May 27, 2011
Gil Scott-Heron, Spoken-Word Musician, Dies at 62
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW YORK (AP) — Musician Gil Scott-Heron, who helped lay the groundwork for rap by fusing minimalistic percussion, political expression and spoken-word poetry on songs such as "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised," died Friday at age 62.
A friend, Doris C. Nolan, who answered the telephone listed for his Manhattan recording company, said he died in the afternoon at St. Luke's Hospital after becoming sick upon returning from a European trip.
"We're all sort of shattered," she said.
Scott-Heron's influence on rap was such that he sometimes was referred to as the Godfather of Rap, a title he rejected.
"If there was any individual initiative that I was responsible for it might have been that there was music in certain poems of mine, with complete progression and repeating 'hooks,' which made them more like songs than just recitations with percussion," he wrote in the introduction to his 1990 collection of poems, "Now and Then."
He referred to his signature mix of percussion, politics and performed poetry as bluesology or Third World music. But then he said it was simply "black music or black American music."
"Because Black Americans are now a tremendously diverse essence of all the places we've come from and the music and rhythms we brought with us," he wrote.
Nevertheless, his influence on generations of rappers has been demonstrated through sampling of his recordings by artists, including Kanye West.
Scott-Heron recorded the song that would make him famous, "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised," which critiqued mass media, for the album "125th and Lenox" in Harlem in the 1970s. He followed up that recording with more than a dozen albums, initially collaborating with musician Brian Jackson. His most recent album was "I'm New Here," which he began recording in 2007 and was released in 2010.
Throughout his musical career, he took on political issues of his time, including apartheid in South Africa and nuclear arms. He had been shaped by the politics of the 1960s and the black literature, especially of the Harlem Renaissance.
Scott-Heron was born in Chicago on April 1, 1949. He was raised in Jackson, Tenn., and in New York before attending college at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania.
Before turning to music, he was a novelist, at age 19, with the publication of "The Vulture," a murder mystery.
He also was the author of "The Nigger Factory," a social satire.
“I consider myself neither poet, composer, nor musician. These are merely tools used by sensitive men to carve out a piece of beauty or truth they hope may lead to peace and salvation.” - Gil Scott Heron
Gil Scott-Heron has been doing something his with his life and music few dare to do; look at himself and the culture around him honestly and articulate clearly his experiences and feelings about what he sees. Few artists have been as honest about their own experiences and flaws as Scott-Heron and it inspires us to look as honestly at ourselves. For Gil-Scott Heron and many contemporary artists the Civil Rights Movement didn't end thirty years ago. Through Gil's music we learn and recognize how much further we need to go and take an honest look at the continuing struggle of African-Americans and all people alike.
Scott-Heron was raised in Tennessee and the Bronx and his influences include Oscar Brown Jr., Richie Havens, John Coltrane, Langston Hughes, Malcolm X, Nina Simone and Billie Holiday. By the time Gil was twenty he had written a novel called 'The Vulture', a book of poetry titled 'Small Talk at 125th and Lenox' and released his first album 'New Black Poet:Small Talk at 125th and Lenox' which featured one of his most well known songs 'The Revolution Will Not be Televised'. Scott-Heron followed that album with 'Pieces of a Man' in 1971 with Brian Jackson, Ron Carter, Bernard Purdie and Hubert Laws. Gil and Brian Jackson would collaborate together on many more albums including 'Winter In America', 'It's Your World', 'Bridges' and 'Secrets'. Gil took part in the No Nukes concerts at Madison Square Garden in 1979, protesting the use of nuclear energy after the Three Mile Island accident and wrote a song about the incident called 'We Almost Lost Detroit' referencing the book of the title and speaking about the previous incident. Scott-Heron is known as the Godfather of Rap and continues making music and poetry to this day and trying to inspire new generations of musicians, hip-hop artists and people alike to take an honest look at themselves and the world around them.
