National Black Arts Festival "The Legends Celebration"

 

The Legends Celebration is a festival favorite recognizing artistic luminaries across the NBAF disciplines. Spotlight Series curator Wynton Marsalis is this year’s Music Legend, and he is joined by Melvin van Peebles (Film), Ntozake Shange(Theatre), Dr. Samella Lewis(Visual Arts), and Maurice Hines (Dance). The Legends Celebration boasts an exciting new award-show format and ​celebrates the five 2014 Legends through tribute performances from Anika Noni Rose, Melissa Aldana and Crash TrioMarcus Belgrave, the Manzari Brothers and more!
Don’t miss this highly-anticipated, action-packed event!
About the 2014 NBAF Legends:
Music: Wynton Marsalis
This year’s Spotlight Series curator, Wynton Marsalis is an internationally-acclaimed musician, composer, bandleader, educator and leading advocate of American culture. Marsalis, Artistic Director of Jazz at Lincoln Center, NEA Jazz Master, and winner of nine Grammy Awards, was the first jazz musician to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music. He has had an inspiring, swinging career that has spanned over 20 years.
Film: Melvin van Peebles
Most famous for the acclaimed Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song, which paved the way for a new era of films centered on African American experiences, van Peebles has enjoyed a diverse international career. In 1970, van Peebles directed his first Hollywood film, the comedyWatermelon Man before making Sweetback the following year. Through the decades, his career has taken a variety of artistic turns, most recently, van Peebles made his debut as a visual artist with pieces he originally created to be displayed in his home.
Theater: Ntozake Shange
Ntozake Shange is a renowned poet, playwright, performer and author whose work illustrates the contemporary experience of black women in America. This year marks the 40th anniversary of her award-winning choreopoem For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf. The piece ran on Broadway for nearly two years, was produced by the legendary Joe Papp, andwas nominated for Best Play at the Tony Awards.
Visual Arts: Dr. Samella Lewis
Dr. Samella Lewis is a distinguished scholar, artistic innovator, and legendary teacher who has committed her life to the recognition and celebration of African American artists. As the first African American woman to receive her doctorate in fine arts and art history in 1951 (at Ohio State University), she founded The International Review of African American Art and later, with the assistance of Scripps College, The Museum of African American Art, in Los Angeles. Lewis also founded the first African American-owned publishing house.
Dance: Maurice Hines
Maurice Hines’ prolific career as an entertainer has earned him a Tony Award Nomination for Best Actor in a Musical in Uptown…It’s Hot! and a Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding Choreography for Cool Papa’s Party. Hines also made history as the first African American to direct The Radio City Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall.
About the 2014 NBAF Tribute Performers:
Anika Noni Rose
Anika Noni Rose is a Tony Award winning performer who most recently starred alongside Denzel Washington in the Broadway revival of A Raisin in the Sun. Her outstanding performance not only earned her numerous rave reviews, but also a Tony Award and an Outer Critics Circle nomination. On the big screen, she has starred as Lorell Robinson inDream Girls and voiced Princess Tiana in Disney’s The Princess and the Frog. She became the youngest inductee to ever be honored as a Disney Legend.
Melissa Aldana and Crash Trio
Saxophonist Melissa Aldana began playing at the age of 6, trained by her renowned jazz saxophonist father Marcos Aldana. Her career took off with a weeklong residency at the Village Vanguard, and she has performed in many prestigious venues in the United States, Barcelona and her native Chile. Last year, she won the Thelonious Monk International Jazz Saxophone Competition, the first female instrumentalist to have ever done so. With her current band mates bassist Pablo Menares and drummer Francisco Mela, she released an album for Concord Music Group this summer.
Marcus Belgrave
Marcus Belgrave is an internationally recognized jazz trumpeter from Detroit. He rose to prominence in the late 1950s, touring and recording with the Ray Charles Orchestra. He was recently awarded the singular title of Official Jazz Master Laureate for the City of Detroit. His performances encompass the history of jazz musical styles, and he was one of the original members of the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra.
The Manzari Brothers
This young duo has just concluded a tour with the show Maurice Hines is Tappin’ Thru Lifeand the second production of Apollo Club. Jonn and Leo Manzari have performed on television and in renowned theaters across the nation, and both received a Helen Hayes Award nomination for “Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Resident Musical.”