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Sathima Bea Benjamin
Beatrice "Sathima Bea" Benjamin (17 October 1936 – 20 August 2013) was a South African vocalist and composer based in New York City for nearly 45 years.
She was born Beatrice Bertha Benjamin in Claremont, Cape Town, South Africa. Her father, Edward Benjamin, was from the island of St. Helena off the coast of West Africa, and her mother, Evelyn Henry, had roots in Mauritius and the Philippines. As an adolescent, Benjamin first performed popular music in talent contests at the local cinema (bioscope) during the intermission. By the 1950s she was singing at various nightclubs, community dances and social events, performing with notable Cape Town pianists Tony Schilder and Henry February, among others. She built her repertoire watching British and American movies and transcribing lyrics from songs heard on the radio, where she discovered Nat King Cole, Billie Holiday, Doris Day, Ella Fitzgerald. These musicians would come to influence her singing style, notably in terms of light phrasing and clear diction.
At the age of 21, she joined Arthur Klugman's travelling show Coloured Jazz and Variety on a tour of South Africa. When the production failed, she found herself stranded in Mozambique, where she met South African saxophonist Kippie Moeketsi. In 1959, she returned to Cape Town's now thriving jazz scene, where she met pianist Dollar Brand (later known as Abdullah Ibrahim), whom she married in 1965. In that same year she recorded what would have been the first jazz LP in South Africa's history. Entitled My Songs for You, with accompaniment by Ibrahim's trio, the recording of mostly standards was never released.
In the aftermath of South Africa's Sharpeville Massacre of 1960, Benjamin and Ibrahim left South Africa for Europe. The couple, along with Ibrahim's trio of bassist Johnny Gertze and drummer Makhaya Ntshoko, settled in Zurich, Switzerland, and worked throughout Germany and Scandinavia, meeting and occasionally working with American jazz players, including Don Byas, Dexter Gordon, Kenny Drew, Ben Webster, Bud Powell, John Coltrane, and Thelonious Monk. The artist who would have the greatest impact on Benjamin's life, however, was Duke Ellington.
Benjamin met Duke Ellington while he was in Zurich in 1963. Standing in the wings during most of his band's performance, once the concert ended she insisted that Ellington hear her husband's trio at the Club Africana, where Ibrahim's band had a standing engagement. Ellington obliged, but insisted that Benjamin sing for him. Following this encounter, Ellington arranged for the couple to fly to Paris and record separate albums for Frank Sinatra's Reprise label, for whom Ellington functioned as Artists and Repertoire representative. Ibrahim's record, Duke Ellington Presents The Dollar Brand Trio, was released the following year and subsequently helped him build a following in Europe and the United States. Benjamin's recording, however, remained unreleased and was presumed to be lost until its release in 1996 by Enja Records, under the title A Morning in Paris. The session's engineer, Gerhard Lerner, had surreptitiously made a second copy.
She maintained her musical relationship with Ellington. In 1965, he arranged to have her perform with his band in the U.S. at the Newport Jazz Festival (when she sang the Ellington ballad "Solitude"), and at one point asked her to join his band permanently. Due to her recent marriage to Ibrahim that same year, Benjamin declined the offer.
Throughout the 1960s, Benjamin and Ibrahim moved back and forth between Europe and New York City, as Ibrahim worked to establish his career. Benjamin spent much of the period as a manager and agent for her husband while raising their son, Tsakwe. The year 1976 marked a turning point for Benjamin. She and Ibrahim returned to South Africa to live; she gave birth to her daughter, Tsidi (now the underground hip-hop artist Jean Grae); and recorded African Songbird, an album of original compositions, for South Africa's Gallo Records. Shortly after Tsidi's birth, the family relocated to New York city in 1977, to the famed Hotel Chelsea.
In 1979, Benjamin started a record label Ekapa to produce and distribute her and Ibrahim's music. Between 1979 and 2002, she released eight of her albums on Ekapa, including Sathima Sings Ellington, Dedications, Memories and Dreams, Windsong, Lovelight, Southern Touch, Cape Town Love, and Musical Echoes.
