I don't know about the movies, but here was something good at the Oscars. A singer I've seen only once performed a tribute to past Oscar winners, and to Hollywood, with Louis Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World."
It's a fresh, quiet, and enchanting rendition. The signer is Esperanza Spalding (excuse the mixed nomenclatures: this is the reality of our times). I'm not sure who she is, and how she escaped the heavily melismad [link pdf article] singing style of contemporary black singers, and how she got away with such an afro in the heavily permed style of black celebrities, but here she is:
Spalding grew up in the King neighborhood of Portland, Oregon, a neighborhood she describes as "ghetto" and "pretty scary". Her mother raised her and her brother as a single parent. Spalding has a diverse ethnic background. She notes, "My mom is Welsh, Hispanic, and Native American, and my father is black."
 |