Brazilian music is known for its vast influences from Africa, but how about Afrobeat? Well, the slaves that brought African music to Brazil were deported from their homeland until one century before Fela Kuti and Tony Allen invented the explosive mixture of Jazz, Funk, Soul and African rhythms. In the late 60ies Brazilian musicians were looking much more to the US and Europe and there was not much more than Gilberto Gil in the 70ies and then Nação Zumbi in the 90ies that got inspired by West-African Afrobeat. But there is a very interesting recording before that time: The song “Liberdade” from Orquestra Afro-Brasileiro (1957) has amazing similarities with “Shenshema” by Fela Kuti. Their whole album “Obaluaye!” is a surprising mixture of jazzy arrangements and African rhythms that by that time was very innovative as African percussion was regarded to be “barbaric” whereas piano and saxophone were “civilized” instruments. Since a few years the Afrobeat revival reached Brazil too and well known artists like MPB singer Vanessa da Mata, rapper Criolo or Céu use elements from Afrobeat in their music and there is a bunch of other artists doing so as well that are less known internationally. And with Bixiga 70 and the Abayomy Afrobeat Orchestra Brazil has at least two bands dedicated to play Afrobeat at full power.
Announcing the 2012 winner of our Vassar Miller Prize in Poetry,
Matt Miller
Club Icarus
was chosen by Major Jackson
and will be published in April 2013
University of North Texas Press is also pleased to announce the publication of the 2011 winner:
Gibson Fay-LeBlanc
Death of a Ventriloquist
chosen by Lisa Russ Spaar and published in April 2012
The Vassar Miller Prize in Poetry 2013
The winner of this annual award receives $1000 and publication by the University of North Texas Press.
This year’s judge will be Chad Davidson. To avoid conflicts of interest, current or former students of the judge should not enter.
Postmark deadline: November 15, 2012
Submit 50- to 80-page, typed manuscript, including an additional title page that does not bear the name of the poet. All pages indicating the poet's identity will be removed from the manuscript prior to its being forwarded to the final judge.
Manuscripts cannot be returned and must be accompanied by $25 entry fee (payable to UNT Press) and a letter-sized SASE for notification.
Previously published portions of the manuscript should be identified on a separate acknowledgment page. Once a winner is declared and contracted for publication, UNT Press will hold the rights to the poems in the winning collection. They may no longer be under consideration for serial publication elsewhere and must be withdrawn by the author from consideration.
Winning manuscript will be announced by March 15, 2013.
Send manuscripts to:
John Poch Vassar Miller Prize Department of English Texas Tech University Lubbock, TX 79409-3091
The Seventeenth Annual White Pine Press Poetry Prize competition will open for submissions on July 1. The award consists of a $1,000 cash award and publication by White Pine Press.
Manuscripts must be between 60 and 80 pages in length. Poems must be original, but may have appeared in magazines, anthologies, or chapbooks. Translations are not eligible.
Manuscripts must be postmarked by November 30th. They must be typed and should include a table of contents. The author’s name, address, email address, and telephone number should appear on the cover sheet only. Manuscripts will be recycled at the end of the competition. Please include a self-addressed, stamped, business-size envelope with your submission if you wish to be notified of the results.
Manuscripts must include a $20 entry, reading, and processing fee. Checks should be made out to White Pine Press. The manuscript, along with a self-addressed, stamped postcard for notification that it has been received, if so desired, should be sent to:
White Pine Press Poetry Prize P.O. Box 236 Buffalo, New York 14201
If you send the manuscript via express mail services, the manuscript should be sent to:
White Pine Press Poetry Prize 5783 Pinehurst Court Lake View, NY 14085
Manuscripts are screened by the editorial staff, and a poet of national reputation makes the final selection. The name of the final judge is not revealed until the end of the competition. We alternate between a male and a female poet each year as final judge.
Due to the large number of entries received, manuscripts cannot be returned.
Copies of these books should be available from your local bookseller. If you cannot find them, they may be ordered directly from the press for $12.00 plus $3.00 shipping and handling.
