Etta James

African American singer Etta James (born 1938), whose career has spanned more than 50 years, has overcome many obstacles to establish herself as a powerful voice whose abilities span styles as diverse as blues, soul, jazz, gospel, rhythm and blues, and rock. She truly defies categorization.

James began her long career as a singer early, singing doo-wop as a teenager in the 1950s. She has endured highs and lows, hampering her own success at times through a reckless existence that included heroin abuse, but she ultimately conquered her addiction, redirected her struggles back into her music, and became an R&B legend. She has enjoyed equal success crooning blues ballads, belting out rhythm and blues and rock and roll, or interpreting jazz. While the ease with which she can navigate these various styles demonstrates her impressive skill, it has also served to confound the music industry as to how to categorize her. In the late 20th century and into the next, James has finally been widely acknowledged as one of the most talented singers of her era.

Sang Gospel at Age Five

James was born Jamesetta Hawkins in Los Angeles, California, on January 25, 1938. Dorothy, her mother, was just fourteen years old when she gave birth to James, and she never overtly named the father. In her 1995 autobiography, Rage to Survive, James expressed her suspicion that her father was pool shark Minnesota Fats. Despite being a mother, Dorothy Hawkins continued to lead a life that included an active nightlife and some run-ins with the law; because of this, James's care was left largely to relatives and friends, including a middle-aged couple by the name of Rogers. James and her foster mother, Lula "Mama Lu" Rogers, became particularly close. By the age of five, James was living with her grandparents in Los Angeles. It was at this time, while singing solos with the St. Paul Baptist Church's Echoes of Eden choir under the direction of musical director James Earle Hines, that she began to get attention for her powerful voice. Soon she began performing gospel on a local radio broadcast.

James visited her mother, whom she addressed using her first name, when Dorothy Hawkins showed up every month or so. In her autobiography James described the weekends when she would go to the boarding house where Hawkins was staying. Watching her mother dress to go out at night while listening to Billie Holiday on the phonograph, the young girl admired her mother's beauty and confidence and thought she was a movie star.

When James was 12, Mama Lu Rogers suffered a series of strokes and died, leaving James to go live with Hawkins on Polk Street in San Francisco. In Rage to Survive, James confessed that San Francisco brought out her wild side, and she became involved with girl gangs. Life with her mother was unpredictable, and she was rebellious, untamable, and wanted to cause a fuss. She also wanted to be a star. James turned to music for refuge, and when she was fourteen she formed the Creolettes with two other girls. They tracked down Johnny Otis, a bandleader and promoter, when he was playing at the Fillmore. On the strength of the Creolettes' audition for him, Otis arranged for the girls to tour. Because of James's age, however, Otis needed parental permission for her to travel. Hawkins was said to be in jail at the time, so James forged her mother's signature.

Had First R&B Hit

Otis renamed the group the Peaches and reversed Jamesetta's name, creating the stage name that has endured to this day. The girls started off earning ten dollars per night for their work with Otis's revue. James first recorded with the Peaches in 1955 on the Modern Records label. The song was her own composition and was called "Roll with Me Henry," a coarse response to a song by Hank Ballard and the Midnighters called "Work with Me Annie." The song was rechristened a less-racy "The Wallflower" and became a top-ten hit on the rhythm and blues charts. It became an even bigger sensation when Georgia Gibbs, a white singer, subsequently recorded it under the title "Dance with Me Henry." Although James collected her share of the royalties for this version, the fact that another singer enjoyed more fame for her song irked her.

In 1955 James had another hit on the Modern label, "Good Rockin' Daddy." It became apparent that her talent overshadowed that of her friends, and she separated from the Peaches. Over the ensuing few years James, who was also known as Miss Peaches, toured the country on bills with stars such as Bo Diddley, Little Richard, Marvin Gaye, zydeco accordionist Clifton Chenier, Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Minnie Riperton, and Chuck Berry. While on the road, she encountered a wide range of responses, from admiration to racism and intimidation. She found herself performing before large, eager crowds, even though her fame had dimmed somewhat since her 1955 hits. One of the highlights of this time was when James shared the stage with Billie Holiday and Count Basie as part of an National Broadcasting Company radio show in New York called Jazz Plus Blues Equals Soul. The performance occurred in the late 1950s, near the end of Holiday's life. In her autobiography James describes Holiday as looking old, tired, and weak, with swollen hands and feet. The encounter stayed with James, who, despite Holiday's physical challenges, saw in the singer a strong and uncompromising survivor - qualities she also saw in her mother Dorothy.

