Fresh from a sojourn in the Big Apple, soul-pop singer Jessie Ware is living life to the full with a new album and much-anticipated Cornbury Park debut. Tim Hughes reports

Classically beautiful, elegantly dressed and with her jet black hair pulled back into a tight shiny ponytail, Jessie Ware looks every inch the smooth r’n’b singer.

Launched out of backing singer anonymity by the release of her debut album Devotion two years ago, she has established herself as one of our most exciting new female artists – with a voice matched by an engaging stage presence and easy-going charm.

This weekend she plays Wilderness festival – the three-day feast of music, dancing, theatre, food and all manner of other creative pursuits held at Cornbury Park. The singers’s debut at the gathering, alongside Burt Bacharach, London Grammar and Metronomy, among the ancient oaks of Wychwood Forest near Charlbury, follows a packed out show at Oxford’s O2 Academy last year, where her capacity audience included members of her own family, who live locally.

While that show saw her buoyed by Mercury and BRIT nominations for down-tempo classic Devotion, this time finds Jessie armed with a new record’s-worth of tunes from soon-to-be-released follow-up Tough Love, starting with the title track single.

It sees the South Londoner musing on love, fresh from a sojourn in the Big Apple where she recorded with producers Two Inch Punch, and Rihanna and Katy Perry collaborator Benny Blanco – who together trade under the name BenZel.

“I had just finished a run of shows in the States and went to NY to work with BenZel for a couple weeks, mainly as a different focus to touring,” says the artist, who has nominations for British Breakthrough Act and British Female Solo Artist.

“I didn’t have any expectations or pressures with what would come out of those two weeks, and think Tough Love sums this up. It was me experimenting with my voice and having fun with it. It just felt right and kind of dictated the route of the album, much like Devotion did on my first album.”

The songs will find favour with fans of 80s pop and cutting-edge electronic dance music as well as lovers of soul-infused r’n’b.

Despite her sudden fame, Jessie remains warm and engaging; a reflection, perhaps, of her unusual ascent of the music industry – which started, as a backing singer, performing on releases by dance outfits SBTRKT and Sampha, and for underground urban live stream The Boiler Room before being handpicked for stardom as a soul-pop singer. That’s the official line, anyway. Actually her story began a little earlier, singing at school, inspired by her mum’s Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald tapes, appearing in musicals and picking up some instruction of her own. Then she went to university, real life took over, and she emerged as a journalist, all musical ambitions shelved.

“I didn’t think it was ever going to be possible,” she says. “It always broke my heart a bit. I couldn’t even do it as a pastime, because it made me feel too sick to only half do it.”

The daughter of respected Panorama reporter John Ware, Jessie’s journalistic credentials were impeccable. After a stint as a PA for a TV production company (where she worked with Fifty Shades of Grey author Erika ‘EL James’ Leonard), she took up a post at the Jewish Chronicle.

“I wanted to be a football reporter for a red top,” she says. ”I loved asking questions and was very nosy, but I never felt I was very good.”

Those tabloid ambitions were dashed by a phone call from old schoolmate Jack Penate, who asked if she’d do backing vocals for him on a BBC session for Zane Lowe.

“I thought, this is brilliant, it’s really fun, singing... maybe I could be a backing singer.”

Jack took her on a tour of the UK festival circuit, and then America. It was there that she was introduced to the producer SBTRKT, who, funnily enough, lived close to her London home. The result was Nervous, featuring Sampha. The two also hooked up to write stunning follow-up Valentine, her vocals catching the attention of record label PMR.

To go it alone, however, Jessie insists she needed to find her own sound.

“I needed to take a step back from being a dance vocalist,” she says. “As much as I love the underground scene, and was lucky enough to be accepted by it, I wanted to set that apart and learn how to be a classic songwriter. It meant working hard, because I didn’t want to put out rubbish. I wanted a bit of longevity. I didn’t want to be a flash in the pan.

“I wanted to combine electronic with a more classic songwriting,” she goes on. “I didn’t want it to feel too ‘of now’, so that’s why I went back to beats and grooves of things I loved before, like Prince and Chaka Khan and Grace Jones.”

And that sweet/ dark nu-soul sound shimmers through Tough Love as much as on Devotion.

“I feel like I’ve been allowed to push it with the melodrama,” she says.

And with the industry now eating out of her hand, she is sticking to her ambition of reaching the top. “I want to be a pop star, in the classic sense, like Annie Lennox, or Sade, or Whitney,” she says. “There’s something classy about them. I’m going for the big ones!”

CHECK IT OUT
Jessie Ware plays Wilderness, which takes place at Cornbury Park from today until Sunday.
Weekend tickets are £143.50 plus booking fee from wildernessfestival.com
Tough Love is due out in October.

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