Her story reads something like a fairy tale: Young scholar becomes overnight international jazz star. It even includes the element of the unknown singer championed by the dean of the British Jazz Community—Humphrey Lyttelton. She has built a solid career that includes award-winning and hugely successful recordings, sold-out extended engagements at the most prestigious venues her own program on BBC radio, and receiving the National Order of Arts and Letters from the French government.
Not bad for a gal from New Jersey whose first interest was in literature. Music was also important to her as she saw its connection to storytelling, communication and language. Studying French and Latin in high school proved “thrilling,” so she added German and Italian in college. Then off to Germany to continue her studies, but, as she told me, on a visit to England to see some friends, “I kind of got bumped off my path.”
It proved to be a serious bump when she met tenor saxophonist Jim Tomlinson one evening. As Kent explained, “We fell in love at first sight.” She was soon singing with his group, receiving gig offers, and getting much encouragement to continue in music. She decided to stay in London and concentrate on jazz
Of course, her attraction to Jim Tomlinson was a major part of her decision. They proved to have much in common, especially in music. As she explained, “When I was a kid, I had a voracious appetite for all kinds of music. I was not discerning. I did not think in terms of what was jazz, folk, classical, or pop. I was just looking for particular things that moved me. I would buy records because one name would lead me to somewhere else. I bought a record called Ella and Duke at the Cote D’Azur. Of course, I knew who Ella and Duke were, but it was live. I didn’t have any live records and I loved it!
That experience led her to buy Ellington at Newport. “I had never heard anything quite like this before. It was so exuberant and exciting. I heard the crowd going crazy and Paul Gonsalves playing his million choruses on “Diminuendo and Crescendo.” I listened to it over and over again, and I had no idea that I was studying it. I listened to it so many times I learned the solo. Many years later when I was dating Jim, he put on “Diminuendo and Crescendo,” and I started to sing along. He said, ‘How do you know that? That’s the kind of thing that tenor players transcribe.’ I thought it was pretty funny and so did he.”
Their attraction only grew, and proved to be personal, professional, and enduring down to today.
Another key figure in Kent’s life also appeared early in her career. As she explained, “Humphrey Lyttelton was a huge figure in my life. He was a remarkable man. When I first got to London, everybody said, ‘You’ve got to make a demo and send it to a few key people.’ I sent demos to three people; one to Humph, one to a gentleman named Richard Cook at Polygram, and another to Candid Records. What was extraordinary was I got immediate response from all three of them.
“The first came from Humph. I remember this so clearly: I sent the demo out on a Monday and the reason I remember that is because he did his show The Best of Jazz on Monday night. On Thursday I got a phone call and he said, ‘Hello is this, Stacey Kent?’ I recognized his voice immediately. He had an absolutely beautiful voice that I knew from the radio. I said, “Yes” and he said, ‘This is Humphrey Lyttelton. I got your demo, and I just want you to listen to my show on Monday night.’
“On Monday night he went on and on about this demo. His producer told me, ‘First of all we don’t play demos on the radio, only published records. Second, Humph effuses about music, always had, but never like this. This was just ridiculously lengthy.’ What Humph said was he received my demo and put it on the passenger seat of his Volvo with all his stuff. He would listen to music on his way to gigs and figure out what he wanted to put in his show. He was driving to a place called Oswestry, which is a couple hundred miles. He picked mine up first, and he didn’t take it out all the way to Oswestry and all the way back. Mine was the only thing he listened to in a two-day trip.
“So, he played this demo, ‘Day in and Day Out’ and he said, ‘This girl is going to be great. You have to watch out for her.’ He did a great thing for me because I had national air play even before I had a record deal or any concerts. That was how it started. It really came from Humph.
“He was such a lover of language and this is a relationship that was so important to me because we met on this level as lovers of language. On the jazz scene people talk about ‘the jazz’ and ‘the groove’ and all those things are very important but just sometimes it gets forgotten that it’s not simply about me, the band, and how we present the story. Sometimes it’s just a word in itself. You can be so moved by a lyric or a song in general without even speaking the language. If it’s done so beautifully it is so evocative you feel like you understand it the same way that we love instrumental music.
Stacey Kent at Cosmpolite in Oslo, Norway, on October 15, 2016. (Photo: Tore Sætre/Wikimedia)Stacey Kent at Cosmpolite in Oslo, Norway, on October 15, 2016. (Photo: Tore Sætre/Wikimedia)
“When I’d do gigs with him for example, he would say, ‘Stacey, I like you picking songs that have the word blue in it because I love the way you say blue.’ He would impersonate me and go ‘b-l-ue’ and it was just beautiful. He was so playful with language. He kept telling everybody the story about how he listened to me all the way to Oswestry, which is such a wonderful word in itself, and all the way back; that he coined a term. If you tell a story many, many times, even to the same people, over and over, it is called an ‘oswestry.’
