New biography reveals many details of singer Al Jarreau's life in Milwaukee and Wisconsin

Musically speaking, Al Jarreau's spectacular genre-crossing voice was also his great career challenge.

Kurt Dietrich develops that theme throughout his new biography of the Milwaukee native, "Never Givin' Up: The Life and Music of Al Jarreau" (Wisconsin Historical Society Press).

Jarreau's hit songs included “We’re in This Love Together,” which reached No. 15 on the Billboard Top 100 chart; "Mornin'," which made it to No. 21; and the theme song for the TV series “Moonlighting,” which peaked at No. 23.

Jarreau (1940-2017) had extraordinary vocal fluidity and playfulness that made him a jazz natural, as evidenced by his vocalese takes on "Take Five," "Blue Rondo a la Turk" and Chick Corea's "Spain." But he performed and recorded in times when jazz, as purists define it, was not reaching a particularly wide audience. Jarreau's six individual Grammy awards included wins in jazz, R&B and pop vocal categories.

Dietrich, a professor emeritus of music at Ripon College, Jarreau's alma mater, spends considerable time going through each of the singer's albums, analyzing their genre approach, their contents and critical reactions to them, including frequent carping from DownBeat reviewers about the music not being jazz enough.

Another motif in Dietrich's book is the positive messaging and general feeling of uplift in many of Jarreau's songs; Jarreau was the son of a Seventh-day Adventist minister. New York Times critic Stephen Holden succinctly summarized these expressions of positivity as Jarreau's "upbeat cultural ecumenism."

Dietrich will talk about his new bio during a Sept. 23 appearance at Milwaukee Public Library's East Library, 2320 N. Cramer St.

While Jarreau moved away from Wisconsin after college, he continued to identify strongly with his hometown: In the full-length version of his song "Moonlighting," there's a salute to his favorite baseball team, the Milwaukee Braves.

In turn, Milwaukee recently renewed its affection for Jarreau when the Common Council voted unanimously in August to rename the 30th and Cawker Park Area at 2929 N. 30th St. as the Alwin Lopez (Al) Jarreau Park.

Here's a sample of the entertaining and illuminating notes about Jarreau that readers will glean from Dietrich's biography, with special attention paid to Milwaukee and Wisconsin connections.

Jarreau grew up on Reservoir Avenue

The young Jarreau lived with his family at 336 W. Reservoir Ave., in the area now known as Halyard Park. When the Jarreaus bought the house, they were the first Black family in the neighborhood, Dietrich writes. As a boy, Jarreau occasionally made a few bucks as a pinsetter at a nearby Catholic Youth Organization bowling alley. He walked to Henry L. Palmer School on North First Street for his elementary education, passing Kilbourn Reservoir Park on the way. Later, Jarreau named his music publishing company Reservoir Inc.

Jarreau attended Lincoln High School

He attended Lincoln High School at North Cass and East Knapp streets, now Lincoln Center of the Arts, a middle school. On the way to school, he and a friend regularly stopped at a neighbor's house to carry her wheelchair-using son down the stairs to the sidewalk, where a school bus would pick the boy up. As a high schooler, Jarreau served one day as a temporary legislator for the Milwaukee Common Council.

Jarreau made his mark at Badger Boys State

The summer before his senior year of high school, Jarreau attended Badger Boys State, an American Legion-sponsored mock government program held annually at Ripon College. His father was concerned for Al's safety as a young Black person at a small-town, almost exclusively white event in rural Wisconsin. But in an early display of his charisma, Jarreau was elected governor of that year's cohort.

Jarreau was a good baseball player

He was a notable high school athlete. Playing second base for Lincoln High, Jarreau was named to all-city baseball teams by both The Milwaukee Journal and Milwaukee Sentinel, Dietrich reports. Jarreau also was invited to invitational baseball camps hosted by the Milwaukee Braves.

Jarreau had four eventful years at Ripon College

Jarreau's time at Badger Boys State led directly to his attending Ripon College. Being elected Badger Boys governor won him an automatic $700 scholarship. But initially, he found Ripon tough going academically, flunking French and European history courses. He lost his scholarship, but the boys basketball coach helped Jarreau find a job on campus. Jarreau played basketball all four years at Ripon. He also co-founded a vocal quartet, the Indigos, which had off-campus gigs as far away as Milwaukee. While Jarreau did not often talk directly about race, he was hip to his situation. A friend reported that when Jarreau would hitchhike home to Milwaukee, he'd hold up a sign that read "UNARMED."

Jarreau learned compassion as a rehabilitation counselor

During his school years, Jarreau's early singing jobs in Milwaukee included the Driftwood Lounge on Capitol Drive, the Pfister Hotel, Sardino's on the east side, and the Holiday House. He surprised many musical colleagues here with his decision to go to graduate school at the University of Iowa, where he earned a master's degree in vocational rehabilitation. Moving to San Francisco, Jarreau worked for four years as a rehabilitation counselor. "I was a good counselor but terrible about the bureaucratic aspects of the gigs, like filling out reports," Jarreau said. He believed that work sharpened his compassion for others: "When you sit there across from a guy who’s an amputee, when you sit there across from someone who has cerebral palsy, when you sit there across from someone who just got back from rehabilitation because he was on drugs and he’s still struggling with that, when you sit across from people like that, it changes you. It changed me.”

Jarreau was one degree of separation from a famous radio show

One of Jarreau's close early collaborators in the Twin Cities and then California was a talented teenage pianist named Richard Dworsky — who would go on to spend more than two decades as music director for Garrison Keillor's radio program "A Prairie Home Companion."

Before MTV existed, Jarreau got a boost from a music video

Jarreau got an early boost from a music video, several years before MTV began. To promote Jarreau's 1978 live album "Look to the Rainbow," his manager Pat Rains hired a young director to make a four-minute video of Jarreau singing "We Got By." (That director was Penelope Spheeris, who would go on to make successful full-length films including "Wayne's World" and "The Decline of Western Civilization.") Rains was inspired by seeing a music video of Joan Armatrading singing as a pre-movie feature in London. Rains bought time in neighborhood movie theaters in a number of cities; the exposure helped make "Rainbow" Jarreau's bestseller to that point.

Jarreau wanted to make an 'Unforgettable' biographical movie

Announcements were made in 1985 that Jarreau would star in a biographical film about singer Nat King Cole, whom Jarreau admired. He was working with Cole's son Kelly on the project. To Jarreau's disappointment, the film did not get off the ground.

Jarreau was fussy about his ride

Later in life, Jarreau had a specific request in his contract rider for performances: He did not want to be transported in a Cadillac Escalade. "He didn’t like the vehicle itself, but he also resented the assumption that because he was African American he would want to be driven around town in an Escalade, which had become a status symbol for many Black artists and athletes," Dietrich writes.

If you go

Kurt Dietrich will speak about "Never Givin' Up: The Life and Music of Al Jarreau" at 3 p.m. Sept. 23 at Milwaukee Public Library's East Library, 2320 N. Cramer St. Admission is free. Register for this event at kurtdietrichmpl.eventbrite.com.

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: 'Never Givin' Up' full of details about Al Jarreau's Milwaukee years