Hazel Scott was an enormously talented jazz and classical pianist whose popularity began to soar in the early 1940s. She appeared regularly at New York's Cafe Society in 1941, performed at Carnegie Hall in 1943, went to Hollywood, married Congressman Adam Clayton Powell in 1945 and was one of the first Black women to have her own TV show in 1950. But later that year, she was accused by the House Un-American Activities Committee of being a Communist, which tanked her career overnight. She had a nervous breakdown, recovered, toured in the U.S. and Europe, and moved to Paris in 1957. She lived and performed there for 10 years before returning to the U.S. Back home, she performed occasionally and appeared in the soap opera One Life to Live. She died in 1981 of cancer at age 61.
Here's a clip that shows just what a virtuoso she was...
And here's a superb minidoc on Scott by Eve Goldberg entitled What Ever Happened to Hazel Scott?...
