Donny Hathaway

[arX]

Can we show some love for this wonderful artist and composer?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHr9H5zyR5Q

[jazzbo]

I'm a big fan. In my college time it wasn't a party unless "Donny Hathaway Live" was in a stack of records ready to be played.

[sgcim]

Huge fave of mine. One of the most soulful singers that ever lived, IMHO.

I used to play "Sackful of Dreams" and "I Love You More Than You'll Ever Know ' from the great "Live" LP for the hip-hop kids in my HS music classes, and they'd just say "Old School", and beg me to put on some Fifty Cent (a former student at my school, before they booted him out).

Edited April 10, 2014 by sgcim

[fasstrack]

Anyone seen the flick Come Back Charleston Blue? The soundtrack was written and performed by DH.

BTW DH's daughter Lahla is supposed to be a great singer in her own right.

Edited April 10, 2014 by fasstrack

[arX]

Anyone seen the flick Come Back Charleston Blue? The soundtrack was written and performed by DH.

I had Harlem Dawn playing as I stumbled across your post! (I've queued it to play between every dozen tunes in my playlist.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OXkO9cWj3rQ

He was a master.

BTW DH's daughter Lahla is supposed to be a great singer in her own right.

Indeed she is. She won a Grammy this year with Snarky Puppy et al for this astounding performance:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0SJIgTLe0hc

Check out her harmonic voicing at 6:12.

[sgcim]

I just finished the 33&1/3 book "Donny Hathaway Live" by Emily J. Lordi, and it's hard to believe this was the only book written about this great pianist, vocalist, Composer of film music, songs, and I just learned from the book, a Piano Concerto! I just heard the concerto (sometimes called a symphony in the book)yesterday, and it's better than anything I've heard of the thankfully departing head of JALC director Chicken Marsalis. If Donny hadn't passed at 33 in 1979, he would've gotten my vote for music director at JALC, and maybe I would've gone to some of their concerts. He was a jazz pianist also, and was classically trained, so "Chicken" had nothing on him.

[JSngry]

You heard it here first!

 

[sgcim]

Thanks for that, Jim. He was all over the place as a sideman, composer, arranger and producer. If the illness hadn't gotten him, Black music would've been in a much better place than it is now.

Even Stevie Wonder admitted he was heavily influenced by him.

[felser]

13 hours ago, sgcim said:

He was all over the place as a sideman, composer, arranger and producer. If the illness hadn't gotten him, Black music would've been in a much better place than it is now.  Even Stevie Wonder admitted he was heavily influenced by him.

This.  And unfortunately, apart from the duets with Roberta Flack, he never crossed over to pop audiences the way he should have.  The Live LP did OK (#18) on the pop charts, but everything else inexplicably stiffed.  BTW, these are great 4 CD set basically containing his full Atco output including a lot of unreleased material:

Edited 10 hours ago by felser

[jazzbo]

I have both those box sets, great releases.

[sgcim]

2 hours ago, felser said:

This.  And unfortunately, apart from the duets with Roberta Flack, he never crossed over to pop audiences the way he should have.  The Live LP did OK (#18) on the pop charts, but everything else inexplicably stiffed.  BTW, these are great 4 CD set basically containing his full Atco output including a lot of unreleased material:

Yeah, the "Never My Love" had the Piano Concerto/Symphony(?) I mentioned in my post. 

I heard his version of "Misty"the other day, and the fact that he didn't sing a note of the melody, and changed the chords to a gospel progression in the A section, might have confused the listening public of the time. 

I bought the vinyl of a Danny O'Keefe album, and was amazed to find DH playing his Wurlitzer on it! I think Atlantic encouraged its artists to collaborate on their albums. They got into some wild jams that you wouldn't expect on a Pop/Country singer's album!

[mikeweil]

7 hours ago, felser said:

I didn't know about this. Thanks for mentioning. I must get a copy.