The majority of the material in the Benny Carter Collection is dated from the late 1920s through the later half of the 1990s. Donated to the Smithsonian Institution in December, 2000, the bulk of the collection is comprised of original music manuscripts (full scores and parts), band books, and published sheet music from Benny Carter's prolific career as a jazz composer and musician. The collection also contains newspaper clippings, correspondence, photographs, scrapbooks, awards, posters, commercial sound recordings, a few jazz related journals and some personal ephemera documenting Benny Carter's personal life and career as a composer, arranger, bandleader, trumpeter and alto saxophonist.
Arrangement:
The collection is organized into six series
Series 1: Music Manuscripts, 1928-1990s
Series 2: Newspaper Clippings and Magazine Clippings, 1928-2000
Series 3: Photographs, 1928-1998
Series 4: Awards and Proclamations, 1961-1999
Series 5: Sound Recordings, 1958-1989
Series 6: Ephemera, 1952-2000
Series 7: 2004 Photographs Addenda
Series 8: 2004 Ephemera Addenda
Series 9: 2004 Magazine and Newsclippings Addenda
Series 10: 2004 Awards and Proclamations Addenda
Biography:
Bennett Lester Carter, better known as "Benny," was born on August 8, 1907 in New York City. The Carter's were quite a musical family - - Benny's father played guitar, his mother played piano, and a cousin, Theodore ("Cuban") Bennett, played the trumpet professionally - - so it was no surprise that Benny also became a musician, beginning his musical training at the age of ten. He first played the trumpet and then C-melody saxophone before changing to alto saxophone, which became his chief instrument.
Benny Carter began his professional career around the young age of seventeen, when he joined a local group as an alto saxophonist. He subsequently played with various other groups, including Billy Paige and Louis Deppe, until attending Wilberforce College in Ohio to study seminary in 1925. Finding music more enticing than theology, Carter left college and instead toured with Horace Henderson's Wilberforce Collegians intermittently between 1925 and 1928.
Carter's musical talents began attracting widespread attention in 1930 during a year-long stint with Fletcher Henderson's orchestra, to which he contributed many important arrangements. As word of his talent continued to spread, Carter played with such notables as William "Chick" Webb (1931) and served as musical director of William McKinney's Cotton Pickers (1931-1932) in Detroit. Upon returning to New York in 1932, Carter formed his own highly-respected orchestra. In its two years of existence, the Benny Carter Orchestra included several major pioneers in early swing style, such as Bill Coleman, Dicky Wells, Ben Webster, Chu Berry, Teddy Wilson, and Sid Catlett. Months after playing the inaugural show in New York City at Harlem's Apollo Theater in 1934, Carter disbanded the orchestra and, one year later, sailed to Europe to spread jazz across the globe.
After arriving in Europe, Carter first performed with Willie Lewis in Paris, France, and then, during 1936 -1938, served as staff arranger for the BBC Dance Orchestra in London, England. As he continued to tour throughout his stay in Europe (even leading his own interracial band in the Netherlands in 1937), he met with even greater success than in the United States. By this point, Carter was well-known for his arrangements and for his alto saxophone and clarinet playing. He was also recognized for his talented singing and tenor saxophone, trumpet, and piano playing.
In 1938, Carter sailed back to the United States and formed a new orchestra which regularly played at Harlem's Savoy Theater until 1940. He toured the United States during the next few years, both with small groups and with his big band, finally settling in Los Angeles in 1945. There he continued to lead his band (band members included modern jazz greats such as Miles Davis and J. J. Johnson), but turned increasingly to writing and arranging music for films and television productions. His film scores include Stormy Weather (1943), A Man Called Adam (1966), Red Sky at Morning(1970), and Buck and the Preacher (1972). "Ironside," "Bob Hope Presents," and the Alfred Hitchcock show were among the television programs for which he wrote music.
