Billy Vera: Harlem to Hollywood

Billy Vera: Harlem to Hollywood
Author: Billy Vera
Publisher: Hal Leonard Corporation
Total Pages: 291
Release: 2017-03-01
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1617136948

(Book). Although he's a showbiz lifer, Billy Vera is cut from a wholly different cloth than his peers. If an artist is measured by their devotion to their craft, Harlem to Hollywood may be the purest treatise on the subject ever produced. All the better, it's also an astounding story. Born into a white, suburban family, Vera fell for black music as a child and started down a winding performer's path that would buoy him the rest of his life. In the sixties, Vera paid his bills by songwriting (for other artists) through the day and playing mobbed up clubs at night. By 1967, as Newark burned on the other side of the Hudson, he and gospel singer Judy Clay, the first interracial duet to perform at the Apollo, tore the house down with a little ditty he wrote for himself: "Storybook Children," a commercial hit produced by Atlantic Records. Through the seventies, popular taste shifted drastically. As blue-eyed soul went out of fashion, Vera, like many other musicians, found himself scrounging for survival gigs, but one crucial difference set him apart: he abstained from the drugs and drink that fueled and eventually claimed so many of his contemporaries. As that decade sputtered to a close, a woman by the name of Dolly Parton recorded Vera's "I Really Got the Feeling" and hit number one on the charts. Riding the tide of this unexpected attention, Vera hightailed it to Los Angeles, formed a new band, Billy and the Beaters, and charted twice before the close of 1981 with songs from their eponymous album recorded live at the Roxy. Five years later, one of these minor hits, "At This Moment," was featured in several episodes of NBC's Family Ties . The song rocketed up the charts and a 42-year-old Vera found himself with his very own number one single. Nine visits to Carson and an American Bandstand appearance later, Vera tasted many other flavors of success: acting both on- and off-camera, producing records, and reissuing his own work. Today, with a star on the Hollywood Walk and Fame and a Grammy in tow, he's finally prepared to share his journey (did we mention that he's also a photographer and music historian who documented every step of career?). To sit down with Billy Vera is to take a personalized tour through nearly fifty years of entertainment history. Won't you come along for the ride?

Reading Race

Reading Race
Author: Norman K Denzin
Publisher: SAGE
Total Pages: 256
Release: 2002-03-29
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9780803975453

In this insightful book, one of America's leading commentators on culture and society turns his gaze upon cinematic race relations, examining the relationship between film, race and culture. Acute, richly illustrated and timely, the book deepens our understanding of the politics of race and the symbolic complexity of segregation and discrimination.

Love Goes to Buildings on Fire

Love Goes to Buildings on Fire
Author: Will Hermes
Publisher: Macmillan
Total Pages: 385
Release: 2012-09-04
Genre: History
ISBN: 0374533547

This title provides a group portrait of some of the greatest musicians of the 20th century, including Bruce Springsteen, Patti Smith, Grandmaster Flash and Bob Dylan.

Recorded in Hollywood

Recorded in Hollywood
Author: Jamelle Baruck Dolphin
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2011
Genre: African American businesspeople
ISBN: 9781463784430

Legendary Los Angeles music producer John Dolphin was one of the first and most well respected and successful black businessman and independent record label owner, well before Motown ever existed. In 1948 he open his World Famous Dolphin's of Hollywood Record Shop in Los Angeles on the legendary Central Avenue, the music mecca on the west coast. His contributions to music and the formative years of Rock'n'Roll are often overlooked. John Dolphin was the epitome of a record businessman, a big man with a big cigar, and big talk. A mini-mogul he would have nearly every facet of the record business covered. His record shop Dolphin's of Hollywood soon became the most famous record shop in America and the Dolphin's of Hollywood radio show the most popular black radio show in America. Recording artist appeared at the store and performed live on-air interviews as well as greet and signed autographs for customers. Dolphins of Hollywood record store was the first business to open 24 hours even on Sundays, also first to offer "Buy One Get One Free" for purchases of any record in the store. The creator and innovator of the crossover music concept he knew white teenagers loved black music. He went on white radio station KRKD and played a black music format, marketing black music to whites. White kids would pack the Dolphin's of Hollywood record shop in the all black neighborhood of South Central Los Angeles, nightly. Dolphin hired the most deejays including famous Dick "Huggy Boy" Hugg, who drew white teenagers to the shop in ever increasing numbers. Dolphin's of Hollywood radio show featuring Huggy Boy as deejay was the first to play and break the song "Earth Angel" by the Penguins and within weeks of its release it shot to the top of the charts. His contributions to music spans from Jazz to Rock'n'Roll, the many great artist who's careers he help are astonishing, artist such as Sam Cooke, Jesse Belvin, Charles Mingus, Pee Wee Crayton, Major Lance and many more. The Dolphins of Hollywood legendary DJs in the store window like Huggy Boy, Hunter Hancock, Charles Trammel, spinning records all nights. Read and discover his contributions goes beyond music, his record shop and radio show would bring together all races during a time of segregation, his protest against LAPD harassment of black business. An incredible never told story of John Dolphin's life journey to the day of his murder in 1958. A great tale of American history, African American history, Music history, and Los Angeles history all in this one story.

