Just to Hear your Voice A tribute to: TONI PRICE

"Toni" Price was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Her adoptive parents, the Prices, named her Luiese Esther after her grandmothers. Her first exposure to blues was through second-generation blueswoman Bonnie Raitt. Luiese later began to study the recordings of women blues singers such as Sippie Wallace and Victoria Spivey, from whose music Raitt herself had learned.

She "musically" grew in Nashville, where she recorded a few country and western singles. However, she felt frustrated by the 'rigid' Nashville music industry. She accepted an invitation to play the South by Southwest music festival in Austin in 1989. The town's music fans "just responded so lovingly that I said that's it. I know where I belong." Price cites vocalists Aretha Franklin, Emmylou Harris, Linda Ronstadt, Patsy Cline, and Ray Charles as her major influences.