Talking With Nicole Henry – October 9, 2023

Ira Sternberg: "What do you do when you grow up in a musical family in Bucks County, Pennsylvania? Well, you develop your talent, you record a ton of albums, and you tour the world. And my guest is international award-winning vocalist Nicole Henry. She's performing in myin at the Smith Center this Saturday, October 14th at 5 and 8 p.m. For ticket information, go to the Smith center.com. And for everything about Nicole Henry, including your extensive catalog of songs, by the way, go to Nicolehenry.com. And you can follow her on X formly Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube, and Spotify, of course, too. Nicole, welcome to the show."

Nicole Henry: "Thank you so much for having me, and thanks for that. Yeah, it's always fun to hear my hometown mentioned."

Ira Sternberg: "Oh yeah, I gotta throw that in. So, uh, this is going to be a banal question, but I have to get it out there. Which is, when did you decide to pursue that career in music? How old were you? What was it? Were you in high school, junior high, college? Where did that come from?"

Nicole Henry: "It was during my last couple of years at college, and I was actually asked by a DJ to record some house music vocals for him. And I always loved house music and dance music, so I was like, sure. I hadn't even thought of a full-time career in music because, back in those days, I just thought you got discovered, and that's how you became an artist. I didn't know you could go to school and actually work on it, and then maybe find a band and write some. So, I had recorded these dance music songs with this DJ, and one of them got to number eight on the Billboard Chart. But before that even happened, he invited me to do a live music show at a rave at a nightclub at like 1 or 2 in the morning, and that was typical Nicole Henry, of course, for dance music. So, I was invited to go do this show with him, and that was the first time in my life that I had a chance to sing four songs in a row as the lead vocalist. When you're singing the National Anthem or you're singing in a talent competition or at church, you're singing one song at a time. But that was the first time that I had a chance to experience what it felt like to entertain an audience, and that's what you do if you're singing more than one or two songs in front of an audience. I was petrified, and it was really the first time in my life that I was that nervous, and I loved it. I was like, 'Oh my gosh, what is happening to me right now?' And I knew just from that date that this was something I wanted to do and get better at, and I just loved it. It was electric, and I can almost still feel that energy from that night."

Ira Sternberg: "Yeah, so it was 1997. Do you have any photos from that period?"

Nicole Henry: "I have… that is so funny that you ask me that. I have one photo that I can find now. These were all printed photos back in those days, you know. Of course, yes. We scanned this photo, and it was like, this was the second time that I was doing a show, and this was the time… I mean, I'm sure it still happens, I don't know, I'm not in that scene anymore, but this was the… basically, I came up with this idea to do a dress out of bubble wrap. Just the noise alone would be distracting, let alone the visual elements. Oh, how fun would that be, getting out of it, which I was still stapled into. So yeah, I have a picture, and I have like these two little buns on the side of my… oh, staple, not Scotch tape or masking tape or duct tape, no, staple. You got to fold them in, staple. So, I was like, I… the strapless dress with, um, with, you know, obviously undergarments, but uh, that's the only picture that I've yet so far found."

Ira Sternberg: "Well, if you find it and you can send it to me, I will add it to the show if you'd like. If you don't, I will absolutely… I'll find it."

Nicole Henry: "Okay, good. Yeah, no, that'd be great. So now, you have to make this decision, okay, the bug bit me, and I'm in show business, or I want to be in show business. What were the first few tentative steps you took after that to get going?"

