Rickie Lee Jones

On 26 May 2026 at the Barbican Centre in London, Rickie Lee Jones revisits a songbook where jazz, folk, rock and rhythm and blues meet. Raised between Chicago, Phoenix and California, she came up in the late-70s Los Angeles clubs with a narrative way of singing and a supple phrasing. The self-titled debut (1979) and Pirates (1981) set the course; The Magazine and Flying Cowboys widened the view; Pop Pop and It's Like This took on standards and acoustic tones; Ghostyhead stepped toward trip hop textures. Then came Traffic from Paradise, The Sermon on Exposition Boulevard, Balm in Gilead, The Other Side of Desire, Kicks and, in 2023, Pieces of Treasure.

On stage she moves between originals and re-interpretations, keeping the focus on the story inside each song. The set draws on a long path of experiments and collaborations with artists such as Dr. John, Lyle Lovett, Rob Wasserman and Tom Waits, heard in the writing and phrasing.