“We became very, very close, and he was an unbelievable friend to me for many years. He caught on to the whole internet thing, and when I started to tour or go home and I would be hours away from him, he would get in front of his computer, and I would get email from him at all hours of the night. He hardly slept really. He couldn’t stop writing. He was working on his comedy show, writing for The Best of Jazz, and writing books. He was on the road all the time. He was the patriarch of this large family who loved him. He just had such an ability to live and get the most out of everything. He is one of the most remarkable people I will ever know.”
By serendipity, the second demo got her into the opening of Ian McKellen’s film version of Richard III. “I told you I sent one to Polygram. [Those plotting the film] wanted the opening scene to establish character in the film; and they wanted somebody unknown to sing this song that is set to a Marlow sonnet. They asked Polygram, ‘Do you know any singer?’ And they said, ‘Stacey Kent, maybe you want to see her.’ They called me in for an audition and a week later we were filming.”
“I kept getting bumped onto this path. What I really love about what happened to me—I think this is enormously important to me—my life is very real. I just did this because I had a need to do it. I was compelled to sing and interpret and share music. I think I’ve done that in my own quiet way. I got a lot of strange advice that I didn’t actually take. People said, ‘Hey kid if you are going to sing jazz, you are going to have to scat.’ ‘Hey kid you can’t sing the standards or it’s never going to happen for you.’ I followed my own heart. when I started and things keep happening to me.
“It’s not like I was discovered when I was still in college and somebody said I’m going to make you a star. The graduation from that point to that point to this point has been in such a real and natural way that I feel very lucky and proud about that. It has left my personal life very much intact. I just happened to get to sing to people around the world. I feel enormously privileged to get to do this and without the hype.
“I feel very proud of the work that I’ve done and the growth that still continues to happen. I feel that I’ve really grown as an artist and interpreter. I feel bad for the people who get so hyped. I think that is very dangerous for your self-esteem because you think, “Do I really deserve all of this?” So, I really enjoy my own pace and never have to ask that question. That biggest moment of, ‘Wow. Is this really happening?” was that call from Humph. That’s how it all started.”
She and Tomlinson now have their home address in Virginia, but continue to share their music all around the world. I recently saw them at a well-attended performance back in hew home state. She still sang standards, along with some wonderful originals her husband co-wrote, and didn’t scat.
Visit Stacy Kent online at staceykent.com.
Her story reads something like a fairy tale: Young scholar becomes overnight international jazz star. It even includes the element of the unknown singer championed by the dean of the British Jazz Community—Humphrey Lyttelton. She has built a solid career that includes award-winning and hugely successful recordings, sold-out extended engagements at the most prestigious venues her own program on BBC radio, and receiving the National Order of Arts and Letters from the French government.
Not bad for a gal from New Jersey whose first interest was in literature. Music was also important to her as she saw its connection to storytelling, communication and language. Studying French and Latin in high school proved “thrilling,” so she added German and Italian in college. Then off to Germany to continue her studies, but, as she told me, on a visit to England to see some friends, “I kind of got bumped off my path.”
It proved to be a serious bump when she met tenor saxophonist Jim Tomlinson one evening. As Kent explained, “We fell in love at first sight.” She was soon singing with his group, receiving gig offers, and getting much encouragement to continue in music. She decided to stay in London and concentrate on jazz.
Of course, her attraction to Jim Tomlinson was a major part of her decision. They proved to have much in common, especially in music. As she explained, “When I was a kid, I had a voracious appetite for all kinds of music. I was not discerning. I did not think in terms of what was jazz, folk, classical, or pop. I was just looking for particular things that moved me. I would buy records because one name would lead me to somewhere else. I bought a record called Ella and Duke at the Cote D’Azur. Of course, I knew who Ella and Duke were, but it was live. I didn’t have any live records and I loved it!
That experience led her to buy Ellington at Newport. “I had never heard anything quite like this before. It was so exuberant and exciting. I heard the crowd going crazy and Paul Gonsalves playing his million choruses on “Diminuendo and Crescendo.” I listened to it over and over again, and I had no idea that I was studying it. I listened to it so many times I learned the solo. Many years later when I was dating Jim, he put on “Diminuendo and Crescendo,” and I started to sing along. He said, ‘How do you know that? That’s the kind of thing that tenor players transcribe.’ I thought it was pretty funny and so did he.”
Their attraction only grew, and proved to be personal, professional, and enduring down to today.
Another key figure in Kent’s life also appeared early in her career. As she explained, “Humphrey Lyttelton was a huge figure in my life. He was a remarkable man. When I first got to London, everybody said, ‘You’ve got to make a demo and send it to a few key people.’ I sent demos to three people; one to Humph, one to a gentleman named Richard Cook at Polygram, and another to Candid Records. What was extraordinary was I got immediate response from all three of them.
