"With all the talk today about new jazz singers, none comes even close to Carol Sloane. This is what jazz is all about."Nat Hentoff, Boston, May 2004
American singer Carol Sloane was born on March 5, 1957 in Providence, Rhode Island to Claudia and Frank Morvan, the older of two daughters, but she never lived in that city. Instead, she spent her happy childhood in the small town of Smithfield, just a few short miles north of the city. Her parents worked steadily through the years of World War II in the textile mill near their home.
Carol was the lucky member of a large family of cousins, aunts and uncles who all possessed natural singing voices. Only one uncle ever received formal musical education, and he played the tenor sax. In 1951, her Uncle Joe arranged an audition for her with a society dance band led by Ed Drew, and she began singing the stock arrangements of popular hits of the day each Wednesday and Saturday night at Rhodes-on-the-Pawtuxet Ballroom, located in Cranston, Rhode Island. She has been singing professionally since she was 14, although for a time in the 1970s she worked as a legal secretary in Raleigh, North Carolina.
One of her early efforts was working with Les and Larry Elgart's orchestra. Later she filled in for Ross of Lambert, Hendricks & Ross. By 1961, success at the Newport Jazz festival led to albums for Columbia Records. Her career stalled for a time in the 1970s, but resumed by the 1980s. She later signed with Concord Records and had some successes touring in Japan.
Her marriage to Buck Spurr took place in November, 1986, and Carol has lived in the Boston area since that time. She recorded two albums for Contemporary in 1988 and 1989, then signed with Concord Jazz in 1991, recording six solo albums and touring Japan many times as part of the Concord-Fujitsu Festival. Carol stayed busy making her debut with the Boston Pops Orchestra at Symphony Hall, Boston in 1998, then with the New York Pops Orchestra in 1999, and recorded a tribute album to Duke Ellington on the DRG label that same year.
In March 2000, she began a second career in radio, hosting The Jazz Matinee, a four-hour jazz program, five days a week on WICN-FM, the NPR affiliate in Worcester, Mass. This jazz show took a full year's time to produce, until, in the spring of 2001, a heavy performance schedule made it necessary for Carol to leave WICN to resume touring and also record a new CD. In 2001, Carol signed a contract with the famous HighNote Jazz label which issued the first cd titled "I Never Went Away". This has been followed by "Whisper Sweet".
Carol's recording, "Dearest Duke", was released in April of 2007 on the Arbors label. Featuring Brad Hatfield on piano and Ken Peplowski on tenor sax and clarinet, this cd contains 15 tunes of Ellington material plus Billy Strayhorn's "Day Dream".
Recommended CD
Carol's CD, "We'll Meet Again", is available on Arbors Records
Listen to Carol singing "My Foolish Heart"
Reference - Carol's Homepage
No comments:
Post a Comment