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Female singers who manage to stir a whole genre are seldom found. Diana Krall and Norah Jones are such outstanding talents who gave vocal jazz a whole new colour, and Korean singer Youn Sun Nah has been equally phenomenal. In the last few years, she has conquered the music world with her albums Voyage (2009) and Same Girl (2010) released on ACT Music.
Within two years, Nah had received her fourth “Korean Music Award,” the BMW World Jazz Award and the ECHO Jazz Award for best international female singer whilst in France, her second home, Same Girl was the best-selling jazz album of the year in 2011, Nah received the “Prix Mimi Perrin du Jazz Vocal” as female vocalist of the year, the leading magazine “Jazzman” awarded her with “Choc de l’annee 2012” as artist of the year and she was granted the title of nobility “Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres” by the culture secretary, putting her in the prominent company of such stars as David Bowie, Dee Dee Bridgewater and Dustin Hoffman.
What is the secret of her remarkable success? Her new album Lento (available on June 11) gives an explanation by combining Nah’s unique qualities. One of them is the blending of different cultural and musical sources, in a respectful yet unconventional manner. Besides jazz and related styles, she draws on chanson, pop and folk music, and in addition to compositions by herself and her band members, there is the extremely light version of the Korean folk song “Arirang” as well as “Hurt” by the alternative rock band Nine Inch Nails, and Stan Jones’ “Ghost Riders in the Sky,” a classic country song made famous by Johnny Cash.
For the first time Nah also calls upon European classical music: Alexander Scriabin’s “Prelude op. 16 No. 4 in E minor” with its tempo indication “Lento” was a source of inspiration for the album’s title, and it also sets up an intimate, atmospheric and harmonious musical world. Nah unfolds her expressive power especially in the peaceful and slow-paced moments – on the fragile chanson “Full Circle,” with heartbreaking grievance on “Lament” or artistic unison singing on “Momento Magico.”
It has been 15 years since bassist Kyle Eastwood burst onto the jazz scene with his 1998 debut, From There to Here. At that moment in his budding career, the press seemed more preoccupied with his paternal lineage (he’s the son of famed actor-director Clint Eastwood) than his music. Over the course of the four subsequent releases – 2004’s Paris Blue, 2005’s Now, 2009’s Metropolitan and 2011’s Songs from the Chateau – Eastwood built up an impressive body of work while earning respect in musician circles. With his sixth release as a leader, The View from Here on the JazzVillage label, he demonstrates a strong command of both electric and upright basses while expanding into more adventurous territory that is informed as much by jazz as it is by world music.
“I’ve always loved music from other countries,” says the Carmel, California native who has resided in Paris for the past eight years in a news release. “Living in France, you hear a lot of North African and Middle Eastern music, and you can hear some of those influences on this new recording.”
Accompanied by a London-based crew of stellar young musicians worthy of wide recognition — pianist Andrew McCormack, tenor saxophonist Graeme Blevins, trumpeter Quentin Collins and drummer Martyn Kaine — Eastwood and company blend infectious grooves and outstanding improvisations throughout eleven diverse tracks on The View from Here.
“They’re all really talented players,” says Eastwood, “and we’ve been playing together for a while now, developing a real band chemistry. We ended up writing a lot of these new tunes together either at rehearsals or out on the road during last year’s tour around Europe. Sometimes I would come up with a couple of ideas or Andrew might bring something in, then everybody would just add on to it after that.”
In addition to his six solo albums, Eastwood has also contributed music to eight of his father’s films: The Rookie (1990), Mystic River (2002), Million Dollar Baby (2004), Flags of our Fathers (2006), Letters from Iwo Jima (2006), Changeling (2008), Gran Torino (2008) and Invictus (2009). And while he takes pride in those credits, his most personal, fully realized and rewarding project to date is his current quintet offering, The View from Here.
On her new album, Glass Song, Moscow-born pianist/composer Yelena Eckemoff celebrates the season of renewal that ushers winter into spring with a mesmerizing set of crystalline beauty, available on L & H Production. In crafting this, the latest expression of her gorgeously delicate blend of classical intricacy and jazz invention, Eckemoff brings together two of modern music’s greatest improvisers for the first time: bassist Arild Andersen and drummer Peter Erskine.
