Bgcolour	#6495ED
Name	Willem de Kooning
Caption	Willem de Kooning, Woman V (1952-53), National Gallery of Australia
Birthdate	April 24, 1904
Birthplace	Rotterdam, Netherlands
Deathdate	March 19, 1997
Deathplace	Long Island, New York United States
Nationality	Dutch, American
Field	Abstract expressionism
Works	Woman I, Easter Monday, Attic, Excavation

Willem de Kooning (April 24, 1904 – March 19, 1997) was a Dutch American abstract expressionist artist who was born in Rotterdam, the Netherlands.

In the post-World War II era, de Kooning painted in a style that came to be referred to as Abstract expressionism or Action painting, and was part of a group of artists that came to be known as the New York School. Other painters in this group included Jackson Pollock, Franz Kline, Arshile Gorky, Mark Rothko, Hans Hofmann, Adolph Gottlieb, Robert Motherwell, Philip Guston and Clyfford Still.

Biography

De Kooning's parents, Leendert de Kooning and Cornelia Nobel, were divorced when he was about five years old, and he was raised by his mother and stepfather. His early artistic training included eight years at the Rotterdam Academy of Fine Arts and Techniques. In the 1920s he worked as an assistant to the art director of a Rotterdam department store. and returned to depicting women while also referencing the landscape in such paintings as Woman, Sag harbor and Clam Diggers. He also turned to sculpture in later years, creating a number of works that were later cast in bronze.

On September 14, 1964, De Kooning was presented with the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Lyndon Johnson. In 1986, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts.

In later years, de Kooning was diagnosed with the probability of suffering from Alzheimer's disease. As the style of his later works continued to evolve into early 1989, his vintage works drew increasing profits; at Sotheby's auctions Pink Lady (1944) sold for US$3.6 million in 1987 and Interchange (1955) brought $20.6 million in 1989. In November 2006, Kooning's Woman III was sold by David Geffen to Steven A. Cohen for $137.5 million, making it the second most expensive painting ever sold.

There is much debate over the significance of his 1980s paintings, which became clean, sparse, and almost graphic, while alluding to the biomorphic lines of his early works. Some have said that his very last works present a new direction of compositional complexity and color juxtaposition, and are prophetic of directions that some current painters continue to pursue. Some speculate that his mental condition and years of alcoholism had rendered him unable to carry out the mastery indicated in his early works. Others claim some of these paintings were removed from the studio and exhibited before de Kooning was finished with them. Unfortunately, de Kooning's last works have not been afforded the amount of critical commentary or substantial serious assessment that his earlier works received.

See also

Abstract expressionism

Action painting

Elaine de Kooning

Impasto

Women in art

Woman III

Notes

References

Marika Herskovic, American Abstract and Figurative Expressionism Style Is Timely Art Is Timeless An Illustrated Survey With Artists' Statements, Artwork and Biographies. (New York School Press, 2009.) ISBN 9780967799421. p. 76-79; p. 127; p. 136

Marika Herskovic, American Abstract Expressionism of the 1950s: An Illustrated Survey, (New York School Press, 2003.) ISBN 0-9677994-1-4. p. 94-97

Marika Herskovic, New York School Abstract Expressionists: Artists Choice by Artists, (New York School Press, 2000.) ISBN 0-9677994-0-6. p. 16; p. 36; p. 106-109

Edvard Lieber, Willem de Kooning: Reflections in the Studio, 2000, Harry N. Abrams, Inc. ISBN 0-8109-4560-6

ART USA NOW Ed. by Lee Nordness;Vol.1, (The Viking Press, Inc., 1963.) pp. 134–137

The American Presidency Project

Lifetime Honors - National Medal of Arts

External links

Photo

Links to reproductions

Works by Willem de Kooning at Xavier Hufkens, Brussels

Woman in the Pool (1969) Phoenix Art Museum

Category:Abstract expressionist artists Category:American painters Category:Modern painters Category:American artists Category:Deaths from Alzheimer's disease Kooning, Willem Category:Artists from New York Category:1904 births Category:1997 deaths Category:American people of Dutch descent Category:Dutch immigrants to the United States Category:Naturalized citizens of the United States Kooning, Willem Category:People from New York City Category:People from East Hampton (town), New York Category:People from Greenwich Village, New York Category:People of the New Deal arts projects Category:United States National Medal of Arts recipients Category:20th-century painters

Roger Huntington Sessions (28 December 189616 March 1985) was an American composer (of classical music), critic, and teacher of music.

Life

Sessions was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a family that could trace its roots back to the American revolution. His mother, Ruth Huntington Sessions, was a direct descendent of Samuel Huntington, a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Roger studied music at Harvard University from the age of 14. There he wrote for and subsequently edited the Harvard Musical Review. Graduating at age 18, he went on to study at Yale University under Horatio Parker and Ernest Bloch before teaching at Smith College. His first major compositions came while he was travelling Europe with his wife in his mid-twenties and early thirties.

Returning to the United States in 1933, he taught first at Princeton University (from 1936), moved to the University of California, Berkeley, where he taught from 1945 to 1953, and then returned to Princeton until retiring in 1965. He was appointed Bloch Professor at Berkeley (1966–67), and gave the Charles Eliot Norton Lectures at Harvard University in 1968–69. He continued to teach on a part-time basis at the Juilliard School from 1966 until 1983.

