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Artist
Champian Fulton
12+ albums
vocal jazzjazzUnited StatesFemale Voicesoklahoma
about
Pianist/vocalist Champian Fulton grew up with music in her home. Her father (jazz trumpeter and educator Stephen Fulton) and mother quickly recognized their daughter's interest in music at an early age. The presence of her father's musician friends, including Clark Terry and Major Holley, also served to stimulate her focus on music. She began studying piano with her grandmother at the age of five, while she later took up singing, drums, and trumpet before eventually settling on piano and vocals. The family moved to Lemars, IA, in 1994 after Stephen Fulton became director of the Clark Terry Institute for Jazz Studies. Champian participated in the summer camp jazz program there, where she met other young jazz musicians from her area and formed the Little Jazz Quintet. They would get together to perform a couple of times annually for the next few years, playing shows consisting exclusively of Terry's repertoire, including Terry's 75th birthday party. One of Fulton's first vocal influences was Dinah Washington, especially her album For Those in Love, which she played repeatedly. She admired Nat King Cole (one of the earliest jazz artists to show equal chops on piano and vocals), while she devoured Art Tatum, Red Garland, Wynton Kelly, Bud Powell, Hampton Hawes, Sonny Clark, and Thelonious Monk. In 1999 Champian„s family relocated to Norman OK, where Champian continued to play with her new band while attending high school, appearing at a number of regional jazz festivals.
