Curtis Mayfield

At 57 years old, Curtis Mayfield physical status not available right now. We will update Curtis Mayfield's height, weight, eye color, hair color, build, and measurements.

Career

Mayfield's career began in 1956 when he joined the Roosters with Arthur and Richard Brooks and Jerry Butler. The Roosters, now including Sam Gooden, made the Impressions two years ago. Butler had two hit singles with him, "For Your Precious Love" and "Come Back My Love," followed by Butler. Mayfield spent a short time with him, co-writing and performing on Butler's upcoming hit "He Will Break Your Heart," before rejoining the Impressions as a team member of ABC Records and working with the label's Chicago-based producer/A&R manager Johnny Pate.

Butler was replaced by Fred Cash, a former original Roosters fan, and Mayfield became the band's lead singer, with "Gypsy Woman" becoming a Top 20 Pop hit. Their hit "Amen" (Top 10) was included in the soundtrack to the 1963 United Artists film Lilies of the Field, which starred Sidney Poitier. With a series of Mayfield compositions including "Keep On Pushing," "People Get Ready," "It's All Right" (Top ten), and "Man's Got Soul," the Impressions reached the height of their fame in the mid-to-late '60s (Top ten), "Keep On Pushing," "People Get Ready," "It's All Right" (Top 10) and "Woman's Got Soul" (Top 20) and "Wo "People Get Ready" ("It a, including "People Get Message Getting's "Get Ready," "It Get's" (Top Getting Around My Baby" ("Wo" (Top 20) and "Wo" (Top 20) and "Itheiro's, "Wo" (Top 20) and "Wo" ("Man's" (Top 20) and "It'Son...What's" (Top 20) and "People Get Ready" (Top 20) and "Man's, "Get Ready" (Top 20) and "Woa" (Top 20) and "Britix) "Wo" ("Wo"), "Met's" (Top 20) and "Get Ready" (Top 20) and "Woman's, "Wo" (Top 20) and "Becafa) and "Iton Get Ready" (Top 20) and "Mo" (Top 20) and "Woman's, "Wo" (Top 20) and "My Baby" (Top 20) &" (Top 20) and "Woman's Have Afame" (Top 20) and "Wo "Womitting "Maware)

In Chicago, he founded Curtom Records, and the Impressions followed him in their hit "This Is My Country," "Choice Of Colors," and "Check Out Your Mind." Mayfield had written much of the Civil Rights Movement in the early 1960s, but by the time of the decade, he had emerged as a pioneering voice in the black liberation movement, alongside James Brown and Sly Stone. The last big hit for ABC was Mayfield's "We're a Winner." When it was released in late 1967, it became a anthem of the black power and black pride movements, as well as "Move On Up" and "Becaw" (whose title is quoted in Billboard's pop chart and also in "Move On Up) and "Moment On Up"), as it became a symbol of Martin Luther King Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement.

And outside of his appearance at the Impressions, Mayfield was a prolific songwriter in Chicago, writing and delivering scores of hits for many other artists. He also owned the Mayfield and Windy C labels, which were sold by Cameo-Parkway, and was also a partner in the Curtom (first independent, then Warner Bros, and then RSO and finally Buddah) and Thomas labels (first independent, then Atlantic, and then Buddah).

"He Will Break Your Heart," "Find Another Girl," and "I'm A-Tellin' You" were three of Mayfield's most popular songwriting hits, including three hits he wrote for Jerry Butler on Vee Jay ("He Will Break Your Heart" and "I'm A-Tellin' You." His harmony vocals are extremely popular. "Mama Didn't Lie" was also a hit writer and arranger for Jan Bradley's "Mama Didn't Lie." He was instrumental in writing and arranging for OKeh Records, which included hits by Major Lance like "Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um" and "The Monkey Time", as well as Walter Jackson, Billy Butler, and the Artistics, beginning in 1963. This scheme operated from 1965 to 1965.

Mayfield left the Impressions in 1970 and embarked on a solo career. Curtom released many of Mayfield's 1970s recordings, as well as ones from Impressions, Leroy Hutson, the Five Stairsteps, the Staples Singers, Mavis Staples, Linda Clifford, The Notations, and Baby Huey and the Babysitters. Gene Chandler and Major Lance, who had served with Mayfield in the 1960s, also signed for short stays in Curtom. Many of the label's songs were made by Mayfield.

