Marie-Claire Giraud’s “Caravan” is a one-part mirage, one-part magic. The classically trained soprano and genre-jumping vocalist leads Duke Ellington’s classic song into the wilderness of the desert night, the stretch of desolation in her interpretation haunted and deeply personal.
Recorded at the Boston studio Plaid Dog Recordings, indie ground zero for label head Mike Davidson, “Caravan” pulls you in like a blowout in the desert by the flicker of a fire under the star-lit Sahara sky. Giraud’s voice is limber, operatic, purposeful, and windswept. Her reading is sand in the moonlight, shifting with a delicate impurity between reverence and reinvention.
“Caravan” isn’t just a one-off release. There’s a flare gun going off for what’s to come. With this track, Giraud ushers in a new era of sound and spirit. She is also starting a crowdfunding campaign and working with Plaid Dog Recordings to create a new studio EP, this time delving further into her blend of jazz, opera, and musical storytelling.