Ira Sternberg: "Oh, it gets more classic. So, um, so I decided, I… this is the plan of a young artist who doesn't know what artists like, what musicianship really entails. So I said to myself, okay, what am I going to do? You know, I can't sing at this time, dance music wasn't all around the world, and wasn't as popular. You hear it everywhere now. Um, and so I said, well, I've got to find other music to sing, and I always loved singing like those epic ballads, and I love singer-songwriters as well. So I was like, let me buy an instrument and start learning how to play music and write songs. So Mars music, I don't know if you all had that where you're based, um, but they just… that big music chain, big instrument chain, uh, had opened up in Fort Lauderdale. So, um, I went to Mars music store and was thinking, okay, should I buy a piano, guitar? And I said, no, I got to learn real fast. I want to do this really quickly. So I bought bongos and thought that I could write songs to bongos. I was like, I can… I can do rhythm, and I got back, I'm like, what am I thinking? This is ridiculous. So then I, within the 30-day time frame, bought a guitar and started teaching myself guitar and writing songs to guitar. You know, I bought Bob Marley and a Stevie Wonder, which that's not an artist that you pick up to learn simple songs from, but I learned. But, um, yeah, bought a bunch of chord books and just started learning guitar and then writing and singing songs like in that, in that vein, we're singer-songwriter, you know, doing all the open mics and so forth in Miami Beach. And then I fell in love with jazz. I was doing a guitar duo with my friend Lou Duban. I was singing, he was playing songs from all over the place, but I had never consciously listened to jazz growing up, believe it or not. I had heard of Frank Sinatra, heard of Ella and Billy, and even saw 'Lady Sings the Blues' growing up, but didn't really know the genre. And then I was asked with my guitar duo to open up at a jazz club in Miami Beach of all places. And we did this love hour for an hour and a half with me and my guitarist. And then I would stay around and listen to the Monday and Tuesday night jazz sets. And I was like, 'What? Oh, this is Fly Me to the Moon, this is Cole Porter, this is Tony Bennett songs.' And I just was enthralled for probably a solid three to four months, or maybe even two months. And the bassist from that jazz trio that would host, that would have singers with them Monday and Tuesday nights, would hear me sing. And he said, 'Well, why don't you learn some jazz tunes, and we'll do a night together?' And it was August 20, April 21st, 2002, was my first jazz gig. So I came there with 21 songs that I crammed in into two to three months."

Ira Sternberg: "21 Songs, amazing. Were you surprised about the convergence of jazz and the Great American songbook? Because you mentioned some of the obviously leading lights of that period."

Nicole Henry: "Oh, you know, and at in those days, I didn't even know the difference between the two so much, you know. But I was just amazed at how much freedom I found in studying jazz, you know, and how much freedom as an artist to take these songs and reinterpret them but still be inside the framework of these Great American songbook songs. So yeah, I was amazed at how much I fell in love with the genre."

Ira Sternberg: "Well, what's surprising is you mentioned earlier that you weren't involved at all or aware of jazz growing up. So what kind of music did you listen to in those days?"

Nicole Henry: "Well, I was, uh, so being born in Bucks County, right outside of Philadelphia, my mom's from Columbus, Ohio, my dad's from Memphis, Tennessee. And they were children of the '50s and the '60s. So they would play their music, you know, the oldies but goodies. And then, you know, Philly Soul, Commodores, Spinners, Patti LaBelle, some soul, you know. Songs from the '70s, really grew up on. And it probably is terrible of me to guilt you, but do you think you ought to add one oldie but goodies in your repertoire as a tribute to your parents?"

Ira Sternberg: "Oh, I have. Okay, great. All I don't feel bad about guilting you."

Nicole Henry: "Yeah, no, no guilt at all. In fact, they… I owe so much to them, so much of what I love about music to my parents. Although I was like, 'How did you guys not play jazz in the house?' But I do, you know, they were great DJs, thank goodness, on the weekends. But at the same time, my mom was a classical pianist, and we grew up with a piano in the house. I played cello growing up, you know, classical music."

Ira Sternberg: "Were you… Okay, I hate to say this because if people are just listening and not watching, you look a certain way. And when you see Nicole Henry performing, she comes across a certain way. But I'm getting the feeling, based on what you're telling me, that you grew up slightly nerdy."

Nicole Henry: "You know what, in a way, I think I was a little bit of everything. Because I loved everything. I mean, I loved other students. I was president of my class, but I was still in the orchestra. And you would have loved jazz had you known about it at the time, too."

Ira Sternberg: "Yes, and the crazy thing is, I don't think we had jazz in my school, but we did have a full orchestra. So yes, because I was in the choir, and then we just had choir, which was great, you know."

