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(b al-Qrayya, Syria, Oct 18, 1915; d Beirut, Dec 26, 1974). Syrian singer, composer, ‘ūd player and film actor and producer. In 1924 political circumstances forced his family to move to Egypt. His mother, the noted singer ‘Aliyya al-Munther, taught him singing in the Syrian style. He studied the ‘ūd (lute) at the Cairo Institute for Arab Music. His professional work began as an ‘ūd player and singer at the national radio station and in Badī ‘a Maṣabnī's variety show saloon.

In 1941, through his sister Asmahān , he entered the cinema industry, and for the rest of his life was involved in films as a composer, singer actor, and producer. His singing of Syrian mawwāl (popular songs), tangos and rumbas achieved great popularity, and his work laid the foundations for Arab variety show films, cinematic operetta, orchestral musical overtures and comic and sad songs. His 31 films are mostly autobiographical and provide valuable insight into the role of the musician in society....

[Kubelsky, Benjamin ]

(b Chicago, IL, Feb 14, 1894; d Beverly Hills, CA, Dec 26, 1974). American Entertainer, actor, and violinist. The son of Jewish immigrants from Poland and Lithuania, he began playing violin at age six and was considered a local prodigy. By age 17 he was playing in vaudeville pit orchestras and soon moved onto the stage. Benny paired up with a pianist—initially Cora Salisbury, then Lyman Wood—in his signature musical act of this time, “From Grand Opera to Ragtime.” After brief service in the US Navy during World War I, Benny returned to vaudeville as a single in an act emphasizing comedy over music. He married Mary Livingstone (Sadye Marks) in 1927. She was an integral part of Benny’s act for most of his career. Although a movie contract with MGM in 1929 led nowhere, Benny found his true medium on radio. His first radio appearance came on ...

(b Galway, Ireland, May 9, 1817; d New York, NY, Jan 19, 1902). American violinist and actor of Irish birth. He had a sensational career as a child actor, making his debut in Dublin in 1824. He appeared with equal facility in comedy and tragedy, played the violin, and sang. As “Master Burke the Irish Roscius” he first appeared on the American stage on 22 November 1830 at the Park Theatre, New York. In 1840 he left the theater to study and practice law in Albany, New York, then in 1844 went to Europe to study violin with Charles-Auguste de Bériot. He returned to the United States the following year, undertook lengthy tours of the country with Leopold de Meyer (1846–7), Richard Hoffman (1847–8), and Jenny Lind (1850–52), and appeared with Gottschalk (1855–6) and Thalberg (1857). He performed several times with the New York Philharmonic Society, with which he gave the American premiere of Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto (...

[Colón Román jr, William Anthony; ‘El malo’]

(b South Bronx, New York, April 28, 1950). American bandleader, composer, arranger, trombonist, popular singer, producer and actor. Dubbed ‘El malo’ (the ‘bad boy’) of salsa, he began playing the trumpet in 1963 with the teenage band the Dandees. Switching to trombone, he made his professional début at 17 with the album El malo (Fania, 1967). Both as a bandleader and a member of the Fania All-Stars, he quickly moved to the fore of the burgeoning New York salsa scene, cementing the raw, trombone-heavy ‘New York sound’ inspired by earlier artists such as Eddie Palmieri and Mon Rivera. Between 1967 and 1973 he made a series of important recordings with vocalist Hector Lavoe, which included the albums Asalto Navideño I and II (Fania, 1972 and 1973) with cuatro virtuoso Yomo Toro, where traditional Puerto Rican Christmas aguinaldos were fused with salsa. During his second period (...

(b New Orleans, LA, Sept 11, 1967). American pianist, singer, leader, and actor. He began playing piano at the age of three, was sitting in at local jazz clubs when he was six, and made his first recordings three years later; he had piano lessons with James Booker until 1980 and studied with Ellis Marsalis at the New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts. After a brief period at Loyola University he moved to New York and attended the Manhattan School of Music; he later transferred to Hunter College to study history and economics. In 1987 he began working in New York, where he held a residency at the Oak Room in the Algonquin Hotel. He made his first international tour in 1988, and the following year he recorded the soundtrack to the film When Harry Met Sally, the success of which elevated him to the status of a pop star and led to his forming an orchestra. During the 1990s he toured with this group and began working as a film and television actor. Connick’s piano playing is based on the New Orleans style, which he learned from Booker, but also shows the influence of Thelonious Monk and Erroll Garner. Although a pop crooner and a big band traditionalist for most of his career, he briefly experimented with funk styles on his album ...

