MODENA, PIAZZA ROMA
Thursday, 22 July

Acclaimed singer-songwriter Gregory Porter was raised in Bakersfield, California and cites the Bakersfield Southern Gospel sound, as well as his mother’s Nat King Cole record collection, as fundamental influences on his own sound. Porter began singing in jazz clubs in San Diego while attending San Diego State University on a football scholarship. Eventually Porter moved to New York City to pursue music full-time and his career began to ascend with the release of his first two albums—Water (2010) and Be Good (2012)—both of which received GRAMMY nominations.

 In 2013, he released his breakout Blue Note debut Liquid Spiritwhich grew into a global phenomenon, selling more than a million albums and earning Porter his first GRAMMY Award with NPR declaring him “America’s Next Great Jazz Singer.” His 2016 follow-up Take Me To The Alley won Porter his second GRAMMY Award and firmly established him as his generation’s most soulful jazz artist. In 2017, Porter released the heartfelt tribute album Nat King Cole & Me, and in 2020 returned to his original songwriting on the uplifting ALL RISE, both of which received GRAMMY nominations. His 2021 release Still Rising collected new songs, covers, duets, and a selection of his most-loved hits. In 2023, Porter released his first-ever holiday album Christmas Wish. Porter has hosted the podcast The Hang, a conversation series featuring his famous friends, as well as his own cooking show The PorterHouse, in which the singer shared recipes inspired by his local community, experiences from touring the globe, and family cooking traditions.

In 1995 Gail Ann Dorsey was on tour with Tears for Fears when the phone rang: David Bowie wanted her in his band. It was the start of more than a decade at his side, on bass and vocals, on four studio albums from Earthling to The Next Day and in their showstopping live duet of Under Pressure. “Bowie changed my life in so many ways,” she says. Born in Philadelphia, Dorsey taught herself guitar at nine and switched to bass at fourteen. She moved to London, played in jazz bands, sang with the Charlie Watts Big Band and released her debut album The Corporate World in 1988. Since then she has become one of the most renowned bassists in rock and pop, working with Lenny Kravitz, Seal, Gwen Stefani, Bryan Ferry, Olivia Newton-John and The National. Now the singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist is stepping forward with her first solo album in more than twenty years, inspired by the richly arranged radio hits of the 1970s that first made her fall in love with music.