Who Is Duke Ellington?

He was born August 24th, 1890 in Waikiki, Honolulu County, Hawaii. His parents were Duke and Julia. Duke was a police officer, and Julia was a deeply religious women who stayed home with her children. Duke had 8 siblings; Samuel, Sargent, Brenice, David, Bill, Kapiolani, Louis, Maria. Duke went to grammar school but dropped out so he could spend more time on the beach, and help take care of his family.

In the 1920’s many African American were searching for a refuge to escape from racism,discrimination, and violence. Many went to place called Harlem, a neighborhood in New York, where they commenced a new style of art, writing, and music. This was known as the Harlem Renaissance, where African Americans had their chance to be known for their skill. Langston Hughes, Louis Armstrong, were some of the important people who help express the African culture through writing and and music. They became an important figure in the birth of the Harlem renaissance. Even today they are remembered for their African American cultural success.

He was born on 1886 in Lenox, Massachusetts, the 2nd oldest of six siblings, and was a skilled violinist since he was a kid (The Black Past). When he got a promotion at his magazine job when he was 14, he got his first camera. He was one of the first people in his town to own a personal camera so it was up to him to photograph lower class African American life at the time. At least until he, his brother Walter, and his dad would move to the Big Apple where he would work as an elevator operator and a waiter. While there,

In our era today, as you proceed through life, there is discrimination against races. As much as we would like to witness things change for the better we won’t due to some people not taking the chance to rewire their hatred. But in the early 1900’s, some black middle-class families immigrated to Harlem, New York, which at the time was an upper-class white neighborhood. The White’s tried to kick the African Americans out, but ultimately failed. In 1910-1930 African Americans in Harlem have changed what the city was like back then, now it is known for its African American culture. They also created a period called the Harlem Renaissance that is considered a golden age in African American culture. This was a time when they had an artistic explosion,

He was born in Washington D.C but later on he moved to New York City.

EE Cummings lived during a very eventful and historic era. He was born on October 14, 1894 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. When he was a kid,

“John Duke was a distinguished composer, pianist, and teacher of piano. He is best known for his art-songs in English, which were composed between 1920 and his death in 1984. His works also include solo instrumental pieces, instrumental and vocal chamber music, choral and symphonic works, and music for the stage. He composed two operas ("Captain Lovelock," 1953; "The Sire de Maletroit," 1958), an operetta ("The Yankee Pedlar," 1962), a "musical fantasy for children" ("The Cat That Walked Himself": 1964), and music for numerous Smith College faculty shows and theatre department productions. He was born in Cumberland, Maryland, on July 30, 1899. He became interested in music through his mother, Matilda Hoffman Duke. At age 16 he won a three-year

The Harlem Renaissance was an era full of life, excitement, and activity. The world in all aspects was in gradual recovery from the depression. The world of music was

Duke met Oliver “Doc” Perry and Louis Brown who helped teach him how to read music and helped improve his overall piano playing skills. Duke found some jobs playing at clubs and cafes in the Washington area. Three months before Duke graduated he dropped out of school and began his professional music career.

Still started to learn how to play the violin at the age of fifteen. He taught himself to play a bunch of instruments including the clarinet, saxophone, double bass, cello oboe, and the viola. Then at the age of 16 he graduated from M.W. Gibbs High School in Little

His first compassion ever “Soda Fountain Rag” was at the age of 15, he started playing professionally at 17, Duke Ellington 50 years of compositions, and a lot of his great work came from his teenage years and his late 20s. in 1923 duke and some of his friends came to New York they form the group the Washingtonians, they took part in the Harlem Renaissance and started playing in homes for income.

William Edward Burghardt Du Bois was a major sociologist historian, writer, editor, political activist, and cofounder of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). During the Harlem renaissance and through his editorship of crisis magazine, he actively sought and presented the literary genius of black writers for the entire world to acknowledge and honor (Gale schools, 2004).

“James Mercer Langston Hughes, known as Langston Hughes was born February 2, 1902 in Missouri, to Carrie Hughes and James Hughes.” Years later his parents separated. Langston’s father moved to Mexico and became very successful, as his for mother, she moved frequently to find better jobs. As a child growing up Langston spent most of his childhood living with his grandmother named Mary Langston in Lawrence, Kansas. Mary Langston was a learned women and a participant in the civil rights Movement. When Langston Hughes was 12 years old his grandmother passed away. Langston then moved in with his mother and stepfather Homer Clark. A few months later, Langston’s mother sent him to live with her mother’s friend “Auntie” and Mr. Reed. In 1915

The first jazz was played in the early 20th century. The work chants and folk

“The Harlem Renaissance was a time where the Afro-American came of age; he became self-assertive and racially conscious… he proclaimed himself to be a man and deserving respect. Those Afro-Americans who were part of that time period saw themselves as principals in that moment of transformation from old to new” (Huggins 3). African Americans migrated to the North in great numbers to seek better lives than in the South as the northern economy was booming and industrial jobs were numerous. This movement brought new ideas and talents that shifted the culture forever. Black writers, such as Langston Hughes, used their work to claim a place for themselves and to demand self-respect in society. Poems that Langston Hughes wrote captured the essence of the complexity of a life that mixes joy and frustration of black American life through the incorporation of jazz and blues in order to examine the paradox of being black in mostly white America, the land of the not quite free.