Eckemoff herself is no stranger to rebirth. Classically trained, she has successfully transitioned into a strikingly assured jazz composer; raised in the Soviet Union, she fled her repressive homeland and has lived in the United States for the past two decades. Her evocations on spring’s rejuvenating thaw vividly illustrate her life experiences, as she hints in her liner notes.
“The same way as spring is always certain to replace even the most severe winter,” she writes, “hope is eternally present in the least favorable situations and in all circumstances of life.”
Eckemoff frequently turns to images of nature when composing, from the wintry landscapes of Cold Sun to the serene breezes of Grass Catching the Wind. But as she explains, the seasons suggest the constant change and evolution in life, which is even more important to her music. “I get inspired by nature a lot, because everything comes from nature,” she says in a news release. “But the observation of nature isn’t really my priority. I’ve had very, very rich experiences in my life, and the music I write expresses those feelings.”
Glass Song conjures images of sun glinting off of ice and frost melting away from windowpanes. It is also quite literal on the title track, which begins with the sound of Eckemoff playing water-filled glasses. But those concepts are equally present in the airy chill that opens the first track, “Melting Ice,” or in the shimmering rhythms of “Dripping Icicles.”
The trio that Eckemoff has assembled to help realize these reflective visions is composed of two of jazz’s most creative minds – who remarkably had not worked together prior to this recording. The legendary Erskine played with Weather Report and Steps Ahead in the early years of a career that has now spanned four decades and includes recordings and performances with everyone from Steely Dan to John Abercrombie, Joni Mitchell to Gary Burton and Pat Metheny. Norwegian bassist, Andersen, has an equally impressive resume, encompassing a six-year stint in the Jan Garbarek Quartet and more than a dozen albums as a leader for ECM.
Erskine had worked with Eckemoff on two earlier CDs, but the pianist had been searching for an opportunity to work with Andersen for a number of years, and Glass Song provided the perfect collection of material. “I was really excited about having the opportunity to put together those two giants for the first time,” Eckemoff says.
The combination works spectacularly, three distinctive voices seeming to breathe as one. The sensitivity of Erskine and Andersen serves Eckemoff’s fragile compositions with an airy but sure touch. The lush serenity of the leader’s piano is matched by the singing caress of Andersen’s bass and the hushed precision of Erskine’s percussion. The trio shares a deep intimacy while remaining attuned to the spaciousness of the pieces, all captured in the wondrously lush sound of the recording.
Eckemoff herself began playing piano at the age of four, studying first with her mother Olga, a professional pianist, then at the prestigious Gnessins Academy of Music and the Moscow State Conservatory. Despite the repressive atmosphere in the Soviet Union at the time, she began to explore rock and jazz music with other like-minded musicians. “Everything from the west was prohibited at that time,” she recalls, “and jazz was one of those things. But there was a jazz studio formed by some activists who were also professional musicians and we studied traditional jazz. I used jazz principles in my composing, which put me on a different path from other musicians.”
Eckemoff stepped away from her life as a concert pianist for several years to concentrate on raising her children. She finally left the Soviet Union with her husband, momentarily leaving her three children behind. “That was the hardest thing I ever did,” she says, “but we had the drive to leave Russia. It was a very hard and scary thing to do, but it worked out and we never regretted it. It ended up helping me in my musical development because I had much deeper spiritual experiences because of it.”
That sense of spiritual comes vividly to life in pieces like the sun-dappled “Sunny Day in the Woods” or the tender, evanescent “Sweet Dreams.” While the titles are accurate depictions, they’re almost unnecessary given the illustrative, purely emotional music itself. Once resettled in the States, Eckemoff returned to recording, taking advantage of modern recording techniques. Since then she has been stunningly prolific, first with classically oriented recordings and then with her reinvention as an elegant jazz musician in the past several years.
“Some people dance, some people sing, some people write,” Eckemoff explains. “When I feel something, I compose. It’s almost like I can’t stop it. My head is always filled with music. If I couldn’t write music I think I would just explode. Life is sometimes sad, but I find escape in writing music. I’m happy because I can do it.”
