Karrin Allyson

Kansas City-reared jazz singer Karrin Allyson isn't quite as pop as some of her better-selling peers. Rather, she leans toward artists like Diana Krall--Allyson prefers to twist a melody in an unexpected direction rather than caress its well-worn edges à la Norah Jones. Still, she makes for a fine interpreter of pop on Wild for You, her 2004 disc of covers of "compositions that made me want to start singing in the first place." She spices up the title track with rhythmic accents not heard in Cat Stevens' original, and teases the spectral solemnity out of Ewan McColl's "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face."