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| Lara Downes But Beautiful: My Life With Billie Holiday Last week I played a show in NYC at the Zinc Bar, featuring music from my Steinway & Sons Records album A Billie Holiday Songbook, and readings from my memoir But Beautiful: My Life with Billie Holiday, which just came out in The Rumpus and Listen Magazine. I was in the middle of my soundcheck when I felt a tap on my shoulder, turned around, and found my wonderful longtime friend/mentor/secret crush Benny Golson, who had come downtown to surprise me. That made a special night absolutely perfect. Playing this music with Benny in the room, surrounded by my friends and fans who come from both jazz and classical backgrounds, just crystallized everything that has made my musical adventures this year so extraordinary. I want to share the story of how a nice classical pianist like me ended up playing Billie Holiday songs on the jazz circuit. It's a story about family, history, love, loss, American life, music "beyond category", and the courage to take a chance. As Lady sang in that one-and-only way of hers: "Beautiful to take a chance, and if you fall, you fall. And I'm thinking I wouldn't mind at all." -Lara Downes In celebration of the 100th anniversary of Billie Holiday's birth, Lara Downes has released A Billie Holiday Songbook, a deeply personal tribute to an icon of American music. With radiant sensitivity and timeless intimacy, Downes performs the songs forever associated with Lady Day's legendary interpretations – drawing on her own classically-trained background and transcending historical traditions of genre to honor the American tradition of music "beyond category", in the words of the great Duke Ellington. "Possibly the most intriguing Holiday tribute may be this one by pianist Lara Downes. The adroit pianist goes solo in interpreting songs associated with the vocalist... A focus on the lyrical side of the Holiday Songbook that works well." — Jazz Weekly Downes grew up listening to Holiday's recordings with her father, who was born and raised in Harlem only blocks from the iconic jazz clubs where Lady Day was a star presence in the 1930s and '40s. Downes acknowledges that Holiday's singing has been a lifelong influence. "As a musician, I learned from Billie Holiday to make something completely personal when you make music, " she says. "Something that is completely your own - maybe something unexpected, something indefinable, perhaps complicated, but beautiful. To take a chance." write your comments about the article :: © 2015 Jazz News :: home page |