In 1937, Odetta Felious Holmes moved from Birmingham, Alabama, to Los Angeles. Only six, she was already bigger than the other kids when she arrived in East Hollywood with her mother, Flora, and her ...

“If I had to pick one person responsible for the establishment of the Newport Folk Festival in 1959,” said the festival founder George Weing, “it would be Odetta.” After hearing her album Odetta Sings ...

Odetta: Live at 75 with 'Let It Shine' Legendary blues and folk singer Odetta is marking her 75th birthday with a live performance CD called Gonna Let It Shine: A Concert for the Holidays. She tells ...

On the night of May 30, 1964, the Alabama-born singer Odetta watched a thunderstorm explode over Brussels from her room at the Amigo hotel. She was on her first European tour, promoting her twelfth ...

In 1959, Harry Belafonte produced and starred in a live prime-time special that he envisioned as a musical portrait of black America. He had the box-office clout to call the shots, which included an ...

Odetta, the folk singer with the powerful voice who moved audiences and influenced fellow musicians for a half-century, has died. She was 77. By The Associated Press NEW YORK — Odetta, the folk singer ...

Before there was Bob Dylan, the folk revival icon, there was Odetta. Before there was Janis Joplin, the wailing blues singer, there was Odetta. The woman whom Martin Luther King Jr. called the “Queen ...

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or ...

One year ago, Congress defunded public media. Now that we're 100% community funded, please become a sustaining member or increase your existing membership today. Folk-music legend Odetta died Tuesday ...

We all know the story of Bob Dylan going electric at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival: the boos, the cheers, Pete Seeger overheard backstage wishing that he had an axe to chop through the microphone ...