Earlier this year, Dianna Krall released Wallflowers, an album of pop songs produced by David Foster. In advance of this week’s two shows at Massey Hall, the Grammy-winning jazz artist spoke about piano bars, Neil Young and playing to the stars.
Listening to Wallflowers and hearing your versions of Gilbert O’Sullivan’s Alone Again (Naturally) or Jim Croce’s Operator, I felt nostalgic for the seventies. Was that what you were after?
That’s the point of the record. That’s what David and I were trying to do. Not so calculated, but we made it for people of our generation. We didn’t want to do a jazz record.
There’s a melancholy to many of the songs.
Well, what else is new? That’s kind of my deal, right?
Fair enough. It just got me to thinking about piano bars, and the mood of the material people tend to request.
When I was 24 I went to Sweden and other places where I played piano bars for six hours a night. I went under the pretense that I was supposed to be a jazz piano player playing in the corner quietly. Instead there were seven bar stools around me, with people drinking, falling face down onto the piano lid asking for Somewhere My Love. We all have to pay our dues.
What kind of pop stuff would you have been doing back then?
If I was told to play pop songs, I was going to play songs that I liked. I probably played Bohemian Rhapsody, and a lot of Elton John songs. Operator was probably too hard for me to play. I probably played Bad, Bad Leroy Brown. [Laughs.]
You’re playing Massey Hall, which you last played while touring with Neil Young in 2014. Can we talk about that?
I feel touring with him was a life-changing experience. I knew that I wouldn’t be going out there to do Peel Me a Grape and Pick Yourself Up. I knew that Neil had given me an incredible place. I can never thank him enough. He said one thing to me: “Play whatever you want.” I was right back to being a 16-year-old kid again. So I started getting into Gordon Lightfoot, Buffy Sainte-Marie and Joni. It wasn’t going to be Neil Young songs – that wouldn’t be too bright [laughs].
What was life-changing about the experience?
I was so happy to be 49 years old and to allow myself to be in that position of vulnerability. To not know, really, what was going to happen, and not relying on “Oh, I’m just go out there and do what I do.” It’s a tortuous process sometimes, to have the desire to do that. Ultimately, we don’t evolve if we don’t.
So we’re seeing a new Diana Krall on stage these days?
Absolutely. I have nothing left to prove. I don’t think about having to play this type of song or that type of song. I just have that Frank Capra-esque kind of feeling, that there’s just a bunch of twinkling stars out there who just want to hear anything that I play. And that they’ll just love it.
Diana Krall, May 22 and 23, 8 p.m. $80 to $145. Massey Hall, 178 Victoria St., 416-872-4255, with dates to follow in Hamilton (May 24), London, Ont., (May 26) and Kitchener (May 27).