Othella Dallas – Biography

ETERNALLY YOUNG - the 84-year old "Grand Lady" of jazz and blues

Othella Dallas, born 1925 in Memphis, Tennessee as Othella Talmadge Strozier, can look back to a long and famous career. She was discovered by the famous dance teacher Katherine Dunham and was awarded a scholarship to study at her dance school in New York. After the war she herself became a teacher at the Dunham School and a permanent member of the dance company. After a glamorous wedding in Paris in 1949, with Katherine Dunham and Bill Coleman acting as attendants, Othella moved to Switzerland. She was dancing in whole Europe. She started to take up singing and so her stage presence was growing as fast as her repertoire.

Following the death of her mother she returned to New York in 1954. This was the beginning of her successful American singing career. During this period she appeared alongside such greats as Sammy Davis Jr. at the Apollo in Harlem, Duke Ellington in Miami, as well as Sony Stitt and King Curtis, to name just a few. Then she moved back to Switzerland. She opened her own jazz ballet school in Basle. Between 1988 and 1990 she enjoyed major success with her appearances with one-time Woody Hermann saxophonist Sal Nistico and his quartet. She amazed the crowd with her recent appearance with Slide Hampton and John Gordon&s Trombones Unlimited. Her specialty is the mixture of Dance, Show and Jazz which all build up to a sparkling climax. She was worldwide invited to give master classes as for example the "International Vienna Dance Week". And her concerts became all over Europe an event for connoisseurs. All her CD&s were successful – and her new one "I Live The Life I Love" will be the best.

This is the fire of Othella Dallas, a Lil& Gal from Memphis who, as this disk testifies, still "Lives The Life I Love". She toured next to Duke Ellington, Samy Davis Jr. and many of the greatest artists of the scene. The sound of this album started with John Di Martino&s marvelous ability to hone in on Othella&s personality and charisma. He connected to her history and produced arrangements that give her a musical home and make her shine. "Bird In The Sky" and "On My Way Back Home" are new contributions from her son, Peter Wydler. We are lucky to have two of the best audio engineers in the business: Jon Rosenberg, New York and Fred Herrmann, Switzerland. We were wonderfully blessed to have remarkable string players from New York&s Metropolitan Opera.

Othella Dallas is booked for festivals more and more as main act. The Rap- and Hiphop-Generation loves her as well as the jazz and blues connaisseurs.

"I Live The Life I Love" is manufactured with Suonix/Switzerland and will be distributed worldwide. It is a joy to listen to this album. Othella Dallas – she is 83 - and on the top of her career.