Diane Schuur
Encyclopedia
Diane Schuur is an American
jazz
singer and pianist. Nicknamed "Deedles", she has won two Grammy Awards, headlined many of the world's most prestigious music venues, including Carnegie Hall
and The White House
and has toured the world performing with such greats as Quincy Jones
, Stan Getz
, B. B. King
, Dizzy Gillespie
, Maynard Ferguson
, Ray Charles
, and Stevie Wonder
. Like Stevie Wonder, Schuur was blinded
at birth due to retinopathy of prematurity
.
and was encouraged by both her parents to sing. Her early childhood music heroines were Sarah Vaughan
and Dinah Washington
. Schuur had her first gig at Tacoma's Holiday Inn
at age ten in which she sang country music
. Attending the Washington State School for the Blind, she began performing original material, and starting at the young age of sixteen, revealed a distinctive voice and began performing. Her big break came when Stan Getz
became positive about her work on hearing her sing "Amazing Grace
" at legendary Monterey Jazz Festival
in 1979, returning once again in '88 and '91. In 1982, Getz asked her to join him at a performance at the White House
. Nancy Reagan
invited her to perform again as a vocalist with the Count Basie Orchestra
in 1987. Stan Getz later played on Schuur's first three albums, Deedles (1984), Schuur Thing (1985) and Timeless (1988).
Schuur's debut album, Deedles, was released in 1984, the first of several recordings to showcase her vocal abilities. In 1985, while on tour in the Far East, Schuur met B.B. King when the two of them played a music festival in Tokyo
. Schurr and King eventually made an album together, Heart to Heart released May 1994, which top the Billboard charts
to number one. Twelve of Schuur's albums have reached the Top 10 Jazz Albums on Billboard history charts, including her latest Diane Schuur: Live In London (2006) She received her first Grammy for the album Timeless (1986), and the following year received another, for Diane Schuur & the Count Basie Orchestra (1987).
Schuur proved her staying power through the 1990s and into the 2000s, first with her 1991 follow up to Talkin' 'Bout You, Pure Schuur, and then with nearly an album a year from then on, including In Tribute (1992]), Love Songs (1993), Heart to Heart (1994), Love Walked In (1995), Blues for Schuur (1997), Music Is My Life (1999), Friends for Schuur (2000), and Swingin' for Schuur (2001). Late in 2003, Schuur released Midnight, featuring original songs written for the album by Barry Manilow
. Manilow also performs alongside Schuur on the album, along with Alan Broadbent
on piano, Chuck Berghofer on bass, and the drummers Harvey Mason
and Peter Erskine
.
Her second live album, Diane Schuur: Live In London, was released in June 2006. It is her first release on the GR2 Classics label, the 20th album of her career and was recorded at Ronnie Scott
's in Soho, London.
In 2008 she released a new studio collection entitled Some Other Time.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
singer and pianist. Nicknamed "Deedles", she has won two Grammy Awards, headlined many of the world's most prestigious music venues, including Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....
and The White House
White House
The White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., the house was designed by Irish-born James Hoban, and built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the Neoclassical...
and has toured the world performing with such greats as Quincy Jones
Quincy Jones
Quincy Delightt Jones, Jr. is an American record producer and musician. A conductor, musical arranger, film composer, television producer, and trumpeter. His career spans five decades in the entertainment industry and a record 79 Grammy Award nominations, 27 Grammys, including a Grammy Legend...
, Stan Getz
Stan Getz
Stanley Getz was an American jazz saxophone player. Getz was known as "The Sound" because of his warm, lyrical tone, his prime influence being the wispy, mellow timbre of his idol, Lester Young. Coming to prominence in the late 1940s with Woody Herman's big band, Getz is described by critic Scott...
, B. B. King
B. B. King
Riley B. King , known by the stage name B.B. King, is an American blues guitarist and singer-songwriter.Rolling Stone magazine ranked him at No.3 on its list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time. According to Edward M...
