Joshua Kadison

Joshua Kadison (born February 8 1963 in Santa Barbara, California) is an American singer-songwriter, pianist, and writer.

Early life

Joshua grew up in Westlake Village, California, the younger of two sons. His mother was of Mexican-American Indian descent. At age 12 he started playing the piano and subsequently started to write songs. After his mother died, when he was 15, he received his drivers licence and left home (with the blessing of his father) to become a travelling troubadour. He later admitted that anger and confusion over his mother's death drove much of his songwriting during this time. He later wrote "Mama's Arms" about his pain over losing his mother as a teenager; it was featured on his first album "Painted Desert Serenade". He did the rounds of piano bars across the United States for the next decade. Eventually in the early 1990s he caught the attention of EMI and they signed him.

Career

According to an early press release by EMI, "His maverick ways paid off in 1993 when EMI released his self-penned debut "Painted Desert Serenade", a collection of introspective story songs including the break-through single "Jessie" and "When A Woman Cries," already covered by legends Joe Cocker and Smokey Robinson. "I was so used to being outside of whatever was going on that I didn't even think I'd get a record deal, much less have my songs played on the radio." This, from the young man who received the BMI Award for one of the most played songs of 1994. His international hit "Beautiful in My Eyes" is often played at weddings and peaked at #19 in the U.S. Billboard charts. "Painted Desert Serenade" went platinum in the US and Germany, and went multi-platinum in Australia and New Zealand". According to The "Guinness book of British Hit Singles" Both "Jessie" and "Beautiful in my eyes" both reached the UK Top 40 with Jessie spending 15 weeks in the UK Top 75 with the 2 releases of the song combined and the album reached number 45. "Jessie" is still often heard on UK radio.

His second album "Delilah Blue" was less commercially successful (the single "Take It On Faith" failed to reach a high chart position). His collection of songs were closer to sonic novels than the ballads featured in his first album; he used John Steinbeck's book "The Pearl" as inspiration for a song of the same name. The single "Take it on Faith" failed to reach the Billboards Top-10 and shortly after EMI voided the contract with Kadison. The title track "Delilah Blue" was released as a single in Australia.

In 1997 Joshua featured on Man Doki's duets album "People in Room no8" on the track "Let the music show you the way".

In 1998, he published his book "17 Ways To Eat A Mango: A Discovered Journal Of Life On An Island Of Miracles" and the 5-track-album "Saturday Night In Storyville" on his own label Storyville Records, selling it predominantly from his website. It was well received in Germany, where he continues to have a huge following. In 1999 he released another album via his website called "Troubador in a timequake" which was the first CD to include "My fathers son", he is quoted to have said it was a song written about his father, Ellis who had recently passed away.

In 2000 Joshua recorded a duet with Erikah Karst called "Dragonfly Queen" released as a single under the Mercury label.

Shortly after, he signed a new deal with EMI Germany and his album "Vanishing America", produced by Leslie Mandoki, was released. The album, released in May 2001, dealt with his disillusionment with the lost values of America. The album was a collection of songs that told stories about people not realising their own beauty and full potential. Ironically, the album was never distributed in the United States. The album also included 2 tracks previously used on his late 90's albums, "My father's son" and "Cherry Bowl Drive-in" and a solo version of "Dragonfly Queen" renamed "Begging for grace".

In 2005, Joshua relaunched his career on his self-run website "Radio Humanity." He has since then bought back his previous website address and relaunched it. The Venice Beach Sessions was released as a download only album in 2 parts including a track called "Over the sad songs" thought to be inspired by his recently dissolved relationship.

In 2006, EMI released "Essential" a collection which included tracks from all three full-length studio albums and three additional tracks (formerly b sides).

In 2007 Joshua continued to update his website with regular letters and toured Germany in the Spring.

In 2008 Joshua released the download only album "Return of the dragonfly" and toured Germany again. During the tour he announced that he will no longer be performing as a pianist and will be traveling to learn new instruments and that he plans to relaunch his career in the future with a brand new sound.

Wherever possible at his concerts he allows audience members to sit on the stage, this is evidenced by various videos on YouTube. He also has a "requests" and "q and a" sessions at the end.

Personal life

2005 Kadison came out as a homosexual on his personal website at which time he also stated he had recently left a long term relationship.cite web |title=Letter |url=http://joshuakadison.com/letters.php?p=http://joshuakadison.com/wordpress/?p=10 |date=2007-04-06 |work=JoshuaKadison.com |accessdate=2008-05-22]

Discography

*1993: "Painted Desert Serenade"
*1994: "Premium Gold Collection"
*1995: "Delilah Blue"
*1998: "Saturday night in Storyville"
*1999: "Troubadour in a Timequake"
*2001: "Vanishing America"
*2002: "Jessie"
*2005: "The Venice Beach Sessions - Part 1"
*2006: "The Venice Beach Sessions - Part 2"
*2006: "Essential"
*2008: "Return of the dragonfly"

Books

* "17 ways to eat a mango: A discovered journal of life on an island of miracles." Hyperion, New York 1999. ISBN 0-7868-6457-5

References

External links

* [http://www.joshuakadison.com Official website]
* [http://www.laut.de/wortlaut/artists/k/kadison_joshua/ Joshua Kadison at laut.de (German)]
* [http://launch.groups.yahoo.com/group/kadison/ Yahoo Fanlist]
* [http://www.indyramp.com/music/joshua/bio.html EMI Press Release]