Bonnie Lynn Raitt is an American singer, guitarist, and songwriter. In 1971, Raitt released her self-titled debut album. Following this, she released a series of critically acclaimed roots-influenced albums that incorporated elements of blues, rock, folk, and country. She was also a frequent session player and collaborator with other artists, including Warren Zevon, Little Feat, Jackson Browne, the Pointer Sisters, John Prine, and Leon Russell.
Martha Rose Reeves is an American R&B and pop singer. She is best known for being the lead singer of the Motown girl group Martha and the Vandellas, which scored over a dozen hit singles, including "Come and Get These Memories", "Nowhere to Run", "Heat Wave", "Jimmy Mack", and their signature "Dancing in the Street". From 2005 until 2009, Reeves served as an elected councilwoman in her hometown of Detroit, Michigan, U.S. Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995. In 2023, Rolling Stone ranked Reeves at number 151 on its list of the 200 Greatest Singers of All Time.
Cassandra Wilson is an American jazz singer, songwriter, and producer from Jackson, Mississippi. She is one of the most successful female jazz singers and has been described by critic Gary Giddins as "a singer blessed with an unmistakable timbre and attack [who has] expanded the playing field" by incorporating blues, country, and folk music into her work. She has won numerous awards, including two Grammys, and was named "America's Best Singer" by Time magazine in 2001.
Leon Redbone was a singer-songwriter and musician specializing in jazz, blues, and Tin Pan Alley classics. Recognized by his hat, dark sunglasses, and black tie, he was born in Cyprus of Armenian ancestry and first appeared on stage in Toronto, Canada, in the early 1970s. He also appeared on film and television in acting and voice-over roles.
Lowell Fulson was an American blues guitarist and songwriter, in the West Coast blues tradition. He also recorded for contractual reasons as Lowell Fullsom and Lowell Fulsom. After T-Bone Walker, he was the most important figure in West Coast blues in the 1940s and 1950s.
Emily Drinkard, known professionally as Cissy Houston, was an American soul and gospel singer. Born in Newark, New Jersey, Houston began singing with three of her siblings in the family gospel group, The Drinkard Singers. By the early 1960s, Houston began a career as a session vocalist for several secular musicians in the rhythm and blues, soul, rock and roll, pop and rock genres. After initially joining her nieces' group the Gospelaires for a session with Ronnie Hawkins in 1961, Houston gradually took control of the group, which revamped into "The Group" with Houston, niece Sylvia Shemwell, Myrna Smith and teenager Estelle Brown. She eventually founded the girl group The Sweet Inspirations with Shemwell, Smith and Brown in 1967 and that year signed a contract with Atlantic Records where, with Houston as lead singer, they would record four albums before Houston departed for a solo career in 1970. Her best known solo singles include the top 20 R&B chart single, "I'll Be There" and the top 5 dance single, "Think It Over". Her solo career culminated with two Grammy Award wins, both in the Traditional Gospel Album category.
Ahmir K. Thompson, known professionally as Questlove, is an American drummer, record producer, disc jockey, filmmaker, music journalist, and actor. He is the drummer and joint frontman for the hip-hop band the Roots. The Roots have been the in-house band for The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon since 2014, after having fulfilled the same role on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. Questlove is also one of the producers of the 2015 cast album of the Broadway musical Hamilton. He has also co-founded of the websites Okayplayer and OkayAfrica. He joined Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music at New York University as an adjunct professor in 2016, and hosts the podcast Questlove Supreme.
Redbone is an American rock band formed in Los Angeles, California, in 1969 by brothers Pat and Lolly Vegas. All members during their commercial peak and success were of Mexican American and Native American heritage, which was heavily reflected in their songs, stage costumes, and album art.
Rosanne Cash is an American singer-songwriter and author. She is the eldest daughter of country musician Johnny Cash and his first wife, Vivian Cash.
Blood quantum laws or Indian blood laws are laws in the United States that define Native American status by fractions of Native American ancestry. These laws were enacted by the federal government and state governments as a way to establish legally defined racial population groups. By contrast, many tribes do not include blood quantum as part of their own enrollment criteria. Blood quantum laws were first imposed by white settlers in the 18th century. Blood quantum (BQ) continues to be a controversial topic.
Black Indians are Native American people – defined as Native American due to being affiliated with Native American communities and being culturally Native American – who also have significant African American heritage.
Pura Fé (Tuscarora/Taino) was born Pura Fé Antonia "Toni" Crescioni) is singer-songwriter, musician, story teller, instructor, seamstress, artist and a founding member of the Native Women's a cappella trio Ulali.
The Choctaw Freedmen are former enslaved Africans, Afro-Indigenous, and African Americans who were emancipated and granted citizenship in the Choctaw Nation after the Civil War, according to the tribe's new peace treaty of 1866 with the United States. The term also applies to their contemporary descendants.
Norma "Nana" Howard (1958–2024) was a Choctaw Nation artist from Stigler, Oklahoma, who painted genre scenes of children playing, women working in fields, and other images inspired by family stories and Choctaw life. Howard won her first art award at the 1995 Red Earth Native American Cultural Festival in Oklahoma City. Her work is popular with collectors and critics.
Samantha Fish is an American guitarist and singer-songwriter from Kansas City, Missouri. While often cited as a blues artist, Fish's work features and draws from multiple genres, including rock, country, funk, bluegrass, and ballads.
Maimouna Youssef is an American Grammy nominated singer, songwriter, and rapper. She is of Choctaw, Creek, Cherokee and African American heritage. She performs music under the stage name Mumu Fresh.
Mary Adair is a Cherokee Nation educator and painter based in Oklahoma.
Pretendian is a pejorative colloquialism describing a person who has falsely claimed Indigenous identity by professing to be a citizen of a Native American or Indigenous Canadian tribal nation, or to be descended from Native American or Indigenous Canadian ancestors. As a practice, being a pretendian is considered an extreme form of cultural appropriation, especially if that individual then asserts that they can represent, and speak for, communities from which they do not originate.