Terri Lyne Carrington. Photo Credit: Annette Brown
In 1962, Duke Ellington recorded a trio date with bassist Charlie Mingus and drummer Max Roach that is today considered one of the pivotal jazz recordings of the 1960s. Money Jungle, the 1963 album that emerged from the session, was – among other things – a commentary on the perennial tug-of-war between art and commerce. In some ways, the album’s 11 tracks were intended as a sort of counterbalance to the capitalist bent of the Mad Men generation.
Fifty years later, this precarious balance in the world of jazz – or in any art form, for that matter – hasn’t changed much. Enter Grammy Award-winning drummer, composer and bandleader Terri Lyne Carrington, who enlists the aid of two high-profile collaborators – keyboardist Gerald Clayton and bassist Christian McBride – to pay tribute to Duke, his trio and his creative vision with a cover of this historic recording. Carrington’s Money Jungle: Provocative in Blue was released by Concord Jazz on Feb. 5, 2013.
Duke’s original recording is something that has haunted Carrington since she first heard it about a decade ago. “I had bought it on CD, from the discount bin in a music store,” she says in a news release. “I put it on in my car, and I immediately just felt something mysterious about it. There was just an energy that moved through the tracks. Duke and Charles and Max had a chemistry about them. There was this tension that you could hear, and yet they fit together like a hand in a glove.”
In preparation for the project, Carrington read up on Duke’s biography. “I felt like a method actor, she says. “I just dug as deep as I could in the time that I had to get a glimpse of his perspective on things. When you start rearranging music by someone like Duke Ellington, you better feel really good about what you’re doing. In the end, I felt confident that I didn’t do him a disservice, because he was a very open-minded artist, and he was very much about moving forward.”
Carrington considers her Money Jungle – like its predecessor – primarily a trio album, but she’s not averse to some enhancement and additional textures along the way. Helping out with the rearrangements and reinterpretations is an impressive list of guest artists: trumpeter Clark Terry, trombonist Robin Eubanks, reed players Tia Fuller and Antonio Hart, guitarist Nir Felder, percussionist Arturo Stabile and vocalists Shea Rose and Lizz Wright. Herbie Hancock appears in a spoken word segment as the voice of Duke Ellington.
The music of Duke’s Money Jungle may have first emerged a half-century ago, but “there’s nothing old about great music and great musicians,” says Carrington, who sees her own Money Jungle: Provocative in Blue as addressing some of the same issues as its 1963 predecessor. “There’s always something that’s new, if you know how to listen to it. You have to be able to appreciate the past if you want to have a future. I think that’s a big part of our job as artists and entertainers and educators – to keep reminding the younger musicians how important our predecessors were – especially the people who made the music what it is today. So it was my goal to bring some fresh light and fresh energy to some of Duke’s music in general and this recording in particular.”
Left to right: Cleotha, Yvonne and Mavis Staples. Roebuck “Pops” Staples is seated. Photo Provided – 1984.
According to a recent news release, Cleotha ‘Cleedi’ Staples, a founding member of the pioneering folk-gospel group, The Staple Singers, has died at age 78. She had battled Alzheimer’s disease for the last decade and passed away peacefully at her Chicago home on Feb. 21, 2013.
Staples was born April 11, 1934 in Drew, Mississippi. She was the first-born child of Roebuck “Pops” Staples and his wife, Oceola. The family moved to Chicago in 1936 for better job opportunities. In the Windy City, siblings Pervis, Yvonne, Mavis and Cynthia were born. Pops worked a variety of manual labor jobs during the day, and Oceola worked at the Morrison Hotel at night. To entertain the children in the evening, Pops began to teach them gospel songs while he strummed along on his $10 guitar. His sister Katie enjoyed the sing-a-longs so much that she arranged for the family to sing at her church one Sunday morning in 1948. The family was called out for three encores and more than $7 was raised in the offering basket. Pops realized the family group had a future, and The Staple Singers were born.
The group began to sing on WTAQ 1360 AM radio and made its first recording with “These Are They” for Pops’ own Royal Records in 1953. They then recorded for United Records before striking gold with Vee Jay Records where they recorded “If I Could Hear My Mother Pray Again” in 1956. With Pops’ blues-influenced guitar, Cleotha’s bright high notes, Pervis’ falsetto and Mavis rich contralto, they were on their way to stardom. They became one of the biggest gospel outfits of the era and turned out best-selling gospel classics such as “On My Way to Heaven,” “Will The Circle Be Unbroken,” “Don’t Knock,” “Pray On” and their signature hit, “Uncloudy Day,” generally accepted to be the first gospel record to sell one million copies.
