All Discussions Tagged 'university' - Pittsburgh Jazz Network2024-03-29T11:14:22Zhttp://jazzburgher.ning.com/group/obituaries/forum/topic/listForTag?tag=university&feed=yes&xn_auth=noFarewell to my dear friend and frat brother I. N. Rendall Harper, Jr.tag:jazzburgher.ning.com,2021-01-14:1992552:Topic:5243512021-01-14T22:36:56.111ZDr. Nelson Harrisonhttp://jazzburgher.ning.com/profile/NelsonHarrison
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<div class="col-md-6 col-sm-12 col-xs-12 col-12"><div class="details-body-story"><h2 class="subtitle-story hidden-xs d-none d-md-block">I.N. RENDALL HARPER, JR.</h2>
<p class="date-story hidden-xs d-none d-md-block">July 19, 1938<span> - </span>May 4, 2020</p>
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<div class="details-body-copy set-font"><span class="details-copy">I.N. Rendall Harper, Jr. passed away in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on May 4, 2020. Mr. Harper ("Rendall") was 81 years old. He was born on July 19, 1938 in Pamplico, South Carolina, the only child of I.N. Rendall Harper, Sr. and Kate Ella Harper. He is survived by his children I.N. Rendall Harper, III (Randy) and his wife, Caprice Johnson; his daughter Tara Harper O'Connor and her husband Stephen O'Connor, and his grandchildren, Kamran Kate Eugenie Harper and Elizabeth Rebecca Kamalika Harper, all of Pittsburgh. Rendall had numerous cousins and friends in North and South Carolina, Georgia and the US Virgin Islands, as well as friends and family here in Pittsburgh who will all miss him dearly. At the age of 13, Rendall left his parent's home in Orangeburg, South Carolina to attend St. Emma Military Academy in Powhatan, Virginia. St. Emma was a Catholic boarding school for African American boys. Upon graduation, Rendall matriculated at Duquesne University where he was a biology major. During his freshman year at Duquesne he met his future wife, Elizabeth C. (Betsy) Johnson at a party at her house. The first thing he said to her was that he was going to marry her. She would later say about that moment that he was charming, but she was not sure he was sane. Betsy preceded him in death in 1999 after 37 years of marriage. While at Duquesne University, Rendall worked as a photographer in the labs at the University of Pittsburgh, taking photos of autopsies and experiments. He also worked as a wedding photographer while still in school. Rendall had a love of photography that he maintained his entire life. He had a long list of friends and family who received a daily photo of his grandchildren in an e-mail, and later a daily text of a photo of a flower. As a wedding guest, Rendall would take photos of the ceremony and the reception, rush to a 24 hour photo store, get three sets of prints, put the photos in albums, and then deliver a copy to the couple and their parents. Recipients would frequently prefer Rendall's photos to the work of their professional wedding photographer, as Rendall was a friend who knew how to create and capture candid moments. Rendall was one of the first African-Americans to work in sales at IBM. His market was hospitals and universities, and he sold the University of Pittsburgh their very first mainframe computer. He left IBM to join the startup company Shared Medical Systems, which he then left in 1977 to create his own company, American Micrographics Company ("AMC"). AMC was a true family business, with Betsy as the general manager, and employing their children, nieces, and his sister in law, as well as the children of dear friends. Rendall had a fertile mind and was a true entrepreneur. He loved research and data, and if you were lucky, he would explain his theory on investing in stocks and options, or his strongly held opinion that coding was an invaluable skill to have. He came from a long line of storytellers. Discussions with Rendall were reminiscent of his father's gatherings under the carport in South Carolina where Rendall Sr. would "hold court." Rendall also loved to barbecue. His ribs and hamburgers were legendary, and he loved to cook ribs to feed friends and family. Rendall also loved to dance with Betsy. Theirs was a wonderful partnership. Rendall was a member of Omega Psi Phi and Sigma Pi Phi (the Boule). He sat on numerous boards including but not limited to Duquesne University, The Art Institute, Shady Side Hospital, The Children's Institute and C-Cor Electronics. He could most often be found on the audit committee, due to his love of data and numbers. Those who knew Rendall also know that he was an enthusiastic technophile, having been an early adopter of the "personal computer" in the early 1980s. The family would appreciate if you would send memories or stories about Rendall to the email address INRHMEMORIES@gmail.com Due to the COVID 19 crisis, the family is preparing a memorial at a later date. Rendall will be interred with Betsy at Allegheny Cemetery in Pittsburgh, PA. Arrangements by BALL FUNERAL CHAPEL, INC.</span></div>
