James Brown summary

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Below is the article summary. For the full article, see James Brown.

James Brown, (born May 3, 1933, Barnwell, S.C., U.S.—died Dec. 25, 2006, Atlanta, Ga.), U.S. singer and songwriter. Growing up in Georgia during the Depression, Brown first sang and danced on street corners for money. He later formed a group, appearing at small clubs throughout the South. He gradually evolved a highly personal style, combining blues and gospel music elements with his own emotionally charged and highly rhythmic delivery, accented by a strong sense of showmanship. His first hit, “Please, Please, Please” (1956), was followed by other million-selling singles, including “Papa’s Got a Brand New Bag”; his style, marked by strong dance-oriented rhythms and heavy syncopation, became known as funk. His checkered personal life included charges of drug use and a period of imprisonment for a 1988 high-speed highway chase in which he tried to escape pursuing officers. Brown, whose sobriquets included “the Hardest-Working Man in Show Business” and “the Godfather of Soul,” was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1986.

Grammy Award Summary

Grammy Award, any of a series of awards presented annually in the United States by the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences (NARAS; commonly called the Recording Academy) or the Latin Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences (LARAS; commonly called the Latin Recording Academy) to recognize

song Summary

Song, piece of music performed by a single voice, with or without instrumental accompaniment. Works for several voices are called duets, trios, and so on; larger ensembles sing choral music. Speech and music have been combined from earliest times; music heightens the effect of words, allowing them

soul music Summary

Soul music, term adopted to describe African American popular music in the United States as it evolved from the 1950s to the ’60s and ’70s. Some view soul as merely a new term for rhythm and blues. In fact a new generation of artists profoundly reinterpreted the sounds of the rhythm-and-blues

rhythm and blues Summary

Rhythm and blues, term used for several types of postwar African-American popular music, as well as for some white rock music derived from it. The term was coined by Jerry Wexler in 1947, when he was editing the charts at the trade journal Billboard and found that the record companies issuing Black