[The introduction to this series of posts is here.]
“During the 1950s Charles White began a notably fertile period as an artist whose work appeared on records of the Vanguard label. Vanguard was a particularly innovative record label, founded in 1949 by Seymour Solomon and his younger brother Maynard Solomon in New York City. The label grew to become one of America’s leading independent labels. Charles White supplied drawings and illustrations for a number of Vanguard records, for the most part with 10 inch sleeves. Many of these were jazz recordings, but in one or two instances his illustrations were used for other types of recordings.
In 1954, Charles White provided an illustration for the cover of the eponymously titled Sir Charles Thompson Trio. The record was released on the Vanguard label as part of its Vanguard Jazz Showcase – AVRS-7008-X. Again, it was a 10” mono recording. Sir Charles Thompson (1918 – 2016) was an American swing and bebop pianist, organist, composer, and arranger. The cover of Sir Charles Thompson Trio featured a drawing of a pianist. The drawing was not signed by White and neither did the record sleeve contain any references to him.”
“In 1955, Charles White provided an illustration for the cover of another eponymously titled release by the Sir Charles Thompson Trio. The record was released on the Vanguard label as part of its Vanguard Jazz Showcase – VRS-8018. Again, it was a 10” mono recording. Sir Charles Thompson (1918 – 2016) was an American swing and bebop pianist, organist, composer, and arranger. White’s drawing for this album was of a pair of hands, touching, with sensitivity and purpose, the keys of a piano. The hands took up pretty much the whole of the record cover and as such, accentuated an understanding that a pianist’s skills lay for the most part in her or his hands and fingers. This was an exquisite drawing which was somehow able to communicate a sense that a passage was being played which required attention, focus and care. There was an otherworldly dimension to the image, as it appeared as if the pianist (whose disembodied hands played with such delicacy and intent) was submerged in water, as was the piano being played. It was thus possible to read White’s illustrations such as this as distinctly interpretive.
The notes on the back of the sleeve included ‘The drawing on the cover is by the distinguished artist Charles White, winner of several national awards, whose work is represented in the Whitney Museum in New York, Library of Congress, and other famous collections.’”
“In 1955, Charles White provided an illustration for the cover of a jazz recording by the Sam Most Sextet, the record being released on the Vanguard label as PPT 12009. Again, it was a 10” mono recording. It was perhaps White’s determination to portray his people that led him to a highly original approach to the sleeve he created for Vanguard’s mid-50s releases of music by Sam Most, then a young American jazz flautist, clarinetist and tenor saxophonist. Most was white and it was perhaps this consideration that lead White to provide his commissioners with a drawing of a pair of disembodied Black hands, playing a flute. Slightly angled, the top and bottom of the flute extended beyond the top and bottom of the sleeve, with a hand on the instrument, in both of the sections of the cover. In this version of the recording by the Sam Most Sextet, the imagery of the disembodied black hands playing a flute was duplicated, the two instruments crossing to create a dramatic V shape.
[From the notes on the back sleeve:] ‘The drawing on the cover is what photographers would call a ‘perspective’ and ‘angle shot’ of a flute and the player’s hands, as expanded and recreated in the unique technique of the distinguished artist Charles White. Mr. White’s work is represented in the Whitney Museum in New York, the Library of Congress, and his previous drawings for the Vanguard Jazz Showcase series have been on public display.’”
“In 1954, Charles White provided an illustration for the cover of folk singer Brother John Sellers’ recording Jack of Diamonds. The record was released on the Vanguard label as part of its Vanguard Jazz Showcase – VRS-7022. Again, it was a 10” mono recording. The record sleeve stated ‘Cover drawings (sic) by Charles White.’”
“In 1955, Charles White provided an illustration for the cover of 2 Part Inventions in Jazz, a two-volume issue. The record illustrated here was an Austrian release, Vol. 1, on the Vanguard label as part of its Vanguard Jazz Showcase – AVRS-7009-X. Again, these were 10” recordings. The cover featured two drawings by White, one of a piano player (Ellis Larkins’ instrument) and the other of a trumpet player (Ruby Braff’s instrument). The drawings had each been used on other Vanguard record sleeves, but for 2 Part Inventions in Jazz had been montaged together. There were no references to White on the back of the sleeve.”
“In 1954 Vanguard released Alexander Nevsky (VRS 451)– a cantana (a medium-length narrative piece of music for voices with instrumental accompaniment, typically with solos, chorus, and orchestra), an opus by Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev (1891–1953), Alexander Nevsky was a revered 13th century Russian leader (1219-1263), prince of Novgorod and then grand prince of Vladimir. He was an outstanding military leader and statesman who earned his surname from a victory over the Swedes at the Neva River. Sung in Russian, the music was performed by the Vienna State Opera Orchestra and Chorus, conducted by Mario Rossi. Ana Maria Iriarte was mezzo soprano. The record cover featured a montage, part of which was a rendering of Nevsky drawn by Charles White and dated ’54.’ Though the gatefold sleeve contained extensive notes when opened up, there was nothing about Charles White.”
