Sandy Graham

Biography

Sandy Graham is an excellent straight-ahead, bop, ballad, and blues singer who is based in Los Angeles. She has a very expressive and at times conversational style that is both soulful and swinging. Born and raised in Santa Barbara, she grew up surrounded by music. Graham sang in her Baptist church as a child and grew up loving jazz. She started out imitating and learning from the recordings of Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday, and Carmen McRae. Graham sat in at jam sessions and at 19 was a professional singer for the first time, performing at the Sapphire Room in West Los Angeles. Her life since then has been wide-ranging and includes time spent working as a model and an actress. Among the highlights of her singing career are performing with Jimmy Rowles in 1973, recording with the Colorado Springs Air Force Band in 1975, performing on a fairly regularly basis with the Nat Pierce/Frank Capp Juggernaut since 1979, working with Bill Berry's L.A. Big Band and the Gerald Wilson Orchestra, performing on several different occasions in Japan, touring Europe with the Duke Ellington All-Stars in the 1990s, and working with pianist Gerald Wiggins. Sandy Graham performs regularly in the Los Angeles area but thus far has surprisingly recorded only three CDs as a leader, one for the defunct Muse label and two more recent efforts (Comes Love and By Request) for Jazz Link. ~ Scott Yanow, All Music Guide