Stacey Kent

New York native Stacey Kent never anticipated a career in jazz music, for she was a Sarah Lawrence graduate with a degree in comparative literature. But her childhood days spent listening to the traditional beauty of Frank Sinatra and Nat "King" Cole undoubtedly influenced her. While on holiday in Europe after graduating from college, she took up singing without much formal training and never looked back.

Kent became acquainted with several musicians at Oxford in 1991 and through them she found herself participating in a jazz course at the famed Guildhall School of Music and Drama. There she also met her future husband, tenor saxophonist Jim Tomlinson, and also landed a spot in the class. Her next spot was singing with the Vile Bodies Swing Orchestra at the Ritz Hotel in London, quickly landing a role in Ian McKellen's Richard III film, playing a big-band singer. The mid-'90s were more focused on recording and in 1996, Kent inked a deal with Candid Records. A year later, the critically acclaimed Close Your Eyes was issued; Tender Trap followed in 1999. Her third LP Let Yourself Go: Celebrating Fred Astaire, which showcased popular standards, appeared in spring 2000. The ballad-oriented Dreamsville appeared the next spring.