Cassandra Wilson, Singular Voice Who Connected Jazz, Blues and R&B, Dies at 70

Cassandra Wilson performs at the Ottawa Bluesfest in Ottawa, Ontario, on July 3, 2008. The two-time Grammy Award winner, whose rich contralto and adventurous approach brought jazz into conversation with blues, R&B, folk and other musical traditions, died Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2026, in her native Jackson, Mississippi. She was 70. (Photo by Scott Penner/CC BY-SA 2.0)

Cassandra Wilson, the two-time Grammy-winning singer whose unmistakable contralto carried blues, R&B, folk, country and the sounds of her native Mississippi into some of the most adventurous jazz recordings of her generation, has died. She was 70.

Wilson died Tuesday morning in her hometown of Jackson, Mississippi, Hinds County Coroner Jeramiah Howard confirmed. Her longtime manager, Robert Torre, announced her death Wednesday, saying Wilson died peacefully at home surrounded by family and close friends.

A cause of death was not announced.

Wilson emerged as a major voice in the 1980s and became one of jazz's most distinctive stars during the following decade, challenging expectations about both what a jazz singer should sound like and what songs belonged in a jazz repertoire.

Her breakthrough 1993 album, “Blue Light ’Til Dawn,” drew from blues, jazz, folk and popular music and included her interpretations of songs associated with Robert Johnson, Van Morrison and Joni Mitchell.

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“New Moon Daughter” pushed the idea further in 1995, moving from Billie Holiday and Son House to Hank Williams, Neil Young and the Monkees without losing the musical identity holding it together.

The album earned Wilson her first Grammy Award for best jazz vocal performance.

She would win again for “Loverly,” released in 2008, and received four Grammy nominations during her career.

Wilson's reach also extended into hip-hop during a period when the genre's relationship with jazz was rapidly evolving. She appeared on “Swept Away” from the Roots' 1995 album “Do You Want More?!!!??!,” a record that helped establish the Philadelphia group's live-band approach to hip-hop.

For Wilson, crossing those boundaries was less a detour than an extension of where she came from.

Born in Jackson in 1955, she grew up listening to music that included Motown, Miles Davis and Thelonious Monk. Her father, Herman B. Fowlkes, was a musician, and Wilson began piano lessons at 6 before taking up other instruments.

After spending time in New Orleans, she moved to New York in the early 1980s and became associated with saxophonist Steve Coleman and the M-Base Collective, the experimental group of musicians whose ideas helped reshape contemporary jazz.

Wilson eventually moved toward the spacious, acoustic sound that became one of her signatures.

Her low, instantly identifiable voice could make familiar material sound as though it had originated somewhere else entirely.

That quality allowed Wilson to move through musical traditions that were often separated by genre labels — Delta blues, jazz standards, rock, folk, R&B and country — while keeping Mississippi at the center of her sound.

Jon Batiste, who toured with Wilson early in his career, remembered that quality Wednesday.

In a tribute posted after her death, Batiste wrote that Wilson's combination of folkloric, R&B, diasporic, experimental and popular music had a major influence on him. He said her Mississippi heritage remained present regardless of how far her music traveled stylistically.

“She was one of the first people to take me on tour around the world, the great Cassandra Wilson,” Batiste wrote.

Jackson Mayor John Horhn also paid tribute to Wilson, saying the city had lost an extraordinary native daughter and the world a singular musical voice.

Wilson's later work continued to resist easy categorization.

In 2015, she released “Coming Forth by Day,” an album honoring Billie Holiday released during the centennial of Holiday's birth. It would become Wilson's final studio album.

The National Endowment for the Arts named Wilson a Jazz Master in 2022, placing her among recipients of one of the nation's highest honors for jazz musicians.

Wacko, Rapper Whose ‘Nolia Clap’ Became a New Orleans Anthem, Dies

The cover of UTP's 2004 “Nolia Clap” release. The title track, co-written by Damon “Wacko” Grison, Juvenile, Skip and producer Donald “XL” Robertson, reached No. 31 on the Billboard Hot 100. (Rap-A-Lot Records)

Damon “Wacko” Grison, the New Orleans rapper whose work with Juvenile and Skip helped turn “Nolia Clap” into a national hit and an enduring piece of the city's hip-hop history, has died.

News of Grison's death was announced by New Orleans Room on Instagram, followed by a remembrance from Mia X and condolences from Young Buck, DJ Paul and Big Freedia. His age and cause of death have not been publicly confirmed.

