The new Album is currently being mixed and will be released within the next six months. Here are some exclusive demos of the album ...
Good news. As careers rise and fall, all around us, at the flick of the TV remote, there’s a place where the song still rules. It’s in the performance-steeped life and times of Frances Ruffelle.

The award-winning English vocalist and actress is the youngest and most vivacious entertainment veteran in town, having been in front of audiences just about all her life. Her new album [TITLE TO COME] is the perfect summation of a singular career, because it’s a set of extraordinary songs that came to life on stage.

Even before you play it, the project exudes the ambience of a subtle but powerful perfume. It’s a record imbued with the desire to leave an impression on the room with its appealing aura, born not of airbrushed perfection but an enchantingly earthy realism.

These are the songs of Frances Ruffelle’s life. They were created by such giants as Porter, Ellington and Weill, as well as by lesser-appreciated songwriting talents. But they were made hers and before she recorded them they were tried out with a big sound in an intimate setting, the famous Ronnie Scott’s jazz club in London. The album also includes a duet with Frances’ daughter Eliza Doolittle, signed to Parlophone as an artist in her own right.

“After the gig at Ronnie Scott’s we recorded the album live in an old country house in Italy,” says Frances,“then we’ve gone back to London and added some additional production. But most of the vocals and instruments we’ve kept live, because I like them raw and passionate.”
It’s the perfect setting in which to re-appreciate such compositions as ‘What Now My Love,’ ‘Mood Indigo’ and ‘Alabama Song,’ and perhaps to discover the lesser-known delights of ‘Slap That Bass,’ ‘Love mw For What I Am’ or ‘Hit Me With A Hot Note.’ As long as they swing or sway or laugh or cry, as the singer might say in quotation of another track on the album, ‘It’s Alright With Me.’

“I’m not trying to do cool jazz,” she says. “To be honest, I always loved the jazz standards of the great American Songbook and my idea was to re-interpret these classic songs for a new generation and keep them sexy, melancholy and passionate. I’m doing it because all the songs have good lyrics and stories.”

“When I’ve liked an artist, it’s usually more to do with their visuals, their performance and their entertainment level. I fall in love with crazy artists, like Bette Midler, Elvis Presley, Judy Garland. Just absolute star-quality, charismatic artists.”

Maybe it takes charisma to know charisma. Frances was hardly ever going to do anything other than entertain, coming into a family in which her mother, Sylvia Young, was the founder of the celebrated theatre school.
“I was so much brought up around performing, it was just talked about all the time,” she remembers. “When I was seven years old, I was asked to sing with a jazz band. I never rebelled against it, but I wouldn’t say I was pushed into it either. I guess I was naturally quite good, and things went well for me.”

That’s an understatement. She hit the West End for the first time in a Rattigan play, ‘The Sleeping Prince,’ then got her skates on to join Andrew Lloyd Webber’s ‘Starlight Express’ before ‘Les Misérables’ came calling. So great was the impression Frances made that despite a low profile beyond London theatre land, she was invited to reprise her role as Éponine when the musical opened on Broadway. The performance would win her a Tony Award, and the show would remain a big part of her life.

Frances’ further stage adventures have ranged far and wide, from appearing with Ian Dury in ‘Apples’ to playing Roxie Hart in ‘Chicago.’ Her multi-faceted career has also included 2 solo albums  ‘Frances Ruffelle’ (1998) and ‘Showgirl’ (2004) since 1994’s ‘Fragile’.

But no album has captured her spirit the way the new one does. “I was asked to sing by the BBC Big Band,” she explains, “and it suddenly felt very comfortable with me, so that’s when I eventually got my own big band together. It felt like I was doing something that was true to me, to my upbringing.”

Such is Frances’ versatility and appetite that no one format can hold her. The watchwords, as ever in Frances Ruffelle’s vocation, are natural spontaneity. 2009 promises many live performances, and the chance for audiences to get intimate with one of the UK’s most widely-travelled and distinguished performers.

“I think at one point I wanted to be quite cool,” she smiles. “Now I don’t give a damn. I just want to do what I love. I’m a performer, that’s what I do.”

   Cast Recordings

- Starlight Express Original London Cast (1984)
- Les Misérables Original London Cast (1985)
- Les Misérables Original Broadway Cast (1987)
- Mack and Mabel In Concert (1988)
- Apples Original - Ian Dury (1989)
- Children of Eden Original London Cast (1991)

- Fragile (1994)
- Frances Ruffelle (1998)
- Showgirl (2004)
- Purify as paTala with Sam Bonner (2008)

- Back of my Mind (Christopher Cross album, 1988) on 'I Will (Take   You Forever)'.

- Michael Crawford Performs Andrew Lloyd Webber (1991) on 'Only You'.

- 'Lonely Symphony (We Will Be Free)' - The Eurovision Song Contest 1994, Dublin (Ireland).

- Save the Children - A Christmas Spectacular of Carols and Songs  (1992) - 'I Watch You Sleeping'.

- The Definitive Christopher Cross (2001) on 'I Will (Take You Forever)'.

- Tony Award
- Helen Hayes Award
- Theatre World Award
- Outer Critics Circle Award