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Thirty years working with blues musicians has taught me that there can be great irony woven into the stage names performers choose for themselves — particularly with female players who opt for sugary noms de plume.

But Precious Bryant was different. Precious was her given name, and she lived up to it.

When Music Maker first began working with Precious, she was initially reticent and hard to engage, but what we discovered — when we eventually prevailed and got to know her — was that she was an extremely loving and tender-hearted person, even though she was raised in a world of great deprivation surrounded by brutality.

She was also a world-class flirt, a quality you could hear frequently in her music. She was so sexy, but without a trace of bawdiness. I completely admired this in her.

She also hungered throughout her life for the education she was deprived of as a child and took adult-education classes into her 60s.

This active mind and tender heart were all wrapped up in a generosity of spirit that made her irresistible. She was genuinely precious.

— Denise Duffy