For listeners who encountered UTP during its national breakthrough in the mid-2000s, Wacko was one of the three rappers behind “Nolia Clap.”

His connection to the record ran considerably deeper than that.

Juvenile said so himself.

“That's really more like Wacko's song,” Juvenile told Complex in 2013 while breaking down the most important records of his career.

According to Juvenile, Wacko had been singing the “Nolia Clap” hook around the studio before the group traveled to the West Coast and connected with producer Donald “XL” Robertson. They began building the track around Wacko's idea, with Juvenile saying Mannie Fresh and producer Slice T later added touches to the record.

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The songwriting credits support Wacko's creative role.

Grison shares credit on “Nolia Clap” with Terius Gray, better known as Juvenile; Clifford Nicholas, better known as Skip; and Robertson.

The record became UTP's biggest national hit, reaching No. 31 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. 9 on Billboard's Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks chart.

That success arrived after UTP had undergone considerable change.

Juvenile formed the Uptown Project Playas as he was separating from Cash Money Records. The early collective had fluid membership and included appearances from Wacko, Skip, Soulja Slim, Corey Cee and Young Buck. After Young Buck left for G-Unit and Soulja Slim was killed in 2003, UTP narrowed into the Juvenile-Wacko-Skip trio most listeners came to know.

Their album “The Beginning of the End...” arrived in May 2004 through Rap-A-Lot Records, with “Nolia Clap” opening the record.

The “Nolia” referred to the Magnolia Projects, officially the C.J. Peete Public Housing Development, in New Orleans' Central City neighborhood. The complex became an important incubator of the city's music across generations and was home to artists including Juvenile and Soulja Slim.

A Closer Walk, the New Orleans music-history project presented by WWOZ, includes “Nolia Clap” among the recordings tied to the Magnolia and traces the development's role in the rise of New Orleans hip-hop.

Wacko and Skip remained part of Juvenile's musical orbit after UTP's breakthrough. Both appeared on Juvenile's 2006 album “Reality Check,” including Wacko's appearances on “Sets Go Up” and “Way I Be Leanin'.”

By 2007, Juvenile was out of UTP and Wacko and Skip continued the group without him, releasing “Back Like We Left Something” through Rap-A-Lot.

Mia X said in her remembrance that Wacko had continued creating music before his death, praising his wordplay and distinctive cadence and saying he had been working on material she considered special.

Wacko's national profile may have been tied most closely to one record. But the history of that record gives him a larger role than the shorthand of “UTP member” suggests.

Years before there was any reason to argue about Wacko's legacy, Juvenile had already made the most important point about the song.

It was, he said, “more like Wacko's song.”

Kehlani Says Hospital Visit Forced Two Tour Postponements

Kehlani appears in a promotional image released in connection with the singer’s 2024 single “After Hours.” Kehlani postponed two stops on the Kehlani World Tour this week after a hospital visit and said they were not medically cleared to sing. (Courtesy Warner Music/Atlantic Records)

Kehlani has postponed two stops on the Kehlani World Tour after a sudden illness sent the R&B singer to the hospital.

Kehlani said Wednesday that they had felt normal during two days off before developing severe pain and difficulty swallowing overnight.

“I just left the hospital & am not cleared to sing for the next two shows,” Kehlani wrote on Instagram.

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The affected concerts were Wednesday at Freedom Mortgage Pavilion in Camden, New Jersey, and Thursday at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, Maryland. Kehlani referred to the latter as the Washington, D.C., stop in the announcement.

Both concerts are now officially listed as postponed.

Ticketmaster says tickets for the Camden show will remain valid once a new date is announced. Merriweather Post Pavilion similarly says tickets for Thursday’s show will be honored when the concert is rescheduled.

Kehlani said the tour is expected to resume in Virginia. The next scheduled performance remains Saturday at Allianz Amphitheater at Riverfront in Richmond, according to Live Nation and Ticketmaster.

No diagnosis or cause for the sudden symptoms has been announced.

The interruption comes during the North American leg of Kehlani’s world tour, which began earlier this month. The singer entered the tour as a two-time Grammy winner after “Folded” won best R&B performance and best R&B song at the 2026 Grammy Awards.

Latimore, ‘Let’s Straighten It Out’ Singer and Blues Hall of Famer, Dies at 86

Latimore performs at the Nancy Jazz Pulsations festival in Nancy, France, on Oct. 22, 1983. The blues and R&B singer, songwriter and pianist, best known for the 1974 hit “Let’s Straighten It Out,” died Aug. 22, 2026, at 86. (Lioneldecoster/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 3.0)

Latimore, the singer, songwriter and pianist whose conversational baritone turned a relationship talk into the 1974 R&B classic “Let’s Straighten It Out,” died Aug. 22 at 86.

