Ella Jane Fitzgerald was an American jazz singer, sometimes referred to as the "First Lady of Song", "Queen of Jazz", and "Lady Ella". She was noted for her purity of tone, impeccable diction, phrasing, timing, intonation, and a "horn-like" improvisational ability, particularly in her scat singing.
Tina Turner was a singer, songwriter, and actress. Known as the "Queen of Rock 'n' Roll", she rose to prominence as the lead singer of the husband-wife duo Ike & Tina Turner before launching a successful career as a solo performer.
Outsider music is music created by self-taught or naïve musicians. The term is usually applied to musicians who have little or no traditional musical experience, who exhibit childlike qualities in their music, or who have intellectual disabilities or mental illnesses. The term was popularized in the 1990s by journalist and WFMU DJ Irwin Chusid.
Lucia Pamela was an American musician, nightclub singer, bandleader, and eccentric. She is remembered today largely for a science fiction themed musical album and coloring book concerning an imaginary trip to the Moon.
What's Love Got to Do with It is a 1993 American biographical film based on the life of American singer-songwriter Tina Turner. Directed by Brian Gibson and written by Kate Lanier from a uncredited story draft by the late Howard Ashman, based on Tina's 1986 autobiography I, Tina, it stars Angela Bassett as Tina and Laurence Fishburne as her abusive husband Ike Turner.
The Shaggs were an American rock band formed in Fremont, New Hampshire, in 1965. They comprised the sisters Dorothy "Dot" Wiggin, Betty Wiggin, Helen Wiggin (drums) and, later, Rachel Wiggin. Their music has been described as both among the worst of all time and a work of unintentional brilliance.
William "Shooby" Taylor was an American jazz vocalist famous for scat singing over various records, including those of the Ink Spots, the Harmonicats, Johnny Cash, Miles Davis, Mozart, and Cristy Lane, in a baritone voice.
Phoebe Buffay is one of the six main characters from the American television sitcom, Friends. She was created by David Crane and Marta Kauffman and portrayed by actress Lisa Kudrow.
"Smelly Cat" is a comedy song from the American sitcom Friends (1994–2004), performed by American actress Lisa Kudrow. The song was written by Friends writers Adam Chase and Betsy Borns, with musician Chrissie Hynde and Kudrow for the latter's character Phoebe Buffay, and first appears in the sixth episode of the show's second season, "The One with the Baby on the Bus". Hynde guest stars in the episode as a singer hired to replace Phoebe as Central Perk's in-house musician, to whom Phoebe eventually teaches "Smelly Cat". Borns intended to write the song about a dog, basing it on her own pet dog Gouda, but ultimately decided that a song about a pungent cat would be funnier.
Y. Bhekhirst is an outsider musician based in New Hyde Park, New York.
Angela Lisa Winbush is an American R&B/soul singer-songwriter, musician and record producer who rose to fame first in the 1980s R&B duo René & Angela, also scoring hits as a solo artist. To date, Winbush has sold over 10 million albums and singles worldwide.
Irwin Chusid is a journalist, music historian, radio personality, record producer, and self-described "landmark preservationist". His stated mission has been to "find things on the scrapheap of history that I know don't belong there and salvage them." Those "things" have included such previously overlooked but now-celebrated icons as composer/bandleader/electronic music pioneer Raymond Scott, Space Age Pop avatar Esquivel, illustrator/fine artist Jim Flora, various outsider musicians, and The Langley Schools Music Project. Chusid calls himself "a connoisseur of marginalia," while admitting he's "a terrible barometer of popular taste."
The Langley Schools Music Project is a collection of recordings of children's choruses singing pop hits by the likes of the Beach Boys, Paul McCartney, and David Bowie. Originally recorded in 1976–77, they were found and rereleased 25 years later and became a cult hit and a successful example of outsider music. It was rereleased on vinyl March 9, 2018, by Bar/None Records.
B. J. Snowden is an American songwriter and musician who sings and plays synthesizers. She has become a cult figure in Canada for her many songs about the country, including titles covering every Canadian province, and has been featured on CBC Radio One's show As It Happens where she noted that her grandmother was Canadian. In addition to her songs about Canada, she covers diverse subjects, including Judge Joe Brown and Daisuke Matsuzaka.
Gayl Angela Masson is an American aviator and artist. She flew for American Airlines for over 30 years and was the first woman cleared to fly the Boeing 747. Masson earned a PhD from the University of Southern California in 1976, specializing in aerospace safety and writing her dissertation on the Air Force's response to women as pilots. She set several speed records for commercial air routes and was the first woman to serve as Chief Pilot for American Airlines.
Downloading the Repertoire is a 1996 novelty album by American singer John "Jack" Mudurian.
Songs in the Key of Z is a book and two compilation albums written and compiled by Irwin Chusid. The book and albums explore the field of what Chusid coined as "outsider music". Chusid defines outsider music as; "crackpot and visionary music, where all trails lead essentially one place: over the edge." Chusid's work has brought the music of several leading performers in the outsider genre to wider attention. These include Daniel Johnston, Joe Meek, Jandek and Wesley Willis. In addition, his CDs feature some recordings by artists who produced very little work but placed their recordings firmly in the outsider area. Notable amongst these are nursing home resident Jack Mudurian who sings snatches of several dozen songs in a garbled collection known as Downloading the Repertoire and the obscure and extreme scat singer Shooby Taylor AKA 'The Human Horn.'
The Nightcrawlers were an American garage rock band formed in Daytona Beach, Florida in 1965.
Susan Dietrich, known as The Space Lady (TSL) (formerly Suzy Soundz), born 1948 in Pueblo, Colorado and raised in Las Animas, Colorado, US, is a singer and musician in the genres of space music, synth pop, and psychedelic pop. She is also a paragon of the genre known as outsider music.
Malinda Jackson Parker was a Liberian singer and pianist. She composed her own music and recorded the album The Liberian Landmark Joy around 1971. She served a term in the House of Representatives of Liberia representing Montserrado County. A well-known figure in Monrovia, she graduated from Morgan College in Baltimore. Her songs were included in Irwin Chusid's 1999 compilation albums Songs in the Key of Z, which considered her an outsider artist.