As the 1950s ended, James was often on the road and broke. But her fortunes began to turn after she arrived in Chicago, where she drew the attention of Leonard Chess and signed on with his label, Chess Records. Chess was just starting to earn recognition with artists like Berry and Diddley. In the early 1960s, James began a prolific period and became one of R&B's most successful singers. With producer Jerry Wexler, she recorded jazz tunes and soul ballads and ran up a string of hits for Chess's subsidiary label, Argo, such as "At Last" - which peaked at number two on the R&B chart in 1961 - "My Dearest Darling," "Trust Me," and "All I Could Do Was Cry." In 1962 her "Something's Got a Hold on Me" was the most successful of her three hits that year, charting at number four. She also did some duets with her boyfriend, Harvey Fuqua, lead singer for the Moonglows. James's broad stylistic range was demonstrated in the material she recorded at this time, which included straight blues, romantic ballads, and pop. Blues-rock great Janis Joplin, who was influenced by James, even dropped by one of her recording sessions to observe the veteran blues singer.

Struggled with Drug Addiction

While Chess helped revitalize James's career, the company also exploited her, as it did many other artists. Royalties were withheld and the company was known to seize the publishing rights to artists' original material. James was living at the Sutherland Hotel, an historic and inexpensive hotel, along with other artists who were headed for stardom, including Marvin Gaye, Fuqua, and Curtis Mayfield. In her autobiography she admitted to being unhappy and restless during this time, in part due to a lack of input in the recording process. She complained that Wexler and Allen Toussaint, who produced her record Changes, while extremely talented, were both controlling. She felt there was too much tinkering and direction. Despite favorable critical reviews for the recordings she produced, James felt on edge in the studio.

By the time she was 21, James was addicted to heroin, and she struggled in relationships with abusive and violent men. Her addiction was so disruptive that she stopped recording almost completely between 1964 and 1966, but then pulled herself together enough to record Call My Name, an acclaimed blues album. She also recorded some duets with a childhood friend, Sugar Pie DeSanto, which resulted in the hit song "In the Basement." In 1967 James went to work for Alabama's Fame Studios, where she recorded a classic album that was well received; Tell Mama contains the standout ballad "I'd Rather Go Blind." Despite her hits, however, James was generally unknown outside the black population and a group of white rockers. In addition to Joplin, James influenced Rod Stewart and Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones with her sincere, all-out style.

Although life for James was out of control by the early 1970s, she was able to arrive at live performances and recording sessions when necessary. To support her burgeoning heroin habit, she indulged in petty crime, including writing bad checks and forging prescriptions. She was even known to steal from friends and associates at times. In 1974, facing several years in prison, James finally entered a drug rehabilitation program as a resident at Tarzana Psychiatric Hospital, just outside of Los Angeles, California.

Rebuilt Career, Earned Awards and Honors

Ultimately, James was able to win out over her addiction, and then slowly began to rebuild her career. She busied herself with performances in small venues, often singing at gay clubs during the early 1980s. In her autobiography she credited these jobs giving her the encouragement to keep her going and noted that gay people related to her style. Struggling to pull her career together, James hopped from record label to record label, including Warner Bros., where she worked with Wexler, and T-Electric, where she worked with Toussaint. At Fantasy in 1986 she teamed with tenor sax legend Eddie "Cleanhead" Vinson and recorded two outstanding jazz albums, Blues in the Night and The Late Show. She was also affiliated with the Island and Elektra labels. James then toured with the Rolling Stones and performed at blues and jazz festivals, with the result that white listeners finally began to buy her albums. She sang during the Olympic opening ceremony in 1984, and her debut hit "The Wallflower" became part of the soundtrack to the hugely popular movie Back to the Future. The singer even made some guest appearances on television programs.

James went for seven years without a recording contract, then in 1988 she released Seven-Year Itch with Island. The next year she received the W. C. Handy Award and the Rhythm and Blues Foundation's Pioneer of the Year Award, and in 1990 the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) honored her with two awards: an Image Award and an award for best blues artist for her album Stickin' to My Guns.

James continued recording at a furious pace and by the 1990s was considered an R&B legend. Her vaulted status was confirmed with her 1991 induction into the Bay Area Blues Society Hall of Fame and her 1993 induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In 1994 she began to work with producer John Snyder at Private Music and released the critically acclaimed Mystery Lady: Songs of Billie Holiday, winning a Grammy Award for best jazz vocal in 1995.