Carter had stopped performing with a regular orchestra by 1946, but he remained active up through the 1960s both by playing at Norman Granz's Jazz at the Philharmonic shows and with Duke Ellington, among others. He also continued to arrange music for various singers, including Sarah Vaughan, Ella Fitzgerald, Ray Charles, Peggy Lee, and Louis Armstrong. During the 1970s he began performing again, touring in Europe, Asia and Australia; in 1976 he toured the Middle East under sponsorship of the U.S. Department of State. Carter also became involved with academia, serving as visiting professor or workshop consultant at universities such as Yale, Cornell, Princeton, and Duke. He remained active in the music business well into the 1990s and still resides in California.
Benny Carter is regarded as "one of the most versatile musicians of his time." As a musician, he made major contributions to several areas of jazz and, as an arranger, he helped to construct the big-band swing style. He has received many awards throughout his career. The more prestigious honors included a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences and a 1994 Grammy Award for the album "Elegy in Blue."
Footnotes
[1 ] Biographical note derived from Benny Carter: A Life in American Music, by Monroe and Edward Berger, and James Patrick (New York: Scarecrow Press and the Institute of Jazz Studies, Rutgers University, 1982).
[2] J. Bradford Robinson, "John Kirby," The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz, vol 1, 1986: 653-54.
Provenance:
The Benny Carter Collection was donated by Bennett Carter in December 2000.
Smithsonian Institution. Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage Search this
Type:
Archival materials
Collection Restrictions:
Access to the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections is by appointment only. Visit our website for more information on scheduling a visit or making a digitization request. Researchers interested in accessing born-digital records or audiovisual recordings in this collection must use access copies.
Collection Rights:
Permission to publish materials from the collection must be requested from the Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections. Please visit our website to learn more about submitting a request. The Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections make no guarantees concerning copyright or other intellectual property restrictions. Other usage conditions may apply; please see the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for more information.
Collection Citation:
Smithsonian Folklife Festival records: 2016 Smithsonian Folklife Festival, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives and Collections, Smithsonian Institution.
3 folders containing 10 parts in key of Bb Major? -- in black ink, pencil, and photocopy -- for reeds, brass, and drums -- in unidentified copyists' hand (one is probably Whaley).
folder A: 5 parts from the Mercer Ellington Library -- 1 reed -- Jimmy/tenor; 1 trumpet -- Terry; 2 trombones -- Britt, Butter -- 4 parts in this folder appear to be by the same copyist -- 1 sketch in unidentified hand labeled - "After all - Bridge" -- the parts are probably in the hand of copyist Tom Whaley; folder B: 3 parts from the Duke Ellington Library -- Jimmy, Sears, drums -- all parts appear to be by Tom Whaley -- in ink; folder C: 2 parts from the Duke Ellington Library -- Johnny, Tricky -- parts appear to be in the same hand -- in pencil -- probably same arrangement
folders appear to contain at least two different arrangements -- music is related.
General:
Handwriting and other details have been reported based on the notes of David Berger, Andrew Homzy, Dr. Theodore Hudson, Walter van de Leur, and Mark Tucker. Prof. Homzy and Dr. Tucker have been consultants on this project. Dr. Hudson is a knowledgeable member of the Duke Ellington Society, and Walter van de Leur is a budding Strayhorn scholar. David Berger is affiliated with the Lincoln Center jazz program in New York City, and has worked with Ellington music as a conductor and transcriber for many years.
Condition: good, worn. Folder A -- 3p., folder B -- 1p. . Folder A -- 5p., folder B -- 3p., folder C -- 2p.
Collection Restrictions:
Collection is open for research but the original and master audiovisual materials are stored off-site and special arrangements must be made to work with it. Contact the Archives Center for information at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Collection Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Copyright restrictions. Consult the Archives Center at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Paul Ellington, executor, is represented by:
Richard J.J. Scarola, Scarola Ellis LLP, 888 Seventh Avenue, 45th Floor, New York, New York 10106. Telephone (212) 757-0007 x 235; Fax (212) 757-0469; email: rjjs@selaw.com; www.selaw.com; www.ourlawfirm.com.
