“What I find most compelling about her is her musical adventurousness, her willingness to voyage across centuries and make the music of different times, cultures, and mindscapes uniquely her own,” Brian Levine says of Cécile McLorin Salvant, his guest on The Gould Standard, a podcast from the Glenn Gould Foundation about the arts, culture, and contemporary society. “Cécile’s questing spirit is fully on display in her newest album, Mélusine, and its predecessor, Ghost Song.” You can watch their conversation—the first of two parts, with the second forthcoming—on YouTube and hear it on Apple Podcasts here:

Mélusine has been nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Jazz Vocal Album and for Best Arrangement, Instrumental and Vocals, for the album track "Fenestra," arranged by Godwin Louis. The album is a mix of originals and interpretations of songs dating as far back as the 12th century, mostly sung in French along with Occitan, English, and Haitian Kreyòl. They tell the folk tale of Mélusine, a woman who turns into a half-snake each Saturday after a childhood curse by her mother. You can get it and hear it here.