Queen Esther - Things Are Looking Up (2024)

A heady mix of original songs and lost classics from Lady Day, played by some of the best jazz musicians on the planet.

Simply put, Queen Esther is, in Duke Ellington’s eloquent words, “Beyond Category.” --- Urban Music Scene

Called by some the “Black Lucinda Williams” and “the unknown queen of Americana,” the singer, songwriter and vocal interpreter extraordinaire has fashioned a masterwork paying homage to Billie Holiday in her own inimitable jazz, blues, gospel, country and bluegrass melting pot style. Instead of more torchy versions of Stormy Weather and God Bless The Child, Queen Esther’s got a different sort of agenda in mind as she weaves her hypnotic, rootsy magic through a batch of lost and rarely heard Holiday tunes and alternating between a quartet and trio format led by the astonishingly intuitive pianist Jeremy Bacon.--- The JW Vibe

The title song by the Gershwins, Things Are Looking Up, cements Queen as an original, genuine singer who never has to use vocal pyrotechnics to be heard.--- Stage and Cinema

Things Are Looking Up has a careful cadence as Queen Esther delves into a celebratory worldview, taking apart an entire history of American culture in a way that becomes serene, even soothing in the right light.--- Skope Magazine