Elnora Jean Wallace Nora won the West Tallahatchie High School Talent Show for singing, and began to perform in other schools in her local area. Dawkins band, including Bruso, appeared at the
Chicago Blues Festival in 1989. Bruso also participated on
Kant Sheck Dees Bluze (1991), another Dawkins release, this time on Earwig Records. In 1992, she left the
music industry to raise her two sons, but almost a decade later was tempted back into a recording studio following the promptings of
Billy Flynn, another member of Dawkins' backing band. Her live appearances continued and included the
King Biscuit Blues Festival,
Rawa Blues Festival,
Notodden Blues Festival (2005),
Briggs Farm Blues Festival (2008), Cape May Jazz Festival and Pocono Blues Festival. She appeared again at the Chicago Blues Festival in 2011. In 2011, the
Chicago Sun-Times noted that her collaboration with Little Bobby for the latter's album,
Good Blues, "... helped push Nora Jean to her seventh Blues Music Award nomination for 'Best Traditional Female Blues Performer'." In June 2014, she appeared with
Lurrie Bell's Chicago Blues Band in Pyla-sur-Mer, France. In July 2015, she performed at the
Kingston Mines club in Chicago. Bruso is currently based in
La Porte, Indiana. In 2020, she released her latest album,
Blues Woman. ==Discography==