BY STEPHANIE ESLAKE
The music featured on vocalist Alex Siegers’ debut album spans six decades. Yet some of these works have never been recorded, or have recordings that seem impossible to find beyond the walls of a university library.
In From Here, Alex showcases an important collection of Australian jazz standards — allowing these pieces to “continue living” through her newly accessible recordings.
The ABC Jazz release, which came out in March, includes tracks from a range of legendary jazz artists including Judy Bailey and Sharny Russell, along with those from the classical sphere such as Elena Kats-Chernin — all united by Alex’s unique interpretation and presentation of their music.
Alex — who has studied and performed jazz, sacred, pop, classical music with Australia’s leading arts organisations — tells CutCommon about her debut release.
Alex, how are you feeling about having your debut album From Here out in the world?
I’ve been very nervous, actually. I want everyone to love it.
I am also nervous because the work isn’t done yet. It has been a long road already, but I have to keep on working and challenging myself. I’m having to invest in learning more about music promotion, distribution and e-commerce — I set up an online store on my website recently to directly sell CDs, which was a fun learning experience. Now I am about to start pitching international jazz channels, publishers, and radio stations.
Despite the nerves, I do get so excited when people do say they love it. Especially when I know that I’m introducing new people to this great music, which was the whole point of the project. I know there is an HSC student singing Judy Bailey’s Colours of My Dream in her HSC now after having heard it on this album, which just makes me ecstatic.
I’ve also sold a few physical CDs to buyers in the United Kingdom and United States, so my little postcard from Australia is beginning to travel the world.
So tell us about the album! It’s filled with Australian jazz standards; what do you think typifies an Australian jazz standard, as opposed to an American jazz standard?
For me, it is the people that make the jazz Australian. The musicians that write and perform the music — their characteristics, personalities, stories, and history that comes through in their melody, harmony, rhythm, and lyrics. It is intangible but it is unique!
Obviously, it’s impossible to capture the full spectrum and range of Australian jazz on one album — what even is jazz?! — but I think my selections have a thread of fun, cheek, irreverence, and not taking yourself too seriously, and I think that thread connects a lot of jazz composed and performed in Australia and by Australians since the early 20th Century.
Tim Nikolsky, who generously wrote a liner note for this album, has written a whole PhD thesis on this topic and put a lot of thought into this question. I’d recommend people giving it a peruse if they want to learn more. I think it’s a great read.
You’re presenting some Australian jazz standards — “several recorded here for the first time“, which is a notable achievement in itself! Why do you think some of these classics hadn’t been recorded?!
It is possible that they were recorded, once upon a time, but those recordings have disappeared — no longer available for purchase, not uploaded to digital distribution services, and no bootleg recordings of the original vinyls on YouTube. This is especially the case where the recordings were released independently, or the label has since become defunct.
It is in this situation where collections like the CD and vinyl collection at Sydney Conservatorium of Music Library becomes completely invaluable — so many of them the only copies of the recordings that exist in Australia and sometimes the world, not able to be legally digitised and distributed due to copyright restrictions.
But if we want this music to continue living, having recordings readily available is an important part of that. This is especially important in a genre with such a strong aural tradition like jazz.
You’re bringing together songs spanning six decades. I’d love to know how your unique style shines through each track, and what your point of difference might be as a 21st Century singer of jazz in Australia.
I think the ‘Alex’ shines through partly in the song choices themselves — the combination of jazz and classical, the whimsical lyrics, and tunes with music and words by women.
Vocally, I am not a stereotypical jazz singer. I don’t really fit into the mould of modern jazz singers like Veronica Swift or Samara Joy. I am not very ‘cool’. I do have exuberance and enthusiasm in spades though, and I think the vocal drama comes through in my interpretation and delivery.
Working from lead sheets, as I did for all the tracks on this album, forces you to impart your personality onto the tunes. Generally speaking, a lead sheet will have a melody, chords, and time feel, and that’s it. Sometimes you will get some structural things: a repeat, a suggested ending, or maybe an introduction. You can choose how specific you want to get in your arranging, or you can leave it to your band to interpret. Things like piano voicings, bass lines, and drum patterns I mostly left in the extremely competent hands of my band mates Aaron Blakey, Jacob Graham, and Andrew Dickeson.
You’ve included some of your own arrangements in this album, one of which includes Kats-Chernin’s Eliza Aria, which you’ve transformed as you sing a lower register and change the style of this ballet music. What gave you the idea to make it your own?
Yes! It’s an octave down from the original, except for a phrase towards the end where I sing up at the original pitch, just to show I can.
I first heard Jane Sheldon sing this with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra on an ABC Classic FM Life is Beautiful that came with the Sydney Morning Herald one weekend as a kid. I was completely enamoured.
By the time I was in my 20s, I’d accepted the fact that I was not a soprano like Jane Sheldon and, choosing to study jazz, was pretty unlikely to ever have an opportunity to sing solo with a symphony orchestra. I put that dream to bed.
Then, when I was completing my Honours at Sydney Conservatorium of Music, I did a bit of a deep dive into third stream music, and when programming a recital I realised this was my chance to finally sing this piece.
In the Wild Swans story, Eliza is a naïve princess that is pure and good. I wanted to explore other dimensions of her character, subvert those traditionally feminine qualities, and imagine, what if Eliza was a bit more three-dimensional and was a bit naughty as well? I took inspiration from another classical work I had always wanted to sing, Bizet’s L’amour est un oiseau rebelle from Carmen. The tango and habanera lent themselves so well to Kats-Chernin’s melody, and I always have so much fun singing this, particularly when there are people in the audience who know the original.
As an experienced jazz and classical performer, how do you bring that same energy and presence into your recordings as when you’re on stage for a live audience?
I love performing for people, so much so that I often find myself caught up in the energy of the audience. It’s like a drug. Sometimes, I find myself trying things I haven’t practised in an effort to continue to wow them and bring on their applause. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn’t. When it doesn’t, I always vow to practise more before the next one and start meditating to improve my concentration. My love of audience approval sometimes sabotages my honouring of the music.
Being in the studio with just the band, I can really focus on the music and my voice. In terms of energy and presence, I have spent so much time on stage that all I need to do is imagine my audience, and I am there.
With these jazz recordings, we were playing with the full band, and playing mostly full takes, so we were really able to bounce off each other musically like we would in a live performance.
What story or legacy would you like to share through your new album?
Both jazz and classical music are imported genres in Australia that exist in a relatively small musical industry on a vast continent.
It can sometimes feel like the musical contributions that we make here are small, insignificant and ersatz, somehow, compared to where the ‘real’ music is happening in Europe and North America. When you combine this with our tall poppy syndrome, it can feel like our musical successes aren’t held in as high esteem as they could be.
This album is a real exercise in celebrating the good stuff about jazz in Australia. I want to encourage us — instead of immediately looking abroad — to take a moment to look again in our own backyard and celebrate our homegrown heroes, and share that with the rest of the world.
Any parting words as Australia gets listening?
I just think Australia is really great, and we are so lucky to live on such beautiful country, in such a safe community, with such talented peers, and I don’t think that is always celebrated and acknowledged.
It can be extremely challenging to survive as an artist in a nation like Australia with its vast interior, small population, geographical isolation, and lean music industry. I think the challenges of that sometimes overshadow the incredible art that has been and is being produced here.
Alex Siegers’ album From Here is now available to listen and purchase on her website.
Images supplied.