During the 1990s James lived on a ranch in Southern California with her husband, Artis Mills, whom she had married in 1969, and her two sons, Donto and Sametto, as well as the family's nine dogs. By mid-decade she entered one of her career's most prolific phases. Mystery Lady followed on the heels of both Etta James Live from San Francisco and her autobiography, which was followed by Time after Time in 1995.

James's star kept rising into the next century. In 2001 she was inducted into the Blues Foundation's Hall of Fame, and on April 18, 2003, James was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Later that same year she won the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, then returned for another Grammy in February 2004 for her self-produced album Let's Roll. Her 2004 recording, Blues to the Bone, is a compilation of her favorite blues classics, such as Muddy Waters's "Got My Mojo Working" and Howlin' Wolf's "Smokestack Lightnin'." James has also benefitted from being able to turn her career into a family affair; she often works with her sons, who back her and produce her recordings.

Books

James, Etta, with David Ritz, Rage to Survive, Villard, 1995.

Online

Babich, John, "Etta James - Matriarch of the Blues," Your Guide to the Blues,http://blues.about.com/cs/halloffame/p/biprotetta.htm (January 8, 2005).

"Etta James," VH1.com,http://www.vh1.com/artists/az/james - etta.bio.jhtml (January 8, 2005).

"The Legendary . . . Miss Etta James," NothinButDaBlues Web site,http://nothinbutdablues.bizland.com/FeaturedArtistMarch01.chtml (March, 2001).

singer

Personal Information

Born Jamesetta Hawkins on January 25, 1938, in Los Angeles, CA; daughter of Dorothy Hawkins; married Artis Mills, 1969; children: Donto, Sametto (both sons).

Career

Singer, 1943-; toured with bandleader Johnny Otis, 1954-55; toured with a variety of performers, including Little Richard, Bo Diddley, Marvin Gaye; recording artist for a variety of companies, including Modern, 1955; Chess, 1960-75; Warner Brothers, 1978; Island, 1988-93; Private, 1994-; RCA, 2004-.

Life's Work

Etta James may have surprised herself by living long enough to become a big star. Her singing career, more than 50 years long, has included more highs and lows than her vocal range. For decades she subverted her own success by maintaining a reckless lifestyle that included serious drug abuse and a number of questionable love-life decisions. At various career stages she has been a rhythm-and-blues belter, a blues crooner, and a rock-and-roll screamer. Although her powerful voice has handled each type of material with equal skill, this style-hopping has made it hard for the music industry to categorize her. In the 1990s, James finally gained widespread recognition as one of the most gifted singers of her time, much to the delight of hardcore fans who have remained loyal since she recorded her first hits as a teenager in the 1950s. By the turn of the century, James had become a legend.

James was born Jamesetta Hawkins on January 25, 1938, in Los Angeles, California. Her mother, Dorothy, was only 14 years old when Jamesetta was born, and she never directly revealed the identity of Jamesetta's father. In her 1995 autobiography, Rage to Survive, James put forth her belief that pool legend Minnesota Fats was her real father. Because Dorothy Hawkins led a somewhat wild, Bohemian lifestyle, Jamesetta was left in the care of a middle-aged couple named Rogers. Jamesetta became especially close to her foster mother, Lula "Mama Lu" Rogers.

Jamesetta's powerful singing voice began to gain attention when she was still a small child. As early as age five, she was singing solos with her church choir, and soon she was even performing gospel music on local radio. As she got older, she began taking an interest in the smooth doo-wop music that was becoming popular on the streets. When Jamesetta was about 12, Mama Lu died after a series of strokes. She was then taken to San Francisco to live with her biological mother, Dorothy Hawkins.

With the unpredictable Dorothy, Jamesetta's home life was very unhappy. Increasingly, she sought refuge in music. She formed a girl singing group called the Creolettes, which quickly attained a sizable local following. When Jamesetta was 14, the Creolettes were discovered by bandleader and promoter Johnny Otis. Otis took the Creolettes to Los Angeles--with the forged permission of the underage Jamesetta's mother--and put them into his revue. He renamed the group the Peaches, and reversed Jamesetta's name, creating what has remained her stage name ever since: Etta James.

In 1955 James made her first recording with the Peaches on the Modern Records label. Originally titled "Roll with Me Henry," the song was an answer to Hank Ballard and the Midnighters' hit "Work with Me Annie." Since "Roll with Me Henry" was considered too racy a title for radio airplay, the song was renamed "The Wallflower." It eventually made it into the top ten on the R&B charts. Although "The Wallflower" was a hit for James, it made an even bigger splash when it was subsequently recorded as "Dance with Me Henry" by white singer Georgia Gibbs. Although she collected a share of the royalties, James was outraged to see another singer get most of the glory for her song.

