The Best Jazz Music Singers of All Time
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Find out who made the cut as the best jazz singers of all time. From Ella Fitzgerald to Sarah Vaughan, these are the ladies who have made their mark on the genre.
Louis Armstrong
Louis Armstrong is one of the most iconic jazz music singers of all time. He is known for his gravelly voice and his unique style of singing. He was an influential figure in the development of jazz music and he helped to popularize the genre. He is also one of the most recorded artists in history, with over 1,000 recordings to his name.
Ella Fitzgerald
Ella Fitzgerald is considered to be one of the best jazz music singers of all time. She was born in 1917 in Virginia, United States of America and died in 1996 in New York, United States of America. Fitzgerald was a popular figure in the jazz world and was known for her vocal abilities and repertoire.
Billie Holiday
Billie Holiday was an American jazz singer with a career spanning nearly thirty years. Born in Philadelphia, she came to prominence in the jazz clubs of New York City in the 1930s and released her first album, Lady Sings the Blues, in 1957. She died at the age of 44 from cirrhosis of the liver.
Miles Davis
Miles Davis was an American jazz trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. He is among the most influential and acclaimed figures in the history of jazz and 20th century music. Davis adopted a variety of musical styles throughout his career that encompassed elements of bebop, cool jazz, hard bop, modal jazz, and jazz fusion.
John Coltrane
John Coltrane was an American jazz musician and composer, considered one of the most important and influential figures in jazz. He first gained prominence as a member of Miles Davis’s band in the 1950s, and later led his own groups, including the John Coltrane Quartet and John Coltrane and His Legacy. His sound was highly innovative, drawing on both Eastern European harmonic structures and African-American Musical developments such as bebop, blues, and modal jazz, while infusing his own ideas into his work. His work revolutionized jazz, moving it away from traditional forms towards more free-form expression. His use of extended harmonic structures, complex melodies, chromaticism, and dissonance had a profound influence on subsequent jazz musicians. He is also one of the most recorded musicians in jazz, with over fifty albums to his name.
Charlie Parker
One of the most revolutionary and significant jazz musicians of all time, saxophonist Charlie Parker was born in Kansas City, Missouri in 1920. Parker’s style of playing was something totally new to the music world, and his genius helped to propel jazz into the modern era. He was a master of improvisation, and his solos were filled with complex harmonies and rapid runs. Parker’s influence can be heard in the playing of almost every jazz musician that came after him.
Dizzy Gillespie
Dizzy Gillespie was an American jazz trumpeter, bandleader, composer, and singer. He was a leading figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz. He is also credited with helping to bring Afro-Cuban rhythms to the forefront of jazz with his pieces “Manteca” and “Tin Tin Deo”.
Thelonious Monk
Thelonious Monk was an American jazz pianist and composer known for his unique improvisational style. He is considered one of the best jazz musicians of all time, and his influence can be heard in the work of later musicians such as John Coltrane and Miles Davis. Monk was born in 1917 in Rocky Mount, North Carolina, and began playing piano at the age of six. He moved to New York City in the early 1940s, where he quickly became a fixture on the city’s vibrant jazz scene. Over the course of his career, Monk released a number of highly acclaimed albums, including ‘Round Midnight (1956) and Thelonious Monk Quartet with John Coltrane at Carnegie Hall (1957). He died in 1982 at the age of 64.
Sarah Vaughan
Sarah Vaughan is often considered to be one of the best jazz music singers of all time. She was born in 1926 in Newark, New Jersey, and began her singing career shortly thereafter. She quickly gained notoriety for her exceptional vocal range and ability to improvise. She toured with several famous jazz musicians, including Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. In the 1950s, she began to experiment with pop music and had several hits on the Billboard charts. She continued to perform and record until her death in 1990.
Carmen McRae
Carmen McRae was a legendary jazz singer who had a profound impact on the genre. She is considered one of the best jazz singers of all time and was known for her distinctive voice and improvisational skills. McRae began her career in the 1940s and released her debut album in 1954. She went on to release several more albums throughout her career, including live albums and compilations. Carmen McRae died in 1994, but her legacy as one of the greatest jazz singers of all time lives on.