, Dizzy Gillespie
Dizzy Gillespie
John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie was an American jazz trumpet player, bandleader, singer, and composer dubbed "the sound of surprise".Together with Charlie Parker, he was a major figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz...
, Maynard Ferguson
Maynard Ferguson
Maynard Ferguson was a Canadian jazz musician and bandleader. He came to prominence playing in Stan Kenton's orchestra, before forming his own band in 1957...
, Ray Charles
Ray Charles
Ray Charles Robinson , known by his shortened stage name Ray Charles, was an American musician. He was a pioneer in the genre of soul music during the 1950s by fusing rhythm and blues, gospel, and blues styles into his early recordings with Atlantic Records...
, and Stevie Wonder
Stevie Wonder
Stevland Hardaway Morris , better known by his stage name Stevie Wonder, is an American singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, record producer and activist...
. Like Stevie Wonder, Schuur was blinded
Blindness
Blindness is the condition of lacking visual perception due to physiological or neurological factors.Various scales have been developed to describe the extent of vision loss and define blindness...
at birth due to retinopathy of prematurity
Retinopathy of prematurity
Retinopathy of prematurity , previously known as retrolental fibroplasia , is an eye disease that affects prematurely-born babies. It is thought to be caused by disorganized growth of retinal blood vessels which may result in scarring and retinal detachment. ROP can be mild and may resolve...
.
Biography
Diane Schuur grew up in suburban Seattle, WashingtonSeattle, Washington
Seattle is the county seat of King County, Washington. With 608,660 residents as of the 2010 Census, Seattle is the largest city in the Northwestern United States. The Seattle metropolitan area of about 3.4 million inhabitants is the 15th largest metropolitan area in the country...
and was encouraged by both her parents to sing. Her early childhood music heroines were Sarah Vaughan
Sarah Vaughan
Sarah Lois Vaughan was an American jazz singer, described by Scott Yanow as having "one of the most wondrous voices of the 20th century."...
and Dinah Washington
Dinah Washington
Dinah Washington, born Ruth Lee Jones , was an American blues, R&B and jazz singer. She has been cited as "the most popular black female recording artist of the '50s", and called "The Queen of the Blues"...
. Schuur had her first gig at Tacoma's Holiday Inn
Holiday Inn
Holiday Inn is a brand of hotels, formally a economy motel chain, forming part of the British InterContinental Hotels Group . It is one of the world's largest hotel chains with 238,440 bedrooms and 1,301 hotels globally. There are currently 5 hotels in the pipeline...
at age ten in which she sang country music
Country music
Country music is a popular American musical style that began in the rural Southern United States in the 1920s. It takes its roots from Western cowboy and folk music...
. Attending the Washington State School for the Blind, she began performing original material, and starting at the young age of sixteen, revealed a distinctive voice and began performing. Her big break came when Stan Getz
Stan Getz
Stanley Getz was an American jazz saxophone player. Getz was known as "The Sound" because of his warm, lyrical tone, his prime influence being the wispy, mellow timbre of his idol, Lester Young. Coming to prominence in the late 1940s with Woody Herman's big band, Getz is described by critic Scott...
became positive about her work on hearing her sing "Amazing Grace
Amazing Grace
"Amazing Grace" is a Christian hymn with words written by the English poet and clergyman John Newton , published in 1779. With a message that forgiveness and redemption are possible regardless of the sins people commit and that the soul can be delivered from despair through the mercy of God,...
" at legendary Monterey Jazz Festival
Monterey Jazz Festival
The Monterey Jazz Festival is one of the longest consecutively running jazz festivals. It debuted on October 3, 1958 and was founded by San Francisco jazz radio broadcaster Jimmy Lyons.-History:...
in 1979, returning once again in '88 and '91. In 1982, Getz asked her to join him at a performance at the White House
White House
The White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., the house was designed by Irish-born James Hoban, and built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the Neoclassical...
