Blood, Sweat & Tears

Blood, Sweat & Tears (also known as "BS&T") is an American jazz rock music group founded in New York City in 1967, noted for combining a brass section with rock band instrumentation. BS&T has gone through numerous iterations with varying personnel and has encompassed a wide range of musical styles. Their sound has merged rock, pop and R&B/soul music with big band jazz. The Canadian lead singer David Clayton-Thomas was added to the group in 1968 and stayed until 1972, marking their most successful period. The group's second album, Blood, Sweat & Tears, spent seven weeks atop the U.S. charts in 1969, won the Grammy Award for Album of the Year in 1970, and contained the hit recordings "And When I Die", "You've Made Me So Very Happy", and "Spinning Wheel". On the Hot 100, all three peaked at number 2 and lasted thirteen weeks. The follow-up album, Blood, Sweat & Tears 3, also reached number 1 in the U.S. In addition to original music, the group is known for arrangements of popular songs by Laura Nyro, James Taylor, Carole King, the Band, the Rolling Stones, Billie Holiday and many others. The group has also adapted music from Erik Satie, Thelonious Monk and Sergei Prokofiev into their arrangements. The group was inspired by the "brass-rock" of the Buckinghams (produced by James William Guercio) as well as the Maynard Ferguson Orchestra. BS&T's success paralleled that of similarly configured ensembles such as Chicago (also produced by Guercio) and the Electric Flag, but by the mid-1970s the group's popularity began a decline.