Dakota Staton

Dakota Staton (* June 3, 1930 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, † April 10, 2007 in New York City ) was an American jazz singer who had her biggest success in the 1950s and 1960s. She joined temporarily to as Aliyah Rabia.

Life and work

Staton came as a child with song and dance numbers with her sisters, attended George Westinghouse High School in Pittsburgh and studied music at the " Filion School of Music " in her hometown, where she was a member of the swing band " Kadets ". In 1946, she appeared on the show " Fantastic Rhythm" and played regularly since 1948 the Jazz Club " Hill District " with the " Joe Wespray Orchestra". In the 1950s, she toured nightclubs in the Midwest (Detroit, Indianapolis, Cleveland, St. Louis), with a longer exposure to Detroit's "Flame Show Bar ".

When she sang in Harlem night Club " Baby Grand ," she heard the producer Dave Cavanaugh of Capitol Records, where she held various singles released ( debut single, 1954 " What Do you know about Love ?"), Her 1955 " Most Promising New Comer Award "from Downbeat magazine brought in. However, it was not only jazz singer ( as successor to Dinah Washington), but sang rhythm and blues around with Big Joe Turner and Fats Domino. In 1958 she married the Muslim ( from Antigua and Barbuda derived ) trumpeter Talib Ahmad Dawud and converted to Islam (at times she appeared as Aliyah Rabia on ) and was like her husband active member of the "Muslim Brotherhood", the 1959 exclusive agency claims of Black Muslim and nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammad fought. This dispute became public in the newspapers and then hurt her career at the American audience.

The late 1950s and early 1960s, she released several successful albums, including "The Late Late Show" 1957 ( No.4 in the charts ), whose title song became her biggest hit, " In the Night " 1957 ( with George Shearing ) "Dynamic " 1958 ( arranged by Sid Feller ) and " Dakota at Storyville " 1961 live from the Boston jazz club " Storyville ". In 1963 she went to United Artists ( "From Dakota with Love", "Live and Swinging ", " Dakota with Strings ").

In 1965 she moved to England ( '67 Dakota album, recorded in London on London Records ), singing on cruise ships and in hotels while their reputation faded in the USA. In the early 1970s she returned to her home country (Album I've Been There on Verve Records, 1971) and appeared as a singer until the 1990s on, among other things, with Paula Hampton and organized by Cobi Narita Annual Women 's Jazz Festival in Damrosch Park at Lincoln Center. She has published on at irregular intervals, most recently in 1999, " A Packet of Love Letters".

Swell

• Linda Dahl: Stormy Weather. The Music and Lives of a Century of Jazz Women. London: Quartet Books. 1984, ISBN 0-7043-2477-6, p 155
• Leslie Gourse: Madame Jazz. Contemporary Women Instrumentalists. New York: Oxford University Press. 1995, ISBN 0-19-508696-1. , P 63