Neo-traditionalist Jolie Holland in concert performance
Jolie Holland was born and raised in Houston Texas who taught herself to play piano, guitar, accordion & violin. By her mid-teens, she left home and began working as a travelling musician. She eventually landed in San Francisco in the mid-Nineties where she became a popular performer in music clubs & cafes.
Around 2000, Holland moved to Vancouver British Columbia & formed the all female neo-traditionalist folk band the Be Good Tanyas with three promising Canadian musicians, Samantha Parton, Frazey Ford & Trish Klein.
Soon after the release of their 2001 debut album,
Blue Horse, Holland once again got the urge to travel. She left the Be Good Tanyas before the ink on the rave reviews for
Blue Horse had dried and she moved back to San Francisco where she produced a series of stark minimalist low-fi demo recordings that made the rounds & eventually caught the ear of the legendary Tom Waits who signed her on his own Anti record label and Waits became her career mentor & adviser.
Jolie Holland's music is a skillful blend of blues, jazz, folk, gospel, Tex-Mex border music & popular standards. Her approach is from a minimalist, post modernist perspective using low-fi production techniques. Many of her songs sound like they were recorded using a vintage two track analog high-fidelity tape deck, the kind of equipment by Smithsonian Folkways label used to make field recordings of rediscovered delta blues artists in the late 50s and early 60s.
Jolie Holland's biggest musical asset is her smoky voice and her innate gift for vocal phrasing which is reminiscent of the languid phrasing of the great jazz songbird, Billie Holiday. Like Billie Holiday, Jolie Holland's singing phrases often linger behind the tempo of the song to make her singing sound intimate and conversational.
Like Billie Holiday, Jolie Holland doesn't have the range of many modern day pop music divas, but her strength as a singers rests on the flawless timing of her vocal phrasing. As Sinatra once put it, "A singer with a four octave range is still a singer, but a singer with a two octave range who has mastered the art of phrasing is a vocal stylist."
Her vocal rendition of
Sasha on her 2004 album
Escondida is a good example of Jolie Holland's talent for vocal phrasing.
On another song from
Escondida, Holland commits an act of musical blasphemy... She subversively transforms the revered Christian fundamentalist gospel anthem
Give Me That Old Time Religion into a New Orleans jazz funeral dirge praising the wonders of that old fashioned opiate pain-killer morphine.
Since 2003, Jolie Holland has produced five studio albums & in 2008 she relocated to New Orleans where she cobbled together a home studio.
In January 2013, Jolie spent every Sunday evening woodshedding new material for an new album before audiences in a small club in Brooklyn. The songs are largely improvised and she's backed by a seven piece jazz ensemble, the largest band she's ever worked with.
Jolie will be returning to the West Coast in late February to perform in a trio with with Carey Lamprecht and Keith Cary. Jolie emailed me a copy of her concert schedule for her West Coast tour.
Jolie Holland Tour Schedule February/March 2013
[FONT="Garamond"]2/21 Davis, CA – Odd Fellows Hall
2/22 Sebastopol, CA – Hopmonk Tavern
2/23 Oakland, CA – The New Parish
2/24 San Fran – Swedish American Hall (NoisePop 2012)
2/26 Santa Cruz, CA – The Crepe Place
2/27 Seaside, CA – Alternative Cafe
3/4 LA, CA – Bootleg Theater