Malaco Records, his longtime label, confirmed his death in a social-media statement.

“We are deeply saddened to hear of the passing of Benjamin ‘Benny’ Latimore,” the Jackson, Mississippi-based label wrote, offering condolences to his family and loved ones.

A cause of death has not been publicly disclosed.

Born Benjamin William Lattimore in Charleston, Tennessee, Latimore grew up listening to gospel, blues and country music. He began playing his family’s piano as a child and sang his first solo in a Baptist church at 13, according to Malaco’s biography of the singer. He eventually moved to Miami and began recording for music entrepreneur Henry Stone’s Dade label before moving to Stone’s Glades imprint.

His version of T-Bone Walker’s “Stormy Monday” reached No. 27 on Billboard’s R&B chart in 1973. A year later came the record that would define his career.

Written by Latimore, “Let’s Straighten It Out” reached No. 1 on the R&B chart and crossed over to No. 31 on the Billboard Hot 100. He followed it with more R&B hits, including “Keep the Home Fire Burnin’” and “Somethin’ ’Bout ’Cha.”

Latimore signed with Malaco in 1982, beginning another substantial chapter of his career.

The move also placed him in the middle of an important shift in Black music. As major labels increasingly moved away from veteran soul performers, Malaco built a durable business recording artists whose audiences had not disappeared, including Z.Z. Hill, Denise LaSalle, Johnnie Taylor, Little Milton and Latimore.

Latimore remained active well beyond his 1970s chart run. He played piano on Joss Stone’s 2003 debut, The Soul Sessions, and her 2004 follow-up, Mind Body & Soul. In 2014, he sat in with the Roots on “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.”

The Blues Foundation inducted Latimore into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2017, recognizing a career that resisted an easy genre label.

Latimore himself put it more simply in a 2017 interview with Blues Blast Magazine.

“I can’t say that I’m a blues singer, but I’m a singer who can sing the blues.”

John Paris Awake Again as Earth, Wind & Fire Drummer Faces Two Major Surgeries

Earth, Wind & Fire drummer John Paris, left, poses with his wife, Honey Cone member Kathy Merrick, in an undated photo shared with a GoFundMe established to support the family during his hospitalization. Paris remains in intensive care after an Aug. 6 medical emergency and faces two major surgeries, according to the family-backed Standing for John Paris page. (Courtesy of GoFundMe)

The musician remains in intensive care after an Aug. 6 medical emergency forced Earth, Wind & Fire’s San Francisco concert with Lionel Richie to be postponed.

John Paris is awake again.

But the Earth, Wind & Fire drummer remains in intensive care and faces two major surgeries as he recovers from the medical emergency that hospitalized him earlier this month, according to a new update from the family and friends who have been chronicling his condition.

The update was posted Thursday on the family-backed Facebook page Standing for John Paris, which has become the primary public source of information about his recovery.

Paris had briefly awakened earlier in his hospitalization before doctors needed to sedate him again.

His family says he has now awakened a second time, with more encouraging results. His blood pressure remained stable and his breathing stayed strong while doctors monitored and evaluated him.

Additional testing determined that Paris will need two major surgeries as part of his recovery. He will remain in the intensive care unit.

The family has not identified the procedures or publicly disclosed the underlying diagnosis that caused the Aug. 6 medical emergency.

“This journey is definitely a marathon, but JP is fighting every single day and our hope is strong,” his wife, singer Kathy Merrick, said in the family update.

The crisis began shortly before Earth, Wind & Fire was scheduled to perform with Richie at Chase Center in San Francisco.

The Aug. 6 concert was postponed because of what was initially described only as a medical emergency involving a member of Earth, Wind & Fire. Friends and relatives later identified Paris as the hospitalized musician.

A GoFundMe organized on behalf of Paris and Merrick says he experienced a “critical medical emergency” shortly before taking the stage and was rushed to a hospital.

That remains the most specific description of the initial episode provided by the family’s public sources.

Some reports have described the emergency as a heart attack or cardiac event, but Paris’ family has not publicly announced such a diagnosis. The Standing for John Paris updates have likewise not identified the underlying condition.

The family’s accounts instead have documented a difficult recovery with periods of both progress and setback.

Paris briefly regained consciousness earlier in his hospitalization, recognized people around him and asked for Merrick. Doctors later sedated him again after his blood pressure rose and he experienced difficulty breathing.

