Tracey Roberts
Biography
Tracey has a wealth of singing experience as a solo singer-songwriter and in both original and cover bands, duos and trios. She has sung as a cabaret artist and as a jazz & pop singer-pianist in Europe and Australasia, performing in concert venues, festivals, five-star hotels, clubs and restaurants in Australia, Holland, Germany, Sweden, India, and the UK. She continues to perform regularly at concerts, festivals, private and corporate events.
Tracey has 12 music releases:
4 Full length studio releases: Simple Things, Treasure Box, Parallel Universe and Shades of Blue
2 Full length LIVE album releases: Live at DIZZY's and LIVE at the LARK
3 EPs Link, The Nightingales and After the Wave
1 Single - Alexandra
1 Blu-ray video - Play Me
Her first two albums were produced in The Netherlands, the rest in Australia, with promotion on TV and radio in both countries. She has also done a considerable amount of session work and recorded with many other artists on their own albums and recording projects.
As well as writing and singing her original material at concerts and festivals, Tracey also performs a wide and varied repertoire of well-known music with her jazz combos for corporate and private functions. A number of residencies in five-star hotels in Melbourne have included The Hotel Windsor, Hotel Sofitel (formerly The Regent Hotel), the RACV Club and The Carlton Crest Hotel.
She has also performed for summer seasons at the Sheraton in New Delhi and AGRA, India, and The Grand Hotel in Stockholm, Sweden, and toured extensively at festivals and concerts in Holland for 4 years with a comical cabaret duo.
The enormous repertoire offered by her solo act, duos, trios and quartets include jazz standards, folk, soul, Celtic and contemporary pop music with original pieces sprinkled into the mix. She is regularly accompanied by horns, bass and drums, and also performs with guitarists, percussionists and didgeridoos. (She will however still happily do some solo gigs - especially if there is a grand piano involved!)
Tracey Roberts, either on her own, or with her outstanding accompanists, provides musical entertainment (and/or background music), which is totally enjoyable and of the highest quality. With the combination of their experience, style, musicality and professionalism as well as their cheerful personalities, Tracey Roberts and her musicians are sure to be a delightful and excellent choice for your upcoming event.
Over the last decade Tracey has developed her artistic skills as a freelance graphic designer and illustrator, and is now also an established visual artist with many exhibitions under her belt with over 100 pieces of richly coloured musically-themed fine art, created in conjunction with her music-colour synesthesia (the ability to see colours and shapes whilst listening to and composing and performing music).
She often performs musical concerts at exhibitions and displays her artwork at musical events, as the two are inextricably entwined. Her Blu-ray visual/audio release, Play Me is an audio / visual feast including a 30 minute improvised piano concert along with smaller improvised pieces with explanations about the performances and about her synesthesia and musically themed artworks. For more information about Tracey - the visual artist, please click here.
She is also the brainchild behind Your Story in Art commissioned artwork for clients creating, with their input, a visual depiction of their personal story encapsulated in a rich, colourful and meaningful piece of unique art, often becoming family heirlooms.
For more information about Your Story in Art, please click here.
Other interesting stuff ...
(...this is the musical history really...it'll take you a bit longer to read but some of it's juicy and will put a smile on ya dial! )Just to answer straight up the often asked question: "When did you start singing and playing?" Apparently, I was playing the piano with both hands - using individual fingers - when I was 3. And I can only imagine that I have been singing ever since I could talk...
From the age of 6 till 10, the tiny island of Nauru was the place where I would often listen in on Mum and Dad's music nights with friends singing songs by the The Seekers, Connie Frances and Frank Sinatra. No TV or computers meant expressing ideas the old-fashioned way which involved noodling around on the piano and no doubt led to the desire to draw.
Writing songs came later (in the back of a restaurant in Bentleigh) where I grew up as a teenager and, as we all do, started out on the inevitable road to self-discovery and adulthood. Musical influences came from 3XY radio station and really getting into Supertramp (the first album I bought - VERY big deal), girlfriends at school who (of course) loved Sherbet and Skyhooks, boyfriends at school with older brothers who (of course) were into Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin but mostly from my sister's boyfriend who was more into Joni Mitchell, Carole King, Billy Joel, Elton John, Neil Young and Neil Diamond.
My folks' restaurant had reel to reel music from 10am till 10pm day in, day out and I'm sure that it was through subconscious absorption that I have become the "ear-musician" I am today - and how I know SO many thousands of songs without even knowing the names of them or who sung them half the time! It was also in the lounge room behind the restaurant kitchen where the passion for quiet ballads was born ("Tracey, keep it down - there are customers in the shop!") and also the place where many a piano lesson was held with various teachers who all gave up in the end ("...she doesn't want to sight-read, she's an ear player"). It was also the place where I started writing colour-coded song lyrics (no chords) into exercise books which was the beginning of what is now a ridiculously enormous repertoire of songs that stood me in very good stead when I eventually got into the singer-pianist thing.
My first ever piano performance was at a high school variety night - my own complex piano version of MacArthur Park - I was actually as crook as a dog and nearly didn't do it, but I did, in a foggy-headed state, which completely eradicated any nerves and so gave the "performance of my life" , got an unexpected thunderous applause and got me thinking that maybe I could do something with this performance thing ... and it wasn't entirely unhealthy for the ego I have to admit...
