Madeleine Peyroux (b. 1974) is an American jazz singer, songwriter, and guitarist. She is noted especially for her vocal style, which is highly reminiscent of Billie Holiday.
Peyroux was born in Athens, Georgia, and grew up in southern California, New York City and Paris. She started singing at the age of fifteen, when she discovered street musicians in the Latin Quarter in Paris. She joined a group called the Riverboat Shufflers, first passing round the hat, and then singing. At sixteen she joined the Lost Wandering Blues and Jazz Band, spending two years touring Europe, performed the songs of Fats Waller, Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, and others, which provided the basis for her first album, Dreamland.
Dreamland was released in 1996, and gained widespread attention. Time called it "the most exciting, involving vocal performance by a new singer this year". Peyroux soon found herself opening for Sarah McLachlan? and Cesaria Evora, and made appearances at jazz festivals and on the Lilith Fair tour.
Peyroux spent much of the next six years busking in ...