The following video features one of my all time favorite compositions by Gil entitled "Winter in America" (1974). The lyrics are::
From the Indians who welcomed the pilgrims
And to the buffalo who once ruled the plains
Like the vultures circling beneath the dark clouds
Looking for the rain
Looking for the rain
Just like the cities staggered on the coastline
Living in a nation that just can't stand much more
Like the forest buried beneath the highway
Never had a chance to grow
Never had a chance to grow
And now it's winter
Winter in America
Yes and all of the healers have been killed
Or sent away, yeah
But the people know, the people know
It's winter
Winter in America
And ain't nobody fighting
'Cause nobody knows what to say
Save your soul, Lord knows
From Winter in America
The Constitution
A noble piece of paper
With free society
Struggled but it died in vain
And now Democracy is ragtime on the corner
Hoping for some rain
Looks like it's hoping
Hoping for some rain
And I see the robins
Perched in barren treetops
Watching last-ditch racists marching across the floor
But just like the peace sign that vanished in our dreams
Never had a chance to grow
Never had a chance to grow
And now it's winter
It's winter in America
And all of the healers have been killed
Or been betrayed
Yeah, but the people know, people know
It's winter, Lord knows
It's winter in America
And ain't nobody fighting
Cause nobody knows what to save
Save your souls
From Winter in America
And now it's winter
Winter in America
And all of the healers done been killed or sent away
Yeah, and the people know, people know
It's winter
Winter in America
And ain't nobody fighting
Cause nobody knows what to save
And ain't nobody fighting
Cause nobody knows, nobody knows
And ain't nobody fighting
Cause nobody knows what to save
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcHOq8i5Pyk&feature=related http://youtu.be/kcHOq8i5Pyk
Gil Scott-Heron (born April 1, 1949 -- May 27, 2011) was an American poet, musician, and author known primarily for his late 1960s and early 1970s work as a spoken word soul performer and his collaborative work with musician Brian Jackson. His collaborative efforts with Jackson featured a musical fusion of jazz, blues and soul music, as well as lyrical content concerning social and political issues of the time, delivered in both rapping and melismatic vocal styles by Scott-Heron. The music of these albums, most notably Pieces of a Man and Winter in America in the early 1970s, influenced and helped engender later African-American music genres such as hip hop and neo soul. Scott-Heron's recording work is often associated with black militant activism and has received much critical acclaim for one of his most well-known compositions "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised". On his influence, a music writer later noted that "Scott-Heron's unique proto-rap style influenced a generation of hip-hop artists".
Winter in America is a studio album by American soul musician and poet Gil Scott-Heron and musician Brian Jackson, released in May 1974 on Strata-East Records. Recording sessions for the album took place on three recording dates in September and October of 1973 at D&B Sound Studio in Silver Springs, Maryland. The album served as the third collaboration effort by Scott-Heron and Jackson following the latter's contributions on Pieces of a Man and Free Will. As the first record produced by the two musicians, it was also the first of their work together to have Jackson receive co-billing for a release. The album features introspective and socially-conscious lyrical content by Scott-Heron and mellow instrumentation and soundscape stylistically rooted in jazz and the blues, which produced a fusion of bluesy jazz-based vocals and Jackson's free jazz arrangements. The album is also one of the earliest known studio releases to contain proto-rap elements such as a stripped-down production style and spoken word-vocalization.
Winter in America is a studio album by American soul musician and poet Gil Scott-Heron and musician Brian Jackson, released in May 1974 on Strata-East Records. Recording sessions for the album took place on three recording dates in September and October of 1973 at D&B Sound Studio in Silver Springs, Maryland. The album served as the third collaboration effort by Scott-Heron and Jackson following the latter's contributions on Pieces of a Man and Free Will. As the first record produced by the two musicians, it was also the first of their work together to have Jackson receive co-billing for a release. The album features introspective and socially-conscious lyrical content by Scott-Heron and mellow instrumentation and soundscape stylistically rooted in jazz and the blues, which produced a fusion of bluesy jazz-based vocals and Jackson's free jazz arrangements. The album is also one of the earliest known studio releases to contain proto-rap elements such as a stripped-down production style and spoken word-vocalization.