So after battling through HSC, Uni and getting "a real job" as a computer programmer in the IT industry, I decided I could finally allow myself the indulgence of getting into a band. The first one was called Chances R (we subtitled that with the line "not just another cover band" but of course, that's exactly what we were!) The highlight of those few years was the support gig for Arlo Guthrie at Dallas Brooks Hall in front of a few thousand people...(although it competes pretty strongly with the New Years Eve fancy dress bash at a nudist colony on the Murray River! The answer, by the way, to the next obvious question is, "yes - but with lots of accessories!")
Next came the Annie Stanford Band where I really started to understand the nature of the pop music industry and my place in it (or not in it!). A few sabbaticals ensued - but never for too long (that itch comes back like a curse) and I began with the duo and trio combinations as well as the piano bar scene in the five star hotels (very nice indeed...). It was in this arena that I began to expand the repertoire and get into my jazz-infused pop style of playing really. Plenty of time to get proficient really (6-7 hour gigs behind a piano...how did I ever do it?!!! Must have been the lure of appreciative customers' tips and cocktails).
Overseas beckoned and I finally gave up on the computer jobs and went full-time muso in London - never looked back really - nowhere near as lucrative as cutting code but I was SO much happier and better at being an artist - then, (after the delicious diversion of getting married) the cabaret scene got me in Holland whilst recording 2 CDs over there (Simple Things and Treasure Box) and performing in a funk band called Nightlife but mostly in the cheeky and fun-loving duo with Hilda Wartena called the Lullaby Ladies (cruisy we were NOT!) which toured around Holland for nearly 5 years. That duo, Bette Midler, and our producer/manager really taught me about the theatrical nature and value of openly expressing yourself and giving your all within the context of live performance.
After nearly 10 years of travelling and living overseas, Australia (space and the smell of gum leaves) finally called me home and I started getting into the jazz stuff a bit (The Tracey Roberts Combos) using my own booking agency (Pangaea Productions) as a vehicle - that certainly taught me a thing or two! Then into some production work (the MoonGlow concert series at Chapel off Chapel) where I met some wonderful women singer-songwriters like Janette Geri and Maria Forde, who have become great friends and musical collaborators. The itch to compose set back in and the LINK EP was produced - not long after my greatest creation ever - my son. And so began my trek into the world of the singer-songwriter which is where I intend to truly implant myself for several years to come. Moving up to the hills got me intrigued with the folk scene and so I have entrenched myself in that circuit to a degree and done some lovely concerts and festivals and met some gorgeous people.
The jazz/pop stuff is still fun for me though (there are SO many good songs I will always love to sing) and I continue to do a variety of gigs in that ilk (which include my own songs too of course...). Recorded my first LIVE album, Live at Dizzy's, with a jazz quartet, which was a wonderful experience and a great way to get a high energy CD out fairly quickly). Two new studio CD recordings came thereafter Parallel Universe and After the Wave and then Shades of Blue, which is a beautiful cruisy album of ballads, improvised instrumental pieces and a few of my favourite jazz standards, recorded on a magnificent Steinway grand piano at Baker St Recording studios. Just me and the piano. Mmmmmmm...
I've released my first Blu-ray - this is primarily a high-quality audio product with a visual component - it is a very fine recording of the concert at LIVE at Baker Street in July 2013 where I played a 30 minute instrumental improvisation on the grand piano in that magnificent 33and1/3 Amphitheatre, now called The Maven Room. We have called this piece (and the whole concept of improvised piano music) PLAY ME.
The second half of the concert comprised smaller 1-2 minute improvs inspired by suggestions from the audience, and this Blu-ray contains 6 of the best of those too. There are interviews about the concert (both the 30-minute pieces and the shorter improvs ) and also a segment where I describe selected pieces of artwork and I explain my music-colour synesthesia, what it means to me and how I use it to create my music and my art.
Most recently (in 2017-8) the boys and I recorded and released my second live CD at the Skylark Room in Upwey, my home venue for many years. This CD, called LIVE at the LARK is with my fabulous quartet comprising Jon Magill on sax, Robert Mercer on drums and Andy Eames on bass. All consummate musicians who have my back. It's a pleasure to play with them and I'm really happy with the energy and honesty of this album.
I'm already getting my head into the next batch of songs for the next album (of course - there is always another album!) - there are many more songs left in me yet (one day I want to do a cruisy jazz standards CD for those wee small hours of the morning - and there's a funny, quirky cabaret-style one too with all my kooky songs on it stored away too...) Shall certainly keep you posted!
In the meantime, I continue to enjoy the festival circuit, folk clubs and concerts and private function work including house concerts, outdoor events in parks and jazz gigs in the summer (really casual and relaxed events for young and old). Love playing outdoors too on a sunny day to people lazing on picnic rugs and happy little kids running around. Who doesn't!
I do love playing with other musos too - there have been some other lovely side projects, primarily produced with my dear friend and musical colleague, Michelle Chandler like The Alive and Gigging Roadshow and Acoustic Brew.
Herft, Geri, Roberts & Smith (with Suzette Herft, JoJo Smith, and Janette Geri) has been wonderful too - beautiful established experienced friends and great songwriters and musicians - sadly we lost Janette in June 2018 to the big C.
So it continues to be an interesting lifestyle - not without the stones in our shoes, but I wouldn't want to live my life any other way...as I say in one of my songs on the Parallel Universe release, dedicated to the muse: "She's in the blood".