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MUSIC MONDAY: “Calypso” – a Collection in Celebration of Artist and Activist Harry Belafonte’s 95th Birthday (LISTEN)

MUSIC MONDAY: “Calypso” – a Collection in Celebration of Artist and Activist Harry Belafonte’s 95th Birthday (LISTEN)

By goodblacknews on March 7, 2022

words by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (@lakinhutcherson); art and music by Marlon West (FB: marlon.west1 Twitter: @marlonw IG: stlmarlonwest Spotify: marlonwest)

This week’s Music Monday share is in tribute to the one and only Harry Belafonte, who turned 95 on March 1st. We celebrate the renowned singer, actor and activist by sharing refreshed and updated list of Calypso music, a genre that Belafonte popularized worldwide with his recordings (his Calypso album from 1956 became the first by a solo performer to sell a million copies) and contributions to the style.

Not only is the refreshed playlist the creation of GBN contributor Marlon West (his original post on calypso can be read here), but he also created the artwork that honors Belafonte as the superhero and champion for civil rights and human rights that he has been for decades (which includes marching on Washington with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., funding the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, fighting against apartheid, organizing USA for Africa for famine relief and acting as a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador) and still is.

Luminaries such as Spike Lee, Alicia Keys, Laurence Fishburne, Whoopi Goldberg and Cornel West turned out to celebrate Belafonte’s milestone last week at The Town Hall Theater in Manhattan for the first Harry Belafonte Social Justice Awards given by Sankofa.org, a social justice organization founded 10 years ago by Belafonte, his daughter Gina Belafonte and the music executive Raoul Roach.

You can celebrate Belafonte by listening to his own words about his life and activism by checking out the unabridged audiobook of his autobiography, My Song: A Memoir:

Also included in today’s post is a conversation with Belafonte from 2012 at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum. 

Sankofa.org is a social justice organization founded by Harry Belafonte that enlists the support of today’s most celebrated artists and influential individuals in collaboration with grassroots partners to elevate the voices of the disenfranchised and promote justice, peace, and equality.

Rest In Power Archbishop Desmond Tutu, 90, Nobel Peace Prize Winner and Human Rights Activist

Rest In Power Archbishop Desmond Tutu, 90, Nobel Peace Prize Winner and Human Rights Activist

By goodblacknews on December 26, 2021

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who helped lead the movement that ended apartheid, the unjust system of white rule in South Africa and won a Nobel Peace Prize, passed away today in Cape Town, the country’s president Cryil Ramaphosa confirmed Sunday. Tutu was 90.

Ramaphosa stated: “[A] leader of principle and pragmatism who gave meaning to the biblical insight that faith without works is dead.”

The Desmond and Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation said the cause of Tutu’s death was cancer, adding that Tutu died in a care facility. The archbishop was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 1997, and had been hospitalized several times in the decades since.

To quote from the New York Times:

As leader of the South African Council of Churches and later as Anglican archbishop of Cape Town, Archbishop Tutu led the church to the forefront of Black South Africans’ decades-long struggle for freedom. His voice was a powerful force for nonviolence in the anti-apartheid movement, earning him a Nobel Peace Prize in 1984.

When that movement triumphed in the early 1990s, he prodded the country toward a new relationship between its white and Black citizens, and, as chairman of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, he gathered testimony documenting the viciousness of apartheid.

“You are overwhelmed by the extent of evil,” he said. But, he added, it was necessary to open the wound to cleanse it. In return for an honest accounting of past crimes, the committee offered amnesty, establishing what Archbishop Tutu called the principle of restorative — rather than retributive — justice.

His credibility was crucial to the commission’s efforts to get former members of the South African security forces and former guerrilla fighters to cooperate with the inquiry.

