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By Laura Claverie

At age 77, Irma Thomas, indisputably the Soul Queen of New Orleans, is showing no sign of slowing down.   

Her singing engagements are as busy as she wants, her charity work is on-going, and the honors for her lifetime musical career continue to pour in. 

“Retirement is not in my vocabulary,” she says emphatically. “I tell people: If you are 50 and don’t have a career, then do something. Find something you love to do and do it. Everyone has a talent.  Switch jobs if you have to.  Slow down if you want. Don’t just sit there and wait to die.”

Irma follows her own advice. She has a packed schedule of appearances, and her velvety voice is as soulful, strong and vibrant as ever. She has been nominated for a Grammy four times and won the coveted award for Best Contemporary Blues album in 2007 for “After the Rain.”  

“So many people thought that album was written after Katrina, but we had it together before the storm hit,” she says. “It was just good fortune and timing.”

After two nominations for a Grammy, Irma didn’t expect to win on that third shot. When her name was called, she just sat there. Husband/manager Emile Jackson kept telling her to get up. Then she heard a scream. “It was me!  I was the one screaming …and I’d won!” She was 66 years old and finally won American music’s highest award.

Irma is tenacious in all things. Born in Ponchatoula in 1941, the only child of Percy and Vader Lee, Irma  began singing in her Baptist church at age 13. By the time she was 15, she was married and pregnant with her first child. A second and third child followed before she was 18. “And then I figured out what was causing it,” she laughs.

Life in the 50s was tough. “There were very few opportunities for a young, black female.  I didn’t have any big ambitions. As a black female, I couldn’t buy a house or eat in many restaurants. I wasn’t even given anesthesia for any of my children’s births, except one stillborn. Only the white women got anesthetics for childbirth. This was the segregated south in the 50s.”

Her first job was washing dishes at the Copper Kitchen Restaurant on Tulane and Carrollton Avenue for 50 cents an hour, but she was fired for– of all things– singing in the kitchen. Her second job was as a waitress at the Pimlico Club, where she often sang with Tommy Ridgley and the Untouchables Band when business was slow. But again, she was fired for singing.

By then, Ridgley was a big fan of Irma’s and got her a recording contract, which helped get her name out, but made her no money. In time, her personal appearances grew and her popularity soared until 1964, when the Beatles took over the music industry. “Things got slow for most musicians during the ‘British Invasion’,” she sighs.

After Hurricane Camille destroyed her work venues along the Mississippi Coast in 1969, Irma moved to California with her family and worked as a clerk at Montgomery Ward. For six years, she flew back and forth to New Orleans when she lined up  good singing gigs. While in California, she got her GED and moved back to New Orleans, the home of her heart.

Throughout her climb to the top, Irma admits she had no mentors, no one to teach her the ropes of the music business. “We were all learning by trial and error,” she says. She eventually received an Associate Degree in Business from Delgado Community College, something she’s rightfully proud of. In September she received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Americana Music Association in Nashville. Last spring, Tulane University awarded her an honorary Doctor of Letters degree, another award she never expected to receive. Yes, you can call her “Dr. Thomas” if you would like.

“I’ve seen so many artists and musicians fail because they didn’t know how to take care of business. I can negotiate my contracts, handle my hard-earned money, pay my taxes all on my own. I know the business and share that knowledge,” she adds.

To that end, Irma sponsors The Irma Thomas Center for W.I. S.E. Women’s Center at Delgado to empower young women to fulfill their personal and professional goals. The center provides young women with financial aid, school supplies, transportation,  and a safe place to study, assistance she would have loved when she was in school.  “We give this help very discreetly. I’m blessed to be able to help others, so I do,” she points out.

Today Irma lives in her New Orleans East home, which she rebuilt after Katrina, with her third husband Emile, to whom she has been married since 1976. Together they have seven adult children, 15 grandchildren and 13 great-grandchildren. She admits that she has trouble keeping all their birthdays straight unless they call her a week or so in advance to remind her.

Her performance schedule is full, and she is always a crowd favorite at the Jazz and Heritage Festival. She sings at as many charity events as she can. “I believe in passing it on. Don’t broadcast it. Just do it,” she says.

The only thing she doesn’t do now, that she did for many years, is make her own gowns. It’s not that she can’t or doesn’t want to. It’s because her CPA told her to buy gowns as that was the only way she could deduct them as a business expense. She is, simply put,  the savvy businesswoman and gifted musician.

“I have always lived by the thought: Can’t nobody block your blessings but you. It’s the choices you make in life that matter,” she says. “God knew better than I knew what was right for me. He gave me a voice, and I use it.”