Matt Marcinkowski
Janet Evra wants to take you to the beach this summer. That’s how the jazz singer, upright bass player, and Kranzberg Artist in Residence describes the sound of her upcoming single, “Summer Love Song.” In the up-tempo tune, five percussion instruments build the rhythm, which Evra describes as a pop/indie/bossa nova hybrid. It’s part of a new sound that she’s trying to create, first with her 2018 solo album Ask Her to Dance and now on the follow-up.
That new sound blends the different flavors and languages of jazz tradition, all anchored in Evra’s warm, sweet-as-honey voice. It’s a style that fits within the St. Louis landscape but is also distinct.
“It’s its own niche, but it fits under the umbrella,” Evra says of her style, “and I love that the umbrella of jazz is so big here in St. Louis. If you go out—[before] COVID-19—to the venues in St. Louis, you can find something for everyone.”
Although St. Louis is home now, Evra grew up in Gloucester, England, listening to classical, pop, and folk in a musical family. She sang in choirs and performed in coffeehouses with her sister.
Bossa nova proved the spark that ignited Evra’s love for jazz. She discovered the Brazilian genre, popularized in the ’60s by such hits as “The Girl From Ipanema,” while learning to play the guitar as a teenager.
Matt Marcinkowski
“I absolutely fell in love with it,” she recalls, “the rhythms, the conversational style of the vocals, the kind of beachy, light sound of it. When I put all that together, I never turned back.”
Evra first came stateside for a gap year at Principia College, in Elsah. But she never returned to the United Kingdom, instead studying in Michigan before settling in the St. Louis area.
“Summer Love Song” features Evra’s fellow Kranzberg Artist in Residence Brady Lewis on trumpet and multi-instrumentalist Will Buchanan, Evra’s husband. “I’m very lucky to have my live-in guitarist,” Evra says of Buchanan. He’s played alongside Evra for most of her St. Louis career. To stay on schedule, the trio recorded the song remotely, with Evra—singing under a blanket to prevent echo—and Buchanan using their dining table for their parts of the track.
The pandemic has forced Evra into downtime, time she was supposed to spend touring the East Coast with a jazz quartet. Instead, she’s been fleshing out ideas for her second album and awaiting her Jazz St. Louis debut, originally scheduled for April 2020.
“Of course I’ve missed the gigs,” she says, “but working on the album has been a silver lining. I’m grateful for that.”
Watch "Summer Love Song" below:
BEHIND THE MUSIC
More about making “Summer Love Song”
The video for “Summer Love Song,” shot at Urban Chestnut Brewing Company and available on YouTube, matches the laidback but romantic vibe of the music. Evra—playing the acoustic guitar—and crew appear under a subdued vintage filter. With the track mixed by Sawhorse Studios and mastered by Blue Jade Audio, it’s a true St. Louis collaboration. Setting the scene is the percussion, by Hal Pascale and Justin Ra, followed by the soulful trumpet of fellow Kranzberg Artist in Residence Brady Lewis. Lewis, also the leader of the group BLStet, hails, like legendary jazz trumpeter Miles Davis, from East St. Louis. Although he’s been studying the trumpet since the seventh grade, Lewis has performed with groups playing blues, bluegrass, gospel, hip-hop, indie-rock, and soul—music that’s influenced his own. On his website, listen to his track “Green Finch (Johanna),” exploring the world of the Sweeney Todd character Johanna, and “Caiyanna (Fancies),” based on a short poem about two pairs of estranged lovers.