His notable students include John Adams, Milton Babbitt, Jack Behrens, Elmer Bernstein, Robert Cogan, Robert Black, Edward T. Cone, Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, David Del Tredici, Alan Fletcher, Carlton Gamer, Steven Gellman, Miriam Gideon, John Harbison, Walter Hekster, Robert Helps, Andrew Imbrie, Earl Kim, Fred Lerdahl, David Lewin, William Mayer, Conlon Nancarrow, Roger Nixon, Will Ogdon, Claire Polin, Einojuhani Rautavaara, William Schimmel, Richard St. Clair, George Tsontakis, John Veale, Peter Westergaard, Rolv Yttrehus and Ellen Taaffe Zwilich.

He died at the age of 88 in Princeton, New Jersey.

Style

His works written up to 1930 or so are more or less neoclassical in style. Those written between 1930 and 1951 are more or less tonal but harmonically complex. From the Solo Violin Sonata of 1953 on, he wrote almost exclusively in a serial style.

Major works

Symphony No. 1 (1927)

The Black Maskers Orchestral Suite (1928)

Piano Sonata No. 1 (1930)

Violin Concerto (1935)

String Quartet No. 1 (1936)

Duo for Violin and Piano (1942)

From my Diary (Pages from a Diary) (1940)

Piano Sonata No. 2 (1946)

Symphony No. 2 (1946)

The Trial of Lucullus (1947), one-act opera

String Quartet No. 2 (1951)

Sonata for Solo Violin (1953)

Idyll of Theocritus (1954)

Piano Concerto (1956)

Symphony No. 3 (1957)

String Quintet (1957 or 1957–58)

Symphony No. 4 (1958)

Divertimento for Orchestra (1959)

Montezuma (1963), opera in three acts (libretto by Giuseppe Antonio Borgese)

Symphony No. 5 (1964)

Piano Sonata No. 3 (1965)

Symphony No. 6 (1966)

Six Pieces for Violoncello (1966)

Symphony No. 7 (1967)

Symphony No. 8 (1968)

Rhapsody for Orchestra (1970)

Concerto for Violin, Violoncello, and Orchestra (1971)

When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d (1971)

Concertino for Chamber Orchestra (1972)

Five Pieces for Piano (1975)

Symphony No. 9 (October 1978)

Concerto for Orchestra (1981)

Duo for Violin and Violoncello (1981), incomplete

Some works received their first professional performance many years after completion. The Sixth Symphony (1966) was given its first complete performance on March 4, 1977 by the Juilliard Orchestra in New York City

The Ninth Symphony (1978), commissioned by the Syracuse Symphony Orchestra and Frederik Prausnitz, was premiered on January 17, 1980 by the same orchestra conducted by Christopher Keene.

Writings

Sessions, Roger. Harmonic Practice. New York: Harcourt, Brace. 1951. LCCN 51008476.

Sessions, Roger. Reflections on the Music Life in the United States. New York: Merlin Press. 1956. LCCN 56012976.

Sessions, Roger. The Musical Experience of Composer, Performer, Listener. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. 1950, republished 1958.

Sessions, Roger. Questions About Music. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. 1970, reprinted New York: Norton, 1971. ISBN 0-674-74350-4.

Sessions, Roger. Roger Sessions on Music: Collected Essays, edited by Edward T. Cone. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1979. ISBN 0-691-09126-9 (cloth) ISBN 0-691-10074-8 (pbk)

Sources

Cone, Edward, ed. Roger Sessions on Music: Collected Essays. Princeton, N.J. : Princeton University Press, 1979. ISBN 0-691-09126-9 and ISBN 0-691-10074-8.

Olmstead, Andrea. Conversations with Roger Sessions. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1987. ISBN 1-55553-010-9.

Olmstead, Andrea. The Correspondence of Roger Sessions. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1992. ISBN 1-55553-122-9.

Olmstead, Andrea. Roger Sessions: A Biography. New York: Routledge, 2008. ISBN 978-0-415-97713-5 (hardback) ISBN 978-0-415-97714-2 (pbk.) ISBN 978-0-203-93147-9 (ebook)

Olmstead, Andrea. "Sessions, Roger (Huntington)". The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell. London: Macmillan Publishers, 2001.

Prausnitz, Frederik. Roger Sessions: How a "Difficult" Composer Got That Way. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. ISBN 0-19-510892-2

Notes

External links

The Roger Sessions Society

Art of the States: Roger Sessions

biographer/Andrea Olmstead contains a discography

The Seymour Shifrin Papers at Irving S. Gilmore Music Library, Yale University Shifrin's papers include two MSS by Roger Sessions

Category:1896 births Category:1985 deaths Category:20th-century classical composers Category:American composers Category:Guggenheim Fellows Category:Harvard University alumni Category:Kent School alumni Category:Opera composers Category:Princeton University faculty Category:Pulitzer Prize for Music winners Category:University of California, Berkeley alumni

Name	Robert Rauschenberg
Caption	Robert Rauschenberg
Birthname	Milton Ernst Rauschenberg
Birthdate	October 22, 1925
Death date	May 12, 2008
Birthplace	Port Arthur, Texas, US
Deathdate	May 12, 2008
Deathplace	Captiva, Florida, US
Nationality	American
Field	Assemblage
Training	Kansas City Art InstituteAcadémie JulianBlack Mountain College Art Students League of New York
Movement	Neo-Dada
Works	Canyon (1959), Monogram (1959)
Copyright	Rauschenberg Estate/VAGA, NYC

Robert Rauschenberg (October 22, 1925 – May 12, 2008) was an American artist who came to prominence in the 1950s transition from Abstract Expressionism to Pop Art. Rauschenberg is well-known for his "Combines" of the 1950s, in which non-traditional materials and objects were employed in innovative combinations. Rauschenberg was both a painter and a sculptor and the Combines are a combination of both, but he also worked with photography, printmaking, papermaking, and performance. He was awarded the National Medal of Arts in 1993.

