Stephen Pate, NJN Network, Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada, June 4, 2009 with story from
Koko Taylor Wang Dang Doodle with Little Walter (1967)
Koko Taylor, dubbed the Queen of the Blues, died June 3rd of complications from surgery in a Chicago Hospital. She was 80 years old.
Alligator records has set up a condolence page on her website.
Taylor was a member of the famous Chess Records alumni of post-war Chicago blues artists.
Rolling Stone magazine called said Taylor had “Deep soul, raw vocal power, blustery swagger…the great female blues singer of her generation”
From her website –
“Live, she simply cannot be matched in her power and raw talent. In fact, reviews of her 2006 live performances all rave about how “The Queen” is singing better than at any other time in her long, storied career—a career that includes singing with Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, Willie Dixon, B.B. King, Buddy Guy, Robert Plant and every other imaginable legend. She’s performed in clubs, festivals and concert halls all over the world, played for two presidents, and even lent her voice and her likeness (as an animated bear) to the PBS children’s television program Arthur.”
“Over the course of her almost 50-year career, Taylor has received just about every award the blues world has to offer and then some. She’s received Grammy nominations for seven of her last eight Alligator albums, and she won a Grammy in 1984 for the live multi-artist album Blues Explosion on Atlantic Records. In 2004 she was presented with the coveted National Heritage Fellowship Award from the National Endowment For The Arts. She holds 25 Blues Music Awards (more than any other blues artist, male or female). A major feather in her cap came on March 3, 1993, when Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley honored Taylor with a Legend Of The Year Award, and declared “Koko Taylor Day” throughout Chicago. In 1998, Chicago Magazine named her “Chicagoan Of The Year,” and in 1999, Taylor was inducted into the Blues Foundation’s Hall Of Fame. “There are many kings of the blues,” said The Boston Globe, “but only one queen. Koko’s voice is still capable of pinning a listener to the back wall.”
“It is not easy being a woman succeeding in the male-dominated blues world, but Koko Taylor has done just that. She’s taken her music from the tiny clubs on the South Side of Chicago to giant festivals, and continues to perform all over the world. She’s appeared on national television numerous times and has even been the subject of a PBS documentary. Through good times and personal hardships, Koko Taylor has remained a major force in the blues. “It’s a challenge,” she says. “It’s tough being out here doing what I’m doing in what they call a man’s world. It’s not every woman that can hang in there and do what I am doing.” Without a doubt, Koko Taylor is the preeminent blues woman in the world today. She is—and will remain—the undisputed Queen Of The Blues.”
Her raw power never faded. Last year she appeared at the Kennedy Centre in New York City to honor Morgan Freeman and showed she could deliver still deliver the blues.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUmkbhxfFVQ
That’s the blues.
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