Today we remember the late great Curtis Lee Mayfield (June 3, 1942 – December 26, 1999) an American soul, R&B, and funk singer-songwriter, guitarist, and record producer. He achieved success and recognition with the Impressions during the Civil Rights Movement of the late 1950s and 1960s. Mayfield is also known for his efforts in writing the soundtrack to the blaxploitation film Super Fly which was considered unusual as a soundtrack for a blaxploitation film, as its songs contained themes focusing more on the social problems of impoverished African-American urban areas during the time. Mayfield is regarded as a pioneer of funk and of politically conscious African-American music. Being one of the most celebrated figures in the genre of soul and 20th-century music, Mayfield is a winner of both the Grammy Legend Award (in 1994) and the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award (in 1995), and he was a double inductee into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, inducted as a member of the Impressions into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991, and again in 1999 as a solo artist. He is also a two-time Grammy Hall of Fame inductee. Curtis Mayfield was born in Chicago, Illinois, the son of Marion Washington and Kenneth Mayfield. Mayfields father left the family when Mayfield was five; his mother moved the family into various Chicago projects before settling at Cabrini–Green when Mayfield reached his teenage years. Mayfield attended Wells Community Academy High School. His mother taught him the piano, and encouraged him to enjoy gospel music; when he was seven he was a singer with the gospel quintet, the Northern Jubilee Gospel Singers. When he was 14 years old he formed the Alphatones; when he was 15 he joined his school friend Jerry Butlers group the Roosters with Arthur and Richard Brooks; this group would become the Impressions four years later. Mayfield remained active in the 1970s; output began to slow during the 1980s. Then, on August 13, 1990, he became paralyzed from the neck down after stage lighting equipment fell on him at an outdoor concert at Wingate Field in Flatbush, Brooklyn, New York. He was unable to play guitar, but he wrote, sang, and directed the recording of his last album, New World Order. Mayfields vocals were painstakingly recorded, usually line-by-line while lying on his back. Mayfield received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1995. In February 1998, he had to have his right leg amputated owing to diabetes. Mayfield was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame on March 15, 1999. Health reasons prevented him from attending the ceremony, which included fellow inductees Paul McCartney, Billy Joel, Bruce Springsteen, Dusty Springfield, George Martin, and 1970s Curtom signee and labelmate The Staple Singers. His last appearance on record was with the group Bran Van 3000 on the song Astounded for their album Discosis, recorded just before his death and released in 2001. Curtis Mayfield died from complications of diabetes on December 26, 1999, at the North Fulton Regional Hospital in Roswell, Georgia; his health having steadily declined following his paralysis.
Posted on: Fri, 26 Dec 2014 17:36:15 +0000
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