Earlier this week, his family reported another encouraging sign: Paris squeezed the hands of Merrick and their daughter, Kyla, as they spoke to him.

Now, after awakening again, he has remained stable enough for doctors to conduct further evaluations and determine the next stage of his treatment.

The seriousness of his condition has not changed.

Paris remains in intensive care, with two major surgeries ahead.

He has spent much of the past quarter-century behind the drums for one of the most enduring groups in R&B and funk.

Earth, Wind & Fire’s official website lists Paris as a current member on drums and vocals, alongside longtime members Philip Bailey, Verdine White and Ralph Johnson.

Paris became Earth, Wind & Fire’s drummer in 2001 after a career that had already included work with artists such as Patti LaBelle and Sheila E. An official artist biography from instrument maker Artesia also credits him as a drummer, arranger, singer and songwriter.

In January, only months before his hospitalization, NAMM recorded Paris for its Oral History program. NAMM described him as a drummer known for a powerful groove, versatility and an approach that balances precision with feel.

Music also connects many of the people now supporting Paris.

Merrick performs with the current lineup of Honey Cone, the soul vocal group whose catalog includes the 1971 hit “Want Ads.” The present trio features Merrick and Wendy Smith-Brune alongside original Honey Cone member Shelly Clark White.

Clark White is also married to Earth, Wind & Fire bassist Verdine White, making the two groups’ connection a personal one as well as a musical one. Honey Cone’s official biography says Merrick and Paris have frequently collaborated professionally.

The GoFundMe says Merrick and the couple’s daughter, Kyla, have remained near Paris during his hospitalization. Because the family lives in the Los Angeles area, the extended stay in San Francisco has brought additional travel, lodging and other expenses.

Clark White canceled Honey Cone’s remaining performances for at least the next couple of months so Merrick could remain with her husband, according to the fundraiser.

Clark White, Smith-Brune and longtime family friend Tazz Cole helped establish the campaign.

Earth, Wind & Fire, meanwhile, is scheduled to return to the road in September.

The band’s official calendar currently lists its next performance for Sept. 4 in Vancouver, followed by a series of West Coast dates. The postponed San Francisco concert with Richie has been rescheduled for Sept. 26 at Chase Center.

No timetable has been announced for Paris’ return to the stage.

Kurupt Reveals Eminem Stepped In to Pay for His Rehab

West Coast rap veteran Kurupt is opening up about a private act of generosity from one of hip-hop’s biggest superstars that helped save his life.

​In a newly published interview, the former Death Row Records artist and Tha Dogg Pound member revealed that Eminem quietly paid the full cost of his medical rehabilitation treatment following a severe struggle with alcohol addiction.

 

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Speaking on SiriusXM’s "Sway in the Morning," Kurupt, born Ricardo Brown, detailed how his addiction led to multiple seizures and a three-week medically induced coma. While recovering from the life-threatening ordeal, he received unexpected outreach from two iconic architects of hip-hop.

​The 53-year-old rapper explained that Dr. Dre initially reached out to offer moral support and guidance.

​"It was Dr. Dre that called and was just giving his support and just let me know that, you know, we all go through these things," Kurupt told the radio hosts. "He was just giving me that game."

​That phone call quickly opened the door for direct financial and logistical help from Eminem. According to Kurupt, the Detroit rapper arranged treatment through his own trusted contacts and covered the entire expense to ensure the rehabilitation remained entirely private.

​"And it was Em who came to the table like, 'I'm gonna put Kurupt with my folks, and I'm going to put some money into getting him into like, a rehab situation to where he can sit down and enjoy [himself] and be out the way. Nobody will know he's there,'" Kurupt recalled.

​"You know, these things cost bread, so Em put the cheese up for it and said, 'Tell Kurupt I love him,'" the rapper added. "Dr. Dre relayed the message, and then he put me with Em's folks."

​The revelation underscores a long-standing, quiet brotherhood between 1990s and 2000s rap legends. Eminem famously listed Kurupt among his favorite MCs of all time on his 2002 track "Till I Collapse". Furthermore, Eminem has been highly transparent about his own past struggles with prescription pill addiction and a near-fatal overdose, treating his hard-won sobriety as a point of pride.

​For Kurupt, whose 1990s dominance was anchored by legendary West Coast releases like Dr. Dre's 1992 album "The Chronic" and his own 1998 solo debut "Kuruption!", the unexpected gesture left a lasting mark.

