Grammy Winner Nicole Zuraitis Headlines White Plains Jazz Fest

This year’s White Plains Jazz Fest will bring a variety of acts from across the world over five days starting Sept. 11.

On Friday, Sept. 13, Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter and pianist Nicole Zuaraitis and her quartet will be part of a special performance at the ArtsWestchester gallery on Mamaroneck Avenue in White Plains.

Zuraitis, 39, a self-taught musician and solo singer, remembered her first spark of inspiration. She picked up an Ella Fitzgerald CD and was struck by the song “Someone to Watch Over Me.”

From there, she became enamored of jazz vocalists such as Nina Simone, among others, leading Zuraitis to pursue jazz singing and songwriting full-time.

“It’s been quite the journey to get to ‘just jazz,’” Zuraitis explained, describing how she’s performed many genres. “I’ve toured in a folk band, I’ve done classical for many years, opera, I sang in a blues band, I love rock and pop music…but I also love to write music that evokes nostalgia.”

She discovered that jazz was her true calling, explaining that it was a key factor in inspiring all other American genres. When Zuraitis finally found that path, she dove in head-first, pulling out the culture, language and traditions that emerge from jazz and spinning it into her original material.

Jazz has influenced Zuraitis for most of her life, but she didn’t consider herself one of its practitioners until she was about 30. Her big break was through a long-running residency at the former 55 Bar in Greenwich Village, where she performed once a month for seven years.

In 2016, Zuraitis and producer Christian McBride crossed paths, and they have been friends and creative partners since then.

McBride has worked with Zuraitis on all six of her studio albums, playing upright bass and assuming an executive production role on her latest project, last year’s “How Love Begins.” The dynamic duo started planning the new album right after the pandemic ended, saying that she had some song ideas for the project and that what she needed was the “go-ahead.”

“His role was basically the most epic cheerleader position you could imagine,” Zuraitis explained. “For someone who’s a self-taught pianist and a late lover of jazz, to have Christian McBride producing…it was very validating.”

The journey to reach that point was a long time in the making, a full-circle vision only she and McBride could breathe life into.

Unlike her other albums, Zuraitis wanted this newest project to be a concept and an intention, not just to make music for the sake of making music. In planning the album, two things happened simultaneously during the pandemic.

“One was I realized I had to be more specific with the intent that I was writing if I wanted to move forward in jazz, and two, I got my MBA, so that helped me with making an actual plan for myself…once I decided who my team was, I just had to build it out from there,” she said.

The recording band is comprised of Zuraitis’s husband, Dan Pugach, on drums, who also serves as an associate producer along with pianist David Cook, Gilad Hekselmen on guitar, Maya Kronfeld on organ and, of course, McBride on bass. The instrumental roster, she said, will be completely different for the White Plains Jazz Fest performance, as her quartet arrangement will be noticeably more intimate and dynamic with the audience.

When collaborating with a list of different instrumentalists, rotating throughout each album and performance, keeping the improvisatory spirit between her and the bandmates is key.

“I believe that as a songwriter, music should be intuitive. And so when I write music, I’m not trying to sound like I’m just coming out of jazz mode…there has to be a story, there has to be an intention, and when the band sounds cohesive together, I know I’ve done my job right,” Zuraitis said.

Zuraitus is already focused on writing her next studio album, this time putting narrative at the forefront of the music.

“How Love Begins” was originally written and planned as a two-sided project, with one side titled “Oil,” the other “Water.” The idea for the album came from an aerial photograph of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill in 2010, which she mistook for an oil painting when she originally saw it.

“And that photo, combined with the oil and water imagery, became a subplot for the album,” she said.

Reception to the album has been a whirlwind for Zuraitis. Before the Grammy Awards, where she captured Best Jazz Vocal Album, she said she was doing everything independently or with her husband. When she put out “How Love Begins,” Zuraitis was greeted by favorable reaction and reviews, which motivated her to tour and promote the album. She is the woman to write and arrange the entire album herself in the category in the history of the Grammys.

Along with her music, Zuraitis is an activist for nature conservation and mental health. She recalls a quote from Simone that says “If you have a creative platform, use it for something that matters to you, and stand for something.” For each album she’s recorded, Zuraitis explained that she tries to give back in some way.

Her Sept. 13 engagement will contain material from Zuraitis’s latest project, but the setting and her backing band will make for a more freeform performance. They will throw in numbers to engage the audience, whether originals from the album, covers of popular songs, solo pieces or interesting turns on classic jazz standards.

What excites Zuraitis about the performance is that it’s in White Plains, a creative epicenter for her between her home in West Haven, Conn. and her recording and performing setting in New York City.

Zuraitis will appear for two performances on Sept. 13, at 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. The ArtsWestchester gallery is located at 31 Mamaroneck Ave. in White Plains. For more information and the full schedule of performers at Jazz Fest, visit www.artswestchester.org/special-events.