TV's Bryant Gumbel, opera diva Jessye Norman and R&B master Smokey Robinson will be among those feted in January during TBS' seventh annual Trumpet Awards, honoring achievement by black Americans.
Also getting a posthumous award will be Frank Sinatra, who championed the careers of such entertainment greats as Sammy Davis Jr., Diahann Carroll, Ella Fitzgerald and Nat "King" Cole.In addition to Gumbel, Norman and Robinson, official Trumpet honors will be given to Ford Motor Co. staffer Matel Dawson Jr., whose more than $500,000 in cash contributions to universities includes a $100,000 donation to Louisiana State University, and to Eunice W. Johnson, producer and director of Ebony Fashion Fair, the world's largest traveling fashion show.
Barbara Sinatra will accept her late husband's award for humanitarian service. Dorothy Height, chairwoman of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, will receive the Living Legend Award, and U.S. Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.) will get the Pinnacle Award.
New to the Trumpet Awards will be the Circle of Athletes, honoring sports figures for positive impact. The 1999 trio of winners are Jackie Joyner Kersee, baseball's John "Buck" O'Neil and football coach Eddie Robinson.
The awards, started in 1993 by TBS corporate consultant Xernona Clayton, will be held Jan. 11 at an invitation-only dinner at CNN Center's Omni Hotel.
TBS will televise the event at 7 p.m. Feb. 21.
Hosts and scheduled presenters include Debbie Allen, NAACP President Kweisi Mfume, model Tyra Banks, gospel singer Kirk Franklin, radio host Tom Joyner and actresses Tia and Tamera Mowry.
Over the years the Trumpet Awards have risen in importance and become a glitzy, star-studded affair. Past recipients include Muhammad Ali, Maya Angelou, Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds, Evander Holyfield, Whitney Houston, the Rev. Jesse Jackson, Quincy Jones, Coretta Scott King, Gladys Knight, Justice Thurgood Marshall, Terry McMillan, Rosa Parks, Gen. Colin Powell and Andrew Young.
On Feb. 21 when the awards are televised, TBS will also air nine films about African-Americans, including 1972's "Sounder," 1967's "In the Heat of the Night," 1989's "Glory," 1997's "Miss Evers' Boys," 1995's "The Tuskegee Airmen" and 1978's "A Woman Called Moses."