​"So, you know, that was real special to me," he said. "I appreciate both of them so much. And it's like, damn, you know? He just came out the blue from nowhere. Like, 'OK, Kurupt going through that? Bam. Boom. I'ma do that for him, man. Tell Kurupt get well, we love him.' That's deep."

Thousands Sent Home as Earth, Wind & Fire Show is Postponed Over Medical Emergency

Earth, Wind & Fire appear in a promotional photo. The R&B and funk group postponed its Aug. 6 concert with Lionel Richie at San Francisco's Chase Center minutes before showtime after a medical emergency involving a band member. The affected member has not been publicly identified. (Jabari Jacobs/Live Nation)

A medical emergency involving a member of Earth, Wind & Fire forced the legendary group to postpone
its San Francisco concert with Lionel Richie just minutes before showtime Thursday night.

The band and Chase Center announced the postponement shortly after 7:20 p.m., about 10 minutes before the scheduled 7:30 p.m. start. Thousands of concertgoers who were already inside the arena or waiting outside were directed to leave, according to local reports.

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“We are unable to perform as scheduled tonight at Chase Center in San Francisco due to a medical emergency involving a member of our band,” Earth, Wind & Fire said in a statement posted to social media.

The group has not identified the member or publicly disclosed the nature of the medical problem.

The San Francisco Fire Department received a medical call at Chase Center at approximately 5:30 p.m., spokesperson Capt. Mariano Elias told the San Francisco Chronicle. One person was taken to a hospital by private ambulance. Elias did not identify the patient or tell the newspaper what prompted the emergency response.

TMZ reported Friday morning that Elias separately described the call to the outlet as a “cardiac incident” and said the patient was transported in critical condition.

Neither Earth, Wind & Fire nor its representatives had confirmed those additional details as of Friday morning, and the identity of the patient remained undisclosed. The band's representatives referred TMZ to Earth, Wind & Fire's original statement.

ABC7 in San Francisco also reported Friday morning that officials had not released the affected band member's identity or current condition.

The abrupt postponement came as Earth, Wind & Fire and Richie near the end of their 26-city “Sing a Song All Night Long” North American tour.

According to Earth, Wind & Fire's official tour announcement, the Live Nation-produced run began June 24 in Saint Paul, Minnesota, and is scheduled to conclude Aug. 14 at Moody Center in Austin.

The tour's next scheduled performance is Saturday at Acrisure Arena in Palm Desert, California, followed Sunday by a show at Intuit Dome in Inglewood. As of Friday morning, those dates remained listed on the official tour schedule, and no further postponements had been announced.

The San Francisco show will be rescheduled, the band said. Ticketholders were told to keep their tickets, which will be honored on the new date. Refunds will also be available through the original point of purchase.

“We sincerely apologize for the unexpected change and appreciate everyone’s understanding,” the group said.

The health scare follows an earlier interruption of the same tour involving Richie. During the June 24 opener in Saint Paul, Richie became dizzy during his performance and later postponed two dates before returning to the tour June 30 in Pittsburgh.

Earth, Wind & Fire remains anchored by longtime members Philip Bailey, Verdine White and Ralph Johnson. The group, founded by the late Maurice White in Chicago, has remained one of R&B and funk's most enduring touring acts more than five decades after its breakthrough.

Earth, Wind & Fire has won six Grammy Awards from 18 nominations and received the Recording Academy's Lifetime Achievement Award in 2016. Its catalog includes “Shining Star,” “September,” “Reasons,” “After the Love Has Gone” and “Let's Groove.” The group was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2000 and became the first Black group to receive Kennedy Center Honors in 2019.

No new information about the affected band member had been released publicly as of Friday morning.

Plas Johnson, Saxophonist Who Gave ‘The Pink Panther Theme’ Its Voice, Dies at 94

The cover of Plas Johnson’s Capitol Records album “Mood for the Blues.” Johnson, whose tenor saxophone gave Henry Mancini’s “The Pink Panther Theme” its unmistakable sound, died July 15 at 94. (Courtesy Photo: Capitol Records)

Most people heard Plas Johnson long before they knew his name.

His tenor saxophone slides into Henry Mancini’s “The Pink Panther Theme” with a low, bluesy prowl, giving the animated cat in the film’s opening credits its cool, its mischief and its unmistakable strut.

The melody became part of popular culture. The musician behind it spent much of his career outside the spotlight.

Johnson died July 15 at his Los Angeles home, his children, Eric Johnson and Stephanie Oliver, told The New York Times. He was 94. A cause of death was not announced.

