About Amina Claudine Myers
Amina Claudine Myers (born March 21, 1942) is an American jazz pianist, organist, vocalist, composer, and arranger. == Biography == Born in Blackwell, Arkansas, "Myers was brought up largely by her great-aunt, a schoolteacher, and her great-uncle, a carpenter by trade who played the clarinet, piano, and flute". She started taking piano lessons around the age of four, including at Sacred Hearts Catholic School, and when she was seven, her family moved to Roosevelt, a Black community outside of Dallas, Texas. Myers took piano and violin lessons, but eventually, partly for financial reasons, settled on the piano, taking weekly lessons of fifteen minutes each. She began to learn some European classical music at high school, but this was interrupted when she and the family moved back to Blackwell. Myers majored in music education at Philander Smith College in Little Rock, Arkansas. In her second year, she was invited to play at The Safari Room in Memphis, Tennessee. This engagement, however, was very brief, as her musical repertoire was too limited. After graduation, she moved in 1963 to Chicago, where she taught music at an elementary school. She also attended classes at Roosevelt University and worked with musicians such as Sonny Stitt and Gene Ammons.
Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.