"The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" (1970) by Gil Scott-Heron:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGaoXAwl9kw&feature=related
http://youtu.be/qGaoXAwl9kw
"Whitey On The Moon" (1969) by Gil Scott-Heron:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtBy_ppG4hY&feature=related
http://youtu.be/PtBy_ppG4hY
Gil Scott-Heron (born April 1, 1949 -- May 27, 2011) was an American poet, musician, and author known primarily for his late 1960s and early 1970s work as a spoken word soul performer and his collaborative work with musician Brian Jackson. His collaborative efforts with Jackson featured a musical fusion of jazz, blues and soul music, as well as lyrical content concerning social and political issues of the time, delivered in both rapping and melismatic vocal styles by Scott-Heron. The music of these albums, most notably Pieces of a Man and Winter in America in the early 1970s, influenced and helped engender later African-American music genres such as hip hop and neo soul. Scott-Heron's recording work is often associated with black militant activism and has received much critical acclaim for one of his most well-known compositions "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised". On his influence, a music writer later noted that "Scott-Heron's unique proto-rap style influenced a generation of hip-hop artists".
Winter in America is a studio album by American soul musician and poet Gil Scott-Heron and musician Brian Jackson, released in May 1974 on Strata-East Records. Recording sessions for the album took place on three recording dates in September and October of 1973 at D&B Sound Studio in Silver Springs, Maryland. The album served as the third collaboration effort by Scott-Heron and Jackson following the latter's contributions on Pieces of a Man and Free Will. As the first record produced by the two musicians, it was also the first of their work together to have Jackson receive co-billing for a release. The album features introspective and socially-conscious lyrical content by Scott-Heron and mellow instrumentation and soundscape stylistically rooted in jazz and the blues, which produced a fusion of bluesy jazz-based vocals and Jackson's free jazz arrangements. The album is also one of the earliest known studio releases to contain proto-rap elements such as a stripped-down production style and spoken word-vocalization.
Winter in America is a studio album by American soul musician and poet Gil Scott-Heron and musician Brian Jackson, released in May 1974 on Strata-East Records. Recording sessions for the album took place on three recording dates in September and October of 1973 at D&B Sound Studio in Silver Springs, Maryland. The album served as the third collaboration effort by Scott-Heron and Jackson following the latter's contributions on Pieces of a Man and Free Will. As the first record produced by the two musicians, it was also the first of their work together to have Jackson receive co-billing for a release. The album features introspective and socially-conscious lyrical content by Scott-Heron and mellow instrumentation and soundscape stylistically rooted in jazz and the blues, which produced a fusion of bluesy jazz-based vocals and Jackson's free jazz arrangements. The album is also one of the earliest known studio releases to contain proto-rap elements such as a stripped-down production style and spoken word-vocalization.
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://blogs.westword.com/backbeat/gil-scott-heron.jpg&imgrefurl=http://blogs.westword.com/backbeat/2009/05/qa_with_gil_scott-heron.php&usg=__IblPGZ0gzCSL2bWlcd0bPipQ8TM=&h=271&w=229&sz=8&hl=en&start=4&zoom=1&itbs=1&tbnid=E08YvZb7qKs0oM:&tbnh=113&tbnw=95&prev=/search?q=Gil+Scott-Heron--images&hl=en&sa=G&tbm=isch&prmd=ivnsu&ei=P3HhTd6tIoyksQOrxcXtBg
INTERVIEWS
Q&A with Gil Scott-Heron
By Tom Murphy,
May 1 2009
Denver Westword
In advance of his two shows this weekend (Saturday, May 2nd at The Oriental and Sunday, May 3rd, 2009 at The Fox Theatre), we were able to have a few words with jazz/proto-hip-hop legend Gil Scott-Heron about his influences and his work.
