Jane E. Jens

I have loved jazz nearly all of my life, having been exposed first to rhythm and blues, then to big band and west coast jazz in the 50's. My older sister and her friends collected jazz records, and soon I followed suit. As a teenager I joined the Columbia Record Club at a time when the monthly album picks included several Miles Davis classics (e.g., "Kind of Blue", "Sketches of Spain") as well as records by JJ Johnson, Erroll Garner, Duke Ellington and Dave Brubeck. I also loved jazz singers, Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughn, Joe Williams, June Christy and Jackie and Roy. As a jazz singer myself, I appreciate good singing of any kind, but especially jazz singing, and instrumental jazz. I feel jazz is the music that is (at least can be) the music that demands the most intellectually of the listener while evoking intense and varied emotional responses.