Curtis, Mayfield's first solo album, was released in 1970 and debuted in the top 20, as well as being a critical success. It pre-dated Marvin Gaye's album What's Going On, to which it has been compared in terms of social change. Super Fly, the soundtrack to the blaxploitation Super Fly film, debuted on the Billboard Top LPs chart and sold over 12 million copies, marking his professional and critical peak of his solo career. Mayfield's lyrics were more than the soundtracks to other blaxploitation films (most notably Isaac Hayes' score for Shaft), which glorified the ghetto excesses of the characters, but the story's scripts were based on hard-hitting commentary on the state of affairs in black, urban ghettos at the time, as well as direct critiques of several characters in the film. Bob Donat wrote in Rolling Stone magazine in 1972 that although the film's message "was diluted by schizoid cross-purposes" because it "glamorizes machismo-cocaine consciousness," the anti-drug message on [Mayfield's soundtrack] is much more definite and more definite than in the film." Mayfield's album set this film apart because of the tendency of these blaxploitation films to glorify the criminal lives of dealers and pimps in a predominantly black lower class audience. Mayfield, a song that relies on the death of Freddie, a junkie who was coerced into "push for the man," and "Pusherman," a collection that reveals how many people in the ghetto fell victim to heroin use and became dependent upon their dealers, introduced a darker side of life in the ghetto that these blaxploitation films often failed to address, with songs like "Freddie's Dead" Nevertheless, although Mayfield's soundtrack condemned the glorification of dealers and pimps, he in no way denied that this glorification was occurring. When asked about the subject of these films, he was quoted as saying "I don't see why people are raving about these films" and "the way you clean up the streets is to disinfect them."

This album, as well as What's Going On and Stevie Wonder's Innervisions, heralded a new socially aware, funky style of popular soul music. He was dubbed "The Gentle Genius" by the author. Both "Freddie's Death" and "Super Fly" have sold over one million copies, and the R.I.A. has given them gold discs.

Super Fly achieved a following that culminated in Mayfield's being chosen for additional soundtracks, some of which he wrote and produced, while others performed the vocals. Gladys Knight & the Pips produced Mayfield's soundtrack for Claudine in 1974, while Aretha Franklin produced the Sparkle soundtrack in 1976. Mayfield also worked with The Staples Singers on the soundtrack for the 1975 film Let's Do It Again, and Mavis Staples on the 1977 film soundtrack A Piece of the Play (both films were produced by Poitier and featured Bill Cosby and Sidney Poitier's acting and comedic adventures.

Mayfield's anti-war album Back to the World, a concept album that dealt with the human aftermath of the Vietnam War and criticized the US' involvement in wars around the world, released in 1973. "Do Wap is Strong in Here" from his soundtrack to Miguel Pieno's film Short Eyes was one of Mayfield's most popular funk-disco meldings. People Never Give Up, author Peter Burns' biography, Mayfield's People Never Give Up in 2003, noted that Mayfield has 140 songs in the Curtis vaults. Burns said the songs were either already completed or in the process of completion, so they could be released commercially. "The Great Escape," "In The News," "Turn Up the Radio," "What's The Situation," are among the recordings that have been released. Two other albums containing Curtis Mayfield are available in the Curtom vaults, one titled "Live at the Club Chicago" in September 1966 and the Impressions' "Live at the Club Chicago," which includes performances by Mayfield, the Impressions, and Jerry Butler.

Mayfield and his family were able to move to Atlanta in 1982, putting an end to his recording business in Chicago. With the introduction of the main RSO imprint and Curtom as the production company, the label had gradually reduced in size in its last two years or so. Mayfield has appeared on occasion, with the Curtom brand surviving for a few years and then touring around the world. "Don't Worry" by Mayfield has been included as an entrance song on every episode of the drama series The Deuce. The Deuce records the germination of the sex-trade industry in the 1970s in the heart of New York's Times Square. Mayfield's career began to slowed down in the 1980s.

Mayfield's music appeared in the films I'm Gonna Git You Sucka, Hollywood Shuffle, Friday (although not on the soundtrack album), Bend It Like Beckham, The Hangover Part II, and Short Eyes, where he appeared as a prisoner.

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