Campus News
Legendary composer and performer Samuel L. Waymon coming to UC Santa Cruz
Samuel L. Waymon has enjoyed an extraordinarily successful career in music, film, and the theater.
Legendary composer, performer and actor Samuel Waymon is coming to the University of California, Santa Cruz, this October for a week-in-residence punctuated by an on-campus performance with the Magic Man Band on Saturday, October 24.
Waymon has enjoyed an extraordinarily successful career in music, film, and the theater.
Movie goers will recall Waymon in his role as Rev. Luther Williams in the 1973 classic Ganja & Hess (for which he also composed the score). Ganja & Hess was voted as one of the ten best American films of the decade during Critic’s Week at the prestigious 1973 Cannes Film Festival.
Waymon also acted Personal Problems, Weeds, and Philadelphia. Theater fans will remember his work with writer and director Bill Gunn and with Joe Papp, creator of New York’s Shakespeare in the Park and the Public Theater.
Over the past 60 plus years, music lovers have hummed, danced to and been inspired by tunes from Waymon’s pen including: “It’s In Your Eyes” (co-written with LeRonald Walker) from the motion picture Philadelphia; “Down on Me” from the motion picture Personal Problems; “Saratoga” (co-written with Mr. Gunn) from the motion picture Just Crazy About Horses; “Standing on the Coastline” (co-written and performed with Mr. Walker) from Waymon’s Mood Swing album, and “It Be’s That Way Sometime” included on the 1967 album Silk and Soul released by his late sister, Nina Simone (Eunice Kathleen Waymon).
Don’t let the problems of this world drive you slowly out of your mind. Just smile, look at the problem and say “It be’s that way, be’s that way sometime!”
– It Be’s that way sometime
A native of Tryon, North Carolina, Waymon (aka ‘Magic Man’) came of age during the turbulent days of the Civil Rights era. He marched and was arrested in Philadelphia with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
For more than twenty-five years, Waymon contributed to the career of his sister—as an organist, composer, producer and manager. The siblings traveled together to numerous venues throughout the world—including special performances for the King of Morocco, for the President of France, and at funeral of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
During his years in the New York area, Waymon’s social circle included such well-know figures as Malcolm X, Betty Shabazz, Lorraine Hansberry, Maya Angelou, James Baldwin, Max Roach, Miles Davis, Cicely Tyson, Roberta Flack, and Donny Hathaway. Aretha Franklin called upon ‘Dr. Sam’ for assistance in refining her breathing technique.
More details about Waymon’s visit to UC Santa Cruz will be share in the fall.