Half Chinese and half Icelandic, Laufey spent much of her childhood traveling between Reykjavík and Washington, DC, where she learned to speak English with barely a trace of an accent. Inspired in part by her mother, a classical violinist, she took up piano and cello early on, but it was her father’s collection of Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday albums that spoke to her on a deeper level. “I’m definitely very influenced by composers like Ravel and Chopin,” Laufey explains, “but when I discovered the Great American Songbook and the music of George Gershwin and Richard Rodgers, it felt like this middle ground between jazz and classical that suited me perfectly.” Laufey dove into the music headfirst, captivated by the... read more