Yemassee is now accepting entries for its 2012 William Richey Short Fiction Contest. Author Matt Bell will serve as final judge. The author of the winning story will receive $1,000 and publication in Yemassee. Yemassee will publish stories by two runners-up, along with a list of ten finalists.
To enter, submit one piece of unpublished short fiction of up to 10,000 words. An entry fee of $10 must accompany each entry. All submissions should be double-spaced. Story title and page numbers should appear on all pages of the entry, but the author's name should not appear anywhere within the entry. Entries must be submitted through Submittable. We welcome multiple story submissions; each story should be entered separately and will require its own entry fee. While we do allow simultaneous submissions, please notify us that the entry is being simultaneously submitted elsewhere. Note that no refunds will be issued for submissions that are withdrawn. All entries must be submitted by the November 15th deadline. Winners will be announced on our website, and all entries will be considered for publication.
GO HERE to create a new account. This will allow you to return and monitor the status of your Submissions. You only need to do this step the first time you submit.
If you already have a Submittable account, please log in now.
If that child is attending the public schools in Meridian, Mississippi.
This is what the Justice Department has charged in their lawsuit filed last Wednesday in Mississippi.
The Justice Department filed a lawsuit today against the city of Meridian, Miss.; Lauderdale County, Miss.; judges of the Lauderdale County Youth Court; and the state of Mississippi alleging that the defendants systematically violate the due process rights of juveniles.
The litigation seeks remedies for violations of the Fourth, Fifth and 14th amendments of the U.S. Constitution. The complaint alleges that the defendants help to operate a school-to-prison pipeline in which the rights of children in Meridian are repeatedly and routinely violated. As a result, children in Meridian have been systematically incarcerated for allegedly committing minor offenses, including school disciplinary infractions, and are punished disproportionately without due process of law. The students most affected by this system are African-American children and children with disabilities. The practices that regularly violate the rights of children in Meridian include:
• Children are handcuffed and arrested in school and incarcerated for days at a time without a probable cause hearing, regardless of the severity – or lack thereof – of the alleged offense or probation violation.
• Children who are incarcerated prior to adjudication in the Lauderdale County system regularly wait more than 48 hours for a probable cause hearing, in violation of federal constitutional requirements.
• Children make admissions to formal charges without being advised of their Miranda rights and without making an informed waiver of those rights.
• Lauderdale County does not consistently afford children meaningful representation by an attorney during the juvenile justice process, including in preparation for and during detention, adjudication and disposition hearings.
This story has been in the news for some time, since the Justice Department made an announcement of its investigative findings, and referred to this situation as part of the school-to-prison pipeline.
attribution: NYU Press
The School-to-Prison Pipeline: Structuring Legal Reform, by Catherine Y. Kim, Daniel J. Losen and Damon T. Hewitt
The use of the term school-to-prison pipeline is not new, nor is it a problem restricted to the south. School systems across the U.S., especially in areas with large minority populations, feed that pipeline each week. The book, depicted above by Richard Ross, is a photo essay on juvenile incarceration, and all the photos are available at his blog. An equally important read is The School to Prison Pipeline.
The “school-to-prison pipeline” is an emerging trend that pushes large numbers of at-risk youth—particularly children of color—out of classrooms and into the juvenile justice system. The policies and practices that contribute to this trend can be seen as a pipeline with many entry points, from under-resourced K-12 public schools, to the over-use of zero-tolerance suspensions and expulsions and to the explosion of policing and arrests in public schools. The confluence of these practices threatens to prepare an entire generation of children for a future of incarceration.
Meridian, Mississippi, is simply the latest cynosure, and has to now go to court to defend itself against these charges.
I don't live in Meridian. Nor have I ever lived in Mississippi, though I lived in neighboring Louisiana. When I hear "Meridian" it brings up memories of the civil rights workers murdered there in 1964; James Earl Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael “Mickey” Schwerner. Cheney was from Meridian. It took over 40 years to finally get a conviction (for manslaughter) for only one of the murderers. His gravesite has been repeatedly desecrated.
