Nancy Wilson
By All Music Guide
By All Music Guide
In the years to follow, however, Wilson often moved away from jazz, much to the chagrin of purists; she made numerous albums, many of them properly categorized as pop and R&B outings, and toured extensively, appearing with everyone from Nat King Cole and Sarah Vaughan to Ruth Brown and LaVern Baker. She even hosted her own Emmy-winning variety series for NBC, The Nancy Wilson Show, and was a frequent guest performer on other programs; hits of the period included Tell Me the Truth, How Glad I Am, Peace of Mind, and Now, Im a Woman. Regardless of how far afield she traveled, Wilson always maintained her connections to the jazz world, and in the 1980s, she returned to the music with a vengeance, working closely with performers including Hank Jones, Art Farmer, Ramsey Lewis, and Benny Golson. By the 1990s, she was a favorite among the new adult contemporary market, her style ideally suited to the formats penchant for lush, romantic allads; she also hosted the Jazz Profiles series on National Public Radio.
In the early 2000s, Wilson returned to jazz, recording two albums with Ramsey Lewis for Narada (2002s Meant to Be and 2003s Simple Pleasures). Her 2004 album R.S.V.P. (Rare Songs, Very Personal) was a blend of straight-ahead jazz and allads, similar to her next record, 2006s Turned to Blue, which, like R.S.V.P., used a different instrumentalist for each track. In 2005, Capitol released a three-part series to pay tribute to Wilsons contributions to music in the 50s and 60s: Guess Who I Saw Today: Nancy Wilson Sings Songs of Lost Love, Save Your Love for Me: Nancy Wilson Sings the Great Blues Ballads, and The Great American Songbook.