Westword: Your music is known for being socially conscious. When and what sparked that awareness inside you?
Gil Scott-Heron: Don't you just hate socially unconscious people? We run into them every once in a while but we try not to hang out with them. I think everybody has it, some people choke it off and don't use it. I think we all start off with it. We are a social sort of animal, as far as I'm concerned. My songs are just about people. Generally they're folks I know or have heard about.
WW: Did Langston Hughes having gone to Lincoln University influence your decision to go there after high school?
GSH: Langston Hughes, Thurgood Marshall, Kwame Nkruhmah, Melvin Tolson--quite a few people. Langston Hughes going there was definitely an influence. I thought his writing was something special and I became aware of him at a very young age. But Thurgood Marshall was one of the great men of the twentieth century.
WW: Did you ever get to meet Mr. Hughes?
GSH: I wrote my senior paper on Langston Hughes and I went down to interview him. He was working at The Amsterdam News and the New York Post. He wrote a column each week. He was very gracious and humble. We talked about his work and how he had come to master so many different art forms. That, also, was very influential because I like to write many different things myself: poetry as well as longer pieces and music. He'd done the same. He wrote songs, he wrote that weekly column and I used read his work in The Chicago Defender when I was a boy in Tennessee. It was nice to come across him still working and still just as powerful and as humorous as he was in print.
WW: Your albums always seem to have poetic titles. What lead you to title the albums "Pieces of a Man" and "Winter in America?"
GSH: Pieces of a Man was done when we were with Flying Dutchman Records, that was one of the songs that Bob Thiele was particularly fond of. Bob had produced John Coltrane. He liked the song, and he liked to name the albums that came out on his label behind something that was represented inside. Small Talk at 125th and Lennox was the name of our first book of poetry and the name of one of the poems we did on our first album. Pieces of a Man and Free Will, the other two albums we did for him, were from songs we included inside. Winter In America was what the inside of the album was about. There was no song called "Winter in America" at the time. Miss Peggy Harris, the woman who did the collage inside the album, said there ought to be a song called "Winter in America." I eventually wrote it and put it on an album called The First Minute of a New Day. In general we did not name things after a song, we tried to sum up what we were talking about on the albums.
WW: How did you get hooked up with Bob Thiele for Pieces of a Man?
GSH: I went to see him after I did my first book of poetry. I introduced myself as a songwriter. He had just started his own label and he had Leon Thomas, Oliver Nelson, Gato Barbieri and some other people that I thought might find some of the songs I wrote interesting. We got a three record deal with him eventually.
WW: Your songs often deal with heavy subjects but I also hear a playfulness and wry sense of humor there as well. I realize that may be your personality coming through but is there something else at work there?
GSH: I think that's part of life. If you're always living one way or another, you're not living a full life. You talk about all sorts of things that challenge you in your life and they have an influence on you. There are things that are, as you call it, "heavy," or complex but we deal with the simplest aspects of them so everyone can understand what we're talking about.
WW: One of your most powerful songs is "The Bottle." I have often wondered if that song was autobiographical in any way?
GSH: Actually, there was a liquor store that I could see from the back of the house when I lived in Washington. The folks used to be there every morning at 6:30 or 7:00 and be there when they opened the door. I went out there to find out who they were. There were a lot of different people. There was an ex-schoolteacher, an ex-air traffic controller, there was a doctor--there were different people with different experiences. Different things lead them to be out there in the morning like that. But none of them set out to be an alcoholic when they were born, something happened in their life that turned them that way. I like to drink a glass of cognac once in a while but that's about it for me.
WW: You've been working on an autobiography?
GSH: It covers certain pieces of my life but it's really about the campaign Stevie Wonder initiated to get Dr. Martin Luther King's birthday turned into a national holiday. That's the slice of my life that I discuss because I think that when things of historical significance happen, there need to be firsthand accounts of it. Since I was on the tour with him, I saw the various things he had in mind to bring that about and I got a good look at it. There are autobiographical pieces in there but it's not cover to cover about me.
