Since the early 2000s, 3x GRAMMY nominated vocalist Gretchen Parlato has earned a reputation as one of the most inventive and mesmerizing jazz vocalists of her generation. “Parlato is a mid-career master whose emergence changed the course of jazz vocals, via her own recordings and through her ubiquitous presence on projects by her peers, elders, and younger artists.” – Andrew Gilbert, SF Classical Voice. “She’s just so different. A good singer, we tend to think, seeks out the subtleties to work with in a song. Parlato seeks out the blatancies in a song and makes them subtle, seemingly effortlessly. It takes courage to maintain such gentleness, and brilliance, maybe even genius…” Michael J West, Washington City Paper

Born and raised in Los Angeles, CA , surrounded by an artistic family, she is a graduate of Los Angeles County High School for the ARTS and continued her education at UCLA as an Ethnomusicology major, among the first graduating class of the newly formed Jazz Studies department in 1998. Parlato moved to New York City after graduating as the first vocalist to attend the (then Thelonious Monk Institute) now Herbie Hancock Institute of Jazz Performance.

Soon after, she won the Herbie Hancock (formerly Thelonious Monk) International Jazz Vocal Competition, quickly building momentum touring globally with her quartet and releasing several acclaimed albums, including her self-titled debut and Live in NYC (ObliqSound, 2013), which earned a GRAMMY® nomination for Best Jazz Vocal Album. “She is spiritual to the extent that she sings from the bottom of her very soul; indeed from the bottom of her very being. She bends and twists notes, phrases and as a result her lines are like the proverbial double helix and which dances almost head over heels.” -Raul da Gama, Latin Jazz Network

After sixteen years on the East Coast, she returned to Los Angeles with her husband, Mark Guiliana and son, Marley. In 2023, Parlato released Lean In (Edition Records), a duo collaboration with Benin-born guitarist Lionel Loueke. Celebrated for its fusion of cultures, languages, and friendship, the project earned her third GRAMMY® nomination in 2024 for Best Jazz Vocal Album. Her deep affinity for Brazilian music inspired Flor (2021), which received her second GRAMMY® nomination for Best Jazz Vocal Album, won the German Jazz Award for International Vocal Album of the Year, and was named one of the top five jazz albums of 2021 by Jazzwise, The Guardian, and Amazon. Her earlier albums also drew wide acclaim—The Lost and Found (2011) co-produced by Robert Glasper, garnered over 30 national and international awards, including the DownBeat Jazz Critics Poll No. 1 Vocal Album of the Year and iTunes Vocal Jazz Album of the Year, while her sophomore release In a Dream (2009) was named JazzTimes Critics Poll Vocal Album of the Year and hailed by Billboard as “the most alluring jazz vocal album of 2009.” Along with her own projects, Parlato has been a featured guest on over 100 recordings, with artists including Esperanza Spalding, Moonchild, Terri Lyne Carrington, Terence Blanchard, Marcus Miller, Kenny Barron, Keiko Matsui, Gerald Clayton, and Taylor Eigsti.

“When I think of Parlato, I hear Miles Davis. If modern jazz singing is all about using the voice as an instrument, Parlato has put her instrument front and center… she has quickly evolved a sound based largely on nuance and subtlety, appealing as much to Brazilian, R&B and pop audiences as to modern jazz listeners. Gretchen Parlato’s success may lie as much in her poetry as in her vocal stylings.” Andrea Canter, JazzPolice

Parlato has performed worldwide, from The Hollywood Bowl, Carnegie Hall and The Kennedy Center to the Montreal, North Sea, and London Jazz Festivals. She was a member of the SFJAZZ Collective, a professor of voice at Manhattan School of Music and the New School, and continues to be a committed educator, leading workshops and masterclasses internationally.

Most recently, she released the single If It Was with John Clayton, Gerald Clayton, and composer, Alan Hampton, honoring Altadena in the aftermath of the Eaton fire. Parlato will be releasing a quartet album of new music in 2026. She is grateful to have come full circle as faculty at her alma mater, eager to pass on all she has gathered along her path. “Parlato has mastery of rhythm, emotional depth, subtlety, and the kind of precise technical craft where even the breathing sounds matter. It’s indisputable that she sounds like no one else working in jazz today. Parlato is, in fact, arguably the emblematic jazz vocalist of her generation, and perhaps the most visionary.”
Michael J. West, Washington City Paper