Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Cynthia Scott was born July 20th in El Dorado, Arkansas, the tenth of twelve children. She started singing at the age of four, and was exposed to a wide variety of music. She grew up soaking in a myriad of influences such as Carmen McRae, Robert Flack, Aretha Franklin, Billie Holiday, Sarah Vaughan and Ella Fitzgerald.
After high school Scott moved to Dallas, Texas and while working as an airline stewardess honed her craft with James Clay, Claude Johnson, Roger Boykin, Onzy Matthews and Red Garland. In 1972 she became a Raelette, backing Ray Charles for two years. During this time they toured Europe with Oscar Peterson, Joe Pass, The Count Basie Orchestra and Joe Williams.
Following Charles’ death she would work with Hank Crawford, Marcus Belgrave, and David “Fathead” Newman. By the late 80s she was in New York’s Chelsea Place hiring a young Harry Connick Jr., turning a four-week engagement into three years. She has since headlined at such jazz spots as Birdland, Iridium, Dizzy’s Club Coca Cola and the Super Club.
Cynthia has worked with Lionel Hampton, Cab Calloway, Kevin Mahogany, The Harper Brothers, Bill Charlap, Julius LaRosa, Norman Simmons and Wynton Marsalis, the later bringing her in to be the first vocal to sing in Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Rose Room to test its acoustics.
Scott’s list of accomplishments are too long to enumerate but on the short list she has performed at festival worldwide, toured with the musical “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil”, was a finalist in the 1998 Thelonious Monk Vocal Competition, and the 2005 International Songwriting Competition, is a vocal teacher at The New School and City College and teaches private students and among other things has been a Jazz Ambassador for U.S. State Department. Vocalist and educator Cynthia Scott continues to perform, tour and record.
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