Harry Belafonte, pioneering performer and activist, dies at 96

NEW YORK: Harry Belafonte, the superstar entertainer who introduced a Caribbean flair to mainstream US music and became well known for his deep personal investment in civil rights, died Tuesday in Manhattan, his publicist said. He was 96.

Born in Harlem to a Jamaican mother and a father from the French territory of Martinique, the calypso singer and actor spent part of his childhood in Jamaica before returning to New York, a binational upbringing that shaped his musical and political outlooks that saw him crusade for racial equality.