NANCY KELLY: The Voice of Life
When you are growing up
the music heard most sets a standard from which you grow and develop your
own love of music… I heard great music in my home, my father played
classical music often but more so all of the big bands and Billy Holiday,
Frank Sinatra. Mother played Fats Waller a lot on the piano.
In my early teens
my friends were listening to the Beach Boys while I was groovin' on Aretha
and James Brown. I became really interested in jazz after a friend turned me
on to Kenny Rankin and Mark Murphy. I have listened to all the greats:-
Ella, Billy, Frank but I'm drawn more to horn players, I think you can hear
that in my style now. For me, music must have a lot of soul and be very
sincere.
When you are first trying
out your jazz chops you borrow from everyone, it's like learning to speak
for the first time. You learn from hearing it performed and as you grow you
develop your own style along the way. It's very important to be in touch
with your inner self ." Nancy
appeared at Birdland in New York City, Jewels in Philadelphia, and other
major jazz clubs. Touring the U.S. with producer/pops conductor Jeff Tyzik,
she has appeared with many symphony orchestras. She has also performed with
Benny Goodman and Nelson Riddle orchestra and opened for Dizzy Gilespie,
Chick Corea, New York Voices, Yellow jackets and Doctor John among others.
Her debut album
Live Jazz
landed at number eleven on the BILLBOARD Top Jazz Chart. Her new CD
on Amherst Records Jazz Woman is in pre-production with a fall
release planned. You should hear Nancy sing “That’s All”,
"The world is a painful show. It brings to you tears and blows. That’s life, you die or grow, drink to life and spread it around you.” A passage from the theme song of “Marmara The Gypsy”, a world premiere musical play, I wrote and directed long time ago at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC, USA. And now, twenty years later, I feel the same way when I hear the voice of Nancy Kelly…when I read the emails she sends me…and when I sail into “bigger than life” musical world of this fabulous human being. In ancient Babylon, Phoenicia, Greece and Roma, Gods and Goddesses descended on earth to amuse and inspire kings and queens. They also descended on their kingdoms, castles, prairies and hills to spread beauty, hope, colors, tears, joy and light.
Through
their inspiration and celestial voices, the Gods and Goddesses of the
Pantheons guided humans and attenuated their pain and sufferings. The high
priests, the Oracle mistresses and the sages followed suit. They created
musical instruments such as the pan, the flute and the “cithara”. And to
enhance the magical effect of music on the souls and minds of humans, they
taught us how to write poetry and how to sing songs. For, the magical
influence of music, singing and poetry is transcendental, ageless and
multidimensional. Some songs were written to lift up your soul, to make you
dream, to fantasize and to create a better world, where only hope grows, joy
blooms and beauty ascends to your visions. When those songs are sung by a
singer like Nancy Kelly who projects life, who captures your inner thoughts
and feelings, who elevates you to a higher plane, then and only then, music
and poetry become an essential necessity in your daily life. Nancy Kelly’s
voice and particularly “Nancy Kelly, the woman behind the mic” inspires and
energizes us. She is one of those goddesses who descended on earth and did
not return to the firmament. She remained with us to vitalize our hope, to
stimulate our positive thoughts, to “put a tiger in our tank” and to show us
the multiple facets of life. Every good singer can sing well but, few like
Nancy Kelly make you think, contemplate, re-anchor yourself and now and then
hit you with a fresh breeze or shake the hell out of your hard time. When
Nancy sings and talks to you, she is as strong as mother earth, as truthful
as the last prayer and as mesmerizing Diva as the first Goddess who taught
humans how to sing and mock the absurdity of destiny. Nancy is a pulverizing
power on stage. Nancy is beauty and love from within. Nancy Kelly is the
lyrical Goddess of contemporary Jazz.
http://www.nancykelly.com/
End of the article.