Urban Thought Collective

Jazz-funk songbird Maysa chats about her new CD.
Presented by Electronic Urban Report.

If change is truly good, then “Metamorphosis” must be great. Singer Maysa is here to show and prove that that is indeed the case.

The soulful songbird has released her latest smooth jazz-funk-soul disc called “Metamorphosis” as well as begun a personal metamorphosis herself.

The Baltimore native has paid her dues as a member of touring and recording groups through the ’90s including Stevie Wonder’s female backup group Wonderlove and the British jazz-funk group Incognito. She went solo in 1995 and consistently put out six acclaimed (original) albums and has done her share of ‘guesting’ on dozens of albums for some legendary artists, groups, and producers.

“My uncle turned me on to jazz music one day when he told me to turn on PBS to see Al Jarreau because he was scatting,” Maysa said of her inspired beginnings. “That was it. I was like, ‘I have to do this.’ My mom took me to see Melba Moore when I was six. As soon as Melba Moore opened her mouth in the play ‘Purlie,’ I was like, ‘I don’t think there is anything else I want to do. I remember my heart feeling too big for my chest and being extremely excited about what she was doing. And knowing at the point, as six years old, that that was what I was going to do for the rest of my life.”

Knowing her calling at such an early age, it’s quite interesting to find that even fans don’t know what to call or categorize her music as. While Maysa gladly accepts the ‘Are you soul or are you jazz’ question, she really sees herself as more of a jazz-funk singer.

“It’s all the same to me,” she said. “Whatever comes from your spirit to me is soul music.”

Maysa has been compared to a number of soul-jazz songbirds including Anita Baker, Sade, and Phyllis Hyman, and she told EUR’s Lee Bailey that upon those comparisons, though flattered, she became determined to create a name for herself and find her own sound. She explained that the combination of her degree in classical performance, her opera training, her experiences, and her size; she found her voice.

According to Maysa and her education, a singer’s body has a lot…

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