HARLEM SPEAKS” AT THE JAZZ MUSEUM IN HARLEM WELCOMES
JOHN LEVY, OLDEST LIVING NEA JAZZ MASTER, ON NOVEMBER 10 AT 6:30 P.M.
(October 13, 2005 – Los Angeles, CA) The Jazz Museum in Harlem's bi-weekly series, “Harlem Speaks,” continues its Thursday’s series, featuring a lively discussion and Q&A with the legendary John Levy, one of the seven living legends of American music who join the ranks of the National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Masters in January 2006. Levy will receive the A.B. Spellman NEA Jazz Masters Award for Jazz Advocacy, for his career as manager. Mr. Levy, who lived in Harlem in the mid 1940s, was the great-grandson of Louisiana slaves, born in New Orleans in 1912, and is considered to be the first black talent manager in jazz and popular music. At age 93, he is the NEA’s oldest living recipient of the award.
The series, co-produced by the Jazz Museum in Harlem and Greg Thomas Associates, will be held at the Jazz Museum in Harlem, located at 104 East 126th Street (between Park and Lexington Avenues), from 6:30 pm-8:00 pm on November 10. Admission is free, for reservations call the museum at 212.348.8300 or visit the website at
www.jazzmuseuminharlem.org.
Over the years, Mr. Levy made millions of dollars for his clients bringing them from sometimes-total anonymity to the rarefied atmosphere of success. The impressive roster of artists he has managed include more than 85 singers and musicians, a “Who’s Who” of jazz luminaries, eight of whom are already NEA Jazz Masters: Betty Carter, Herbie Hancock, Shirley Horn, Ahmad Jamal, Abbey Lincoln, Billy Taylor, Joe Williams, and Nancy Wilson, and one more, Freddie Hubbard, who will join the ranks with him in 2006. Other notable clients from the Levy roster throughout the years include: Cannonball Adderley, Brook Benton, Roberta Flack, Johnny Hartman, Etta Jones, Ramsey Lewis, Les McCann, Wes Montgomery, Dianne Reeves, George Shearing, Dakota Staton, and many others.
As a manager, Mr. Levy looked out for his clients’ interests, setting up publishing companies for them so they could retain full ownership, rights and royalties for their music instead of giving it away to the record companies or other publishers. Still very active, handling the careers of song stylist Nancy Wilson (her one and only manager since the beginning in 1959) and jazz vocalist, Clairdee, who made her first appearance at the 2005 Monterey Jazz Festival in August where she sold more CDs than Tony Bennett. Mr. Levy continues advising many other artists, both established artists and newcomers.
Mr. Levy began his jazz career as a bassist. In 1944, he left Chicago with the Stuff Smith Trio to play an extended engagement at the Onyx Club on New York City’s 52nd Street. Over the next years, he was to play with many jazz notables, including Ben Webster, Buddy Rich, Errol Garner, and Milt Jackson (also a Jazz Master), as well as with Billie Holiday at her comeback performance at Carnegie Hall in 1948.
In 1949, George Shearing heard Levy play at Birdland with Buddy Rich’s big band and hired him for his own group, which featured Buddy DeFranco (yet another 2006 Jazz Master Fellow). As Levy toured the country playing with the original George Shearing Quintet, he gradually took on the role of road manager. Levy put aside performing in 1951 to become the group’s full-time manager, making music-industry history and establishing the career he would follow for the rest of his life.
When “Men, Women, and Girl Singers” (Mr. Levy’s autobiography written by his wife, Devra Hall Levy, daughter of renowned jazz guitarist Jim Hall) was published in 2001, Levy said, “I’d like to be remembered as someone who helped musicians and singers spread the love of jazz around the world.” It seems only fitting that the NEA honor him for that.
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