music

Subterms

    More stories

    • 125 Shares129 Views

      in Music

      Rob Stone, Master Marketer of Hip-Hop, Is Dead at 55

      by

      A founder of the influential music magazine The Fader, he also bridged the worlds of hip-hop and the Fortune 500 with his innovative marketing agency.Rob Stone, who as a founder of the music magazine The Fader and the brand-strategy firm Cornerstone Agency bridged the sounds of the streets and the corporate suites, giving early exposure to rappers like Kanye West and Drake while brokering lucrative endorsements at a time when corporate America was still resistant to hip-hop, died on June 24 in Mount Kisco, N.Y. He was 55.His longtime professional partner, Jon Cohen, said the cause of his death, in a hospital, was lung cancer.Early in his music business career, first at SBK Records and later at Arista, Mr. Stone was charged with finding exposure and radio airplay for new artists. He began to establish himself as a hip-hop insider, working with performers like the Notorious B.I.G. and Craig Mack, as well as with Sean Combs, whose label, Bad Boy Records, had entered into a joint venture with Arista.Before long Mr. Stone decided to set out on his own, and in 1996 he started Cornerstone with Steve Rifkind, the founder of the hip-hop label Loud Records. Mr. Rifkind left the agency after a year and a half and was replaced by Mr. Cohen, who had also worked at SBK and had been Mr. Stone’s best friend since middle school on Long Island.Mr. Stone and Mr. Cohen went on to create eye-opening campaigns for brands like Sprite, Converse and Johnnie Walker that leveraged their relationships with labels and with new artists, who in the early days were all too sensitive to charges of selling out.Mr. Stone, left, in an undated photo with the musician and producer Pharrell Williams and Jon Cohen, who founded The Fader with Mr. Stone.via Jon CohenWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 75 Shares159 Views

      in Music

      Shania Twain Is a Glastonbury ‘Legend’

      by

      The Glastonbury Festival’s coveted “Legend’s Slot,” at 3:45 p.m. Sunday, was hers and she said she was ready for the “most extraordinary party of my career.”On a recent Friday, Shania Twain rode a horse through rural terrain in Alberta, Canada, helping a neighbor relocate a herd of Angus cattle. As cows mooed loudly around her, the country-pop star multitasked, chatting on the phone about prepping for an appearance on a famous field an ocean away.Twain recalled how she started to perform at age 8 in smoky bars where drunk men would sometimes heckle her. As a result, she developed stage fright and hated being in the spotlight until she was about 50, she said, so the idea of performing for more than 200,000 revelers at Britain’s biggest music festival would have been anxiety inducing.Shania Twain answers questions for an interview with The Times on horseback while herding cattle.Courtesy of Shania TwainBut on Sunday afternoon, Twain, now 58, walked onstage at the Glastonbury Festival and did just that. Accompanied by a herd of equines (giant hobby horses, this time), Twain kicked off with “That Don’t Impress Me Much,” her 1998 megahit about dismissing romantic suitors. Within seconds, the vast crowd was singing along, dozens of women climbing up onto friends’ shoulders, their hands outstretched in front of them.She was occupying the most coveted slot at Britain’s largest and longest-running music event, the so-called Legend’s Slot, at 3:45 p.m. on the festival’s final day, an appearance she said she expected to be the “most extraordinary party of my career.”The musician who earns this prized booking — past performers have included Dolly Parton, Diana Ross and Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys — not only gets to hear tens of thousands of fans singing their music back to them, but also secures a large live TV audience, which typically results in a boost in record sales and streams.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 113 Shares129 Views

      in Movies

      The Broad Appeal of the Elsa Dress from “Frozen”

      by

      Wearing a costume from “Frozen” in daily life has become a pastime for many children who identify with the character, regardless of gender.Dressing up as Elsa, the blond queen with magical powers from Disney’s animated film “Frozen,” wasn’t necessarily Jeff Hemmig’s idea of a good time.​​“It was well outside of my comfort zone,” Mr. Hemmig, 43, said.But he knew it would make his son, Jace, happy. So Mr. Hemmig, who lives in Killingly, Conn., squeezed his shoulders into a dress his mom made for him, which matched an Elsa costume she had made for her grandson. Mr. Hemmig then performed a rendition of “Let It Go,” choreography and all, as Jace watched.“He loved it,” Mr. Hemmig said. “He was filled with joy.”Mr. Hemmig wasn’t thrilled about wearing the dress: He said it was tight in the armpits and it made him feel vulnerable. But he loved how it delighted his son, then 3. “Seeing Dad do it, too, felt like a big moment,” Mr. Hemmig said.Like the Hemmigs, countless parents have gone to great lengths to satisfy their Elsa-obsessed children since “Frozen” was released in 2013 and became the cornerstone for one of Disney’s most successful franchises. And Mr. Hemmig is far from the only father to dress as Elsa with his son.Such instances have happened enough that the actor Jonathan Groff, the voice of the character Kristoff in “Frozen” and “Frozen 2,” thanked the films’ directors at a 2022 event for “creating space for young boys to dress up as Anna and Elsa,” the franchise’s sister protagonists.Jacqueline Ayala had been a preschool teacher for five years when “Frozen” came out, and it quickly infiltrated her classroom. For a time, Ms. Ayala recalled, there was only one Elsa dress in its dress-up chest. “That’s why the kids started wearing their own costumes to school,” she said. “So they wouldn’t have to share it.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 113 Shares199 Views

