Harlem Renaissance

By all accounts, the musical Shuffle Along should have never succeeded. An all Black production prospering in an era of sharp racial division seems unfathomable. Not to mention the fact that the show was deeply in debt and released…

In the annals of musical mythology, Jelly Roll Morton is one of those oft elusive, yet larger-than-life legends. Morton is credited as the first true jazz composer.

Before Madonna vogued, before RuPaul was a household name, before Beyoncé built a Renaissance, there were queens carving out space in a city that had none for them. Ballroom culture was alive and pulsing through New York's underground…

On August 4, 1901, Louis Armstrong was born in New Orleans. Until the age of five, Armstrong's grandmother was his caregiver. At the age of six, he attended the Fisk School for Boys, an all black school in New Orleans. While performing odd…

In continuation of NYS Music’s series celebrating the Harlem Renaissance in its centennial years, it is important to highlight the Cotton Club which was instrumental in displaying Black talent. Before it was the Cotton Club, the…

Langston Hughes, full name James Mercer Langston Hughes, was born around February 1st, 1902 in Joplin, Missouri. He was raised by his mother and grandmother, and grew up in a series of towns across the United States midwest, showing a…

As part of NYS Music's continuing series looking at the Centennial years of the Harlem Renaissance, we turn to activist Marcus Garvey, leader of the Pan-African movement, the first American Black nationalist movement. Marcus Moziah…

Eleanora Fagan was born on April 7, 1915 in Philadelphia. As a child, she started going by Billie Holiday, Billie from Billie Dove and Holiday from her dad. She began listening to records by Louis Armstrong and Bessie Smith. Her mother…

For a brief few decades in the 1900s, the Savoy provided a vibrant home for the budding genre of swing, and saw rise to popular dances like the Lindy Hop.

Born Gertrude Malissa Nix Pridgett, Rainey would go on to become one of America's most influential blues singers, a key player in the Harlem Renaissance and an important mentor and inspiration to many singers that followed.