Judi Jackson is one of the headliners at the Buxton International Festival, with a concert on 11 July this year at the Buxton Opera House, as part of a double bill with Madeline Bell and Ian Shaw. This is the first appearance at the festival by the singer who was raised in Roanoake, Virginia and is now based in London. As she thinks ahead to appearing in a festival with the breadth of programming that Buxton has, she says she looks forward “to being a part of that versatility.”
Judi Jackson‘s appearance at Buxton International Festival will primarily feature material from her newest album, “My American Songbook”. This represents a departure for her, away from releasing her own striking compositions to making an album consisting of well-crafted American standards and popular songs. She explains:
“I just wanted to revisit my roots… I grew up listening to jazz music and performing it in night clubs from the age of 14 really. I would go to clubs, I wouldn’t be able to drink, they would have to sneak me in the back – and then I would have to wear a special wrist band. I loved it though, I was there for the music and nothing else.“
The album does not just draw on traditional “Tin Pan Alley” or “Songbook” repertoire, her choices are consciously and deliberately far wider ranging. True to form for such an emotive singer, the material is reflective of her life now.
“I wanted to go with the songs that resonated with me… because I knew if they spoke to me, they would speak to the audience… I wanted to tell the story of come rain or come shine because I’m engaged now. And I felt as if it rang true for me that I’m going to love this person no matter what kind of weather or what we go through, that I will always love this person. So, there were songs that resonated with me in the story that I wanted to tell.”
I dig a little deeper and soon we’re discussing the connection between love and art, frenetic creativity and the kind of music that can come from, as Judi describes it, “inner peace and confidence – that’s what this love has bought me”.
She humbly waxes lyrical about pianist Jamie Safir, who’s sensitive musical playing rings throughout the record and who she credits with many of the interesting arrangement choices. “Stormy Weather” stands out on the record for a particularly striking vocal rendition by Jackson, and despite being such a well-known standard feels freshly unfamiliar with the inclusion of the verse – “we went back to the legend, Judy Garland and listened to how she did it”.
She also includes Carmen McRae and Blossom Dearie as some of her greatest vocal influences, casually remembering Wynton Marsalis sending her a box of Blossom’s music. Her pool expands wider still as she speaks of a love for Sarah Vaughan, “a giant with her tone and her breath control” which she links to her own training in classical repertoire.
I ask her how it feels now, to perform at a festival with such a mixed programme of opera, chamber music, jazz and literature, and she speaks of being excited “to be a part of that versatility” – and that she is. She’s learned from Italian Operas, from Sondheim and Bernadette Peters and before I know it has broken out into a brief but beautiful rendition of an aria – the name of which she has long forgotten, but the melody she often finds herself singing in supermarkets. Above all, it’s Nina Simone who she speaks of with the greatest passion. Undoubtedly, she feels affinity with Simone’s love of classical music as well as her own powerful song writing but it’s clearly deeper than that – “I respect her immensely, and I will always love her and thank her for giving me the career that I have. I wouldn’t have a career without Nina Simone. I think that she’s the epitome of class and strength, and musicianship and womanhood”.
She recommends me “I Put a Spell On You”, Nina Simone’s autobiography and I thought it only right to ask for some recommendations of other books she loves ahead of her performance in Buxton. She speaks of her relationship with the Jefferson Centre through mentor Cyrus Pace who told her “You cannot be a great writer unless you are a great reader” – I couldn’t agree more. Her recommendations; “100 Selected Poems of E.E Cummings”, “Lady Sings the Blues” by Billie Holiday and William Dufty and “Moving to Higher Ground” by Geoffrey C. Ward and Wynton Marsalis.
I feel even more excited to watch Judi’s performance following this interview. Some final thoughts from Judi:
“I hope that people walk away from the performance feeling energised, having high feelings of empathy, sympathy, peace, happiness, and inspiration, just overall being inspired by the beauty that is music and the arts; the work, the craft.”
Singer Becky Alice will be covering the Buxton Festival for UKJN as a guest of the festival.
3 responses
My reaction was totally different. I felt that her use of the mike reduced the clarity. I also found her turning her back to her audience so often lessened my connection with her.