The family became active in the Civil Rights movement after hearing Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. preach at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, AL in 1962 while on tour, and they often performed at events at the request of Dr. King. As they became immersed in the Movement, their music broadened from gospel music to more mainstream material. In 1963 they became the first black recording artists to cover a Bob Dylan song (“Blowin’ in the Wind”), and they also recorded songs of protest such as “For What It’s Worth,” “Freedom Highway” and “Why? (Am I Treated So Bad).” By 1968, when Pervis had left the group for the Army, and Yvonne Staples took his place, they began to record for Stax Records, home of southern soul stars such as Otis Redding, Booker T. & The MGs and Sam & Dave.
At Stax, the Staples enjoyed a run of Top 40 hits, becoming known as “God’s greatest hitmakers” with such songs as “Heavy Makes You Happy (Sha-Na-Boom Boom Yeah)” (1971), “This World” (1972), “Oh La De Da” (1973), “Touch a Hand, Make a Friend” (1974) and “City in the Sky” (1974). The iconic million-seller “I’ll Take You There” spent a week at No. 1 on the Billboard pop singles chart and four weeks at that spot on the R&B singles chart. The group also earned two other million-sellers at Stax with “Respect Yourself” (1971) and “If You’re Ready (Come Go With Me)” (1973).
Although Pops and Mavis usually handled vocal leads on Staple Singers songs, Cleotha was featured with Eddie Floyd (of “Knock on Wood” fame) on “It’s Too Late” from the 1969 Stax Records duets LP Boy Meets Girl. Her velvety soprano was powerful and dynamic on the bluesy ballad about a lost love. She also appeared with her family’s group in Ghana in 1971 at the Soul To Soul concert, appearing along with Wilson Pickett, Ike & Tina Turner and Santana; at the historic 1972 Wattstax festival in Los Angeles and in Martin Scorsese’s landmark 1978 concert film “The Last Waltz,” in which Ms. Staples and her family sang “The Weight” with The Band. The Soul To Soul concert and the Wattstax Festival, known as “the Black Woodstock,” have both been the subject of recent documentaries.
The Staple Singers moved to Curtis Mayfield’s Curtom label in the mid-1970’s, where they scored another No. 1 smash, “Let’s Do It Again,” in December 1975 before signing with Warner Bros. Records.
Cleotha’s last recordings were with the Staple Singers for backing sessions on Abbey Lincoln’s Devil Got Your Tongue CD (1993) and Pops Staples’ two solo albums, Peace to the Neighborhood (1992) and the GRAMMY Award-winning Father Father (1994). After Pops died in 2000, the Staple Singers ceased to perform as a group.
Ms. Staples was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with her family in 1999 and also received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2005.
Cleotha is survived by her siblings Pervis, Yvonne and Mavis, her dedicated caretakers Penny and Sushi, and a loving and wonderful extended family of nieces, nephews and treasured friends.
Rudresh Mahanthappa's new group - "Gamak." Photo Credit: Zak Shelby-Szyszko
Rudresh Mahanthappa. Photo Credit: Jimmy Katz
Rudresh Mahanthappa’s new group – “Gamak.” Photo Credit: Zak Shelby-Szyszko
The idea of hybridity has been central to the music of alto saxophonist/composer Rudresh Mahanthappa throughout his career. Most prominent, of course, has been his highly original fusion of east and west, jazz mixed with the sounds of his Indian heritage. But that’s too easy and linear a depiction of this open-eared and inventive composer, who has absorbed an enormous variety of music into his thinking and amalgamated it into a singular vision.
On his new ACT release, Gamak (available Jan. 29), Mahanthappa continues that multi-directional evolution with a bold, striking set of music that melds leading-edge jazz with innovative reinterpretations of traditional Indian and Middle Eastern approaches, shot through with an electric jolt of prog-rock complexity. Mahanthappa’s distinctly personal sound hybridizes progressive jazz and South Indian classical music in a fluid and forward-looking form that reflects the composer’s own experience growing up a second-generation Indian-American. Just as his personal experience is never wholly lived on one side of the hyphenate or the other, his music speaks in a voice dedicated to forging a new path forward.
