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Artist
Betty Wright
12+ albums
soulfunkfemale vocalistsrhythm and bluesrnb
about
Bessie Regina Norris (born December 21, 1953 - died May 10, 2020), better known professionally as Betty Wright, was an American soul and R&B singer, songwriter and background vocalist born in Miami, Florida, who rose to fame in the 1970s with hits such as "Clean Up Woman" and "Tonight is the Night". Wright was also prominent in regard to the use of whistle register, the highest human singing register. She influenced a generation of female singer-songwriters and also influenced the world of hip hop who sampled some of her more popular material. Starting singing gospel with the family group, the Echoes of Joy, Wright began switching to R&B music in 1965 when she was only 11. In 1968, she released her first album, My First Time Around, at the age of 15, and scored her first hit, "Girls Can't Do What Guys Can Do". It was not until the end of 1971 that Wright's most successful phase of her career took place. The song, "Clean Up Woman", became a Top 5 pop and R&B hit, and would later influence a remix of Mary J. Blige's "Real Love" single with the sample of its guitar riffs; R&B girl group trio SWV's "I'm So Into You" also featured a sample from "Clean Up Woman", as did Afrika Bambaataa's song "Zulu War Chant". In 1974, Wright scored big with the songs "Tonight is the Night" (about a real-life love affair that happened with Wright when she was a teenager) and "Where is the Love" (which won her a Grammy for Best R&B Song). After experiencing a brief slump in the early 1980s, she
