Home » Jazz Articles » Interview » Samara Joy: Ascension Into Jazz
Samara Joy: Ascension Into Jazz
I love listening to the music. I love singing the songs.
—Samara Joy
Her style has a certain clarity and directness of emotion. She's only 21 and graduated just this May from SUNY Purchase, a state college north of New York City and her native Brooklyn. She has a degree in jazz studies. But before attending college, she had little performing experience and not much knowledge of her chosen genre: jazz. It makes her accomplishment all the more remarkable.
She won the prestigious Sarah Vaughan International Jazz Vocal Competition in 2019, which will earn her a spot on stage at the Newport Jazz Festival in August. Another example of her artistry at such a young age is a video she made after being named an
Ella Fitzgerald
vocals1917 - 1996
Pete Malinverni
pianoBuoyed by that unexpected reaction, she launched a GoFundMe campaign to finance her first album Samara Joy that comes out in July via Whirlwind Recordings.
She is humble and unassuming about her accomplishments and admits that as a young girl, "I was actually a quiet kid. My mom was kind of nervous about me, because all I would do is just stare people down. Turns out I was waiting for something to say."
"I couldn't even believe it," she says of the reaction to her video. "Millions of people viewed it and cheered and everything. And from there, Matt Pierson (producer) reached out to me and was like, 'Hey, you know there seems to be sort of a demand to hear from you.' I don't have any music, nothing on Spotify or anything like that. So once we raised the money in a matter of days, that began the whole process ... I guess it turned out all right."
She says she inadvertently benefited, in a sense, from the pandemic, which delayed her Newport appearance, and some others, by a year. "Being delayed on those gigs was a good thing. Because I have something to present now" at her appearances. She will do more performances as venues start to have live music this year.
Sarah Vaughan
vocals1924 - 1990
Pasquale Grasso
guitar
Ari Roland
bass
Kenny Washington
drumsb.1958
It was recorded at the end of October of 2020. She knew Washington from being a student in his jazz history class. Grasso and Roland she met at the nightclub Mezzrow in New York, "so I was really grateful to be sort of familiar with all of them prior to doing this. Because I had a couple people in my ear saying you should go higher, you know. Play with
Kenny Barron
pianob.1943
Samara selected the songs with Pierson. "All of those songs are songs that I've listened to or heard from a friend and you know, learned from listening to a record or something like that. So all of those songs are really very special to me," she says. "We only had three rehearsals. So it was sort of like putting together the arrangements kind of on the spot. By the time we got into the studio, it was simple, but still, you know, clean."
While she's relatively new to jazz, the soulfulness in her voice can be traced to her family of musicians. Her grandmother played organ and sang and her grandfather sings as well. They both were founders of a choir in Philadelphia called the Savettes. "They're not the leaders anymore, but still active to this day. And it just kind of trickles down from there. So their kids—my father is a bassist and sings, my aunts sing and play piano. Everybody sings."
Around the house, she listened to a lot of music written by her song-writing father, as well as gospel music. There was some pop music, "Whatever was on the radio on the way home. But it's funny. Throughout high school, my uncle gave me this iPod, one of those really old ones, and it had all of music he liked on there, like the
Yellowjackets
band / ensemble / orchestrab.1977
George Duke
piano1946 - 2013
Russell Malone
guitar1963 - 2024
Chick Corea
piano1941 - 2021
Samara's first exposure to jazz was while attending Fordham High School for the Arts, where she performed with the jazz band and won Best Vocalist at the Essential Ellington competition put on by Jazz at Lincoln Center's Jazz Academy, a program for high school bands.
"My last two years of high school, I joined the after-school jazz band. We would perform whenever there was a big production at school. There was vocal, there was acting, there was dance. So the instrumental section, I would kind of sit in with the band. I was just singing with the jazz band, very casually, occasionally."
When it was time to choose a college, she didn't know if she wanted to pursue music. Could she develop a career that she could sustain and support herself? She decided to give it a try and did an audition at Purchase.
