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Richie Havens
Richie Havens was born in Bedford-Stuyvesant, a Brooklyn neighbourhood. His father was a piano player. Whilst in his early adolescence, Richie began singing in different Gospel choirs like The McCrea Gospel Singers, which would later be influencing his style of music. Beside the music, Richie also was a gifted painter, and for a few years, made a living as a portrait painter in the streets of Greenwich Village.
The Village was the perfect location to soak in what was brewing in the Folk music scene, as it was the place where singers like Joan Baez and Bob Dylan had started their careers. As an Afro-American, Richie Havens sure was an exception among the predominantly white music scene of Folk.
After releasing several less successful records, Richie had his breakthrough at the legendary Woodstock-Festival. His performance was received with such enthusiasm, that he played until he ran put of tunes. He then improvised a song based on the old spiritual Motherless Child, which would become his international hit Freedom.
Even though being a talented songwriter himself, Richie Havens had his biggest successes with cover versions of for example the Beatles classic Here Comes The Sun, or Lamont-Dozier's Going Back To My Roots.
In 1972 Havens started his own record label, Stormy Forest, where from now on he would release his records. By the end of the 70s he focused more and more on his other artistic talents and made a name for himself as an actor, a writer, a painter and a sculptor.
On the side, he co-founded the Northwinds Undersea Institute, an oceanographic museum, and was committed to protecting the environment. In 1990 he founded Natural Guard, an organization to motivate kids to become active in environment protection.
Havens had to undergo kidney surgery in 2010, from which he wouldn't recover completely. In March 2012, he officially announced his retreat from stage, after 45 years, due to health issues. Pretty much one year later, on the 22nd of April 2013, Richie Havens died of a heart attack at the age of 72 in Jersey City.