AaronNeville

Biography

Neville was born Aaron Joseph Neville on January 24, 1941, in New Orleans, the third of the four Neville brothers, and grew up in the Calliope housing projects. His singing came out of gospel and doo-wop — the Pilgrim Travelers and the Blind Boys of Alabama on one side, the Flamingos and the Spaniels on the other — with a yodeling cowboy, Gene Autry, behind the vibrato. He sang with his brothers in the Hawkettes, whose "Mardi Gras Mambo" was a regional hit in 1954, and his first solo single, "Over You" (1960, on Minit, produced by Allen Toussaint), reached No. 21 on the R&B chart.

"Tell It Like It Is," released in 1966 on the tiny Par-Lo label, spent five weeks at No. 1 on the R&B chart and reached No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100; it was later inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. The Neville Brothers reunited in 1975 and cut their Capitol debut in 1978, followed by Fiyo on the Bayou (1981) and Yellow Moon (1989), produced by Daniel Lanois, whose "Healing Chant" won the Grammy for Best Pop Instrumental Performance. The band formally disbanded in 2012. Neville's mainstream breakthrough came with Linda Ronstadt's Cry Like a Rainstorm, Howl Like the Wind (Elektra, 1989), produced by Peter Asher, which featured four duets with Neville: "Don't Know Much" won the 1990 Grammy for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal, and "All My Life" won the same award in 1991; both topped the Adult Contemporary chart. Ronstadt then produced his Warm Your Heart (1991), whose cover of "Everybody Plays the Fool" reached No. 8, and The Grand Tour followed in 1993. His duet with Trisha Yearwood, "I Fall to Pieces," won the 1995 Grammy for Best Country Vocal Collaboration.

Hurricane Katrina destroyed his home in eastern New Orleans on August 29, 2005. Days later he sang Randy Newman's "Louisiana 1927" on NBC's A Concert for Hurricane Relief, then the National Anthem at the Saints' home opener and, with Dr. John, at the Super Bowl on February 5, 2006. He now lives on a farm in upstate New York. My True Story (Blue Note, 2013), co-produced by Don Was and Keith Richards, was a set of doo-wop covers; Apache (2016), produced by Eric Krasno, was mostly songs Neville wrote himself, released for his 75th birthday and the 50th anniversary of "Tell It Like It Is." He retired from touring in May 2021, at 80. In 2023 he won a fifth Grammy — "Stompin' Ground," with the Dirty Dozen Brass Band, for Best American Roots Performance — and published his memoir, Tell It Like It Is: My Story.