Black Music Month Spotlight: Hazel Dorothy Scott blended jazz and classical music

Immigrant. Child prodigy. Film and television trailblazer. Civil rights activist. Political target.

At eight years old, Hazel Dorothy Scott’s musical genius earned her a scholarship to the renowned Julliard School in New York City (NYC).

Born June 11, 1920, in Port of Spain, her musical brilliance and erudition can be attributed to her exceptional parents R. Thomas Scott, a West Indian scholar from England, and Alma Long Scott, a pianist and saxophonist. After her parents’ separation in 1924, Hazel moved with her mother and grandmother to Harlem, NY.

According to the National Women’s History Museum (NWHM), “Scott’s mother played in several all-women bands to earn a living. (She) and her mother were extremely close, and Scott called her mother “the single biggest influence in my life.”

At 13, Hazel joined her mother’s jazz band, the American Creolians Orchestra.

Even before graduating from all-girls’ Wadleigh High School with honors, her talent led to performances on radio (Mutual Broadcasting System), on Broadway (Sing Out the News and Cotton Club Revue of 1938), and with the famous Count Basie Orchestra.

Nonetheless, NWHM notes: “It was her 1939 performances at Café Society in Greenwich Village that pushed Scott’s career to the next level. Café Society was New York’s first fully integrated nightclub and the city’s hot spot for jazz. When singer Billie Holiday ended her standing engagement there three weeks early, she insisted on Scott as her replacement ….”

Eventually, Hollywood came calling.

Hazel relocated to Los Angeles and signed with RKO, a major movie studio, and encountered racial stereotyping. The first four roles the studio offered her were as “singing” maids.

She refused, and would appear as herself in several RKO films, I Dood It (1943), Something to Shout About (1943), The Heat’s On (1943) Broadway Rhythm (1944), and Rhapsody in Blue (1945).

She insisted that credits read, “Hazel Scott as Herself.”

Hazel also advocated pay equal to that of her white counterparts, but making demands of the studio hastened the end of her film career by 1945.

In a 2022 article for WRTI’s Art Desk, Karen Chilton writes, “It was on (a) Columbia Pictures set where she staged a three-day strike against the studio when the Black actresses in a different scene were given soiled costumes to wear.”

Hazel’s contracts for shows stipulated that she would not appear before segregated venues. Still, “… by 1945, she was attracting large audiences and earning today’s equivalent of over one million dollars per year.”

In the early 1940s, Hazel returned to NYC, where she met the charismatic and controversial Baptist pastor, Congressman Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., who, in 1945, was the first African American elected to Congress from New York.

One year after Powell’s divorce from his first wife, he married Hazel. They had one son, Adam Clayton Powell III. Their marriage ended in divorce in 1960.

In 1950, Hazel had become the first African American woman to host and perform for The Hazel Scott Show, a national television show (airing for 15-minutes, three times a week) on the Dumont Television Network. It received good ratings.

Political Troubles

Fame and fortune, unfortunately, did not shield Hazel from becoming a political target. In 1950, Counterattack a right-wing journal, listed her, and 150 others, in a pamphlet, “Red Channels, the Report of Communist Influence in Radio and Television.” (Editor’s Note: pages 129-131)

It cites her affiliation with organizations such as the Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee, American Peace Mobilization, and the National Citizens Political Action Committee.

Consequently, Hazel chose to testify (and correct any falsehoods) before the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC), headed by Senator Joseph R. McCarthy and driven by the “Cold War” between the United States and the Communist Soviet Union.

Ostensibly charged with investigating “un-American activity,” the committee blacklisted actors, screenwriters, musicians, and directors In Hollywood with alleged links to the Communist Party, USA, often with little evidence.

(HUAC) accused her of performing for organizations with Communist ties. She testified that she was not aware of their political affiliations; however, she admitted to having supported a Communist candidate for New York City Council years earlier, but she was never a party member.

Hazel’s appearance created controversy that led to the cancellation of her television show one week later.

To escape the political fallout and re-invigorate her career, Hazel moved to Paris in 1957, where she lived for ten years, where she appeared in the French crime film Le désordre et la nuit. In 1963, she and other expatriates, including James Baldwin, marched to the American embassy in support of the March on Washington to be held in Washington, D.C.

Chilton writes, “It was there that she was able to heal her emotional wounds and reconcile the anger and frustration she felt about American injustice. Later in life, she concluded, “I believe America is as big and as strong as its weakest point…it is up to the Negro to be the conscience of this great land of ours.”

Hazel returned to the U.S. in 1967, but the music scene had changed, Motown and British pop were popular; hence, her career faltered. She performed primarily at small venues, made a few recordings, and had minor roles on television.

Hazel was unapologetic about her life choices. "I've been brash all my life and it's gotten me into a lot of trouble. But at the same time, speaking out has sustained me and given meaning to my life.”

Hazel passed away from pancreatic cancer on October 2, 1981, just two months after her final performance.

Wista JohnsonJune 13, 2025