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Bonnie Raitt

American musician (born 1949)

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
People and ideasInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 23, 2026
Entity authorityQ234693 ↗
Source-derived summary

Bonnie Lynn Raitt (; born November 8, 1949) is an American singer and songwriter. In 1971, Raitt released her self-titled debut album. Following this, she released a series of critically acclaimed roots-influenced albums that incorporated elements of rock, blues, country, and folk. She was also a frequent session player and collaborator with other artists, including Warren Zevon, Little Feat, Jackson Browne, the Pointer Sisters, John Prine, and Leon Russell.

In 1989, after several years of limited commercial success, she had a major hit with her tenth studio album, Nick of Time, which included the song "Nick of Time". The album reached number one on the Billboard 200 chart, and won the Grammy Award for Album of the Year. It has since been selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the United States National Recording Registry. Her following two albums, Luck of the Draw (1991) and Longing in Their Hearts (1994), were multimillion sellers, generating several hit singles, including "Something to Talk About", "Love Sneakin' Up On You", and the ballad "I Can't Make You Love Me" (with Bruce Hornsby on piano). Her 2022 single "Just Like That" won the Grammy Award for Song of the Year.

As of 2025, Raitt has received 13 competitive Grammy Awards, from 31 nominations, as well as a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Bonnie Raitt” is american musician (born 1949). The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Bonnie, Raitt and American, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewStrongest as a route into the people, institutions and dated events that shaped the subject’s public record. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1949, 1971, 1989, 1991—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1949-11-08. For this dossier, Bonnie, Raitt and American is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “american musician (born 1949)” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 23, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q234693. VIAF identifies the subject as 59892402. The Library of Congress control number is n90714709. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1949, 1971, 1989 and 1991.

Critical limits

A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Bonnie Raitt”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Bonnie Raitt primary sources, Bonnie Raitt archive and Bonnie research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Bonnie Raitt”?
  2. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
  3. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Bonnie Raitt” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.