Cassandra Wilson
(born December 3, 1955) is an American jazz musician, vocalist, songwriter, and producer from Jackson, Mississippi. She has won two Grammy Awards.
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CASSANDRA WILSON TICKETS
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Family and Early Life
Cassandra Wilson is the third and youngest child of
Herman Fowlkes, Jr., a guitarist, bassist and music teacher; and Mary McDaniel, an elementary school teacher who eventually earned her
Ph.D. in education. Between her mother’s love for
Motown and her father’s dedication to jazz, Wilson’s parents sparked her early interest in music.
[1]
Musical Beginnings
Like many jazz musicians Wilson’s formal musical education consisted of classical lessons; she studied piano from the age of six to thirteen and played clarinet in the middle school concert and
marching bands. When she tired of this training, she asked her father to teach her the guitar. Instead, he gave her a lesson in self-reliance—some
Mel Bay method books. She explored the instrument on her own, developing what she has described as an “intuitive” approach. During this time she began writing her own songs, adopting a
folk style. She also appeared in the musical theater productions, including
The Wizard of Oz
as Dorothy , crossing racial lines in a recently desegregated school system.
For college, Wilson attended
Millsaps College and
Jackson State University. She graduated with a
degree in mass communications. Outside of the classroom, the busy student spent her nights working with R&B, funk, and pop
cover bands, also singing in local coffeehouses. The Black Arts Music Society, founded by John Reese and
Alvin Fielder, provided her with her first opportunities to perform
bebop.
In 1981, she moved to
New Orleans for a position as assistant public affairs director for the local television station, WDSU. She did not stay long. Working with mentors who included elder statesmen
Earl Turbinton,
Alvin Batiste, and
Ellis Marsalis, Wilson found encouragement to seriously pursue jazz performance and moved to the New York City area the following year.
Musical Association with M-Base
There her focus turned towards improvisation. Heavily influenced by singers
Abbey Lincoln and
Betty Carter, she fine-tuned her vocal phrasing and
scat while studying
ear training with trombonist
Grachan Moncur, III. Frequenting jam sessions under the tutelage of pianist
Sadik Hakim, a
Charlie Parker alumnus, she met alto saxophonist
Steve Coleman, who encouraged her to look beyond the standard jazz repertoire in favor of developing original material. She would become the vocalist and one of the founding members of the
M-Base collective in which Coleman was the leading figure, a stylistic outgrowth of the
Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) and
Black Artists Group (BAG) that re-imagined the grooves of funk and soul within the context of traditional and
avant-garde jazz.
Although the voice – typically treated as the focal point of any arrangement in which it is included – was not an obvious choice for M-base’s complex textures or dissonant free melodies, Wilson wove herself into the fabric of these settings with wordless improv and lyrics. She can be heard on Coleman’s
Motherland Pulse
(1985);
On the Edge of Tomorrow
(1986);
World Expansion
(1986); and
Sine Die
(1987).
At the same time, Wilson recorded and toured with alto saxophonist
Henry Threadgill in the avant-garde trio New Air. A decade her senior and an AACM member, Threadgill has been lauded as a composer for his ability to transcend stylistic boundaries, a trait he and Wilson share.
Solo career
Like fellow M-base artists, Wilson signed to the Munich-based, independent label
JMT. She released her first recording as a leader
Point of View
in 1986. Like the majority of her JMT albums that followed, originals by Wilson in keeping with M-base dominated these sessions; she would also record material by and co-written with Coleman,
Jean-Paul Bourelly, and
James Weidman as well as a few standards. Her throaty
contralto gradually emerges over the course of these recordings, making its way to the foreground. She developed a remarkable ability to stretch and bend pitches, elongate syllables, manipulate tone and timbre from dusky to hollow.
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While these recordings established her as a serious musician , Wilson received her first broad critical acclaim for the album of standards recorded in the middle of this period,
Blue Skies
(1988). Her signing with
Blue Note records in 1993 marked a crucial turning point in her career and major breakthrough to audiences beyond jazz with albums selling in the hundreds of thousands of copies.
Beginning with
Blue Light 'Til Dawn
(1993) her repertoire moved towards a broad synthesis of blues, pop, jazz, world music, and country. Although she continued to perform originals and standards, she adopted songs as diverse as
Robert Johnson’s “Come On in My Kitchen”,
Joni Mitchell’s “Black Crow”,
The Monkees’ “
Last Train to Clarksville”, and
Hank Williams’ “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry”.