Topic:
Music -- United States -- 20th century Search this
Genre/Form:
Copy scores
Manuscripts
Music
Parts (musical)
Collection Citation:
Duke Ellington Collection, Archives Center, National Museum of American History
Sponsor:
Processing and encoding partially funded by a grant from the Council on Library and Information Resources.
The collection documents the professional career of Chico O'Farrill, Cuban-born trumpet player, composer and arranger of Afro Cuban, bebop, and other styles of jazz.
Scope and Contents:
The collection consists of materials documenting the musical career of Chico O'Farrill. There are no personal papers, and there is very little information about his life.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into two series.
Series 1, Music Manuscripts, undated
Series 2, Other Materials, 1949, 1975, 1999
Biographical / Historical:
: Arturo (Chico) O' Farrill was born October 28, 1921, into an Irish-German Cuban family in Havana, Cuba. He learned to play trumpet while attending Riverside Military Academy in Gainesville, Georgia. O'Farrill later returned to Havana and studied composition. He arranged and composed classical music and jazz for mainstream and Latin musicians. He played trumpet throughout the mid-forties with various Cuban bands, including the Lecuna Cuban Boys. In 1948, O'Farrill moved to New York to study at The Julliard School. Later he composed and arranged music for Benny Goodman, Count Basie, Machito, Stan Kenton, Dizzy Gillespie, and Gato Barbieri. He collaborated with impresario Norman Granz, who helped put together a recording session including Machito, alto saxophonist Charlie Parker, tenor saxophonist Flip Phillips and drummer Buddy Rich. They recorded Afro Cuban Jazz Suite in 1950, a successful blend of the bebop sound he arranged for Benny Goodman and Latin jazz rhythms. O'Farrill formed his own band and toured the United States and Cuba, returning to Havana around 1955, subsequently relocating to Mexico City. O'Farrill moved to Los Angeles in 1965. He recorded Afro Cuban Moods with Dizzy Gillespie in 1975. Around this time, he began to compose commercial music for advertising and television. From 1998 until 2000, he conducted the Lincoln Center Latin Jazz Orchestra and the Chico O'Farrill Afro-Cuban Jazz Big Band in New York. O'Farrill died on June 27, 2001 in New York City.
Materials in the Archives Center, National Museum of American History:
Paquito D'Rivera Music Manuscripts and Photograph (AC0891)
Tito Puente Papers (AC0894)
Mongo Santamaria Papers (AC0893)
Charismic Productions Records of Dizzy Gillespie (AC0979)
Latino Music Collection (AC0852)
Provenance:
Guadalupe Valero O'Farrill, widow of Chico O'Farrill, donated the collection in 2005.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Indians of North America -- Southern States Search this
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Newsclippings
Date:
1931-1942
Scope and Contents:
Contents include: ---- Correspondence with editor of Bureau of American Ethnology and list of illustrations used in Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 161. ---- "Seminole Music." 374 page carbon copy of manuscript and a few miscellaneous pages, roughs of music transcriptions, arranged music transcriptions of 243 songs as published. Submitted December 18, 1942. ---- "Seminole Music." Approximately 250 page manuscript. Incomplete manuscript submitted by Frances Densmore, May 16, 1940. This manuscript and the manuscript finally published in Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 161 are compilations of previous manuscripts submitted by the author, 1931-1933, 1936, 1941. (Old Number) 1787 "Seminole Hunting and Alligator Dance Songs." 22 page manuscript, 28 pages tabulated analyses of 13 songs. (Transcriptions and 10 illustrations mentioned on old catalog card are not present. See original prints file for illustrations in part.) Submitted February 1, 1932.
