Featured Artist

Nancy Wilson

Born February 20, 1937, in Chillicothe, OH
African American jazz singer Nancy Wilson, known for her old-fashioned glamour and timeless, sultry voice, has become a legendary entertainer and enjoyed a career that has endured over 40 years. However, Wilson defied and resisted labels that many used to describe her style. Not only has she been a renowned jazz singer and balladeer, but she has also performed cabaret, sophisticated pop, and rhythm and blues. Placing her music in any one or all of such categories denies what Wilson felt her songs epresented. "I'm a song stylistâalthough I have been pigeonholed as a jazz singer," Wilson asserted in a 1994 cover story by Robert E. Johnson published in Jet magazine and Essence magazine writer Audrey Edwards, in May of 1992, described the singer as "an artist of such enduring talent, class and elegance that she doesn't just defy the labels, she transcends them." Moreover, Wilson believed that her music cut across class and race. "I didn't know I was a 'Black artist' until I was nominated for a Grammy in a Black category," she told continued. The music, rather than racial categories is "what people identify me with." With 60 albums to her name, beginning with her 1960 debut Like in Love through her 1997 release If I Had My Way, Wilson and her music have surpassed the longevity of most, garnering fans of all races and ages. As the next decade approached, many record companies, especially those involved with pop and rhythm and blues artists, started using technical enhancements for album production. Wilson, who preferred to record her songs live, resisted such innovations that might alter the sound of her voice and never wanted to release a record that she was unable to perform before an audience. Therefore, since most labels in the United States declined to meet her standards, Wilson spent the 1980s primarily recording for Japanese labels. "They've allowed me to sing so that I can sing," she told Jet magazine in 1986. "I can't sing for a splice in the middle. I say 'We'll do it from the top until you get what you want.' The day the music died, is the day... when they stopped recording live, they started doing things you can't reproduce live." She expressed a similar, though somewhat more resigned, sentiment later in 1999. "When we were recording those Capitol albums, all of the musicians were in the same room playing," she recalled to Weiner. "Now, you record all by yourself with headphones on." Without losing her fans in the United States, Wilson further endeared herself to legions of Japanese jazz enthusiasts during these years. In 1983, she was declared the winner of the annual Tokyo Song Festival and released a total of five acclaimed albums for Japanese labels. Back in the United States, Wilson started recording for Columbia Records as well, beginning in 1984 with a collaborative effort, The Two of Us, that also featured pianist/keyboardist Ramsey Lewis.

http://www.enotes.com/wilson-nancy-reference/wilson-nancy

Etta James

Born Jamesetta Hawkins; January 25, 1938 – January 20, 2012) was an American singer. Her style spanned a variety of music genres including blues, rhythm and blues, rock and roll, soul, gospel and jazz. Starting her career in the mid-1950s, she gained fame with hits such as "Dance With Me, Henry", "At Last", "Tell Mama", and "I'd Rather Go Blind" for which she wrote the lyrics.
James began listening to doo-wop and was inspired to form a girl group, called the Creolettes (due to the members' light skinned complexions). The 14-year-old girls met musician Johnny Otis. Stories on how they met vary including Otis' version in which James had come to his hotel after one of his performances in the city and persuaded him to audition her. Another story came that Otis spotted the group performing at a Los Angeles nightclub and sought them to record his "answer song" to Hank Ballard's "Work With Me, Annie". Nonetheless, Otis took the group under his wing, helping them sign to Modern Records and changing their name from the Creolettes to the Peaches and gave the singer her stage name reversing Jamesetta into Etta James. James recorded the version, which she was allowed to co-author, in 1954, and the song was released in early 1955 as "Dance with Me, Henry". Originally the name of the song was "Roll With Me, Henry" but was changed to avoid censorship due to the subtle title. In February of that year, the song reached number one on the Hot Rhythm & Blues Tracks chart.[10] Its success gave the group an opening spot on Little Richard's national tour.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Etta_James

Whitney Houston

Whitney Elizabeth Houston (August 9, 1963 – February 11, 2012) was an American recording artist, actress, producer, and model. In 2009, the Guinness World Records cited her as the most-awarded female act of all time. Her awards include two Emmy Awards, six Grammy Awards, 30 Billboard Music Awards, and 22 American Music Awards, among a total of 415 career awards in her lifetime. Houston was also one of the world's best-selling music artists.Inspired by prominent soul singers in her family, including her mother Cissy Houston, cousins Dionne Warwick and Dee Dee Warwick, and her godmother Aretha Franklin, Houston began singing with her New Jersey church's junior gospel choir at age 11. After she began performing alongside her mother in night clubs in the New York City area, she was discovered by Arista Records label head Clive Davis. Houston released seven studio albums and three movie soundtrack albums, all of which have diamond, multi-platinum, platinum or gold certification. Houston's first acting role was as the star of the feature film The Bodyguard (1992). The film's original soundtrack won the 1994 Grammy Award for Album of the Year. Its lead single "I Will Always Love You", became the best-selling single by a female artist in music history. With the album, Houston became the first act (solo or group, male or female) to sell more than a million copies of an album within a single week period. The album makes her the only female act in the top 10 list of the best-selling albums of all time. Houston continued to star in movies and contribute to their soundtracks, including the films Waiting to Exhale (1995) and The Preacher's Wife (1996).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitney_Houston