James had one more big hit on Modern in 1955, "Good Rockin' Daddy." She spent the next few years traveling the country at the bottom end of bills that featured stars like Little Richard, Bo Diddley, and zydeco king Clifton Chenier. Though she was still a minor, James grew up on these tours, meeting celebrities, witnessing their sometimes outrageous lifestyles, and receiving treatment that ranged from adulation to racist intimidation to outright theft. Her star faded somewhat from her initial hits of 1955, but she was still performing in front of large and enthusiastic crowds during this period.

As the 1950s drew to a close, James frequently found herself on the road and penniless. Landing in Chicago, she managed to attract the attention of Leonard Chess of the Chicago-based Chess Records, an emerging company that was making a name for itself with artists like Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley. During the early 1960s, James scored a string of major hits for Chess and its subsidiary labels, making her one of the biggest stars on the R&B scene. In 1960, two James songs made the R&B charts. Four more reached the charts the following year, including the soulful ballad "At Last," which peaked at number two. In 1962, James' "Something's Got a Hold on Me" reached the number four spot, the highest of her three hits that year. She also recorded several duets with Harvey Fuqua of the Moonglows, with whom her relationship was romantic as well as professional. The material that James recorded for Chess exhibited the full range of her stylistic capabilities, from tender love ballads to heavy blues to easy-on-the-ears pop. Although the people at Chess kept her career alive, they also exploited her, as they did many artists, finding ways to withhold royalties and grabbing the publishing rights to musicians' original material. During this time, James lived at the historic--and cheap--Sutherland Hotel along with many other musicians destined for stardom, including Fuqua, Marvin Gaye, and Curtis Mayfield.

Unfortunately, the pressures of constant touring wreaked havoc on her personal life. By the time she was 21 years old, James was addicted to heroin. Her problems with drugs made it all the more difficult for James to sustain her career. She also seemed drawn to violent and abusive men. By the mid-1960s, she had disappeared from the scene again. She rebounded in 1966 to record a widely-acclaimed blues album, Call My Name. She also recorded a series of duets with singer Sugar Pie DeSanto, a childhood friend, and those sessions produced a big hit in "In the Basement." In 1967 James began recording at Fame Studios in Alabama, and this period produced the well-received albums Tell Mama and I'd Rather Go Blind.

Although James remained largely unknown outside of the black community despite her hits, white rockers knew who she was. Many rock stars had become Etta James fans early on, and her no-holds-barred singing style influenced several of them. Janis Joplin and Rolling Stone Keith Richards were among those who were listening to James when she was still toiling on shoestring-budget tours.

By the early 1970s, James' life was very much out of control, although she managed to arrive at the recording studio and at live performances when required. In order to support her growing heroin habit, she found it necessary to become a petty criminal, forging prescriptions and writing bad checks. When things got bad enough, she was not above stealing from friends and acquaintances. In 1973, faced with the prospect of several years in prison, James opted to enter the residential drug rehabilitation program at Tarzana Psychiatric Hospital outside of Los Angeles.

James continued to record during her rehabilitation, producing two more albums in 1974. During the rest of the 1970s and into the early 1980s, she kept busy performing in small clubs and occasionally at big-time blues and jazz festivals, usually bringing down the house. Finally free of her various addictions, James' career suddenly skyrocketed in the mid-1980s. After decades of failing to find a crossover audience, James' albums began to catch on with white listeners. As fans of her early work rose to positions of power in the entertainment industry, James' songs began to find their way into all sorts of unexpected places. She sang at the opening ceremony for the 1984 Olympics, for example. "The Wallflower," her first hit, was used in the soundtrack of the blockbuster movie Back to the Future. James also began making occasional spot appearances on television shows.

In 1988, after seven years without a recording contract, James released Seven Year Itch on Island Records. She continued to record at a frenzied pace, and as the 1990s unfolded James found herself elevated to the status of R&B legend. She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1993. In 1995 James won her first Grammy award, after several nominations, for Mystery Lady, a collection of songs associated with the great Billie Holiday, with whom James had long identified. It is somewhat ironic that James' first Grammy came in the jazz category, after some 40 years spent chasing rhythm-and-blues dreams. Her follow-up album, Time After Time, also consisted mainly of jazz standards.

