September 30, 2008

Lillette Jenkins-Wisner is a one of a kind. Born in Harlem almost 85 years ago, she could play whatever she heard by the time she was three. The oldest of nine, her parents couldn’t afford a piano but her upstairs neighbor, who little Lillette would visit and “entertain,” offered her a piano if Lillette’s parent would give her music lessons. And Lillette took the financial pressure off her parents by getting scholarships to study music by the time she was 10. Lillette refuses to be pigeonholed; she plays every kind of music. She has been every country in the world following the soldiers as part of the USO in three wars.