“The first came from Humph. I remember this so clearly: I sent the demo out on a Monday and the reason I remember that is because he did his show The Best of Jazz on Monday night. On Thursday I got a phone call and he said, ‘Hello is this, Stacey Kent?’ I recognized his voice immediately. He had an absolutely beautiful voice that I knew from the radio. I said, “Yes” and he said, ‘This is Humphrey Lyttelton. I got your demo, and I just want you to listen to my show on Monday night.’
“On Monday night he went on and on about this demo. His producer told me, ‘First of all we don’t play demos on the radio, only published records. Second, Humph effuses about music, always had, but never like this. This was just ridiculously lengthy.’ What Humph said was he received my demo and put it on the passenger seat of his Volvo with all his stuff. He would listen to music on his way to gigs and figure out what he wanted to put in his show. He was driving to a place called Oswestry, which is a couple hundred miles. He picked mine up first, and he didn’t take it out all the way to Oswestry and all the way back. Mine was the only thing he listened to in a two-day trip.
“So, he played this demo, ‘Day in and Day Out’ and he said, ‘This girl is going to be great. You have to watch out for her.’ He did a great thing for me because I had national air play even before I had a record deal or any concerts. That was how it started. It really came from Humph.
“He was such a lover of language and this is a relationship that was so important to me because we met on this level as lovers of language. On the jazz scene people talk about ‘the jazz’ and ‘the groove’ and all those things are very important but just sometimes it gets forgotten that it’s not simply about me, the band, and how we present the story. Sometimes it’s just a word in itself. You can be so moved by a lyric or a song in general without even speaking the language. If it’s done so beautifully it is so evocative you feel like you understand it the same way that we love instrumental music.
“When I’d do gigs with him for example, he would say, ‘Stacey, I like you picking songs that have the word blue in it because I love the way you say blue.’ He would impersonate me and go ‘b-l-ue’ and it was just beautiful. He was so playful with language. He kept telling everybody the story about how he listened to me all the way to Oswestry, which is such a wonderful word in itself, and all the way back; that he coined a term. If you tell a story many, many times, even to the same people, over and over, it is called an ‘oswestry.’
“We became very, very close, and he was an unbelievable friend to me for many years. He caught on to the whole internet thing, and when I started to tour or go home and I would be hours away from him, he would get in front of his computer, and I would get email from him at all hours of the night. He hardly slept really. He couldn’t stop writing. He was working on his comedy show, writing for The Best of Jazz, and writing books. He was on the road all the time. He was the patriarch of this large family who loved him. He just had such an ability to live and get the most out of everything. He is one of the most remarkable people I will ever know.”
By serendipity, the second demo got her into the opening of Ian McKellen’s film version of Richard III. “I told you I sent one to Polygram. [Those plotting the film] wanted the opening scene to establish character in the film; and they wanted somebody unknown to sing this song that is set to a Marlow sonnet. They asked Polygram, ‘Do you know any singer?’ And they said, ‘Stacey Kent, maybe you want to see her.’ They called me in for an audition and a week later we were filming.”
“I kept getting bumped onto this path. What I really love about what happened to me—I think this is enormously important to me—my life is very real. I just did this because I had a need to do it. I was compelled to sing and interpret and share music. I think I’ve done that in my own quiet way. I got a lot of strange advice that I didn’t actually take. People said, ‘Hey kid if you are going to sing jazz, you are going to have to scat.’ ‘Hey kid you can’t sing the standards or it’s never going to happen for you.’ I followed my own heart. when I started and things keep happening to me.
“It’s not like I was discovered when I was still in college and somebody said I’m going to make you a star. The graduation from that point to that point to this point has been in such a real and natural way that I feel very lucky and proud about that. It has left my personal life very much intact. I just happened to get to sing to people around the world. I feel enormously privileged to get to do this and without the hype.
“I feel very proud of the work that I’ve done and the growth that still continues to happen. I feel that I’ve really grown as an artist and interpreter. I feel bad for the people who get so hyped. I think that is very dangerous for your self-esteem because you think, “Do I really deserve all of this?” So, I really enjoy my own pace and never have to ask that question. That biggest moment of, ‘Wow. Is this really happening?” was that call from Humph. That’s how it all started.”
She and Tomlinson now have their home address in Virginia, but continue to share their music all around the world. I recently saw them at a well-attended performance back in hew home state. She still sang standards, along with some wonderful originals her husband co-wrote, and didn’t scat.
Visit Stacy Kent online at staceykent.com.
Schaen Fox is a longtime jazz fan. Now retired, he devotes much of his time to the music. Write him at foxyren41@gmail.com.
