Benny Carter
Sound
Biography
Bennett Lester Carter (August 8, 1907 – July 12, 2003) was an American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, trumpeter, composer, arranger, and bandleader. With Johnny Hodges, he was a pioneer on the alto saxophone. From the beginning of his career in the 1920s, he worked as an arranger including written charts for Fletcher Henderson's big band that shaped the swing style. He had an unusually long career that lasted into the 1990s. During the 1980s and 1990s, he was nominated for eight Grammy Awards, which included receiving a Lifetime Achievement Award. Carter was born in New York City in 1907. He was given piano lessons by his mother and others in the neighborhood. He played trumpet and experimented briefly with C-melody saxophone before settling on alto saxophone. In the 1920s, he performed with June Clark, Billy Paige, and Earl Hines, then toured as a member of the Wilberforce Collegians led by Horace Henderson. He appeared on record for the first time in 1927 as a member of the Paradise Ten led by Charlie Johnson. He returned to the Collegians and became their bandleader through 1929, including a performance at the Savoy Ballroom in New York City. In his early 1920s, Carter worked as arranger for Fletcher Henderson after that position was vacated by Don Redman. He had no formal education in arranging, learning by trial and error, getting on his knees and looking at the existing charts, "writing the lead trumpet first and the lead saxophone first—which, of course, is the hard way. It was quite some time that I did that before I knew what a score was." He left Henderson to take Redman's former job as leader of McKinney's Cotton Pickers in Detroit. In 1932, he formed a band in New York City that included Chu Berry, Sid Catlett, Cozy Cole, Bill Coleman, Ben Webster, Dicky Wells, and Teddy Wilson. Carter's arrangements were complex. Among the most significant were "Keep a Song in Your Soul", written for Henderson in 1930, and "Lonesome Nights" and "Symphony in Riffs" from 1933, both of which show Carter's writing for saxophones. By the early 1930s, Carter and Johnny Hodges were considered the leading alto saxophonists. Carter also became a leading trumpet soloist, having rediscovered the instrument. He recorded extensively on trumpet in the 1930s. Carter's short-lived Orchestra played the Harlem Club in New York but only recorded a handful of records for Columbia, OKeh and Vocalion. The OKeh sides were issued under the name The Chocolate Dandies. In 1933, Carter participated in sessions with British composer/musician Spike Hughes, who visited New York City to organize recordings with prominent African American musicians. These 14 sides plus four by Carter's big band, titled at the time Spike Hughes and His Negro Orchestra, were initially only issued in England. The musicians were from Carter's band and included Red Allen, Dicky Wells, Wayman Carver, Coleman Hawkins, J. C. Higginbotham, and Chu Berry. ... Source: Article "Benny Carter" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.
Known For
Le Grand Échiquier is a French variety television program created and presented by Jacques Chancel. It aired at 8:30 pm on the first channel of the ORTF from January 12, 1972 to July 12, 1972, then on the second color channel of the ORTF from September 1972 to December 1974, and finally on Antenne 2 from January 1975 to December 21, 1989. The program returned to France 2 on December 20, 2018 and is hosted by Anne-Sophie Lapix.
Le Grand Échiquier
The Kennedy Center Honors is an annual honor given to those in the performing arts for their lifetime of contributions to American culture.
The Kennedy Center Honors
A team of allied saboteurs are assigned an impossible mission: infiltrate an impregnable Nazi-held island and destroy the two enormous long-range field guns that prevent the rescue of 2,000 trapped British soldiers.
The Guns of Navarone
Jerry Mulligan is an exuberant American expatriate in Paris trying to make a reputation as a painter. His friend Adam is a struggling concert pianist who's a long time associate of a famous French singer, Henri Baurel. A lonely society woman, Milo Roberts, takes Jerry under her wing and supports him, but is interested in more than his art.
An American in Paris
Writer Harry Street reflects on his life as he lies dying from an infection while on safari in the shadow of Mount Kilimanjaro.
The Snows of Kilimanjaro
Though legendary lyricist Howard Ashman died far too young, his impact on Broadway, movies, and the culture at large were incalculable. Told entirely through rare archival footage and interviews with Ashman’s family, friends, associates, and longtime partner Bill Lauch, Howard is an intimate tribute to a once-in-a-generation talent and a rousing celebration of musical storytelling itself.
Howard
A wagon master and a con-man preacher help freed slaves dogged by cheap-labor agents out West.
Buck and the Preacher
A medical examiner discovers that an innocent shooting victim in a robbery died of bubonic plague. With only 48 hours to find the killer, who is now a ticking time bomb threatening the entire city, a grisly manhunt through the seamy underworld of the New Orleans Waterfront is underway.
Panic in the Streets
The relationship between an aspiring dancer and a popular songstress provides a retrospective of the great African-American entertainers of the early 1900s.
Stormy Weather
A brash, big-time investigative reporter, looking into the death of a call girl, uncovers her diary and tries to find her killer among the names contained in it.
Fame Is the Name of the Game
Acrobat Eddie Marsh is in the army now. His first act is to become friendly with Kathryn Jones, the colonel's pretty daughter. Their romance hits a few snags, including disapproval from her father. Eddie's also plagued by fear of having an accident during his family's trapeze act in the army variety show, which also features a gallery of MGM stars.
Thousands Cheer
A famous jazz trumpeter finds himself unable to cope with the problems of everyday life.
A Man Called Adam
A gunman whose best friend has been murdered enacts a plan to blackmail the corrupt labor union leader responsible but finds he isn't the only one after his money.
The Hanged Man
Earth is visited by a race of aliens, who issue an ultimatum: either peace or complete destruction.
The Cosmic Eye
Upon awaking in the morning, a man finds his thoughts clouded by the possibility that he committed a murder.
Night Without Sleep
"Jazz Seen" is an exploration of the life of William Claxton, whose photographs turned the world of jazz on its keen and perceptive ear. Various jazz artists, photographers, and actors recount memories they had with Claxton and explore his work, while parts of his life are re-enacted by actors.
Jazz Seen
Are our lives predetermined? Is it possible to change fate? These questions are addressed in "Fumi and the Bad Luck Foot", a heartwarming tale of female empowerment. Fumi is a young girl whose left foot attracts bad luck. This affliction, which instigates infant electrocution, a shotgun barrage, and a moose attack, drives her to the brink of despair until she realizes that the source of her unhappiness might be her most powerful asset.
Fumi and the Bad Luck Foot
A comic allegory in which a runaway "city" on legs matches wits with a wily farmer. A farmer has an encounter with a runaway "city" (which devours its environs). He deserts his rural home for the imagined joys of urban life.
Urbanissimo
A compilation reel of television commercials produced by Story Board Inc.
A Smattering of Spots
Burt Lancaster narrates this overview of the incredible career of jazz saxophonist Benny Carter, one of the chief architects of the Big Band sound. COMMENTARY BY QUINCY JONES, DIZZY GILLESPIE, ELLA FITZGERALD, LENA HORNE AND MORE