WW: You were a published novelist before releasing an album and yet you've said you were in bands before you were a poet. Is the creative process of writing poetry and writing music different for you?
GSH: They're absolutely different. Some ideas show up by themselves and others show up with tones and melodies that you can only express with a few chords or a few pieces of harmony. Everything that shows up, shows up differently. I published a novel, I quit school to write it. I was a college sophomore. I'd always wanted to write so when I came across an idea I thought might fill the bill as a novel I took off and went to work on it.
WW: Your first novel was The Vulture?
GSH: It was and it came out at the same time as Small Talk at 125th and Lennox.
WW: Your second novel was called The Nigger Factory? I saw an interview where you talked about how it maybe had to do with the university and schooling system in America.
GSH: It was a piece of fiction. It was about a small uprising on a college campus, trying to get some basic rights. Because of the conflict between the students and the administration, things kept getting blown out of proportion. The title itself came from looking at three or four situations like that: one was Columbia University, one was Lane College in Jackson, Tennessee and one was Kent State in Ohio. Where students were trying to find themselves in one direction were getting pulled in another by folks who can't remember being young.
WW: Will you be performing new songs and poems on this tour and can we expect to see a new album in the near future?
GSH: Absolutely. If you've never heard them before, they're all new. I doubt anyone has heard all twenty-five of the albums. But we're constantly working on new things and different arrangements on old things, trying to make the show as interesting as possible for everyone involved. We're trying to finish up a new album this week that will hopefully be out at the end of the summer.
By Tom Murphy,
May 1 2009
Denver Westword
In advance of his two shows this weekend (Saturday, May 2nd at The Oriental and Sunday, May 3rd, 2009 at The Fox Theatre), we were able to have a few words with jazz/proto-hip-hop legend Gil Scott-Heron about his influences and his work.
Westword: Your music is known for being socially conscious. When and what sparked that awareness inside you?
Gil Scott-Heron: Don't you just hate socially unconscious people? We run into them every once in a while but we try not to hang out with them. I think everybody has it, some people choke it off and don't use it. I think we all start off with it. We are a social sort of animal, as far as I'm concerned. My songs are just about people. Generally they're folks I know or have heard about.
WW: Did Langston Hughes having gone to Lincoln University influence your decision to go there after high school?
GSH: Langston Hughes, Thurgood Marshall, Kwame Nkruhmah, Melvin Tolson--quite a few people. Langston Hughes going there was definitely an influence. I thought his writing was something special and I became aware of him at a very young age. But Thurgood Marshall was one of the great men of the twentieth century.
WW: Did you ever get to meet Mr. Hughes?
GSH: I wrote my senior paper on Langston Hughes and I went down to interview him. He was working at The Amsterdam News and the New York Post. He wrote a column each week. He was very gracious and humble. We talked about his work and how he had come to master so many different art forms. That, also, was very influential because I like to write many different things myself: poetry as well as longer pieces and music. He'd done the same. He wrote songs, he wrote that weekly column and I used read his work in The Chicago Defender when I was a boy in Tennessee. It was nice to come across him still working and still just as powerful and as humorous as he was in print.
WW: Your albums always seem to have poetic titles. What lead you to title the albums "Pieces of a Man" and "Winter in America?"
GSH: Pieces of a Man was done when we were with Flying Dutchman Records, that was one of the songs that Bob Thiele was particularly fond of. Bob had produced John Coltrane. He liked the song, and he liked to name the albums that came out on his label behind something that was represented inside. Small Talk at 125th and Lennox was the name of our first book of poetry and the name of one of the poems we did on our first album. Pieces of a Man and Free Will, the other two albums we did for him, were from songs we included inside. Winter In America was what the inside of the album was about. There was no song called "Winter in America" at the time. Miss Peggy Harris, the woman who did the collage inside the album, said there ought to be a song called "Winter in America." I eventually wrote it and put it on an album called The First Minute of a New Day. In general we did not name things after a song, we tried to sum up what we were talking about on the albums.