BeBe & CeCe Winans

Born Benjamin (BeBe) Winans, 1962, and Priscilla (CeCe) Winans, 1964, both in Detroit, MI; son and daughter of David (a minister, barber, and gospel singer) and Delores Winans (a medical transcriptionist and gospel singer);Began singing together with brother David as The Winans Part 2; launched career as duo with The PTL Singers, 1982; released first album, BeBe and CeCe Winans, 1987; numerous television appearances, including The Tonight Show, Live with Regis and Kathie Lee, Martin, Sesame Street, and the 1994 Grammy Awards telecast; tours include Winans One Family World Tour, 1992; Young Messiah Tour, 1993; and 1994 tour featuring "The Sounds of Blackness"; CeCe has also established a solo recording and concert career, 1995-; BeBe has starred in a run of the off Broadway musical Your Arms Too Short to Box with God. While they insist that they are equally close to all of their siblings, BeBe and CeCe, because of their closeness in age, began singing together early on. After they graduated from high school together--CeCe was promoted a rade-- CeCe attended cosmetology school and eventually opened her own hair salon. BeBe, on the other hand, chose to focus single-mindedly on music. As four of their older brothers began to gain exposure as The Winans, BeBe & CeCe sought to make their own mark with a more contemporary sound. They joined with another older brother, Daniel, to form The Winans Part 2 in the late 1970s. Andrae Crouch, the gospel star who had initially discovered The Winans, eventually noticed that their kid siblings could sing a little, too, and he hired BeBe and CeCe to sing backup for him.

http://www.answers.com/topic/bebe-and-cece-winans

Brandy

Brandy Rayana Norwood (born February 11, 1979), known professionally as Brandy Norwood was born in McComb, Mississippi, the daughter of Willie Norwood, a former gospel singer and choir director, and his wife Sonja Norwood (née Bates), a former district manager for H&R Block. She is the elder sister of entertainer Ray J, as well as a first cousin of rapper Snoop Dogg. Raised in a Christian home, Norwood started singing through her father's work as part of the local church choir, performing her first gospel solo at the age of two. In 1983, her parents relocated to Los Angeles, California, where Brandy was schooled at the Hollywood High Performing Arts Center. Norwood's interest in music and performing increased after becoming a fan of singer Whitney Houston at the age of seven, but at school, she experienced trouble with persuading teachers to send her on auditions as she found no support among the staff. Undaunted, Norwood began entering talent shows by the time she was eleven, and as part of a youth singing group, performed at several public functions. Norwood, stylistically, has evolved since her 1994 start in music, at the age of 15. With her mother as her manager and stylist, Brandy developed a “good girl” image and a “hip-yet-wholesome” appeal. At the start of her career, she often cited Whitney Houston, Janet Jackson, and Mariah Carey, as her biggest musical inspirations. Her current musical influences are Sade, Kim Burrell, Boyz II Men, The Clark Sisters, Enya, and her father Willie Norwood.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandy_Norwood

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Rihanna

Robyn Rihanna Fenty was born on February 20, 1988, in Saint Michael, Barbados, to Monica Braithwaite, a retired accountant, and Ronald Fenty, a warehouse supervisor for a garment factory. Her mother, a native of Guyana, is Afro-Guyanese, and her father is of Barbadian and Irish descent. The eldest of three siblings, Rihanna has two brothers, Rorrey and Rajad Fenty. Rihanna grew up listening to reggae music, and began singing at around the age of seven. Rihanna was discovered in her home country by American record producer Evan Rogers. The two met in December 2003 through mutual friends of Rihanna's and Rogers' wife, while the couple was on vacation in Barbados, because of how Rihanna's friend had told Rogers' wife how the aspiring singer was always singing and performing. After meeting for the first time, Rogers' asked Rihanna to come to his hotel room, where she performed renditions of Destiny's Child's "Emotion" and Mariah Carey's "Hero". Rihanna's renditions impressed Rogers, who then took her to New York, where she was accompanied by her mother, Monica, to record some demo tapes which could be sent to record labels. Production of the demo tapes took about a year, due to Rihanna only being able to record during school holidays. At the age of 16, Rihanna was signed to Rogers' and Carl Sturken's production company, Syndicated Rhythm Productions, who assigned her a lawyer and manager, before the completed demo tape were distributed to various record labels around the world in late 2004.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rihanna

