Public NYC Event To Honor The Legacy Of Harry Belafonte

The "Celebration of Life" will take place Mar. 1 at Riverside Church in New York City to honor Belafonte's groundbreaking achievements.

A public celebration of life will honor the incredible legacy of cultural legend Harry Belafonte on March 1 at Riverside Church in New York City.

According to a press release, the event will take place on what would have been his 97th birthday. Belafonte had chosen it over a traditional funeral service.

The celebration will honor Belafonte’s groundbreaking life achievements such as providing startup funding for the civil rights movement, becoming the first to sell a million-copy album and the first Black Emmy winner, and pioneering the iconic “We Are the World” global fundraising concept.

The evening will feature remarks, musical tributes, and video messages in honor of Belafonte.

Born in 1927 to Caribbean parents in Harlem, Belafonte drew from diverse musical traditions like calypso, folk, and jazz to connect America to Black culture. He spent his childhood years in his mother’s native Jamaica. Described as “an environment that sang,” Belafonte was exposed to calypso’s rhythms alongside colorism prejudices. He returned to New York to study drama alongside mentor Paul Robeson, who inspired his work with social activism.

“Belafonte used the arts as a mechanism to effect social change on a global scale,” the press release states.

Belafonte’s breakthrough 1956 album, Calypso, was the first to top one million sales in a year. The album introduced Caribbean folk music to America and has a cultural imprint on today’s music, with songs sampled by Gotye, Lil Wayne, and Jason Derulo.

The ’60s saw Belafonte emerge as a powerful voice for civil rights as he supported his good friend Martin Luther King Jr. In later decades, Belafonte helped organize the “We Are the World” benefit. He served as a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador since 1987, Grand Marshal in the 2013 NYC Pride Parade, and was an adviser to the Women’s March on Washington. Among his greatest honors were the 2021 French Legion of Honor and a 2022 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction.

The King of Calypso died in April 2023 at the age of 96 from congestive heart failure. The entertainer was honored last year with an official tribute by the state of New York’s Senate and Assembly.

Belafonte’s celebration of life begins at 6 p.m. on March 1 and will be livestreamed on Roland S. Martin’s YouTube channel and the Black Star Network app.