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Author	Black, Ivan, d. 1979.
Title	Ivan Black papers, 1887-1979 (bulk 1937-1978)

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Location	Call No.	Status	Message
OFFSITE - Request in Advance for use at Performing Arts	JPB 06-20 Box 1	AVAILABLE	SUPERVISED USE
OFFSITE - Request in Advance for use at Performing Arts	JPB 06-20 Box 2	AVAILABLE	SUPERVISED USE
OFFSITE - Request in Advance for use at Performing Arts	JPB 06-20 Box 3	AVAILABLE	SUPERVISED USE
OFFSITE - Request in Advance for use at Performing Arts	JPB 06-20 Box 4	AVAILABLE	SUPERVISED USE
OFFSITE - Request in Advance for use at Performing Arts	JPB 06-20 Box 5	AVAILABLE	SUPERVISED USE
OFFSITE - Request in Advance for use at Performing Arts	JPB 06-20 Box 6	AVAILABLE	SUPERVISED USE
OFFSITE - Request in Advance for use at Performing Arts	JPB 06-20 Box 7	AVAILABLE	SUPERVISED USE
OFFSITE - Request in Advance for use at Performing Arts	JPB 06-20 Box 8	AVAILABLE	SUPERVISED USE
OFFSITE - Request in Advance for use at Performing Arts	JPB 06-20 Box 9	AVAILABLE	SUPERVISED USE
OFFSITE - Request in Advance for use at Performing Arts	JPB 06-20 Box 10	AVAILABLE	SUPERVISED USE

Details

Description	22.5 linear feet (55 boxes)
	Arranged in series: I. Client and subject files, 1927-1979, and undated; II. Photographs, 1887-1978, and undated; III. Stock arrangements, 1926-1945; IV. Oversized material, 1942-1969, and undated.
Summary	The Ivan Black papers are mostly made up of press releases and clippings from newspapers and magazines documenting the publicity work he did for his clients. Also included are promotional flyers, concert and stage programs, and correspondence. The correspondence is mainly with newspaper reporters and editors, or nightclub owners and managers, rather than with artists. The collection also contains a large section of photographs, which are mostly, but not all, publicity headshots, and a section of published stock musical arrangements for jazz big band with violins.
Biography	Ivan Black (1903-1979) was a publicity agent in New York, from the early 1940s until his retirement in the mid-1970s, representing mainly nightclubs, theatrical productions, and entertainers. After receiving a bachelor's degree from Harvard in 1924, Black worked as an architect in New Jersey and Florida, and then as a journalist in Boston and Philadelphia. After moving to New York in 1932, he was a supervisor in the Works Progress Administration's Federal Writers' Project and Federal Theatre Project, before being promoted to head of the Division of Information and Publicity of the F.T.P.'s Radio Division. When the division was dissolved in 1939, Black opened his own publicity office. His first clients were the Café Society nightclub, the radio writer and director Arch Oboler (Lights Out), and The Adventures of the Thin Man radio series. After the Café Society closed in 1948, Black worked for corporate clients such as the Philco Corporation, music publisher Edward B. Marks, Inc., and the magazine True. In the late 1950s, he returned to representing nightclubs, notably the Five Spot, the Village Gate, and Gregory's. In the course of working for the clubs, he publicized appearances by many important musicians and comedians. Black and the Café Society discovered comedian Sam Mostel and gave him his stage name, Zero. Others included the musicians Ernesto Lecuona, Thelonious Monk, Nina Simone, and Josh White, singer-actor Wilbur Evans, and comedian Jimmy Savo. Black occasionally worked directly for entertainers, events, political and social justice organizations, and visual artists, including singer Miriam Makeba, pianists Errol Garner, Brooks Kerr, and Hazel Scott, composer William Russo, pianist and vibraphonist Dardanelle, the New York Jazz Loft Celebration, the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, and painter Lumen Martin Winter. He also did publicity for many Broadway and Off-Broadway productions, most notably the revue Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris, as well as lesser-known shows such as Philip Yordan's Anna Lucasta.
Location of Other Archival Materials	See also his Ivan Black collection : scrapbooks (microfilm; *ZB-1936) in the Music Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.
Indexes	Collection guide available in repository and on internet.
Subject	Black, Ivan, d. 1979.
	Brel, Jacques -- Stage history.
	Yordan, Philip -- Stage history.
	Evans, Wilbur, 1908-1987.
	Lecuona, Ernesto, 1896-1963.
	Makeba, Miriam.
	Monk, Thelonious.
	Mostel, Zero, 1915-1977.
	Oboler, Arch, 1907-1987.
	Russo, William.
	Savo, Jimmy.
	Scott, Hazel.
	Café Society (Nightclub)
	Five Spot (Nightclub)
	Gregory's (Nightclub)
	Village Gate (Nightclub)
	Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (U.S.)
	Press agents -- New York (State) -- New York.
	Nightclubs -- New York (State) -- New York.
	Musical theater -- New York (State) -- New York -- History -- 20th century.
	Theater -- New York (State) -- New York -- History -- 20th century.
	Off-Broadway theater -- History -- 20th century.
Genre/Form	Press releases.
	Clippings.
	Promotional materials.
	Programs.
	Photographs.
	Scores.
Added Author	Lecuona, Ernesto, 1896-1963.
	Oboler, Arch, 1907-1987.
	Russo, William.
	Savo, Jimmy.
	Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (U.S.)
	Café Society (Nightclub)
	Five Spot (Nightclub)
	Gregory's (Nightclub)
	Village Gate (Nightclub)
	American Music Collection.
Call No.	JPB 06-20
Research Call Number	JPB 06-20