Referred to by Jazz Lives as “one of New York’s great gifts to the world,” blues and jazz vocalist Mara Kaye is “like some lost pocket of the blues that had never been explored in the old days, all wrapped up in a ball of 21st-century Brooklyn-bred attitude.”

For over a decade, Kaye has traveled internationally and throughout the US, singing beloved songs of the past with a deep passion and respect for its original storytellers. With musical gravitas, she can deliver the blues of Billie Holiday and turn on a dime to express the joys of Bessie Smith.

Mara’s voice has been compared to “Louis Armstrong’s trumpet at a rent party” by blues legend Jimmy Vivino and praised by The Wall Street Journal as proof that things are getting better. Her debut EP, It Had to Be You, recorded straight-to-tape by Bigtone Records, was released in February of 2022 and features incomparable piano legend, Carl Sonny Leyland.

Roots & Rambles Workshop: A Storyteller’s Guide to Singing the Blues

Roots & Rambles is a concert workshop series featuring musicians dedicated to the preservation, artistry, and evolution of folk and traditional music in the United States. One hour before the concert. Please RSVP if you plan on participating. Concert tickets are required to participate.

Roots & Rambles is made possible by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.