Winning 12 Grammy Awards hasn’t slowed Alicia Keys down a bit.
She’s now on tour supporting her latest release, “The Element of Freedom,” which has won her even more popular and critical kudos.
“The music is really strong and the drums are really aggressive but my voice is vulnerable and delicate,” Keys said in a press statement. Summing up the music, it’s about “eliminating all of the boundaries and all the limitations, so that you can feel your freedom and express your freedom in every way you possibly can and that’s what I did with this album.”
If you go
Alicia Keys
Where: Verizon Center, 601 F St. NW
When: 7:30 Thursday
Info: $49.50 to $128; ticketmaster.com
Not that reaching for freedom is anything new to Keyes, whose credentials include songwriter, singer, pianist, producer, author and actress. A product of New York’s Hell’s Kitchen, Keys cites Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, Nina Simone and Donny Hathaway among the many musicians whose work prompted her to attend the city’s Professional Performing Arts School (which has many distinguished alumni in the arts), where she was discovered at age 14. After receiving a scholarship and enrolling at Columbia University, she left to pursue a full-time music career. Mixing soul, hip-hop, jazz and classical, Keys won five Grammy awards for her 2001 debut release, “Songs In A Minor.”
Her 2003 Grammy Award-winning sophomore release, “The Diary of Alicia Keys,” was certified seven-times platinum.
“When the album was completed I was ecstatic because I really felt the energy of the songs and hearing them as one piece of work, I was finally able to say, ‘Yes, this is who I am right now,’ Keys said. “I’m so proud, happy, and excited that I could offer this music to the world.”
It was so well-received that in October 2005, she released the Grammy-nominated live concert recording “Alicia Keys Unplugged.”
Keys vowed that her next album, “As I Am,” would tell stories culminating from her world travels and personal experiences. The music from the commercially successful album won Keys’ more Grammy Awards.
“My music allows me to speak freely,” she said. “It doesn’t have a beginning or ending because it’s an integral part of my ongoing journey.”