Rauschenberg lived and worked in New York City as well as on Captiva Island, Florida until his death from heart failure on May 12, 2008. His father was of German and Cherokee ancestry and his mother of Anglo-Saxon descent. His parents were Fundamentalist Christians.

Josef Albers originally of the Bauhaus school became Rauschenberg's painting instructor at Black Mountain. Albers' preliminary courses relied on strict discipline that did not allow for any "uninfluenced experimentation". Rauschenberg described Albers as influencing him to do "exactly the reverse" of what he was being taught.

From 1949 to 1952 Rauschenberg studied with Vaclav Vytlacil and Morris Kantor at the Art Students League of New York, where he met fellow artists Knox Martin and Cy Twombly.

Rauschenberg married Susan Weil in 1950. Their only child, Christopher, was born July 16, 1951. They divorced in 1953. According to a 1987 oral history by the composer Morton Feldman, after the end of his marriage, Rauschenberg had romantic relationships with fellow artists Cy Twombly and Jasper Johns. An article by Jonathan D. Katz states that Rauschenberg's affair with Twombly began during his marriage to Susan Weil.

Rauschenberg died on May 12, 2008, on Captiva Island, Florida. He died of heart failure after a personal decision to go off life support,. Rauschenberg is survived by his partner of 25 years, artist Darryl Pottorf,

A memorial exhibition of photographs opened October 22, 2008, (on the occasion of what would have been his 83rd birthday) and closed November 5, 2008 at the Guggenheim Museum.

Artistic contribution

Rauschenberg's approach was sometimes called "Neo Dadaist," a label he shared with the painter Jasper Johns. Rauschenberg's was quoted as saying that he wanted to work "in the gap between art and life" suggesting he questioned the distinction between art objects and everyday objects, reminiscent of the issues raised by the "Fountain," by Dada pioneer, Marcel Duchamp. At the same time, Johns' paintings of numerals, flags, and the like, were reprising Duchamp's message of the role of the observer in creating art's meaning.

Alternatively, in 1961, Rauschenberg took a step in what could be considered the opposite direction by championing the role of creator in creating art's meaning. Rauschenberg was invited to participate in an exhibition at the Galerie Iris Clert, where artists were to create and display a portrait of the owner, Iris Clert. Rauschenberg's submission consisted of a telegram sent to the gallery declaring "This is a portrait of Iris Clert if I say so." , 1998.]]

By 1962, Rauschenberg's paintings were beginning to incorporate not only found objects but found images as well - photographs transferred to the canvas by means of the silkscreen process. Previously used only in commercial applications, silkscreen allowed Rauschenberg to address the multiple reproducibility of images, and the consequent flattening of experience that implies. In this respect, his work is contemporaneous with that of Andy Warhol, and both Rauschenberg and Johns are frequently cited as important forerunners of American Pop Art.

In 1966, Billy Klüver and Rauschenberg officially launched Experiments in Art and Technology (E.A.T.) a non-profit organization established to promote collaborations between artists and engineers.

In 1984, Rauschenberg announced his Rauschenberg Overseas Culture Interchange, or ROCI, at the United Nations. This would culminate in a seven year, ten country tour to encourage "world peace and understanding," through Mexico, Chile, Venezuela, Beijing, Lhasa (Tibet), Japan, Cuba, Soviet Union, Berlin, and Malaysia in which he left a piece of art, and was influenced by the cultures he visited. Paintings, often on reflective surfaces, as well as drawings, photographs, assemblages and other multimedia were produced, inspired by these surroundings, and this was considered some of his strongest works. The ROCI venture, supported by the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., went on view in 1991.

In 1986, he was commissioned by BMW to paint a full size BMW 635 CSi for the sixth installment of the famed BMW Art Car Project. Rauschenberg's contribution was the first to include the wheels in the project, as well as incorporating previous works of art into the design.

In addition to painting and sculpture, Rauschenberg's career has also included significant contributions to printmaking and Performance Art. He also won a Grammy Award for his album design of Talking Heads' album Speaking in Tongues. As of 2003 he worked from his home and studio in Captiva, Florida.

In a famously cited incident of 1953, Rauschenberg erased a drawing by de Kooning, which he obtained from his colleague for the express purpose of erasing it as an artistic statement. The result is titled Erased de Kooning Drawing. In 1964 Rauschenberg was the first American artist to win the Grand Prize at the Venice Biennale (Mark Tobey and James Whistler had previously won the Painting Prize). After that time, he enjoyed a rare degree of institutional support. In 1951 Rauschenberg had his first one-man show at the Betty Parsons Gallery and in 1954 had a second one-man show at the Charles Egan Gallery.

The White Paintings, Black Paintings, and Red Paintings

In 1951 Rauschenberg created his "White Paintings," in the tradition of monochromatic painting, whose purpose was to reduce painting to its most essential nature, and to subsequently lead to the possibility of pure experience. The "White Paintings" were shown at Eleanor Ward's Stable Gallery in New York during October 1953. They appear at first to be essentially blank, white canvas. However, one commentator said that "…rather than thinking of them as destructive reductions, it might be more productive to see them, as John Cage did, as hypersensitive screens – what Cage suggestively described as ‘airports of the lights, shadows and particles.’ In front of them, the smallest adjustments in lighting and atmosphere might be registered on their surface. Rauschenberg himself said that they were affected by ambient conditions, "so you could almost tell how many people are in the room." The Black Paintings of 1951 like the White Paintings were executed on multiple panels and were single colour works. Here Rauschenberg incorporated pieces of newspaper into the painting working the paper into the paint so that sometimes newspaper could be seen and in other places could not. By 1953-1954 Rauschenberg had moved from the monochromatic paintings of the White Painting and Black Painting series, to the Red Painting series. These paintings were created with diverse kinds of paint applications of red paint, and with the addition of materials such as wood, nails, newsprint and other materials to the canvas created complex painting surfaces, and were forerunners of Rauschenberg's well-known Combine series.

Rauschenberg's comment concerning the gap between art and life can be seen as a statement which provides the departure point for an understanding of his contributions as an artist. In particular his series of works which he called Combines served as instances in which the delineated boundaries between art and sculpture were broken down so that both were present in a single work of art. Technically "Combines" refers to Rauschenberg's work from 1954 to 1962, but the artist had begun collaging newsprint and photographic materials in his work and the impetus to combine both painting materials and everyday objects such as clothing, urban debris, and taxidermied animals such as in Monogram continued throughout his artistic life.

Considered the first of the Combines, Bed was created by dripping red paint across a quilt.The quilt was later stretched and displayed as a work of art. Some critics according the UK Telegraph considered the work to be a symbol for violence and rape.

Historical perspectives

Critics originally viewed the Combines in terms of the formal aspects of art, shape, color, texture, and the composition and arrangement of these. This 1960's view has changed over time so that more recently critics and art historians see the Combines as carrying codified messages difficult to decipher because there is no apparent order to the presentation of the objects.

See also

Arte Povera

Assemblage (art)

Happening

Experiments in Art and Technology

Art Students League of New York

Moon Museum

References

Further reading

Busch, Julia M., A Decade of Sculpture: the New Media in the 1960s (The Art Alliance Press: Philadelphia; Associated University Presses: London, 1974) ISBN 0-87982-007-1, ISBN 978-0-87982-007-7.

Marika Herskovic, New York School Abstract Expressionists Artists Choice by Artists, (New York School Press, 2000.) ISBN 0-9677994-0-6. p. 8; p. 32; p. 38; p. 294-297.

Fugelso, Karl. "Robert Rauschenberg's Inferno Illuminations." In: Postmodern Medievalisms. Ed. Richard Utz and Jesse G. Swan (Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 2004). Pp. 47-66.

Sweeney, Louise M. "Rauschenberg's Worldwide Quest for Art and Ideas," The Christian Science Monitor, May 20, 1991.

External links

Robert Rauschenberg Foundation 2010

Robert Rauschenberg artwork at Brooke Alexander Gallery

Robert Rauschenberg biography on the New York Guggenheim Museum website.

Current exhibitions on Artfacts.net

Screening of Robert Rauschenberg's 1966 Film "Open Score" at the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, D.C.

"OUR PICASSO?", Village Voice

1997 Vanity Fair Profile

Art Quotations by Robert Rauschenberg - The Painter's Keys Resource of Art Quotations

disorientations.com Obituary

Dossier : Robert Rauschenberg, Combines (1953-1964) , exhibition at the Centre Pompidou, 2006

Cardbird VI from the Cardbird Series (1971)

Category:AIGA Medalists Category:American painters Category:American printmakers Category:American sculptors Category:Assemblage artists Category:Modern painters Category:Pop artists Category:Contemporary painters Category:Black Mountain College alumni Category:Art Students League of New York alumni Category:Members of the American Academy of Arts and Letters Category:Artists from Texas Category:Artists from New York Category:Artists from Florida Category:United States National Medal of Arts recipients Category:People from Port Arthur, Texas Category:American people of Native American descent Category:American people of Cherokee descent Category:American people of German descent Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Bisexual artists Category:Gay artists Category:1925 births Category:2008 deaths Category:Kansas City Art Institute alumni Category:American members of the Churches of Christ

Name	Isaac Hayes
Background	solo_singer
Birth name	Isaac Lee Hayes, Jr.
Alias
Born	August 20, 1942Covington, Tennessee
Died	August 10, 2008Memphis, Tennessee
Origin	The United States of America
Instrument	the piano, keyboard instruments, vocals, and the saxophone
Genre	R&B;, funk music, soul music, disco
Voice type	bass
Occupation	Singer-songwriter, arranger, record producer, actor
Years active	1962–2008
Label	Enterprise/Stax, ABC, Columbia Records, Point Blank
Associated acts	David Porter, Booker T. & the MGs, The Bar-Kays
Url	www.isaachayes.com

Isaac Lee Hayes, Jr. (August 20, 1942 – August 10, 2008) was an American songwriter, musician, singer, and occasionally an actor. Hayes was one of the creative geniuses behind the southern soul music label Stax Records, where he served both as an in-house songwriter and as a record producer, teaming with his partner David Porter during the mid-1960s. Hayes, Porter, Bill Withers, the Sherman Brothers, Steve Cropper, and John Fogerty were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2005 in recognition of writing scores of notable songs for themselves, the duo "Sam & Dave", Carla Thomas, and others.

The hit song "Soul Man" written by Hayes and Porter, and first performed by "Sam & Dave" has been recognized as one of the most influential songs of the past 50 years by the Grammy Hall of Fame. This song was also honored by The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, by Rolling Stone magazine, and by the RIAA as the Songs of the Century.

During the late 1960s, Hayes also became a recording musician, and he recorded several successful soul albums such as Hot Buttered Soul (1969) and Black Moses (1971). In addition to his work in popular music, Hayes worked as composer of musical scores for motion pictures.

Hayes is well known for his musical score for the film Shaft (1971). For his composition of the Theme from Shaft, Hayes was awarded the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1972. Other than such distinguished actors as Sidney Poitier and Hattie McDaniel, Hayes became the first African-American to win an Academy Award in any field whatsoever covered by Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Hayes also won two Grammy Awards for that same year. Later, he was given his third Grammy Award for his music album Black Moses.

During 1992, in recognition of his humanitarian work there, Hayes was crowned as the honorary king of the Ada, Ghana region. Hayes also acted in motion pictures and television, such as in the movie, I'm Gonna Git You Sucka. Then from 1997 to 2005, he lent his distinctive, deep voice to the character "Chef" on the animated TV series South Park, and also to Gandolf "Gandy" Fitch in the TV series The Rockford Files (1974 – 80).

On August 5, 2003, Isaac Hayes was honored as a BMI Icon at the 203 BMI Urban Awards for his enduring influence on generations of music makers. Throughout his songwriting career, Hayes received five BMI R&B; Awards, two BMI Pop Awards, two BMI Urban Awards and six Million-Air citations. As of 2008, his songs generated more than 12 million performances.

Hayes's life and career

Early years

Isaac Hayes was born in Covington, Tennessee, in Tipton County. He was the second-born child of Isaac Hayes, Sr., and Eula Hayes.

After his mother died young, and his father abandoned his family, Isaac, Jr., was raised by his maternal grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Willie Wade, Sr. The child of a poor sharecropper family, he grew up picking cotton on farms in Shelby County, Tennessee and in Tipton County.

Hayes dropped out of high school, but he was later encouraged by his former high school teachers at Manassas High School in Memphis to complete his high school diploma, which he did at the age of 21. After graduating from high school, Hayes was offered several music scholarships from colleges and universities. Hayes turned down all of them because of his obligations to his immediate family. Hayes next worked at a meat-packing plant in Memphis by day, and he played music at nightclubs and juke joints several evenings a week in Memphis and nearby northern Mississippi.

Stax Records and Shaft

Hayes began his recording career in the early 1960s, as a session player for various acts of the Memphis-based Stax Records. He later wrote a string of hit songs with songwriting partner David Porter, including "You Don't Know Like I Know", "Soul Man", "When Something Is Wrong with My Baby", and "Hold On I'm Comin" for Sam & Dave. Hayes, Porter and Stax studio band Booker T. & the M.G.'s were also the producers for Sam & Dave, Carla Thomas and other Stax artists during the mid-1960s. Hayes-Porter contributed to the Stax sound made famous during this period, and Sam & Dave credited Hayes for helping develop both their sound and style. In 1968, Hayes released his debut album, Presenting Isaac Hayes, a jazzy, largely improvised effort that was commercially unsuccessful.

His next album was Hot Buttered Soul, which was released in 1969 after Stax had gone through a major upheaval. The label had lost its largest star, Otis Redding, in a plane crash in December 1967. Stax lost all of its back catalog to Atlantic Records in May 1968. As a result, Stax executive vice president Al Bell called for 27 new albums to be completed in mid-1969; Hot Buttered Soul, was the most successful of these releases. before breaking into song, and the lone original number, the funky "Hyperbolicsyllabicsesquedalymistic" runs nearly ten minutes, a significant break from the standard three minute soul/pop songs.

"Walk On By" would be the first of many times Hayes would take a Burt Bacharach standard, generally made famous as three-minute pop songs by Dionne Warwick or Dusty Springfield, and transform it into a soulful, lengthy and almost gospel number.

In 1970, Hayes released two albums, The Isaac Hayes Movement and To Be Continued. The former stuck to the four-song template of his previous album. Jerry Butler's "I Stand Accused" begins with a trademark spoken word monologue, and Bacharach's "I Just Don't Know What to Do with Myself" is re-worked. The latter spawned the classic "The Look Of Love", another Bacharach song transformed into an eleven-minute epic of lush orchestral rhythm (mid-way it breaks into a rhythm guitar jam for a couple of minutes before suddenly resuming the slow love song). An edited three-minute version was issued as a single. Hayes won an Academy Award for Best Original Song for the "Theme from Shaft," and was nominated for Best Original Dramatic Score for the film's score.

Later in the year, Hayes released a double album, Black Moses, that expanded on his earlier sounds and featured The Jackson 5's song "Never Can Say Goodbye". Another single, "I Can't Help It", was not featured on the album.

In 1972, Hayes would record the theme tune for the TV series The Men and enjoy a hit single (with "Type Thang" as a B-side).

Hayes was back in 1973 with an acclaimed live double album, Live At Sahara Tahoe, and followed it up with the album Joy, with the eerie beat of the fifteen-minute title track. He moved away from cover songs with this album. An edited "Joy" would be a hit single.

In 1974, Hayes was featured in the blaxploitation films Three Tough Guys and Truck Turner, and he recorded soundtracks for both. Tough Guys was almost devoid of vocals and Truck Turner yielded a single with the title theme. The soundtrack score was eventually used by filmmaker Quentin Tarantino in the Kill Bill film series and has been used for over 30 years as the opening score of Brazilian radio show Jornal de Esportes on the Jovem Pan station.

HBS (Hot Buttered Soul Records) and bankruptcy

By 1974, Stax Records was having serious financial problems, stemming from problems with overextension and limited record sales and distribution. Hayes himself was deep in debt to Union Planters Bank, which administered loans for the Stax label and many of its other key employees. In September of that year, Hayes sued Stax for $5.3 million. As Stax was in deep debt and could not pay, the label made an arrangement with Hayes and Union Planters: Stax released Hayes from his recording and production contracts, and Union Planters would collect all of Hayes' income and apply it towards his debts. Hayes formed his own label, Hot Buttered Soul, which released its product through ABC Records. His new album, 1975's Chocolate Chip saw Hayes embrace the disco sound with the title track and lead single. "I Can't Turn Around" would prove a popular song as time went on. This would be Hayes' last album to chart top 40 for many years. Later in the year, the all instrumental Disco Connection album fully embraced disco.

In 1976, the album cover of Juicy Fruit featured Hayes in a pool with naked women, and spawned the title track single and the classic "Storm Is Over". Later the same year the Groove-A-Thon album featured the singles "Rock Me Easy Baby" and the title track. However, while all these albums were regarded as solid efforts, Hayes was no longer selling large numbers. He and his wife were forced into bankruptcy in 1976, as they owed over $6 million. By the end of the bankruptcy proceedings in 1977, Hayes had lost his home, much of his personal property, and the rights to all future royalties earned from the music he'd written, performed, and produced.

Basketball team ownership

On July 17, 1974, Hayes, along with Mike Storen, Avron Fogelman and Kemmons Wilson took over ownership of the American Basketball Association team the Memphis Tams. The prior owner was Charles O. Finley, the owner of the Oakland A's baseball team. Hayes' group renamed the team the Memphis Sounds. Despite a 66% increase in home attendance, hiring well regarded coach Joe Mullaney and, unlike in the prior three seasons, making the 1975 ABA Playoffs (losing to the eventual champion Kentucky Colonels in the Eastern Division semifinals), the team's financial problems continued. The group was given a deadline of June 1, 1975 to sell 4,000 season tickets, obtain new investors and arrange a more favorable lease for the team at the Mid-South Coliseum. The group did not come through and the ABA took over the team, selling it to a group in Maryland that renamed the team the Baltimore Hustlers and then the Baltimore Claws before the club finally folded during preseason play for the 1975-1976 season.

Polydor and hiatus, film work, and the Duke of New York

In 1977, Hayes was back with a new deal with Polydor Records, a live album of duets with Dionne Warwick did moderately well, and his comeback studio album New Horizon sold better and enjoyed a hit single "Out The Ghetto", and also featured the popular "It's Heaven To Me".

1978's For The Sake Of Love saw Hayes record a sequel to "Theme from Shaft" ("Shaft II"), but was most famous for the single "Zeke The Freak", a song that would have a shelf life of decades and be a major part of the House movement in the UK. The same year, Fantasy Records, which had bought out Stax Records, released an album of Hayes' non-album singles and archived recordings as a "new" album, Hotbed, in 1978.

In 1979, Hayes returned to the Top 40 with Don't Let Go and its disco-styled title track that became a hit single (U.S. #18), and also featured the classic "A Few More Kisses To Go". Later in the year he added vocals and worked on Millie Jackson's album Royal Rappin's, and a song he co-wrote, "Deja Vu", became a hit for Dionne Warwick and won her a Grammy for best female R&B; vocal.

Neither 1980s And Once Again or 1981's Lifetime Thing produced notable songs or big sales, and Hayes chose to take a break from music to pursue acting.

In the 1970s, Hayes featured in the films Shaft (1971) and Truck Turner (1974); he also had a recurring role in the TV series The Rockford Files as an old cellmate of Rockford's, Gandolph Fitch (who always referred to Rockford as "Rockfish" much to his annoyance), including one episode alongside duet-partner Dionne Warwick. In the 1980s and 90s, he appeared in numerous films, notably Escape from New York (1981), I'm Gonna Git You Sucka (1988), Prime Target (1991), and (1993), as well as in episodes of The A-Team and Miami Vice. He also attempted a musical comeback, embracing the style of drum machines and synth for 1986s U-Turn and 1988s Love Attack, though neither proved successful. In 1991 he was featured in a duet with fellow soul singer Barry White on White's ballad "Dark and Lovely (You Over There)". In 1991 Hayes produced the still controversial "Origin of the Feces" for Type O Negative.

Return to fame and stardom

In 1995 Hayes appeared as a Las Vegas minister impersonating Isaac Hayes in the comedy series the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

Hayes launched a comeback on the Virgin label in May 1995 with Branded, an album of new material that earned impressive sales figures as well as positive reviews from critics who proclaimed it a return to form. A companion album released around the same time, Raw and Refined, featured a collection of previously unreleased instrumentals, both old and new.

In a rather unexpected career move shortly thereafter, Hayes charged back into the public consciousness as a founding star of Comedy Central's controversial — and wildly successful — animated TV series, South Park. Hayes provided the voice for the character of "Chef", the amorous elementary-school lunchroom cook, from the show's debut on August 13, 1997 (one week shy of his 55th birthday), through the end of its ninth season in 2006. The role of Chef drew on Hayes's talents both as an actor and as a singer, thanks to the character's penchant for making conversational points in the form of crudely suggestive soul songs. An album of songs from the series appeared in 1998 with the title reflecting Chef's popularity with the show's fans, and the Chef song "Chocolate Salty Balls" became a number-one U.K. hit. However, when South Park leaped to the big screen the following year with the smash animated musical , Hayes/Chef was the only major character who did not perform a showcase song in the film; his lone musical contribution was "Good Love," a track on the soundtrack album which originally appeared on Black Moses in 1971 and is not heard in the movie (more on Chef below).