This history must not be forgotten. Those civil rights workers who went to the south, went there to hook up with local people, like James Cheney, who wanted the right to vote.
Today, I'd like to address how the system has effectively disenfranchised a significant group of our citizens, and how the school-to-prison pipeline plays a key role in ensuring that the voteless will remain poor, unemployed or underemployed and overwhelmingly black, or of color.
Nationally, an estimated 5.85 million Americans are denied the right to vote because of laws that prohibit voting by people with felony convictions. Felony disenfranchisement is an obstacle to participation in democratic life which is exacerbated by racial disparities in the criminal justice system, resulting in 1 of every 13 African Americans unable to vote.
As we near the date of the next elections, almost all of our efforts are focused on protecting and getting out the vote—as they should be.
But unless we address the insidious affect of our skewed criminal injustice system on those citizens and young people who may never have a right to vote, we are being willfully blind to the long game that is being played—on us.
Yes, it is truly a long game. Deeply rooted in racist history, especially the time of Reconstruction, when freemen got the right to the franchise.
The Civil War, blacks comprised the majority of the electorate of Mississippi, since whites who had supported the Confederacy were denied the vote. Virtually all historians agree that this development was greeted by obstructionist whites with alarm. Virtually all historians also agree that disenfranchising tactics and methods, including literacy and property tests, poll taxes, understanding clauses, and grandfather clauses were adopted in hopes of reducing the enthusiasm and lessening the impact of the black vote. Some historians have remarked that disenfranchising provisions in state constitutions for convictions of certain “black” crimes was one additional method explored.
In one of its opinions, the Mississippi Supreme Court itself has taken this view. Six years after the adoption of § 241, the Mississippi Supreme Court reviewed the new law and remarked that blacks were more likely than whites to be “convicted of bribery, burglary, theft, arson, obtaining money or goods under false pretenses, perjury, forgery, embezzlement or bigamy.” Ratliff v. Beale, 74 Miss. 247, 256–66, 20 So. 865, 868 (1896). The Mississippi Supreme Court offered its insights into the intent of the drafters of the 1890 Constitution:
[t]he convention swept the circle of expedients to obstruct the exercise of the franchise by the negro race. By reason of its previous condition of servitude and dependence, this race had acquired or accentuated certain particularities of habit, of temperament and of character, which clearly distinguished it, as a race, from that of the whites—a patient, docile people, but careless, landless, and migratory within narrow limits, without forethought, and its criminal members given rather to furtive offenses than to the robust crimes of the whites. Restrained by the federal constitution from discriminating against the negro race, the convention discriminated against its characteristics and the offenses to which its weaker members were prone…. Burglary, theft, arson, and obtaining money under false pretenses were declared to be disqualifications, while robbery and murder, and other crimes in which violence was the principal ingredient, were not.
I had to go back and read this several times. "White crimes" (robbery, murder and rape) described as "robust" were not reason enough to disenfranchise, but "negro" crimes were written into law.
Fast forward to the school system in Meridian. The Justice Department's letter of findings states:
The students most severely affected by these practices are black children and children with disabilities in Meridian. While the City of Meridian’s overall population is approximately 62% black, 36% white, 2% Hispanic, and 1% Asian, the District has a student enrollment that is approximately 86% black, 12% white, 1% Hispanic, and 1% Asian. Approximately 13% of District students have been identified as eligible for an Individualized Education Program under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). Students in the District are expelled and suspended for longer than ten days at a rate almost seven times the rate for Mississippi schools generally.
I was curious about several details that weren't mentioned in any of the many news stories I've read on this specific issue. It seems local officials have not yet responded to these charges officially. So who are they? And the other question is why is the public school enrollment in Meridian only 12 percent white, when the Lauderdale County school district is majority white?