<div class="details-published">Published on<span> </span>May 9, 2020</div>
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</div> THE FINAL CURTAIN: Dr. Vernell Lillie, founder of Kuntu Repertory Theater, dies at 89tag:jazzburgher.ning.com,2020-05-30:1992552:Topic:4631402020-05-30T01:48:36.888ZDr. Nelson Harrisonhttp://jazzburgher.ning.com/profile/NelsonHarrison
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<h1 class="entry-title">THE FINAL CURTAIN: Dr. Vernell Lillie, founder of Kuntu Repertory Theater, dies at 89</h1>
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<li>May 28, 2020…</li>
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<h1 class="entry-title">THE FINAL CURTAIN: Dr. Vernell Lillie, founder of Kuntu Repertory Theater, dies at 89</h1>
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<li>May 28, 2020</li>
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<div class="entry-content"><div title="THE FINAL CURTAIN: Dr. Vernell Lillie, founder of Kuntu Repertory Theater, dies at 89" class="hero__featured col mb-3"></div>
<p>by Renee P. Aldrich<br/>For New Pittsburgh Courier<br/>For more than 35 years, the University of Pittsburgh’s Kuntu Repertory Theater was an institution in Pittsburgh. And it was Dr. Vernell Audrey Lillie who gave it the reputation of having a bold, brave look into the face of Black America… through theater.</p>
<p>In 2013, its 39th year, the Kuntu held its final season. Shortly after, Dr. Lillie relocated to Washington, D.C., where she would be closer to her daughters, Dr. Marsha (Hisani) Lillie-Blanton and Charisse R. Lillie.</p>
<p>On her 89th birthday, May 11, Dr. Lillie, founder of the Kuntu Repertory Theater, passed away in her home in Sunrise Senior Living Facility, in D.C. She had suffered from dementia.</p>
<p>She undoubtedly left behind a legacy of love and passion for the arts, mentoring hundreds of individuals whose theatrical careers she helped launch, and garnering a reputation for demanding excellence driven by the motto: “No excuses” for getting it done.</p>
<p>Dr. Lillie received her B.A. in Speech and Drama from Dillard University in New Orleans. With credentials in hand, she returned to her hometown in Hempstead, Tex., married her childhood sweetheart, Richard L. “Dickie Boy” Lillie Jr., and began laying the groundwork for her distinguished 50-plus year career in theater by producing and directing local productions at Worthing and Wheatley high schools in Houston, Tex. Molding and creating outstanding performers started early in her career. According to her daughter, Hisani, “these productions featured outstanding student actors, whom she mentored with love and ferocity.”</p>
<p>The call for advancing her education beckoned her and she and her family came to Pittsburgh in 1969, where she enrolled at Carnegie Mellon University. She earned her Master of Arts in English in 1970 and her Doctorate in English in 1971.</p>
<p>By 1972 she was an associate professor at the University of Pittsburgh in the Department of Africana Studies.</p>
<p>She had been planting little seeds of the legacy she would ultimately leave along the way, but the creation of the Kuntu Repertory Theater in 1974 set things ablaze in terms of setting a standard for community the ater, impacting lives and providing opportunities for Black artists.</p>
<p>“The intent of the Kuntu Theater was to allow an examination of Black life from a sociopolitical-historical prospective,” her daughter, Hisani, told the New Pittsburgh Courier in an exclusive interview. “Though it was a University Theater, it was rooted in Pittsburgh’s Black community, and provided a supportive space for Black writers, including both Rob Penny and August Wilson, among countless other Pittsburgh artists.”</p>
<p><img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-327135" src="https://newpittsburghcourier.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2020/05/Vernell-Lillie-and-R-P-Pitt-Archives.jpg" alt=""/></p>
<p>DR. VERNELL A. LILLIE founded the University of Pittsburgh’s Kuntu Repertory Theater in 1974, as a premier platform for writer and Pitt associate professor Rob Penny. The two are shown in the photo at right, from 1975. In the center photo, Dr. Lillie died on her 89th birthday, May 11. (Photos courtesy University of Pittsburgh)</p>