Archbishop Tutu preached that the policy of apartheid was as dehumanizing to the oppressors as it was to the oppressed. At home, he stood against looming violence and sought to bridge the chasm between Black and white; abroad, he urged economic sanctions against the South African government to force a change of policy.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/26/world/africa/desmond-tutu-dead.html

 

Laurence Fishburne to Star in Nelson Mandela Miniseries ‘Madiba’ for BET

By goodblacknews on October 4, 2015

Laurence Fishburne Nelson MandelaLaurence Fishburne is set to play the lead role of Nelson Mandela in Madiba, a miniseries for BET Networks executive produced by the late South African hero’s grandson Kweku Mandela. The six-hour mini, directed by Kevin Hooks (Prison Break), is based on two Mandela books, Conversations With Myself and Nelson Mandela by Himself. Named after Madiba, the Thembu clan to which Nelson Mandela belonged, the project tells the story of a younger Nelson Mandela during the early-60s as he deals with the political unrest engulfing South Africa.

Madiba will be produced and financed by Toronto-based Blue Ice Pictures and also produced by UK-based Left Bank Pictures and South Africa’s Out of Africa Entertainment in association with Fishburne’s Cinema Gypsy Productions. Blue Ice Pictures president Lance Samuels executive produces alongside Kweku Mandela of Out of Africa and Daniel Iron, Neil Tabatznik, Steven Silver, Andy Harries, Marigo Kehoe and Loretha Jones.
Pre-production will begin later this year, with production slated for early 2016 in South Africa.
nelsonmandelabyhimselfconversationswithmyslef“Nelson Mandela’s journey of political activism and leadership is deeply inspirational and we are proud to have the talented and award-winning actor Laurence Fishburne join Madiba to tell this triumphant story” said Stephen Hill, President of Programming, BET Networks.
Fishburne executive produces and co-stars on the ABC comedy series Black-ish and will be seen next summer in Batman vs Superman: Dawn Of Justice. He recently signed on to star in the A&E remake of Roots and is in production on Sony’s romantic sci-fi drama Passengers starring Chris Pratt and Jennifer Lawrence.
There have been a number of feature and TV movies about Mandela, with the Nobel Peace Prize-winning anti-apartheid activist and political prisoner-turned-president portrayed by such actors as Morgan Freeman, Sidney Poitier, Idris Elba, Dennis Haysbert, Terrence Howard and Danny Glover.
article by Nellie Andreeva via deadline.com

Happy 95th Birthday, Former South African President and Activist Nelson Mandela

By goodblacknews on July 18, 2013

220px-Nelson_Mandela-2008_(edit)Despite his current health status and the speculation that ranges from a critical condition to on the road to recovery, today is Nelson Mandela’s 95th birthday, and we want to celebrate his incredible life and work on this momentous occasion.  Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela was born July 18, 1918 in Mvezo, South Africa, a Xhosa born to the Thembu royal family.  
According to Wikipedia, Mandela attended Fort Hare University and the University of Witwatersrand, where he studied law. Living in Johannesburg, he became involved in anti-colonial politics, joining the African National Congress and becoming a founding member of its Youth League. 
To learn more about his work to overthrow apartheid in South Africa, his decades-long imprisonment, leadership of the country at its President, and how he inspired freedom fighters and activists around the world, click here.
article by Lori Lakin Hutcherson

Desmond Tutu Wins 2013 Templeton Prize With $1.7 Million Award

By goodblacknews on April 4, 2013
Desmond Tutu Templeton

Desmond Tutu was named this year’s winner of the 2013 Templeton Prize.
Desmond Tutu, the former Anglican archbishop of Cape Town who rose to international fame as he helped lead the fight against apartheid in South Africa in the 1970s and 1980s, was named the 2013 Templeton Prize winner Thursday.  The honor, which comes with a $1.7 million award, is given annually by the West Conshohocken, Penn.-based John Templeton Foundation. It has, in recent years, been awarded to academics who work at the nexus of religion and science.
Tutu is being awarded for his promotion of what the foundation calls “spiritual progress,” including love, forgiveness and human liberation, especially after the fall of apartheid when he chaired South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The commission addressed tensions between perpetrators of the apartheid state and reformers, and granted amnesty on both sides to hundreds of requests out of thousands that were submitted. It is considered key to the nation’s democratic transition in the 1990s.
“When you are in a crowd and you stand out from the crowd it’s usually because you are being carried on the shoulders of others,” Tutu said in response to receiving the prize in a video on the Templeton website. “I want to acknowledge all the wonderful people who accepted me as their leader at home and so to accept this prize, as it were, in a representative capacity.”

