Rita Coolidge Signs Jazz Record Deal

[Captain Bacardi]

Former A&M songstress Rita Coolidge signed a new record deal with Concord Records and will release a jazz album next summer. From Jazz Times:

Rita Coolidge Signs to Concord

Two-time Grammy-award winner Rita Coolidge has signed to independent label Concord Records to release her first new recording in over five years and her first jazz album of her career.

The album, slated for summer 2005, will be produced by Jimmy Haslip of The Yellowjackets and overseen by Concord’s John Burk, who recently worked with Ray Charles on his Genius Loves Company album. The CD will include a repertoire of jazz and pop standards, as well as one of Coolidge’s unreleased tracks, “A Song for You,” a love letter written by Leon Russell to Coolidge.

“I am thrilled that I have finally been given the opportunity to create a jazz CD, a genre that I have loved all my life,” Coolidge said in a press release. The 60-year-old singer has already established a career for herself, with over 15 albums to her name, including Full Moon, which topped the Billboard Country charts in 1973. She also recorded the theme for the 1983 James Bond movie Octopussy, “All Time High.”

Concord Records is one of the largest independent labels in the United States and has released over 1,000 albums over its 31-year history. Its current roster also includes Regina Belle, Peter Cincotti, Barry Manilow and the Rippingtons.



Capt. Bacardi
...not believing that Rita is 60, online...

 

[Mr Bill]

You'd think with Yellowjackets' Jimmy Haslip producing, out intrepid leader would've known about this first!

--Mr Bill

 

[Rudy]

About three months ago, actually... Not a Coolidge fan--she doesn't register on my radar, in other words.

 

[DAN BOLTON]

She does on mine...gorgeous looks, a slightly husky voice...ALL TIME HIGH was one of my favorite make-out songs of all-time, and I never even had to buy a copy of the LP, because all the girls had their own.

And, it's nice to know that A SONG FOR YOU was a love letter fron Leon to Rita...

Dan

 

[Dave]

Hmmmm..."Are we ready for this kind of Jazz...?!" Well, this might be worth picking up... She might even do a new version of "Fever", too...

I thought "Southern Lady" from Anytime...Anywhere had that sort of potential, if you slowed it down; same for "Higher & Higher (Your Love Keeps Lifting Me)". Rita is overdue for making an album with songs worthy of being filed with Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holliday or Sarah Vaughn...or Nina Simone or Little Esther Phillips...!

Thought Rita's last album was a sort of "Blues" album, though hardly anything like Bonnie Raitt would have been doing...or Big Mama Thornton or Sippie Wallace had done...

Yes, Rita looked real good when I saw her in concert back in 2000 and "not her age" was how you could describe her, back then!!


Dave