Oscar Brown Jr.
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Oscar Brown, Jr (October 10, 1926–May 29, 2005) was a singer, songwriter, playwright, poet, and civil rights activist.
Born and raised on the south side of Chicago, he was named for his father who was a successful attorney and real estate broker. His singing debut was on the radio show Secret City at age fifteen. Brown attended Englewood High School in Chicago, the University of Wisconsin, and Lincoln University (Pennsylvania) but did not obtain a degree. He served a stint in the U.S. Army, officially segregated until 1948, where his views on “race relations” were considered “subversive. ” In his youth, he was even a member of the Communist Party, USA, which ultimately also decided Oscar was “too subversive”; he was suspected to be a Black Nationalist.
Some of Brown’s musical plays involved Chicago street gang members. These plays affected hundreds of young lives in a positive way. He founded The Oscar Brown, Jr. H.I.P. Legacy Foundation to carry on his work. But his first attempt at mounting a major musical stage show in New York City was “Kicks & Co.,” c. 1960. Host Dave Garroway turned over an entire broadcast of the “Today” show to Brown to perform numbers from the show and try to raise the necessary funds to launch it on the stage. As with virtually all of Brown’s theatrical endeavors, the public was not won over sufficiently to allow financial breakeven despite acclaim by some critics. (His longest-running relative success, thanks to participation by Muhammad Ali, was “Big-Time Buck White.”) “Kicks & Co.
Born and raised on the south side of Chicago, he was named for his father who was a successful attorney and real estate broker. His singing debut was on the radio show Secret City at age fifteen. Brown attended Englewood High School in Chicago, the University of Wisconsin, and Lincoln University (Pennsylvania) but did not obtain a degree. He served a stint in the U.S. Army, officially segregated until 1948, where his views on “race relations” were considered “subversive. ” In his youth, he was even a member of the Communist Party, USA, which ultimately also decided Oscar was “too subversive”; he was suspected to be a Black Nationalist.
Some of Brown’s musical plays involved Chicago street gang members. These plays affected hundreds of young lives in a positive way. He founded The Oscar Brown, Jr. H.I.P. Legacy Foundation to carry on his work. But his first attempt at mounting a major musical stage show in New York City was “Kicks & Co.,” c. 1960. Host Dave Garroway turned over an entire broadcast of the “Today” show to Brown to perform numbers from the show and try to raise the necessary funds to launch it on the stage. As with virtually all of Brown’s theatrical endeavors, the public was not won over sufficiently to allow financial breakeven despite acclaim by some critics. (His longest-running relative success, thanks to participation by Muhammad Ali, was “Big-Time Buck White.”) “Kicks & Co.
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Sin & Soul... And Then Some
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Sin & Soul ... and Then Some
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fergalmc wrote:
So few plays? Criminal.
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A1enochka wrote:
!!
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c4rb0n wrote:
Wow stunning voice..
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ABUTOM wrote:
mr kicks, somebody buy me a drink, dat dere, straighten up and fly right. my favorites. good messages.sad to learn he left in 2005. he was the voice of the people. saddest reality song was head em in move em out.
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ro8bog wrote:
Brother Where Are You - most
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tgates10 wrote:
I forst heard Oscara Brown Jr. when I was 14 yrs old and have been hooked ever since. One of my favorite albums was Finding A New Friend with Luiz Henrique. It took 30 Plus years for me to find that album again and it's till a treasure. I still brings tears to my eyes.
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kozzy420 wrote:
one of my all time favs!
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maggot_brain wrote:
He was a beautiful man and performer. I was working lights at a small club when he joined the band onstage improptu to do All Blues. I cried, man.
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xCUDDLECOREx wrote:
Brother Where Are You...is an amazing, amazing song.
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