[Smith, Dante Terrell; Yasiin Bey]

(b Brooklyn, NY, Dec 11, 1973). American rapper and actor. He is known for his wide-ranging abilities as a lyricist and is also a competent multi-instrumentalist. He first came to prominence during the late 1990s as a member of Black Star, a duo with the rapper Talib Kweli. Many of his lyrics focus on political and socioeconomic subjects.

A convert to Islam, he initially formed a group with his younger brother and sister called Urban Thermo Dynamics. The group was signed to Payday Records, but they managed to release only two singles and their debut album Manifest Destiny was shelved until 2004. In 1996 he appeared in several songs on Da Bush Babees’ album Gravity (1996). He also made an appearance on De La Soul’s album Stakes is High (1996).

In 1998 Mos Def (shorthand for “most definitely”) teamed up with Kweli to form Black Star; the pair released their critically acclaimed debut ...

[Giovan, Gian, Gianleonardo]

(b Naples, c1530; d Naples, Jan 1602). Italian harpist, singer, composer and actor. He was generally known as ‘dell’Arpa’ because of his outstanding playing of the double harp. His improvisatory skills were praised by several Neapolitan writers, among them Giovan Battista del Tufo (Ritratto … della nobilissima città di Napoli, 1588) and Giulio Cesare Cortese (Viaggio di Parnaso, c 1610), Scipione Cerreto (Della prattica musica vocale, et strumentale, 1601) and Giambattista Basile (Le muse napoletane, 1635). In the dedication to his Tempio Armonico (RISM 1599⁶), Giovenale Ancina revealed that Arpa sang laude to harp accompaniment, probably in the oratories of Naples and Rome. A favourite entertainer in aristocratic circles, he attracted the patronage of Giovanna d’Aragona (see Luigi Dentice, Duo Dialoghi della musica, 1552) and her children. As musician-actor he played the role of servant in comedies staged in Neapolitan palaces of the Prince of Salerno (...

[Clifton A.; Ukulele Ike]

(b Hannibal, MO, June 14, 1895; d Los Angeles, CA, July 21, 1971). American singer, actor, and ukulele player. He started performing in St. Louis movie houses and saloons as a teenager. He learned to play the ukulele as an easy way to accompany himself, taking advantage of the popularity of that instrument following the Panama Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco in 1915. He spent the following decade based in New York, where he had significant success on Broadway, in vaudeville, and on record. He performed in George and Ira Gershwin’s Lady be Good (1924–5) in which he introduced “Fascinatin’ Rhythm.” Edwards’ first film was The Hollywood Review of 1929, in which he introduced “Singin’ in the Rain.”

Edwards never regained the level of success he achieved in the 1920s, partly due to struggles with finances and alcohol abuse. His singing style and his brand of spare ukulele accompaniment went out of style. His biggest post-1920s success came in work for Walt Disney Productions as Jiminy Cricket in ...

[The Duke of Paducah; Whitey]

(b Desoto, MO, May 12, 1901; d Brentwood, TN, June 20, 1986). American comedian and banjo player. Ford was one of the earliest country comedians to use the emerging medium of radio. Possessing a third-grade education, he joined Otto Gray’s Oklahoma Cowboys after his 1922 discharge from the Navy, which led to tours with Gene Autry and work with Chicago’s WLS Barn Dance. Leaving WLS, he joined NBC’s Plantation Party, writing most of the segments, hosting, and starring as the comedic “Duke of Paducah” for nine years, until leaving in 1942 to be the comedic star of WSM’s Grand Ole Opry. He left the Opry in 1947 to host multiple popular national radio shows, toured in the mid-1950s with the Rock and Roll Revue, and even shared the bill with a young Elvis Presley. The producers of the popular variety show Hee haw (1969–82) purchased Ford’s collection of over half a million country jokes, securing his influence on several later generations of country comedians. He was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in ...

[Knechtges, Margaret Fern]

(b Sioux City, IA, Jan 17, 1905; d Los Angeles, CA, Feb 12, 2007). American tenor saxophonist, clarinetist, vibraphonist, singer, music contractor, and advocate for women instrumentalists. She studied music with her father (violinist) and mother (singer) and began a lifetime of touring, first with a Highland dance troupe, at age seven. She took up the saxophone in high school and started her first all-girl band, the Melody Girls, in Sioux City.

In 1928 Gilbert moved to Hollywood, and toured the vaudeville circuit in a sextet of women saxophone players backing up C-melody saxophonist Rudy Wiedoeft. She founded her own band, which played the Hawaiian Islands for a year, and organized women sideliners for motion pictures through the 1930s. During this period, her bands appeared in prominent swing concerts and performed on radio. Gilbert also established herself as an advocate for women instruments through interviews and national publications in magazines such as ...