Nicole Henry: "Yeah, I would have loved jazz. Did your folks follow your career or have your folks followed your career and been amazed at what you've accomplished? When you look, if you go to your website, Nicolehenry.com, you see all your albums that you've done over the years, that you've recorded over the years."

Ira Sternberg: "Actually, the technical term… Well, you know, it's okay. So, I'll… My mom is more like, you know, she, when I graduated from college, she was like, 'Well, you want to take this particular job because you might get benefits, and you'll eventually get benefits.' And that's, you know, that's what they were taught. My dad, on the other hand, he gets it because my aunt, my Aunt Deborah, his sister, she's a singer. She's been in the '70s and in the '80s, she put out albums with her own band out of Virginia, and the band was called Anglo Saxon Brown, and then they changed their name to Silk. And I grew up singing her songs, my sister and I would be singing along to her albums."

Nicole Henry: "So, he gets it, you know. My cousin came to my show last time I was in Philly and took a video of my dad watching me. Nice. And he was, he was, yeah, clapping and singing along. He doesn't even know I have the video. But you can surprise him."

Ira Sternberg: "Great, because I knew you came from a musical family, but I didn't realize also that you had an aunt who also recorded and so the whole family is talented. But you're touring the world; they're not, generally, I would think. And so you have that slightly different level of performance, I guess, to term."

Nicole Henry: "Yes, um, because my aunt, who stopped singing her own music in the early '80s, she still continues to sing. She's one of Patti LaBelle's background singers. So, she, you know, and it's funny, we don't talk shop that much, but she's… it's a job. Her voice is amazing. I forget what question you were asking me."

Ira Sternberg: "No, no, you've answered it. But it's funny, I was just thinking when you said 'aunt,' and I'm West Coast, so I say 'aunt,' and you say 'aunt.' I like that. So that's good, people say 'Aunt' too. Okay, I want to talk about your show in a few minutes again. It's at my at the Smith Center this Saturday, October 14th. There are two shows, 5 and 8 pm, which is cool. So there's not just one but two. So you tour a lot. Do you find that you pick up musical influences to this day, or did you have someone in the beginning that was an influence on you that sort of provided the path to the way you wanted to go? How did that work?"

Nicole Henry: "No, you know what, and so I grew up loving big epic ballads, you know, the Whitney Houston ballads, and I still love that. But then I also love to jam with like Stevie Wonder and again, the Commodores and the Spinners. That's my base, if somebody were to ask me. But then, a little bit of gospel, more of the '60s, '70s, '80s gospel. And then, when I started learning jazz, my bass player, who I mentioned, Paul Shuchuk, who invited me to join my first jazz band and I recorded with him a few albums, he shared with me some of his albums. He shared Nancy Wilson, Sarah Vaughan, and Carmen McRae. Can't go wrong with that. To this day, Nancy is one of my favorites, such a classy lady. So, I think I have a little bit of influence from that. But then, you know, I've always tried to just make sure that when I'm singing, I hear myself telling the story, my voice, Nicole, telling the story. And so, where I think there might be different influences in my sound, like some people say, 'Oh, you sometimes you'll sing, and you sound like Whitney, or you sound like Stephanie Mills, or I heard a little Nancy in there.' So, I think that some of that does come up, but I try to make sure I'm not hearing anyone else's voice, just because I think that's what an artist should do."

Ira Sternberg: "Yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense. I hadn't heard that before, in terms of how you do that. So you can take from influences, but then you just focus on your voice as you deliver, which is a great way to do it. I want to mention too, some of your albums: 'The Very Thought of You,' 'Embraceable,' 'Time to Love Again,' 'The Nearness of You'—great song—'So Good, So Right,' 'Your Smiling Face.' And you have a video out, yes, called 'Is It a Crime?' So, what is the crime? Is the crime not hearing you sing? Is the crime something else? What is that crime?"

