Jazz singer and pianist Shirley Horn was one of the leading jazz musicians of her generation. With her distinctive voice and the slow pace of her music, Horn had a long and storied career which touched both national and international audiences.
“The High Priestess of Soul,” Nina Simone was a singer, pianist, songwriter, and civil rights activist. Mostly known as a jazz singer, her music blended gospel, blues, folk, pop, and classical styles. No popular singer was more closely associated with the Civil Rights Movement than Simone.
One of the greatest jazz pianists, composers, and arrangers of all time, Mary Lou Williams was a swing and bebop icon. “The Lady Who Swings the Band” also devoted herself to aiding musicians in need and teaching younger generations about jazz’s rich African American heritage.
Toshiko Akiyoshi changed the face of jazz music over her sixty-year career. As one of few women and Asian musicians in the jazz world, Akiyoshi infused Japanese culture, sounds, and instruments into her music. As a pianist, bandleader, and composer-arranger, Akiyoshi cemented her place as one of the most important jazz musicians of the twentieth century.
Rich and powerful musical language and a strong sense of drama have made Scottish-American composer Thea Musgrave one of the most respected and exciting contemporary composers in the Western world.
Joan Tower is widely regarded as one of the most important American composers living today. During a career spanning more than sixty years, she has made lasting contributions to musical life in the United States as composer, performer, conductor, and educator.
Gubaidulina’s compositional interests have been stimulated by the tactile exploration and improvisation with rare Russian, Caucasian, and Asian folk and ritual instruments collected by the “Astreia” ensemble, of which she was a co-founder, by the rapid absorption and personalization of contemporary Western musical techniques (a characteristic, too, of other Soviet composers of the post-Stalin generation including Edison Denisov and Alfred Schnittke), and by a deep-rooted belief in the mystical properties of music.
Betsy Jolas has won many awards, including those of the Copley Foundation of Chicago, the American Academy of Arts and the Koussevitsky Foundation, becoming a member of the American Institute of Arts and Letters in 1983.
Laurie Anderson’s career spans four decades and her contributions to the histories of performance art, experimental music, contemporary visual art and installation have received wide recognition.
Ono’s performances and instructional paintings of the early 1960s changed forever the relationship between artist and audience.