Submitted April 21, 1932. (Old Number) 3228 "Seminole Songs connected with Legends and Dances." 38 page manuscript including descriptive analysis of songs, tabulated analyses of 31 songs. (transcriptions of 31 songs, recorded on old catalog card, are not present.) Submitted September 30, 1932. (Old Number) 3259-a "Chitimacha, Choctaw and Seminole Music, with a comparative survey of Indian music in the Gulf States." 75 page manuscript, including descriptive analyses of 23 songs, tabulated analyses for 13 Seminole songs. (Tabulated analyses for Chitimacha and Choctaw songs, 20 pages transcriptions, 18 photos and 2 figures, recorded on old catalog card, are not present. See original print file for part of the illustrations.) Submitted main portion of the manuscript to the Bureau of American Ethnology June 17, 1933. The comparative survey part was a report submitted to the National Research Council, May 15, 1933. (Old Number) 3259-b (part) Seminole text from manuscript "Choctaw and Seminole Songs." 8 page manuscript Submitted June 14, 1939. The Choctaw material is separately filed under Choctaw, Bureau of American Ethnology Ms Number 3258 (Old Manuscript Number 3259-b, part.) (Old Number) 3260 "Dance Songs of the Seminole Indians." 19 page manuscript including descriptive analyses of 20 songs, tabulated analyses. (Transcriptions and 9 photos sent with this manuscript, recorded on old catalog card, are not present.)
(Old Number) 3197 "The Seminole Indians." 43 page manuscript including descriptive analyses of 7 songs, tabulated analyses of 8 songs. (8 transcriptions and 36 photos and 1 sketch illustration, recorded on old catalog card, are not present.) See original prints file for part of illustrations.) Submitted March 3, 1931. (Old Number) 3208 "Seminole Bird Dance and their Songs." 31 page manuscript including descriptive analyses of songs, tabulated analyses for 18 songs. (18 song transcriptions and 42 photo illustrations, recorded on old catalog card, are not present). Submitted January 18, 1932. (Old Number) 3209 "Buffalo Dance and Corn Dance." 30 page manuscript including descriptive analyses of 12 songs, 12 tabulated analyses. (12 transcriptions and 12 photo illustrations, recorded on old catalog card, are not present. See original print file for part of the photo illustrations.) Submitted December 12, 1931. (Old Number) 3211 "A comparison between the structure of Nootka and Quileute songs and that of songs previously analyzed, also a description of a Seminole flute and Seminole customs." 57 page manuscript, from which pages 4-10 were taken out by F. D. for incorporation in Nootka and Quileute Music. No Nootka and Quileute material remains in this manuscript. (17 photo illustrations, map and diagram, recorded on old catalog card, are not present. See original print file for some of the illustrations.)
Submitted November 30, 1932. (Old Number) 3262 "Caloosa and Seminole Corn Dance and Hunting Dance Songs." 28 page manuscript, including descriptive analyses of 25 songs, tabulated analyses of 25 songs. (11 pages transcriptions, 1 sketch, 13 photos, recorded on old catalog card, are not present. See original print file for some of the photos.) Submitted May 28, 1932. (Old Number) 3407 "Dance Songs of the Seminole Indians." 2 page list of Seminole transcriptions and cylinder records. (7 sheets transcriptions, recorded on old catalog card, are not present.) All these songs were recorded at Brighton, Florida, by Billie Stewart in February 1932. Submitted by F.D. March 16, 1936. (Old Number) 4083 "Songs of the Seminole in Florida." 28 page manuscript (71 transcriptions of songs, recorded on old catalog card, are not present.) Submitted by F.D. March 20, 1941.
The following Seminole material was received from the Densmore estate, ca. 1962. Three notebooks in F. Densmore's handwriting, dated: 1931, 1932 and 1933 (Brighten), and 1933. These notebooks contain material on Seminole songs and dances. Miscellaneous fieldnotes including "Last of Josie Billie" and "Discended from Osceola". Reading notes from Frank Drew, Minnie Moore-Willson, Clay McCauley, and others. 2 notebooks and several miscellaneous pages. "Annual Report, Narrative Section, 1935, Seminole Agency Dania, Fla." Prepared by J.L. Glenn, Officer in Charge. 18 page mimeo. Clippings: "Indian Buried Unmourned; Tribesmen at Paleface Rites," February 25, 1938, The Herald; photographs of Seminole Indians, page 10, April 25, 1937, The Herald, Miami, Florida, with typed note: "Do these scenes remind you of 'Days of (not so) long ago?' Chas." Various reprints re Seminole Indians: "Souvenir of the Original Musa Isle Seminole Indian Village, Miami, Fla." No date, 12 pages. Publishers announcement of Grant Forman's book, Indian Removal. "Musa Isle Seminoles and Alligators" by James Lowther Berkebile, 1929, Phoenix Printing Co., Augusta, Georgia. 35 pages and 23 illustrations of Seminole Indians.