"I didn't really start performing until college," she says. "It is a jazz program for sure. When I came in, even for my audition, I didn't know what a chart was, a lead sheet or anything like that. I just came in. I know this one
Duke Ellington
piano1899 - 1974
The Sarah Vaughan competition was November of 2019. "The Sunday before Thanksgiving, I remember. I was really, really grateful and really surprised. Being around all those amazing singers is really an honor."
There were three rounds in the competition. She sang "Perdido" and "Sophisticated Lady." For the last song, she performed a ballad called "Autumn Nocturne." First prize in the competition named after her idol was hers.
In addition to Vaughan, she lists Laila Hathaway and
Stevie Wonder
vocalsb.1950
"When I first got to school, trying to learn these standards, I would first listen to Ella for the melody, and then listen to Sarah. We had to sing them in class. So I would listen to Sarah for the different kind of inflections and stuff so that I could show off a little bit—sing it differently or try something different. But more recently, I've been getting into
Carmen McRae
vocals1920 - 1994
Etta Jones
vocalsb.1928
As she looks at her budding career, she says "I really knew nothing about (jazz) before coming to school. So I didn't know that it's kind of relatively new compared to other forms music, I guess I could say. I love the history. I love the fact that Sarah Vaughan exists. Even though I'm trying to learn, sort of, how to imitate her and everything, there's always something new to learn, always some record that you've never heard ... and you always know when you see names, when you see
Philly Joe Jones
drums1923 - 1985
Bud Powell
piano1924 - 1966
"I'm grateful to have a team now. So they're putting together dates, sort of tentatively, to see what is open and what's not. I know for sure that I'm going to be at Umbria (in Italy) for the first time this summer, as well as coming back to to reclaim the Newport date, since it was canceled. So yeah, I'm really excited. Umbria is with the
Emmet Cohen
pianob.1990
She says there is already some talk about concepts for a second album. Future plans also involve "hopefully playing with as many people as possible, established musicians. Whether it be Emmett, who I love playing with.
Bill Charlap
pianob.1966
Tags
Interview
Samara Joy McLendon
R.J. DeLuke
Lydia Liebman Promotions
United States
Ella Fitzgerald
Pete Malinverni
Sarah Vaughan
Pasquale Grasso
Ari Roland
Kenny Washington
Kenny Baron
Yellow Jackets
George Duke
Russell Malone
Chick Corea
duke ellington
Stevie Wonder
Carmen McRae
Etta Jones
Philly Joe Jones
Bud Powell
Emmet Cohen
Bill Charlap
Comments
PREVIOUS / NEXT
Samara Joy Concerts
Sep
26
Fri
Samara Joy
Patricia Reser Center For The ArtsBeaverton, OR
Sep
29
Mon
Samara Joy
Moore TheatreSeattle, WA
Oct
1
Wed
Samara Joy
Humphrey's By the BaySan Diego, CA
Oct
2
Thu
Samara Joy
The Granada TheatreSanta Barbara, CA
Oct
18
Sat
Samara Joy
Odeon TheatreHobart, Australia
Oct
26
Sun
Samara Joy
Hamer HallMelbourne, Australia
Nov
11
Tue
An Evening With Samara Joy
Miller TheaterPhiladelphia, PA
Nov
12
Wed
Samara Joy
Warner TheatreWashington, DC
Support All About Jazz
All About Jazz has been a pillar of jazz since 1995, championing it as an art form and, more importantly, supporting the musicians who make it. Our enduring commitment has made "AAJ" one of the most culturally important websites of its kind, read by hundreds of thousands of fans, musicians and industry figures every month.
Go Ad Free!
To maintain our platform while developing new means to foster jazz discovery and connectivity, we need your help. You can become a sustaining member for as little as $20 and in return, we'll immediately hide those pesky ads plus provide access to future articles for a full year. This winning combination vastly improves your AAJ experience and allow us to vigorously build on the pioneering work we first started in 1995. So enjoy an ad-free AAJ experience and help us remain a positive beacon for jazz by making a donation today.Showcase
Buy Now
Featured
Carnaval - The Songs Were So Beautiful
By Antonio Adolfo buy
Darwin AI: Surivior Choice
By Alex Otey buyGiveaway