(b New York, Feb 11, 1928). American trombonist, bandleader, and actor. In his early teens, while under contract to 20th-Century Fox, he began playing the trombone after hearing Kid Ory. He started his first band, the Tailgate Jazz Band, in Los Angeles in 1949 and promptly won Record Changer magazine’s International Jazz Band Contest; the first prize was a trip to New York and a recording date for the Record Changer. His initial commercial recordings (Conrad Janis’s Tailgate Jazz Band, 1950, Cir. [USA] 404) appeared a year later on the Circle (i) label, operated by his mother, Harriet Janis, and Rudi Blesh, and are among the early jazz issues on LP. He remained in New York and led bands at Central Plaza, Eddie Condon’s, Jimmy Ryan’s, Nick’s, the Metropole, and other such venues with such notable sidemen as Roy Eldridge, Coleman Hawkins, Wild Bill Davison, James P. Johnson, and Willie “the Lion” Smith. Janis took part in a few further recording sessions in the early 1950s. He has appeared as a musician in more than 30 network television dramas, in eight Carnegie Hall concerts, and in scores of Broadway plays and Hollywood films. His Beverly Hills Unlisted Jazz Band recorded in ...

(b Bilbao, July 19, 1795; d London, Sept 20, 1867). English violinist, composer, actor and playwright. According to Sainsbury (the source from which all other biographies derive), Lacy was a child prodigy who performed in public at the age of six a concerto by Giornovichi. He was educated at Bordeaux (1802) and Paris (1803), where he studied with Kreutzer. About the end of 1804 he performed for Napoleon. He played in the Netherlands on his way to London, which he reached in October 1805. His musical and linguistic skills earned him much success there: his first concert at the Hanover Square Rooms was given under the patronage of the Prince of Wales. In 1807 Lacy was in Dublin, performing with Catalini; he then moved on to Edinburgh, where he was engaged for Corri's concerts. Some time after that he left music for the theatre, acting in Dublin, Edinburgh and Glasgow. In ...

[Koch, Lydia Anne ]

(b Rochester, NY, June 2, 1959). American singer, songwriter, guitarist, composer, poet, and performance artist. Lydia Lunch arrived in New York City as a teenage runaway in 1976, after a childhood of chaos, abuse, and extreme neglect. Motivated by the Velvet Underground, the New York Dolls, Patti Smith, and the incendiary writing of Lester Bangs in Creem magazine, Lunch formed Teenage Jesus and the Jerks in 1977. The group (which briefly included James Chance) released only a handful of singles and EPs before breaking up in 1979, but Lunch had established herself as an uncompromising purveyor of a brutal, confronting, violently sexual, and bleak artistic vision. She is considered to be a founder of No Wave, an abrasive, untutored form of noise-based punk music that was often politically charged and musically experimental. No wave often involved conventional instruments (guitar, bass, electronic keyboards) used as extreme noise-making devices to create discomforting, visceral sounds—Lunch regularly used electric guitar with a slide in this manner to piercing, abrasive effect. Lunch released her first solo album, ...

[Hall, Marcel Theo]

(b Harlem, New York; April 8, 1964).

American rapper, beatboxer, MC, DJ, and actor. He began his career in 1985 as a beatboxer for Roxanne Shanté of the Juice Crew. In 1988, he signed with Cold Chillin’ Records and released his first solo album, Goin’ Off. His second album, The Biz Never Sleeps (1989), went gold and included his first Top Ten hit, “Just a Friend,” which peaked at number nine on Billboard’s Pop Singles chart. The single, Markie’s biggest hit to-date, features the self-deprecating and satirical humor that won him the title “Clown Prince of Hip Hop.” Besides “Just a Friend,” he is also well known for the controversy surrounding a 1991 lawsuit leveled against him by singer/songwriter Gilbert O’Sullivan. Markie’s song “Alone Again,” from his album I Need a Haircut (1991), featured an unauthorized sample of O’Sullivan’s “Alone Again (Naturally).” The case featured the first federal decision regarding music sampling and had a profound effect on hip hop, requiring prior approval of samples on future recordings. An injunction was issued against the sale of ...

(b Calgary, March 4, 1937). Canadian composer, pianist, and performance artist. After studying with Gladys Egbert in Calgary and Boris Roubakine in Banff and Toronto, she settled in Winnipeg in 1959. She undertook further studies with Alma Brock-Smith, Leonard Isaacs, Peter Clements, and Michael Colgrass in Canada, and with Adele Marcus in the USA. In 1972 she graduated with the BMus from the University of Manitoba, where she served as composer-in-residence for many years. A champion of Canadian contemporary music, she co-founded (with Ann Southam) the Winnipeg-based Music Inter Alia, western Canada’s first contemporary music series, in 1976. She served as artistic director of the series until 1991. Remaining active as a performer, she has given many première performances of Canadian works. Her 28 one-woman theatrical presentations have been lauded for their innovation.

