Sorry, I have some bad news to report. I was informed this afternoon that veteran sound recordist and teacher Charles Blackwell was found dead in his hotel room in Singapore this morning. He was there on assignment teaching at the NYU Singapore film school. I don’t have any more information at this time, but will update as it becomes available.
Charles was also a dear friend and colleague. His last collaboration with me was on our short film “One People” where he did location sound. We, in the Black independent film community are deeply saddened at the loss of this great human being.
Al
Al, I’m one of Charles Blackwell’s neighbors here in Clinton Hill. His friends here had been awaiting his arrival home for the holidays from Singapore, so we could hear stories of the exciting new world he’d decided to jump into, with encouragement from many of us. This afternoon, our security guard here at the building told me that he’d heard from his barber that Charles had died. Apparently, the barber had been told this by another customer, who was a student of Charles from NYU. Enoch, our security guard, had been collecting mail from Charles these past months and asked if I could find anything out on the internet.
That’s when I found your sad posting, which I then printed out and put up in the lobby of our building. He was a good dude, with whom I enjoyed numerous sit back and chew the fat neighborly conversations over my years here. It’s kind of hard to believe he’s not going to still come walking through the front door of the building for Christmas, so new is the news of his passing for us.
Would you please let us know if you hear that anyone in his professional community is planning any kind of a memorial service for him? I could let folks here know. Thanks much.
Dear John T. I’m very sorry to tell you that this past Tuesday (March 31st.) there was a memorial for Charles at NYU. I didn’t know anyone from his building and therefore, was not able to inform you all. Know though, that it was a moving tribute made by his colleagues, students and friends. We were informed that in remembrance of Charles, a tree was planted in his name at the entryway of Tisch Asia in Singapore.
Charles was a special person who managed to work his way into the hearts of so many people. We miss him.