Diana Krall is attempting to answer a question.
The jazz pianist and vocalist, who will perform at the Salt Lake Hilton Monday and Tuesday, is having a hard time in her answer. She hems and haws, hesitates, starts, stops, changes the subject -- a standard reaction, in fact, to most questions posed to her.To be fair, this particular question is not an easy one: To what does she attribute her remarkable success?
Her success is indeed remarkable -- Diana Krall is arguably the hottest thing in jazz right now. She has been topping the charts since shooting out of nowhere with her 1996 breakthrough album "All of You" and has been touring like a madwoman ever since with such luminaries as bassist Ray Brown, with whom she recently played New York's famed Blue Note club.
But her appeal extends far beyond the usual crowd of jazz aficionados. Krall has hit a chord with many in the lay public who can't get enough of her smoky, charcoal-tinged jazz diva voice, singing standards like "Peel Me a Grape" and "All or Nothing at All."
So, getting back to the question -- what is the appeal?
"That's a very hard question to answer," she said, during a telephone interview from New York. "People are asking me all the time, 'What do you attribute your success to?' -- I have no idea."
OK, let's ask another question: What are her plans for the future?
Long pause. "Oh, I don't know."
Another long pause. "I don't know."
The interviewer starts casting about for a simple question with a simple answer. A factual question: Is she still 32 years old?
"Is that how old you want me to be?" (It finally comes out that she's 34.
It doesn't take long to realize that Diana Krall -- well-known, lauded Diana Krall, who has played on innumerable stages all over the continent -- is almost painfully shy. She doesn't like revealing herself in the spoken word. She relies on her music for that.
"I love what I do so much," she says after warming up a bit. "I love music, and I think that's the answer."
Uh, not quite following you here. Answer to what?
Turns out she's responding to the first question. Krall will continue to respond to various questions in fits and starts in no particular order throughout the interview.
She is asked who her influences are. Joni Mitchell is one. After some prompting, Willie Nelson ("majorly Willie Nelson"). After responding to another question, "Ravel or Peter Frampton or Billy Joel or Sting or Marvin Gaye."
Krall says she likes to think of herself as open-minded, and she's as good as her word -- her list of influences would give many a jazz purist an apoplectic attack. While she obviously loves jazz music, Krall dislikes feeling confined by arbitrary limits on what is "jazz."
Krall is blond, attractive and has a somewhat reluctant smile. We know this because it's impossible not to know it for anyone who has bought any of her CDs -- her picture is plastered all over the place. In fact, her three-song Christmas CD out this year has an entire calendar of nothing but Diana Krall photos. She has appeared on television ("Melrose Place") and will have a cameo in the Val Kilmer-Mira Sorvino movie "At First Sight" this spring.
"I have other projects, but I can't really say," she said. "I'm so superstitious -- I think, 'Oh, maybe they'll get rid of me.' "
But Krall resents any implication that she has risen to the top of the musical heap on her looks.
"People can criticize me and say, 'Oh, they've marketed her,' and that (ticks) me off. . . . When you rehearse for four hours with Ray Brown, it's not how good-looking you are. It's like, 'What have you got?' "
The consensus among critics is that Krall has got it -- something not lost on Utah audiences. Her Hilton show last year quickly sold out, prompting a two-night date this time around.
The Monday concert is sold out, but at press time there were a few tickets left for the Tuesday concert. Tickets are $20 each -- call Holladay Pharmacy at 278-0411 for more information.
One of the few times in the interview in which Krall becomes positively garrulous is when she's talking about Utah. "I love Salt Lake City," she said. "The people are very kind, very nice. They like the music. I had a great experience (last year)."
Much later in the interview: "I can't wait to come. I'm going to go skiing. Yoo hoo!"