Billie Holiday - 100% match to Nina Simone
Eleanor(a) Harris, 7 April 1915, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA, d. 17 July 1959, New York City, New York, USA. ‘Lady Day’ taught herself to sing during her early teens in Baltimore, Maryland, where she was brought up until moving to New York in 1929. Factual inaccuracies and elements of myth and exaggeration have clouded the picture of her formative years despite Read more 
Ella Fitzgerald - 88% match to Nina Simone
Ella Jane Fitzgerald, 25 April 1917, Newport News, Virginia, USA, d. 15 June 1996, Beverly Hills, California, USA. Following the disappearance of her father, Fitzgerald was taken to Yonkers, New York by her mother and her new man Joseph da Silva. At school she sang with a glee club and showed early promise, but preferred dancing to singing. Even so, chronic shyness militated Read more 
Chris Connor - 76% match to Nina Simone
8 November 1927, Kansas City, Missouri, USA. After singing publicly while still at school, Connor worked with the bands of Claude Thornhill, where she was a member of the vocal group, the Snowflakes, and Herbie Fields in the late 40s and early 50s. Audibly influenced by Anita O’Day, Connor quickly developed her own recognizable style and built a localized reputation. Ha Read more 
Sarah Vaughan - 60% match to Nina Simone
Sarah Lois Vaughan, 27 March 1924, Newark, New Jersey, USA, d. 3 April 1990, Los Angeles, California, USA. Although she was not born into an especially musical home environment (her father was a carpenter and her mother worked in a laundry), the young Sarah Vaughan had plenty of contact with music-making. As well as taking piano lessons for nearly 10 years, she sang in her c Read more 
Aretha Franklin - 55% match to Nina Simone
25 March 1942, Memphis, Tennessee, USA. Aretha Franklin’s music is steeped in the traditions of the church. Her father, Rev. C.L. Franklin, was a Baptist preacher who, once he had moved his family to Detroit, became famous throughout black America for his fiery sermons and magnetic public appearances. He knew the major gospel stars Mahalia Jackson and Clara Ward, who in Read more 
Etta James - 55% match to Nina Simone
Jamesetta Hawkins, 25 January 1938, Los Angeles, California, USA. James’ introduction to performing followed an impromptu audition for Johnny Otis backstage at San Francisco’s Fillmore Auditorium. ‘Roll With Me Henry’, her ‘answer’ to the Hank Ballard hit ‘Work With Me Annie’, was retitled ‘The Wallflower’ in an effort to dis Read more 
Dinah Washington - 52% match to Nina Simone
Ruth Lee Jones, 29 August 1924, Tuscaloosa, Alabama, USA, d. 14 December 1963, Detroit, Michigan, USA. Raised in Chicago, Dinah Washington first sang in church choirs for which she also played piano. She then worked in local clubs, where she was heard by Lionel Hampton, who promptly hired her. She was with Hampton from 1943-46, recording hits with ‘Evil Gal Blues’, Read more 
Louis Armstrong - 41% match to Nina Simone
4 August 1901, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA, d. 6 July 1971, New York City, New York, USA. It is impossible to overstate Louis ‘Satchmo’ Armstrong’s importance in jazz, as he was one of the most influential artists in the music’s history. He was also more than just a jazz musician, he was an enormously popular entertainer (a facet upon which some critics f Read more 
Carmen McRae - 39% match to Nina Simone
8 April 1920, New York City, New York, USA, d. 10 November 1994, Beverly Hills, California, USA. One of the best American jazz singers, McRae was also an accomplished pianist and songwriter. Early in her career she sang with bands led by Benny Carter, Mercer Ellington, Charlie Barnet and Count Basie (sometimes under the name of Carmen Clarke, from her brief marriage to Kenny Read more 
Miles Davis - 34% match to Nina Simone
Miles Dewy Davis, 25 May 1926, Alton, Illinois, USA, d. 28 September 1991, Santa Monica, California, USA. Davis was born into a comparatively wealthy middle-class family and both his mother and sister were capable musicians. He was given a trumpet for his thirteenth birthday by his dentist father, who could not have conceived that his gift would set his son on the road to be Read more 
Anita O'Day - 33% match to Nina Simone
Anita Belle Colton, 18 October 1919, Chicago, Illinois, USA, d. 23 November 2006, West Hollywood, California, USA. As Anita Colton, in her early teens she scraped a living as a professional Walkathon contestant (marathon dancer). During this period she changed her surname to O’Day. Along with other contestants she was encouraged to sing and during one Walkathon was acco Read more 
Ray Charles - 32% match to Nina Simone
Ray Charles Robinson, 23 September 1930, Albany, Georgia, USA, d. 10 June 2004, Beverly Hills, California, USA. Few epithets sit less comfortably than that of genius; Ray Charles held this title for over 40 years and he was a true musical genius. As a singer, composer, arranger and pianist, his prolific work deserved no other praise.Born in extreme po Read more 
Chet Baker - 30% match to Nina Simone
Chesney Henry Baker, 23 December 1929, Yale, Oklahoma, USA, d. 13 May 1988, Amsterdam, the Netherlands. One of the more lyrical of the early post-war trumpeters, Baker’s fragile sound epitomized the so-called ‘cool’ school of white west coast musicians who dominated the American jazz scene of the 50s.Baker studied music while in the arm Read more 
Otis Redding - 28% match to Nina Simone
9 September 1941, Dawson, Georgia, USA, d. 10 December 1967, Lake Monona, Madison, Wisconsin, USA. The son of a Baptist minister with the same name, Redding assimilated gospel music during his childhood and soon became interested in jump blues and R&B. After resettling in Macon, he became infatuated with local luminary Little Richard and began singing on a full-time basi Read more 
Bessie Smith - 26% match to Nina Simone
15 April 1894, Chattanooga, Tennessee, USA, d. 26 September 1937, Clarksdale, Mississippi, USA. In her childhood, Smith sang on street corners before joining a touring black minstrel show as a dancer. Also in the show was Ma Rainey, and before long the young newcomer was also singing the blues. The older woman encouraged Smith, despite the fact that even at this early stage Read more
Artist matches
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