<p>From 1999 to 2006, Eileen J. Morris was the managing director of the Kuntu Theater, alongside Dr. Lillie. Morris, currently the artistic director of the Ensemble Theater in Houston, had a relationship with Dr. Lillie before she recruited her to Pittsburgh.</p>
<p>“I am both honored and blessed to have been able to sit at her feet and to share our joint theatrical journeys,” Morris said. “I learned from Dr. Lillie and was strengthened in my tenacity and my work ethic—but as my fellow artists say, I, too, felt appreciated, special and made to feel I could do anything. She had that way of helping you to push yourself even harder to make a difference in the art you are attempting to create. Forever I’ll have that memory of her and gratitude in my heart for the time I spent with her in Pittsburgh.”</p>
<p><img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-327136" src="https://newpittsburghcourier.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2020/05/Thomas-Dorsey-Jr-Vernell-Lillie-Eileen-Mooris-in-2007-Soul-of-America.jpg" alt=""/></p>
<p>Some notable productions out of the Kuntu Theater were Dr. Lillie’s own, “The Buffalo Soldiers Plus One,” Penny’s “Little Willie Armstrong Jones” and “Good Black Don’t Crack,” Wilson’s “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” “Homecoming” and “Radio Golf.” Notably, “Homecoming” was the first play by Wilson to be produced by a resident company.</p>
<p>The writer and director of some-150 plays, she was highly respected by her peers, and along with numerous other awards and accolades, Dr. Lillie received the University of Pittsburgh Chancellor’s Distinguished Teaching Award. She was also an inductee into the prestigious Distinguished Daughters of Pennsylvania by then-Governor Tom Ridge.</p>
<p>Mark Clayton Southers, an early protege of Dr. Lillie, is the founder and artistic director of the Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre Company, which is about to enter its 17th year in Pittsburgh.</p>
<p>“She was a pillar of our theatrical community, gave opportunities to multitudes of actors, designers and technicians who, in many cases, would never have been afforded the opportunity to advance in the field,” Southers told the Courier. “Her work through Kuntu has provided a communal space for long-lasting relationships to connect and flourish. My favorite quote of hers was, ‘I give because I have the capacity to.’ Doc has given so much over six decades as a producer and educator. She has left us a wonderful legacy through her Kuntu tradition.”</p>
<p><img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-327137" src="https://newpittsburghcourier.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2020/05/Version-1-Screen-Shot-2020-05-23-at-9.50.46-AM.jpg" alt=""/></p>
<p>Dr. Lillie is shown with internationally-known actor Lamman Rucker, who was inspired by Dr. Lillie while Rucker was a student at Duquesne University.</p>
<p>Renee Sorrell was Kuntu’s production manager for many of the years Dr. Lillie led it. She shared with the Courier that she came to the Theater to pass out flyers with no knowledge or experience in the mechanics of theater. “I asked if I could help by passing out flyers; she gave me a script to read and told me I would do props. I was blindsided, but soon, she had taught me to be the production manager, scheduling productions, hiring technicians and sometimes teaching technicians. This is an example of how she would see more in people than they would see in themselves,” Sorrell said.</p>
<p>Dr. Lillie’s reach far exceeded Pittsburgh and was connected to a wide range of theater notables. According to the esteemed director, Woody King Jr., the founder and artistic director of New Federal Theater Company out of New York, “Dr. Lillie was extremely popular among individuals like Phylicia Rashad and Debbie Allen; she was connected in the literary world as well and had influence. She had called for me to come to Pittsburgh years ago to direct a play by Rob Penny, Nefetari Rising and while here she referred me to a magazine called ‘Shining Star’ to submit a short story I wrote, and encouraged the publisher to accept it. They did. When Dr. Lillie spoke, people listened.”</p>
<p>On the day of her death, local Rev. Deryck Tines and others put out a call to the theater community for all those interested to join on an online Zoom call at 9 p.m. to share what Dr. Lillie meant to them. In less than three hours, more than 70 people joined on the call, including the likes of Janet Sarbaugh, vice president, creativity at The Heinz Endowments, screen actors Lamman Rucker and Ben Cain, and Stephen McKinney, who played the role of Bono in “Fences,” recently filmed in Pittsburgh. The Zoom call went past midnight, the effort indeed a tangible demonstration of the high regard in which Dr. Lillie was held—in Pittsburgh, and beyond.</p>