Having reinvented herself as a jazz singer, James seemed to have finally fulfilled the promise that some in the music industry had always seen in her. Perhaps the same demons that haunted and hindered her career for so long have simultaneously fueled her drive to succeed. As James observed in her 1995 autobiography, Rage to Live, "I've learned to live with rage. In some ways, it's my rage that keeps me going. Without it, I would have been whipped long ago. With it, I got a lot more songs to sing."

James' demons caught up with her over the years, however. She piled on weight until she had difficulty walking. For years she was helped onto stage in a wheelchair for knee problems exacerbated by her weight. But when she fell on a New York City sidewalk and had trouble getting her nearly 400-pound body back up, James knew she needed help. She had gastric bypass surgery in 2002 and dropped approximately 200 pounds. James told Ebony that she credits her doctor for having "saved my life."

More than regaining her mobility, however, James discovered a new voice within herself. She told Ebony that after the surgery she was able to sing "lower, higher, and louder." With her "new" voice James embraced both touring and studio sessions, traveling the country to perform and recording new albums. For her contributions to blues music, James was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2001. In 2003 James was honored with a lifetime achievement Grammy award, her own star on Hollywood's walk of fame, as well as a Grammy for best contemporary blues album the next year for Let's Roll. James became especially inspired by Martin Scorsese's documentary The Blues, produced by PBS, and recorded a selection of traditional blues songs on her 2004 album Blues to the Bone, for which she won a Grammy in 2005. At nearly 70 years old, James--who had long related her love of music and continued to wow audiences with her raucous and enthusiastic concerts--showed no interest retiring any time soon.

Awards

W. C. Handy Award, 1989; NAACP Image Award, 1990; Blues Society Hall of Fame, 1991; Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, 1993; Grammy Award, Best Jazz Vocal, 1995, for Mystery Lady; Blues Hall of Fame, 2001; Lifetime Achievement Award, Grammy, 2003; Grammy Award, Best Contemporary Blues Album, 2004, for Let's Roll; Grammy Award, Best Traditional Blues Album, 2005, for Blues to the Bone.

Works

Selected works

Albums

• At Last, Cadet, 1961.
• Etta James Sings for Lovers, Argo, 1962.
• Etta James, Argo, 1962.
• Etta James Rocks the House, Chess, 1963.
• Top Ten, Cadet, 1963.
• Queen of Soul, Argo, 1964.
• Etta James Sings Funk, Chess, 1965.
• Call My Name, Cadet, 1966.
• Tell Mama, Cadet, 1967.
• Losers Weepers, Cadet, 1970.
• Etta James, Chess, 1973.
• Come a Little Closer, Chess, 1974.
• Peaches, Chess, 1974.
• (With Eddie "Cleanhead" Vinson) Blues in the Night, Fantasy, 1986.
• Seven Year Itch, Island, 1988.
• Stickin' to My Guns, Island, 1990.
• The Right Time, Rounder, 1992.
• How Strong is a Woman, Island, 1993.
• Mystery Lady: The Songs of Billie Holiday, Private, 1994.
• Etta James Live from San Francisco, Private, 1994.
• Time After Time, Private, 1995.
• Love's Been Rough on Me, Private, 1997.
• Life, Love and the Blues, Private, 1998.
• Heart of a Woman, Private, 1999.
• Matriarch of the Blues, Private, 2000.
• Blue Gardenia, Private, 2001.
• Burnin' Down the House, Private, 2002.
• Let's Roll, Private, 2003.
• Blues to the Bone, RCA, 2004.

Further Reading

Books

• James, Etta (with David Ritz), Rage to Survive, Villard, 1995.

Periodicals

• Ebony, September 2003, p. 174.
• Essence, January 2004, p. 158.
• Jet, May 12, 2003, p. 45.
• Living Blues, Autumn/Winter 1982, p. 12.
• Los Angeles Times, August 2, 1995, p. F1.
• Newsweek, November 21, 1994, p. 98.
• Rolling Stone, August 10, 1978, p. 22.

On-line

• Etta James, www.etta-james.com (May 31, 2005).

— Robert R. Jacobson and Sara Pendergast

See Etta James Lyrics

• Born: January 25, 1938, Los Angeles, CA
• Active: '50s, '60s, '70s, '80s, '90s, 2000s
• Genres: Blues
• Instrument: Vocals
• Representative Albums: "Her Best," "At Last!," "Etta James Rocks the House"
• Representative Songs: "At Last," "I'd Rather Go Blind," "Tell Mama"

Biography

Few R&B singers have endured tragic travails on the monumental level that Etta James has and remain on earth to talk about it. The lady's no shrinking violet; her autobiography, Rage to Survive, describes her past (including numerous drug addictions) in sordid detail.

