New Smooth Jazz EP from Brenda Layne: original songs in the style of the Great American Songbook

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Hawaii-based singer-songwriter Brenda Layne, the recipient of the ASCAP Award for Achievement in Songwriting, has released a new EP of original romantic love songs in jazz standard style.

Recorded in Los Angeles by Grammy Award winner Tom Weir and co-produced and arranged by Billboard Top 20 jazz artist and five time ASCAP popular music award winner Bennett B, the music harkens back to the days of elegant evenings spent in nightclubs filled with stylish men and women dining, dancing, and sipping champagne. Ms. Layne's lyrics paint the lush scenery of heartbreak and longing as her voice ranges from sultry to flirty and then from intense to wistful in character.

Accompanying Ms. Layne on "Torch" are world-class jazz musicians Bennett Brandeis (Bennett B, the 5th Dimension, Shonentai) on guitar, Louis Durra (international top session player, award-winning film/theatre score composer) on piano, Grammy winner Steve Billman on bass, and Kendall Kay (Rickie Lee Jones, Kenny Burrell, Jack Jones) on drums. On the Arlen/Koehler standard "Stormy Weather", Layne ably accompanies herself on acoustic guitar and is joined by her friend, Massachusetts guitarist Shawn LePoer, playing lead.

While the album is a debut for her in this smooth jazz style, Ms. Layne, who originally hails from Hollywood and graduated with honors from the prestigious Berklee College of Music, has previously released albums in both rock and singer-songwriter style under her own name and with Hawaii-based psychedelic fusion band Ordinary Magic.

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