Arianna Neikrug - Changes (2018) [Hi-Res]

After winning the 2015 Sarah Vaughan International Vocal Competition then performing at the Montreal International Jazz Festival the following year, 25-year-old singer and songwriter Arianna Neikrug makes her grander introduction to the music world with the August 24, 2018 release of Changes on Concord Jazz.

Produced by the Grammy-winning pianist and arranger Laurence Hobgood, Changes displays Neikrug’s gift for interpreting tunes from the Great American Songbook and more recent pop and R&B classics from the ’70s. The disc also contains two originals that reveal some of Neikrug’s journey from her hometown of Los Angeles to New York City, where she argues she truly belongs. Blending the right amount of reverence for the jazz tradition with a knowing glance to modern pop and R&B classics, sprinkled with two inviting originals, Changes will delight both jazz purists and novices without making any unwise artistic compromises as she superbly negotiates the glories of jazz’s past with a wide-eyed optimism that betrays her tender age. “When you’re recording your debut album, fresh out of college, you’re not exactly sure how you want to present yourself,” Neikrug explains. “It was easier figuring that out by discovering who I didn’t want to be. I’m just trying to take the jazz tradition and move it in my direction.”