NEW YORK — Two-time Grammy Award-winning jazz singer, songwriter and producer Cassandra Wilson died Tuesday in her hometown of Jackson, Mississippi, her manager said. She was 70.
Hinds County Coroner Jeramiah Howard confirmed Wilson’s death Tuesday morning.
Wilson’s manager said the singer died peacefully at home surrounded by family, close friends and her manager.
Wilson gained international recognition for a distinctive contralto voice that blended jazz with blues, folk, pop, R&B, country and other musical styles. Time magazine named her America’s best singer in 2001.
Her career earned four Grammy nominations and two wins for best jazz vocal album. She won in 1997 for “New Moon Daughter” and in 2009 for “Loverly.”
Born and raised in Jackson, Wilson grew up in a musical family. Her father, Herman B. Fowlkes, was a musician, while her mother, Mary Fowlkes, worked as a teacher.
Wilson began piano lessons at age 6 and later played clarinet in marching bands. She performed in coffeehouses and cover bands while studying at Millsaps College and Jackson State University.
She studied under jazz musicians in New Orleans in the early 1980s before moving to New York City, where she joined Steve Coleman’s M-Base Collective and eventually became its lead vocalist.
Wilson released her final album, “Coming Forth by Day,” in 2015 as a tribute to Billie Holiday. That year, she also performed at the Apollo Theater in New York to mark the centennial of Holiday’s birth.
The National Endowment for the Arts named Wilson a Jazz Master in 2022, one of the highest honors for jazz musicians in the United States.
Musicians and public officials paid tribute to Wilson after news of her death.
Singer and musician Jon Batiste praised Wilson’s distinctive sound and Mississippi roots in a tribute Wednesday.
“She had an unmistakable vocal tone, phrasing and her approach of weaving folkloric, R&B and diasporic music together with experimental and popular genres had a major impact on me,” Batiste said.
Jackson Mayor John Horhn said the city lost an extraordinary native daughter and the world lost a singular musical voice.
Wilson’s music reflected her Mississippi heritage throughout a career that expanded the boundaries of jazz and incorporated influences from across American and global musical traditions.
