Lucy Woodward & The Rocketeers - Lucy Woodward & The Rocketeers (2024)

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Lucy Woodward & The Rocketeers - Lucy Woodward & The Rocketeers (2024)

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LUCY WOODWARD is going big with this new project of hers, Lucy Woodward & The Rocketeers. Big as in the size of the band, which numbers 18, and big as in potential, and range. Throughout her career, Lucy has mixed genres, genre-bending if you will. And with this jazz orchestra, she pulls vibes from icons of jazz and pulsing vibrations from the then to the now and future music makers. Pushing the music forward is a worldwide collection of musicians from countries like Spain, Italy, and Ghana, all seriously helping to break the mold of the traditional Big Band.

Music-driven movement is within Lucy Woodward’s life force. Born in London to classical musicians and traveling since Day One, okay, maybe a few days after that. Her childhood was spent traveling between The Netherlands, where her father lived after her parents separated, and her hometown of New York, where she lived with her mother, growing up on a steady diet of Chopin and American music, the background of her NYC soundtrack she found in countless New York bodegas, on basketball courts, and the boomboxes of Breakdancers.

Like many others, Lucy started her singer/songwriter career busking in NYC coffee shops and countless cover bands. This “apprenticeship” landed Lucy with a contract at a major label, Atlantic Records, in the early 2000s, with her tracks landing on top 40 radio, earning her two BMI Music Awards. She has since left the pop world, endearing herself to a larger, more diverse audience, recording an album on Verve produced by the legendary Tony Visconti (Bowie) and collaborating with Snarky Puppy in the studio and live, most recently opening up for them at London’s Royal Albert Hall alongside guitar virtuoso Charlie Hunter. She recorded two albums of intriguing covers with Charlie, backed by extensive international touring. Pink Martini enlisted her as a temporary sub for China Forbes, with Lucy learning their repertoire of Croatian,

Turkish, Spanish, French, and Japanese songs on a few days' notice. She has guest appeared with European jazz orchestras such as WDR Big Band, Danish Radio Big Band and Frankfurt Radio Big Band. She has also sung vocals for Rod Stewart, Celine Dion, Barbra Streisand, and Chaka Khan and has graced several movie soundtracks, including blockbusters The Blind Side, Last Vegas, What a Girl Wants, Birds Of Prey, and, with her version of the Bjork classic "It’s Oh So Quiet,” on Disney’s The Ice Princess.

This debut album of Lucy Woodward & The Rocketeers was recorded live in Rotterdam, Netherlands, in the city’s iconic hall, LantarenVenster. Lucy produced the sessions with Louk Boudesteijn, founder of the New Rotterdam Jazz Orchestra and Bonsai Panda. The Rocketeers' rhythm section is comprised of Jelle Roozenburg (guitar), Niek de Bruijn (drums), and Udo Pannekeet (bass), who have been Lucy’s touring band for years, performing with her at internationally renowned festivals such as the Istanbul Jazz Fest and Athens Jazz, as well as touring together throughout Europe. On the road, their musical chemistry and immense trust in each other’s abilities have gelled into something deeply organic, telepathic, and thrilling.

The compositions and arrangements for this project fully employ Lucy’s full range and are vibrantly pushed forward by the players’ ambitions, consummate skills, and unbiased personalities. Lucy, a powerhouse singer whose soulful, impeccably controlled vocals can turn on a dime from runaway-train full-throttle intensity to soft, personal, and sultry whisper, takes the songs from fiery, high-energy explosions to hauntingly intimate meditations.

“Plain Gold Ring” is likewise deeply multilayered. Lucy first heard Nina Simone’s bluesy and hauntingly direct version. As arranged here by Louk Boudesteijn and Jelle Roozenburg, the track brims with uncontrolled passion, devastating heartache, and seismic emotional turbulence. “I found freedom in being able to sing it differently every night. The song fluctuates between ownership and surrendering to a situation while also lyrically being completely helplessly in love. It covers a lot of emotional ground.”

The inclusion of the Donny Hathaway song, “Tryin’ Times,” was motivated by watching the US Riots breaking out during the summer of 2020. Lucy watched in horror as the videos played on European news shows. America was burning once again; protesters were taking to the streets to fight for racial equality and justice. When Lucy was 12, her mother took her to her first peace march. So, for this project, she wanted a song that would honor that memory and her commitment to fighting for what is right, her memories of being swept away in the moment of the movement, and the renewed sense of rage sweeping through her country. “I grew up in NYC, a city which has, for me, a palpable and life-affirming pulse,” she explains. “I wanted our ‘Tryin’ Times’ to capture that energy, the conversations of the subway, people wanting to be heard in a city of millions, people’s outcry, the sound of change. I wanted to dwell in that feeling of chaos so as to bring a sense to the rage.”

Some intimate moments on the album include their hushed lullaby of “Love Me Tender.” Boudesteijn distilled the Elvis track, carefully arranging the reeds and flute, and features Alexander van Popta on piano. “Rocketeer,” Lucy’s tender hymn, is a heartfelt goodbye to old ways and well-worn paths, which became the subtext of this project. Initially, “Rocketeer” was written by Woodward and Boudesteijn for her previous 2024 release, Stories From The Dust. “I love the Big Band genre and the singers from that era; it was the pop music of the day,” says Lucy, “but I wanted us to contribute a different, boundary-breaking spin, a new wave if you will, that moves this all forward.”

Lucy Woodward &The Rocketeers did go big, and in doing so, brought it all home with this album.