Herbie Hancock donates instruments to Smithsonian

[mgraham333]

Herbie Hancock donates instruments to Smithsonian

Tuesday, March 30, 2004 Posted: 4:29 PM EST (2129 GMT)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- U.S. jazz legend Herbie Hancock donated several of his instruments to the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History on Tuesday and said he hoped they would inspire others.

A keyboard used to create some of his most famous hits, two synthesizers and a headphone microphone joined the museum's other musical memorabilia from jazz greats such as Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald and Lionel Hampton.

"Maybe some little kid will identify with them and think that one day I can create music on a new instrument, maybe I can be somebody," Hancock told Reuters in an interview after a ceremony at the museum.

"But, the truth is that everyone is somebody already. You don't need the fame to be vital. You would not exist if you did not have something to bring to the table of life."

The keyboard, a Fairlight CMI Series II that cost Hancock $25,000, was the computer-based instrument he used to compose his 1983 hit "Rockit," a song famous for its use of a scratching technique.

Hancock said he managed to convince the Australian supplier of the Fairlight to show him the instrument before giving a demonstration to another music icon, Stevie Wonder.

A winner of eight Grammy awards in the past two decades and an Academy Award in 1987 for the film score "Round Midnight," he is best known for fusing jazz techniques with electronic instrumentation.

Child prodigy

"Hancock's instruments not only represent the career of one of our country's most prominent musical figures, they help us to better understand the story of electric and electronic musical instruments," said American History museum curator John Hasse.

Born in 1940, Hancock was a child prodigy pianist and performed at age 11 with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

Brought up in a poor neighborhood on the south side of Chicago, Hancock's mother recognized his talent early on and bought him a piano for his seventh birthday.

It was the "magnetism of improvisation" that first attracted Hancock away from his classical roots to jazz, which he said while growing out of slavery was more about the human experience than anything else.

Hancock said he had already sold many of his instruments to a company but was holding onto many of his more valuable items so they could go into his estate when he died.

"I am still a jazz musician and not a pop star in terms of money and so I have to take care of my family first, then my extended family and my country."

Hancock is working on a new record called "HH Project 2004" which involved a collection of artists. He declined, for legal reasons, to give any further details.

Source: CNN

[7/4]

Herbie Hancock Receives NEA Jazz Award

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: March 31, 2004

Filed at 10:05 p.m. ET

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Nine-time Grammy winner Herbie Hancock was honored Wednesday with the Jazz Masters Fellowship Award from the National Endowment of the Arts.

Hancock received the award, the government's most prestigious honor for jazz musicians, after performing at halftime of the NBA game between the Washington Wizards and New Jersey Nets.

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This year's other Jazz Masters recipients were honored in January, but Hancock was unable to attend the ceremony in New York. Past recipients of the award include Count Basie, Miles Davis, Ella Fitzgerald, Dizzy Gillespie and Sarah Vaughan.

Hancock released his first album, ``Takin' Off'' in 1963. His album ``Future Shock'' in 1983 produced the hit single ``Rockit.'' He also won an Oscar in 1987 for the soundtrack to the movie ``Round Midnight.''

[Alec]

Okay, I think it’s great that he is donating the instruments, but my cynical side (and the fact that I have been working on taxes) screams –“Tax write off!”

[Guest ariceffron]

herbie is crazy--- why in the hell would he donate his fairlight out of all his instruments. i know its outdated. but still. what if he ever wants to use his fairlight now he needs to go to the smithsonian

[Jim Alfredson]

Why would he? You can do 100,000 times more with any $2,000 synth bought at your local Guitar Center today than with the Fairlight.

[chris olivarez]

Okay so it's a tax write off. It was still neat of Herbie to do it.

[mikeweil]

That's the way I see it.