Dan's Papers - June 20, 2008 - Four-Time Grammy Winner Dianne Reeves on Stage

"They say the eyes are the window to the soul," said, four-time Grammy award-winning jazz vocalist Dianne Reeves in an interview last week from her home in Denver. "But your voice is the real indicator of what you're feeling. You can hear any emotion in the voice. My voice is the utterance of my spirit."

Recently, Reeves did a 25-date European tour showcasing her voice and two guitars. This musical concept, the brainstorm of her manager Daryl Pitt, ended up being a turning point in this world-renowned artist's 30-year career. Over the course of it, she got to know her voice in a new way - no small statement for a woman who was the only vocalist in any musical category to earn three Grammys in a row (2001, 2002 and 2003) as Best Jazz Vocal Performance. Reeves' oeuvre has covered every shade of jazz, from the most rhythmically and harmonically complex Latin/Brazilian to exotic world music to the straight up beauty and lyricism of jazz standards. But the two-guitar tour opened up a whole other realm for this highly regarded musician.

"The music was so stripped down, so nude, that I found a new place in my voice, in my being. A peaceful place," said Reeves, who is known for having a three-octave range. "I hadn't been using the upper register of my voice for a long time - I had decided not to go up there anymore. But I got there with ease. I found a place where everything worked and had a sensuous quality that relayed more clearly what was happening in my heart."

It is the exploration of the heart that Reeves delved into during the tour and in her new CD, When You Know, that followed. That recording includes several songs from the tour, including "Social Call," "Once I Loved," Smokey Robinson's "Just My Imagination" and Minnie Ripperton's "Lovin' You." Reeves will include many of these songs in her concert at the Westhampton Beach Performing Arts Center on Saturday, June 28.

"On the tour, the three of us knew so much music that it gave me a chance to do some of my earliest songs," she said. "So when I was working on the record, I even chose stuff I'd sung in high school."

There was a non-musical influence that also affected Reeves' choice of music for the CD. Many years ago, she had a calendar with a picture of the Gustav Klimt painting, "The Kiss." Knowing she was going to sing in Vienna, a friend told her to check out the Belvedere Museum, which houses many Klimt paintings. "I happened upon a very, very long, painting of women - it was unfinished," said Reeves. "I looked at the eyes, the turn of the head, and I realized it was the same woman through different stages of her life. When I worked on the record, I remembered the painting."

As a result, Reeves chose songs that reflected the meaning of love, and how that changes throughout a life. "It goes from the very simple sentiment of a song like 'Lovin' You' to the mature intensity of 'Midnight Sun,'" she said.

Reeves said she has kept lists of songs throughout her life, songs she couldn't necessarily relate to - but revisiting them at this point in her life, she found they "resonated." She has had plenty of opportunities to visit and revisit songs that were meaningful to her throughout her illustrious career that includes almost 20 albums, and began when the singer got her "big break" as a 16-year-old.

Born in Detroit to a musical family and raised in Denver, Reeves sang in a big band in high school. It was when the band performed at a festival that she met trumpeter Clark Terry, who ultimately become her mentor. She studied music in Colorado, then relocated to Los Angeles, where she got caught up in the Latin-American music scene. Reeves made her foray into the international music stage touring with Sergio Mendes, then later as a lead singer with Harry Belafonte. In the '80s, when the world seemed to reawaken to jazz, Reeves was approached by Blue Note/EMI to reactivate the label with her album, Better Days. Between then and the year 2000, she recorded a dozen albums.

Then, in 2001 came the first of the three Best Jazz Vocalist Grammys, for In the Moment, followed by The Calling in '02, and A Little Moonlight in '03. The fourth Grammy was for her solo performance on the soundtrack recording of the film Good Night, and Good Luck.

But whether she is singing standards, world music, Brazilian or classic jazz, there is one dominant element. "It's the lyric that ultimately attracts me," she said. "I love changing the harmony to give the lyric a place that it really resonates."

Reeves came to a new realization of this concept on that recent tour. "During the concerts I'd do these stories - they were a kind of inventory, very cathartic. Through it I thought, 'You know girl, you're alright.' It changed me - changed my life," she continued. "I've always viewed music as a healing and doing those concerts, finding that new sound, made me come to a realization of who I am in my life right now. I am who I am. I stand behind it."

Dianne Reeves will perform at the Westhampton Beach Performing Arts Center on Saturday, June 28 at 8:00pm. For information call 631-288-1500 or go to www.whbpac.org.