José James Focuses on Songs From 1978 and 1979, Something of a Pangaea Moment for Music It was a time when the many strains of pop — soul, funk, R&B, rock, jazz, and even disco — were all coming ...

Jose James calls Billie Holiday his “musical mother.” He’s far from alone in jazz song in claiming her maternity. The number of jazz singers, justly or not, who might claim Holiday as their ...

How the 1978 sounds of Prince and Marvin Gaye inspired Pasadena’s José James The soulful, hypnotic grooves on his new album '1978' run the older music through a modern filter.

James felt inspired to pursue such a project because jazz keyboardist extraordinaire Herbie Hancock enlisted a cast of jazz musicians and pop singers to interpret Joni Mitchell songs on 2007's ...

James was born in 1978 in Minneapolis—he has the style of a Chuck Foreman spin move—but his sensibility feels early ’80s New York, where many of us grew up on radio stations like BLS and KTU ...

James rises to that challenge with On & On mostly by engaging with it directly. His interpretations of the seven Badu songs he sings over the album’s 43 minutes are faithful to the originals ...

Jazz singer José James presents his dilemma starkly: He grew up in the time of hip-hop, and he couldn’t rap. The Minneapolis native says he began to drill down on music as a 14-year-old, right ...