McIntosh’s compositions frequently employ multi-media such as music, video, slides, electronic tapes, mouth sounds, dialogue, and movement that all become part of her artistic expression. Humour is central to McIntosh’s music, whether for conventional instrumentation or multi-media presentation. ...

(b Little Rock, AR, Nov 18, 1933; d New York, Nov 8, 1991). American cellist and performance artist. She studied at Centenary College, Shreveport, Louisiana (BM 1955), and the University of Texas at Austin (1956–7), where she was a cello pupil of Horace Britt. In 1957–8 she began studying with Leonard Rose at the Juilliard School. She played in the Boccherini Players (1958–63) and the American SO (until 1967). Influenced by Yoko Ono, a close friend, in 1963 she founded the annual New York Avant Garde Festival, and in 1964 collaborated for the first time with the composer and video and performance artist Nam June Paik. They interpreted and collaborated on a large number of works diverse in aim, from the Cello Sonata no.1 for Adults Only (1965), in which music is associated with sex and violence, to Global Grove...

( b East Tupelo, MS, Jan 8, 1935; d Memphis, Aug 16, 1977). American rock and roll singer, guitarist and actor . As the most successful artist of the mid-1950s rock and roll explosion, Presley had a profound impact on popular music. His sense of style, musical and personal, was both the focal point of the media reaction to early rock and roll and the inspiration for many of the most important rock musicians to follow. The narrative of his meteoric rise and subsequent decline amidst mysterious and tawdry circumstances fuelled many myths both during his life and after his death at 42....

[Hubbard, Jerry Reed ]

(b Atlanta, GA, March 20, 1937; d Nashville, TN, Sept 1, 2008). American guitarist, vocalist, songwriter, and actor. He grew up in a family split by divorce and poverty. At age seven he gravitated to guitar and became enamored of the fingerstyle playing of Merle Travis and Chet Atkins. As a teenager, he played country music in the Atlanta area and took the professional name Jerry Reed after signing with Capitol Records in 1954. His records did not sell many copies, but Capitol rockabilly star Gene Vincent made Reed’s composition “Crazy Legs” a staple of his repertoire. In the early 1960s, though Reed’s recordings failed to sell, stars including Brenda Lee and Porter Wagoner began recording his songs. By then, he was a Nashville session guitarist. He developed a new and unorthodox approach to Travis-Atkins fingerstyle playing involving the use of the right-hand thumb and all four fingers. Chet Atkins began recording Reed instrumentals and later adapted aspects of Reed’s unique style to his own playing. In ...

(b Straloch, Perthshire, Feb 13, 1721; d London, Feb 6, 1807). Scottish composer, flautist and musical benefactor. He studied law at Edinburgh University and in 1745 joined the British army as a lieutenant; he was active in Scotland in the Jacobite Rebellion (1745–6), in Flanders (1747–8) and in North America (1756–67). In 1770 he retired from the army, intending to settle in New York State, but this plan was upset by the War of Independence; he returned to the army in 1780 and was promoted to the rank of general in his old age.

Reid’s flute-playing was renowned in Edinburgh and London salons. He wrote 12 flute sonatas, the melodic invention and security of construction of which are remarkable for a part-time composer. Some are English in style (e.g. no.3 of the 1762 set, which ends with a fast 3/4 air similar to some of Purcell’s theatre songs), others Scottish (e.g. no.2 of the same set, the slow movement of which has gapped-scale melodies and Scotch snaps, and which ends with a 6/8 jig). His use of different regional styles was probably learnt from James Oswald, who, as well as being a prominent composer, was Reid’s publisher. Reid’s marches, dedicated to various army regiments, are vividly coloured by Scottish idioms. The most famous is the ...

(b Rio de Janeiro, Nov 21, 1961). Brazilian composer, pianist, arranger, actor and theatre author. He studied music theory and piano at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (1976–8), then at the Villa-Lobos School, where he also studied counterpoint, arranging and composition with Koellreutter (1979–83). He earned his bachelor's degree in music at the University of Rio de Janeiro (1983). In 1979 he won the first prize in the composition competition sponsored by the Villa-Lobos School and the School of the Brazil SO. Until then he had worked as an arranger and pianist of popular music, but he now turned his attention to theatre music, working as composer and musical director in more than 50 productions. In 1983 he received the Mambembe Prize for the music of the plays Will and A porta.

Rescala participated in various festivals of contemporary music in Brazil and other countries, including that of the American Composers' Orchestral Festival, Sonidos de las Américas (...