Pioneering Jazz Icon
Lionel Hampton,94,the frenetic1) jazz vibraphonist2),gifted bandleader and storied showman who was one of the most celebrated musicians of the swing era and went on to a six-decade career on the American stage,died on August at a hospital in New York after a heart attack.
A dynamic showman with an electric personality,Hampton was one of the last giants of jazz.He pioneered the use of the vibraphone as a jazz instrument and single-handedly popularized its use.
Hampton has cut hundreds of records.He was known for tremendous energy and for directing bands that were among the most long-lived and consistently popular large ensembles in jazz.His work has been hailed by everyone from presidents to jazz critics and endorsed by the public through enthusiastic attendance of his performances and unending sales of his records.Hampton was born on April 20,1908,in Louisville,Kentucky.He began working as a drummer when he was a teenager.He spent many of his formative musical years in Los Angeles,playing with top local bands and some great national figure s as they came through town.Among them were Louis Armstrong――who first encouraged him to play the vibraphone――and,later,Benny Goodman.He was one of the first musicians to bridge the racial gap between blacks and whites in jazz.He joined drummer Gene Krupa and pianist Teddy Wilson to form the multiracial3) Benny Goodman quartet in the 1930s.Hampton later recalled,“I didn’t recognize that it was a social advancement,but it was the first time blacks and whites ever played together out in public.”
By 1930,he was touring extensively o n the West Coast with his own groups,making records and enjoying billing as the“fastest drummer in the world,”when he struck his first note on a vibraphone.He played with Armstrong’s group for a year,establishing the vibraphone as a jazz instrument and himself as its top interpreter.
Hampton played the vibes with lightning swiftness and harmonic and melodic4) simplicity and the drums with a fierce,driving rhythm.He became a household name after recording such hits as Moon glow and Dinah with Goodman in the 1930s and continued to make the charts in the 1940s and 1950s.He kept up a torrid5) performing pace,appearing at colleges and jazz festivals across the country and on countless television variety shows.He also wrote more than 200pieces of music,including such jazz standards as Evil Gal Blues and Midnight Sun.He once estimated that he performed his best-known composition,Flyin’ Home ,more than 300times a year from 1937to 1987.
In 1940,he left Goodman and started h is own big band,featuring a big sound,swinging arrangements and such soloists6) as Washington.Hampton’s newly recorded big-band version of Flyin’ Home became a huge success.The band specialized in boogie-woogie7),jump and later bop,and by the early 1950s it had become as much a rhythm and blues as a jazz attraction.But it nevertheless remained the medium for the introduction of many jazz talents.
Hampton dissolved the big band in 1965but continued to play with a sextet he called the Inner Circle.He remained an attraction at concerts and jazz festivals,despite ill health in his eighties.
