Artist: Esperanza Spalding
Country: USA
Genre: Latin Jazz
Artist of the week features a beautiful jazz singer from Jersey City, although she may not be a first or second generation Hispanic, she carries the culture in her music thanks to her mother. A virtuoso instrumentalist and a great melody singer who is making phenomenal buzz with her new album Esperanza. The sound of Cuban jazz seasoned with some traditional tones from Spain, a country she probably feels very close as her last production Junjo was a collaborative album with Spaniard instrumentalists. Esperanza marks a mature album confident enough to step of Rhythm & Blues territory, never loosing the elegancy of jazz. The artist sounds very fluent in her songs in Spanish and Portuguese, especially on a Spanish version of Body & Soul. A great artist to discover, and nothing will make us happier than to see her performing along some latin jazz masters such as Chucho Valdez, Paquito D’Rivera or Arturo Sandoval.
