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Lena Horne
About the Performer

Even in her eighties, the legendary Lena Horne has a quality of timelessness about her. Elegant and wise, she personifies both the glamour of Hollywood and the reality of a lifetime spent battling racial and social injustice. Pushed by an ambitious mother into the chorus line of the Cotton Club when she was sixteen, and maneuvered into a film career by the N.A.A.C.P., she was the first African American signed to a long-term studio contract. In her rise beyond Hollywood’s racial stereotypes of maids, butlers, and African natives, she achieved true stardom on the silver screen, and became a catalyst for change even beyond the glittery fringes of studio life.

Born in Brooklyn in 1917, Lena Horne became one of the most popular African American performers of the 1940s and 1950s. At the age of sixteen she was hired as a dancer in the chorus of Harlem’s famous Cotton Club. There she was introduced to the growing community of jazz performers, including Billie Holiday, Cab Calloway, and Duke Ellington. She also met Harold Arlen, who would write her biggest hit, “Stormy Weather.” For the next five years she performed in New York nightclubs, on Broadway, and touring with the Charlie Barnet Orchestra. Singing with Barnet’s primarily white swing band, Horne was one of the first black women to successfully work on both sides of the color line.

Within a few years, Horne moved to Hollywood, where she played small parts in the movies. At this time, most black actors were kept from more serious roles, and though she was beginning to achieve a high level of notoriety, the color barrier was still strong. “In every other film I just sang a song or two; the scenes could be cut out when they were sent to local distributors in the South. Unfortunately, I didn’t get much of a chance to act,” she said. “CABIN IN THE SKY and STORMY WEATHER were the only movies in which I played a character who was involved in the plot.” Her elegant style and powerful voice were unlike any that had come before, and both the public and the executives in the entertainment industry began to take note. By the mid-’40s, Horne was the highest paid black actor in the country. Her renditions of “Deed I Do” and “As Long as I Live,” and Cole Porter’s “Just One Of Those Things” became instant classics. For the thousands of black soldiers abroad during World War II, Horne was the premier pin-up girl.

Much like her good friend Paul Robeson, Horne’s great fame could not prevent the wheels of the anti-Communist machine from bearing down on her. Her civil rights activism and friendship with Robeson and others marked her as a Communist sympathizer. Like many politically active artists of the time, Horne found herself blacklisted and unable to perform on television or in the movies. For seven years the attacks on her person and political beliefs continued. During this time, however, Horne worked as a singer, appearing in nightclubs and making some of her best recordings. LENA HORNE AT THE WALDORF ASTORIA, recorded in 1957, is still considered to be one of her best. Though the conservative atmosphere of the 1950s took their toll on Horne, by the 1960s she had returned to the public eye and was again a major cultural figure.

In 1963, she participated in the march on Washington and performed at rallies throughout the country for the National Council for Negro Women. She followed that with a decade of international touring, recording, and acting on both television and the silver screen. Horne had found in her growing audience a renewed sense of purpose. All of this came crashing down when her father, son and husband died in a period of twelve months during the early 1970s. Horne retreated almost completely from public life. It was not until 1981 that she fully returned, making a triumphant comeback with a one-person show on Broadway. LENA HORNE: THE LADY AND HER MUSIC chronicled Horne’s early life and almost fifty years in show business. It ran for fourteen months and became the standard by which one-woman shows are judged. Throughout the past twenty years, Horne’s performances have been rare yet welcome occurrences.

Much has changed since the 16-year old who was Lena Horne danced her first tentative steps across the stage of the Cotton Club. Through myriad triumphs and challenges, she paved the way to stardom for countless others in the entertainment industry. Her continued musical, theatrical, and political efforts grew with the times and met each new decade with courage and grace. But, if one thing hasn’t changed, it’s Horne’s ability to break our hearts with her shimmering resonant voice, singing songs like “Black Coffee” and “Stormy Weather.”

Connected artists:

Louis Armstrong

Richard Avedon

Truman Capote

Duke Ellington

George Gershwin

John Hammond

Billie Holiday

Paul Robeson

Related Web sites:

Class Act

Biography at The Iceberg

Internet Movie Database Entry

Horne Resource Page

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26 responses
Cindy -- January 2nd, 2009 at 5:28 pm

I am looking for info on her appearance at the White House at which there was some sort of confrontation.

KATIE -- January 14th, 2009 at 3:42 pm

i love this website. it gave me good info for my research paper.
thank you (:

Kenyona -- January 19th, 2009 at 12:36 pm

This is a great site, it provided me with alot information for my research. Very infomative!!!!!!!!

bob -- February 3rd, 2009 at 2:11 pm

u guys r crazy

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Sydnee -- February 9th, 2009 at 9:47 pm

i love this website….it is very informative…
thank you sooo much!!