He died six days before his 95th birthday. His children said he had performed at his retirement community about a month earlier.

“The Pink Panther Theme” was Johnson’s most famous performance, but it accounted for less than three minutes in a recording career that crossed jump blues, jazz, R&B, soul, rock, pop, television and film.

His saxophone appeared on recordings by the Platters, Larry Williams, Little Richard, Fats Domino, Nat King Cole, Sam Cooke, Nancy Wilson, Ella Fitzgerald, Marvin Gaye, Dr. John, the Beach Boys and scores of others. He played tenor on the Platters’ “The Great Pretender” and piccolo on Bobby Day’s “Rockin’ Robin.”

 

Johnson was part of a generation of Black studio musicians whose work moved across genres more freely than the music industry’s marketing categories did.

A record might be sold as pop, rock, easy listening or a Hollywood soundtrack. Johnson brought to it the phrasing he had developed in Louisiana dance halls, blues bands, jazz clubs and Los Angeles recording rooms.

Other musicians knew what his name meant.

Louisiana arranger and producer Harold Battiste recalled that when producers could not hire Johnson, they looked for someone who sounded like him. Harmonica player and producer Bob Corritore remembered him after his death as a “musician’s musician.”

Mancini did not want an imitation.

He composed “The Pink Panther Theme” with Johnson’s tenor in mind after watching David Niven play the sophisticated jewel thief at the center of Blake Edwards’ comedy.

“Plas has the sound and the style I wanted,” Mancini wrote in his autobiography.

The theme was recorded in 1963 for the film, which opened in the United States in 1964. Johnson played during the introduction, returned for the central solo and closed the piece.

He later recalled that the arrangement felt special from the first run-through. When the musicians finished, the string section joined the rest of the room in applauding — an unusual response during a professional studio session.

Mancini’s music from “The Pink Panther” won three Grammy Awards, while the score received an Academy Award nomination. The American Film Institute later ranked it No. 20 on its list of the 25 greatest American film scores.

Johnson’s identity remained less familiar than the solo.

He sometimes met listeners who told him that his performance sounded exactly like the musician heard in the movie. Johnson would explain that they were listening to the same man.

He returned to the theme decades later, rerecording it for the 2004 tribute album “Ultimate Mancini” and the 2006 remake of “The Pink Panther” starring Steve Martin.

Johnson was born July 21, 1931, in Donaldsonville, Louisiana, and grew up in a family of professional musicians. His mother played piano, while his father played saxophone and banjo.

The family later moved to Thibodaux and then New Orleans. Johnson began as a singer before his father gave him a soprano saxophone. He switched to tenor at 15 and formed the Johnson Brothers Combo with his older brother, pianist Ray Johnson.

The brothers played dances around the New Orleans area, mixing the popular music of Louis Jordan, Dinah Washington and Charles Brown with the bebop of Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie.

The crowd did not always ask for bebop. The brothers played it anyway.

In 1951, singer and pianist Charles Brown heard Johnson perform at the Dew Drop Café in New Orleans and hired him. The job lasted about six months before Johnson was drafted into the Army, where he continued playing in a military band.

Johnson moved to Los Angeles with his siblings in 1954. Jam sessions led to recording dates, and his blues-touched sound proved valuable as rock and roll expanded the market for musicians who could combine Black musical language with the precision demanded by commercial studios.

A session with Johnny Otis brought him to the attention of Capitol Records executive Dave Cavanaugh. Johnson soon found himself recording behind Cole, Frank Sinatra, Peggy Lee and other major stars.

He could bring personality to a record without crowding the singer or arrangement.

“You just have to know when to start and when to stop,” Johnson said in a 2005 interview.

That judgment kept him working through decades of changes in recording technology and popular taste.

Johnson remained active in jazz while handling commercial studio work. He released albums under his own name, including “This Must Be the Plas!” and “Mood for the Blues,” and maintained a long association with trumpeter Harry “Sweets” Edison.

In 1970, he joined the studio band for “The Merv Griffin Show,” beginning a 15-year run that placed a working jazz ensemble inside a five-day-a-week television production. He continued accepting outside recording dates during the show’s run.

Johnson later appeared in Denny Tedesco’s documentary “The Wrecking Crew,” which brought wider attention to the Los Angeles session musicians behind generations of familiar records. The film also featured New Orleans drummer Earl Palmer, with whom Johnson had worked frequently.

By then, Johnson had spent more than half a century demonstrating how much identity a musician could fit into an introduction, a background fill or a few measures between a singer’s lines.