I figured I would start with the mayor of Meridian. The current mayor is Cheri Barry (R). It seems she was a graduate of a local private school, Lamar, which had its tax exempt status denied in 1971, due to a Supreme Court ruling against private all-white schools in Mississippi. I visited the school website. Though they have made sure to display a few dashes of color in their photos of students, it is clear from data they provide that it priced beyond the means of most citizens.
Mission Statement Lamar School's mission is to educate each individual by providing a challenging and purposeful college preparatory curriculum in a safe, respectful, Christian environment. Lamar presently serves approximately 500 students in grades pre-K through 12. The average student to teacher ratio is 15:1.
According to their website costs per year: Pre-K $4000.00, K – 6 $5616.00, and 7 – 12 $6144.00.
Mayor Barry gives weekly addresses on local issues, which can be viewed on YouTube. I did not find a video where she discusses this issue, though she does tout the new law enforcement center.
The city of Meridian has recently shuffled the administration of its public school system, and there is now a new superintendent, Alvin Taylor, who claims that the DOJ charges do not apply to his watch, details in Mississippi town struggles with "school-to-prison pipeline" charges.
Examining the schools disciplinary policies, and uniform policies (which includes a "no-head covering" rule) I cannot judge how they compare to other school systems. I do wonder how many of the students from private Lamar find themselves in handcuffs for lateness.
I am using this case against Meridian, simply as an example of a far more complex problem, which involves a long history of de-facto segregation, not just in schools but in housing, as well as the disproportionate incarceration of a large sector of our population who are Black, Latino and Native American.
Ultimately, for me, it adds up to imbalances of power. Who has it, and who doesn't, or won't unless they have the fundamental power to vote. We are creating an entire generation of young people who will become future non-voters. Much has been written here about the deleterious effects of "the war on drugs" on swelling the incarcerated population in the U.S. to topping the world charts, but sending kids into the pipeline for non-drug related school infractions tends to get overlooked.
Somewhere in the opening shot of The Assassin’s Practice there is a woman crying alone in bed, tangled in a blue room. If the sound of her racking sobs is enough to turn your stomach, you won’t be able to handle all of the sudden hysterical plot twists or the unpredictable side stories that fuel Andrew Okoko’s latest thriller. The Assassin’s Practice runs the overwrought, low-budget excess of Nollywood off the rails.
It starts out innocently enough; a respected stockbroker, secretly failed gambler, and desperate family man puts in motion an elaborate plot to kill himself, and make his own death look like a violent crime, so that his second wife and bratty daughter can keep up their lavish living on his life insurance policy.
Then you begin to notice that Okoko has tampered with the tempo of melodrama. Skeletons and confessions come out faster than they can develop intrigue. Clever dialogue winks at us, and the talented Kate Henshaw takes a backseat to static shots to announce, “I hate clichés.”
Consider this a response to Steven Soderbergh’s masterful Bubble. Okoko’s Assassin movie cuts prepared emotional responses off short; asks the audience hard questions about artifice, fidelity, and the anxieties that are true-to-life; and keeps one eye on its own charm.
Although its wit can seem a bit smug, the film is strengthened by its honest discussion of the uncertain loyalties of pop culture. Our sense of place “in Largos” is exposed as a series of clichéd images. A mysteriously glamorous London beckons, and the daughter announces she won’t go on safari with her father’s second wife because, “there’s no telling you’ll do with my passport.”
Most people outside Colombia know about the country’s African population through the music of groups like Latin Grammy winners Choquibtown, with their references (see here and here) to Chocó, a Colombian state populated by a majority of African descendants. In their song El Bombo, Choquibtown sing: “Encima África viva — ¡Mía! Esta es mi herencia llena de alegría” (And Africa is alive — It’s mine! This is my heritage full of happiness).
Despite Choquibtown’s efforts to create awareness about other aspects of Afro-Colombian life, people in Colombia and around the world continue to associate Afro-Colombians largely with dance or music, “but they refuse to actually show any kind of real solidarity with African Colombians,” according to Claudia Mosquera, professor of the Faculty of Social Sciences at Universidad Nacional de Colombia.