But her personal problems have seldom affected her singing. James has hung in there from the age of R&B and doo wop in the mid-'50s through soul's late-'60s heyday and right up into the '90s and 2000s (where her 1994 disc Mystery Lady paid loving jazz-based tribute to one of her idols, Billie Holiday). Etta James' voice has deepened over the years, coarsened more than a little, but still conveys remarkable passion and pain.

Jamesetta Hawkins was a child gospel prodigy, singing in her Los Angeles Baptist church choir (and over the radio) when she was only five years old under the tutelage of Professor James Earle Hines. She moved to San Francisco in 1950, soon teaming with two other girls to form a singing group. When she was 14, bandleader Johnny Otis gave the trio an audition. He particularly dug their answer song to Hank Ballard & the Midnighters' "Work With Me Annie."

Against her mother's wishes, the young singer embarked for L.A. to record "Roll With Me Henry" with the Otis band and vocalist Richard Berry in 1954 for Modern Records. Otis inverted her first name to devise her stage handle and dubbed her vocal group the Peaches (also Etta's nickname). "Roll With Me Henry," renamed "The Wallflower" when some radio programmers objected to the original title's connotations, topped the R&B charts in 1955.

The Peaches dropped from the tree shortly thereafter, but Etta James kept on singing for Modern throughout much of the decade (often under the supervision of saxist Maxwell Davis). "Good Rockin' Daddy" also did quite well for her later in 1955, but deserving follow-ups such as "W-O-M-A-N" and "Tough Lover" (the latter a torrid rocker cut in New Orleans with Lee Allen on sax) failed to catch on.

James landed at Chicago's Chess Records in 1960, signing with their Argo subsidiary. Immediately, her recording career kicked into high gear; not only did a pair of duets with her then-boyfriend (Moonglows lead singer Harvey Fuqua) chart, her own sides (beginning with the tortured ballad "All I Could Do Was Cry") chased each other up the R&B lists as well. Leonard Chess viewed James as a classy ballad singer with pop crossover potential, backing her with lush violin orchestrations for 1961's luscious "At Last" and "Trust in Me." But James' rougher side wasn't forsaken -- the gospel-charged "Something's Got a Hold on Me" in 1962, a kinetic 1963 live LP (Etta James Rocks the House) cut at Nashville's New Era Club, and a blues-soaked 1966 duet with childhood pal Sugar Pie De Santo, "In the Basement," ensured that.

Although Chess hosted its own killer house band, James traveled to Rick Hall's Fame studios in Muscle Shoals in 1967 and emerged with one of her all-time classics. "Tell Mama" was a searing slice of upbeat Southern soul that contrasted markedly with another standout from the same sessions, the spine-chilling ballad "I'd Rather Go Blind." Despite the death of Leonard Chess, Etta James remained at the label into 1975, experimenting toward the end with a more rock-based approach.

There were some mighty lean years, both personally and professionally, for Miss Peaches. But she got back on track recording-wise in 1988 with a set for Island, Seven Year Itch, that reaffirmed her Southern soul mastery. Her following albums have been a varied lot -- 1990's Sticking to My Guns was contemporary in the extreme; 1992's Jerry Wexler-produced The Right Time, for Elektra, was slickly soulful, and her most other '90s outings have explored jazz directions. In 1998, she also issued a holiday album, Etta James Christmas. She was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2001, and in 2003 received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. That year also saw the release of her Let's Roll album, followed in 2004 by a CD of new blues performances, Blues to the Bone, both on RCA Records. James then shifted gears and released an album of pop standards, All the Way, on RCA in 2006.

In concert, Etta James is a sassy, no-holds-barred performer whose suggestive stage antics sometimes border on the obscene. She's paid her dues many times over as an R&B and soul pioneer; long may she continue to shock the uninitiated. ~ Bill Dahl, All Music Guide

All-Time Greatest Hits Buy this CD	Sweetest Peaches: Pt. 1 Buy this CD	12 Songs of Christmas Buy this CD	12 Songs of Christmas Buy this CD	Live in New York Buy this CD
Live in New York Buy this CD	Burnin' Down the House: Live at the House of Blues Buy this CD	Let's Roll Buy this CD	Playlist: The Very Best of Etta James Buy this CD	18 Greatest Buy this CD

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