“Perhaps the most unusual sleeve commissioned from White was the one he produced for Sandhog, a folk opera devised and executed by Earl Robinson, singer and pianist, and Waldo Salt, narrator. Miscellany notes by I S Horowitz, in the Billboard magazine of February 26, 1955, noted that, ‘Vanguard Records will soon cut its first L.P. in a new series of show albums. The initial set will be a “special composers’ performance” of “Sandhog,” with Earl Robinson and Waldo Salt featured. The work was recently introduced in New York.’ (I.S. Horowitz, ‘Liner Notes,’ Billboard magazine, February 26, 1955: 38.) A Sandhog was the informal term traditionally given to miners, and those construction workers toiling underground on excavation projects in cities such as New York. Sand was the brainchild of Robinson and Salt. Both were blacklisted (on account of their apparent or perceived left-leaning sympathies) during the McCarthy era, during which time hundreds of Americans, many of whom were artists, writers or otherwise involved in the creative industries, were accused of being communists or communist sympathizers and became the focus of aggressive investigations and questioning before government or private industry panels, committees and agencies. It was as a consequence of this targeting that figures such as Salt and Robinson came to be blacklisted. (Charles White’s own left-leaning impulses and his art work that reflected these impulses were chronicled in Mary Helen Washington’s The Other Blacklist: The African American Literary and Cultural Left of the 1950s [Columbia University Press, 2014] and Artists on the Left: American Artists and the Communist Movement, 1926-1956, by Andrew Hemingway [Yale University Press, 2002]….)
The record, (an opera-like musical) for which White provided a fascinating cover was about a sandhog (as mentioned, a tunnel digger in cities such as New York) named Johnny O’Sullivan, set in the late 19th Century. Characteristically, the opera celebrated the common people, and the laboring man. White’s sleeve feature a sympathetically drawn portrait of a sandhog, shirt sleeves rolled up, with industrial safety goggles perched on his forehead. His muscular arms dominated the lower part of the portrait, and as with other renderings by White, the man’s shirt was suggested by a series of sometimes briskly executed lines. The sandhog gazed, somewhat wistfully, out of the frame, suggesting, in the clearest yet unspoken terms, that though this man lived by the sweat of his brow, he was, even so, a man capable of deep thought and singular intellect. He was, to coin a phrase, a gentle giant. It was though, the delicate line drawing of a little girl jumping rope, in the upper left corner of the record sleeve, that re-inscribed this depiction of humanity. The girl was draw with her knees bent, as the jump rope passed beneath her, the folds of the rope momentarily joining the folds of the sandhog’s shirt. Robinson and Salt’s wish to celebrate the humble laborer was echoed by White’s drawing, including his simple, fetching, depiction of a carefree little girl, skipping, her hair in unpretentious, simple, pigtails.
The record was likely to have been released circa 1956, the only references to White on the sleeve being his signature on the drawing, located below the right-sided wrist of the sandhog. The signature was appended with ’56.” “Recorded in 1953, Vanguard Jazz Showcase released Vic Dickenson Septet, a four-volume set of records. Charles White provided an illustration that was used on the four covers. The drawing of an African American trombone player (the trombone being Dickenson’s instrument) was signed ‘Charles White ’55.’ This was Volume 4 [VRS 8013] and featured a blue background. This colour coding differentiated each of the four records. There were references to White in the notes on the back of the record cover, as follows: ‘The drawing on the cover is one of a series commissioned by Vanguard Recording Society, Inc., from the distinguished artist, Charles White. Mr. White won an Academy of Arts and Letters award in 1952, and, that same year, a National Prize of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. His work is represented in the Whitney Museum, Library of Congress, and other famous collections.’ A version of this text was reproduced on a number of the Vanguard sleeves that Charles White illustrated.”
“Recorded in 1953, Vanguard Jazz Showcase released Vic Dickenson Septet, a four-volume set of records. Charles White provided an illustration that was used on the four covers. The drawing of an African American trombone player (the trombone being Dickenson’s instrument) was signed ‘Charles White ’55.’ This was Volume 4 [VRS 8013] and featured a blue background. This colour coding differentiated each of the four records. There were references to White in the notes on the back of the record cover, as follows: ‘The drawing on the cover is one of a series commissioned by Vanguard Recording Society, Inc., from the distinguished artist, Charles White. Mr. White won an Academy of Arts and Letters award in 1952, and, that same year, a National Prize of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. His work is represented in the Whitney Museum, Library of Congress, and other famous collections.’ A version of this text was reproduced on a number of the Vanguard sleeves that Charles White illustrated.”
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