A further concern brought up in the program is that the local population does not want to be related to Afro-Colombians’ historic experience and that Afro-Colombians, in turn, in many cases, don’t want to either.
Also on the show is Afro-Colombian activist Rossih Amira Martínez who notes that during the 2005 Censusonly 10.5% of the population accepted being Afro-Colombian, despite the fact that the population is estimated closer to 20%. Martínez argued that limitations with the census data compilation process might be partly the cause.
Meanwhile Mosquera spelled out the many ways of Afro-Colombian identity: the acknowledgement of an African history of tragedy and resistance, without considering themselves as victims, but instead revisiting their role in the construction of the nation. For others, instead, it is a way to escape from that historical moment and just recognize themselves through cultural expressions and kinship. It can be almost like a “fashion trend”, she says. Finally, there is a group that might consider itself Afro-descendent in those situations in which they need to apply to certain benefits established by the multi-ethnic and multi-cultural state.
Contrary to popular belief, the largest population of African descendants is located in Colombian cities. However in urban areas the acceptance of an “Afro identity” is lower than in rural areas. That said, the countryside is not a safe haven for cultural heritage as Afro-Colombian families located in areas such as the South Pacific and the Coast of the state of Nariño remain to be forcibly uprooted as a consequence of the current armed conflict. Furthermore, the conflict risks the lives of those who carry knowledge of black culture. Both in urban and rural areas, this population lives in poor conditions, but many do not believe they are living any kind of hardship, given that kinship networks allow them to think poverty is something they can overcome. “Poverty is not politically processed by those who live it nor by the organizations working for their well-being,” according to Mosquera.
In the midst of this confusing process of recognition and identity politics of and by Afro-Colombians, at the local level a crucial step has been the passing of many laws for their protection. Still “legal treatment is homogeneous to other vulnerable populations, and does not take into account Afro-Colombian social dynamics and cultural specifics,” said activist Martinez.
Lately, music has not been the only vehicle to create awareness and discussion; TV and films have made efforts towards this goal as well. Besides Punto Crítico, the film La Playa D.C. (trailer here), for example, screened locally and internationally, exploring emerging black identities marked by dilemmas related to the African ancestry of the countryside, which is continuously being transformed as thousands of African Colombians keep moving to cities such as Bogotá.
A great tribute by Ani Ekpenyoung to Afro-German poet May Ayim, one a year after her death in 1996. If you want to skip the intro, start at 1:45. The downside of this video is that the people behind this channel used this great tribute to link May Ayim to black American radical Louis Farrakhan. I am sure it wasn't Ekpenyoung's idea.
Photo of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor - A centennial celebration
Classical music is the popular art music from the classical period, so of course also black people gave it a try. And with success. Because it's still BHM in the UK, a look at some of the European stars of past and present.
First, violists George Bridgetower and Joseph Emidy who wowed the audiences in 19th century. Next, the famous composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, who in 20th century was called the "African Mahler". And as a bonus the remarkable story of UK's Chi-Chi Nwanoku, the 100 meter track star who became a classical double bass player and a presenter on BBC Radio 3. And to end, an overview of Britain’s Paul Gladstone Reid, who talks about how black people influenced classical music in Europe.