Idris Elba to Portray Mandela in Upcoming Biopic

By goodblacknews on March 28, 2013
Actor Idris Elba arrives for a State Dinner in honor of British Prime Minister David Cameron at the White House on March 14, 2012 in Washington, DC. Cameron is on a three day official visit to Washington. (Photo by Brendan Hoffman/Getty Images)

Actor Idris Elba arrives for a State Dinner in honor of British Prime Minister David Cameron at the White House on March 14, 2012 in Washington, DC. Cameron is on a three day official visit to Washington. (Photo by Brendan Hoffman/Getty Images)

“Not in terms of performance,” he clarifies. “But my film’s about his entire life. Anyone wanting to understand who Mandela was should go and watch my film.”  Although the British-born actor is aware that his movie won’t be the first to portray Mandela’s story on the big screen, he does believe that it will capture a more complete portrayal of the South African leader’s experiences.

South Africa's Desmond Tutu wins $1 Million Prize

By goodblacknews on October 4, 2012

Archbishop Desmond Tutu

A billionaire’s foundation announced Thursday a one-off $1 million award to South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu for “his lifelong commitment to speaking truth to power.”  The foundation, which promotes good governance in the continent, was established by Sudan-born billionaire Mo Ibrahim.

South Africa’s Desmond Tutu wins $1 Million Prize

By goodblacknews on October 4, 2012
Archbishop Desmond Tutu

A billionaire’s foundation announced Thursday a one-off $1 million award to South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu for “his lifelong commitment to speaking truth to power.”  The foundation, which promotes good governance in the continent, was established by Sudan-born billionaire Mo Ibrahim.

Photojournalist Honored For Soweto Uprising Image

By goodblacknews on April 27, 2011

Sam Nzima poses with his iconic photo of Hector Pieterson, a 13-year-old fatally shot by police during the 1976 Soweto Uprising, in South Africa on Wednesday.
Sam Nzima poses with his iconic photo of Hector Pieterson, a 13-year-old fatally shot by police during the 1976 Soweto Uprising, in South Africa on Wednesday. (Denis Farrell/Associated Press)
The man behind a searing image that helped shine an international spotlight on apartheid-era violence more than 30 years ago is being recognized in South Africa Wednesday.
South African President Jacob Zuma will pay tribute to former photojournalist Sam Nzima and bestow on him the Order of Ikhamanga, which celebrates citizens who excel in the arts, culture, journalism or sport.
Nzima, 75, is best known for his June 16, 1976 image of Hector Pieterson, a 13-year-old who was one of the first to die from police gunfire during the Soweto Uprising.
Working as a photojournalist for daily newspaper The World, Nzima was assigned to cover what he thought would be a peaceful demonstration by black students protesting an order that Afrikaans be an official language taught in non-white schools. An officer ordered the students to disperse and, when they began singing instead, the police began firing on the students.

Pronounced dead

Nzima witnessed a boy shot and picked up by another youth, who began to run away with the boy in his arms.
The photographer was able to snap six images of the scene before he and another newspaper colleague rushed the injured child to a clinic. There, the young Pieterson was pronounced dead. Hundreds of black students were killed in ensuing incidents across the nation.
Nzima had removed the film with the images of Pieterson and hid the roll — wisely because when he later encountered police, the officers forced him to expose the film inside his camera.
“A lot of people ask me, why didn’t I help Hector Pieterson?…It was not my duty. A journalist must do his job. My job is to take pictures,” Nzima said in an interview on Wednesday. “This picture was an eye-opener for the whole world.”
Facing police harassment and fearing for his life after the attention-grabbing images were published worldwide, Nzima decided to end his career as a photojournalist. He left Johannesburg for a small eastern town.

A symbol of the Soweto uprising

Over the years, his image has been included in exhibitions in the U.S. and across Europe. He was also invited to speak to students at a German school named for the slain Pieterson, who became a symbol of the Soweto Uprising.
“It has been 35 years now, but when I look at the picture, I still remember everything that happened on that day,” he said.
Nzima is being recognized alongside others receiving national honours on Wednesday, dubbed Freedom Day to mark the anniversary of the first democratic elections held in South Africa.