Shirley Horn

Shirley Horn remembered playing her grandmother's piano when she was four years old. Uninterested in playing with the neighborhood children, Horn enjoyed nothing more than to play that piano, and would close herself off in her grandmother's parlor, which was kept for guests and was chillier than the rest of the house. After several years of this, her mother, who admired classical music, enrolled the girl in piano lessons. Shirley was surrounded by music in her family, and admitted that the majority of the songs in her repertoire are those she heard while she was growing up, in Washington D.C. She played with a choir, at Sunday school, and won a talent contest and 13-week radio engagement at age 13. Horn studied piano and composition at Howard University Junior School of Music, in Washington, from age 12 to age 18. Though she focused on the piano works of great Western classical composers, it was jazz that eventually captured Horn's fancy. At age 17, Horn began playing in a local restaurant and nightclub. The pianist was forced into singing. "I was very shy and it was hard for me to sing," Horn said. Realizing she could earn more money as a vocalist, she continued to play piano and to develop her singing and playing skills, and formed her own trio in 1954.

Her marriage at age 21 slowed down her musical career, and Horn performed live only around the Washington, and Baltimore, Maryland areas. She released her first recording, “Embers and Ashes,” on the small Stereo-Craft record label in 1961. The album went mostly unnoticed, but caught the attention of legendary jazz trumpeter Miles Davis, who tracked Horn down and invited her to New York to open for him at the Village Vanguard. Horn and Davis, were drawn together by their very similar approach to music. Both artists are recognized for their use of space, long silences between notes, to create a certain tension, particularly when doing ballads. The style creates a kind of suspense. Though the two diverged musically throughout the 1960s, Davis remained a close friend and mentor of Horn's until his death in 1991.

Horn recorded “Shirley Horn with Horns,” and “Loads of Love,” in 1963 with producer Quincy Jones for Mercury. They wanted Horn to focus on her vocal skills, and had been signed as a vocalist, so a studio musician played piano on the recordings. The arrangement was not right for Horn, who would have preferred to play the music herself.

After her Mercury contract expired in the early 1960s, Horn went into semi-retirement and retreated back to Washington, DC, to raise her daughter. She continued to play live shows locally with her own trio. Though she recorded a few albums during this time, including “Travelin' Light,”(’65) “A Lazy Afternoon,” (’78) “Violets for Your Furs,” (’81) “At Northsea,” (’81) “All Night Long,” (’81) and “Garden of the Blues,” (’84) Horn remained out of the spotlight for the better part of 25 years.

Horn experienced a tremendous surge in her career in the 1980s. The Verve record label signed Horn and her trio to a recording contract in 1986. Horn's comeback with Verve was a live album, “I Thought About You,” recorded at the Vine St. Bar and Grill in Hollywood and released in 1987. The second phase of Horn's career proved to be her most glorious. “Close Enough for Love,” Horn's studio debut for Verve, was released in 1988 and officially marked Horn's return to the jazz limelight. Extensive touring in the United States and abroad at prestigious jazz venues consolidated her growing popularity, and Horn's Paris and Carnegie Hall debuts, both in 1991, were proof that Horn was back and better than ever.

Shirley Horn and Miles Davis appeared together again on her 1990 Verve release, “You Won't Forget Me.” Davis played trumpet alongside guests Wynton and Branford Marsalis.

In 1992, she worked with composer-arranger Johnny Mandel on the album "Here's to Life," which spent 16 weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard jazz chart. Mandel won a Best Arrangement Grammy award for his work on the recording. Two of her other albums, "I Love You, Paris" (1992) and "Light Out of Darkness (A Tribute to Ray Charles)" (1993), also reached No. 1.

In 1995 Horn was getting back to the old days of jazz to record an upcoming album, “The Main Ingredient.” Rather than record at a studio, Horn convinced Verve to let her do the work in her own home, in the spirit of the old jazz sessions, where musicians would drop by for informal jazz sessions and dinner parties that lasted through the night.

Horn was able to salute her friend and mentor, Miles Davis, on 1998's “I Remember Miles.” Horn took on Davis's renditions of "My Funny Valentine," "Summertime," "I've Got Plenty o' Nuttin'," "My Man's Gone Now," "Basin Street Blues," and "Blue In Green." The mood Horn created on the record was so complete, so true to Davis, that the album won a Grammy award for Best Jazz Vocal Performance in 1998.

