Jo Ann Kelly

Jo Ann Kelly (5 January 1944 — 21 October 1990) was a English blues singer and guitarist.

Life and career

Kelly was born in Streatham, South London, and with her brother, Dave Kelly, and became blues fans in their teens.

Few women were singing or playing the blues during the '60s, let alone with her skill or understanding of early blues styles.Jo Ann had a voice far bigger than her slight frame would suggest; with a rich, deep, tonal quality that could easily have come from Dinah Washington or Sister Rosetta Tharpe. After establishing a musical partnership with the British blues musician Tony McPhee, Kelly appeared on two McPhee compiled albums for Liberty Records, 'Me And The Devil' (1968) and 'I Asked for Water, She Gave Me Gasoline' (1969).At the end of the '60s, with an album on a major record label in the United States, it seemed that she might be spirited away there and moulded into another Janis Joplin. Both Johnny Winter and the seminal LA blues band Canned Heat tried to recruit Kelly into their ranks, but her allegiance was to England and the nightclub club scene, although, the '70s and '80s would fail to support her financially and so she took to the European circuit, latterly with the guitarist Pete Emery or in bands.

Indeed, in the early '80s, she was a member of the Terry Smith Blues Band.

In 1988, Kelly began to suffer from headaches. [http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=11:f9frxqu5ldse~T1 All Music Guide - accessed January 2008] ] . In 1989 she had an operation to remove a malignant brain tumour. [ [http://www.martin-kingsbury.co.uk/articles/jo-ann%20kelly.htm Fansite biography - accessed January 2008] ] She died in October 1990, at the age of 46.

The latest Kelly compilation album, "Blues and Gospel", is available on Blues Matters! Records.

Citations

*"It was hard to do "Walking Blues" for instance, but I was not born with a voice like Mavis Staples or "Jo Ann Kelly"." (Bonnie Raitt)
*"Unquestionably the queen of British country blues singers" (Paul Jones of The Blues Band)
*"To many American performers", an obituarist wrote, "Jo Ann Kelly was the only British singer to earn their respect for her development of what they would be justified in thinking as 'their' genre".cite book
first= Tony
last= Russell
year= 1997
title= The Blues: From Robert Johnson to Robert Cray
edition=
publisher= Carlton Books Limited
location= Dubai
pages= p. 130
id= ISBN 1-85868-255-X]

ee also

*List of British blues musicians
*British blues
*John Peel

References

External links

* [http://www.wirz.de/music/kellydsc.htm Illustrated Jo Ann Kelly discography]
* [http://bluesmatters.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=76 Blues Matters! catalogue]
*