Joan Armatrading

Joan Armatrading was born on December 9, 1950,on the Caribbean island of Saint Kitts; she later moved to England when she was 7. At the age of 14, Armatrading began writing songs by setting her own limericks to music on a piano that her mother had purchased as "a piece of furniture". Shortly thereafter, her mother bought her a £3 guitar from a pawn shop in exchange for two prams and Joan began teaching herself the instrument. Armatrading began performing in the late 1960s in local gigs and joined the stage production for Hair. It was here she met lyricist Pam Nestor, the two would later work closely on Armatrading’s debut album “Whatever’s for Us” released by Cube records in 1972. The album was critically acclaimed and saw Joan voted as best newcomer. In 1976 her next album, Joan Armatrading, entered the Top 20 and spawned the Top 10 hit single "Love and Affection". The album mixed acoustic work with jazz-influenced material, this style was retained for Joan’s 1977 and 1978 albums Show Some Emotion and To the Limit. These works included Joan’s longstanding hits "Willow", "Down To Zero", "Tall in the Saddle", and "Kissin' and a Huggin.

In 1980 Armatrading revised her playing style to more rock/pop-orientated and released Me Myself I. This album became Armatrading's highest-ever charting album, and her title track became her second UK Top 40 hit single. Joan continued her exploration with pop on her 1981 album Walk Under Ladders and her 1983 work The Key. All three albums were Top 10successes in the UK, with The Key also producing the hit single "Drop the Pilot", Armatrading's third UK Top 40 hit single. In 2007 Joan’s album Into the Blues debuted at No. 1 on the US Billboard Blues Chart, making Armatrading the first UK female artist to earn that distinction. Into the Blues, which Armatrading called "the CD I've been promising myself to write for a long time", was nominated for a Grammy Award, also making her the first female UK artist to be nominated in the Grammy Blues category.