In addition to her Grammy and seven additional Grammy nominations, Horn received many honors and accolades throughout her career. She was awarded the Mayor's Arts Award for Excellence in an Artistic Discipline in Washington, D.C., in 1987, the Academie Du Jazz's Billie Holiday Award France in 1990, and the Edison Populair HR57 Award for “Here's to Life,” in 1993. She was elected to the Lionel Hampton Hall of Fame in 1996 and was honored by ASCAP in 1998. She received five Wammys, the Washington area's music industry award, and was been voted Number One female vocalist in the New York Jazz Critics Awards and Number One jazz vocalist in Down Beat magazine's Critics' Poll. In 1999 she received the Phineas Newborn, Jr. Award for her lifelong contributions to jazz, similar tributes followed in the coming years, culminating in a 2004 tribute at the Kennedy Center and being honored in 2005 with the nation's top jazz award: National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master.

One year into the new millennium, at the age of 67, Horn released “You're My Thrill.” A decade after they first worked together, Mandel rejoined Horn as arranger, and Charles Ables and Steve Williams completed Horn's standard trio. After 29 years with Ables and 21 with Williams, Horn treasured her relationship with the two. "It takes time," she told Down Beat, "to find the right musicians. Sometimes we are so close when we play that we are moving as one. That kind of unity is so rare. It's magic."

Fittingly her last album is titled “May the Music Never End,” was released in 2003 on Verve, the label with which she was associated with since 1986. Shirley Horn died in 2005 at age 71. She created a unique penetrating style of playing and singing, with an ability to connect with her audience at the most heartfelt level.
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by Mary Foster Conklin
May 13, 2024

This broadcast includes new releases from Jazz At The Ballroom, Alliance, Judith Owen and Kari van der Kloot plus Noah Preminger & Rob Garcia explore the music of Hildegard von Bingen, a 12th Century abbess and mystic, with birthday shoutouts to Shirley Horn, Connie Crothers, Andrea Brachfeld, Rebecca Martin, Tawanda and Liz Terrell, among others. Thanks for listening and please support the artists you hear by seeing them live and online. Purchase their music so they can continue to distract, ...

Radio & Podcasts

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by Mary Foster Conklin
May 15, 2023

This broadcast includes new releases from Artemis, Luiz Millan, Musique Noire, Grace McNally, Mike Melito, Rickie Lee Jones, with a second single from Nicky Schrire, plus birthday shoutouts to Andrea Brachfeld, Gunhild Carling, Lincoln Briney, Carla Bley, Connie Crothers, KJ Denhert, Tania Maria and Shirley Horn, among others. Thanks for listening and please support the artists you hear by seeing them live and online. Purchase their music so they can continue to distract, comfort, provoke and inspire.Playlist Andrea ...

Radio & Podcasts

Celebrating Jazz Foremothers Ma Rainey, Ella Fitzgerald, Blossom Dearie and Shirley Horn

by Mary Foster Conklin
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This broadcast celebrates the first of May with new releases from the San Gabriel 7 featuring Sinne Eeg, Rebecca Martin, Sven Anderson and Jackie Messina, with birthday shoutouts to Duke Ellington, Ma Rainey, Ella Fitzgerald, Blossom Dearie and Shirley Horn, among others. Thanks for listening and please support the artists you hear by purchasing their music during this time of pandemic so they can continue to distract, provoke, comfort and inspire.Playlist The DIVA Jazz Orchestra “Pure Imagination" from ...

Radio & Podcasts

Birthday Celebrations for Shirley Horn and Judy Collins

by Mary Foster Conklin
June 10, 2019

This broadcast celebrates songs about birds in the second hour plus birthday songbirds Judy Collins (who just turned 80) and the legendary Shirley Horn. New releases included vocalists Kalya Ramu, Holly Cole, Laurie Antonioli, Charles Ruggiero & Hilary Gardner, bassist Anne Mette Iversen, pianists Amina Figarova and Eric Reed, with more birthday shout outs to Bing Crosby, Connie Crothers, and Willie Nelson, among others. Playlist Ariel Pocock “Gonzalos Melody" from Living in Twilight (Justin Time ) 00:00 Kalya ...

