“She sings standards, show tunes and old novelties in a taut, flinty, elusively beautiful voice, erring toward material with difficult lyrics and tough places in history.” (The New York Times) Cécile McLorin Salvant is a composer, singer, and visual artist. The late Jessye Norman described her as “a unique voice supported by an intelligence and full-fledged musicality, which light up every note she sings.”
Salvant has developed a passion for storytelling and finding the connections between vaudeville, blues, folk traditions from around the world, theatre, jazz, and Baroque music. She is an eclectic curator, unearthing rarely recorded, forgotten songs with strong narratives, interesting power dynamics, unexpected twists, and humour. She won the Thelonious Monk competition in 2010 and has received Grammy Awards for Best Jazz Vocal Album for three consecutive albums. In 2020, she received the MacArthur fellowship and the Doris Duke Artist Award. Nonesuch Records released her latest recording, Ghost Song, in March 2022.
Sullivan Fortner is the winner of the 2015 American Pianists Awards.