A Foreign Affair

A Foreign Affair
Author: Gerd Gemünden
Publisher: Berghahn Books
Total Pages: 206
Release: 2008-04-30
Genre: Performing Arts
ISBN: 0857450662

With six Academy Awards, four entries on the American Film Institute's list of 100 greatest American movies, and more titles on the National Historic Register of classic films deemed worthy of preservation than any other director, Billy Wilder counts as one of the most accomplished filmmakers ever to work in Hollywood. Yet how American is Billy Wilder, the Jewish émigré from Central Europe? This book underscores this complex issue, unpacking underlying contradictions where previous commentators routinely smoothed them out. Wilder emerges as an artist with roots in sensationalist journalism and the world of entertainment as well as with an awareness of literary culture and the avant-garde, features that lead to productive and often highly original confrontations between high and low.

The Last Train to Key West

The Last Train to Key West
Author: Chanel Cleeton
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 322
Release: 2020-06-16
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0451490894

Instant New York Times bestseller One of Bustle’s Most Anticipated Books of Summer 2020 “The perfect riveting summer read!”—BookBub In 1935 three women are forever changed when one of the most powerful hurricanes in history barrels toward the Florida Keys. For the tourists traveling on Henry Flagler’s legendary Overseas Railroad, Labor Day weekend is an opportunity to forget the economic depression gripping the nation. But one person’s paradise can be another’s prison, and Key West-native Helen Berner yearns to escape. After the Cuban Revolution of 1933 leaves Mirta Perez’s family in a precarious position, she agrees to an arranged marriage with a notorious American. Following her wedding in Havana, Mirta arrives in the Keys on her honeymoon. While she can’t deny the growing attraction to her new husband, his illicit business interests may threaten not only her relationship, but her life. Elizabeth Preston's trip to Key West is a chance to save her once-wealthy family from their troubles after the Wall Street crash. Her quest takes her to the camps occupied by veterans of the Great War and pairs her with an unlikely ally on a treacherous hunt of his own. Over the course of the holiday weekend, the women’s paths cross unexpectedly, and the danger swirling around them is matched only by the terrifying force of the deadly storm threatening the Keys.

Jazz

Jazz
Author: Paul Whiteman
Publisher:
Total Pages: 332
Release: 1926
Genre: Jazz
ISBN:

The Sound of Music Story

The Sound of Music Story
Author: Tom Santopietro
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
Total Pages: 407
Release: 2015-02-17
Genre: Performing Arts
ISBN: 1466870591

“Fans of The Sound of Music will find plenty to please them in [this] history of the sweeping musical.” —Kirkus Reviews On March 2, 1965, The Sound of Music was released in the United States and the love affair between moviegoers and the classic Rodgers and Hammerstein musical began. Rarely has a film captured the love and imagination of the moviegoing public the way The Sound of Music did as it blended history, music, stunning Austrian locations, heartfelt emotion—and the yodeling of Julie Andrews—into a monster hit. Now, Tom Santopietro has written the ultimate book for fans with behind the scenes stories of the filming, new interviews with Johannes von Trapp and others, photographs, and more. He looks back at the real life story of Maria von Trapp, goes on to chronicle the sensational success of the Broadway musical, and recounts the near cancellation of the film when Cleopatra bankrupted 20th Century Fox. He reveals the actors who were also considered for the roles of Maria and Captain von Trapp, and provides a historian’s critical analysis of the careers of director Robert Wise and screenwriter Ernest Lehman. He also takes a look at the critical controversy that greeted the movie, its relationship to the turbulent 1960s, and the superstardom that engulfed Julie Andrews. The Sound of Music Story is for everyone who cherishes this American classic.

A Short History of Film, Third Edition

A Short History of Film, Third Edition
Author: Wheeler Winston Dixon
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Total Pages: 525
Release: 2018-03-30
Genre: Art
ISBN: 0813595169

With more than 250 images, new information on international cinema—especially Polish, Chinese, Russian, Canadian, and Iranian filmmakers—an expanded section on African-American filmmakers, updated discussions of new works by major American directors, and a new section on the rise of comic book movies and computer generated special effects, this is the most up to date resource for film history courses in the twenty-first century.