The voice of Jimmy Scott is high-pitched and androgynous, transcending gender and age, penetrating the listener with pure heartbreak. It made him a jazz star in the 1950s, influenced legends from Marvin Gaye to Nancy Wilson in the 1960s, and in the 1990s thrust him back in the limelight. But the beauty of Scott's voice was hard-earned.

Born in Cleveland in 1925, Scott idolized his mother. But he was just 13, she was killed, orphaning him and his nine siblings - and leaving no one to help him face Kallmann's Syndrome, a rare genetic deficiency that disrupts and distorts sexual maturation. The devastating syndrome did bless him with one gift: a high, unwavering singing voice. Scott was soon recognised in Cleveland as a musical prodigy, christened "Little Jimmy Scott," and invited to enter the grand whirl of New York's burgeoning 1950s jazz scene.

With full cooperation from Jimmy Scott, his children, his ex-wives and colleagues from Ray Charles to Ruth Brown, Faith In Time is at once an intimate biography, an invaluable history of the years spanning big band to bebop to pop, and the poignant story of a man whose ethereal voice refuses to fade away with time.

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HARDBACK EDITION available