Nicole Henry: "So, that song, first of all, it's a crime if music doesn't affect you in some way, shape, or form. But if you can't find songs that you can really connect with, that's the crime. But this particular album, 'Time To Love Again,' the latest one, is a project of all cover songs, some from the '50s, '30s, even, all the way up into the '80s. And so, 'Is It a Crime' is the cover of the 1985 Sade song. So, my band, my jazz band, starting off with the upright bass there, and great Troy Roberts on saxophone comes in. On the video version, that's like a music video that I released just recently for that song. And it's actually, I just found out today, it's number 21 on the UK Soul charts. So, you know, excellent, gotta take it. But you mentioned those other songs, 'The Nearness of You' is actually the song to this day I still warm up at every sound check to. I just love ballads, those ballads, and 'The Very Thought of You,' and I, whenever I sing those songs, I think of one, the first pianist that I ever worked with, who's no longer with us, but he's just… Mike Ora, if you ever listen, go back and listen to 'The Very Thought of You' and 'The Nearness of You,' which on both of those albums, we did those, um, what do they call them, the track, the title track, just duo, piano duo. My one of my favorite formats, aside from guitar duo. And we always did that as a duo. But give me a ballad and a pianist any day, I could do a whole double-sided album, oh, easy."

Ira Sternberg: "Yeah, you mentioned, and it's funny, I've never asked this of any other guest, but since you mentioned it about soundcheck, I know that all artists do sound checks, but is the main purpose for the musicians backing you versus you, or is it for all of you to kind of make sure you're in sync and the balance is right on the sound, everything seems to be working?"

Nicole Henry: "You nailed it. That's it, yeah. It's definitely to get the understanding of the room, where the monitors are sitting, how you're hearing the rest of the band, and if you need more of a particular instrument in your monitors. I, as a singer, actually, and not many jazz singers do this, even on the jazz club circuit, sometimes on a festival circuit, you might have people, or in a concert, you know, the concert hall circuit, but I wear in-ear monitors as a vocalist. Because I'm tall, I'm five ten and a half without my heels, and to me, my monitors don't hit the sound for my monitors don't hit my ear fast enough. So I love wearing in-ear monitors so that I'm always on, you know, my pitch is there, I hear myself, and no matter where I walk around the stage. So I do that to make sure that my that's set properly. And then for me, you know, as much as I can warm up by myself with whatever vocalization I do on my own, I have to sing for 15-20 minutes with my band to just wake up, you know, it's kind of like going for a jog or stretching."

Ira Sternberg: "Yeah, get the blood going."

Nicole Henry: "Yeah, get the voice in myself, you know, get everything. So yeah, so what have you planned for myin at the Smith Center? Have you thought it through? I'm sure you must have because it's coming up."

Nicole Henry: "Yes, I'm very excited to come back to my first… I had a great time there the first time. We're actually doing the album, 'Time to Love Again.' Most of the album, I'm throwing in a couple of other mixes, but we haven't done that show there yet in Vegas, at the Smith Center. So that's what we'll be doing, most of the music from that album, and a few of my favorites from previous albums."

Ira Sternberg: "How is it that you do the… there are two shows on that date, October 14, 5 and 8. I always wondered, when you finish the first one, and usually not always, but there's sometimes a meet and greet or just an informal kind of a situation, especially at myins, but then you have to get ready for the eight o'clock show. Is it… are you… how does that… I'm gonna get this right in my head, and then it's gonna come out of my voice. Are you exhausted after the first one and then recharge once you start the second one, or is it you just charge through both or how does it work?

Nicole Henry: "Yeah, you do kind of reset. It is always different, but you do have a bit of a reset. I might change a couple of things because it's effectively the same show that we're doing for two different audiences, right? So maybe I'll change the order of one or two songs. And the other thing is, like, you want to make sure that when you're doing your show, you're like, 'Wait, did I talk about a certain thing?' You know, sometimes the dialogue that you have in between the songs, you might be inspired to say something, but I'm thinking, 'Wait, did I say that earlier in this set, or was it the last set? Am I repeating myself?' That's what you have to be careful of. And then also, you just like… But for me, as a singer, I love approaching the lyric as new, as a new lyric, as much as I can, you know? That's kind of like an acting thing. And I had the same philosophy, which is to approach it as if I'm singing it for the first time. So, in a way, it is acting. So, yeah, it works out. Effectively, you can do it."