Gamak, Mahanthappa’s 13th album as leader or co-leader, marks the debut of a new band that is both a reprise and a reinvention. The album reunites the saxophonist with bassist François Moutin and drummer Dan Weiss, the rhythm section from his long-running quartet, which was last recorded for the 2006 album, Codebook. But the group takes on a radically different sound with the addition of David “Fuze” Fiuczynski, a master of microtonal guitar whose eclectic virtuosity offered Mahanthappa a vast new territory to explore.
“Dave has checked out so much music,”Mahanthappa says of Fiuczynski in a news release. “A lot of eastern music, whether it’s Chinese or Indian or Arabic, and a lot of 20th and 21st century classical music. Not to mention that he has this rock/punk aesthetic that’s evident in his band the Screaming Headless Torsos. And Dan and Francois come from a really wide perspective as well. Dan is just as much into Rush as he is Max Roach or Zakir Hussain. So I knew those guys were going to really bring this stuff to life.”
The name Gamak is derived from the word for ornamentation in Indian classical music, an element that is far more central to that culture than the English word implies. “In South Indian music particularly,” Mahanthappa explains, “melodic ornamentation isn’t random. It’s very specific and stylized and studied.” As for the word’s relevance to his current ensemble he says, “In recontextualizing these things, Gamak can refer to any sort of melodic ornamentation. It’s as applicable to Indian classical music as it is to R&B singers riffing or anything in between.”
Mack Avenue Records is proud to announce the signing of Cécile McLorin Salvant, winner of the 2010 Thelonious Monk International Jazz Vocals Competition. The announcement comes as the 23-year-old prepares for her debut album in 2013, titled Woman Child.
“Recording for Mack Avenue has been a truly wonderful experience,” said Salvant in a news release. “As a young artist, I have found the support and encouragement that is paramount in this stage of my development.”
Al Pryor, Mack Avenue Record’s executive vice president of A&R, said, “Cécile has the preternatural ability to delve deeply into the core of a song and then serve it up to an audience. Calling on the vocal techniques of Ella, Sarah and Betty Carter, together with the intelligence of Billie Holiday’s phrasing and the wisdom of Bessie Smith’s lyricism, she heralds a new generation of female jazz vocalists. We are thrilled to partner with Cécile as she adds the vocation of recording artist to her journey as a jazz singer and performing artist who will undoubtedly contribute to the legacy of those artists who came before her.”
Salvant was born and raised in Miami, Fla., of a French mother and a Haitian father. She began classical piano studies at age five, and began singing in the Miami Choral Society at age eight. Early on, she developed an interest in classical voice, began studying with private instructors, and later with Edward Walker, vocal teacher at the University of Miami.
In 2007, Salvant moved to Aix-en-Provence, France, to study law as well as classical and baroque voice at the Darius Milhaud Conservatory. It was in Aix-en-Provence, with reedist and teacher Jean-François Bonnel, that she began learning about improvisation, instrumental and vocal repertoire ranging from the 1910s on, and sang with her first band. In 2009, after a series of concerts in Paris, she recorded her first project Cécile (self-released), with Jean-François Bonnel’s Paris Quintet. A year later, she won the Thelonious Monk Competition in Washington D.C., judged by Patti Austin, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Kurt Elling, Al Jarreau and Dianne Reeves.
With performance experience in Europe as well as the United States, Salvant has been accompanied by renowned musicians such as Jean-Francois Bonnel, Rodney Whitaker, Aaron Diehl, Dan Nimmer, Sadao Watanabe, Jacky Terrasson (with a noted collaboration on his latest album, Gouache), Archie Shepp, and Jonathan Batiste, among others. She has performed at numerous festivals, including Jazz à Vienne, Ascona, Whitley Bay, Montauban, Foix, the Spoleto Jazz Festival, and the Detroit Jazz Festival; with Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra in New York’s Rose Hall and Chicago’s Symphony Center; and with her own band at the Kennedy Center. Additionally, for the second consecutive year, her sole voice can be heard backing the CHANEL® “Chance” ad campaign.
Take the polyrhythmic electro-acoustic beats of King Crimson and Stickmen drummer Pat Mastelotto, add fuzz-inflected lines of creative electric bassist and producer Lorenzo Feliciati, add jazz-informed textures of Fender Rhodes, Hammond B3 organ, piano and synthesizer player Roy Powell, and finally blend in the unique voice of avant-jazz cornetist Graham Hayne: You will have the raw ingredients of one of the most powerful and unique instrumental groups on the scene today.
