Patti Austin

Patti Austin (born August 10, 1950) is an American R&B, pop, and jazz singer and songwriter. Austin has collaborated with the likes of James Ingram, Steely Dan and Quincy Jones. She received an honorary doctorate from the Berklee College of Music. Austin has also won one Grammy out of seven nominations. She was raised in Bay Shore, New York on Long Island. Quincy Jones and Dinah Washington referred to themselves as her godparents. Her father was black and her mother's parents were from Barbados and Sweden.

When Austin was four years old, she performed at the Apollo Theater. As a teenager she recorded commercial jingles and worked as a session singer in soul and R&B. She had an R&B hit in 1969 with "Family Tree". The jazz label CTI released her debut album, End of a Rainbow, in 1976. She sang backing vocals on the track "Everybody has a Dream" for Billy Joel's hit album The Stranger (album) in 1977. She sang "The Closer I Get to You" for Tom Browne's album Browne Sugar, a duet with Michael Jackson for his album Off the Wall, and a duet with George Benson on "Moody's Mood for Love".

In 2003, she collaborated with Frances Yip on Papillon III in the rotunda of San Francisco City Hall to help the Jade Ribbon Campaign of Stanford University. A companion CD/DVD was released with Austin and Yip singing duets in Mandarin.

A performance in 2000 with the Germany-based WDR Big Band For Ella (2002) was a tribute to Ella Fitzgerald.

During a 2007 interview, Austin spoke of reluctantly attending as a teenager one of Judy Garland's last concerts and how the experience helped focus her career. "She ripped my heart out. I wanted to interpret a lyric like that, to present who I was at the moment through the lyric."

In 2011, Sound Advice was released containing cover versions of Bob Dylan's "Gotta Serve Somebody", Brenda Russell's "A Little Bit of Love", the Jackson Five's "Give It Up", Bill Withers' "Lean on Me", and Don McLean's "Vincent". The album also included "The Grace of God", a song Austin wrote after watching an episode of the Oprah Winfrey Show which included a woman with scarred face. Austin appeared in the Oscar-winning documentary film 20 Feet from Stardom, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and was released on June 21, 2013.

In 2015, Austin appeared on Patrick Williams' Home Suite Home large jazz ensemble album, as vocalist for Williams' composition "52nd & Broadway," which won a Grammy for Best Arrangement, Instruments and Vocals.

Awards and honors

Grammy Awards The Grammy Awards are awarded annually by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. Austin has received one award out of seven nominations.

Accolades Honorary doctorate, Berklee College of Music

Discography

End of a Rainbow (1976) Havana Candy (1977) Body Language (1980) Every Home Should Have One (1981) Patti Austin (1984) Gettin' Away with Murder (1985) The Real Me (1988) Love Is Gonna Getcha (1990) Carry On (1991) That Secret Place (1994) In & Out Of Love (1998) Street Of Dreams (1999) On the Way to Love (2001) For Ella (2002) Avant Gershwin (2007) Sound Advice (2011)

Filmography