In 1944, she began a career in musical theater, but got a professional boost in 1957 with the release of her solo debut, Odetta Sings Ballads & Blues. Eventually, she became versed in gospel, spirituals, blues, and jazz, as well as classical music. In that footage, the very earth itself opens up when Odetta raises her powerful baritone.īorn in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1930, during the repressive Jim Crow era, Odetta Holmes landed in Los Angeles, where at 13 she began operatic training. In his critically acclaimed 2005 film portrait Bob Dylan: No Direction Home, director Martin Scorsese prominently featured a 1960s vintage clip of Odetta singing “Water Boy” as an example of the folk scene’s vibrancy. Odetta’s commitment to protest songs, often filtered through the blues idiom, was unwavering and her interpretive skills dazzling. Few possess fine understanding of a song’s meaning that transforms it from a melody into a dramatic experience.” In the liner notes to her 1963 album My Eyes Have Seen, fellow singer and human rights activist Harry Belafonte wrote, “There are many singers with fine voices, great range, and superb technique. Gary Davis) has captured her essence in an authoritative biography of the singer, guitarist, lyricist, actor, civil-rights activist, and cultural icon. Ian Zack (author of Say No to the Devil: The Life and Musical Genius of Rev. “You can’t stop protesting or stop letting the powers that be know how you feel or give it over to them to stomp on you.”įor five decades, Odetta raised a powerful voice in support of social justice-and even death hasn’t silenced her. “Unfortunately, there will always be a place for protest songs, at least until we human beings get our act together,” Odetta, heralded as the unofficial queen of American folk music, told me shortly before her death in 2008. Odetta: A Life in Music and Protest By Ian Zack
0 kommentar(er)