      in Music

      ‘Shifty Shellshock,’ Crazy Town’s Lead Singer, Dies at 49

      by

      He was the frontman for the rap-rock band Crazy Town, which was most known for the hit song “Butterfly.”Shifty Shellshock, the lead singer of the late-1990s rap-rock band Crazy Town known for the hit song “Butterfly,” whose legal name was Seth Binzer, died at his home in Los Angeles on Monday. He was 49.The Los Angeles County Department of Medical Examiner confirmed his death, the cause of which was still being investigated.Crazy Town rose to prominence after the band released its debut album, “The Gift of Game,” in 1999. In 2001, the record reached No. 9 on the Billboard album chart ranking the most popular albums, in large part because of the success of “Butterfly.” The song, which Rolling Stone magazine described as “a sweetly floating ballad that’s atypical for these hard-rocking B-boys,” gained wide acclaim, holding the top spot on Billboard’s Hot 100 ranking for two weeks.Mr. Binzer was open about his struggles with substance abuse. He appeared on two seasons of the VH1 series “Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew” in 2008 and also on the spinoff series “Sober House” from 2009 to 2010.Seth Binzer was born on Aug. 23, 1974, in Los Angeles to Rollin Binzer, who designed album art and directed films for rock bands, and Leslie Brooks, who was a model and script proofreader. He was raised in Southern California and spent part of his childhood in Marblehead, Mass.He was a creative child but also had a wild streak that got him into trouble, according to his mother, and sister, Aubrey Binzer. When he was about 10, he would break dance on the pier in Marblehead for tourists, Ms. Brooks said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 138 Shares169 Views

      in Movies

      ‘I Am: Celine Dion’ Director Talks About Capturing the Star’s Seizure

      by

      Irene Taylor, director of the new documentary “I Am: Celine Dion,” talks about the decision to include a grueling scene of the pop star in crisis.This article contains spoilers.Celine Dion welcomed the cameras. For the new documentary “I Am: Celine Dion” (streaming on Amazon Prime Video), the singer set no restrictions on what to film.What follows is a painfully intimate portrait of a pop star’s body fighting itself. Dion announced in 2022 that she had stiff person syndrome, an autoimmune neurological condition that causes progressive stiffness and severe muscle spasms. During a session with her physical therapist that was being filmed for the documentary, Dion has a seizure. The camera continued to roll throughout the medical crisis.In an interview via video call on Monday, the director, Irene Taylor, discussed shooting the documentary and why Dion’s emergency was included in the final cut. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.How far into preproduction did you learn about Dion’s illness?I spoke with her at length, and I did not know she was ill. We were in the middle of the pandemic and I didn’t think twice about her being at home. Most of us were, and performers around the world were sort of out of commission temporarily.We got to a place where we agreed to make the film. It was several weeks after that mutual decision that her manager asked me for a call. I figured it must be something serious because we got on the phone that day, and he told me that Celine was sick and that they didn’t know what it was. We were filming several months before there was a definitive diagnosis.After getting the diagnosis, was the conversation on the table to stop filming?Definitely not. When I realized that a) she had a problem with no name and b) when I actually started filming I could see how her body looked different, her face looked different, I was able to focus. The iris of my perspective got much smaller.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 175 Shares99 Views

