Album Review: Turn Up the Quiet by Diana Krall

Diana Krall spent the better part of the 2010s exploring byways of American song -- her 2012 set Glad Rag Doll drew heavily on obscure jazz from the 1920s and '30s, its 2015 sequel Wallflower concentrated on pop and rock tunes -- but 2017's Turn Up the Quiet finds the pianist/singer returning to well-known standards from the Great American Songbook. Reuniting with producer Tommy LiPuma for the first time since 2009's bossa nova-inspired Quiet Nights, Krall works with a trio of lineups on Turn Up the Quiet, alternating between a trio, quartet, and quintet. The album isn't divided into triads but rather gently shifts between these bands, a move that's sometimes imperceptible because the focus is firmly on Krall, the pianist.

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Familiarity is a fundamental draw of a standards album. In fact, it's a big part of the point. By including songs as well-known as “Night and Day” and “L-O-V-E” on Turn Up the Quiet, her first true standards album since 2009's Quiet Nights, Diana Krall allows listeners to lean into words and melodies they already know by heart, and to relish the unique phrasing and specific energy she brings to tried-and-true material.

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