Aaron Neville Quintet feat. Charles Neville
With special Opening Act Davina and the Vagabonds
Aaron Neville is one of the absolute giants of New Orleans music and one of the most visible figures in the soul world. Neville’s career is as unique and multivalent as his voice, ranging from soul and funk to adult contemporary and country.
After five decades of consistent hit-making, Neville has, in the words of one Rolling Stone writer, “reached a highpoint in a career marked by artistic superlatives. Bring It On Home – The Soul Classics is an album for the ages and Neville’s most remarkable work to date.”
Born January 24, 1941, Aaron is the third of the four famous Neville Brothers of New Orleans. A product of that city’s richly complex musical culture, his first vocal model was older brother Art, keyboardist and founder of the Meters. Brother Charles played sax with B.B. King while brother Cyril became Aaron’s partner in a funk band they called the Soul Machine. Throughout the sixties Aaron recorded for local Louisiana labels, but it wasn’t until 1966 that he broke onto the national scene with “Tell It Like It Is,” the plaintive ballad that went #1 on the pop charts, a song still considered a classic in the annals of American music.
The Neville Brothers began their string of successful albums in 1977,
beginning on Capitol and moving to A&M. The high point came in 1989 with “Yellow Moon,” written and sung by Aaron, whose solo career was revived in 1991 with Warm Your Heart, the acclaimed album produced by George Massenburg and Linda Ronstadt.
Aaron has won four Grammys: in 1989 for Best Pop Duo with Linda Ronstadt for “Don’t Know Much”; in 1989 for Best Pop Instrumental Performance with the Neville Brothers for “Healing Chant,”; in 1990 for Best Pop Duo with Linda Ronstadt for “All My Life”; and for Best Country Collaboration with Vocals with Trisha Yearwood for “I Fall to Pieces” in 1994.
He was named “Best Male Singer” two straight years in the Rolling Stone critics’ poll. Aaron has recorded a dozen solo albums ranging in genre from gospel to country to jazz to classic soul. And classic soul has been woven through every song he has ever sung.
“The truth is that, as a vocalist, he’s on a par with the artists who made these tunes legendary-Marvin Gaye, Sam Cooke, Al Green, Otis Redding, Curtis Mayfield.” – Producer Stewart Levine