George Bridgetower First the story (above) of violist George Bridgetower (1778 - 1860 ) told by Pulitzer Prize-winning and former United States poet laureate Rita Dove. Her book, “Sonata Mulattica” , a collection of poems subtitled “A Life in Five Movements and a Short Play,” intertwines fact and fiction to flesh out Bridgetower, the son of a Polish-German mother and an Afro-Caribbean father.Read more about Bridgetower at www.100greatblackbritons.com
Joseph Emidy Joseph Emidy (1775 – 1835) is the19th century composer and virtuoso violinist, who was born in West Africa in c.1775, taken as a slave to Brazil and subsequently becoming one of the leading violinists at the Lisbon Opera House. He also became a famous and celebrated violinist and composer in Cornwall in the UK. The video is of BishBashBosh Theatre company in Cornwall UK. Read more about Joseph Emidy at www.emidy.com/
Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875 – 1912) was an English composer who achieved such success that he was once called the "African Mahler". He visited America on several occasions, at a time when it was still extremely hard, if not impossible for talented black Americans to fulfil their cultural aspirations, and was therefore seen as a champion for their cause. The video below is about that American connection. Read more of Taylor at www.100greatblackbritons.com
Chi-Chi Nwanoku Fast forward today, the story of Chi-Chi Nwanoku (born in London of Nigerian and Irish parents), the former track start,who is now a double bassist, founder member and principal double bassist of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and fellow of the Royal Academy of Music.Read more at www.oae.co.uk
The best way to honour George Bridgetower, Joseph Emidy and Samuel Coleridge-Taylor with a Jazz tribute is with American violist Noel Pointer's (1954 - 1994) "Night Song". Learned it as compulsory black violin music.
Terrence O. Callier, known as Terry Callier (May 24, 1945 – October 28, 2012)
Terry Callier
Passes Over the Weekend
Renowned musician, composer, and artist Terry Callier passed away at the age of 67 yesterday 10/28/12.
The singer and guitarist began early on performing with Doo-Wop groups growing up in the North Side of Chicago with the likes of Curtis Mayfield and Jerry Butler among others. While writing and recording his own music, Callier also began touring with Gil Scott-Heron and George Benson. He was known for blending jazz with folk and soul for a unique style that produced songs like ”I Don’t Want to See Myself (Without You)” and ”You Goin’ Miss Your Candyman.” He later went on to collaborate with bands like Massive Attack and the Red Hot Organization (with whom he recorded a Duke Ellington Tribute). Read more over at Stereogum.
Callier will be missed for his wonderful music. Our thoughts are with his family and friends.
Influential but overlooked jazz-folk singer Terry Callier died Saturday at a Chicago hospital after a lengthy battle with throat cancer. He was 67.
Described by the Chicago Sun-Times as a "man of many moods, a musician of varied colors," Callier fused jazz, soul, folk and a bit of funk throughout a 50-year career.
Signed to Chess Records as a teen, Callier cut his debut single, "Look at Me Now," in 1962, but a full album did not emerge until 1968 when "The New Folk Sound of Terry Callier" was released to little notice. He was prolific in the 1970s, releasing a trio of acclaimed (but ignored) albums that inspired the term "jazz-folk," "Occasional Rain" (1972), "What Color Is Love" (1973) and "I Just Can't Help Myself" (1974).
He resurfaced in 1978 with Elektra, releasing "Fire on Ice" and "Turn You to Love" a year later. The latter contained the minor hit "Sign of the Times," which cracked the Billboard R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart in 1979 at No. 78.
In the early 1980s Callier put his music career on hold, becoming a computer programmer while focusing on raising his daughter. "When I got custody of my daughter I had to give up music to raise her properly, she needed me and the music business just didn't seem like a viable option at that point," he said, according to BBC News.
It was during this hiatus that a self-funded 1983 single by Callier, called "I Don't Want to See Myself (Without You)," became a major hit on the British nightclub circuit. The uptempo song, with its shades of funk and disco, led to numerous concerts on both sides of the Atlantic.
In 1997, Callier contributed to singer-songwriter Beth Orton's "Best Bit EP" and two years later sang on her BRIT Awards-winning album "Central Reservation." On Twitter, Orton paid tribute by pointing fans to a video of her and Callier performing the Tim Buckley classic, "Dolphins."
"This was one of the best nights of my life. Such a privilege and joy - RIP dear Terry Callier," she noted.
Callier also sang vocals on Massive Attack's 2006 single, "Live With Me."
Callier's record label Mr. Bongo, which released six of his albums from 2001 to 2009, said on its website that a memorial in London will be announced.
"He was by far the most moving performer I have ever seen and could make a crowded room fall silent with a breath," the label's Jane Dudworth said. "The guaranteed queue of love-struck women after the gigs was a testament to his charm."
