BE PART OF THE IMPOSSIBLE
BIO
Cameron Wade
Cameron Wade Loves “Freedom of Expression!”
“I am Cameron Wade -- and I refuse to be put into a box!”
When Cameron Wade collaborates with fellow musicians, he typically goes with their flow! That flow could be funk, jazz, R&B, hip hop, gospel, rock, reggae or pop. People have been telling him for decades that he needs to conform to one genre to make it easier to be “categorized”. To that he says – (expletive deleted)!
The rebellious attitude of singer-songwriter Cameron Wade started many years ago in the little town where he grew up called Lakeview, Long Island – the black section of West Hempstead – a suburb of New York. There were lots of creative musicians in Lakeview, including some of his lifelong collaborators like keyboardists Larry Mays, Ron Brown and Flint Fleming, his brother, Gary Wade, vocalist Angelo Pimienta and many others. Wade, who at the age of 15, started a band with Mays called the Meditations, realized that he loved performing original songs. After graduating from Malverne High School, he and Mays attended Howard University in Washington D.C., where they continued to write and perform music while attending classes in other subjects. During that time, Wade earned a degree from the School of Communications and co-founded the university's first co-ed fraternity/sorority named “Ubiquity.” (Decades later, Wade would write Ubiquity's theme song for the organization's 35th anniversary.) Following graduation from Howard, Wade returned to New York, where he and Mays started a new band called the “Long Island Funk Exchange,” The young upstarts featured a talented singer named Bobby Talbot and an amazing guitar prodigy named Ulric “Eric” Hodge.
In 1993, Wade relocated to Atlanta Georgia with his wife, Diane, and their two children. He received a transfer through his “day job” at the U.S. Postal Service. USPS would play a role in his musical career as many of the 10,000 employees in the Atlanta District, where he served as a letter carrier and later as a writer/photographer for the Communications Department, would become frequent attendees of his live shows. In 1996 Wade released his first album entitled, “Train of Thought.” He spent the next several years performing the original songs from that album with singers Quandra Ray and Linda Shelton. They called themselves “Three A.M.” He also continued to write original songs with his brother and Flint Fleming, who had eventually moved to the Atlanta area themselves. However, after vocal group Three A.M. broke up in 2010, it would be two years before he had the opportunity to perform his songs in front of a live audience again.
One August night in 2012, Wade went to a small Stone Mountain, Georgia Jazz club called Calabar and Grill to watch the set of a gifted saxophone player named Nadra Bingham. He was transfixed by her energy and sound. After 3 sets, they talked about music and after possibly sensing his anguish, she said, “If you ever want to sing a couple of songs in my set, just let me know.” That generous invitation set Wade on a new course and led to some collaborations with a host of awesome Atlanta musicians, including Nadra, jazz keyboardists Madoca and Rod Kelly, jazz bassist Prince Redd, drummer Bobby Lee Henderson, singer Cadetra Young, Quanda Ray (once again), and eventually his former guitarist Eric Hodge and his wife, singer Donna McGhee.
Wade was given Hodge’s number by Henderson when a guitarist he needed for a gig was a no-show. Years ago in New York he had known Hodge as "Eric" but in Atlanta he simply called himself “Rick," so Wade didn't realize he was speaking with his former band mate. Hodge agreed to do the gig but asked Wade two questions: “Aren’t you from New York?” and “Didn’t you have a band called the Long Island Funk Exchange?” After a perplexed Wade answered yes to those two questions, his final question knocked Wade off his seat. “Don’t you know who you’re talking to? – This is your guitar player!”
Apparently Wade and Hodge had lost touch with each other after the Long Island Funk Exchange disbanded and ironically, both had relocated to Atlanta to continue to perform music while raising their families. Their reunion resulted in an album entitled, “One Human Race.” In April, as the pandemic was gathering steam, Wade teamed up with Hodge again for his new solo project entitled "Freedom Of Expression." Each and every one of the people Wade has collaborated with to create this marvelous thing called music has been very special to him. Through his lyrics, he continues to look for ways to uniquely express himself...