Alyssa Allgood

Alyssa Allgood is an award-winning jazz vocalist, composer, arranger and educator with a compelling voice in the modern jazz landscape. Described as “assured and daring” by Downbeat Magazine and “a model of sophisticated song interpretation” by the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago-based artist boldly weaves soulful storytelling and rich improvisational language through original compositions, captivating arrangements and a lyrical focus of self-love and human connection.

Allgood’s exhilarating fourth album, “From Here”, is due April 19, 2024 on Next Records. Recorded with internationally renowned musicians John Patitucci, Kendrick Scott, Geoffrey Keezer and Greg Ward, the music showcases a modern approach to jazz singing with musical interaction and vocal freedom at its core. The album features 10 original songs which show Allgood reaching a new pinnacle of personal expression, emotional observation and artistic achievement. Her three previous albums — What Tomorrow Brings (Cellar Music, 2021), Exactly Like You (Cellar Music, 2018), and her self-released debut Out of the Blue (2016) — trace the remarkable trajectory of a vocalist admired for the clarity of her instrument, the sureness of her phrasing, the range of her improvising, and the burgeoning depth of her interpretative skills.

Allgood first made her name in such legendary Chicago clubs as the Green Mill and the Jazz Showcase, through residences at Winter’s Jazz Club — where she has delved into the songbooks of jazz’s classic divas (Ella Fitzgerald, Carmen McRae, Dinah Washington) — and at the internationally renowned Chicago Jazz Festival. Appearances followed in New York’s famed Birdland, Jazz at Lincoln Center Shanghai (China) and the Shadbolt Centre for the Arts (British Columbia). She was a semifinalist in the 2015 Shure Montreux Jazz Voice Competition, where jazz icon Al Jarreau led the jury, before winning the Inaugural Ella Fitzgerald Jazz Voice Competition (2017) and the David Baker Memorial Scholarship offered through the Jazz Education Network (2022). Closer to home, she was a 2016 Jazz Improvisation Fellow of the Luminarts Cultural Foundation in Chicago and was named Best Jazz Entertainer in the Chicago Music Awards (2019).

A passionate educator, Allgood teaches in the Jazz Department at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She empowers her students to learn with intention and curiosity while building community and inspiring mindfulness through the jazz artform. Allgood is a highly sought-after clinician and has presented masterclasses at many esteemed institutions including the Jazz Education Network Conference, the Illinois Music Educators Association, the Iowa Choral Directors Association, Anchor Music’s Vocal Jazz Academy, Jazzvoice.com, the University of Chicago and Drake University.

Awards

2023 - International Songwriting Competiton Finalist

2023 - John Lennon Songwriting Contest Finalist

2022 - David Baker Memorial Scholarship Jazz Education Network

2022 - International Songwriting Competition Semifinalist

2020- Project grants from Illinois Arts Council and Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs

2019 -Chicago Music Awards Best Jazz Entertainer

2017 - Inagural Ella Fitzgerald Competition Winner

2016 - Luminarts Cultural Foundation Jazz Improvisation Fellow

2015 - Montreux Jazz Voice Competition Semifinalist

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