Grace Kelly is a bandleader at 19. A highly acclaimed one. She's been praised by - and has collaborated with - jazz giants like Wynton Marsalis, Lee Konitz and Phil Woods (and performs with the latter Saturday night at the Gesù). It would seem fair to wonder how the young alto sax player got where she is so quickly.
Well, there's a false assumption right there. "Quickly" is relative at best: Kelly has been living and breathing jazz for almost half her life. At 10, she was the youngest member and only girl in the New England Conservatory Prep School, studying theory and jazz history, among other things, and putting in the hours on private lessons and ensemble practice. She was already transcribing Miles Davis pieces.
At that same age, she also played her first gig. It was at a Borders store at the Atrium Mall in Chestnut Hill, Mass. "I had been playing for six weeks," she remembered during a recent telephone interview. "I performed with my teacher. I couldn't even hold the horn, so I sat on my saxophone case, put a pillow out and rested it."
Since then, her days have been filled with music, she said. If she's not practising, she's writing music, singing, performing or handling business email. With luck, she might squeeze in some dancing, yoga, fiction writing, time with her puppy or socializing with friends.
Kelly got the jazz bug, she said, by simply singing along to her mother's Stan Getz albums, which were played constantly around the house. "It was almost a subconscious thing, because the television was never on. It was always some type of music," she said. Having started to study classical piano at age 6, Kelly realized within a couple of years that she didn't enjoy practising written music. "It's all kind of caged and in the box," she said.
Once she found the sax, she decided to let go of her earliest childhood ambition: becoming a Broadway actress. But she found common ground with the strong melodies of Broadway musicals and the tuneful jazz players she was rapidly getting familiar with, like Getz.
"His actual tone on the horn is so gorgeous," Kelly said. "To me, it sounds like the human voice - so melodic and so expressive. When I started playing, that's what I was really drawn to, people like Paul Desmond and Stan Getz, a lot of these lyrical players."
By 12, Kelly had released her first CD, Dreaming. It was at the launch of the disc that she discovered an affinity for live performance. "I knew I would have to go on and introduce the musicians and songs. When they introduced me, I didn't think I could go up. My whole body was shaking," she said. "Once I was on stage, I felt very much at home."
Her live act was noticed here by the lucky few who got to see her two free outdoor shows at last year's Montreal International Jazz Festival. "Montreal was one of the highlights of live performance for me," she said. "I felt we were treated like mini-rock stars. I couldn't believe the energy that was coming from the people, and that translates into music. The great thing about live performance for me is being able to take chances. You can really go anywhere."
Well, there's a false assumption right there. "Quickly" is relative at best: Kelly has been living and breathing jazz for almost half her life. At 10, she was the youngest member and only girl in the New England Conservatory Prep School, studying theory and jazz history, among other things, and putting in the hours on private lessons and ensemble practice. She was already transcribing Miles Davis pieces.
At that same age, she also played her first gig. It was at a Borders store at the Atrium Mall in Chestnut Hill, Mass. "I had been playing for six weeks," she remembered during a recent telephone interview. "I performed with my teacher. I couldn't even hold the horn, so I sat on my saxophone case, put a pillow out and rested it."
Since then, her days have been filled with music, she said. If she's not practising, she's writing music, singing, performing or handling business email. With luck, she might squeeze in some dancing, yoga, fiction writing, time with her puppy or socializing with friends.
Kelly got the jazz bug, she said, by simply singing along to her mother's Stan Getz albums, which were played constantly around the house. "It was almost a subconscious thing, because the television was never on. It was always some type of music," she said. Having started to study classical piano at age 6, Kelly realized within a couple of years that she didn't enjoy practising written music. "It's all kind of caged and in the box," she said.
Once she found the sax, she decided to let go of her earliest childhood ambition: becoming a Broadway actress. But she found common ground with the strong melodies of Broadway musicals and the tuneful jazz players she was rapidly getting familiar with, like Getz.
"His actual tone on the horn is so gorgeous," Kelly said. "To me, it sounds like the human voice - so melodic and so expressive. When I started playing, that's what I was really drawn to, people like Paul Desmond and Stan Getz, a lot of these lyrical players."
By 12, Kelly had released her first CD, Dreaming. It was at the launch of the disc that she discovered an affinity for live performance. "I knew I would have to go on and introduce the musicians and songs. When they introduced me, I didn't think I could go up. My whole body was shaking," she said. "Once I was on stage, I felt very much at home."
Her live act was noticed here by the lucky few who got to see her two free outdoor shows at last year's Montreal International Jazz Festival. "Montreal was one of the highlights of live performance for me," she said. "I felt we were treated like mini-rock stars. I couldn't believe the energy that was coming from the people, and that translates into music. The great thing about live performance for me is being able to take chances. You can really go anywhere."
Anyone who has seen Kelly and her band will have remarked that the smooth, lyrical quality of her playing might, at times, evoke her early idols, but her stylistic ambitions are wide-reaching: solid bop, New Orleans syncopation, bossa nova, funk and a rock-like backbeat have all been ingredients in her live sets.
Even though much in her music can't help but delight jazz hardliners, Kelly herself is not a purist. "I'm a very strong believer that jazz is about improvisation and about creating and spontaneity," she said. "That's what really drew me to it, but I think there's plenty of music that can fuse elements of jazz with its own type of sound, whether it's rock or pop. I'm not into 'No, this isn't jazz.' I like everything that's good and I encourage people to think that way."
Kelly said her own tastes are very broad, and that her iTunes library includes artists as varied as Charlie Parker, the Beatles, George Benson, John Mayer and Earth Wind and Fire. "The songs I create all come out of things I listen to," she said. "I'm working on brand new tracks of singersongwriter material, but I just released a CD of hymns and spiritual music. I'm really searching and trying to find out what really resonates."
There aren't many Downbeat darlings who always knew such things as iTunes, Twitter or Facebook. Kelly is one. And as labels struggle to stay afloat, the musician, whose releases are issued on her own label, Pazz Productions, says she sees social media and SoundClouds as the future - even for jazz.
"To get my music out there, it's important to stay current, even though it's jazz and the genre might not be as big as pop," she said. "There's an audience on the Internet in young people who are searching."
Even though much in her music can't help but delight jazz hardliners, Kelly herself is not a purist. "I'm a very strong believer that jazz is about improvisation and about creating and spontaneity," she said. "That's what really drew me to it, but I think there's plenty of music that can fuse elements of jazz with its own type of sound, whether it's rock or pop. I'm not into 'No, this isn't jazz.' I like everything that's good and I encourage people to think that way."
Kelly said her own tastes are very broad, and that her iTunes library includes artists as varied as Charlie Parker, the Beatles, George Benson, John Mayer and Earth Wind and Fire. "The songs I create all come out of things I listen to," she said. "I'm working on brand new tracks of singersongwriter material, but I just released a CD of hymns and spiritual music. I'm really searching and trying to find out what really resonates."
There aren't many Downbeat darlings who always knew such things as iTunes, Twitter or Facebook. Kelly is one. And as labels struggle to stay afloat, the musician, whose releases are issued on her own label, Pazz Productions, says she sees social media and SoundClouds as the future - even for jazz.
"To get my music out there, it's important to stay current, even though it's jazz and the genre might not be as big as pop," she said. "There's an audience on the Internet in young people who are searching."
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