Nobody tells it like Mary. With a voice that is rough and ready, sweet and
pure, Mary J. Blige is capable of conveying heartache and happiness in a
single musical phrase. A confessional singer, her emotional honesty reflects
the great traditions of blues and soul with a
ripped-from-the-pages-of-your-diary immediacy that has won her countless
honors and a devoted, ever-growing audience around the world.
[click the link for more]
New York, March, 2006: Twenty-Three year-old singer-songwriter, Ne-Yo wasn’t
sure if a hip-hop crazed public would be ready for his brand of sensitive
soul. With a hit single and album under his belt his fears have proven
unfounded.
Let’s face it, it’s the stuff dreams are made of. Co-writes of the most
played of the year, (Mario’s “Let Me Love You”), gets signed to his own
record deal through star making executive, Island Def Jam CEO, LA Reid and
watches his debut single (“So Sick”) and album (“In My Own Words”) climb to
the top of the charts. Twenty-three year old, LA based Ne-Yo must have done
something good in his past life because this is as close as it gets to
heaven for new artists. [click the link for more]
David Nathan’s
impressive career stretches back to 1965, when the enterprising
London teenager founded the UK’s first Nina Simone fan club.
From there, he and business partners Dave Godin and Robert
Blackmore opened England’s legendary Soul City Records, the only
spot in the late '60s where Londoners could pick up copies of
the latest hard-core R&B discs coming out of the States –
helping set the larger trend of soul’s remarkable acceptance in
the UK. By the early '70s David had embarked on his own path as
a journalist, writing innumerable articles on top stars of the
day – Diana Ross, Earth, Wind, & Fire, Dionne Warwick – and
setting up residence in New York and Los Angeles.
[click the
link for more]
California-based filmmakers Zach Niles and Banker White
were chosen to receive the 2006 CDS Filmmaker Award for
their feature-length documentary The Refugee All Stars,
the story of six Sierra Leonean musicians who form a
band while living as refugees in the Republic of Guinea.
Filmed in a climate of fear pervading the West African
refugee camps on the Guinea–Sierra Leone border, the
documentary—a tribute to the transcendent power of
music—provides a unique and intimate perspective on war
and conflict in the developing world.
The band’s music—a soulful mix of
traditional West African music, reggae, and classic
R&B—infuses the film with message-oriented songs
decrying the insanities of war, calling for social
justice, and wryly commenting on the corruption that
surrounds the victims of turmoil.
[click the
link for more]
Her career has been so
influential that Atlantic Records is sometimes referred
to as the "House that Ruth Built" and for good reason.
Her career started in the early 1950's with Atlantic as
that fabled labels very first true superstar, preceding
even Ray Charles. The is the founder of the R&B
Foundation and she was THE LEADER in the battle for
artist rights.
[click the
link for more]
I started geting phone calls at about
2pm on Friday November 10. The first one was from
Cleveland (SP Coordinador Iris Smith) and then they
continued all afternoon and into the evening. At first
the calls were to inform me of the passing of Gerald
Levert. Later the calls were from people who were close
to him, expressing pain and shock. By the time I was
able to reach a computer my inbox was full of
notifications about the passing of Gerald Levert. Next
came the emails from people wanting to know when
Soul-Patrol is going to have a tribute posted to Gerald
Levert?
Well here is our tribute to Gerald Levert. It comes from
our man in Chicago "King" George. To listen click on the
link below, the banner below or on Gerald's picture
above and let us know what cha think?? [click the
link for more]
R&B laid the foundation for rock 'n'
roll. Emerging after World War II, R&B was a stripped-down, upbeat form that
mixed jazz and the blues over a back-shuffle snare beat. The raunchy lyrical
content continued a time-honored African-American tradition of setting
sexual innuendos and double entendres to a danceable beat. This was not a
male-dominated music form -- artists such as Ray Charles and Little Willie
John shared the limelight with R&B pioneers Ruth Brown, Big Maybelle and Big
Mama Thornton. In the 1950s, R&B artists incorporated more pop-oriented time
signatures and lyrical topics, moving the infectious sound into the popular
mainstream. [click the link for more]
Rhythm and blues (aka R&B or RnB) is a popular
music genre combining jazz, gospel, and blues influences — first
performed by African American artists.
The term was coined as a musical marketing term in the United
States in 1947 by Jerry Wexler at Billboard magazine.[1] It
replaced the term race music (which originally came from within
the black community, but was deemed offensive in the more
positive postwar world,[1]), and the Billboard category Harlem
Hit Parade in June 1949. The term was initially used to identify
the rocking style of music that combined the 12 bar blues format
and boogie-woogie with a back beat, which later became a
fundamental element of rock and roll. In 1948, RCA Victor was
marketing black music under the name Blues and Rhythm. The words
were reversed by Wexler of Atlantic Records, the most aggressive
and dominant label in the R&B field in the early years.
[click the link for more]
Born
Steveland Morris May 13, 1950 in Saginaw, Michigan.
Stevie Wonder was placed in an incubator and given too
much oxygen, causing permanent sight loss. Playing the
harmonica at five, he started piano lessons at six and
took up the drums at eight. Lula Mae Hardaway Wonder's
mother was afraid to let the young boy out of house.
Thus a brilliant musical career was launched. To pass
the time of day, Wonder would beat on pot, pans,and any
other surface that helped him keep rhythm with the tunes
he heard on the radio. As he became proficient on
various real instruments, he started playing at the
local church and soon grew to be something of a
neighborhood sensation. A child prodigy at an early age,
Steveland sang like a seasoned veteran. After the family
moved to Detroit word spread of the gifted Wonder. It
would be only a matter of time until someone from Motown
caught wind of this talented youngster.
[click the
link for more]
Aretha Louise Franklin (born March 25,
1942) is an American gospel, soul and R&B singer born in
Memphis, Tennessee, but raised in Detroit, Michigan. She
has been dubbed for years "The Queen Of Soul", but many
also call her "Lady Soul," as well as the more
affectionate "Sister Re". She is renowned for her soul
and R&B recordings but is also adept at jazz, rock,
blues, pop, gospel, and even opera. She is generally
regarded as one of the top vocalists ever by such
industry publications/media outlets as Rolling Stone and
VH1, due to her ability to inject whatever she may be
singing about with passion, soul and sheer conviction.
[1] She is the second most honored female singer in
Grammy history after Alison Krauss. Ms. Franklin has won
nineteen competitive Grammys (including an unprecedented
eleven for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance, eight of
them consecutive), and the state of Michigan has
declared her voice to be a wonder.
[click the
link for more]
Shades of
Blue is very much a personal commentary on the great
blues and authentic soul music produced from the 1940s
to the present day - the power of the blues to wound, to
heal and uplift, the joy and sorrow of testifying soul,
the emotional highs of gospel - all shades of blue
in fact! We use the R&B "badge" to try and define the
site boundaries, and then proceed to ignore most of the
parameters we've set - which means a few omissions, more
than a few idiosyncratic entries and maybe a few
pleasant surprises along the way.........
Hopefully, finding your way around the site is fairly
easy, but if you need a quick guide,
Site Help gives a brief
overview of the navigation. [click the link for more]