Ira Sternberg: "How many musicians are behind you?"

Nicole Henry: "I'll have a quartet: piano, upright bass, guitar, and drums. Now, are these musicians… are they the ones that travel with you all the time, or are they for often… they're often, you know, I usually have about two or three sets of musicians because sometimes people are working with other people. I'm so excited that the guitarist, Aon Leos, who lives in Miami and I've worked with since 2000 in different formations, different bands, but he's on the album, and he's going to be there. Eric England, who is my upright bass player, who now lives in LA, which I'm happy for him, but he's gonna be there. Chris Cadenhead, who's a pianist, actually is based in Vegas. A couple of months ago, my other pianist, who was on the album and actually produced the album, he had to change plans because he's the musical director for other artists. So he was like, 'Is it okay if I do this tour?' I was like, 'Okay,' because Chris Cadenhead happens to live in Vegas, and we've traveled the world together for years, so he's jumping in. And a drummer, a newer drummer that I've worked with in Miami, Braam Masla, a graduate from the University of Miami as well, he's gonna be there with me."

Ira Sternberg: "I'm glad you mention it. I always like to have the musicians mentioned if we can, to give them a little shout-out. And in that sense, are you ever tired from touring because you do tour the world? I mentioned that in the opening, and you seem fresh as a daisy to me, although I'm never fresh anymore. But it just… it's amazing to me."

Nicole Henry: "No, no, you look fresh as a petunia. How about that?"

Ira Sternberg: "Oh, shucks, thank you. But how do you do that? Do you… is there a secret to that, that you can… because they, a lot of guests have told me that the work is in the travel and the prep, not on stage where you shine, of course, but just the way travel is today, plane, train, bus, car, walk, ride, swim, however you get there. But it just seems to be very taxing, at least to some of them, but you seem to handle it well."

Nicole Henry: "Yeah, you know, like you said, that's the work. The work is getting there and actually everything that you did to get there, music-wise, prepping-wise, charts-wise, whatever, arrangements, set lists. But so the actual work and walking on stage is like, 'Oh, finally, I get to do this.' So it's like, yeah, that's when the fun turns on."

Ira Sternberg: "I bet. But unlike other artists that I've talked to, you like… and I'm sincere, you don't look like you're exhausted. And I know for a fact that in this case, you just got off a plane. I won't say from where, but the point is, I'm impressed, let's put it that way."

Nicole Henry: "Ah, thank you very much. A little soap and water, you know."

Ira Sternberg: "Mention how you got started with the drag shows in '92 and '93."

Nicole Henry: "Oh, hilarious. That's hilarious that you asked me that. So, living on Miami Beach, early '90s, University of Miami, we go out at night, and then all of a sudden, I found this whole culture of like, uh, drag queen shows. So this woman, Kitty Meow, would have a drag queen show, and she had this thing where, you know, drag queens would get up and perform. And it was an opportunity, I heard, that sometimes they would invite singers to come up and sing. So I was like, 'Oh, how fun. I would love to go sing.' And you know, this was before I knew what putting a band together and how this whole… so I was like, 'Yeah, I'll come there. I'll bring a karaoke track CD at the time, and you go up there and get a chance to sing.' So I started going every few Mondays here and there, and that was really my first stage as an entertainer. This was college. Did I say the year? Uh, oh no. Here's the thing, at least you didn't say you brought an LP or a cassette. You did say CD, so you're fine."

Ira Sternberg: "Yeah, or a track, yeah, right. It could have been cassettes, you know, but might have. But yeah, so that was my first audience, my first opportunity was given on a regular basis to go sing. And I remember one time, the first time I got up, and you know, once you do it more often, people know your name and see your face, they're like, 'Oh, you're a real girl.' Like, yes."

Nicole Henry: "Yeah, I would think so. Yes. I'll tell you, I'll tell you one thing, they taught me how to… that's like, never walk on stage without some lashes."

Ira Sternberg: "Thanks so much for being on the show, Nicole. It was a real great time to be with you."

Nicole Henry: "Thank you so much for having me. See you next time."