<p>Rev. Tines, before the Zoom call ended, declared that as soon as it was doable, there should be an entire weekend dedicated to honoring the power, passion and accomplishments of Dr. Vernell Lillie.</p>
<p><img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-327138" src="https://newpittsburghcourier.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2020/05/Clyde-Jones-Kathy-W-Humphrey-Patricia-E-Beeson-Vernell-Lillie-Mark-Nordenberg-2014-.jpg" alt=""/></p>
<p>DR. VERNELL A. LILLIE, second from right, founded the University of Pittsburgh’s Kuntu Repertory Theater in 1974. Dr. Vernell A. Lillie, shown in various photos courtesy of the University of Pittsburgh, where she founded the Kuntu Repertory Theater in 1974. I</p>
<p><img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-327139" src="https://newpittsburghcourier.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2020/05/vernell-lillie.jpg" alt=""/></p>
<p><img class="alignnone wp-image-327140 size-epic-750x536" src="https://newpittsburghcourier.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2020/05/Dr.-Vernell-Lillie_InsideDisplay-750x536.jpg" alt=""/></p>
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</div> Joseph Jerome Kennedy III passed away suddenly on May 1, 2018tag:jazzburgher.ning.com,2018-05-11:1992552:Topic:4302212018-05-11T22:34:38.240ZDr. Nelson Harrisonhttp://jazzburgher.ning.com/profile/NelsonHarrison
<div id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27818"><font id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_30980" size="3"><b id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_30979"> <a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1045071495?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1045071495?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"></img></a></b></font></div>
<div id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27818"><b id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_28151">Joseph Jerome Kennedy III passed away suddenly on May 1, 2018, a…</b></div>
<div id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27818"><font size="3" id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_30980"><b id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_30979"> <a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1045071495?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="750" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1045071495?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750" class="align-center"/></a></b></font></div>
<div id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27818"><b id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_28151">Joseph Jerome Kennedy III passed away suddenly on May 1, 2018, a<span id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27885">t his home in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania at the age of 75. Joe Kennedy III was born on April 17, 1943 to the late Joseph J. Kennedy Jr. and Thelma M. “Jennifer” (Copeland) Kennedy. He married Jean Carolyn Megginson on June 25, 1966, in Washington, D.C., a union that lasted over 51 years.</span></b></div>
<div class="aolmail_signature" id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27822"><div id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27821"><div id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27886"><div id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27887">After graduating from Maggie L. Walker High School in Richmond, Virginia in 1961, Joe Kennedy III earned his Bachelor of Science and Masters Degrees in Music Education from <a id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27888" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.facebook.com/duquesneuniversityoftheholyspirit/?fref=mentions&hc_location=group" name="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27888">Duquesne University</a> in 1965 and 1971, respectively. Kennedy was an accomplished composer and arranger, as well as a skilled pianist and French Hornist who served as one of the first three African-Americans in the <a id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27889" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.facebook.com/PittsburghSymphonyOrchestra/?fref=mentions&hc_location=group" name="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27889">Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra</a>. During