By Ed Lowe
Senior writer
The Chicago Humanities Festival has announced receipt of a $75,000 grant from the Chicago-based Joyce Foundation for the purpose of restoring and producing the long lost Eubie Blake - Andy Razaf musical titled "Tan Manhattan." Originally written in 1941, the musical was designed to be presented on Broadway. It never made it to a theater there, though it was produced in tryout versions in Washington, DC, and at Harlem's Apollo Theater. Blake and Razaf had co-written songs during the years between 1930 and the mid-1940s.
In spite of Blake's feeling that this musical was his masterpiece, the music by Blake and the lyrics by Razaf never fulfilled Blake's estimation of its worth. Through the years, the score and the lyrics were thought to be lost. Recently, a long lost copy of the show's orchestrations was discovered along with some of the missing lyrics. The Humanities Festival pieced together a workshop performance of the work and presented it as part of the 2003 Festival last November.
Now, with the help of the Joyce Foundation grant, the Festival is preparing a full-scale production of the piece. If the Festival follows its pattern, the musical will be produced by theater historian Robert Kimball and by Razaf biographer Barry Singer.
The entire production is being readied for its premier performance during the 15th Humanities Festival scheduled for November, 2004.
In addition to the intense three week festival held in the fall of the year, the Chicago Humanities Festival has expanded its activities to year-round programming. According to CHF president Eileen Mackevich, "The goal of CHF is to bring a wide range of programming to Chicago throughout the year with special emphasis on the activities during the annual three weeks of the Festival every November."
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