Alley Boy, Influential Voice From Atlanta’s Mixtape Era, Dies

Alley Boy, the Atlanta rapper whose hard-edged records helped make Duct Tape Entertainment one of the city’s most recognizable mixtape-era movements, died Monday, his daughter confirmed on Instagram.

Multiple outlets reported his death was caused by kidney failure.  He was in his early 40s. His exact age remains the subject of conflicting reports, with music publications placing his age at 42, while biographical databases list his birth date as March 3, 1981, which would make him 45.

The confirmation followed a day of confusion. Reports of Alley Boy’s death began circulating Sunday, but his daughter said Monday morning that he was still alive and criticized people for spreading the news prematurely.

Later Monday, she posted photographs in his memory, including a childhood image of Alley Boy holding her and another showing her hand resting on his. She marked the second photograph with the date July 20, 2026, confirming his death.

Alley Boy, smiles while holding two young children in an undated photograph. His daughter shared the image to her Instagram story on Monday, overlaid with an emotional message, to confirm the mixtape pioneer's death.

Alley Boy, whose real name was Curt Freeman, had publicly documented serious kidney problems and his need for a transplant. He said in 2023 that he had begun dialysis and later described undergoing treatment three times a week.

He attributed the damage to his kidneys in part to years of drinking codeine cough syrup, commonly called lean, and used later interviews to warn younger people about the habit. 

Alley Boy never became one of Atlanta’s biggest crossover stars. His standing came from somewhere else.

During a period when mixtapes could establish a rapper’s weight without a national radio hit, his voice carried through East Atlanta, Southern street rap and the artists who understood what Duct Tape represented. His performances were blunt and pressurized, often making anger, fear and desperation sound like parts of the same thought.

He told The Fader in 2011 that he grew up in Edgewood Courts, began rapping at 9 and entered a recording studio by the time he was 10 or 11. With both parents struggling with drugs, he lived with his grandmother and began paying for studio sessions once he could earn his own money.

“I always fell back to the music,” he said.

Freeman and longtime friend Big Bank Black co-founded Duct Tape Entertainment, an independent East Atlanta operation whose identity was built as much around loyalty and neighborhood ties as music. The company later became home to Trouble, another respected Atlanta rapper whose death in 2022 left a lasting wound inside the group.

Alley Boy introduced himself to a wider Southern rap audience with the 2009 mixtape “Da Don.” He followed it with “The Definition of F--- S---” and its 2011 sequel, records that established his reputation as an uncompromising street rapper during one of Atlanta’s most competitive mixtape periods.

“The Definition of F--- S--- 2” also earned attention well outside the usual mixtape circuit.

Pitchfork praised the urgency of the project and Alley Boy’s consistency, noting how easily his threats and more vulnerable moments ran into one another. The tape featured Trouble, Jeezy, Yo Gotti and Freddie Gibbs, but Alley Boy’s intensity remained its center.

His catalog eventually connected him with artists including Pusha T, Meek Mill, Future, Master P and Fat Trel. “Your Favorite Rapper,” with Pusha T, challenged performers whose public images did not match the lives they described on records. “War Cry,” released in 2013, included “Stack It Up” with Meek Mill, “Mama’s House” with Trouble and collaborations with Future, Master P, Yo Gotti and Young Scooter.

His 2012 project “The Gift of Discernment” showed more of the reflection beneath the confrontation. It arrived through Duct Tape Entertainment and was followed by projects including “War Cry,” “Alley Shakur (The Soul of a Runaway Slave),” “Definition of F--- S--- Pt. 3” and “AlleyGod.”

The Duct Tape name never became the commercial empire its founders envisioned, but its influence survived the label deals and internal fractures that slowed its momentum.

Less than a month before Alley Boy’s death, he joined Big Bank for an extended episode of the “Perspektives” podcast. The two revisited Duct Tape’s rise and spoke candidly about business inexperience, industry politics, financial problems and the decisions that kept the movement from reaching its full potential.

 

The conversation also turned to grief, mental health and life after the deaths of people close to them, particularly Trouble. Alley Boy spoke less like a rapper protecting an image than a man taking account of what the years had cost.

News of his death brought tributes from across Atlanta rap.

21 Savage called him an East Atlanta blueprint and legend. DJ Scream remembered him as one of the best rappers the city produced. Master P, who recorded with Alley Boy as part of the Louie V Mob period, praised him as a soldier and recalled the street records they made together.

Those reactions reflected a career whose importance was never best measured by chart positions. Alley Boy helped represent an East Atlanta rap world that existed outside the city’s most famous label systems, carrying Duct Tape’s name through mixtapes, collaborations and a voice that rarely softened itself for wider approval.

