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Back to Biographies Diana Krall At this year's Grammy Awards, singer-pianist Diana Krall walked away with wins for Best Jazz Vocal Performance and Best Engineered Album -- Non-Classical (won by Al Schmitt) for When I Look in Your Eyes. This collaboration with producer Tommy LiPuma and legendary composer Johnny Mandel was also the first jazz album to be nominated for the Best Album of the Year Grammy in more than 20 years. Diana Krall comes from the British Columbia town of Nanaimo, where she was surrounded by music and musicians. She studied classical piano but played jazz in the school band and performed in a local restaurant at age 15. Her first inspiration was the first great singer-pianist, Fats Waller, whose records her father collected. Following studies at Boston's Berklee College of Music, Krall returned home and befriended Jeff Hamilton and Ray Brown, with whom she performed in the Northwest and British Columbia. They encouraged Krall to move to Los Angeles, where a Canadian Arts Council grant allowed her to study with pianist Jimmy Rowles, who would become her musical "grandpa." In 1984 Diana Krall settled in Toronto, where she studied with bassist-pianist Don Thompson. She came to New York in 1990, but she performed most often in Boston with a trio that included bassist Whit Browne and drummer Klaus Suonsaari. Krall's earlier albums include Stepping Out (1993); Only Trust Your Heart (1995); All For You (1996), her breakthrough recording on Impulse!, which remained on Billboard's Traditional Jazz chart for nearly 70 weeks and earned Krall a Grammy nomination; and Love Scenes (1997), which was certified gold and garnered another Grammy nomination. Krall counts among her favorite singer-pianists Dinah Washington, Roberta Flack, Shirley Horn, Andy Bey, Aretha Franklin, Sarah Vaughan, and especially Carmen McRae and Nat King Cole. Since the release of When I Look in Your Eyes, Krall has been touring worldwide, including sold-out performances at the Hollywood Bowl and Massey Hall and several engagements with Tony Bennett. |
