Biography
R&B singer Sharon Jones stands out among performers who waited an exceptionally long time before achieving widespread recognition, only to earn widespread praise once listeners discovered her work. Jones entered the world on May 4, 1956, in Augusta, Georgia, as the youngest of six children; her mother Ella Mae Price Jones also raised four cousins following her sister’s death. The family relocated from Georgia to Brooklyn’s Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood during Jones’s childhood, although summers were frequently spent back in Augusta. Early on she and her siblings developed a passion for James Brown—himself an Augusta native who had known Ella in her youth—and created dance routines to his recordings. Jones later named Sam Cooke, Aretha Franklin, Otis Redding, and numerous Motown stars among her principal inspirations.
Her first performances took place in the choir of Brooklyn’s Universal Church of God. Eager to turn professional, Jones joined a succession of local funk groups in the early 1970s, yet none secured a recording contract despite steady live work. She supported herself through jobs that included guarding armored cars and serving as a corrections officer at Rikers Island while continuing to sing in bars and at weddings. In 1996, Gabriel Roth and Philippe Lehman of Pure Records recruited her for backing vocals on a Lee Fields session; impressed by her ability to supply all the harmonies alone when the other singers failed to appear, Roth later featured Jones on two tracks—“Switchblade” and “The Landlord”—for the Soul Providers’ album Soul Tequila. After Pure folded, Roth and Lehman founded Desco Records and issued three 7-inch singles fronted by Jones and backed by the Soul Providers: “Damn It’s Hot” in 1996, “Bump N Touch Part 1” in 1997, and “You Better Think Twice” in 1998. The singles, whose lyrics Jones herself wrote, circulated widely among collectors who sometimes mistook them for vintage 1960s and 1970s recordings.
Jones’s 2002 debut Dap Dippin’ with Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings first brought her sound to a broader public. Her 2010 release I Learned the Hard Way captured the singer and band at full strength, while 2017’s Soul of a Woman showcased Jones performing at peak ability even as she battled cancer. The 2007 album 100 Days, 100 Nights marked her first chart entry, reaching number 194 on the pop listing and number 97 on the R&B chart. That same year she appeared as a juke-joint singer in Denzel Washington’s film The Great Debaters and toured with Lou Reed. In 2009 Michael Bublé invited her to duet on “Baby (You’ve Got What It Takes)” for his album Crazy Love. After carving out time from the road, Jones and the Dap-Kings recorded I Learned the Hard Way, which climbed to number 15 on the U.S. album chart in 2010. Growing British popularity prompted Daptone to compile non-album singles and live favorites on the collection Soul Time!.
Jones disclosed in 2013 that she had been diagnosed first with bile-duct cancer and later with stage-two pancreatic cancer, yet she maintained a performance schedule around chemotherapy treatments, occasionally appearing bald from treatment. Late that year she finished Give the People What They Want, issued in January 2014 and nominated for a Grammy as Best R&B Album. Filmmaker Barbara Kopple premiered the documentary Miss Sharon Jones! at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival; Jones attended the screening and, after announcing the cancer’s return, declared, “I’m gonna keep fighting, we got a long way to go.” In October 2015 the indefatigable singer and band issued the holiday collection It’s a Holiday Soul Party. As the documentary prepared for wider release, Daptone put out its soundtrack in August 2016, including the new autobiographical track “I’m Still Here.” Jones succumbed to cancer in November 2016 at age 60. She had completed vocal tracks for a final album, Soul of a Woman, which appeared in November 2017. A 2021 collection, Just Dropped in to See What Condition My Rendition Was In, gathered covers she had recorded with the Dap-Kings across their partnership.
Her first performances took place in the choir of Brooklyn’s Universal Church of God. Eager to turn professional, Jones joined a succession of local funk groups in the early 1970s, yet none secured a recording contract despite steady live work. She supported herself through jobs that included guarding armored cars and serving as a corrections officer at Rikers Island while continuing to sing in bars and at weddings. In 1996, Gabriel Roth and Philippe Lehman of Pure Records recruited her for backing vocals on a Lee Fields session; impressed by her ability to supply all the harmonies alone when the other singers failed to appear, Roth later featured Jones on two tracks—“Switchblade” and “The Landlord”—for the Soul Providers’ album Soul Tequila. After Pure folded, Roth and Lehman founded Desco Records and issued three 7-inch singles fronted by Jones and backed by the Soul Providers: “Damn It’s Hot” in 1996, “Bump N Touch Part 1” in 1997, and “You Better Think Twice” in 1998. The singles, whose lyrics Jones herself wrote, circulated widely among collectors who sometimes mistook them for vintage 1960s and 1970s recordings.
Jones’s 2002 debut Dap Dippin’ with Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings first brought her sound to a broader public. Her 2010 release I Learned the Hard Way captured the singer and band at full strength, while 2017’s Soul of a Woman showcased Jones performing at peak ability even as she battled cancer. The 2007 album 100 Days, 100 Nights marked her first chart entry, reaching number 194 on the pop listing and number 97 on the R&B chart. That same year she appeared as a juke-joint singer in Denzel Washington’s film The Great Debaters and toured with Lou Reed. In 2009 Michael Bublé invited her to duet on “Baby (You’ve Got What It Takes)” for his album Crazy Love. After carving out time from the road, Jones and the Dap-Kings recorded I Learned the Hard Way, which climbed to number 15 on the U.S. album chart in 2010. Growing British popularity prompted Daptone to compile non-album singles and live favorites on the collection Soul Time!.
Jones disclosed in 2013 that she had been diagnosed first with bile-duct cancer and later with stage-two pancreatic cancer, yet she maintained a performance schedule around chemotherapy treatments, occasionally appearing bald from treatment. Late that year she finished Give the People What They Want, issued in January 2014 and nominated for a Grammy as Best R&B Album. Filmmaker Barbara Kopple premiered the documentary Miss Sharon Jones! at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival; Jones attended the screening and, after announcing the cancer’s return, declared, “I’m gonna keep fighting, we got a long way to go.” In October 2015 the indefatigable singer and band issued the holiday collection It’s a Holiday Soul Party. As the documentary prepared for wider release, Daptone put out its soundtrack in August 2016, including the new autobiographical track “I’m Still Here.” Jones succumbed to cancer in November 2016 at age 60. She had completed vocal tracks for a final album, Soul of a Woman, which appeared in November 2017. A 2021 collection, Just Dropped in to See What Condition My Rendition Was In, gathered covers she had recorded with the Dap-Kings across their partnership.