Rick James

born James Ambrose Johnson, Jr. in Buffalo, New York. James grew up singing on street corners with fellow neighborhood boys. James' early idols included Marvin Gaye, Smokey Robinson and The Temptations, (particularly his uncle, Melvin Franklin). Rick formed his first band with future Steppenwolf member Nick St. Nicholas, initially called the Sailor Boyz. The band soon changed their name to the Mynah Birds and bassist Bruce Palmer took over for St. Nicholas in early 1965, and the group soon released their first single, "Mynah Bird Hop"/"Mynah Bird Song" for Columbia Records of Canada. James returned to Motown and became a songwriter and producer, writing under an assumed name and working with Smokey Robinson and The Miracles, Canadian band Bobby Taylor and the Vancouvers and The Spinners. The group recorded a demo for Atlantic Records, and played at The Fillmore West with Jethro Tull. In 1971, James and Roth both appeared on Buffalo Springfield bassist Bruce Palmer's solo album, The Cycle is Complete. Then they returned to Toronto, where they recorded two singles - Big Showdown and Don't You Worry - as part of Heaven and Earth. Heaven and Earth, minus Little, then merged with another local group, Milestone, to form Great White Cane. The group recorded an album for Lion Records in Los Angeles in March 1972, but by that summer, they had disbanded. In 1973, A&M Records released the first Rick James single, "My Mama", which is likely to have been recorded in Los Angeles. In 1976, James and South African guitarist Aidan Mason co-wrote "Get Up and Dance!," which was released as a single but failed to chart. In 1977, he returned to Motown as a songwriter/producer. He soon began recording for Motown's Gordy label, first with the Hot Lips and then with a new version of the Stone City Band.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_James

Smokey Robinson

William "Smokey" Robinson, Jr. (born February 19, 1940) is an American R&B singer-songwriter, record producer, and former record executive. Robinson is one of the primary figures associated with Motown, second only to the company's founder, Berry Gordy. Robinson's consistent commercial success and creative contributions to the label have earned him the title "King of Motown." As an original member of Motown Records' first vocal group The Miracles and as a solo artist, Robinson delivered many U.S. and U.K. Top 40 hits for Motown between 1960 and 1987. He also served as the company's vice president from 1961 to 1988. Robinson was born and raised in the North End neighborhood of Detroit, Michigan. According to Entertainment Weekly, "when he was 6 or 7, his Uncle Claude christened him "Smokey Joe," which the young William, a Western-movie enthusiast. In 1959, Gordy founded Tamla Records, which he soon reincorporated as Motown. The Miracles were among the label's first signees. Gordy and Robinson had a synergistic relationship, with Robinson providing a foundation for Motown's hit-making success and Gordy acting as a mentor for the budding singer and songwriter. By 1961, Gordy had appointed Robinson vice-president of Motown Records, a title Robinson held for as long as Gordy remained with the company. The 1960 single "Shop Around" was not only Motown's first number one hit on the R&B singles chart, but the first major chart success for The Miracles. Besides creating hits for his own group, Robinson wrote and produced singles and album tracks for other Motown artists. Mary Wells had a number one hit with obinson's song "My Guy" (1964), and Robinson served as The Temptations' primary songwriter and producer from 1963 to 1966, penning such hits as "The Way You Do the Things You Do", "My Girl", "Since I Lost My Baby", and "Get Ready". Among Robinson's other Motown compositions are "Still Water (Love)" by The Four Tops, "Don't Mess With Bill" and "My Baby Must Be a Magician" by The Marvelettes, "When I'm Gone" by Brenda Holloway, "Ain't That Peculiar" and "I'll Be Doggone" by Marvin Gaye, and "First I Look at the Purse" by The Contours.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smokey_Robinson

Michael McDonald

Born and raised in St. Louis , Missouri , Michael McDonald became one of the most recognizable artists of the past 25 years and perhaps the greatest "blue-eyed soul" singer. His ability to bridge rock, adult contemporary and soul successfully and his unique, recognizable voice, have made him a leading solo singer and backing vocalist. McDonald first attained notoriety in the early 70s as an adjunct member of Steely Dan. However, it was his 1977 admission to the boogie rock band the Doobie Brothers, and his unlikely steering of that group to a more soul-oriented sound, that made him a star. McDonald-written and sung hits such as "Takin It To The Streets," "You Belong To Me" and the #1 smash "What a Fool Believes" gave an extended commercial life to the Doobies and provided them an unexpected initial exposure on soul radio.

http://www.soultracks.com/michael_mcdonald.htm

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