# Cassandra Wilson became one of the top jazz singers: Video

- Link: https://jazzblues.eu/2017/12/04/cassandra/
- Published: 2017-12-04T00:02:15+01:00
- Author: https://JazzBlues.EU

**04.12. – Happy Birthday !!! Although her recording career has been somewhat erratic,
Cassandra Wilson became one of the top jazz singers of the ’90s, a vocalist blessed
with a distinctive and flexible voice who is not afraid to take chances. **

She began playing piano and guitar when she was nine and was working as a vocalist
by the mid-’70s, singing a wide variety of material. Following a year in New Orleans,
Wilson moved to New York in 1982 and began working with Dave Holland and Abbey Lincoln.
After meeting Steve Coleman, she became the main vocalist with the M-Base Collective.
Although there was really no room for a singer in the overcrowded free funk ensembles,
Wilson did as good a job of fitting in as was possible. She worked with New Air 
and recorded her first album as a leader in 1985. By her third record, a standards
date, she was sounding quite a bit like Betty Carter.

After a few more albums in which she mostly performed original and rather inferior
material, Wilson changed direction and performed an acoustic blues-oriented program
for Blue Note called Blue Light ‘Til Dawn. By going back in time, she had found 
herself, and has since continued interpreting vintage country blues and folk music
in fresh and creative ways up until the present day. During 1997 she toured as part
of Wynton Marsalis’ Blood on the Fields production. Traveling Miles, her tribute
to Miles Davis, followed two years later. For 2002’s Belly of the Sun, she drew 
on an array of roots musics — blues, country, soul, rock — to fashion a record that
furthered her artistic career while still aligning well with trends in popular music.
Glamoured, released in 2003, posed a different kind of challenge; half the material
was composed by Wilson herself.

Unwilling to stand still, she gently explored sampling and other hip-hop techniques
for 2006’s Thunderbird. She followed 2008’s Loverly, another album of standards,
with Silver Ponyin 2010. Ever a musical chameleon, she changed direction again with
an album of mostly original tunes entitled Another Country, which she co-produced
with electric guitarist Fabrizio Sotti. Recorded in Italy, New Orleans, and New 
York, it was released in the summer of 2012. Wilson switched labels in 2015, signing
to Sony Legacy and releasing the Billie Holiday tribute Coming Forth by Day. The
album was produced by Nick Launay, who is best known for working with rock acts 
like the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Supergrass, Midnight Oil, the Cribs, and Nick Cave.

![Image result for Cassandra Wilson](https://i0.wp.com/pbs.twimg.com/media/DPKmkv0X0AAm34X.
jpg?w=640&ssl=1)

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