Harry Belafonte

Harold George Harry Bellanfanti, Jr. , better known as Harry Belafonte, is an American singer, songwriter, actor, and social activist. One of the most successful Caribbean American pop stars in history, he was dubbed the King of Calypso for popularizing the Caribbean musical style with an international audience in the 1950s. His breakthrough album Calypso is the first million selling album by a single artist. Belafonte is perhaps best known for singing The Banana Boat Song, with its signature lyric DayO. He has recorded in many genres, including blues, folk, gospel, show tunes, and American standards. He has also starred in several films, most notably in Otto Premingers hit musical Carmen Jones , Island in the Sun and Robert Wises Odds Against Tomorrow .

Belafonte was born Harold George Bellanfanti, Jr. at Lyingin Hospital on March 1, 1927, in Harlem, New York, the son of Melvine , a housekeeper of Jamaican descent, and Harold George Bellanfanti, Sr., a Martiniquan who worked as a chef. His mother was born in Jamaica, the child of a Scottish white mother and a black father. His father also was born in Jamaica, the child of a black mother and Dutch Jewish father of Sephardi origins. This is all Harry says about his Jewish grandfather, whom he never met a white Dutch Jew who drifted over to the islands after chasing gold and diamonds, with no luck at all. From 1932 to 1940, he lived with his grandmother in her native country of Jamaica. When he returned to New York City, he attended George Washington High School after which he joined the Navy and served during World War II. In the 1940s, he was working as a janitors assistant in NYC when a tenant gave him, as a gratuity, two tickets to see the American Negro Theater. He fell in love with

Source: Wikipedia