Female vocalist I like

My friend asked for more women vocalists. I sent him Right Back To It by Waxahatchee, which is my current favorite. Kathryn Crutchfield is the singer.

Unfortunately when I’m meditating, these kinds of questions obsess me as a kind of distraction. 

My first thought was Joni Mitchell, and Brandi Carlile. Those two are giants.

There’s nobody like Ella Fitzgerald, I think she’s the top. I like her work with Duke Ellington best.

Billie Holiday is a favorite. I love it that J. Edgar Hoover sent an agent to get the dirt on her, and he fell in love with her. I love her albums with Lester Young. 

Alison Krauss has such a sweet voice, from bluegrass to pop. Her latest albums have been with the guy who sang for Led Zeppelin. 

Linda Ronstadt constantly amazed me. Blue Bayou is amazing.

Lately I've been listening to Sophie Milman.

Indigo Girls have some solid hits. Galileo, Closer To Fine, Tiny Desk Concert. Tiny Desk Concerts are amazing. Power of Two on Spotify. Romeo and Juliet.

Adele comes to mind in this first group of amazing female vocalists. 

Jane Wickline is a new emerging comedy musician on Saturday Night Live. I am the plus one of someone who has left YouTube.

I listened to Babel Gilberto’s Tanto Tempo a lot for a while (YouTube).

Lastly other artists I’ve been listening to lately:

Laura Marling, Eliane Elias, Susan Tedeschi, Alanis Morissette, KD Lang, Adrianne Lenker, Adele, Fanny, Cranberries, Kate Bush.

Not going to get into opera, that would be a whole other post, but I will get into my past.

Barracuda by Heart was a single I listened to over and over again in 1977 as a kid. I get tingles when I listen to the song now.

There’s an amazing vocal teacher Elizabeth Zharoff (YouTube) who breaks down the vocal aspects of pop songs. “She can pelt really high!” She sees the style as healthy, which is something she thinks about. She can feel the bitterness in the songs. Backstory is that the record label wanted to suggest the sisters were lovers to sell more albums. Great songs often have fairly interesting backstories. “No right no wrong selling a song.” It’s a song about integrity to me. “There’s something about singing with family…” She likes the coordination on articulation. The lyrics are intense. She catches some vibrato. She cuts off the “barracuda” sharply. She examines all the sounds, I feel like after I watch and listen to a video of hers that I’m understanding everything that happens in a song, I can really appreciate in a way that I hadn’t before. She picks up some syncopations I didn’t notice. Really makes me think appreciating this son when I was 10 years old, and that listening to it over and over at a friend’s house was something!

Judy Colins Send in the clowns was a song I liked from my stepfather’s album collection. My friend used to comment on the lone oboe. Perfect melodrama for a young teenager.

I really liked Diana Krall’s Popsicle toes.

Deeper Well by Emmylou Harris. 

Saw a music therapy session where they analyzed Rehab by Amy Winehouse.

Nightstand Drawer by Heather Maloney. 

I love Jess Bush singing I'm Ready in the to me amazing Star Trek musical episode called Subspace Rhapsody, season 2 episode 9 of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. I interpret it as spiritual equanimity, the readiness. 

My daughter loves Paper Rings by Taylor Swift.

While I was nosing around doing this post I discovered (for myself) 

Sister Sadie a bluegrass women’s band. 

I’ve always liked the Chicks version of Landslide.

I have a female painters post, and a female directors post.