Delta lady : a memoir /

Coolidge, the acclaimed singer/songwriter, takes us through her life and career in this new autobiography. You can't talk about Coolidge without talking about the music scene in the 1960s and 70s, the period during which the author found her voice and had her first success. Coolidge tells both stories here, the personal saga of a young woman who was driven to sing and the account of a time in which pop music itself was finding a new version of itself. Coolidge speaks openly about her personal and professional relationships (sometimes both were with the same person, as with her complicated relationship with Kris Kristofferson), but readers thumbing through the book looking for dirt or juicy stories will come up mostly empty: this is a positive, uplifting life story, one which ends with its author thanking God and appearing genuinely to mean it. For Coolidge's legion of fans, this is a must-read.--Pitt, David Copyright 2016 Booklist

In the golden years of pop-rock music of the 1960s and '70s, there were very few singers like the Grammy-winning Coolidge, whose memoir reads like a polite, lyrical confessional. She exhibits a deep understanding of human nature as she writes candidly of her loving family, especially her older singing sister, Priscilla, in the Jim Crow state of Tennessee. Upon graduating from Florida State in 1967, she moved to Memphis with Priscilla, who was starting her singing career in a racially mixed music scene with "a more driving Southern feel tinged with jazz and traditional R&B." The Klan burned a cross on their lawn following Priscilla's interracial marriage, and the 1968 killing of Martin Luther King Jr. shattered the Memphis scene; Coolidge fled to California. Once in L.A., she plunged into the music business, singing backup for Leon Russell, Eric Clapton, Joe Cocker, and Stephen Stills and striking gold with such hits as "We're All Alone" and "Higher and Higher." Coolidge's backstage stories of her sessions with Clapton and Cocker, the drug-fueled orgies of the infamous Mad Dog and Englishmen tour, and her romances with Graham Nash and Kris Kristofferson are authentic and intimate. Agent: Daniel Greenberg, Levine Greenberg Literary. (Apr.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

Singer/songwriter Coolidge ("Anytime.Anywhere"), with best-selling author Walker (Laurel Canyon: The Inside Story of Rock-and-Roll's Legendary Neighborhood), candidly relates the story of growing up part-Cherokee in Kentucky and Tennessee during the 1940s and 1950s. Born to a Baptist minister father and schoolteacher mother, Coolidge sang harmony from an early age with her sisters in church. Listening to recordings of Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters, Mississippi John Hurt, and Bob Dylan helped her hone her songwriting craft. Along the way her musical style was influenced by Delaney and Bonnie and their Southern R&B and rock and roll sound. There were relationships with Leon Russell, Graham Nash, and the love of her life and father of her daughter, Kris -Kristofferson. She endured a bad trip on acid and never tried it again. Coolidge recounts her career highlights to include participating in the "Mad Dogs & Englishmen" tour with Joe Cocker in 1970, singing backup vocals on Stephen Stills's "Love the One You're With," and producing her signature duet with Kristofferson, "Help Me Make It Through the Night." VERDICT This title will appeal to fans of the 1960s folk and light rock period. They may also enjoy Walker's Laurel Canyon.-Elizabeth D. Eisen, Appleton P.L., WI © Copyright 2016. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.