Are there any pieces of music that remind you of a specific color? For someone with synesthesia, that’s probably an easy question to answer, but for everyone else, it might take a little thought. I think it’s safe to say, though, that some works bring to mind specific colors for just about all of us. Hi there – I’m Loki Karuna, and on this edition of Noteworthy I’d like to honor a man whose music gave the world something purple: the late great Quincy Jones.
Quincy Jones, while well-noted in the field of popular music, also had a strong background in western classical. He studied with the world famous Nadia Boulanger in the late 1950s, and would go on to put together a jazz band there that toured both Europe and North America. In the years that followed, Quincy would compose music for some of history’s most iconic films, including The Wiz, In the Heat of the Night, and this bit of music, from the 1985 hit, The Color Purple.
It’s important to note that Quincy Jones, while highly successful as a composer for television and film, was also a social justice activist, founding the Institute for Black American Music and being among the founders of the Black Arts Festival in his hometown of Chicago – all while producing some of the biggest pop albums to ever hit the airwaves. He passed away in November of 2024, but will without a doubt be remembered as one of the world’s most significant musicians, earning him a spot among history’s most Noteworthy. Noteworthy is a production of WDAV classical public radio.