Cassandra Wilson, Grammy-Winning Jazz Singer, Dies at 70

Cassandra Wilson, the two-time Grammy Award-winning jazz singer, songwriter, and producer, has died at age 70.

Hinds County Coroner Jeramiah Howard confirmed that she died in her native Jackson, Mississippi, on Tuesday morning.

“It is with profound sadness that we announce the passing of Cassandra Wilson, the Grammy Award-winning and legendary jazz artist. Cassandra Wilson transitioned peacefully at home, surrounded by family, close friends, and her manager,” a statement from her manager to jazz radio station WBGO read.

Named America’s best singer by Time magazine in 2001, Wilson gained recognition for a genre-bending voice that expanded traditional blues-based jazz into folk, pop, R&B, and country. Her work centered on an idiosyncratic contralto sound rooted in the American South, which Jon Batiste described in a Wednesday eulogy as sounding like the region.

From Jackson to the World

Born and raised in Jackson to musician Herman B. Fowlkes and teacher Mary Fowlkes, Wilson listened to Motown, Miles Davis, and Thelonious Monk. She began piano lessons at age 6, played clarinet in marching bands, and performed at coffeehouses and in cover bands while attending Millsaps College and Jackson State University.

During the early 1980s, she studied under jazz musicians in New Orleans before relocating to New York City to join Steve Coleman’s M-Base Collective as its primary vocalist.

Her voice earned four Grammy nominations and two wins for best jazz vocal album, taking home the prize in 1997 for “New Moon Daughter” and in 2009 for “Loverly.”

In 2015, Wilson performed a concert at the Apollo Theater to mark the 100th birthday of blues singer Billie Holiday, who died in New York City at age 44. Wilson released her final album that same year, titled “Coming Forth by Day,” as a tribute to Holiday.

The National Endowment for the Arts named Wilson a Jazz Master in 2022, marking one of the United States honors given to jazz musicians.

Tributes Pour In

“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 stated on Instagram.

“Her Mississippi heritage was always present in everything no matter how expansive her artistry evolved,” he wrote in a caption alongside a video of them performing on Brazilian television in 2009. “She was one of the first people to take me on tour around the world, the great Cassandra Wilson.”

Jackson Mayor John Horhn stated that the city lost an extraordinary native daughter and the world lost a singular musical voice.

“Cassandra Wilson carried the sound, spirit and history of Mississippi with her wherever her music reached,” Horhn said in a statement shared with WJTV. “Her work had rare depth of character and a profound understanding of how music moves people, tells stories and connects generations.”