Over the course of a thirty year career Janette Mason has quietly but emphatically made her presence felt, delighting audiences with her skills as a pianist, arranger, composer and producer in all kinds of settings, from tiny jazz clubs to international film and TV projects. To those in the know she’s become a byword for artistic quality and emotional authenticity: her music embraces the complexity and challenge of modern jazz but always reaches out to the listener with its honesty and directness of expression, and as a result she’s established a reputation that’s as revered by critics and her fellow musicians as it is by the listening public.
Music has been at the centre of Janette’s life since her earliest childhood. Her mother, Margaret Mason, was a true pioneer of the UK scene, with a successful career as a professional jazz organist, playing in Gracie Cole’s all-female big band in the 1950s. Retiring from the road, she became musical director of a South Coast holiday camp, and worked in a duo with Janette’s dad on drums. “Mum was always the star in our household!” remembers Janette. She plundered her parent’s record collections, and listened transfixed when visiting artists like Maynard Ferguson and Dakota Staton would perform at the holiday camp. Janette absorbed all these influences, giving her a thorough grounding in the heart of the jazz tradition while teaching her a valuable lesson about how to reach out to audiences, regardless of genre. “All these artists had the ethos that jazz is music to be enjoyed by everyone! And I’ve always tried to include that element in my music.”
PERFORMER/COMPOSER
On leaving school Janette went straight into performing in pubs and clubs, learning on the job, supported by powerful female role models such as her mum and the singer Carol Grimes. She played across all kinds of genres, from jazz to pop to soul to reggae, always seeking the links rather than the differences. Her reputation as a creative, supportive facilitator grew rapidly, and she was soon equally in demand as a player on pop sessions with Jimmy Sommerville, Pulp, Oasis and Seal, as well as for left-field artists like Robert Wyatt, and acting as Lea Delaria’s musical director. She maintained a parallel career as a jazz artist and bandleader, releasing a series of albums featuring some of the UK’s most respected players, with her 2004 debut Din And Tonic nominated for John Fordham’s Album Of The YeaR. And she combined all these diverse streams of musical creativity together in her role as a composer and musical director for the TV shows of Jonathan Ross and Antoine De Caunes, and as a composer of film scores for international releases, notably Ruby Blue (2008) The Calling (2014) and Cars 3 (2017).
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Whether leading her own trio in jazz re-workings of pop classics, playing with legendary producer Tony Visconti’s Best Of Bowie Project, scoring for film and TV, or launching her latest project AYRA in collaboration with vocal legend Juliet Roberts, Janette always stays true to the values instilled by her upbringing – a commitment to musical excellence combined with a generous, giving sensibility that reaches out to audiences and ensures that the message in the music is always there to be heard.
Janette is currently Artist In Residence at The Exchange Theatre in Twickenham and keyboard player for Tony Visconti’s Best Of Bowie Project.