Preview: Mayisha/South Shore Cultural Center

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This Chicago native’s father earned a good living as a lawyer in Minneapolis, while her mother worked as a TV producer in Chicago (they divorced when she was three), where Mayisha grew up admiring Natalie Cole, Chaka Khan and Diana Ross, who both her parents admired. Though she participated in numerous school musicals – the first being the lead in a production of “The Wiz” (infamous for Sidney Lumet’s 1978 screen version starring Diana Ross and Michael Jackson) when she was twelve, her musical career didn’t really begin until she after she graduated from New York’s Sarah Lawrence College, where she studied vocal performance, creative writing and race and gender studies. Her debut disc “This Much is True” contains a cohesive blend of R&B, funk and soul with a subtle touch of jazz. The music immediately gets the listener moving to the beat, and her powerful voice captivates the listener at once, and you get the feel that uptempo tunes like “Orbit” and “You Don’t Know” might soon be hitting dance floors around the country. Also worth close attention is the only cover on the CD, a blues-tinged version of Peter Gabriel’s 1980s hit “Sledgehammer.” (Ernest Barteldes)

October 3 at South Shore Cultural Center, 7059 S. South Shore, (773)256-0149. 7pm.