Valerie Joyce

New York Blue Valerie Joyce

Valerie Joyce, born in Japan and now living in Seattle, recorded two albums for Chesky Records in the 2000s. The first of these was the critically acclaimed “New York Blue,” which was first released in 2005. The recording was made at St. Peter's Church in Chelsea under sound engineer Nicholas Prout and featured the young singer accompanied by a first-class Big Apple jazz band: pianist Andy Ezrin, bassists John Hebert and Tim Lefebvre, and drummer Gene Jackson. On some tracks, the ensemble is complemented by the smoky saxophone of veteran session musician Lawrence Feldman. Joyce's fascinating repertoire combines skillful interpretations of well-known evergreens from the Great American Songbook (“Darn That Dream”) with jazz standards (Miles Davis' “Blue In Green”), jazz-tinged R&B pieces (‘Fever’), rock (Jimi Hendrix's “Little Wing”) and pop (“Golden Slumbers” by the Beatles).

The daughter of a Japanese mother and an American father, Valerie Joyce spent her childhood in Japan, where she began her musical training at the age of six. In 1991, she moved to Tacoma, Washington, and studied piano. During this time, she discovered her love for jazz and began singing in the university choir. At an audition at Berklee College of Music in Boston, she was offered a scholarship to study vocal jazz, which she declined. Back in Washington, she devoted herself more to her vocal training and took lessons from Michael Brockman, Jay Clayton, and Jerome Gray. Valerie Joyce recorded her first album, “Reverie”, in Seattle in 2002, together with musicians from the region. This brought her into contact with David and Norman Chesky, for whose label Chesky Records she recorded “New York Blue.”

The recording was made at St. Peter's Church in Chelsea under sound engineer Nicholas Prout and is a unique gem in the Chesky Records catalog. As part of the “Chesky Original Masters” series, Evosound now presents a collectible reissue of this wonderful album: The Hybrid SACD brilliantly showcases Chesky's famous production and recording techniques and comes with a booklet including new liner notes and a recent interview with Valerie Joyce.

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