"Seminole Indians: Survey of the Seminole Indians of Florida," presented by Mr. Fletcher, 71st Congress, 3rd Session, Doc. No. 314, GPO, 1931. 88 pages and map. Announcement of lectures W. Stanley Hanson, Secretary Seminole Indian Association, and article from The American Eagle, "Seminole Indian Association Reorganized", September, 1933.
Local Numbers:
NAA MS 4690
Other Title:
Seminole Music
Seminole Hunting and Alligator Dance Songs
The Seminole Indians
Seminole Bird Dance and their Songs
Buffalo Dance and Corn Dance
A comparison between the structure of Nootka and Quileute songs and that of songs previously analyzed, also a description of a Seminole flute and Seminole customs
Seminole Songs connected with Legends and Dances
Chitimacha, Choctaw and Seminole Music, with a comparative survey of Indian music in the Gulf States
Seminole text from manuscript "Choctaw and Seminole Songs"
Dance Songs of the Seminole Indians
Caloosa and Seminole Corn Dance and Hunting Dance Songs
Collection consists of one letter and six music manuscripts by James H. "Eubie" Blake.
Scope and Contents:
The collection consists of one handwritten letter by Eubie Blake to Professor John Garvey, director of the University of Illinois Jazz Band, dated August 3, 1969. There are five undated manuscripts in Blake's hand of his arangements for the songs Manda, Poor Archie, Brittwood Rag, March of the Senegalese, and the W.C. Handy song, Yellow Dog Blues. In the letter Blake requests that Garvey, when playing any of these songs (for which he enclosed the manuscripts,) please mention his (Blake's) name as the arranger.
In the letter Blake also mentions Here Tis, but that manuscript was not included in this donation.
Arrangement:
Collection is arranged in one series.
Series 1: Letter and Music Manuscripts, 1969
Biographical / Historical:
James Herbert "Eubie" Blake, noted ragtime pianist, was born February 7, 1883 in Baltimore, Maryland. Some government records show his birth year as 1887. His parents Emily "Emma" Johnston and James Sumner Blake had formerly been enslaved. Blake was their only child to live to maturity. Blake learned to play the pump organ and the piano while still a young child. Blake began his career as a pianist, songwriter, and arranger in 1915 in Baltimore playing piano in Aggie Shelton's bordello. He formed a songwritng partnership with Noble Sissle in 1915. In 1921, their musical Shuffle Along became a hit on Broadway and ran for fourteen months. Blake's career spanned his entire life. Perhaps his most recognizable song, I'm Just Wild About Harry, is considered a standard of the American musical canon. His life was the subject of the Broadway musical, Eubie, that premiered in 1978.
Blake married twice first to Avis Elizabeth Cecelia Lee (1881-1939) the daughter of Lawrence and Florence Lee. After her death from tuberculosis in March 1939, Blake married Marion Gant Tyler (1896-1982), widow of Willie Tyler, violinist, and daughter of James H. Gant and Nattie Thomas, on December 27, 1945 in Norfolk, Virginia. Marion acted as his business manager until her death.
Blake died in Brooklyn, New York, on 1983 February 12. He and Marion are both buried in Cypress Hills Cemetery, Brooklyn, New York.
Sources
The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz, page 114. Death certificate for Avis Blake, dated 1939, New York, New York City Municipal Deaths, 1795-1949," database Family Search, accessed July 5, 2019
Certificate of Marriage for James Hubert Blake and Marion Louise Gant, dated 1945 December 27, Virginia Marriage Certificates, 1936-1988, Family Search, accessed July 5, 2019
Provenance:
Donated to the Archives Center, National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution by Lawrence Dwyer in 2016.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