the day, Kennedy taught music in the <a id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27890" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.facebook.com/PittsburghPublicSchools/?fref=mentions&hc_location=group" name="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27890">Pittsburgh Public Schools</a> for 42 years, becoming the highest rated Instructional Teacher Leader (Master Teacher) in the Pittsburgh Public Schools, and chairing the committee that developed the city’s Magnet Schools curriculum, which Newsweek magazine hailed as the best in the world. At night, along with vocalist Frank LaVelle, Kennedy was a member of the popular musical duo Kennedy & LaVelle, the city’s highest paid nightclub act in the 1960s and 70s.</div>
<div id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27891">Joe Kennedy III was an active member of East Liberty Presbyterian Church, where he was an ordained Deacon and served as the leader of the Contemporaries Adult Sunday School class, as a member of the East End Cooperative Ministries shelter meal team, and as the leader of the Men’s Fellowship.</div>
<div dir="ltr" id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27892">A Memorial Service will be held on Saturday, May 12, 2018 at 11:00 a.m. at <a id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27893" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.facebook.com/EastLibertyPresbyterian/?fref=mentions&hc_location=group" name="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27893">East Liberty Presbyterian Church (ELPC)</a>, followed by a light reception. Joe is survived by his wife, <a id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27894" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.facebook.com/jean.c.kennedy.3?fref=mentions&hc_location=group" name="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27894">Jean C. Kennedy</a>; son, <a id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27895" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.facebook.com/JoeKennedy4?fref=mentions&hc_location=group" name="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27895">Joseph J. Kennedy IV</a>; sister, Victoria Lynne Kennedy; sisters-in-law Theressa Turner and Valeria Megginson; brother-in-law Lorenzo Megginson (Jackie); and a host of relatives, friends, fans and former students. In lieu of flowers, the family encourages memorial contributions to <a id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27896" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.facebook.com/aajpsp/?fref=mentions&hc_location=group" name="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525371869052_27896">The African American Jazz Preservation Society of Pittsburgh</a>, P.O. Box 8240, Pittsburgh, PA 15217</div>
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<p><b id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525693500568_18110"><font color="#0000BF" face="times new roman, new york, times, serif" id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525693500568_17946"><span id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525693500568_17947"><a id="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525693500568_17950" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://www.post-gazette.com/news/obituaries/2018/05/06/Obituary-Joseph-Jerome-Kennedy-III-Teacher-and-half-of-popular-duo/stories/201805060115" name="aolmail_yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1525693500568_17950">http://www.post-gazette.com/news/obituaries/2018/05/06/Obituary-Joseph-Jerome-Kennedy-III-Teacher-and-half-of-popular-duo/stories/201805060115</a></span></font></b></p> Geri Allen, Brilliantly Expressive Pianist, Composer and Educator, Dies at 60tag:jazzburgher.ning.com,2017-06-28:1992552:Topic:4102332017-06-28T02:28:00.109ZDr. Nelson Harrisonhttp://jazzburgher.ning.com/profile/NelsonHarrison
<h1 class="post-title">Geri Allen, Brilliantly Expressive Pianist, Composer and Educator, Dies at 60</h1>
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<h1 class="post-title">Geri Allen, Brilliantly Expressive Pianist, Composer and Educator, Dies at 60</h1>
<div class="by-date"><span class="submitted"><span><span class="submitted-label">By</span> <span class="name">David R. Adler</span></span></span> <i class="bullet">•</i> <span class="pub-date">4 hours ago</span></div>
