“Without a piano I don't know how to stand, don't know what to do with my hands.” - Norah Jones
Who knew that a little girl without a daddy to care for her at some point in her life would turn out to be a versatile artist with the amazing and multiple talents for playing various musical instruments, composing songs, singing, and even acting? It is no wonder that the name “Norah Jones” would be pertinently associated with all kinds of art.
Geetali Norah Jones Shankar, famous as “Norah Jones” was born on March 30, 1979. She is a daughter of sitar virtuoso Ravi Shankar and Sue Jones. After her parents' separation in 1986, Jones spent her childhood with her mother in Texas. She attended two local high schools before transferring to Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts in Dallas. While she was there, Jones sang in the school choir, participated in band and played the alto saxophone. Her musical talents were further honed and molded during these days, along with the aid of voice lessons. She won the DownBeat Student Music Awards for Best Jazz Vocalist for two consecutive years (1996 and 1997) and Best Original Composition (1996) while she was in highschool. Clearly, all of her hard work paid off and at her young age, she began to feel independence. At the age of sixteen, with the consent of her parents, she formally changed her name to Norah Jones - the starting line of her career.
With the release of the successful and acclaimed diamond album “Come Away with Me”, a fusion of country music and pop with elements of jazz, Norah Jones launched her solo music career during 2002. She received numerous Grammy Awards: the Album of the Year, Record of the Year, and Best New Artist. Her following studio albums “Feels Like Home”, released in 2004; Not Too Late, released in 2007, the same year she made her film debut in “My Blueberry Nights”; and 2009's “The Fall” all gained Platinum. Jones' fifth studio album, “Little Broken Hearts” was released on April 27, 2012. Throughout her career, Jones has won many awards and has sold more than 50 million albums to the whole world. Her music brings warmth and peace to the soul and rejuvenation for the mind. It gives listeners the feeling of nostalgia mixed with melancholy and other unexplainable emotions.
This woman is a great inspiration for those who have experienced the pain of growing up with a broken family. She also serves as concrete evidence that sad people who encounter emotional problems could always productively channel their hate into something great and magically turn their big woes into humungous “wows.”
