Norah Jones

• Born: March 30, 1979
• Place of Birth: Brooklyn, New York City

MUSICIAN AND ACTOR

Norah Jones proved herself as one of the most commercially successful musicians of the early twenty-first century. She earned multiple Grammy Awards in addition to several other awards and honors. Her diverse musical background enabled her to successfully collaborate with top performers in jazz, rock, hip-hop, and country music.

Full name: Norah Jones

Birth name: Geethali Norah Jones Shankar

Early Life

Norah Jones was born Geethali Norah Jones Shankar on March 30, 1979, in New York. Her father was the world-renowned Indian sitarist Ravi Shankar, and her mother was Sue Jones. Her parents never married and separated in 1986. Norah moved with her mother to Grapevine, Texas, where she attended Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts. While in school, she sang in the choir and played alto saxophone in the band. She won DownBeat Student Music Awards for Best Jazz Vocalist (1996, 1997) and Best Original Composition (1996) while in high school. She also attended the Interlochen Center for the Arts in Michigan during the summers. Throughout her teenage years, she had little contact with her father, and at age sixteen, she legally changed her name to Norah Jones.

After graduating from high school, Jones attended the University of North Texas as a jazz piano major. She left in 1999 and returned to New York, where she worked as a lounge singer and performed with such diverse artists as singer-songwriter Victoria Williams, blues guitarist Peter Malick, and trip-hop group Wax Poetic.

Life’s Work

In 2000 Jones signed with legendary jazz label Blue Note Records, and she released a six-song extended play (EP), simply titled First Sessions, in 2001. Her first full-length album, Come Away with Me, was released in February 2002 and debuted at 139 on the Billboard 200 chart, eventually peaking at number one. The album was certified platinum in August 2002 and diamond in February 2005, becoming Blue Note’s biggest-selling album to that point. On the success of the album, Jones was nominated for eight Grammy Awards in 2003, winning five, including best new artist and album of the year. With her five awards, she tied rhythm and blues (R&B) singers Lauryn Hill and Alicia Keys for most Grammys by a female artist in one year.

In 2003, Indian filmmaker Dev Anand announced plans to make Song of Life, a film about the strained relationship between Jones and Shankar. The plans for the film were denounced by both Jones and Shankar as well as by Jones’s half sister, Anoushka Shankar. Jones and her father reconciled in 1999, but she continued to downplay her relationship with him; he passed away in 2012. Also in 2003, Jones formed an alternative country band with four of her friends called the Little Willies. After initially performing at a small venue in New York City whenever they had time to get together, the group released a self-titled studio album in 2006.

Meanwhile, Jones released her second solo album, Feels Like Home, in 2004. While Come Away with Me had a strong jazz and soul feel to it, her second album revealed more of a country influence. It was certified platinum one week after its release and was the second-best-selling album of 2004 behind R&B singer Usher’s Confessions. Feels Like Home featured a duet with country legend Dolly Parton that was nominated for the best country collaboration with vocals Grammy in 2005. Jones won a Grammy for best female pop vocal performance for the single “Sunrise” and won record of the year and best pop collaboration with vocals for “Here We Go Again,” a duet with soul singer Ray Charles from his album Genius Loves Company.

Jones’s third album, Not Too Late, was released in January 2007, debuting at number one on the Billboard 200 charts and becoming her third number-one album. It was recorded in a more casual and impromptu manner than her previous albums, leading to reports that Blue Note executives were unaware she was recording an album. She also was featured on a track on jazz legend Herbie Hancock's album River: The Joni Letters (2007), a tribute to musician Joni Mitchell that went on to win the Grammy Award for Album of the Year. Also in 2007, Jones made her acting debut in the film My Blueberry Nights, which premiered at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival; she had previously appeared as herself in the 2002 film Two Weeks Notice.

In 2008 Jones released a self-titled album with her humorous indie rock side band El Madmo. That same year she revealed that she was involved in rock icon Bob Dylan’s The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams project. The project, commissioned by Williams’s daughter Jett, involves original musical arrangements for previously unrecorded Williams lyrics and was released in 2011. Others involved in the project include rock singer Jack White of the White Stripes and country music star Alan Jackson.

