented his place in history as one of the greatest artists of the twentieth century in the 1970’s with multiple chart-topping hits and timeless albums such as the still highly lauded {Songs in the Key of Life} (1976). (Courtesy Photo) By Micha Green AFRO D.C. and Digital Editor mgreen@afro.com Stevland Hardaway Morris’ achievements […]
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Black Supergroups of the 1970s
Son Reynolds, Keith Holland, Maurice White, Philip Bailey, James Pankow, Robert Lamm on stage for NBC Today ShowChicago and Earth, Wind and Fire Concert, Rockefeller Center, New York, July, 2005. (Courtesy Shutterstock) By Sean Yoes AFRO Senior Reporter syoes@afro.com How do you name the greatest Rhythm and Blues bands of the 1970’s, arguably the greatest […]
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Remembering the magnitude of the mass choir
The Georgia Mass Choir was one of many large ensembles that had a hit song in the gospel music industry. Whether or not the mass choir will survive, or even make a return post-pandemic remains a mystery. (Courtesy photo) By Marnita Coleman Special to the AFRO Once upon a time in the city of Baltimore, […]
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Soundtrack of the 1970s
Soundtrack of the 1970s: Shaft, Car Wash, and The Jeffersons By Sean Yoes Special to the AFRO A significant chapter in the history of Black American culture was the so-called “Blaxploitation” era of American film anchored mainly in the 1970’s. And of course a big part of any movie, especially a Black movie is the […]