Not only did Wilson effectively reconnect vocal jazz with its blues roots, she was arguably the first to convincingly fashion post-British Invasion pop into jazz, trailblazing a path that many have since followed. Furthermore, producer
Craig Street drew from pop production techniques to create a rich ambient environment around her voice, magnifying it and giving sonic depth to
Brandon Ross’ sparse but incredibly vivid arrangements, which used steel guitar, violin, accordion, and percussion.
Wilson’s 1996 album
New Moon Daughter
won the
Grammy for
Best Jazz Vocal Performance. In 1997, she recorded and toured as a featured vocalist with
Wynton Marsalis’
Pulitzer Prize winning composition,
Blood on the Fields
.
The late
Miles Davis was one of Wilson's greatest influences. In 1989 Wilson performed as the opening act for Davis at the JVC Jazz Festival in Chicago. In 1999 she produced
Traveling Miles
as a tribute to Davis. The album developed from a series of jazz concerts that she performed at
Lincoln Center in November 1997 in Davis' honor and includes three selections based on Davis' own compositions, in which Wilson adapted the original themes.
Personal life
Wilson was married to Anthony Wilson from 1981 to 1983.
She has a son, Jeris, born in the late 1980s. Her song "Out Loud (Jeris' Blues)" is from the album
She Who Weeps
. For many years she and her son lived in
Harlem, New York, in an apartment that once belonged to jazz great
Duke Ellington.
In 2000, Wilson married actor
Isaach de Bankolé, who directed her in the concert film
Traveling Miles: Cassandra Wilson
(2000).
Wilson and her mother are members of
Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc.
Honors
- Received honorary doctorate in the Arts from Millsaps College, 2003
- Named “America’s Best Singer” by Time Magazine in 2001
- Female Jazz Vocalist of the Year, Down Beat magazine, 1994-1996. Wilson was named best jazz singer.
- Grammy Award for Best Jazz Vocal Performance for New Moon Daughter
, 1996
- Grammy Award for Best Jazz Vocal Album for Loverly
, 2009
Albums
Solo
- Point of View
(1985)
- Days Aweigh
(1987)
- Blue Skies
(1988)
- Jumpworld
(1989)
- She Who Weeps
(1990)
- Live
(1991)
- After the Beginning Again
(1991)
- Dance to the Drums Again
(1992)
- Blue Light 'Til Dawn
(1993)
- New Moon Daughter
(1995)
- Songbook
(compilation, 1996)
- Rendezvous
(with Jacky Terrasson) (1998)
- Traveling Miles
(1999)
- Belly of the Sun
(2002)
- Sings Standards
(compilation, 2002)
- Glamoured
(2003)
- Love Phases Dimensions: From the JMT Years
(2004)
- Thunderbird
(2006)
- Loverly
(2008)
With Steve Coleman
- Motherland Pulse
(1985)
- World Expansion
- On the Edge of Tomorrow
With M-Base
- Anatomy of a Groove
- Dance to the Drums Again
(1993)
Soundtracks
Soundtracks featuring Cassandra Wilson.
- 1994 Jimmy Hollywood
: "Let the Good Times Roll"
- 1994 Junior
: "I've Got You Under My Skin" and "Little Warm Death"
- 1995 Miami Rhapsody
: "How Long Has This Been Going On?"
- 1997 Love Jones
: "You Move Me" (see Love Jones (soundtrack))
- 1997 Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil (film)
: "Days of Wine and Roses"
- 1998 B. Monkey
: "Tupelo Honey"
- 1999 Passions (TV series)
: "Time after Time"
- 2001 The Score
: "Green Dolphin Street" and "You're About To Give In"
- 2002 Brown Sugar
: "Time After Time"
- 2005 Don't Come Knocking
: "Lost"
- 2008 My Blueberry Nights
: "Harvest Moon"
Filmography
Cassandra Wilson features as a singer in the following films.
- Junior
(1994)
- The Score
(2001)
References
- GOING HOME WITH: Cassandra Wilson; Jazz Diva Follows Sound of Her Roots, John Leland, New York Times, March 2002
- Jazz, The Rough Guide, Carr, Fairweather and Priestly, 2nd Edition March 2000