Singing Her Own Song

Awkward brilliance

A singer on Holiday

Hurricane Madeleine blows away audience

...a better slice of laid-back jazz you'd be hard pressed to find...

Peyroux and a crack band honor modern songs

Madeleine Peyroux put her signature on love songs

Peyroux not perfect but shows rare gift

Peyroux's stylistic jigsaw of styles

It's the real thing – no longer a careless love for Peyroux

Madeleine Peyroux delivers subtle, elegant show at the Moore

She's back. But is she bothered?

...she has chosen to tread in the footsteps of a lineage of female singers...

Peyroux's honey-sweet jazz glides through myriad influences

Half The Perfect World - Madeleine Peyroux doesn't simply interpret songs, she possesses them...

Peyroux makes it personal

Assembly Hall Edinburgh

Madeleine Peyroux, Assembly Hall

Peyroux delivers in dynamic style

While her life story isn't nearly as tragic as that of Billie Holiday, Peyroux has a similar air of mysterious restraint and rueful regret about her. After her big breakout with "Dreamland," she essentially ran away from the public eye for almost a decade, claiming that voice strain and the emotional pressure to deliver a successful follow-up album had gotten the best of her.

But finally producer Larry Klein (best known for his work with ex-wife Joni Mitchell) lured her back to do "Careless Love," a high-concept (Norah Jones meets Cassandra Wilson at Billie Holiday's house) album that finds Peyroux doing hurts-so-good, cabaret cool rethinks of tunes from other fabulously tortured souls like Leonard Cohen ("Dance Me to the End of Love"), Bob Dylan ("You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go"), Patsy Cline ("Walking After Midnight") and Josephine Baker ("J'ai Deux Amours" sung in French - but of course, my cherie).

And currently scoring a TV commercial for Dockers is her worldly wise vocal entreaty from the set "Don't Wait Too Long," co-authored by the singer, Klein and Jesse Harris.

Peyroux has been working that "I vant to be alone," air-of-mystery thing away from the microphone, too. She got her British music label in a terrible tizzy a few weeks ago by "vanishing" off the face of the earth, blowing out a bunch of promotional events and forcing the label to put a private detective on her trail.

Then, after my interview with her was tentatively set, Peyroux's American publicist sheepishly informed me that the artist was likewise "indisposed."

Truth is, some talents are better appreciated from afar, without knowing exactly what makes them tick or how they've come to sound like a dusty old vinyl record incarnate.

... while chanteuse Madeleine Peyroux was holding a Garden Stage audience rapt with her dreamy crooning

Peyroux, who has been getting rave reviews for her second album "Careless Love," recorded seven years after her debut "Dreamland," uses a soft, dreamy Billie Holiday-style delivery and phrasing to get her music across. Peyroux's low-key charms and understated style might have worked better in a smaller, intimate setting of a nightclub, but the capacity Garden Stage crowd didn't seem to mind a bit, hanging on her every word and yelling out terms of encouragement from time to time. At times seeming modestly shy and self-conscious, Peyroux even noted at one point that the crowd was unusually quiet and exhorted them to be louder. Even the guitar she quietly strummed seemed more of a security blanket than a musical instrument.

Madeleine Peyroux stole my ears

Passion with precision

Angel-voiced but insecure

Madeleine Peyroux has had an almost stealthless rise ...

Madeleine Peyroux - Live Footage (click on top banner for video)

Sounds from the street

A vintage sound all her own

Current hot thing Peyroux turns shy, awkward in concert

Transported to a golden era

Smooth operator is taking her time

The easy line on Madeleine Peyroux is ... review New Orleans Jazz Fest

Madeleine Peyroux turned the El Rey into an intimate Parisian cafe ...

Madeleine Peyroux at The Living Room, NYC (in French)

Madeleine Peyroux - a voice, easy to fall in love with (in German)

Almost Famous

French language Madeleine info

Susan Werner, Madeleine Peyroux at the Birchmere 11/23/2004

Peyroux is fine and mellow...

Review of Madeleine @ Yoshi's - Oakland CA, 10/12/2004

'This pair covers a multitude of styles' - Moore Theater performance

From blues to country and medium swing to walking ballads, Madeleine Peyroux, in her debut at Le Jazz au Bar, covers all the bases with a subtle and sweet lack of pretension. A freshly minted purity and innocence prevails, but underneath there is a distinctly sexy and seductive core with an edgy jazz sensitivity....

Umusic Canada

Frederik Meijer Gardens - Grand Rapids

City Paper Review

Anthony Wilson Quintet with Madeleine Peyroux @ The Vic

Tin Angel - Philadelphia

Time Herald-Record preview of concert in Rhinebeck NY

Comments about Madeleine in light of Norah Jones' rise

WinAmp Review

Whatever Happened to Madeleine Peyroux? ------from Perfect Sound Forever

Lilith Fair Artist Profile

Review of Dreamland

Another review of Madeleine

Madeleine Peyroux -----from Urban Desires ezine issue 3.3