103.9 FM WDKX
Rochester, NY
Your #1 Radio for R&B
On air:
Listen Online
103.9 WDKX Live Stream
REQUEST A SONG!
Request A Song
Funeral and visitation services are set for blues matriarch Koko Taylor, who died Wednesday at age 80 after gastrointestinal surgery.
Visitation will be 4 to 9 p.m. Thursday and 4 to 6 p.m. Friday (June 12), followed by funeral services at 6 p.m. Friday, all at Rainbow Push Coalition National Headquarters, 930 E. 50th St., said a statement Friday from Taylor�s longtime Chicago label, Alligator Records.
Koko Taylor, a sharecropper's daughter whose regal bearing and powerful voice earned her the sobriquet "Queen of the Blues," has died after complications from surgery. She was 80.
Taylor died Wednesday at Northwestern Memorial Hospital about two weeks after having surgery for gastrointestinal bleeding, said Marc Lipkin, director of publicity for her record label, Alligator Records.
"The passion that she brought and the fire and the growl in her voice when she sang was the truth," blues singer and musician Ronnie Baker Brooks said Wednesday. "The music will live on, but it's much better because of Koko. It's a huge loss."
Taylor's career stretched more than five decades. Although she did not have widespread mainstream success, she was revered and beloved by blues aficionados, and earned worldwide acclaim for her work, which including the best-selling song "Wang Dang Doodle" and tunes such as "What Kind of Man Is This" and "I Got What It Takes."
She was nominated seven times for Grammy awards and won in 1984.