Sathima Bea Benjamin
Beatrice "Sathima Bea" Benjamin (17 October 1936 – 20 August 2013) was a South African vocalist and composer based in New York City for nearly 45 years.
She was born Beatrice Bertha Benjamin in Claremont, Cape Town, South Africa. Her father, Edward Benjamin, was from the island of St. Helena off the coast of West Africa, and her mother, Evelyn Henry, had roots in Mauritius and the Philippines. As an adolescent, Benjamin first performed popular music in talent contests at the local cinema (bioscope) during the intermission. By the 1950s she was singing at various nightclubs, community dances and social events, performing with notable Cape Town pianists Tony Schilder and Henry February, among others. She built her repertoire watching British and American movies and transcribing lyrics from songs heard on the radio, where she discovered Nat King Cole, Billie Holiday, Doris Day, Ella Fitzgerald. These musicians would come to influence her singing style, notably in terms of light phrasing and clear diction.
At the age of 21, she joined Arthur Klugman's travelling show Coloured Jazz and Variety on a tour of South Africa. When the production failed, she found herself stranded in Mozambique, where she met South African saxophonist Kippie Moeketsi. In 1959, she returned to Cape Town's now thriving jazz scene, where she met pianist Dollar Brand (later known as Abdullah Ibrahim), whom she married in 1965. In that same year she recorded what would have been the first jazz LP in South Africa's history. Entitled My Songs for You, with accompaniment by Ibrahim's trio, the recording of mostly standards was never released.
In the aftermath of South Africa's Sharpeville Massacre of 1960, Benjamin and Ibrahim left South Africa for Europe. The couple, along with Ibrahim's trio of bassist Johnny Gertze and drummer Makhaya Ntshoko, settled in Zurich, Switzerland, and worked throughout Germany and Scandinavia, meeting and occasionally working with American jazz players, including Don Byas, Dexter Gordon, Kenny Drew, Ben Webster, Bud Powell, John Coltrane, and Thelonious Monk. The artist who would have the greatest impact on Benjamin's life, however, was Duke Ellington.
Benjamin met Duke Ellington while he was in Zurich in 1963. Standing in the wings during most of his band's performance, once the concert ended she insisted that Ellington hear her husband's trio at the Club Africana, where Ibrahim's band had a standing engagement. Ellington obliged, but insisted that Benjamin sing for him. Following this encounter, Ellington arranged for the couple to fly to Paris and record separate albums for Frank Sinatra's Reprise label, for whom Ellington functioned as Artists and Repertoire representative. Ibrahim's record, Duke Ellington Presents The Dollar Brand Trio, was released the following year and subsequently helped him build a following in Europe and the United States. Benjamin's recording, however, remained unreleased and was presumed to be lost until its release in 1996 by Enja Records, under the title A Morning in Paris. The session's engineer, Gerhard Lerner, had surreptitiously made a second copy.
She maintained her musical relationship with Ellington. In 1965, he arranged to have her perform with his band in the U.S. at the Newport Jazz Festival (when she sang the Ellington ballad "Solitude"), and at one point asked her to join his band permanently. Due to her recent marriage to Ibrahim that same year, Benjamin declined the offer.
Throughout the 1960s, Benjamin and Ibrahim moved back and forth between Europe and New York City, as Ibrahim worked to establish his career. Benjamin spent much of the period as a manager and agent for her husband while raising their son, Tsakwe. The year 1976 marked a turning point for Benjamin. She and Ibrahim returned to South Africa to live; she gave birth to her daughter, Tsidi (now the underground hip-hop artist Jean Grae); and recorded African Songbird, an album of original compositions, for South Africa's Gallo Records. Shortly after Tsidi's birth, the family relocated to New York city in 1977, to the famed Hotel Chelsea.
In 1979, Benjamin started a record label Ekapa to produce and distribute her and Ibrahim's music. Between 1979 and 2002, she released eight of her albums on Ekapa, including Sathima Sings Ellington, Dedications, Memories and Dreams, Windsong, Lovelight, Southern Touch, Cape Town Love, and Musical Echoes.