Praised for her “butterscotch timbres” (★★★★ DownBeat), hauntingly evocative lyrics, and genre-defying artistry, award-winning vocalist Tessa Souter celebrates the release of her new album Shadows and Silence: The Erik Satie Project (2025, Noanara), featuring the talents of her long-time core band, Luis Perdomo, Yasushi Nakamura and Billy Drummond, with special guests Steve Wilson and Nadje Noordhuis. Bringing fresh narratives to Erik Satie’s iconic Gnossiennes and Gymnopédies with her original lyrics, and bold new jazz arrangements by GRAMMY-winner Luis Perdomo, it has been acclaimed as “a work of true brilliance” (UK Jazz News), “a masterpiece” (Audio Stereoplay) and “outstanding”(★★★★ Jazzwise). “Few vocalists measure up to this high standard” (All About Jazz). “Like the late Abbey Lincoln, Souter’s wordsmithery concerns big, even existential topics, such as the nature of beauty and the essence of existence . . .  Moving, engaging, and highly emotional … this is something I actually want to listen to.” (New York Sun).

Mentored by jazz legends Mark Murphy, who called her “a true musician and extraordinary talent, remarkable and very moving,” and NEA Jazz Master Sheila Jordan, who puts her “at the top of my list of great talent,” Souter’s critically-acclaimed voice and penchant for exploring music mostly untouched by other vocalists, has “set her apart as one of the few exceptional standouts in the crowded field of female jazz singers.” (Don Heckman, Los Angeles Times) She has cast an increasingly wide musical net, from her Flamenco-tinged debut, Listen Love (Nara, 2004), to Picture in Black and White (NOA, 2018), a meditative exploration of her bi-racial heritage, to her latest release Shadows & Silence: The Erik Satie Project.

 “There’s something raw and real about hearing Tessa Souter sing,” wrote John Payne in the LA Weekly. “Basically a self-taught musician, she is not afraid to take big risks in her performances with surprising takes on often just as surprisingly un-standard repertoire, from jazz arrangements of  ‘Eleanor Rigby, Cream’s ‘White Room’ and Nick Drake’s ‘River Man’ to covers of Brazilian compositions by Milton Nascimento and Dori Caymmi, originals such as her own mesmerizing ‘Usha’s Wedding,’ superb arrangements of classical stuff by Chopin, Beethoven, Debussy and others, and modern jazz tunes by Kenny Barron and Wayne Shorter.” Shorter gave her not only permission, but shared writing for her lyric to ‘Ana Maria’ – later recorded by Kurt Elling (with additional lyrics by Elling) on his GRAMMY-nominated Wildflowers: Volume 1.

Souter has performed at some of the world’s most notable venues, including SF Jazz, the Kennedy Center, JALC, Mezzrow,  London and Edinburgh Jazz Festivals, the Blue Notes in New York, Beijing and Shanghai and multiple tours of the philharmonic halls of Russia. In 2015 she was the subject of a one-hour WXXI PBS TV show at the Rochester International Jazz festival, where she has performed a record seven times. “Tessa Souter has become a favorite of (festival) fans, not only because of her beautiful voice and amazing artistry but because of her warmth as a person. She is a beautiful human being who relates to her audiences as well as any artist we’ve ever presented,” said John Nugent, co-producer and artistic director of the Rochester International Jazz Festival, speaking to The Rochester Democrat and Chronicle

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