. Nancy Reagan
Nancy Reagan
Nancy Davis Reagan is the widow of former United States President Ronald Reagan and was First Lady of the United States from 1981 to 1989....
invited her to perform again as a vocalist with the Count Basie Orchestra
Count Basie Orchestra
The Count Basie Orchestra is a 16 to 18 piece big band, one of the most prominent jazz performing groups of the swing era, founded by Count Basie. The band survived the late '40s decline in big band popularity and went on to produce notable collaborations with singers such as Frank Sinatra and Ella...
in 1987. Stan Getz later played on Schuur's first three albums, Deedles (1984), Schuur Thing (1985) and Timeless (1988).
Schuur's debut album, Deedles, was released in 1984, the first of several recordings to showcase her vocal abilities. In 1985, while on tour in the Far East, Schuur met B.B. King when the two of them played a music festival in Tokyo
Tokyo
, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...
. Schurr and King eventually made an album together, Heart to Heart released May 1994, which top the Billboard charts
Billboard charts
The Billboard charts tabulate the relative weekly popularity of songs or albums in the United States. The results are published in Billboard magazine...
to number one. Twelve of Schuur's albums have reached the Top 10 Jazz Albums on Billboard history charts, including her latest Diane Schuur: Live In London (2006) She received her first Grammy for the album Timeless (1986), and the following year received another, for Diane Schuur & the Count Basie Orchestra (1987).
Schuur proved her staying power through the 1990s and into the 2000s, first with her 1991 follow up to Talkin' 'Bout You, Pure Schuur, and then with nearly an album a year from then on, including In Tribute (1992]), Love Songs (1993), Heart to Heart (1994), Love Walked In (1995), Blues for Schuur (1997), Music Is My Life (1999), Friends for Schuur (2000), and Swingin' for Schuur (2001). Late in 2003, Schuur released Midnight, featuring original songs written for the album by Barry Manilow
Barry Manilow
Barry Manilow is an American singer-songwriter, musician, arranger, producer, conductor, and performer, best known for such recordings as "Could It Be Magic", "Mandy", "Can't Smile Without You", and "Copacabana ."...
. Manilow also performs alongside Schuur on the album, along with Alan Broadbent
Alan Broadbent
Alan Broadbent, MNZM , is a jazz pianist, arranger and composer best known for his work with artists such as Woody Herman, Diane Schuur, Chet Baker, Irene Kral, Sheila Jordan, Charlie Haden, Warne Marsh, Bud Shank, and many others.Broadbent studied piano and music theory in his own country, but in...
on piano, Chuck Berghofer on bass, and the drummers Harvey Mason
Harvey Mason
Harvey William Mason is an American jazz drummer. He has worked with many jazz and fusion artists such as Bob James, The Brecker Brothers, Lee Ritenour, Herbie Hancock's Headhunters and almost all the Mizell Brothers productions with Donald Byrd, Johnny Hammond, Bobbi Humphrey and Gary Bartz...
and Peter Erskine
Peter Erskine
Peter Erskine is an American jazz drummer and composer. He has enjoyed a long and successful career as a session drummer, recording and touring with many famous jazz and rock artists, including Steely Dan and Weather Report...
.
Her second live album, Diane Schuur: Live In London, was released in June 2006. It is her first release on the GR2 Classics label, the 20th album of her career and was recorded at Ronnie Scott
Ronnie Scott
Ronnie Scott was an English jazz tenor saxophonist and jazz club owner.-Life and career:Ronnie Scott was born in Aldgate, east London, into a family of Russian Jewish descent on his father's side, and Portuguese antecedents on his mother's. Scott began playing in small jazz clubs at the age of...
's in Soho, London.
In 2008 she released a new studio collection entitled Some Other Time.