Jones’s fourth studio album, The Fall, was released in November 2009, debuting at number three. The Fall was not as commercially successful as Jones’s previous albums, failing to reach the top of the Billboard 200 chart, despite being a critical success. In November 2010, Jones released . . . Featuring, an eighteen-song collection of musical collaborations from past albums. These songs include the recordings with Parton and Charles along with collaborations with the rock band Foo Fighters, country legend Willie Nelson, jazz artists the Dirty Dozen Brass Band and Herbie Hancock, and hip-hop stars OutKast and Talib Kweli.

In 2012 Jones released Little Broken Hearts, an album that she explained in interviews she had begun working on with producer Brian "Danger Mouse" Burton in 2009. With a lot of her material inspired by a difficult breakup, Jones took even more stylistic risks with this project, which critics largely praised her for. The album debuted and peaked at number two on the Billboard 200, and Jones toured extensively throughout the country to promote the new work. The Little Willies also released their second album, For the Good Times, in 2012. With another country-oriented side project, Puss N Boots, which she had formed in 2008 with Sasha Dobson and Catherine Popper as an outlet to learn to play guitar, Jones released the album No Fools, No Fun in 2014.

After going more than four years without releasing a solo studio album, Jones returned to the more reserved jazz tones of Come Away with Me for her sixth album, Day Breaks, which came out in October 2016. It includes some cover songs as well as original pieces. Just like her previous record, Day Breaks entered the Billboard 200 at the number two position and was largely lauded by critics.

In 2018 Jones embarked on a project to release a steady stream of singles, and worked with various fellow musicians and producers. The tracks were then compiled on the album Begin Again (2019). That project further led to Jones's next proper studio album, Pick Me Up Off the Floor (2020), which debuted on the Billboard 200 at number eighty-seven. She also released another album with Puss N Boots in 2020, a mix of originals and covers titled Sister. In 2021 Jones put out her first solo live album, 'Til We Meet Again, featuring recordings from 2017 to 2019. She also released her first Christmas collection, I Dream of Christmas, and in 2022, she released a deluxe version with additional live and studio performances. Jones worked with producer Leon Michels on both the Christmas album and Visions, her 2024 album.

Significance

Norah Jones rapidly made a splash as one of the most popular artists of the early twenty-first century, earning both massive commercial success and critical acclaim for her landmark album Come Away With Me as well as later releases. By the early 2020s, she had sold more than 50 million albums and been nominated for dozens of music-industry awards, with nine Grammy wins. Jones worked with some of the top artists in popular music and successfully blended her signature jazzy style with hip-hop, rock, country, and folk to become a widely admired musical icon.

Bibliography

Erlewine, Stephen Thomas. "Norah Jones." AllMusic, www.allmusic.com/artist/norah-jones-mn0000884686/biography. Accessed 21 Aug. 2024.

Kimpel, Dan. “Norah Jones.” How They Made It: True Stories of How Music’s Biggest Stars Went from Start to Stardom. Hal Leonard, 2006, pp. 61–65.

Latham, Donna. Norah Jones. Mason Crest, 2009.

"Norah Jones Releases Expanded 'I Dream of Christmas (Deluxe)." Blue Note Records, 21 Oct. 2022, www.bluenote.com/norah-jones-i-dream-of-christmas-deluxe/. Accessed 21 Aug. 2024.

Ray, Leigh Belz. "Norah Jones Gets Candid about Married Life & Making Her New Album: 'The Goal Was to Do Everything Live.'" Billboard, 29 Sept. 2016, www.billboard.com/articles/news/magazine-feature/7525632/norah-jones-new-album-day-breaks. Accessed 20 Mar. 2017.

Tradd, Katherine. “Norah Jones.” Legends 2: Women Who Have Changed the World—Through the Eyes of Great Women Writers. Edited by John Miller and Kristen Miller, World Library, 2004, pp. 16–17.

Weiner, Jonah. "Norah Jones on Motherhood, Perils of Fame, 'Sneak Attack' New LP." Rolling Stone, 24 Oct. 2015, www.rollingstone.com/music/features/norah-jones-on-motherhood-fame-sneak-attack-new-lp-w446132. Accessed 20 Mar. 2017.