Cheryl Bentyne | |
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| Background information | |
| Born | January 17, 1954 Mount Vernon, Washington, U.S. |
| Genres | Vocal jazz, pop |
| Occupation(s) | Singer |
| Years active | 1975–present |
| Labels | Columbia, Telarc, King, ArtistShare, Summit |
Cheryl Bentyne (born Cheryl Benthien; [1] [2] January 17, 1954) is a jazz singer who spent much of her career with The Manhattan Transfer.
Bentyne started singing at age 13 with her father's Dixieland and swing band. [2] [3] Following graduation from Mount Vernon High School, [1] she enrolled at Skagit Valley College and studied music and theater. She moved to Seattle in the mid 1970s and sang with John Holte's New Deal Rhythm Band. [4] The NDRB trombonist Gary McKaig gave her an album by the Manhattan Transfer. After four years in Seattle, she moved to Los Angeles. [3]
In 1979, Bentyne became the permanent replacement for singer Laurel Massé, who left the group after being injured in an automobile accident. Her first appearance was on the album Extensions (1979), which won the group its first Grammy Award, Best Jazz Fusion Performance for a vocalese version of the song "Birdland" by Weather Report.
She won ten Grammy Awards with the Manhattan Transfer, including awards for her arrangement of "Another Night in Tunisia" with Bobby McFerrin and for writing the song "Sassy" for the album The Offbeat of Avenues . [5]
Her debut solo album, Something Cool (Columbia, 1992), was produced by trumpeter Mark Isham and consisted of traditional pop and jazz standards. [6] This was followed by Dreaming of Mister Porter (2000), a tribute to Cole Porter; Talk of the Town (2004) with Kenny Barron, David "Fathead" Newman, Chuck Mangione; and Let Me Off Uptown (2005), a tribute to Anita O'Day. While still a member of the Manhattan Transfer, she recorded the album Duets with bassist Rob Wasserman. [7] In 1991, she collaborated with Mark Isham on a song for the soundtrack to the film Mortal Thoughts . [7]
Bentyne left music in 2012 due to illness. Her spleen was removed and she was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma. Margaret Dorn replaced her in the Manhattan Transfer. Within a year, a doctor told her she was free of cancer, and she returned to singing. [8]
In 2013, she narrated an audiobook version of the best-selling book Little Girl Blue, a biography of singer Karen Carpenter. [9] In 2014, she was a judge and mentor for the Songbook Academy, a summer program for high school students operated by the Great American Songbook Foundation founded by Michael Feinstein. [10]
The 28th Annual Grammy Awards were held on February 25, 1986, at Shrine Auditorium, Los Angeles. They recognized accomplishments by musicians from the previous year, 1985. The night's big winner was USA For Africa's "We Are The World", which won four awards, including Song of the Year which went to Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie. It marked the first time in their respective careers that they received the Song of the Year Award. For Richie, it was his sixth attempt in eight years. The other three awards for the latter single were given to the song's producer, Quincy Jones.
The 23rd Annual Grammy Awards were held on February 25, 1981, at Radio City Music Hall in New York City and were broadcast live on American television. They recognized accomplishments by musicians from the year 1980.
Robert Keith McFerrin Jr. is an American jazz singer and songwriter. He is known for his vocal techniques, such as singing fluidly but with quick and considerable jumps in pitch—for example, sustaining a melody while also rapidly alternating with arpeggios and harmonies—as well as scat singing, polyphonic overtone singing, and improvisational vocal percussion. He is widely known for performing and recording regularly as an unaccompanied solo vocal artist. He has frequently collaborated with other artists from both the jazz and classical scenes.
Vocalese is a style of jazz singing in which words are added to an instrumental soloist's improvisation.
The 31st Annual Grammy Awards were held on February 22, 1989, at Shrine Auditorium, Los Angeles. They recognized accomplishments by musicians from the previous year.
The Manhattan Transfer is an American vocal group founded in 1969, performing a cappella, vocalese, swing, standards, Brazilian jazz, rhythm and blues, and pop music. The group has won eleven Grammy Awards.
John Carl Hendricks, known professionally as Jon Hendricks, was an American jazz lyricist and singer. He is one of the originators of vocalese, which adds lyrics to existing instrumental songs and replaces many instruments with vocalists, such as the big-band arrangements of Duke Ellington and Count Basie. He is considered one of the best practitioners of scat singing, which involves vocal jazz soloing. Jazz critic and historian Leonard Feather called him the "Poet Laureate of Jazz", while Time dubbed him the "James Joyce of Jive". Al Jarreau called him "pound-for-pound the best jazz singer on the planet—maybe that's ever been".
John Paul Pizzarelli Jr. is an American jazz guitarist and vocalist. He has recorded over twenty solo albums and has appeared on more than forty albums by other recording artists, including Paul McCartney, James Taylor, Rosemary Clooney; his father, jazz guitarist Bucky Pizzarelli; and his wife, singer Jessica Molaskey.
Tierney Sutton is an American jazz singer.
Ann Hampton Callaway is an American jazz singer, songwriter, and actress. She wrote and sang the theme song for the TV series The Nanny.
"Birdland" is a jazz/pop song written by Joe Zawinul of the band Weather Report as a tribute to the Birdland nightclub in New York City, which appeared on the band's 1977 album Heavy Weather. The Manhattan Transfer won a Grammy Award with their 1979 version of the song, which had lyrics by Jon Hendricks. Quincy Jones won two Grammy Awards for the version of the piece he included on his 1989 album Back on the Block. The leading Cuban band Los Van Van included an extended interpolation of the piece in their song Tim Pop/Birdland.
Extensions is the fifth studio album by the Manhattan Transfer, released on October 31, 1979, by Atlantic Records.
Mecca for Moderns is the sixth studio album by the Manhattan Transfer. It was released in 1981 by Atlantic Records.
Vocalese is the ninth studio album by Jazz band The Manhattan Transfer, released in 1985 on the Atlantic Records. Recording sessions took place during 1985. Production came from Tim Hauser and Martin Fischer. This album is considered to be The Manhattan Transfer's most critically acclaimed album. It received 12 Grammy nominations, making it second only to Michael Jackson's Thriller as the most nominated individual album. It also received extremely high ratings from music critics, including a 4.5 out of 5 stars rating from Allmusic. The album peaked at number 2 on the Top Jazz Albums and number 74 on the Billboard 200. The album's title Vocalese refers to a style of music that sets lyrics to previously recorded jazz instrumental pieces. The vocals then reproduce the sound and feel of the original instrumentation. Jon Hendricks, proficient in this art, composed all of the lyrics for this album.
The Offbeat Of Avenues was the thirteenth album released by The Manhattan Transfer on August 13, 1991, by Columbia Records.
Couldn't Be Hotter is the fourth live album released by The Manhattan Transfer in 2003 on the Telarc label. This is their third live album with Cheryl Bentyne. It was recorded during a tour of Japan over two nights at Orchestra Hall in Tokyo.
Janis Siegel is a multiple grammy-winning American jazz singer, best known as a member of the vocal group The Manhattan Transfer.
Spontaneous Inventions is a 1986 live album by American vocalist Bobby McFerrin, released by Blue Note Records.
Roseanna Elizabeth Vitro is a jazz singer and teacher from Arkansas.
"Corner Pocket" is a 1955 jazz standard. Versions with lyrics are titled "Until I Met You", or "Until I Met You (Corner Pocket)".
When I knew her she was Cheryl Benthien, a fellow member of Mount Vernon (Wash.) High School's Class of 1972.
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