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<li><a title="Geri Allen at the Village Vanguard in 2011" href="http://mediad.publicbroadcasting.net/p/wbgo/files/styles/x_large/public/201706/gerivv_wide-b2994e0ec5069dfacfe1049e36eb82e9c13282cd-s900-c85.jpg" class="noexit lightbox"><img src="http://mediad.publicbroadcasting.net/p/wbgo/files/styles/medium/public/201706/gerivv_wide-b2994e0ec5069dfacfe1049e36eb82e9c13282cd-s900-c85.jpg" alt="Geri Allen at the Village Vanguard in 2011"/></a><div class="image-meta"><div class="caption">Geri Allen at the Village Vanguard in 2011</div>
<div class="attribution"><span class="credit">John Rogers for WBGO and NPR</span> / <span class="agency">johnrogersnyc.com</span></div>
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<div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><p>Geri Allen, a widely influential jazz pianist, composer and educator who defied classification while steadfastly affirming her roots in the hard-bop tradition of her native Detroit, died on Tuesday in Philadelphia. She was 60, and lived for the last four years in Pittsburgh.</p>
<p>The cause was cancer, said Ora Harris, her manager of 30 years. The news shocked Allen’s devoted listeners as well as her peers, and the many pianists she directly influenced.</p>
<p>In addition to her varied and commanding work as a leader, Allen made her mark as a venturesome improviser on notable albums with the saxophonist-composers Ornette Coleman, Oliver Lake, Steve Coleman and Charles Lloyd; drummer Ralph Peterson, Jr.; bassist Charlie Haden and drummer Paul Motian; and many others. Her recent collaborations with drummer Terri Lyne Carrington, in separate trios featuring bassist Esperanza Spalding and tenor saxophonist David Murray, found her in a ceaselessly exploratory mode, probing new harmonic expanses and dynamic arcs.</p>
<p>Allen’s solo piano work, from <em>Home Grown</em> in 1985 to <em>Flying Toward the Sound</em> in 2010, reveals an uncommon technical prowess and kaleidoscopic tonal range. The subtitle of <em>Flying Toward the Sound</em> claims inspiration from Cecil Taylor, McCoy Tyner and Herbie Hancock specifically, but on this and other recordings we hear Allen, unfailingly distinctive. From <em>Home Grown</em>, the track “Black Man,” with its looping, interlocking pulses and forward momentum, points clearly toward a rhythmic sensibility heard today from such celebrated pianists as Craig Taborn and Vijay Iyer.</p>
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<p>Geri Antoinette Allen was born on June 12, 1957 in Pontiac, Michigan, and raised in Detroit. Her father, Mount V. Allen, Jr., was a principal in the Detroit public school system, and her mother, Barbara Jean, was a defense contract administrator for the U.S. Government.</p>
<p>Allen took up the piano at age seven and went on to graduate from Cass Technical High School, the alma mater of jazz greats on the order of Paul Chambers, Wardell Gray, Gerald Wilson and Donald Byrd. </p>
<p>While in school Allen became a protégé of the late trumpeter Marcus Belgrave, who directed the Jazz Development Workshop and also mentored saxophonist Kenny Garrett and violinist Regina Carter, among many others. (Belgrave would go on to appear on Allen’s albums <em>The Nurturer</em> and <em>Maroons</em> in the early 1990s.) From another mentor, the late drummer Roy Brooks, Allen developed a deep love for Thelonious Monk, whose compositions she masterfully interpreted.</p>
<p>Allen graduated from Howard University in 1979, as one of the first students to complete a jazz studies degree there. She earned an M.A. in ethnomusicology from the University of Pittsburgh in 1982. For part of a year she sustained herself touring with former Supreme Mary Wilson. In 1984 she debuted with <em>The Printmakers</em>, a tight, imaginative trio session with bassist Anthony Cox and drummer Andrew Cyrille.</p>
<p>Soon afterward, Allen made a series of statements with the vanguardist M-Base Collective, spearheaded by Steve Coleman. She appeared on his debut album, <em>Motherland Pulse</em>, in 1985, and on several subsequent releases by his flagship band, Five Elements. Her own album <em>Open on All Sides in the Middle</em>, from ’86, featured Coleman in a bustling electro-acoustic ensemble, alongside other players including Belgrave and trombonist Robin Eubanks.</p>
<p>Trio summits followed with Ron Carter, a fellow Cass Tech alum, and Tony Williams (<em>Twenty One</em>); with Haden and Motian (<em>Etudes</em>, <em>Live at the Village Vanguard</em>); and with Dave Holland and Jack DeJohnette (<em>The Life of a Song</em>). In each setting, Allen proved more than a virtuoso able to marshal the greatest rhythm sections; she was a musical partner with prodigious ears, motivated by the percussive energy of the avant-garde, the elusive unified spark of straight-ahead swing, and the expressive truth of piano balladry. </p>
