Patti Austin

Patti Austin
Singer Patti Austin on the evening of her appearance at the Ram's Head in Annapolis, Maryland where she sang an "all Gershwin" show on October 29, 2007.
Background information
Born	August 10 1950(1950-08-10)
Origin	Harlem, New York
Genre(s)	R&B, Pop, Jazz
Occupation(s)	Singer, Songwriter
Years active	1953-Present
Label(s)	RCA (1953) CTI (1976-1980) Qwest / Warner Bros. (1981-1989) GRP (1990-1995) Concord Vista (1997-1998) Intersound / Compendia (1998-1999) Warner Bros. (2000-2001) Playboy Jazz / Concord (2002) Rendezvous (2007-Present)

Patti Austin (born August 10 1950^[1], in Harlem, New York), to Edna and Gordon Austin, is an R&B and jazz music singer.

Career

She made her debut at the Apollo Theater at age four and had a contract with RCA Records when she was only five. Quincy Jones and Dinah Washington have proclaimed themselves as her godparents. By the late 1960s Austin was a prolific session musician and commercial jingle singer. By the 1980s she was signed to Jones's Qwest Records and she began having hits. She charted twenty R&B songs between 1969 and 1991 and had success on the Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart, where she hit number one in 1981 with Do You Love Me? / The Genie. The album containing that hit, Every Home Should Have One, also produced her biggest mainstream hit. Baby, Come To Me, a duet with James Ingram, peaked at number 73 on the Hot 100 in early 1982. After being featured as the love theme in a prominent storyline on the soap opera General Hospital, the song re-entered the pop chart in October and went to number one in February 1983. She would later team up again with Ingram for How Do You Keep The Music Playing. She sang the duet It's the Falling in Love with Michael Jackson on his album Off The Wall. Other duet partners include George Benson (Moody's Mood for Love and Keep Your Dreams Alive), and Luther Vandross (I'm Gonna Miss You In The Morning). In 1991, she recorded the duet You Who Brought Me Love with music legend Johnny Mathis which was received with critical acclaim. That same year she was invited to be a guest on a Johnny Mathis television special that was broadcast across North America. Austin continued to have minor chart hits through the remainder of the 1980s, although no other singles reached the Hot 100 Top 40. She tours year round performing and she still releases new music. In 2006, she led a new group of Raelettes for the album Ray Charles + Count Basie Orchestra = Genius². That group also featured veteran session singer Valerie Pinkston and members of the group Perry. In 2007 during an interview promoting her latest recording Austin reflected how as a teenager she reluctantly attended one of Judy Garland's last concerts and the experience helped focus her career stating: "She (Judy Garland) ripped my heart out. I wanted to interpret a lyric like that, to present who I was at the moment through the lyric."[1]

Discography

Albums

• 1976: End Of A Rainbow
• 1977: Havana Candy
• 1979: Live At The Bottom Line (re-released in 1991 with the original live vocals instead of studio overdubs)
• 1980: Body Language
• 1981: Every Home Should Have One
• 1983: In My Life
• 1984: Patti Austin
• 1985: Gettin' Away With Murder
• 1988: The Real Me
• 1990: Love Is Gonna Getcha
• 1991: Carry On
• 1992: Live
• 1994: That Secret Place
• 1996: Jukebox Dreams (Japan only, tracks mostly identical with In & Out Of Love)
• 1998: In & Out Of Love
• 1998: Street Of Dreams (South Korea and Japan, released in the US in 1999)
• 2001: On The Way To Love
• 2002: For Ella (also Japanese issue with bonus track)
• 2007: Avant Gershwin

Compilations

• 1994: The Best Of Patti Austin (compilation of tracks for the CTI label 1977-79)
• 1995: The Ultimate Collection
• 1999: The Best of Patti Austin (Japan only compilation of tracks for Warner Music)
• 1999: Take Away The Pain Stain (French collection of tracks for Coral, 1965-67)
• 2000: The CTI Collection
• 2001: The Very Best Of Patti Austin (collection of singles, mostly Qwest/Warner)
• 2002: Collection
• 2003: Baby Come To Me And Other Hits
• 2007: Intimate Patti Austin

Singles

Notes

1. ^ Some sources still list Ms. Austin's birth year as 1948. She gave this date in the early years of her career, in order to avoid child work regulations. "I lied about my age and I kicked it up two years because in those days it was a problem to work at that age. [...] I think women are very foolish when they say they're younger than they are anyway." Quoted in: Roberts, Michael (2007), "Bless The Godchild", Jazziz Magazine (Boca Raton, FL) (no. 4): 32–37

External links

• Patti Austin Official Website
• Patti Austin Interview Jazz Monthly
• Patti Austin AllAboutJazz.com Interview
• Patti Austin Examiner.com Interview
• Patti Austin Power To End Stroke Campaign Interview

See also

• List of number-one hits (United States)
• List of artists who reached number one on the Hot 100 (U.S.)
• List of Number 1 Dance Hits (United States)
• List of artists who reached number one on the U.S. Dance chart