As we begin the countdown to our 100 year anniversary in 2030, we’re reflecting on the concerts, artists, and moments that helped make your SSO everything it is today.
Today in particular we’re looking back at the time we got to experience with Harry Belafonte.
Singer, actor, and civil rights activist Harry Belafonte was a barrier-breaking artist whose career spanned 80 years. But did you know that the “King of Calypso” performed with the SSO numerous times during his career?
Harry Belafonte was born on March 1, 1927, in Harlem to Jamaican-born parents. He dropped out of high school to join the Navy and served during World War 2. After the war, he got a job as a janitor and eventually took acting classes at the New School in New York (alongside the likes of Sidney Poitier, Marlon Brando, and Bea Arthur.)
He hit the charts and the big screen in the mid 50s, and was a household name by the 60s, when he became deeply involved in the Civil Rights Movement. It was Belafonte himself who bailed his good friend Martin Luther King, Jr. out of the Birmingham Alabama jail in 1963, in addition to raising funds for other protesters.
Belafonte first performed with the SSO in 1977 while on a tour to raise funds for Canadian orchestras. When his show in Montreal was canceled, Belafonte suggested coming to Saskatoon instead – a place he had visited a few times in the 70s – “a place of warm and kind people” who packed Centennial Auditorium with just 8 days notice of the show.
This concert featured a performance of Belafonte’s brand-new song “Turn the World Around” from the 1977 album of the same name – a track he also famously performed on The Muppets Show (and later at Jim Henson’s funeral.)
So it’s safe to say that your SSO has had it’s fair share of great collaborations, dating quite a ways back!
Stay tuned to your SSO’s InTune blog to catch more stories, throwbacks, upcoming news, and more!
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