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<p>Allen’s 1996 encounter with Ornette Coleman, documented on the albums <em>Sound Museum: Hidden Man</em> and <em>Sound Museum: Three Women,</em> stands out in part for its historical significance: this was the first time since Walter Norris on <em>Somethin’ Else!!!!</em> in 1958 that an acoustic pianist had recorded with Coleman.</p>
<p>The piano had little use in his free-floating music because it tended to impose a conventional chordal fixity. Not with Allen on the bandstand. She played a multifaceted textural and contrapuntal role, her ocean-deep harmonic knowledge guiding but never limiting her, from gorgeous and evocative rubato episodes to urgent free blowing. Her melodic voice, too, sometimes moving in unison with Coleman, brought a clarion intensity that remains unique in his output.</p>
<p>Along with her rare qualities as a player, Allen had significant impact as an educator for 10 years at the University of Michigan. She began as director of jazz studies at the University of Pittsburgh, her alma mater, in 2013, succeeding one of her mentors, Nathan Davis. Three years later she became artistic director of the Carr Center — characterized by Mark Stryker, author of the forthcoming book <em>Made in Detroit: Jazz from the Motor City</em>, as “a downtown Detroit arts organization that primarily champions African-American culture and has a strong arts education program.”</p>
<p>In both her institutional work and her musical projects, Allen engaged in a serious way with jazz as part of a larger African-American continuum in the arts. Her 2013 album <em>Grand River Crossings: Motown & Motor City Inspirations</em> was a hometown homage but also a reflection on the porous boundaries of black music. Last year the artist Carrie Mae Weems welcomed Allen and her trio to the Guggenheim Museum for part of a performance series called “Past Tense/Future Perfect.”</p>
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<p>In her own work, Allen often sought to broaden her reference points and sonic palette, featuring the Atlanta Jazz Chorus on <em>Timeless Portraits and Dreams</em> (2006); the electric and acoustic guitar of Living Colour’s Vernon Reid on <em>The Gathering</em> (1998); and tap dancers Lloyd Storey, on <em>Open on All Sides in the Middle</em>, and Maurice Chestnut, on <em>Geri Allen & Time Line Live</em> (2010). She shed light on the legacy of the still underappreciated pianist and composer Mary Lou Williams on <em>Zodiac Suite: Revisited</em>, credited to the Mary Lou Williams Collective, with bassist Buster Williams and drummers Billy Hart and Andrew Cyrille.</p>
<p>Allen is survived by her father; her brother, Mount Allen III; and three children, Laila Deen, Wallace Vernell, and Barbara Ann. Her marriage to the trumpeter Wallace Roney ended in divorce.</p>
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<p>Along with a Guggenheim Fellowship, in 2008, Allen received the African American Classical Music Award from Spellman College, and a Distinguished Alumni Award from Howard. In 1995 became the first recipient of Soul Train’s Lady of Soul Award for jazz album of the year, for <em>Twenty-One</em>. The following year she became the first woman to win the Jazzpar Prize, a highly prestigious Danish honor. </p>
<p>Over years of seeing Allen live, it’s striking to recall her at Caramoor in 1994, when she shared a solo piano bill with the great Kenny Barron. She parsed Monk and other material, including her own, and encored in a riotous two-piano showdown with Barron on “Tea for Two,” dealing impressively with a tune of older vintage. Years later, at the Village Vanguard, she led an engrossing quartet with Hart, bassist (and Cass Tech alum) Robert Hurst, and percussionist Mino Cinelu.</p>
<p>In terms of the unexpected, however, don’t for a moment discount Allen’s 2011 Christmas album, <a href="https://youtu.be/jj81T6Ytm0o"><em>A Child Is Born</em></a>. She plays not just piano but also Farfisa organ, celeste, clavinet and Fender Rhodes, taking “Angels We Have Heard On High” and “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel” to harmonic places they’ve likely never been. Even at its most searching, complex and sonically novel, there’s a contemplative quality in the music that makes this a worthy listen as we mourn Allen’s untimely passing.</p>
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