Madeleine Peyroux

Raised in New York and California by parents she has described as "hippies", Madeleine Peyroux's first instrument was the ukulele and she was in her mid teens when she first began to sing on the streets in Paris. She joined a group called the Riverboat Shufflers before touring Europe singing jazz standards with the Lost Wandering Blues & Jazz Band. Including covers of Edith Piaf's La Vie En Rose and Patsy Cline's Walkin' After Midnight, Peyroux's first album Dreamland in 1996 inspired a lot of interest, igniting the Billie Holiday comparisons. But throat problems hampered her progress and by the new millennium Peyroux was back busking in Paris. She then teamed up with multi-instrumentalist William Galison before being signed by Rounder, with Larry Klein producing her second album Careless Love in 2004. Featuring covers of Bob Dylan, Hank Williams and Leonard Cohen songs, it went on to sell over a million while her third album, Half The Perfect World (2006) - on which she covered Tom Waits, Charlie Chaplin and Serg Gainsbourg songs - was similarly successful. Peyroux's dislike of publicity led her to drop out of view for long periods, resulting in something of a cult status, but she returned to action in 2009 with Bare Bones, incorporating a broader rock style on a collection of collaborations and self-written songs. And in 2011 she moved into rootsier territory with the album Standin' On The Rooftop.