Carmen Mercedes McRae (April 8, 1920 – November 10, 1994) was an American jazz singer.[1] She is considered one of the most influential jazz vocalists of the 20th century and is remembered for her behind-the-beat phrasing and ironic interpretation of lyrics In her late teens and early twenties, McRae played piano at a New York City club called Minton’s Playhouse, Harlem’s most famous jazz club, sang as a chorus girl and worked as a secretary. It was at Minton’s where she met trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie, bassist Oscar Pettiford, and drummer Kenny Clarke, had her first important job as a pianist with Benny Carter’s big band (1944), worked with Count Basie (1944) and under the name “Carmen Clarke” (having married Kenny Clarke)[4] made her first recording as pianist with the Mercer Ellington Band (1946–47). But it was while working in Brooklyn that she came to the attention of Decca’s Milt Gabler. Her five-year association with Decca yielded 12 LPs. n 1948, she moved to Chicago with comedian and impressionist George Kirby, with whom she had fallen in love. At the end of the relationship, she worked as a pianist and singer at the Archway Lounge. She played piano steadily for almost four years at a number of clubs in Chicago before returning to New York in 1952. In Chicago, she developed her own specific style. Those years in Chicago, McRae told Jazz Forum, “gave me whatever it is that I have now. That’s the most prominent schooling I ever had.”[7]
Return to New York
Back in New York in the early 1950s, McRae got the record contract that launched her career. She was voted best new female vocalist of 1954 by DownBeat magazine. MacRae married twice: to drummer Kenny Clarke from 1944 to 1956, though they separated in 1948; and to bassist Ike Isaacs in the late 1950s. Both marriages ended in divorce.[8][9]
Among her most interesting recording projects were Mad About The Man (1957) with composer Noël Coward, Boy Meets Girl (1957) with Sammy Davis, Jr., participating in Dave Brubeck’s The Real Ambassadors (1961) with Louis Armstrong, a tribute album You’re Lookin’ at Me (A Collection of Nat King Cole Songs) (1983), cutting an album of live duets with Betty Carter, The Carmen McRae-Betty Carter Duets (1987), being accompanied by Dave Brubeck and George Shearing, and closing her career with tributes to Thelonious Monk, Carmen Sings Monk (1990), and Sarah Vaughan, Sarah: Dedicated to You (1991).
As a result of her early friendship with Billie Holiday, she never performed without singing at least one song associated with “Lady Day”, and she recorded an album in 1983 in her honor entitled For Lady Day, which was released in 1995, with songs including “Good Morning Heartache”, “Them There Eyes”, “Lover Man”, “God Bless the Child” and “Don’t Explain”. McRae also recorded with some of the world’s best jazz musicians in albums such as Take Five Live (1961) with Dave Brubeck, Two for the Road (1980) with George Shearing, and Heat Wave (1982) with Cal Tjader. The latter two albums were part of a notable eight-year relationship with Concord Jazz. From Wikipedia
