Lucy was born in London, but was raised in Amsterdam and New York City. She has a very musical background: her British father is a composer and conductor and her New Yorker mother is a musicologist and an opera singer.
Raised on classical and Middle-Eastern music, Lucy studied piano and flute before asking for singing lessons at age 12. She attended a Bronx high school renowned for its music department and made her first recordings singing house music in her friends’ basements. She spent part of each summer in music camp and part in Holland, where she frequently locked herself up in her father’s studio and listened to jazz and old R&B records. At 16 she was accepted into the Manhattan School of Music to study jazz, but after a year decided to learn her songwriting and performing skills on her own. She spent the next few years performing in swing-organ trios, working as a session singer, waiting tables, and singing jazz standards in Greenwich Village restaurants. She started off singing in jazz cafes and singing for tips or dinner. "You sing with a piano player and a tip jar on top of the piano." She said in an interveiw on NZGirl.
In 2003 Lucy signed with Atlantic Records and recorded her debut album While You Can, out of which came the Top 40 hit “Dumb Girls,” produced by Kevin Kadish; other songs on the record were produced by John Shanks at Jim Henson Studios. Although her efforts won her some mainstream notoriety, making slick, radio-ready pop proved artistically unsatisfying for her.
The following year, Lucy was asked by producer friend Jaime Houston to record a version of the big-band tune "It's Oh So Quiet" for the Disney film Ice Princess. The song had originally been recorded by Betty Hutton in 1948 and was subsequently popularized by Björk. Lucy credits it as being a major creative turning point for her, one that inspired much of the writing in her second album.
Lucy began her musical reinvention on her second album, the independently released Lucy Woodward Is... Hot and Bothered (2007), a transitional effort that incorporated R&B grooves and electronic beats, while mining deep-rooted jazz influences. Hot and Bothered was produced by longtime collaborator Itaal Shur and Tim K. . Barnes & Noble named her “Artist of the Month” for August 2008. Released in 2007 on Atlantic, it was initially only available through iTunes, on July 29, 2008 getting a physical release exclusively through Barnes & Noble.
Lucy’s third album, Hooked!, was recorded at Stratosphere Sound in New York and Jim Henson Studios in Hollywood and released on Verve Records in 2010. It was largely produced by Tony Visconti (David Bowie, T-Rex), but included contributions by Justin Stanley (Nikka Costa, Sheryl Crow), Itaal Shur and Tim K. Lucy penned much of the record with songwriters Dan Petty and Michelle Lewis, claiming she had been inspired by the music of Peggy Lee and Django Reinhardt. One song on the album, “Another Woman,” was written for her by longtime inspiration Nellie McKay (also Verve), who is also featured on background vocals.
In 2011, Lucy was asked to tour with Pink Martini after the band’s singer China Forbes had to undergo vocal surgery. Her quick study of Pink Martini’s repertoire of Croatian, Japanese, French, English and Turkish songs did not go unnoticed in the music press. She toured cross-continent with the band for a number of concerts the same year, including performances at the Toronto and Montreal jazz festivals and Ravinia, as well as a three-night stint with the San Francisco Symphony (Donato Cabrera conducting).
http://www.lucywoodward.com
Sans Souci
Lucy Woodward Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
When the springtime waters wiggle
Down the mountainside
I can hear the fishes swishing
Just as loud as I'm a wishing
When I hit the tide
Go, go, go, go
Sans souci, ah, sans souci
They got no room here for someone like me
Go, go, go, go
Go, go, go, go
Try to tell me I was evil, try to trample on my soul
Try to make me think that they were righteous
But the plot of the lie was whole
Go, go, go, go
Go, go, go, go
Sans souci, ah, sans souci
They got no room here for someone like me
Ah, the earth, it starts a squaking
'Cause it knows that love is walking
And it ain't no dream, no, you ain't no dream
Sans souci, you ain't no dream
Go, go, go, go
Go, go, go, go
Try to tell me I was evil, try to trample on my soul
Try to make me think that they were righteous
But the plot of the lie was whole
Go, go, go, go
Go, go, go, go
Feel yourselves with all laughing and talking
That used to be
Go, go, go, go
Go, go, go, go
Go, go, go, go
Sans souci
In Lucy Woodward's song Sans Souci, she talks about a place where one feels free, but also unwanted. The opening lines of the song give us an image of the beauty of nature, where the mountains giggle and the springtime waters wiggle down the mountainside. Woodward then talks about hearing the fishes swishing as loud as she is wishing when she hits the tide. She then writes, "Sans Souci, ah, sans souci, they got no room here for someone like me," indicating that there is a place known as "sans souci" where she wants to feel free, but doesn't feel welcomed.
The song then talks about the evil and trampling of one's soul by people who claim to be righteous. These lines suggest that Woodward was shunned by a community or group for some reason, but she refuses to believe their lies. She then repeats the chorus, indicating that despite the people who have hurt her, she still wants to go to sans souci where she can be herself without any judgment. The song ends with the line, "Feel yourselves with all laughing and talking that used to be," indicating that sans souci is a place where people were happy and free to be themselves.
Line by Line Meaning
Oh, the mountains start to giggle
The mountains seem to come alive with happiness when the waters of springtime flow down them
When the springtime waters wiggle
The water from the springs makes a ripple effect and makes everything on the way to the bottom of the mountain wet
I can hear the fishes swishing
Lucy is able to hear the sound that the moving water makes and thinks it sounds like the fish are swimming
Just as loud as I'm a wishing
The sound of the water seems so loud that Lucy compares it to the noise she makes when she is making a wish
When I hit the tide
Lucy is reminded of the sound of the waves when it hits the shore
Sans souci, ah, sans souci
Lucy seems to be referring to a place of peace and tranquility
They got no room here for someone like me
Lucy feels out of place in the peaceful and tranquil setting because she thinks she is different from others who belong there
Try to tell me I was evil, try to trample on my soul
Lucy has been hurt by others who have accused her of being evil and have tried to destroy her emotionally
Try to make me think that they were righteous
Lucy was made to believe that the purpose of her accusers was just and fair, but she now knows that they were not
But the plot of the lie was whole
Lucy feels that the lies that her accusers made up were so convincing that they seemed to be true
Ah, the earth, it starts a squaking
Lucy feels that the earth is talking and making noise about the love that it feels
'Cause it knows that love is walking
Lucy thinks that the earth knows that love is present in the world and is aware that love is around us
And it ain't no dream, no, you ain't no dream
Lucy believes that love is real and it is not just a dream, and she speaks directly to it, assuring it that it is real
Feel yourselves with all laughing and talking
Lucy wants the listeners to experience a surge of joy, surrounded by laughter and communication
That used to be
Lucy is talking about a time of joy and happiness that has passed by
Sans souci
Lucy returns to the idea of a place of peace and tranquility
Lyrics © Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Written by: Peggy Lee, Sonny Burke
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind