Hazel Scott
Encyclopedia
Hazel Dorothy Scott was an internationally known, American jazz
and classical pianist
and singer.
, Trinidad and Tobago
to Alma Long Scott, a musician. They moved to New York City
when Hazel was four. Recognized as a child musical prodigy, the young Scott was awarded scholarships to study classical piano at the Juilliard School
from the age of eight. As a teenager, she performed piano and trumpet with her mother’s "Alma Long Scott" all-girl jazz band, which sometimes featured Lil Hardin-Armstrong.
, gaining a reputation as the “hot classicist.” In the mid-1930s, she also performed at the Roseland Dance Hall with the Count Basie Orchestra
. Her early musical theatre appearances in New York included the Cotton Club Revue of 1938, Sing Out the News and The Priorities of 1942.
Throughout the 1930s and 40s, Scott performed jazz
, blues
, ballads, popular (Broadway songs and boogie-woogie
) and classical music in various nightclubs. From 1939 to 1943 she was a leading attraction at both the downtown and uptown branches of Café Society
. Her performances created national prestige for the practice of “swinging the classics”. By 1945 Scott was earning $75,000 ($ today) a year.
In addition to Lena Horne
, Scott was one of the first African American women to garner respectable roles in major Hollywood pictures. She performed as herself in several features, notably I Dood It
(MGM 1943), Broadway Rhythm (MGM 1944), with Lena Horne
and in the otherwise all-white cast The Heat's On
(Columbia 1943), Something to Shout About
(Columbia 1943), and Rhapsody in Blue
(Warner Bros 1945). In the 1940s, in addition to her film appearances, Scott was featured in Café Society’s From Bach to Boogie-Woogie Carnegie Hall
concerts (1941 and 1943).
She was the first woman of color to have her own television show, The Hazel Scott Show
, which premiered on the DuMont Television Network
on July 3, 1950. During a period of continued racism in the advertising industry as well as economic hardships for jazz musicians in general, the show was canceled in 1950. Some journalists speculated that the show was canceled because of her name's appearance in the Red Channels
published by Counterattack. Scott was called to testify by the House Un-American Activities Committee
just before her television variety program was canceled on September 29, 1950. Scott remained publicly opposed to McCarthyism
and racial segregation
throughout her career.
Scott moved to Paris in the late 1950s, where she appeared in the French film Le Désordre et la Nuit’ (1958). She maintained a steady but difficult career in France and touring throughout Europe until returning to the US in 1967. She continued to play occasionally in nightclubs, while also appearing in daytime television until the year of her death. She made her television acting debut in 1973 on the ABC daytime soap opera One Life to Live," performing a wedding song at the nuptials of her "onscreen cousin", Carla Gray Hall, portrayed by Ellen Holly.
Scott recorded as the leader of various groups for Decca
, Columbia
and Signature
, among them a trio that consisted of Bill English and the double bass player Martin Rivera, and another featuring Charles Mingus
on bass and Rudie Nichols on drums. Her album Relaxed Piano Moods on the Debut Record label, with Mingus and Max Roach
, is generally her work most highly regarded by critics today.
, a U.S. Congressman, in Connecticut. They had one child Adam Clayton Powell III
, but divorced in 1960 after an earlier separation.
On January 19, 1961, she married again, to Ezio Bedin, a Swiss-born comedian.
. She was 61 years old, and survived by her son Adam Clayton Powell III. She was buried at Flushing Cemetery
in Queens, New York, near other musicians such as Louis Armstrong, Johnny Hodges, and Dizzy Gillespie.
Scott was best-known internationally as a performer of jazz. She was also accomplished in politics, leading the way for African Americans in entertainment and film; and was successful in dramatic acting and classical music. She was noted for her swinging style, performing at the Milford Plaza Hotel
in her last months.
“Café Society Concert.” Time Magazine 5 May 1941.
“Hazel Scott is Queen Once More in Warner’s ‘Rhapsody in Blue.” Chicago Defender 1 Sep. 1945: 14.
“Scott, Hazel,” CBY 1943 Obituary, J. McAfee, Jr., JSN, ii/4 (1982), 19
Bogle, Donald. 2001. “The Hazel Scott Show” in Primetime Blues: African Americans on Network Television. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, pp. 15–19.
Chilton, Karen. Hazel Scott: The Pioneering Journey of a Jazz Pianist from Cafe Society to Hollywood to HUAC (University of Michigan Press 2008)
Feather, Leonard. 1941. “Swinging the Classics.” The New York Times May 18: X5.
McGee, Kristin. “Swinging the Classics: Hazel Scott and Hollywood’s Musical-Racial Matrix” in Some Liked it Hot: Jazz Women in Film and Television, 1928-1959 (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press 2009 http://www.upne.com/0-8195-6907-0.html]) 113-133.
Myter-Specner, D.: “Hazel Scott, Jazz Pianist: Boogie-woogie and Beyond,” Jazz Research Papers, x (1990), 75
Reed, Bill. 1998. “The Movies: Hazel Scott,” in Hot From Harlem: Profiles in Classic African American Entertainment. Los Angeles: Cellar Door Press, pp. 110–128.
Taubman, E. 1941. “Café Music Heard at Carnegie Hall,” The New York Times 24 Apr. 24: 24.
Taubman, E. 1943. “Swing feature Soviet Benefit: Café Society assures at least a thousand watches for the Russian Fighting Forces” The New York Times 12 Apr. 1943: 28.
,
Taylor, A. “Hazel Scott,” Notes and Tones: Musician-to-musician Interviews (Liège, Belgium, 1977, rev. and enlarged 2/1993)
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
and classical pianist
Pianist
A pianist is a musician who plays the piano. A professional pianist can perform solo pieces, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers, solo instrumentalists, or other performers.-Choice of genres:...
and singer.
Early years and education
Hazel Scott was born in Port of SpainPort of Spain
Port of Spain, also written as Port-of-Spain, is the capital of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago and the country's third-largest municipality, after San Fernando and Chaguanas. The city has a municipal population of 49,031 , a metropolitan population of 128,026 and a transient daily population...
, Trinidad and Tobago
Trinidad and Tobago
Trinidad and Tobago officially the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago is an archipelagic state in the southern Caribbean, lying just off the coast of northeastern Venezuela and south of Grenada in the Lesser Antilles...
to Alma Long Scott, a musician. They moved to New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
when Hazel was four. Recognized as a child musical prodigy, the young Scott was awarded scholarships to study classical piano at the Juilliard School
Juilliard School
The Juilliard School, located at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City, United States, is a performing arts conservatory which was established in 1905...
from the age of eight. As a teenager, she performed piano and trumpet with her mother’s "Alma Long Scott" all-girl jazz band, which sometimes featured Lil Hardin-Armstrong.
Music career
By the age of 16, Hazel Scott regularly performed for radio programs for the Mutual Broadcasting SystemMutual Broadcasting System
The Mutual Broadcasting System was an American radio network, in operation from 1934 to 1999. In the golden age of U.S. radio drama, MBS was best known as the original network home of The Lone Ranger and The Adventures of Superman and as the long-time radio residence of The Shadow...
, gaining a reputation as the “hot classicist.” In the mid-1930s, she also performed at the Roseland Dance Hall with the Count Basie Orchestra
Count Basie Orchestra
The Count Basie Orchestra is a 16 to 18 piece big band, one of the most prominent jazz performing groups of the swing era, founded by Count Basie. The band survived the late '40s decline in big band popularity and went on to produce notable collaborations with singers such as Frank Sinatra and Ella...
. Her early musical theatre appearances in New York included the Cotton Club Revue of 1938, Sing Out the News and The Priorities of 1942.
Throughout the 1930s and 40s, Scott performed jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
, blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
, ballads, popular (Broadway songs and boogie-woogie
Boogie-woogie
Boogie-woogie has the following meanings:*Boogie-woogie, a piano-based music style*Boogie-woogie , a swing dance or a dance that imitates the rock-n-roll dance of the 1950s*"Boogie Woogie" , a song by EuroGroove and Dannii Minogue...
) and classical music in various nightclubs. From 1939 to 1943 she was a leading attraction at both the downtown and uptown branches of Café Society
Café Society
Café society was the collective description for the so-called "Beautiful People" and "Bright Young Things" who gathered in fashionable cafes and restaurants in New York, Paris, and London beginning in the late 19th century...
. Her performances created national prestige for the practice of “swinging the classics”. By 1945 Scott was earning $75,000 ($ today) a year.
In addition to Lena Horne
Lena Horne
Lena Mary Calhoun Horne was an American singer, actress, civil rights activist and dancer.Horne joined the chorus of the Cotton Club at the age of sixteen and became a nightclub performer before moving to Hollywood, where she had small parts in numerous movies, and more substantial parts in the...
, Scott was one of the first African American women to garner respectable roles in major Hollywood pictures. She performed as herself in several features, notably I Dood It
I Dood It
I Dood It is a 1943 MGM musical-comedy film starring Red Skelton and Eleanor Powell, and directed by Vincente Minnelli. The screenplay is by Fred Saidy and Sig Herzig and the film features Richard Ainley, Patricia Dane, Lena Horne and Hazel Scott...
(MGM 1943), Broadway Rhythm (MGM 1944), with Lena Horne
Lena Horne
Lena Mary Calhoun Horne was an American singer, actress, civil rights activist and dancer.Horne joined the chorus of the Cotton Club at the age of sixteen and became a nightclub performer before moving to Hollywood, where she had small parts in numerous movies, and more substantial parts in the...
and in the otherwise all-white cast The Heat's On
The Heat's On
The Heat's On is a movie musical starring Mae West, William Gaxton, and Victor Moore, and released by Columbia Pictures.-Plot:Broadway star Fay Lawrence is a temperamental diva who is reluctantly persuaded by a Broadway producer to star in his latest production.-Production background:Mae West...
(Columbia 1943), Something to Shout About
Something to Shout About (film)
Something to Shout About is a 1943 Columbia musical film directed by Gregory Ratoff. The movie stars Don Ameche and Janet Blair and was nominated for two Oscars.-Plot:...
(Columbia 1943), and Rhapsody in Blue
Rhapsody in Blue
Rhapsody in Blue is a musical composition by George Gershwin for solo piano and jazz band written in 1924, which combines elements of classical music with jazz-influenced effects....
(Warner Bros 1945). In the 1940s, in addition to her film appearances, Scott was featured in Café Society’s From Bach to Boogie-Woogie Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....
concerts (1941 and 1943).
She was the first woman of color to have her own television show, The Hazel Scott Show
The Hazel Scott Show
The Hazel Scott Show was an early American television program broadcast on the now defunct DuMont Television Network. The series ran during the summer of 1950, and is most notable for being the first U.S...
, which premiered on the DuMont Television Network
DuMont Television Network
The DuMont Television Network, also known as the DuMont Network, DuMont, Du Mont, or Dumont was one of the world's pioneer commercial television networks, rivalling NBC for the distinction of being first overall. It began operation in the United States in 1946. It was owned by DuMont...
on July 3, 1950. During a period of continued racism in the advertising industry as well as economic hardships for jazz musicians in general, the show was canceled in 1950. Some journalists speculated that the show was canceled because of her name's appearance in the Red Channels
Red Channels
Red Channels: The Report of Communist Influence in Radio and Television is an anti-Communist tract published in the United States at the height of the Red Scare...
published by Counterattack. Scott was called to testify by the House Un-American Activities Committee
House Un-American Activities Committee
The House Committee on Un-American Activities or House Un-American Activities Committee was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives. In 1969, the House changed the committee's name to "House Committee on Internal Security"...
just before her television variety program was canceled on September 29, 1950. Scott remained publicly opposed to McCarthyism
McCarthyism
McCarthyism is the practice of making accusations of disloyalty, subversion, or treason without proper regard for evidence. The term has its origins in the period in the United States known as the Second Red Scare, lasting roughly from the late 1940s to the late 1950s and characterized by...
and racial segregation
Racial segregation
Racial segregation is the separation of humans into racial groups in daily life. It may apply to activities such as eating in a restaurant, drinking from a water fountain, using a public toilet, attending school, going to the movies, or in the rental or purchase of a home...
throughout her career.
Scott moved to Paris in the late 1950s, where she appeared in the French film Le Désordre et la Nuit’ (1958). She maintained a steady but difficult career in France and touring throughout Europe until returning to the US in 1967. She continued to play occasionally in nightclubs, while also appearing in daytime television until the year of her death. She made her television acting debut in 1973 on the ABC daytime soap opera One Life to Live," performing a wedding song at the nuptials of her "onscreen cousin", Carla Gray Hall, portrayed by Ellen Holly.
Scott recorded as the leader of various groups for Decca
Decca Records
Decca Records began as a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; however, owing to World War II, the link with the British company was broken for several decades....
, Columbia
Columbia Records
Columbia Records is an American record label, owned by Japan's Sony Music Entertainment, operating under the Columbia Music Group with Aware Records. It was founded in 1888, evolving from an earlier enterprise, the American Graphophone Company — successor to the Volta Graphophone Company...
and Signature
Signature
A signature is a handwritten depiction of someone's name, nickname, or even a simple "X" that a person writes on documents as a proof of identity and intent. The writer of a signature is a signatory. Similar to a handwritten signature, a signature work describes the work as readily identifying...
, among them a trio that consisted of Bill English and the double bass player Martin Rivera, and another featuring Charles Mingus
Charles Mingus
Charles Mingus Jr. was an American jazz musician, composer, bandleader, and civil rights activist.Mingus's compositions retained the hot and soulful feel of hard bop and drew heavily from black gospel music while sometimes drawing on elements of Third stream, free jazz, and classical music...
on bass and Rudie Nichols on drums. Her album Relaxed Piano Moods on the Debut Record label, with Mingus and Max Roach
Max Roach
Maxwell Lemuel "Max" Roach was an American jazz percussionist, drummer, and composer.A pioneer of bebop, Roach went on to work in many other styles of music, and is generally considered alongside the most important drummers in history...
, is generally her work most highly regarded by critics today.
Marriage
In 1945 the Catholic Scott married the Baptist preacher Adam Clayton Powell, Jr.Adam Clayton Powell, Jr.
Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., was an American politician and pastor who represented Harlem, New York City, in the United States House of Representatives . He was the first person of African-American descent elected to Congress from New York and became a powerful national politician...
, a U.S. Congressman, in Connecticut. They had one child Adam Clayton Powell III
Adam Clayton Powell III
Adam Clayton Powell III is an American journalist, media executive, and scholar who currently serves as Director of Washington Policy Initiatives for the University of Southern California and University Fellow at the USC Center on Public Diplomacy. He was USC's vice provost for globalization from...
, but divorced in 1960 after an earlier separation.
On January 19, 1961, she married again, to Ezio Bedin, a Swiss-born comedian.
Death
On October 2, 1981, Hazel Scott died of cancer at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York CityNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. She was 61 years old, and survived by her son Adam Clayton Powell III. She was buried at Flushing Cemetery
Flushing Cemetery
Flushing Cemetery is a cemetery in Flushing in the borough of Queens in New York City, New York.The cemetery is the final resting place for:*Louis Armstrong, renowned musician and singer*Bernard Baruch, financier, after whom Baruch College is named...
in Queens, New York, near other musicians such as Louis Armstrong, Johnny Hodges, and Dizzy Gillespie.
Scott was best-known internationally as a performer of jazz. She was also accomplished in politics, leading the way for African Americans in entertainment and film; and was successful in dramatic acting and classical music. She was noted for her swinging style, performing at the Milford Plaza Hotel
Milford Plaza Hotel
The 1,300-Room Milford Plaza Hotel was the largest hotel in New York City when it opened in 1928. This historic Manhattan hotel remains among the largest New York City hotels in the heart of the Theater District, one block from NYC's Times Square. As of 2011, it is owned by the Ramada hotel chain....
in her last months.
Sources
“Bye-Bye Boogie: Hazel Scott leaves night clubs and moves to concert stage.” Ebony Nov. 1945: 31-34.“Café Society Concert.” Time Magazine 5 May 1941.
“Hazel Scott is Queen Once More in Warner’s ‘Rhapsody in Blue.” Chicago Defender 1 Sep. 1945: 14.
“Scott, Hazel,” CBY 1943 Obituary, J. McAfee, Jr., JSN, ii/4 (1982), 19
Bogle, Donald. 2001. “The Hazel Scott Show” in Primetime Blues: African Americans on Network Television. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, pp. 15–19.
Chilton, Karen. Hazel Scott: The Pioneering Journey of a Jazz Pianist from Cafe Society to Hollywood to HUAC (University of Michigan Press 2008)
Feather, Leonard. 1941. “Swinging the Classics.” The New York Times May 18: X5.
McGee, Kristin. “Swinging the Classics: Hazel Scott and Hollywood’s Musical-Racial Matrix” in Some Liked it Hot: Jazz Women in Film and Television, 1928-1959 (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press 2009 http://www.upne.com/0-8195-6907-0.html]) 113-133.
Myter-Specner, D.: “Hazel Scott, Jazz Pianist: Boogie-woogie and Beyond,” Jazz Research Papers, x (1990), 75
Reed, Bill. 1998. “The Movies: Hazel Scott,” in Hot From Harlem: Profiles in Classic African American Entertainment. Los Angeles: Cellar Door Press, pp. 110–128.
Taubman, E. 1941. “Café Music Heard at Carnegie Hall,” The New York Times 24 Apr. 24: 24.
Taubman, E. 1943. “Swing feature Soviet Benefit: Café Society assures at least a thousand watches for the Russian Fighting Forces” The New York Times 12 Apr. 1943: 28.
,
Taylor, A. “Hazel Scott,” Notes and Tones: Musician-to-musician Interviews (Liège, Belgium, 1977, rev. and enlarged 2/1993)