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Jacqui Sutton

As a singer, getting there wasn’t a straightforward trip. I was born in Orlando, Florida, the second of six children. In the 1960s, my mother (newly single, and pregnant with her sixth child), was determined to make a better life for all of us. She moved us to Rochester, New York. Think: Martin Luther King, Jr., the Beatles, integration, school busing, and the Jackson 5. It was about crossing lines. That sense of boundary trespass filtered into my world as I found myself drawn to experiences that were the opposite of my own. I could never get enough of Stevie Wonder’s Songs in the Key of Life, nor the Beatles’ Yesterday. We had one of those old-fashioned, what I call “kitchen table radios”, with the round wooden body, fabric over the speakers, and a crackly dial. I’d lean against that radio and be consumed by the sadness of Yesterday. Later in life, even certain songs that I heard on Muzak radio stations could make me stop in my tracks. It just had to sound beautiful to my ears. (Musical theater would take longer for me to appreciate, but I got there eventually.) As a musician, I had a brief stint in grade school as a flutist—recitals and everything—which ended abruptly at around age 11 when I lost the instrument and was terrified to report it. Around 1982 (my early 20s), I realized that there were no flute police in the Rochester City School District, and I could well have gone on to have some kind of instrumental career. I made this revelation during my time in the San Francisco Bay Area. Bobby McFerrin and Tuck & Patty were on the rise. As soon as I got there, I cast aside what I thought was my dream to be an environmental designer and at the insistence of one of my roommates, I auditioned for Jazzmouth, a vocal jazz ensemble led by Molly Holm. I had been a competitive gymnast for 11 years, but nothing seemed more dangerous, physically precarious or, paradoxically, beautiful than singing. My roommate helped me prepare one song: Summertime. After several false starts in the audition room (I couldn’t find my starting note, and finally pleaded to sing it a capella so I could get the heck out of there. Embarrassed, I bolted as soon as I was done. Molly called me up and asked me to join, with one admonition: “You’ve got to study.” I did.

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5
Interview

Jacqui Sutton: At the Edge of the Frontier

Read "Jacqui Sutton: At the Edge of the Frontier" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey


Vocalist/bandleader Jacqui Sutton has a vision that was fully realized by the time she started recording. Her vision had a long incubation period, spent in a variety of musical wood sheds all leading to her debut, Billie and Dolly (Toy Blue Typewriter, 2010). And this was only the beginning.All About Jazz: In your press bio, you begin, “Turning 50 and starting a garage band is not the usual vocalist's narrative..." You are a child of the '70s with ...

4
Album Review

Jacqui Sutton: Notes From The Frontier: A Musical Journey

Read "Notes From The Frontier: A Musical Journey" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky


In America's infancy, exploration and a thirst for discovery were endemic to the human spirit. Over time, no stone went unturned, the world shrunk and people, by and large, became content with what they already knew. Something as simple as a new television program or electronic gadget now quenches the thirst-for-the-unknown that was once unquenchable in the mind of mankind, but true musical spirits aren't satisfied in this manner; they never stop searching. These musical pioneers explore the cracks and ...

366
Extended Analysis

Jacqui Sutton: Billie & Dolly

Read "Jacqui Sutton: Billie & Dolly" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey


Jacqui Sutton and The Frontier OrchestraBillie & DollyToy Blue Typewriter Productions2010 Heaven knows that contemporary jazz vocals could use a shot of sense-of-humor. The scene hosts a legion of earnest singers paying tribute to their idols, firebrands intent on extending the already stretched-taut realms of scat and vocalese, and soccer moms and dads fulfilling a vanity ambition--all so serious. Sense of humor is in order, but not just any sense of ...

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