He played into his nineties.In 1995,after suffering two strokes,he received an award for artistic excellence at Manhattan’s first Jazz at Lincoln Center Awards gala,then performed a swinging rendition7) of Goodman’s Air Mail Special on the vibraphone.Over the decades,Hampton was a consistent winner of annual polls as the best vibes player in the business.He won countless awards(including the Kennedy Center Lifetime Achievement Award in 1992)and saw both a Berlin street,Hampton-street,and the music school of the University of Idaho named in his honor.
Through all of it,Hampton once said,he had just one goal:“I want to be remembered for spreading happiness and goodwill.”He did just that.
President Bush issued a statement saying that Hampton“was an American music legend and will be sorely missed.”
爵士樂(lè)宗師萊昂內(nèi)爾·漢普頓
萊昂內(nèi)爾·漢普頓是一位極富激情的爵士樂(lè)電顫琴演奏家、極具天賦的樂(lè)隊(duì)領(lǐng)隊(duì),爵士樂(lè)史上著名的表演家。他是強(qiáng)節(jié)奏爵士樂(lè)時(shí)代最富盛名的音樂(lè)人之一,在美國(guó)舞臺(tái)上有60年的演藝生涯。今年8月,這位大師因心臟病發(fā)作在紐約的一家醫(yī)院辭世,享年94歲。
漢普頓是一位個(gè)性鮮明、極具活力的表演藝術(shù)家,也是爵士樂(lè)的巨匠之一。他首創(chuàng)把電顫琴作為爵士樂(lè)的演奏器樂(lè),并獨(dú)自將它普及化。漢普頓錄制了數(shù)百?gòu)埑?。他以精力充沛,組建了爵士樂(lè)壇上長(zhǎng)盛不衰的大型樂(lè)隊(duì)而聞名遐邇。他的作品受到了從總統(tǒng)到爵士樂(lè)評(píng)論家的贊賞和公眾的支持。他們瘋狂地觀(guān)看他的演出,不斷地購(gòu)買(mǎi)他的唱片。
1908年4月20日漢普頓出生在肯塔基州的路易斯維爾。十幾歲時(shí)他當(dāng)了一名鼓手。在洛杉磯度過(guò)的數(shù)年是他的音樂(lè)風(fēng)格形成期。他同當(dāng)?shù)仨敿獾臉?lè)隊(duì)和一些來(lái)小鎮(zhèn)演出的杰出的音樂(lè)人同臺(tái)演出。這里面有路易斯·阿姆斯特朗,是他第一個(gè)鼓勵(lì)漢普頓演奏顫音琴。后來(lái)他又遇到了本尼·古德曼。漢普頓是第一個(gè)打破爵士樂(lè)中種族隔閡的音樂(lè)人之一。20世紀(jì)30年代,他與鼓手吉恩·克魯帕和鋼琴演奏家特迪·威爾遜組建了多種族的本尼·古德曼四重奏樂(lè)團(tuán)。漢普頓后來(lái)回憶說(shuō):“我并沒(méi)有意識(shí)到這是一種社會(huì)進(jìn)步,但這確實(shí)是黑人和白人第一次在公眾場(chǎng)合同臺(tái)演出。”
到1930年,漢普頓同他的樂(lè)隊(duì)沿西海岸巡演,錄制音樂(lè),榮登排行榜上“世界上最快的鼓手”。這時(shí)他開(kāi)始演奏顫音琴。漢普頓同阿姆斯特朗的樂(lè)隊(duì)演出了1年。他把顫音琴確定為爵士樂(lè)的演奏樂(lè)器,而他自己也成為該樂(lè)器最出色的闡釋者。
漢普頓演奏顫音琴時(shí)輕靈、和諧、旋律簡(jiǎn)潔優(yōu)美,而擊鼓時(shí)則活力四射,節(jié)奏強(qiáng)勁。20世紀(jì)30年代他與古德曼共同錄制了熱門(mén)金曲Moonglow和Dinah,成為家喻戶(hù)曉的人物。40年代和50年代他的唱片一直暢銷(xiāo)不衰。他保持著驚人的演出頻率,現(xiàn)身于各個(gè)大學(xué)、爵士音樂(lè)節(jié)和無(wú)數(shù)的電視綜藝節(jié)目。漢普頓還創(chuàng)作了200多首樂(lè)曲,包括爵士流行曲Evil Gal Blues和Mid-night Sun。他曾估計(jì)從1937年到1987年,他那首廣為人知的作品Flyin‘Home每年演奏超過(guò)300次之多。
1940年漢普頓離開(kāi)古德曼,組建了自己的大樂(lè)隊(duì)。該樂(lè)隊(duì)演奏嘹亮,節(jié)奏強(qiáng)勁,并收羅了如華盛頓這樣的獨(dú)奏演員。漢普頓重新錄制的大樂(lè)隊(duì)版的Flyin’ Home取得了巨大的成功。大樂(lè)隊(duì)擅長(zhǎng)演奏布基伍基樂(lè)曲、強(qiáng)節(jié)奏爵士樂(lè)和博普爵士樂(lè)。到20世紀(jì)50年代早期,它以爵士樂(lè)和節(jié)奏布魯斯聞名。但它一直是許多爵士樂(lè)天才的搖籃。
1965年漢普頓解散了大樂(lè)隊(duì),但仍和他稱(chēng)之為“圈內(nèi)人”的六重奏樂(lè)團(tuán)演出。盡管他已80高齡,健康不佳,但仍是音樂(lè)會(huì)和爵士音樂(lè)節(jié)的亮點(diǎn)。
進(jìn)入90歲后,漢普頓仍然堅(jiān)持演出。1995年,在兩次中風(fēng)后,他在曼哈頓首屆爵士樂(lè)音樂(lè)節(jié)上獲優(yōu)秀藝術(shù)家獎(jiǎng),并在林肯藝術(shù)中心頒獎(jiǎng)演出中用顫音琴演奏了古德曼一首強(qiáng)節(jié)奏爵士樂(lè)風(fēng)格的Air Mail Special。數(shù)十年里,漢普頓在每年的民意調(diào)查中不斷當(dāng)選為娛樂(lè)界最出色的顫音琴演奏家,還獲得了無(wú)數(shù)的獎(jiǎng)項(xiàng)(包括1992年肯尼迪中心頒發(fā)的終生成就獎(jiǎng)),見(jiàn)證了柏林市的漢普頓大街和以他的名字命名的艾德大學(xué)的音樂(lè)學(xué)院。
在經(jīng)歷了這一切后,漢普頓曾經(jīng)說(shuō),他只有一個(gè)目標(biāo):“我想讓世人記住我是在傳播幸福和友善。”他確實(shí)做到了。
布什總統(tǒng)發(fā)表聲明說(shuō):“漢普頓是美國(guó)音樂(lè)界的傳奇人物。人們會(huì)非常想念他。”
NOTE 注釋?zhuān)?/span>
1. frenetic [fri5netik] adj. 狂熱的,極富激情的
2. vibraphonist [`vaIbrEfEJnIst] n. 電顫演奏家
3. multiracial [5mQlti5reiFEl] adj. 多民族的, 多民族和睦相處的
4. melodic [mi5lCdik] adj. 有旋律的, 調(diào)子美妙的
5. torrid [5tCrid] adj. 熾熱的,很強(qiáng)的
7. boogie-woogie [bu:^I5wu:^I; (?@) bJ^I5wJ^I] n.(美國(guó)的)布吉伍吉舞
8. rendition [ren5diFEn] n. 表演, 演唱