Belafonte

Harry Belafonte
has been an international music icon
for more than 70 years. He's one of the most famous, most successful concert performers in the last half-century.

He earned the title, "King of Calypso". 

His music was from the Islands
-- before dreadlocks and Bob Marley
and Rastafarians. 
If you attended one of his concerts 
in the 1960s or '70s or '80s 
you'd sing along with him. 

He and his songs were magnetic. 
He introduced us to bongo drums and limbo bars and steel drums and an Island lifestyle that was so laid-back and so friendly
and so unlike ours. 

He may have been the Caribbean's first Director of Tourism -- 
we all wanted to go there after hearing his music.

He's earned Grammys and Emmys
and a Tony from Broadway
and starred or acted in 33 films.

It's a little surprising that his music
is regularly played at present-day NHL hockey games and baseball games.

It will still be played 100 years from now.

He knew he was a very confident performer and it showed.
He was the opposite of the brash and over-the-top performers 
of his time like Jerry Lee Lewis or Elvis.

He was soft and cool and 
laid back and he invited you into his music
-- he didn't hit you over the head with it. 
He survived the onslaught of the British Invasion and didn't want to miss an audience so,
occasionally, he branched out to capture
the audience of Rhythm and Blues
with Charlie Parker's band in the background
and Gospel music with Odette
and Jazz with Miles Davis
and even had harmonica player, Bob Dylan,
sit in on his Folk catalogue.

He was born in New York City
to Jamaican parents but searched for, developed, created and performed Island music  - Calypso music, starting with "Matilda" in 1953 and three years later, dropped the album "Calypso, the first album in the world to sell a million copies in one year.

In the 1960s,
Belafonte was an international sensation.
He was a force as an entertainer
and a front line warrior
for the Civil Rights Movement
as an apostle of Martin Luther King Jr.

President John F. Kennedy's inauguration producer, 
Frank Sinatra, recruited Belafonte 
to perform at his gala.

His Island music was addictive.
It got into your ear and made you feel good. In the 1960's he introduced me to rhythms
I'd never heard before ... lots of dreamy melodies, lots of drums and when he performed
there were smiling black faces beside him on stage.

Toronto in the middle of the 20th century didn't have many black people. You could count, on one hand, the number of 
people of colour, any colour, on its streets or at one of Belafonte's Toronto performances.

His shows were exotic. 

Toronto's O'Keefe Centre
(one of the very first buildings
 named after a brewery)
opened for business in 1960 
with the world premiere
of the soon-to-be Broadway smash,
Camelot,
with Richard Burton, Robert Goulet and Julie Andrews.

Belafonte's first show at the O'Keefe followed during that year and he dazzled Toronto audiences at that location four more times.
Over the years, hundreds of acts performed there but in my opinion, nobody owned that room like Belafonte.

For his performance in 1972, Lorraine and I were circling the theatre looking for the impossible -- a parking space.

Suddenly, only a block away, I spotted one.
It was like we'd won the lottery. I was so excited we got out and high-fived each other.

While she was feeding the parking meter, I looked over at the guy walking in my direction, in the shade of the building. He was so close to it he was rubbing his shoulder against the bricks. 

It was the guy we'd paid to see ... Harry Belafonte. 
One of the biggest music stars in the world was walking towards me and it was less than a half hour to his showtime.

I couldn't let the opportunity pass. 
I stepped in front of him to block his way.

It startled him but I had his attention.

By way of introduction, I quickly mentioned the name of a mutual friend he and I had in New York. He nodded, "Yes, he's my friend too." I mumbled a few more things trying to engage him in conversation but he was in a trance -- distant, very focused on something that wasn't me and anxious to get on his way to the O'Keefe. 

I'm 5' 11'' tall. While talking with him, he and I were eye-to-eye. We seemed to be the same size. Close-up, his skin colour was much lighter than I'd imagined - from his white grandmother.

I'm sure I confused his shyness with his method of mentally preparing to get ready to meet 3,000 fans in the room across the street. 

I had questions but he said, "I gotta go" as Lorraine 
joined us. After he escaped, she said, "Who was that?" 

Watching him skate through the crowd of 50 people/fans on the corner and stop with them for the light to change was funny. 

Nobody recognized him.
He stayed with them until there was a space in the traffic then ran across the road through the red light. He was so pigeon-toed, 
so awkward I thought he was going to trip himself.

Minutes later we joined our friends in the theatre. 
"Where have you been?"

"We were outside with Harry." "Ya, right." they said in unison.

I showed them my ticket that he'd signed as we moved to our seats.

Suddenly, the cavernous O'Keefe went completely dark. 
You couldn't see your hand in front of your face. Then, a single
pen-light hit a spot on the curtain just as his face appeared -
it went off like a camera flash. What an opening. 

Fabulous showmanship.

Then he broke into Day-O. The place erupted.

When he stepped out to centre stage he looked 8 feet tall.

His perfectly creased black slacks were hitched up high with a wide leather belt with a huge silver buckle.

His no-button, frilly Island shirt 
was split in the front, his boots were glistening -- finishing the look.

He was so smooth, so confident, so tall 
and in control of everything on stage and he had the sold-out audience right where he wanted them.

He was so un-shy.

The Belafonte show was always very, very special -- we went three times. He was the first performer I'd ever seen, who, in the middle of a song, motioned the audience to help him sing the chorus.

Nobody in the theatre ever refused.
He may have single-handedly created sing-a-longs.
The 1960's synonym for that expression became hootenannies. 

Belafonte was generous,
always introducing and showcasing 
the talents of his bandmates and co-stars.

Two of them,
Miriam Makeba and Nana Mouskouri
would become super famous on their own
after touring the world with Belafonte.
He also helped to establish a whole new
audience for the great duo,
Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee.

He only ever referred to his 9 back-up singers and musicians
as artists and eventually during the performance, introduced every one of them.

 Nice touch.

There's no easy way to finish this piece on my moment with Belafonte other than to say it's imprinted in my memory bank forever.

The world, including me, appreciated his artistry, his humanitarianism and his willingness to search for, find and mentor other artists and provide an international stage for them to perform on and give me a chance to see them before they became, deservedly, famous on their own.

In a 1980's radio interview the host started the session by asking, "Is Harry Belafonte your real name?"

No, he said, "It's Harold Belafonte."

He retired in 2007.
He was 93 in March but had a
feature role in the movie, 
Black KKK Klansman