Samara Joy, already a Grammy winner, creates more awards buzz with latest album

Transcript

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Geoff Bennett: Already a three-time winner, jazz vocalist Samara Joy is up for two more Grammys at Sunday’s awards ceremony, while her latest album is receiving critical acclaim and creating more awards buzz. All that, and she’s only 25 years old.

Senior arts correspondent Jeffrey Brown has more for our arts and culture series, Canvas.

Samara Joy singing the jazz standard “You Stepped Out of a Dream” from her new album, “Portrait.” Following in the footsteps of legends like Dizzy Gillespie and John Coltrane, the Bronx, New York, native recorded the album at the historic Van Gelder Studios in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey.

And earlier this month, she returned to talk about her meteoric rise, all the more surprising considering her first introduction to jazz came only in 2017, when as a high school junior she was invited to sit in on a jazz band practice. Soon, she was listening to the likes of Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughan.

What grabbed you?

Samara Joy, Musician: The pure emotion combined with the technical prowess of all of the musicians that I heard and creativity and seemingly never-ending ideas.

Jeffrey Brown: And you heard that and thought?

Samara Joy: Maybe I could do this.

(Laughter)

Jeffrey Brown: Maybe I could do this. Simple as that?

Samara Joy: Yes. So I will give it a try.

Jeffrey Brown: Hooked, Joy enrolled in the jazz program at the State University of New York at Purchase. And by 2019, her professors were so impressed with her abundant talent, they encouraged her to enter the coveted Sarah Vaughan International Jazz Vocal Competition.

She won and used the prize money to help finance the recording of her debut album, “Samara Joy,” in 2020. A year later, she leveraged videos of her performing going viral on social media to embark on a first European tour.

Her second album, “Linger Awhile,” was a critical and commercial success.

Woman: And the Grammy goes to…

Jeffrey Brown: And in February 2023…

Woman: Samara Joy!

(Cheering)

Jeffrey Brown: … Joy took home two Grammys for best jazz vocal album and best new artist, a big win for the jazz community writ large…

Samara Joy: I have been singing all my life, my grandparents, my father.

Jeffrey Brown: … as Joy beat recording artist nominated from all genres.

Antonio McLendon, Father of Samara Joy: Help us to know what to say, and in Jesus’ name, amen.

Jeffrey Brown: But if the rise has been rapid, it’s roots stem from a three-generation family tradition of expressing deep Christian faith through gospel music.

Samara’s grandmother Ruth McLendon and grandfather Elder Goldwire started the family tradition, singing in the Philadelphia gospel group The Savettes. Samara’s father, Antonio McLendon, whom we met at the family’s favorite Bronx restaurant, Jimmy’s Grand Cafe, is a professional musician who’s performed in front of audiences around the world and toured for many years with gospel star Andrae Crouch.

What has it been like seeing your daughter rise like this?

Antonio McLendon: It’s the essence of what dreams are all made of. I often go between tears and smiles when I think about it and when I have the opportunity to see her perform.

There’s always something about her performance. I’m like OK, she got me again.

Jeffrey Brown: His daughter has also grown more comfortable incorporating her gospel roots into her jazz sound.

Samara Joy: I think, when I was first starting to listen to jazz, because it was the only genre I was listening to, I feel like I didn’t apply as much of what I learned growing up to that.

Jeffrey Brown: You were treating it as something different, new?

Samara Joy: Yes, and I felt like I already had a grasp on it. Jazz was the thing that I had never, ever heard or been exposed to. And now I feel like I have a grasp on both and it doesn’t seem like it’s fake or it doesn’t seem like I’m just doing it because I can, but because it’s meant for something. It’s meant to express a certain story.

Jeffrey Brown: It’s a story Joy shared in the 2023 release of her Christmas E.P. “A Joyful Holiday,” five standards and a Christmas carol recorded by Joy and family members.

Some even joined her on a national tour in December.

So, you’re not only seeing her, but you’re on stage with her.

Antonio McLendon: I’m like, how cool is that? I always say singing is what a McLendon was born to do. So to do that together is — again, that’s the thing that dreams are made of.

Jeffrey Brown: As well as fulfilling a McLendon family dream, the album has garnered two more Grammy nominations for best jazz vocal album and best jazz performance, while also introducing Joy to an even wider audience.

Samara Joy: There are people who are like, this is my first time ever going to a jazz concert…

Jeffrey Brown: Really?

Samara Joy: … in life.

Jeffrey Brown: Yes.

Samara Joy: You are my first and I saw you on TikTok. There are some parents who say, my kids introduced me to you. I’m a fan and I have never been into jazz ever.

Jeffrey Brown: She’s also now eager to extend the jazz songbook, as on some of the songs on her new album, “Portrait.”

You’re writing more lyrics. You’re writing more music. Why?

Samara Joy: Because I want to. And if not now, when? Dizzy and Charlie Parker and Miles and all of these wonderful musicians and vocalists, Sarah Vaughan and Betty Carter, they were really young when they started to contribute, so that by the time they got to their 30s and 40s, they were sure and established in what their sound was.

And so I want to put my best effort forward to figuring out what it is I love about it and how I can make it better, so that, 20, 30 years down the line, I have a better sense of what my writing style is and my compositional style. But the crafting of it starts now.

Jeffrey Brown: It’s nice to think about all those things sitting here, isn’t it?

Samara Joy: Yes. Yes.

Jeffrey Brown: In the place where some of that happened.

Samara Joy: Where it happened, yes. And to record in here was just a dream.

Jeffrey Brown: All this is still new to you, I mean, the attention.

And it’s been fast, right?

Samara Joy: Faster than I ever imagined. And I’m…

Jeffrey Brown: Really? You’re surprised?

Samara Joy: Yes. I’m still surprised, because I knew I love to sing. I knew that my family had this beautiful legacy of music, but I never knew where it was going to take me.

Jeffrey Brown: Samara Joy begins a five-month world tour in February, including an upcoming debut at New York’s Carnegie Hall on April 30.

For the “PBS News Hour,” I’m Jeffrey Brown in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey.

Geoff Bennett: Her artistry is somehow fresh and timeless all at the same time.

Amna Nawaz: Absolutely, a joy to watch.

Geoff Bennett: Yes.