hypersongs
?

Donny Hathaway

A Chicago-born, St. Louis-raised singer, pianist and arranger of soul and gospel, who made Live in 1971, sang "Where Is the Love" with Roberta Flack, and recorded "A Song for You" and "Someday We'll All Be Free".

Origin
Chicago, Illinois; raised in St. Louis, Missouri
Years active
1966-1979
Genres
soul, R&B, gospel, jazz
Labels
Curtom, Atco, Atlantic
Also known as
Donny Edward Hathaway, Donny Pitts

St. Louis and Howard

Donny Edward Hathaway was born on October 1, 1945 in Chicago and raised in St. Louis by his grandmother Martha Pitts, a gospel singer and guitarist, in the Carr Square housing project. He sang with her in church from the age of three, performed on the St. Louis gospel circuit as Little Donnie Pitts, studied classical piano and in high school played Grieg's Piano Concerto in A minor. He graduated from Vashon High School in 1963 and won a fine-arts scholarship to Howard University in Washington, where he met the drummer Ric Powell, Roberta Flack and Leroy Hutson, and married Eulaulah Vann in 1967; their daughters include Lalah Hathaway.

He left Howard in 1967 or 1968 for Curtis Mayfield's Curtom label in Chicago, working as a songwriter, session musician and house producer, arranging for the Unifics and working with the Staple Singers, Jerry Butler and Aretha Franklin. His first single under his own name was "I Thank You, Baby" with June Conquest in 1969, and King Curtis took him to Atlantic and Ahmet Ertegun, who signed him as a solo artist; Jerry Wexler said I think we've found our third genius.

The Atco albums

Everything Is Everything (July 1, 1970, Atco) was produced by Hathaway and Ric Powell and recorded between September 11, 1969 and April 16, 1970, with "The Ghetto" and "To Be Young, Gifted and Black". Donny Hathaway (April 2, 1971) was produced by Jerry Wexler and Arif Mardin, recorded in 1970 and 1971 at Atlantic in New York, Criteria in Miami and Universal in Chicago, with King Curtis on tenor saxophone, Chuck Rainey on bass, Cornell Dupree on guitar and Al Jackson Jr. on drums, and strings and horns arranged by Mardin and Hathaway; it holds "A Song for You". AllMusic's John Bush gave it three stars, mostly covers, hearing the lament of a man alone in the sanctuary after services are finished.

Live (February 1972) combines the Troubadour in Hollywood on August 24 to 30, 1971 and the Bitter End in Greenwich Village on October 7, 1971, produced by Mardin and Wexler, 52:39 long. Willie Weeks recalled the crowd swaying like a wheat field in the wind; Hathaway told Mardin on hearing the tapes, oh, it sounds like I'm in the room. It reached number 18 on the Billboard 200 and four on the R&B chart and was certified gold, and AllMusic's Bush called it one of the most glorious of his career. Rolling Stone ranked it 48th in its 2015 list of the 50 greatest live albums. Roberta Flack and Donny Hathaway (1972, number three) includes "You've Got a Friend" and "Where Is the Love", which won the Grammy for best pop vocal performance by a duo, group or chorus in 1973.

Extension of a Man and after

Extension of a Man (June 18, 1973, Atco), produced by Arif Mardin with Wexler producing "Lord Help Me", was recorded between October 11, 1971 and November 26, 1972 at A&R, Bell Sound, Regent Sound and Atlantic in New York and Universal in Chicago, 47:33 long, with Hubert Laws on flute and Stanley Clarke among the bassists. It was his last solo studio album and sold poorly; Nikki Giovanni wrote the sleeve notes. He was largely absent from recording from late 1973 until about 1977, played club dates in Boston, San Francisco and Dallas in 1976 and 1978, and sang "The Closer I Get to You" with Flack in 1978, which reached number two on the pop chart and number one on the R&B chart.

Donny Hathaway died on January 13, 1979 in New York City, aged 33, the funeral conducted by the Rev. Jesse Jackson. Posthumous releases include In Performance (1980), These Songs for You, Live! (2004), Never My Love: The Anthology (2013) and Live at the Bitter End 1971 (2014). Rolling Stone ranked him 49th among its 100 greatest singers in 2010, he received a posthumous Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2019, and the documentary Mister Soul, directed by David Kleijwegt, premiered at IFFR on January 28, 2020. His daughter Donnita Hathaway chairs the Donny Hathaway Legacy Project.

Records

Songs

Minnie Riperton, Billy Preston

Where to go next

Reference

Discography and data

Writing and criticism

Sources

  1. Donny Hathaway, Wikipedia
  2. Live (Donny Hathaway album), Wikipedia
  3. Donny Hathaway, Red Bull Music Academy (2013-12)
  4. Remembering Donny Hathaway, WNYC