A Little Bit Country and a Lot of Buzz

Norah Jones leaned back in her chair, looked out the hotel window toward the Hollywood hills, and yawned. If she was experiencing any apprehension about how her first album, “Come Away With Me,” is going to be received, it wasn’t showing. Mostly, she said, she was just happy to have a few minutes to kick back and relax.

On Monday, she spent a full day at her first video shoot, following a four-day run in San Francisco opening for Willie Nelson, which followed a seemingly endless list of media interviews and photo shoots related to Tuesday’s release of her album. On Wednesday night, she appeared on the “Tonight Show With Jay Leno,” and she can be seen tonight on “The Late, Late Show with Craig Kilborn.”

Why all the attention for a virtually unknown artist? It’s in part because of buzz generated by reviews in the Boston Globe and the Washington Post, selection as one of the “Brand New Heavies” in Entertainment Weekly and inclusion in Rolling Stone’s “The Next Wave: 10 Artists to Watch.”

Asked about the explosion of attention, Jones shook her head and smiled. “It’s a little strange,” she said. “And a lot more work than I thought it would be. Which is fine; I’m up for work. But it’s definitely not a side of music I ever thought I would have to deal with. And I definitely don’t want it to overshadow what I really love to do or have it get to the point where music is secondary.”

That may take some doing, since Jones, 22, is an eminently marketable talent. Her voice, tinged with the vulnerability heard in the work of Eva Cassidy, is capable of expressiveness in almost any musical idiom. And with her slender figure, luminous eyes and mane of raven hair, Jones is the sort of subject that the camera loves.

But neither talent nor looks can mask a certain amount of controversy around Jones’ first album, which was worked on by two of the record world’s most adept producers: Craig Street, who helped vitalize the career of Cassandra Wilson, and Arif Mardin, responsible for classic albums by singers ranging from Aretha Franklin to Dusty Springfield.

Street did the first version, recording, he says, as many as 22 selections. Jones recalled working with Street as “really fun” but added a proviso.

“It just didn’t quite work,” she added, “and it wasn’t really Craig’s fault. We kept three of the songs we did with him, but the rest of the tracks basically took me too far away from ... the sound I was looking for.”

Street recalls the situation a bit differently. “Basically what happened,” he said, “is that Norah came to me and wanted to make a record. She was very clear about who she wanted to work with; she had some cool material and a fantastic voice. When we finished, everybody seemed to be happy. She was happy, I was happy and that was that. But I guess the label wasn’t so happy.”

Apparently not, because Blue Note decided to bring in Mardin, who had just made a production deal with the label. Reluctant to make any comments about the work of a professional colleague, Mardin simply noted, “After Craig did the whole album, the powers that be--the record company and Norah-- were unhappy with some of the results. So they kept three of Craig’s tracks, although they were changed a bit. And we redid the other tunes.”

Decisions to redo albums are hardly uncommon in the record business, but the determination by a small record label to do so with a first album by a young artist underscores Blue Note’s belief in Jones as a potential breakout act. It may also reflect the label’s having an album that doesn’t quite fit its jazz offerings.

Though much of Jones’ training is in jazz--she graduated from Dallas’ Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing Arts, where she won Down Beat magazine Student Music Awards for singing and composing, and attended North Texas State University--her album is an eclectic mix of country (including Hank Williams’ “Cold Cold Heart”) and pop. Perhaps to establish her jazz credentials, Jones has added a final track in which she sings, to her own piano accompaniment, “The Nearness of You.”

Jones admits worrying that this album’s presence on Blue Note might confuse some potential listeners.

“I primarily did jazz for about six years,” she said, “and it was what I wanted to do when I was brought to Blue Note. But I was getting into other things with my friends who are songwriters. When we made some demos, they kind of came out like the record--in that kind of style.

“Blue Note was reluctant, at first, because it wasn’t really jazz, but they finally came around, which was great. Because, at this point, this is exactly the record I wanted to make --style-wise, genre-wise.”

Blue Note executive Bruce Lundvall indicated that Jones’ album is a welcome challenge.

“If jazz is going to grow, we have to be open to new approaches,” Lundvall said. “I know Norah’s recording is not exactly a jazz album, but it is jazz-informed. I suppose the best thing is to say she’s beyond category. And we’re trying to break down the old-school thought that jazz singers can only do standard repertoire.”

Despite her relative inexperience, Jones is quickly becoming aware of the complex currents beginning to surround her career, and she’s moving to keep them under control. Although it’s unclear precisely where the motivation to have Mardin rework the album came from, Jones obviously agreed with the decision. It is one of many she has had to learn how to make.

“What’s happening to me is something that lots of people dream about,” she said, “and I feel very lucky that it’s happening. But I also don’t want to be overexposed. It would be easy to just say to a publicist, ‘OK, I’ll do what ever you give to me.’

“But I’ve discovered that if I do interviews before I do a show, it just sucks my energy dry. And then the music suffers, and I’m right back to having to set my priorities and keep my boundaries. So when they ask me to do something that doesn’t feel right to me, I just say, ‘No way.’”

Amid all the fast-moving youthful accomplishments mentioned in Jones’ media biography, one important bit of information is missing: the fact that she is the offspring of a liaison between her mother and the legendary Indian sitarist, Ravi Shankar.

Jones did not hesitate to provide the information when she was asked about the absence of any paternal reference in the bio.

“It’s not a secret,” she said. “But we really didn’t have much of a relationship at all until about four years ago. And I just don’t want that to be the focus. I don’t want people to have that be the first thing they know about me.

“It’s not like I’m rejecting my father. I love my Dad. But I didn’t grow up with him, and my music has nothing to do with him. We have a relationship, we’ve seen each other now and then over the past four years and it’s fine.”

Perhaps so, but it’s hard not to wonder how Jones feels when she sees the close personal artistic attention offered to her half sister, Anoushka (with whom she reportedly has a close relationship), by her father. And it’s not exactly rocket psychotherapy to speculate that the inner toughness that drives her quest for creative accomplishment might be energized by an urgent desire to prove she can do it on her own.

But Jones, reverting to a laugh, wasn’t interested in any more speculation about “all that personal stuff that’s hairy and emotional that nobody wants to hear about.”

Jones has a strikingly mature attitude to all aspects of her budding career, including the potential tumble that could await an unsuccessful album after all the media build-up. But she shrugged and smiled a smile that managed to be both innocent and guileful.

“Look, I’m young,” concluded Jones, “and it’s OK if this one’s not a big hit, because I’m happy with it. It’s already exceeded my expectations in the response it’s gotten from friends and from some of the press, and that means that the people who are most important to me liked it. Right now, that’s enough.”