Harry Belafonte
It was 25 years ago that Banana Boat Song (Dayo) and Jamaica Farewell became hits for Belafonte, the Harlem-born black who spent part of his youth in Jamaica and captured the soft breezes and gentle wisdom of the Caribbean in his singing style. Since then he has become, in records, films, TV and concerts, one of popular entertainment's most consistent and unfailingly dignified performers. This, however, his first LP released in the U.S. in seven years, is sometimes dignified going on somber. Belafonte's flickering torch songs come off like dirges. But on a calypsofied version of Bob Dylan's Forever Young (medleyed with Jabulani, a Caribbean tune by Belafonte and Caiphus Semenya) and Hoyt Axton's Mary Makes Magic, the 57-year-old master shows he hasn't lost the wit, verve or lilt that made him one of the pioneers of the '60s folk song era. This may not approach the classic Belafonte-Lena Home concert LP, but then what does?
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