Tony Homes -- February 10th, 2009 at 4:54 pm

Well i think they should show pictures.

Andrea -- February 11th, 2009 at 1:50 pm

heyy. I love this website and i get all my research here!!! keep up the great work cause i get all my info from here!!!

thanks:)

ily:)

Dave -- February 12th, 2009 at 1:21 am

The confrontation at the White House was with another fine performer, whom we have just lost. Miss Ertha Kitt. This was during the Johnson years.

VAnna -- February 13th, 2009 at 9:09 pm

I had to do this for church and it was very informational!!

VICKI -- February 21st, 2009 at 11:11 am

This as been an excellent site for me as well. I just found out that Lena Mary Calhoun Horne is my cousin. We just did our family tree with my uncle who is 82 yrs. old and he told us finally that Lena Horne is our cousin and how. I looked it up and its true…….very proud to be connected to her

Shawn -- February 23rd, 2009 at 12:48 pm

This was a wanderful excert of Ms. Lena Horne! It helped my on my research paper with great details. but i also didn’t like the grammar, it had some mishapps. Other than that i loved it, and the students in my class did as well…. :)

some1 -- February 25th, 2009 at 12:22 pm

i love lena horne i am doing a report on her and i cant find enything that i need its really HARD!!!!!
can you guys help me out????

Tyler -- February 25th, 2009 at 8:12 pm

This is a great place to go. I got alot of info!!!!

pistal -- March 4th, 2009 at 10:00 am

this is tellin me alot of stuff..
but its not answer my ?’s

Gary -- March 11th, 2009 at 9:35 pm

Regarding – Cindi’s #1 posting about the White House incident: That was actually Eartha Kitt – not Lena Horne. In 1967 Eartha was invited to the White House by the Johnsons, and she got pretty vocal about her opposition to the Viet Nam war. Here’s what she said: “I am a mother and I know the feeling of having a baby come out of my gut,” she said. “I have a baby and then you send him off to war. No wonder the kids rebel and take pot.”

Somebody should have talked to Dubya like that about Iraq! Oops!

mallory -- March 16th, 2009 at 2:28 pm

i am in 6th grade and im lookin for info this helps but not enough srry! needs more info

Alyssa -- March 17th, 2009 at 2:59 pm

this web site is great and all, but they need to show more character traits of lena horne.

jazz -- April 2nd, 2009 at 10:52 am

im doing a report on her and she is awsome!

jazz -- April 2nd, 2009 at 10:56 am

i think that she is cool show her what she was about

Allaina -- April 10th, 2009 at 1:27 am

To Vicki – Lena Horne was married to my great-great uncle Lennie Hayton. I wish that I could apologize to her for the discrimination she received from my family. Back then, my grandfathers family had were prejudice. I would love to be able to write her and tell her that my family is proud to be conncted to her.

Mooseman the second -- April 20th, 2009 at 1:26 pm

THIS WEBSITE ROCKS! I needed this info for my project and this really helped! It is a GREAT website!

Walter -- May 21st, 2009 at 8:02 pm

Allaina Lennie hayton was a homosexual, did you know that? By marrying her, he protected Lena Horne from being exposed. You’ll find out in the new biography coming out in JUNE 09.

Juls -- August 10th, 2009 at 4:13 am

You know what, Lena Horne has lived an amazing life; might want to check out book written by her daughter 1986, The HORNES, An American Family for more detailed info.

Louis Alemayehu -- August 11th, 2009 at 2:35 pm

There WAS a meeting at the White House that James Baldwin organized for Bobby Kennedy. Besides Lena, it included people like: Lorraine Hansberry, Harry Belafonte, and a young civil rights worker who shook his finger at Bobby and spoke his mind. Basically he said that given the reality of racism in the usa as far as he himself serving in Viet Nam: “Hell no, I wont go!” Needless to say the meeting didn’t go well. It took Bobby a while longer to figure out the contradiction and connections between racism here in the usa our usa foreign policy. That might actually be why both he and King are dead.

Isolde 'Izzy' Hunter -- November 1st, 2009 at 8:26 am

Interesting website, this. How I long to let Lena know how much knowing her has meant in my life! I wonder how she is dealing with old age and how her health is now? I hope she is often surrounded by loved ones and that her great stamina and good health have not failed her. I was her backup singer in Vegas with Harry Belefonte & as such, she soon became my idol. Besides being elegant, beautiful, funny, and explosive onstage, she was (and still is, I’m sure) one of the kindest people I’ve ever known. If you should ever read this Lena, I’ve raised a son alone, since Jimmy Hunter died, and he’s just become a lawyer in D.C.! May God be with you always. With Love and Affection Always, Isolde Hunter
P.S. Remember “A Lena is a Lovesome Thing” by Billy Strayhorn :-)

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