コンペイ・セグンド、ベニ－・カーターともに95歳で死去(速報）
キューバを代表するアーティストであり、ブエナ・ヴィスタ・ソーシャル・クラブのメンバーでもあるコンペイ・セグンドが7月14日、ハヴァナで死去した。95歳だった。
一方、ジャズ界の大御所、ベニ－・カーターも7月14日、ロスアンジェルスのシーダース・サイナイ病院で死去した。きしくも95歳。
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Edited By Jonathan Cohen. July 14, 2003, 11:00 AM ET
Compay Segundo Dead At 95
Compay Segundo, one of Cuba’s oldest “troubadours” and charming frontman for the Buena Vista Social Club group, died this morning (July 14) in Havana. He was 95. Segundo, whose real name was Francisco Repilado, died of kidney failure at his home in Miramar, Havana. The guitarist and singer will be buried in his native Santiago in eastern Cuba.
Segundo shot to international fame with the 1997 Grammy Award-winning recording “Buena Vista Social Club” produced with the collaboration of American guitarist Ry Cooder. The record brought back into the limelight a group of talented musicians who had all but been forgotten in Cuba, including Segundo, pianist Ruben Gonzalez, and singers Ibrahim Ferrer and Omara Portuondo.
The group’s fame was catapulted further by the film “Buena Vista Social Club” by German director Wim Wenders.
Segundo, who was born in 1907 in Siboney, outside Santiago, enjoyed a second youth traveling around the world and recording two albums of his own. Wearing his trademark Panama hat, he gave concerts until this May, when his health deteriorated.
“The flowers of life come to everyone. One has to be ready not to miss them. Mine arrived after I was 90,” the cigar-smoking musician said in a recent interview.
COPYRIGHT: (c) Reuters 2003. All rights reserved.
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Edited By Jonathan Cohen. July 14, 2003, 11:00 AM ET
Jazz Great Benny Carter Dead At 95
Legendary jazz pioneer and big band leader Benny Carter, who helped break Hollywood’s bar to black composers, died Saturday at Cedars Sinai hospital in Los Angeles. He was 95. Carter, who was one of the first black composers and arrangers to work on mainstream Hollywood films, including such classics as “Stormy Weather,” had been hospitalized for about two weeks, complaining of bronchitis and fatigue, said family friend Virginia Wicks.
“If Benny was not there, we wouldn’t be here,” said composer and arranger Quincy Jones, a close friend and protege. “We walked through the door on his shoulders. He was a quiet and dignified man. And one of a kind.”
In a career that spanned seven decades, Carter played with such jazz luminaries as pianist Willie “The Lion” Smith, Fats Waller, Miles Davis and Dizzie Gillespie. He is also credited with launching Ella Fitzgerald’s career by introducing her to bandleader Chick Webb. Carter’s compositions, including “Blues in My Heart” and “When Lights Are Low,” have become jazz standards.
A largely self-taught musician, Carter established the swing-era, big band sound through ensemble compositions for the Fletcher Henderson orchestra and later his own band.
Born in 1907 in New York, Carter studied piano with his mother and was inspired by his neighbor, Bubber Miley, a musician with Duke Ellington’s band. He began sitting in at Harlem night spots at the age of 15, having left school. By 1928, he was recording with Henderson’s band and is credited with groundbreaking arrangements like “Keep a Song in Your Soul.”
Carter applied the principles of the jazz solo to whole sections of the orchestra in a way that made them swing as they never had before, according to biographer Ed Berger. As a result, the major big bands at the peak of their popularity in the 1930s sought him out and his own orchestra attracted a who’s who of jazz musicians, including such sidemen as saxophonist Chu Berry and pianist Teddy Wilson.
In 1941, he formed a sextet that included such bebop pioneers as trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie and drummer Kenny Clarke. Known as a courtly and patient mentor, Carter nurtured some of the next generation’s major stars in jazz.
Carter was also a pioneer in breaking down color barriers for black musicians and composers. He formed the first international and interracial band in the Netherlands in the mid-1930s and a decade later became one of the first black composers to work in film and television.
A self-effacing and private man, Carter was modest about his accomplishments. “No one was ever more articulate than Benny Carter — except about himself,” said Berger. “He would not admit that this was any great, earth-shattering thing. To him it was just another gig.”
Carter is survived by his wife, Hilma, a daughter, Joyce Mills, a grandchild and a great grandchild, said Wicks.
COPYRIGHT: (c) Reuters 2003. All rights reserved.
ENT>OBITUARY>SEGUNDO, COMPAY
ENT>OBITUARY>CARTER, BENNY