Haiti Music Video > Newsletter > Cecile Salvant - Jazz Singer

Introducing the Gifted Cecile Mc Lorin Salvant

August 4, 2013 8:10 AM

Miami native and Haitian-American Cécile Mc Lorin Salvant is a jazz singer, whose emergence onto the music scene has created a stir. Born of French-Haitian parents, she resided in Paris, France, for a period, where she studied jazz improvisation and landed a spot as lead vocalist with her initial band.

Returning to America, she entered the Thelonious Monk jazz-singing competition and won it, creating further buzz about her preternatural vocal talent. Two years later, Salvant has released her first CD, WomanChild.

Cécile Mc Lorin Salvant - Le front caché sur tes genoux

More beautiful songs by Cecile

Music critics praise her precocious vocal delivery, usually not achievable until well into a career. Her CD contains no original material, but is a pastiche of 1920s and 30s blues standards and obscure Parisian torch songs.

Salvant is a singer's singer, her vocal technique one aspiring singers want to emulate. She demonstrates a vocal prowess, with an ability to imbue her phraseology with prisms of color. She takes old material and breathes new life into it, with her original song interpretations. Her performances show she understands the dramatic arc of a song; in other words, she is a dynamic performer.

Cecile Mclorin Salvant - I only have eyes for you

More beautiful songs by the French-Haitian Jazz singer Cecile Mclorin Salvant

Musicians, who play with her, love her sense of musicality and work hard on arrangements that show off her magnificent instrument to advantage. The only drawback music critics note is her tendency to over sing. However, she is just starting out, and they look forward to watching this wunderkind mature into one of the greats of a long lineage of jazz vocalists.

"Take It Right Back" Cecile McLorin Salvant and Martin Seck