STACEY KENT SIGNS WITH BLUE NOTE

Blue Note in Paris has signed U.S. jazz singer Stacey Kent to a worldwide recording deal. Kent previously recorded six albums on U.K. label Candid Records. She also featured on The Lyric (Token), the album released in 2005 by her husband, British tenor saxophonist Jim Tomlinson. The Lyric won best album at the 2006 BBC Jazz Awards. "Blue Note is the label that just felt right," Kent tells Billboard.biz. "It is the label I dreamed of when I was a kid. I feel like Steffi Graf must have felt the first time she played against Martina Navratilova." Kent, who lived in France for a year in the 90's, acknowledges a special relationship with French audiences. "We did very well there," confirms Candid Records CEO Alan Bates, who says her last album Boys Next Door, released in 2003, shipped more than 100,000 copies in France. Kent's new album will be recorded next spring in London, where she lives, and is due out in September 2007. She will perform across Europe in 2007 (booked by Paris-based Loop Productions).
Source: Billboard Magazine