Selective discography
| Year | Title | Genre | Label | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011 | The Gathering | Jazz | Vanguard Records | |
| 2008 | Some Other Time | Jazz | Concord | |
| 2006 | Diane Schuur: Live in London Diane Schuur: Live in London Diane Schuur: Live in London is a 2006 live album by Diane Schuur. -Track listing:# "Deedles' Blues" – 5:09# "I'll Close My Eyes" – 4:37# "Close Enough for Love" – 4:17... |
Jazz | GR2 Classics | |
| 2005 | Schuur Fire Schuur Fire Schuur Fire is a 2005 album by Diane Schuur, accompanied by the Caribbean Jazz Project.-Track listing:# "Lover Come Back to Me" – 4:50# "Don't Let Me Be Lonely Tonight" – 4:05... |
Jazz | Concord | |
| 2003 | Midnight Midnight (Diane Schuur album) Midnight is a 2003 album by Diane Schuur, of songs written by Barry Manilow .- Track listing :# "Meet Me, Midnight" – 2:58# "When October Goes" – 4:49# "Stay Away from Bill" – 3:49... |
Jazz, Pop | Concord | |
| 2001 | Swingin' for Schuur Swingin' for Schuur Swingin' for Schuur is a 2001 album by Diane Schuur and Maynard Ferguson, accompanied by his Big Bop Nouveau big band .-Track listing:# "Just One of Those Things" – 4:09# "Bésame Mucho" – 5:20... with Maynard Ferguson Maynard Ferguson Maynard Ferguson was a Canadian jazz musician and bandleader. He came to prominence playing in Stan Kenton's orchestra, before forming his own band in 1957... |
Jazz | Concord | |
| 2000 | Friends for Schuur Friends for Schuur Friends for Schuur is a 2000 album by Diane Schuur, featuring duets with Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder. It was Schuur's debut album for Concord Records... |
Jazz | Concord | |
| 1999 | Music Is My Life | Jazz | Atlantic / Wea | |
| 1997 | The Best of Diane Schuur | Jazz | GRP | |
| 1997 | Blues for Schuur | Blues, Jazz | GRP | |
| 1996 | Love Walked In | Jazz | GRP | |
| 1994 | Heart to Heart w/B. B. King | Jazz | GRP | |
| 1993 | Love Songs | Jazz | GRP | |
| 1992 | In Tribute | Jazz | GRP | |
| 1991 | Pure Schuur | Jazz | GRP | |
| 1989 | Diane Schuur Collection | Jazz | GRP | |
| 1988 | A GRP Christmas Collection | Gospel | GRP | |
| 1988 | Talkin' 'bout You'' | Jazz | GRP | |
| 1987 | Diane Schuur & the Count Basie Orchestra Diane Schuur & the Count Basie Orchestra Diane Schuur & the Count Basie Orchestra is a 1987 live album by Diane Schuur, accompanied by the Count Basie Orchestra, arranged by Frank Foster.... |
Jazz | GRP | |
| 1986 | Timeless Timeless (Diane Schuur album) Timeless is a 1986 album by Diane Schuur, accompanied by a big band, arranged by Billy May, Johnny Mandel, Patrick Williams and Jeremy Lubbock .... |
Jazz | GRP | |
| 1985 | Schuur Thing | Jazz | GRP | |
| 1984 | Deedles | Jazz | Digital Master |
Grammy history
- Career Nominations: 5
- Career Wins: 2
| Diane Schuur Grammy Awards History | |||||
| Year | Category | Title | Genre | Label | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1993 | Traditional Pop Performance | Love Songs | Pop | GRP | Nominee |
| 1991 | Traditional Pop Performance | Pure Schuur | Pop | GRP | Nominee |
| 1989 | Best Jazz Vocal Performance - Female | The Christmas Song | Jazz | GRP | Nominee |
| 1987 | Best Jazz Vocal Performance - Female | Diane Schuur and the Count Basie Orchestra | Jazz | GRP | Winner |
| 1986 | Best Jazz Vocal Performance - Female | Timeless | Jazz | GRP | Winner |