His final public chapter was different. He spoke openly about dialysis, his need for a kidney and the damage he believed codeine had done to his body. The same rapper who built his name on survival began using his experience as a warning.

“What was meant to destroy me woke me up,” he wrote after starting dialysis. “Now I know my purpose.”

Sparky D, Pioneering ‘Roxanne Wars’ Battle MC, Dies at 61

Sparky D, born Doreen C. Broadnax, is shown in an undated publicity photo. Broadnax, the Brownsville, Brooklyn, rapper whose 1985 answer record “Sparky’s Turn (Roxanne You’re Through)” made her a key voice in the Roxanne Wars, died July 4 at 61. No cause of death has been announced.

Sparky D, born Doreen C. Broadnax, the Brownsville, Brooklyn, MC whose 1985 answer record “Sparky’s Turn (Roxanne You’re Through)” made her one of the defining voices of the Roxanne Wars, has died. She was 61.

Her death was announced over the holiday weekend by her family. No cause of death has been announced.

She first recorded with the Brooklyn group The Playgirls, then broke out on her own with “Sparky’s Turn,” a direct response to Roxanne Shanté’s “Roxanne’s Revenge.” The record arrived during one of rap’s earliest full-scale lyrical wars, when answer records were not social media events but actual vinyl releases, pressed, shipped and judged by DJs, radio listeners and crowds.

The Roxanne Wars began after UTFO’s “Roxanne, Roxanne,” a 1984 record built around a fictional woman who rejected the group’s advances. Roxanne Shanté, then a teenage MC from Queensbridge, answered with “Roxanne’s Revenge.” The response was sharp, funny and ruthless enough to create its own industry.

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Then came the replies to the reply.

Sparky D’s entry stood out because it did not sound like a novelty record or a quick cash-in. She came at Shanté with a hard Brooklyn delivery and the confidence of someone who understood the assignment before there was a phrase for it. “Sparky’s Turn” was not just part of the Roxanne craze. It became one of the records that made the feud feel like a real fight.

The rivalry soon moved beyond wax. Sparky D and Shanté appeared together in staged battles, sometimes leaning into the boxing imagery that surrounded the feud. In 1985, the conflict was captured on “Round One: Roxanne Shanté vs. Sparky Dee,” one of the most memorable documents from rap’s first great answer-record era.

For a later generation raised on diss tracks, beef timelines and endless commentary, the Roxanne Wars can sound almost quaint. They were anything but. They proved that rap audiences would follow conflict across records, boroughs, radio stations and personalities. They also proved that women MCs were not side characters in hip-hop’s competitive tradition.

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DJ Premier, in an Instagram tribute, called her “one of the 1st Female Battle MC’s” and said her “relentless voice and delivery” made her a force.

“I became an instant fan,” Premier wrote, recalling her battles with Shanté.

MC Sha-Rock, one of hip-hop’s first women on record and a founding member of Funky 4 + 1, wrote that “the HIP HOP WORLD has taken a tremendous loss.”

Grandmaster Flash called Sparky D “one of the dopest female MCs from back in the day.”

That praise carries weight because Sparky D’s career connects two crucial eras: the foundational days when women such as Sha-Rock helped open the door, and the mid-1980s moment when MCs such as Shanté and Sparky D kicked it wider through battle records, street-level radio and live performance.

Sparky D understood that lineage. At a 2021 Bronx event honoring MC Sha-Rock, she said, “Without MC Sha-Rock, my mother, there would be no me.”

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After “Sparky’s Turn,” she continued recording through the 1980s. Her catalog included “He’s My DJ” with Kool DJ Red Alert, “Throwdown,” “Sparky’s Back” and the 1988 album “This Is Sparky D’s World” on B-Boy Records. The records placed her in the same gritty independent ecosystem that helped define New York rap before major labels fully understood the music’s commercial power.

Her life after the first wave of fame was not easy. Sparky D later spoke publicly about addiction, abuse and the doors that closed once her early rap run slowed. In a 2007 profile, she described herself as a woman who had been through hardship and come out with faith intact.

“You gotta go through something in order to grow,” she said.

In later years, Broadnax turned toward Christianity, gospel rap and ministry. She moved to Atlanta, founded Treasure Ministries and won a Gospel Choice Award in 2007 for “This Is for the Church.” That part of her story mattered, too. It was not a footnote after hip-hop. It was how she chose to keep using her voice.