      in Movies

      ‘The Lion King’ at 30: Jason Weaver Sang for Simba but Few Knew It

      by

      The actor was playing a young Michael Jackson when Elton John spotted him. Three decades later, the new attention to his legacy is “gratifying.”When Jason Weaver arrived at his middle school in Chicago wearing a sweatshirt emblazoned with “The Lion King” logo in 1993, his classmates sneered. The apparel had been a gift from Disney when Weaver recorded the singing voice of young Simba, but the blockbuster animated film had yet to be released.“They were like, ‘What the hell is ‘The Lion King’?” Weaver, 44, recalled in a recent video interview. “They didn’t believe in any way shape or form I would be involved with a Disney film — not a kid from the South Side.”Until then, Weaver had mostly done print and commercial work in Chicago. He’d landed a small role in the civil rights drama “The Long Walk Home” and played a young Michael Jackson in the ABC mini-series “The Jacksons: An American Dream.” But for kids, a Disney theatrical movie was on another level.During an hour-and-a-half “Lion King” recording session in 1992, Weaver, who was turning 13, had sung the lead vocals for “I Just Can’t Wait to Be King,” the braggadocious anthem belted by the lion cub Simba as he fantasizes about inheriting the pridelands from his father, Mufasa.Opening in June 1994, “The Lion King” would go on to become the highest grossing traditionally animated film of all time. Its soundtrack eventually sold more than 7 million copies, and “I Just Can’t Wait to Be King” was certified double platinum.According to Weaver, his mother, Marilyn “Kitty” Haywood — a former jingle singer and recording artist who worked with Aretha Franklin and Curtis Mayfield — turned down Disney’s initial offer and negotiated a fee of $100,000 plus lucrative royalties for her son.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares149 Views

      in Music

      Mabe Fratti, a Spark in Mexico City’s Experimental Music Scene

      by

      The singer, cellist and composer has found inspiration in the city’s flourishing avant-garde. Her new LP, “Sentir Que No Sabes,” wrestles with the idea of progress.Ten years ago, the cellist and experimental composer Mabe Fratti came across a strange painting by Paul Klee. “Angelus Novus” depicts an angel, wings splayed, eyes wide open, who looks as though he is about to flutter away from whatever he is looking at. “It’s a metaphor for history,” she said, video calling from her friend’s living room couch in Berlin. “The philosopher Walter Benjamin wrote about it: this idea that we’re looking forwards, but also always looking back.”The concept would go on to form the basis for “Angel Nuevo,” the first song Fratti wrote on her new album, “Sentir Que No Sabes,” out Friday. “I wanted to talk about what it feels like to know you want to progress, but not know where you want to go,” she said of the track, which starts out quietly and builds in an anxious crescendo.Moving forward hasn’t exactly been a problem for Fratti, 32, who was born in Guatemala and is based in Mexico City. Since releasing her debut album, “Pies Sobre la Tierra,” in 2019, she has put out two more solo records, in addition to collaborations with her partner and producer, the Venezuelan musician Hector Tosta (known as I la Católica); the German electronic artist Gudrun Gut; and her improvisational quartet Amor Muere. In just five years, she has built a reputation as the most prominent member of Mexico City’s dynamic and rapidly evolving experimental music scene.Driven by an influx of musicians to the metropolis and the establishment there of new institutions — sound galleries like 316 Centro in the city’s La Merced neighborhood, and labels such as Umor Rex — the Mexican capital’s avant-garde music community has flourished in recent years.Older musicians have been sowing these seeds since at least the 1970s, Fratti said, citing Ana Ruiz, a pianist who helped create Atrás del Cosmos, a “community of improvisers Don Cherry participated in,” and the saxophone player Germán Bringas, who founded the venue Jazzorca in the 1990s.Fratti is known for her minimalist structures: economical arrangements made up of distorted cello sounds that sometimes build upon each other. Maria Sturm for The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares109 Views

      in Music

      James Chance, No Wave and Punk-Funk Pioneer, Dies at 71

      by

      With the Contortions and James White and the Blacks, the songwriter and saxophonist set out to challenge musicians and stir up audiences.James Chance, the singer, saxophonist and composer who melded punk, funk and free jazz into bristling dance music as the leader of the Contortions, died on Tuesday in Manhattan. He was 71.His brother, David Siegfried, said Mr. Chance had been in declining health for years and succumbed to complications of gastrointestinal disease at the Terence Cardinal Cooke Health Care Center in East Harlem.During the late 1970s explosion of punk culture in New York City, the Contortions were at the forefront of a style called no wave — music that set out to be as confrontational and radical in sound and performance as punk’s fashion and attitude were visually.Contortions songs like “I Can’t Stand Myself” and “Throw Me Away” filled the rhythmic structures of James Brown’s funk with angular, dissonant riffs, to be topped by Mr. Chance’s yelping, blurting, screaming vocals and his trilling, squawking alto saxophone. He was a live wire onstage, with his own twitchy versions of moves adapted from Brown, Mick Jagger and his punk contemporaries.Although the Contortions often performed in suits and ties, their music and stage presence were proudly abrasive. In the band’s early days, Mr. Chance was so determined to get a reaction from arty, detached spectators that he would jump into the audience and slap or kiss someone. Audience members often fought back.“I got a big kick out of provoking people, I don’t deny that,” Mr. Chance said in a 2003 interview with Pitchfork.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More