JUDY JACQUES

Born in Melbourne in 1944 Judy Jacques began her career at the age of 10 when she was featured on radio shows like Rumpus Time and Swallows Juniors. Recognised as one of Australia's most powerful and popular jazz singers since she started as a teenager singing gospel in the early 1960s in which she was the titled ''the teenage Mahalia Jackson''. In 1962 she was first heard on record with The Yarra Yarra New Orleans Jazz Band. She and the band released two EPs and an album 'Jazz As You Like It At City Hall Volume 1' all on the Crest label. This album sold 7000 copies in the first two weeks.

Leaving the band around 1963 and due to her love of gospel music she founded the band The Gospel Four with Doug Surman on piano, Tom Arrowsmith on organ, Bob Brown on bass and Graeme Morris on drums. This ensemble released EP 'Judy Jacques And Her Gospel Four' in 1963. The following year the band released another EP 'Be My Friend' with John Cahill replacing Bob Brown, Bob Vinnard replacing Tom Arrowsmith and Mel McGilvary replacing Graeme Morris.

For more than a decade, Judy was in great demand as an award-winning television performer. This began with contracts with GTV9, doing shows such as In Melbourne Tonight and Bandstand to appearances on most commercial TV shows throughout Australia. When she left Channel Nine she was approached to become a regular artist on a new pop show starring Bobby and Laurie with the ABC. This show Dig We Must ran for 26 weeks. Judy sang everything from pop to musical comedy. The ABC were so impressed with her versatility they offered her a starring role co-compering a new national show called Start Living. The show had a big following and ran for 12 months.

In 1975, after spending a year travelling in Europe, Judy decided to look for other ways in which to express her music.''Jacques is one of the very few singers to emerge from the jazz/folk boom of the early '60's and define a new phase in her musical career in Australia''. - Bruce Johnson The Oxford Companion to Australian Jazz 1987.

This 'new phase' saw Judy broadening the depth and breath of her singing, both stylistically and technically. She has sung traditional jazz, popular standards, daring improvisations, blues and gospel, with bands as different as the Brian Brown Ensemble, Bob Sedergreen's Blues on the Boil, The Yarra Yarra Reunion Band and her own Wild Dog Ensemble and Lighthouse which performed at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1997. In 2003 she won a Bell Award for her album ‘Making Waves’.

SINGLES

''What Can I Do Lord'' 1965 Lombard
''Since You're Gone / You're Messin' Up My Mind'' 1966 Astor
''Somewhere In The World / A Real Live Fool'' 1967 Astor

EPs
'Yarra Yarra New Orleans Jazz Band With Judy Jacques Vol. 1' 1962 Crest
'Yarra Yarra New Orleans Jazz Band With Judy Jacques Vol. 2' 1962 Crest
''Judy Jacques And Her Gospel Four' 1963 Crest
'Be My Friend' 1964 Segue

ALBUMS

'Jazz As You Like It At City Hall Volume 1' 1964 Crest

'Yarra Yarra Reunion Band' 1994 Newmarket Music

'Making Wings' 2002

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References

http://www.wilddoghill.com.au/judy_jacques/html/bio.htm