The Kennedy Center has announced which entertainers will be celebrated at the 27th Kennedy Center Honors.
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This year’s group includes a filmmaker, a country singer, an iconic psychedelic rock band, and a theater.
The Kennedy Center called Francis Ford Coppola “one of the most influential and acclaimed filmmakers of our time.”
Born in Detroit in 1939, Coppola grew up in Queens, New York, and found a connection with entertainment when he was only 9 years old and paralyzed by polio. Bedridden for a year, he used his television and a toy 15mm movie projector to pass the time. He started writing short stories soon after and eventually studied theater at Hofstra College and film at UCLA, winning the Samuel Goldwin Writing Award for his screenplay “Pilma Pilma.”
Coppola co-founded the production company American Zoetrope with George Lucas in 1969. The studio has produced films that have won 16 Academy Awards from 70 nominations. Four films are among the Top 100 American Films chosen by the American Film Institute.
Coppola won his first Oscar for “Patton” in 1970 before writing, directing and/or producing “The Godfather” series, “American Graffiti” and “Apocalypse Now.” He has his own slate of honors with the Academy, with five Oscars from 12 nominations.
Coppola is no stranger to the Kennedy Center Honors . In 2007 he appeared in the tribute to Martin Scorsese.
The Kennedy Center considers the Grateful Dead “a social and musical phenomenon that grew into a genuine American treasure.”
The group started in 1965 in California and combined rock, folk and jazz into a psychedelic sound that was the soundtrack of the late ’60s.
The Dead spawned ravenous fans called “Dead Heads,” who were emblematic of the counterculture. The band’s mystique continues through the 2020s despite the deaths of two members and the band’s reinvention. The band has played a world-record 2,318 concerts and enjoyed its 59th Top-40 album on Billboard charts, the Kennedy Center said.
In 1994, the band was been honored with induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. They were a recipient of a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2007.
Bonnie Raitt’s sound combines blues, R&B, rock and pop into her own signature music, the Kennedy Center said.
She had been performing for two decades when her “Nick of Time” and “Luck of the Draw” albums brought her into the mainstream of pop in the ’90s and introduced music fans to songs such as, “Something to Talk About” and “I Can’t Make You Love Me.”
Raitt has 13 Grammy awards under her belt and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000.
She was also named one of the 100 greatest guitarists and one of the 100 greatest singers by Rolling Stone magazine.
In addition to music, she has been an advocate for the environment and was a founding member of MUSE (Musicians United for Safe Energy.) She also fights for musicians’ rights and is a member of The Rhythm and Blues Foundation, which is working for reforms and recognition for some of the first R&B artists, the Kennedy Center said.
Arturo Sandoval is a jazz trumpet and flugelhorn virtuoso, but also sings and plays the piano, timbales and keyboard, according to the Kennedy Center .
The organization calls Sandoval one “of the greatest trumpet players in the world due to his exceptional technical skills, virtuosic performances, and profound musicality. He possesses a remarkable range, agility, and control over the instrument, allowing him to execute intricate passages efficiently and expressly.”
He blends styles like jazz, classical and Latin music into his own unique sound.
Sandoval had to overcome political oppression in Cuba before stardom. He has performed live at the Oscars, Grammys and the White House, and has 10 Grammy Awards, six Billboard Awards, an Emmy and the Presidential Medal of Freedom awarded by President Barack Obama.
Though not a person, the final honoree has had enormous influence on entertainment and culture.
The Apollo theater has been an institution for more than 90 years and has launched legends in the entertainment world while being the nexus of innovation for Harlem.
It is the largest performing arts institution committed to Black culture and creativity, the Kennedy Center said, calling the theater a “beacon of Harlem community.”
While music has been most of the focus of The Apollo, it has also hosted performances from the world of dance, theater, spoken word, comedy and special performances from a wide variety of entertainers from U2, to the Red Hot Chili Peppers, to Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars.
It has given the start to many entertainers who have become icons in their own right, thanks to The Apollo Amateur Night: Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, James Brown, Stevie Wonder, Luther Vandross and Glady Knight for example.
It recently had its first major expansion during its 90th anniversary season, opening The Apollo Stages at the Victoria Theater.
The Kennedy Center Honors ceremony will be held on Dec. 8 and will be broadcast on Dec. 23.
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