We are sad to report of the death of Terry Callier, a singer and songwriter who was a legend in the Chicago area and built a following around the world. He was 67 years old.
Callier was born in the North Side of Chicago, Illinois, and was raised in the Cabrini–Green housing area. He learned piano, was a childhood friend of Curtis Mayfield, Major Lance and Jerry Butler, and began singing in doo-wop groups in his teens. In 1962 he took an audition at Chess Records, where he recorded his debut single, "Look at Me Now". At the same time as attending college, he then began performing in folk clubs and coffee houses in Chicago, becoming strongly influenced by the music of John Coltrane He met Samuel Charters of Prestige Records in 1964, and the following year they recorded his debut album. Charters then took the tapes away with him into the Mexican desert, and the album was eventually released in 1968 asThe New Folk Sound of Terry Callier. Two of Callier's songs, "Spin, Spin, Spin" and "It's About Time", were recorded by the psychedelic rock bandH. P. Lovecraft in 1968, as part of their H. P. Lovecraft II album. H. P. Lovecraft featured fellow Chicago folk club stalwart George Edwards, who would go on to co-produce several tracks for Callier in 1969.
He continued to perform in Chicago, and in 1970 joined the Chicago Songwriters Workshop set up by Jerry Butler. He wrote material for Chess and its subsidiary Cadet label, including The Dells' 1972 hit "The Love We Had Stays on My Mind", as a result of which he won his own recording contract with Cadet as a singer-songwriter. Three critically acclaimed but commercially unsuccessful albums followed, produced by Charles Stepney in a style which critics termed "jazz-folk" - Occasional Rain (1972), What Color Is Love (1973), and I Just Can't Help Myself (1974). He also toured with George Benson,Gil Scott-Heron and others. However, Callier was then dropped by Cadet, and the Songwriters Workshop closed in 1976. The following year, he signed a new contract with Elektra Records, releasing the albums Fire On Ice (1977) and Turn You to Love (1978). The opening track of the latter album, "Sign Of The Times", was used as the theme tune of radio DJ Frankie Crocker and became Callier's only US chart success, reaching # 78 on the R&B chart in 1979 and prompting his appearance at the Montreux Jazz Festival
Callier continued to perform and tour until 1983, when he retired from music to take classes in computer programming, landing a job at the University of Chicago and returning to college during the evenings to pursue a degree in sociology. He re-emerged from obscurity in the late 1980s, when British DJs discovered his old recordings and began to play his songs in clubs. Acid Jazz Records head Eddie Piller reissued a little-known Callier recording from 1983, "I Don't Want to See Myself (Without You)", and brought him to play clubs in Britain. From 1991 he began to make regular trips to play gigs during his vacation time from work.
In 1994 Urban Species released their debut album Listen, the title track containing a sample of the bass line and guitar riff from Callier's 1973 recording "You Goin' Miss Your Candyman". In the late 1990s Callier began his comeback to recorded music, collaborating with Urban Species on their 1997 EP Religion and Politics and contributed to Beth Orton's Best Bit EP in 1997 before releasing the album Timepeace in 1998, which won the United Nations' Time For Peace award for outstanding artistic achievement contributing to world peace. His colleagues at the University of Chicago did not know of Callier's life as a musician, but after the award the news of his work as a musician became widely known and subsequently led to his dismissal by the University.
As well as touring internationally, Callier continued his recording career, releasing five albums after Timepeace, including Lifetime (1999), Alive (2001), Speak Your Peace (2002) and Lookin' Out(2004). May 2009 saw his album Hidden Conversations featuring Massive Attack released on Mr Bongo records. In 2001, Callier performed "Satin Doll" for the Red Hot Organization's compilation album Red Hot + Indigo, a tribute to Duke Ellington, which raised money for various charities devoted to increasing AIDS awareness and fighting the disease.
He died on October 28, 2012, after a long illness
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article Terry Callier