In 2000, Isaac Hayes appeared in the soundtrack of the French film "The Magnet" on the song "Is It Really Home" written and composed by rapper Akhenaton (IAM) and composer Bruno Coulais.

Hayes was inducted into the Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame in 2002. The same year, a documentary highlighting Isaac's career and his impact on many of the Memphis artists in the 1960s onwards was produced, "Only The Strong Survive".

In 2004, Hayes appeared in a recurring minor role as the Jaffa Tolok on the television series Stargate SG-1. The following year, he appeared in the critically acclaimed independent film Hustle & Flow.

Scientology activism

Hayes joined Scientology around 1995. He contributed endorsement blurbs for many Scientology books. The frontispiece page for Scientology: The Fundamentals of Thought (1997 paperback edition) quotes Hayes as saying "If you really want to know about the mind, the spirit and life itself, read Scientology: The Fundamentals of Thought. It will put you on the right path!" In 1996, Hayes began hosting The Isaac Hayes and Friends Radio Show on WRKS in New York City. While there Hayes became a client of young vegan raw food chef, Elijah Joy and his company Organic Soul, Inc. Hayes also appears in the Scientology film Orientation.

In 1998 Hayes and fellow Scientologist entertainers Anne Archer, Chick Corea and Haywood Nelson attended the 30th anniversary of Freedom Magazine, the Church of Scientology's investigative news journal, at the National Press Club in Washington DC, to honor eleven human rights activists.

In 2001, Hayes and Doug E. Fresh, another Scientologist musician, recorded a Scientology-inspired album called The Joy Of Creating – The Golden Era Musicians And Friends Play L. Ron Hubbard.

Charitable work

The Isaac Hayes Foundation was founded in 1999 by Hayes.

In February 2006, Hayes appeared in a Youth for Human Rights International music video called "United". YHRI is a human rights group founded by the Church of Scientology.

Hayes was also involved in other human rights related groups such as the One Campaign. Isaac Hayes was crowned a king in Ghana for his humanitarian work and economic efforts on the country’s behalf.

Family

Hayes fathered 12 children, and had 14 grandchildren and three great-grandchildren. His fourth wife, Adjowa, gave birth to a son named Nana Kwadjo Hayes on April 10, 2006. One son is his namesake, Isaac Hayes III, known as rap producer Ike Dirty. Hayes' eldest daughter is named Veronica, and he also had a daughter named Heather Hayes.

Hayes' first marriage, in 1960, ended in divorce.

He married bank teller Mignon Harley on April 18, 1973, and they divorced in 1986; they had two children. For her wedding gift, Hayes gave her a matching convertible Jaguar. The couple resided in a mansion with maid service. Hayes and his wife were forced into bankruptcy, owing over $6 million. Over the years, Isaac Hayes was able to recover financially.

Stroke and death

On March 20, 2006, Roger Friedman of Fox News reported that Hayes had suffered a minor stroke in January. but on October 26, 2006, Hayes himself confirmed that he had suffered a stroke.

Two years later, Hayes was found unconscious in his home located just east of Memphis on August 10, 2008, as reported by the Shelby County, Tennessee Sheriff's Department. A Shelby County Sheriff's deputy and an ambulance from Rural Metro responded to his home after his wife found him on the floor near a still-running treadmill. Hayes was taken to Baptist Memorial Hospital in Memphis, where he was pronounced dead at 2:08pm. Hayes was ten days from his 66th birthday. The cause of death was not immediately clear, though the area medical examiners later listed a recurrence of stroke as the cause of death.

Hayes is buried in the Memorial Park Cemetery in Memphis, Tennessee.

South Park

on South Park.]]

During the late 1990s, Hayes gained new popularity as the voice of Chef on the Comedy Central animated television series South Park. Chef was a soul-singing cafeteria worker at the South Park kids' school. A song from the series performed by Chef, "Chocolate Salty Balls (P.S. I Love You)", received international radio airplay in 1999. It reached number-one on the UK singles chart and also on the Irish singles chart. The track also appeared on the album in 1998.

Scientology episode

In the South Park episode "Trapped in the Closet", a satire of Scientology which aired on November 16, 2005, Hayes did not appear in his role as Chef. While appearing on the Opie and Anthony radio show about a month after the episode aired, Hayes was asked, "What did you think about when Matt and Trey did that episode on Scientology?", he replied, "One thing about Matt and Trey, they lampoon everybody, and if you take that serious, I'll sell you the Brooklyn Bridge for two dollars. That's what they do."

In an interview for The A.V. Club on January 4, 2006, Hayes was again asked about the episode. He said that he told the creators, Matt Stone and Trey Parker, "Guys, you have it all wrong. We're not like that. I know that’s your thing, but get your information correct, because somebody might believe that shit, you know?" He then told them to take a couple of Scientology courses to understand what they do. In the interview, Hayes defended South Park's style of controversial humor, noting that he was not pleased with the show's treatment of Scientology, but conceding that he "understands what Matt and Trey are doing."

Departure from South Park

On March 13, 2006, a statement was issued in Hayes' name, indicating that he was asking to be released from his contract with Comedy Central, citing recent episodes which satirized religious beliefs as being intolerant. "There is a place in this world for satire, but there is a time when satire ends and intolerance and bigotry towards religious beliefs of others begins," he was quoted in a press statement. The statement, however, did not directly mention Scientology. A response from Stone said that Hayes' complaints stemmed from the show's criticism of Scientology and that he "has no problem – and he's cashed plenty of checks – with our show making fun of Christians, Muslims, Mormons or Jews." Stone adds, "[We] never heard a peep out of Isaac in any way until we did Scientology. He wants a different standard for religions other than his own, and to me, that is where intolerance and bigotry begin." Stone and Parker agreed to release Hayes from his contract by his request.

