Lori Williams is an American vocal artist, educator, songwriter, producer and quite simply, a force to be reckoned with. She has worked with an incredible line up of artists including Nathan East, Savion Glover, Will Downing, Eric Benet, Walter Hawkins and Slide Hampton. Terri Lynne Carrington said that Lori ‘seamlessly moves from Jazz to R&B in ways the listener can feel at home with her in either genre. She has set the bar for vocalists to come.’ Having recently released her fifth album ‘Full Circle’ and set up an incredible organisation ‘Positive Music for Positive Minds’ it was wonderful to catch up with Lori and have an insight into her world.

Born and raised in Southeast DC, Lori fell in love with Jazz while she was a student at Hampton University, Virginia, where she participated in their wonderful Jazz program, despite being on a degree program for Communication and Mass Media Arts. Sneaking around seems to be a prerequisite for all great Jazz artists, and Lori is no exception.

Lori spoke of some of the challenges of starting her musical career and her biography on her website quotes her as saying ‘Back then, the demographics were such that a chocolate sister with natural hair like myself was not ‘the desired one.’ As an American based artist, Lori has gigged extensively in the US but loves working in Europe. It seems to be a common theme with, especially American Jazz artists that I speak to. Europe seems to offer more. So many Jazz musicians tell me they feel more ‘at home’ in Europe than they do in the US. I find this fascinating, especially when you consider the roots and history of Jazz. We explored this.