Esperanza Spalding at University Musical Society at Michigan Theater

The 2011 Grammy winner for Best New Artist will demonstrate the power of song and how it can influence our lives.

With her ample talent and beauty, singer, bassist, and composer Esperanza Spalding instantly found herself ranked among the darlings of jazz despite — or perhaps because of — her unusual background. At 15 she left high school and, armed with a GED, entered Portland State University to study music. By age 20, she was one of the youngest faculty members in the history of the Berklee College of Music. At 26, she captured the world’s attention when she was awarded the 2010 Grammy for Best New Artist, the first time the award had gone to a jazz musician in 35 years...

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The 2011 Grammy winner for Best New Artist will demonstrate the power of song and how it can influence our lives.

With her ample talent and beauty, singer, bassist, and composer Esperanza Spalding instantly found herself ranked among the darlings of jazz despite — or perhaps because of — her unusual background. At 15 she left high school and, armed with a GED, entered Portland State University to study music. By age 20, she was one of the youngest faculty members in the history of the Berklee College of Music. At 26, she captured the world’s attention when she was awarded the 2010 Grammy for Best New Artist, the first time the award had gone to a jazz musician in 35 years. After wowing us as a member of Joe Lovano’s “Us Five” Quintet in 2007, she returns with her new album, Radio Music Society, which explores song forms and melodies that are formatted as “pop” songs. “Whether exploding into vocalese or making her bass solo sound like a horn, she’s a spark plug who dances as she grooves through a funked-up and rocked-out repertoire.” (Billboard)

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