IN MEMORIAM: Business leader, mentor and music business legend Clarence Avant dies 92

Clarence Avant, a music business icon and mentor to many, has died at 92 years old. Avant was called “The Godfather” by many because of his long reach in the business community and his ability to bring all sides together in negotiations.

“The Godfather” has left us. This man was singularly responsible for helping so many Black artists get paid their worth. Also was a wonderful supporter & former board member of ⁦@NAACP_

LDF. Rest in Peace & Power

#ClarenceAvant,” wrote attorney Sherrilyn Ifill on social media. Avant was born in North Carolina in 1931. He went on in the business to promote and manage Sarah Vaughan and discovered Bill Withers. Avant also promoted Michael Jackson as he laughed on his first tour as a solo artist. Avant, along with his wife, Jacquline, were the subjects of the Netflix feature, The Black Godfather.

Tragically, Jacquline Avant, at 81, Clarence Avant’s wife of 54 years, was murdered during a burglary in the early morning hours of December 1, 2021, in the couple’s home in Beverly Hills. The murder was was a home invasion in the wealthy Trousdale Estates area of Beverly Hills. Clarence and Jacqueline Avant married in 1967 “He’s a deal maker, he’s the best in the business,” said Rev. Jesse Jackson, Sr., in the documentary of Clarence. Several participants in the documentary referred to Jacqueline as a key to Clarence’s success. The Avant’s children, Nicole and Alexander were also featured in the Netflix documentary. Nicole Avant is married to Netflix Co-CEO Ted Sarandos. A statement was released by the family:

“It is with a heavy heart that the Avant/Sarandos family announce the passing of Clarence Alexander Avant,” the statement from his children, Nicole and Alexander and sonin-law Ted Sarandos. “Through his revolutionary business leadership, Clarence became affectionately known as ‘the Black Godfather’ in the worlds of music, entertainment, politics, and sports. Clarence leaves behind a loving family and a sea of friends and associates that have changed the world and will continue to change the world for generations to come. The joy of his legacy eases the sorrow of our loss. Clarence passed away gently at home in Los Angeles on Sunday, August 13, 2023.” Lauren Victoria Burke is an independent investigative journalist and the publisher of Black Virginia News. She is a political analyst who appears regularly on #RolandMartinUnfiltered. She can be contacted at LBurke007@gmail.com and on twitter at @LVBurke to Park Center. I’ve always had family here. My aunt Cynthia Wilson, is the president of the

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Minneapolis chapter of the NAACP. I played for University of Minnesota’s basketball team. I used to visit here when I was younger, hooping at North Commons. I was on the music scene at 17, winning rap battles, developing my craft. My program is about bringing a whole other level of leisure. What having a good time looks like to me when I go out… I want to hear Tribe Called Quest, I want to hear Erykah Badu, things of that nature. It’s an amazing thing because you realize a lot of people who love this type of music are sometimes looked at as a subculture. That’s what The Avant Garde is all about.

Taylor: This weekend’s event?

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Phillips: The Avant Garde is putting on our second annual music festival called On the One. On the One used to be an open mic event at Pimento Kitchen that ran for seven months. Everyone would come there. It was packed out, even when it was -3-degree weather. Packed. It was beautiful. Then the pandemic hit. And then the idea came to mind to expand it into a festival, and here we are. It’s at the Normandale Lake Bandshell on 5901 West 84th Street, Bloomington, Minnesota. It’s a part of a partnership initiative between the city of Bloomington and The Avant Garde. Bloomington is rapidly growing in the diverse trajectory, and I got contacted by representative, shout-out to Faith Jackson, who’s a big part of the new movement in Bloomington. And, we were able to create this festival. This is the second year. Last year, we had Jamecia Bennett, Ashley Dubose, and International Reggae All Stars as the headliners. This year, we’re doing an Erykah Badu and Jill Scott Tribute by Jamela Pettiford, who is a St. Paul legend, Minnesota music legend, soul artist, and Ashley Dubose, who made it far on The Voice. Everybody knows Ashley. The festival represents Black music across the diaspora. So you’re going to get R&B, neo soul, reggae, Afro beat, HipHop, spoken word, and jazz. It’s bringing all corners of the music scene together as one, hence On the One. It’ll be Saturday, August 26th, Normandale Lake Bandshell in Bloomington, Noon to 8:00 PM. Come vibe with us.

Taylor: All right. So one more time, give us the date, the time, and the place for the event.

Gold Medal posthumously.

Phillips: Indeed. The On the One Music Festival, Saturday, August 26th from noon to 8:00 PM. It’ll be at the Normandale Lake Bandshell on 5901 West 84th Street, Bloomington, Minnesota. We’re celebrating Black music across the diaspora: R&B, neo soul, Afrobeat, jazz, Hip-Hop, reggae, spoken word. And it’ll be headlined by Ashley Dubose and Jamela Pettiford, putting on a once-in-a-lifetime performance that is giving homage to the queens of neo soul, Erykah Badu and Jill Scott. And we have a lot of amazing openers within those genres. Come out, it’s free of charge, all ages. We’d love to have you all. It’s going to be incredible.

Hopkins discovered that the cells sampled from Lacks’ cervix could regenerate outside the human body.

They shared those groundbreaking cells, which were instrumental in developing polio and COVID-19 vaccines and the world’s most common fertility treatment. Crump has noted that

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“It became personal for me,” Hahn said in an interview with the LSU Cold Case Project. He said the FBI “stuck me in a position where something awful happened, and they didn’t have to do that.”

Hahn said the workshop helped him because he and Wood had never had an in-depth conversation with each other about the incident.

Multiple investigations Hours after the shooting, the FBI realized that Scott’s identity had been stolen and found the thief, other companies besides Thermo Fisher Scientific sell Lacks’ cells, and biotech companies and labs globally use them for various types of research. The family has signaled that they also may act against those companies. For decades, Lacks’ contributions to science remained unrecognized.

However, Maryland Democratic Rep. Kweisi Mfume and fellow Maryland Democrats U.S. Sens. Chris Van Hollen and Ben Cardin have introduced legislation seeking to award Lacks a Congressional

Calvin Wallace, in prison in California. Wallace had juggled at least five stolen aliases in committing various misdemeanors and felonies.

Wallace told the FBI that he had met Scott when Scott was on a trip to California in the early 1970s. Wallace pried into Scott’s background and learned his date of birth, the name of his parents and his Social Security number. Wallace was able to recite the number to agents, missing only one digit.

Wallace lived a transient life. When a childhood acquaintance, Robert King, saw him more than 20 years ago in San Diego, he said Wallace showed signs of heroin addiction. Wallace, then 82, died last October in a San Diego nursing home. Black leaders demanded investigations into

The lawmakers said the goal is to ensure her contributions are honored and acknowledged for generations, as the cells she unknowingly provided continue to benefit millions worldwide.

Lacks’ story has since become a best-selling book and, in 2017, Oprah Winfrey starred in the big screen biopic, “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.”

“It’s a real honor to have a family member that’s genetic makeup is that important to the world,”

Scott’s death, which came just eight months after an East Baton Rouge sheriff’s deputy had killed two Black students at Southern University.

Emmett Douglas, then the president of the Louisiana NAACP, questioned how two trained FBI agents could not subdue a man weighing less than 180 pounds without shooting him. Neither of the agents was suspended as federal and state authorities looked into what happened.

J. Stanley Pottinger, then the assistant U.S. general attorney for civil rights, instructed the FBI to conduct a preliminary civil rights investigation.

FBI documents say that the bureau did not request an interview with Shabazz shortly after the shooting