On March 20, 2006, Roger Friedman of Fox News reported having been told that the March 13 statement was made in Hayes' name, but not by Hayes himself. He wrote: "Isaac Hayes did not quit South Park. My sources say that someone quit it for him. ... Friends in Memphis tell me that Hayes did not issue any statements on his own about South Park. They are mystified." In 2007, the New York Post reported that Hayes felt Stone and Parker "didn’t pay [him] enough" and "weren’t that nice."

The South Park season 10 premiere (aired March 22, 2006) featured "The Return of Chef", a thinly veiled telling of the affair from Parker and Stone's point of view. Using sound clips from past episodes, it depicts Chef as having been brainwashed and urges viewers (via Kyle talking to the town) to "remember Chef as the jolly old guy who always broke into song" and not to blame Chef for his defection, but rather, as Kyle stated, "be mad at that fruity little club for scrambling his brains."

After South Park

Hayes’ income was sharply reduced as a result of leaving South Park. There followed announcements that he would be touring and performing. A reporter present at a January 2007 show in New York City, who had known Hayes fairly well, reported that "Isaac was plunked down at a keyboard, where he pretended to front his band. He spoke-sang, and his words were halting. He was not the Isaac Hayes of the past." Two months after his death, the South Park episode "The China Probrem" was dedicated to him.

During the spring of 2008, Hayes shot scenes for a comedy about soul musicians inspired by the history of Stax Records entitled Soul Men, in which he appears as himself in a supporting role. His voice can be heard in the film in a voice-over role as Samuel L. Jackson, Bernie Mac, and Sharon Leal's characters are traveling through Memphis, Tennessee. His first actual appearance in the film is when he is shown in the audience clapping his hands as The Real Deal does a rendition of Hayes' 1971 hit song "Do Your Thing." His next appearance consists of him entering The Real Deal's dressing room to wish them luck on their performance and shaking hands with Louis Hinds (played by Jackson) and Floyd Henderson (played by Mac). During this scene, Hayes also helps Hinds reunite with his long-lost daughter Cleo (played by Leal). His final appearance in the film consists of him introducing The Real Deal to the audience. |rowspan=3|Won |Best Instrumental Arrangement (For the song "Theme from Shaft", arranged with Johnny Allen) |Shaft |- |Best Original Score Written for a Motion Picture or a Television Special |Shaft |- |1973 | Best Pop Instrumental Performance By An Arranger, Composer, Orchestra and/or Choral Leader |Black Moses |- |1999 |NAACP Image Award |Nominated |Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series |South Park |- |2006 |Screen Actors Guild Award |Nominated |Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture |Hustle & Flow (Shared with cast) |}

Discography

Top Forty US and UK albums

1969: Hot Buttered Soul (US #8)

1970: The Isaac Hayes Movement (by The Isaac Hayes Movement, US #8)

1970: ...To Be Continued (US #11)

1971: Shaft (US #1)

1971: Black Moses (US #10)

1973: Joy (US #16)

1973: Live at the Sahara Tahoe (US #14)

1975: Chocolate Chip (US #18)

1979: Don't Let Go (US #39)

Top Forty US and UK singles

1969: "Walk On By" (US #30)

1969: "By the Time I Get to Phoenix" (US #37)

1971: "Theme from Shaft" (US #1)

1971: "Never Can Say Goodbye" (US #22)

1972: "Do Your Thing" (US #30)

1973: "Joy" (US #30)

1980: "Don't Let Go" (US #18)

1998: (as Chef) "Chocolate Salty Balls" (UK #1)

Selected songwriting and production with David Porter

1965: "Candy" by The Astors

1965: "You Don't Know Like I Know" by Sam & Dave

1966: "Let Me Be Good to You" by Carla Thomas

1966: "B-A-B-Y" by Carla Thomas

1966: "Your Good Thing (Is About to End)" by Mabel John(later a big hit by Lou Rawls) .

1966: "Hold On, I'm Comin'" by Sam & Dave

1967: "When Something is Wrong with My Baby" by Sam & Dave

1967: "Soul Man" by Sam & Dave

1968: "I Thank You" by Sam & Dave

1969: "So I Can Love You" by The Emotions (production only)

1969: "The Sweeter He Is" by The Soul Children

1969: "Soul Sister Brown Sugar" by Sam & Dave

1979: "Deja Vu" by Dionne Warwick (co-written by Hayes and Adrienne Anderson)

2000: "I Can't Go To Sleep" by Wu-Tang Clan

Filmography

References

External links

Isaac Hayes Online Memorial

Isaac Hayes Memorial

IsaacHayes.com

Pete Lewis of 'Blues & Soul' Pays Tribute To Isaac Hayes on the BBC News Channel, August 11 2008

Site of Isaac Hayes' breakout gig

[ Isaac Hayes] at Allmusic

Isaac Hayes at Wenig-LaMonica Associates

MP3 audio interview with Stax Records expert Rob Bowman on the radio program The Sound of Young America, including information on Hayes' performance at Wattstax

Isaac Hayes Final Interview with L.A. Record(7/31/2008)

Soul legend Isaac Hayes dies

R.I.P Issac Hayes 1942-2008/Asnycnow15News

Listen to Hayes' "(They Long to Be) Close to You" at Acousmata music blog

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