Koko Taylor American blues musician was born September 28, 1935 as Cora Walton, on a farm just outside Memphis, Tennessee.

Koko Taylor is a singer known primarily for her rough and powerful vocals and has been called, by blues fans, "the undisputed queen of the blues." She grew up in Memphis and moved to Chicago, Illinois in 1954 with her husband, truck driver Robert "Pops" Taylor.

In the late 1950s, Taylor began singing in Chicago blues clubs. She was spotted by Willie Dixon in 1962, and this led to wider performances and her first recording contract.

In 1965, Taylor was signed by Chess Records, for which her single Wang Dang Doodle became a major hit. Taylor has recorded many versions of this Dixon-penned song over the past several decades and has added more material, both original and covers.

National touring in the late 1960s and early 1970s improved her fan base, and she signed with Alligator Records in 1975. She has since recorded over a dozen albums for that label.

The 1990s found Taylor in movies such as Blues Brothers 2000, and she opened a blues club on Division Street in Chicago in 1994, but closed it in 1999. Koko Taylor has influenced such musicians as Bonnie Raitt, Shemekia Copeland, Janis Joplin, Shannon Curfman, and Susan Tedeschi.

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