WW: How did you get hooked up with Bob Thiele for Pieces of a Man?
GSH: I went to see him after I did my first book of poetry. I introduced myself as a songwriter. He had just started his own label and he had Leon Thomas, Oliver Nelson, Gato Barbieri and some other people that I thought might find some of the songs I wrote interesting. We got a three record deal with him eventually.
WW: Your songs often deal with heavy subjects but I also hear a playfulness and wry sense of humor there as well. I realize that may be your personality coming through but is there something else at work there?
GSH: I think that's part of life. If you're always living one way or another, you're not living a full life. You talk about all sorts of things that challenge you in your life and they have an influence on you. There are things that are, as you call it, "heavy," or complex but we deal with the simplest aspects of them so everyone can understand what we're talking about.
WW: One of your most powerful songs is "The Bottle." I have often wondered if that song was autobiographical in any way?
GSH: Actually, there was a liquor store that I could see from the back of the house when I lived in Washington. The folks used to be there every morning at 6:30 or 7:00 and be there when they opened the door. I went out there to find out who they were. There were a lot of different people. There was an ex-schoolteacher, an ex-air traffic controller, there was a doctor--there were different people with different experiences. Different things lead them to be out there in the morning like that. But none of them set out to be an alcoholic when they were born, something happened in their life that turned them that way. I like to drink a glass of cognac once in a while but that's about it for me.
WW: You've been working on an autobiography?
GSH: It covers certain pieces of my life but it's really about the campaign Stevie Wonder initiated to get Dr. Martin Luther King's birthday turned into a national holiday. That's the slice of my life that I discuss because I think that when things of historical significance happen, there need to be firsthand accounts of it. Since I was on the tour with him, I saw the various things he had in mind to bring that about and I got a good look at it. There are autobiographical pieces in there but it's not cover to cover about me.
WW: You were a published novelist before releasing an album and yet you've said you were in bands before you were a poet. Is the creative process of writing poetry and writing music different for you?
GSH: They're absolutely different. Some ideas show up by themselves and others show up with tones and melodies that you can only express with a few chords or a few pieces of harmony. Everything that shows up, shows up differently. I published a novel, I quit school to write it. I was a college sophomore. I'd always wanted to write so when I came across an idea I thought might fill the bill as a novel I took off and went to work on it.
WW: Your first novel was The Vulture?
GSH: It was and it came out at the same time as Small Talk at 125th and Lennox.
WW: Your second novel was called The Nigger Factory? I saw an interview where you talked about how it maybe had to do with the university and schooling system in America.
GSH: It was a piece of fiction. It was about a small uprising on a college campus, trying to get some basic rights. Because of the conflict between the students and the administration, things kept getting blown out of proportion. The title itself came from looking at three or four situations like that: one was Columbia University, one was Lane College in Jackson, Tennessee and one was Kent State in Ohio. Where students were trying to find themselves in one direction were getting pulled in another by folks who can't remember being young.
WW: Will you be performing new songs and poems on this tour and can we expect to see a new album in the near future?
GSH: Absolutely. If you've never heard them before, they're all new. I doubt anyone has heard all twenty-five of the albums. But we're constantly working on new things and different arrangements on old things, trying to make the show as interesting as possible for everyone involved. We're trying to finish up a new album this week that will hopefully be out at the end of the summer.
Poet/Spoken Word Artist Gil Scott-Heron talks about the meaning behind his piece "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised." Excerpt from The 90's by Skip Blumberg.
"The Bottle" by Gil Scott-Heron
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_b2F-XX0Ol0
Che Guevara Memorial video
Words and music by Gil Scott Heron
"The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" (1970)
INTERVIEW WITH GIL SCOTT-HERON IN PHILADELPHIA, APRIL 20, 2008
