A gifted vocalist whose crystalline tone lent itself equally well to rock, pop, R&B, country, and folk, Rita Coolidge built an extensive career as one of the most sought-after backing singers of her era while also pursuing her own recordings. She entered the world in Lafayette, Tennessee, just outside Nashville, during 1945, carrying Cherokee ancestry and receiving her earliest musical exposure in the congregation led by her minister father. Although she majored in art at Florida State University, Coolidge continued to compose and perform on the side, ultimately choosing a professional music path over classroom teaching. After completing her degree she settled briefly in Memphis, where she recorded radio and television jingles, often alongside her sister Priscilla, before joining Delaney & Bonnie as a touring background vocalist. From there she headed west to Los Angeles and quickly established herself on studio dates for Eric Clapton, Stephen Stills, Leon Russell, and Joe Cocker, among many others. Once the road work supporting Cocker’s Mad Dogs & Englishmen concluded, she secured a solo deal with A&M Records.
Her debut album, issued in 1971 under the simple title Rita Coolidge, drew strong reviews yet failed to register with mainstream audiences, a fate shared by the follow-up Nice Feelin’. In the ensuing years she gravitated toward country-rock and the mellow Southern California sound, occupying stylistic ground comparable to that explored by Linda Ronstadt. During this period she wed progressive country songwriter Kris Kristofferson in 1973 and joined him on the duet project Full Moon. The album reached the summit of the country chart, and the track “From the Bottle to the Bottom” earned a Grammy for Best Country Vocal by a Duo or Group. A second collaborative effort, Breakaway, appeared the next year; its single “Lover Please” brought the pair another Grammy in the same category. Commercial success as a solo artist finally arrived with 1977’s Anytime, Anywhere, an album of carefully selected covers that carried a pronounced R&B flavor. Anchored by the Jackie Wilson classic “(Your Love Has Lifted Me) Higher and Higher,” which climbed to number two on the pop chart, along with the Top Ten entry “We’re All Alone” and the Top 20 Temptations cover “The Way You Do the Things You Do,” the record entered the Top Ten and surpassed the million-copy mark. Coolidge and Kristofferson issued one last joint album, Natural Act, in 1979, though their marriage had already begun to unravel and they parted ways by year’s end.
Subsequent solo releases never recaptured the broad pop impact of Anytime, Anywhere, yet Coolidge maintained a steady presence on the adult-contemporary charts into the early 1980s with such singles as “You,” “I’d Rather Leave While I’m in Love,” and “All Time High,” the latter serving as the theme for the James Bond film Octopussy. She left A&M following the 1984 release Inside the Fire and stepped away from recording to focus on social activism. Her return came with 1992’s Love Lessons on the Critique label, after which she issued several projects for independent imprints throughout the remainder of the decade. The 1995 album Cherokee highlighted her renewed engagement with Native American musical traditions; around the same time she joined Priscilla and niece Laura Satterfield to form the trio Walela, which further examined those roots across albums released in 1997 and 2000. Compilation sets appeared in the early 2000s, and in 2005 Coolidge made her Concord debut with And So Is Love, a collection of jazz standards. Seven years later, in 2012, 429 Records issued the holiday project A Rita Coolidge Christmas.
