Musicians Illustrated

Because I've always been a music lover, I'm attracted to drawing the personalities that rise to prominence... thus, Musicians Illustrated.When I pushed the pens at The Wall Street Journal as head illustrator, there was a trio called the Thompson Twins. They were enough of a splash that the WSJ ran a story about them. Here is the finished work:It's always great to have high-quality material to work with, as I had here. This image was created for a one-column space in the paper, about 2-and-a-quarter inches across. It is impressive how we achieved such detail in the newspaper at the time!Above, the African superstar, Youssou N'Dour. I drew this image for the New Yorker magazine. I worked for the New Yorker pretty steadily for a couple of years. It is still my favorite 'zine. Also for the New Yorker (Hello, Eustace!), the illustration below was made to announce a perfrmance by the pop trio, "Animal Logic".Last of the New Yorker illustrations in this post, the Eighties rocker, "Sylvain Sylvain"...That was a great publishing gig, with lots of interesting imagery to re-imagine! After leaving my day-job at The Journal, it was good to keep a foot in the periodicals game.Lastly, to bring you completely up-to-date, an illustration I produced last week -- the legendary blues artist, Sister Rosetta Tharpe.Here is a detail from the drawing:I hope you enjoyed this brief survey from the realm of pop, rock and blues. Feel free to comment... I look forward to hearing from you, Dear Reader.

All images, c. Kevin Sprouls