Album Review

Shirley Horn: With Friends

Read "With Friends" reviewed by Maurizio Zerbo

by Maurizio Zerbo
April 26, 2019

I dischi di Shirley Horn per la Verve hanno segnato per la cantante-pianista statunitense una seconda vita artistica, foriera di più ampi riconoscimenti. Questo doppio CD antologico enuclea alcuni degli episodi più rilevanti, dove lasciano il segno anche preziosi cammeo di Miles Davis, Joe Henderson, Toots Thielemans e Wynton Marsalis. In primo piano l'eterea sensualità del suo canto sussurrato, che dalle predilette formule in trio si apre soavemente ai timbri orchestrali di Johnny Mandell. Ne discende un percorso di grande ...

Album Review

Shirley Horn: Shirley Horn Live at the 4 Queens

Read "Shirley Horn Live at the 4 Queens" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
September 5, 2016

“Horn did ballads and cool, understated ruminations better than anyone except her first champion, mentor and lifelong friend, trumpeter Miles Davis. Both were masters of silence and anticipation, but even Davis teased Horn about her pacing. 'You do 'em awful slow!' he once said.'" Richard Harrington, Washington Post. The incandescence that was Shirley Horn, and her central importance to jazz vocals, cannot be overstated. She was a master, like Miles Davis and Ahmad Jamal, at retaining ...

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Album Review

Shirley Horn Trio: Live At the 1994 Monterey Jazz Festival

Read "Live At the 1994 Monterey Jazz Festival" reviewed by Joel Roberts

by Joel Roberts
October 10, 2008

No jazz singer ever sang as softly and slowly and with such subtle command as Shirley Horn. Her voice often just above a whisper, she forced audiences to hush up and pay attention as she delivered lyrics without flash or pretense, but with a knowing sense of life lived and dues paid.

Three years to the month of her passing in 2005, it’s a gift for Horn’s devotees to have a chance to hear this collection ...

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Shirley Horn

Source: Michael Ricci
May 1, 2023

All About Jazz is celebrating Shirley Horn's birthday today!

TV / Film

Doc: Shirley Horn Sings & Plays 'Here's to Life'

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
October 19, 2022

Vocalist Shirley Horn's 1992 album Here's to Life (Verve) is a jazz masterpiece. The album has long been considered Horn's most emotionally penetrating album and Johnny Mandel's greatest triumph as a string arranger and orchestra conductor. He won the Grammy for Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocal(s) for the album. Unfortunately, Horn lost in the Best Jazz Vocal Performance category that year to Bobby McFerrin for his vocal of 'Round Midnight on his Play album with Chick Corea. Many fans of ...
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Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Shirley Horn

Source: Michael Ricci
May 1, 2022

All About Jazz is celebrating Shirley Horn's birthday today!

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Shirley Horn

Source: Michael Ricci
May 1, 2021

All About Jazz is celebrating Shirley Horn's birthday today!

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Shirley Horn

Source: Michael Ricci
May 1, 2020

All About Jazz is celebrating Shirley Horn's birthday today!

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Shirley Horn

Source: Michael Ricci
May 1, 2019

All About Jazz is celebrating Shirley Horn's birthday today!

Shirley Horn remembered playing her grandmother\'s piano when she was four years old. Uninterested in playing with the neighborhood children, Horn enjoyed nothing more than to play that piano, and would close herself off in her grandmother\'s parlor, which was kept for guests and was chillier than the rest of the house. After several years of this, her mother, who admired classical music, enrolled the girl in piano lessons... Read more. ...
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Video / DVD

Shirley Horn: Bern, 1990

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
January 1, 2019

Happy New Year to all of my JazzWax readers around the globe and to my Facebook friends and 10.7K Twitter followers! As a New Year's Day treat, I'm sharing a link that pianist Leslie Pintchik sent along featuring the splendor that was Shirley Horn. In the video, she sings and plays at the International Jazz Festival in Bern, Switzerland, in 1990, backed by bassist Charles Ables and drummer Steve Williams. Part 1 leads into the next five parts. So just ...
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Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Shirley Horn

Source: Michael Ricci
May 1, 2018

All About Jazz is celebrating Shirley Horn's birthday today!

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Shirley Horn

Source: Michael Ricci
May 1, 2017

All About Jazz is celebrating Shirley Horn's birthday today!

Recording

Shirley Horn at the 4 Queens

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers
October 6, 2016

If you were a female jazz vocalist who began your recording career in 1959 or later, you were almost certainly in trouble. Not only were you entering real estate already crowded with band veterans such as Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, Dinah Washington, Peggy Lee, June Christy, Carmen McRae, Julie London and Joe Stafford but you also were going up against pop titans including Patti Page, Dinah Shore, Eydie Gormé, Rosemary Clooney and so many others. To complicate matters, the market ...
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