Samara Joy | Portrait

Born out of her time on the road, Samara Joy took her touring band, made up of other rising young jazz musicians, into the legendary Van Gelder Studios (the venerable studio from which A Love Supreme and so many of the great catalog records from Impulse! and Blue Note were recorded) in February of 2024. Recorded across three days, Samara and her musicians were able to capture an incredible snapshot of who she is today and the promise of tomorrow. This record, appropriately entitled Portrait is a collection of standards, as well as one original and some of her first forays into lyric writing and, most importantly, features her singular voice, alongside arrangements and playing from this tight-knit young group. The recording tells the story of the community she’s created with a new generation of young players and is in many ways of evocative of the energy of the live show that so many fans have seen them perform over the last year or so.