Anna Elizabeth Kendrick is a modern day old-fashioned jazz songbird and composer. She revisits the spirit of the earlier decades of the last century in her song-writing and singing style, particularly embracing the 30's, 40's and 50's. She accompanies her own originals with lovable standards and lesser known standards that you will come to love in her performances and recordings. Her arsenal of songs range from sophisticated to bluesy to cabaret-esque. Anna has a penchant for honest, clever lyrics and catchy, melodic music, whether it is her own writing or someone else's. She takes inspiration from the likes of Cole Porter, Peggy Lee, Marilyn Monroe, Harold Arlen, June Christy and Julie London, to name a few.
Anna Elizabeth Kendrick started singing and taking voice lessons as a child and into adulthood. She began writing jazz music in her early teens, and chose to live out her dream when she moved to New York and started performing her own music and jazz standards in many various venues, such as Bar Bayeux, Lele, Flute Midtown, Winnie's Jazz Bar, Tomi Jazz,, Flute Beekman, Flute East, Flute Gramercy, Swing 46, Tagine Dining Gallery, Somethin' Jazz Club (formerly known as Mile's Cafe), and many more!
Anna has studied in New York with the highly reputable vocal instructor Katie Agresta. Ms. Agresta's most notable students are Bon Jovi, Annie Lennox and Cyndi Lauper.
Ms. Kendrick is currently performing her own jazz/pop solo shows for 16 years and counting with her band The Hot Plates who consist of various and regular rotating jazz artists since 2009.
They currently include Mark Capon on guitar, Takaaki Otomo on piano, Nori Naraoka on bass, also Jon B. Roche on bass, Ocie Davis on drums and also Yosuke Nagayama on drums and other musicians too as needed per gig.
Anna also occasionally guest sings for friends. She has guest sung with Ian Kane and his Red-Hot Blues band, formerly known as the Boogie Stride Trio and also has guest sung with The Hot Sardines and The Virginia Marcs Band. She occasionally has guest singers and musicians at her own shows as well. Anna is open to collaborating with more musicians and performing in more venues! To date Anna has performed at 23 New York venues and counting.
I'm very happy to announce that Anna Elizabeth Kendrick's 3rd jazz album “Almost Like Being In Love” was recently released on 5/9/25. This album strays from her 1st 2, in that it is an album completely of jazz standards this time rather than her own originals. It has 10 tracks of lovely and wonderful songs from the Great American Songbook on it and it is available on all major streaming platforms!
“Almost Like Being In Love” made it into the “Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album” category for the 1st round ballot voting for the 68th Grammys!
Mark Capon plays the guitar on this album, along with Nori Naraoka on upright bass and with Ocie Davis on 4 tracks on the drums and Yosuke Nagayama on 3 tracks on the drums. Also, Nori Naraoka recorded and mastered this album.
And, don't worry, although Anna wanted to do this album of only standards for this particular album she is still writing many new original songs that are also in the works for future performances and recordings! ;)
In August of ‘24 Anna recorded an original jazzy Christmas song called “Swingin’ Christmas," by Altino Music Inc, which was used 2/ce in the indie film “Christmas Cowboy” that was released on 11/12/24.
Anna's 2nd album/EP "Old-Fashioned Gal" came out on August 18th, 2017 and it has 5 tracks on it, which include 4 original jazz songs that she wrote and 1 jazz standard. It is also available on Apple Music, Spotify, Amazon Music and all other major streaming platforms.
Jeevan D'Souza played the piano for this album, along with Marc Daine on guitar (and on alto saxophone for certain tracks), Anton Vittal played electric bass and Serge Terentev is on the drums. Kyle Schweizer (of the Double Down band) played the clarinet on 1 track and Ben Rydell played his trumpet on 2 tracks. This EP was recoded and mastered by Phil Duke of Continental Recording Studios.
Anna's 1st album "In Out of The Rain" was released on April 9th, 2013 and it has 12 tracks of original jazz songs that she wrote on it. It's available on iTunes, Amazon music, Spotify and many more sites. See "links" in order to view or purchase it. She joined the Recording Academy in 2013 and "In Out of The Rain" made it through to the 1st round ballot of the 2014 56th Grammy's in the Best Jazz Vocal Album category.
Jeevan D'Souza is on the piano for this album, along with Miguel Mateus on electric bass and Keith Dorgan on the drums. Miguel Mateus recorded and mastered this album.
Some of Ms. Kendrick's personal quotes are:
“Saucy and sassy, but always classy”
"If the Yankees were good enough for Marilyn Monroe then they're good enough for me"
"I'm like Doris Day, but in a modern way"
"Your best accessory is your smile"