On Ouroboros, their second release, the members of Naked Truth boldly push the envelope of contemporary electric instrumental music, an edgy blend of jazz, prog-rock, ambient music and electronica, as they themselves explain.
Graham Haynes, who succeeds original trumpeter Cuong Vu in the lineup and is a longtime collaborator of Bill Laswell as well as part of an ambient-electronica improv duo with DJ Hardedge, says in a news release, “The stuff I do with Hardedge is all completely 100% improvised – Naked Truth is very different in that we try to bring more structure to the music while keeping it loose at the same time.”
“I came to Bill Laswell’s studio in New Jersey with several pre-produced ideas, most of which already involved the drumming of Pat Mastelotto” adds Italian bass player Lorenzo Feliciati, who is also responsible for the whole of the post production and pre-mix of the recording.
Roy Powell continues: “I had several ambient textures recorded at my studio in Oslo with my prepared piano and new Moog things done on the iPad. Then after listening to it, Pat and Lorenzo put down a rhythm track – Pat using both electric drums and an acoustic kit simultaneously, which he is a monster at doing. And finally Graham found a space for his lyrical and inventively treated cornet work to round off the whole process.”
“The main thing for me,” says Haynes, “is I didn’t want to just play over loops, because I had already done that. I wanted to have some kind of flesh, some kind of harmonic content to deal with. So Roy and I each brought in some harmonic ideas, Lorenzo and Pat brought in different pre-recorded grooves and sketches, and we interacted with all these ideas playing live in the studio. Everybody brings in something, everybody’s got their own flavor. And a couple of guys have several flavors that they bring to the session.”
Feliciati adds “Graham in particular was terrific in coming up with melodies and ideas during this process. He really surprised me with his use of electronics on the cornet. It is not easy to hear a new or different approach these days from everything that Miles Davis had done with trumpet and electronics. But I think Graham is adding so much, creating his own vocabulary on the instrument that it is fresh and unique while also being in some way a sincere tribute to the great Miles, whom we are all very connected to.”
He continues, “Working with Bill Laswell, who produced the final mix of Ouroboros, was both a nerve-racking and exciting experience. “I admire Laswell so much,” he says. “He is a genius, one of the best and most forward-looking artists of the entire scene as well as a wonderful bass player. So you can imagine how happy and honored I am to have his touch on the music.”
Pat Mastelotto reflects how one tune from Ouroboros evolved during the sessions at Bill Laswell’s Orange Studios. “What eventually became ‘Dust’ began as a trippy kind of Pink Floyd thing that Roy brought in. It had no intrinsic time or tempo so to hold the fort I decided to throw down that double-timed beat box stuff that you hear, so then we had an anchor to improvise around. Then I started jamming on the drumkit to what Lorenzo was doing with all that high fuzzy feedback bass stuff he was playing. At some point I reached over and turned off my beatbox, and from there the attitude was, ‘whatever happens, happens.’ I just go for it and look for ‘happy accidents’ to come along in the process.”
Founder of the successful ’80s pop group Mr. Mister as well a member since 1994 of King Crimson and more recently in the power trio Stick Men (with noted stick players Tony Levin and Markus Reuter), Mastelotto says Naked Truth is unlike any band he’s ever been in. “For me, it’s the addition of the trumpet and keys that makes it different. It seems I work with gobs of guitar and stick players but seldom do I get to interact with a horn. And Graham is a killer improviser. He is really a powerful force. And while I have worked with keyboard players, it has been quite a while, so working with someone of Roy’s caliber is a special treat. Roy is over-the-top good on everything — piano, Hammond B3 organ, synthesizers. He also does killer iPad stuff, so he’s both old and new school. And like Graham, he’s a very smart and tasty improviser.”
Female singers who manage to stir a whole genre are seldom found. Diana Krall and Norah Jones are such outstanding talents who gave vocal jazz a whole new colour, and Korean singer Youn Sun Nah has been equally phenomenal. In the last few years, she has conquered the music world with her albums Voyage (2009) and Same Girl (2010) released on ACT Music.
