JAZZ MASTER: As part of her 2026 tour, “cool and sultry” vocalist Diana Krall performs at State Theatre New Jersey on Friday, March 20.
State Theatre New Jersey presents Diana Krall — Tour 2026 on Friday, March 20 at 8 p.m.
Krall is the only jazz singer to have eight albums debut at the top of the Billboard Jazz Albums chart. To date, her albums have won two Grammy Awards and 10 Juno Awards. She has also earned nine gold, three platinum, and seven multi-platinum albums. Born in Nanaimo, British Columbia, which is outside of Vancouver, Krall began studying the piano when she was 4 years old. By the time she was 15, she was performing jazz locally and, with the encouragement of her father, a stride pianist with a vast knowledge of such ’20s and ’30s keyboard masters as Fats Waller, James P. Johnson, and Earl Hines, she devoted herself to music.
“I think Dad had every recording Fats Waller ever made,” she said, “and I tried to learn as many as I could.”
Krall was still a teenager when she was awarded a scholarship to the Berklee College of Music in Boston. After two years, she moved to Los Angeles, where she met her first jazz heavyweights, including bassist John Clayton, drummer Jeff Hamilton, pianist/singer Jimmy Rowles, and Ray Brown, the legendary bassist who served as her musical mentor. In 1993, the Montreal-based Justin Time Records released her debut album, Stepping Out. The following year, she signed with GRP Records and recorded Only Trust Your Heart, which featured Ray Brown on bass and Stanley Turrentine on tenor saxophone. Only Trust Your Heart also marked the beginning of her association with Tommy LiPuma, a collaboration that would continue until LiPuma’s untimely passing in 2017.
Krall’s success continued with her subsequent releases All for You, and Love Scenes but her watershed moment came in 1999 with the release of When I Look in Your Eyes, her first release for the historic Verve record label. The recording spent an unprecedented 52 weeks in the #1 position on Billboard’s Jazz chart, won two Grammy Awards, and went platinum in the U.S. and Canada. Krall’s next album, The Look of Love, continued her international success and became a top ten seller on Billboard’s Top 200 Album charts. Since then, she has released a string of recordings that have created an impressive body of work, including her critically acclaimed Turn Up The Quiet, which won two Juno Awards, including Producer of the Year. Love Is Here To Stay found Krall collaborating with her long-time friend and colleague, Tony Bennett.
Her recordings have been included in several film soundtracks, and she has expanded upon her role as a performer to include songwriting, producing, and arranging, and collaborating with many other artists, including Paul McCartney, Barbra Streisand, and Tony Bennett. She tours extensively, appearing at premiere jazz festivals and concert halls throughout North America, Europe, Asia, and Australia.
State Theatre New Jersey is at 15 Livingston Avenue in New Brunswick. Visit Stnj.org for tickets, which start at $79.