Leela James makes music that feels both modern and old-school. The Los Angeles, Calif., R&B vocalist and songwriter, who performs March 10 at the Charleston Music Hall, has spent most of her two-decade career blending traditional rhythm-and-blues instrumentation with electronic accents, allowing her to score hits on modern radio but still sound timeless.
You can hear that approach on two of the most popular songs from her nine releases, a mix of singles, EPs and full-length albums.
One of her biggest hits, the Top 20 single “Fall For You,” has been streamed more than 33 million times, and it’s a slow and sultry piano ballad. James’ passionate vocal sells the song’s tale of new love and old pain. On another hit, “Music,” (14 million streams), James channels the great Mavis Staples as she confidently scats and improvises her way over a low-down groove that’s as sparse as it is funky.
At her Music Hall show, James and her band will be focusing on her new nine-song EP, 2BHonest, which mixes seductive slow jams like the “Right On Time” with sleek modern funk like “Honesty,” which recalls the greatest moments of Toni Braxton’s career.
It’s the most confident statement yet in James’ long climb to the top of the R&B charts.
“I continue to grow as a songwriter because of life,” James said in a recent interview with the Charleston City Paper. “We grow with life. And as an artist, I’m definitely constantly evolving, and I think that my music evolves as well.”
And James’ audience has been evolving, and growing, throughout her career. From her first album, A Change Is Gonna Come back in 2005, James’ career has risen a bit more with each of her releases, going from the bottom of the charts to the Top 10 with albums like Let’s Do It Again and My Soul.
In fact, it took a decade of steady climbing for James to land her first #1 R&B hit, the wronged-woman ballad “Don’t Want You Back.” It was the first of more than 15 hit singles, including another #1 hit, “Complicated.”
That gradual upward climb gave her plenty of time to develop both her sound and her audience.
“I definitely think that there are advantages to the slow build,” James said. “I’m grateful for my grassroots fans. They’ve been there from day one, and they’ve never wavered, and it just continues to grow.”
“I have a couple of generations at my shows now that support me, and it’s a beautiful thing,” she added. “It definitely isn’t something that’s happened overnight, but it’s been long lasting and really genuine.”
There’s also a pragmatic benefit to a slow-building career. You can make plenty of music for people to explore in the age of the short attention span.
“People want new music right away, all the time,” James said. “You can drop a project, but a month later it’s considered old. In this current market, the attention span is very short. So you continue to feed your audience’s best as you possibly can.”
James’ live shows are less purely R&B than her albums, and fans at the Music Hall show can expect a decidedly jazzy approach to the music, one that doesn’t always show in the studio. She’s been working with the same musicians for the majority of her career, and the group’s onstage comfort level allows plenty of room to jam.
“We have a great chemistry onstage,” James said. “They’ve been with me for years, so it’s a family. We have a good time on stage, and I think people feel that energy because we’re so connected. I think that makes the music feel even better, and we go off script quite often. We like to have fun live and let the music just do what it’s going to do.”
Onstage and off, though, there’s a realness to James’ music she says people are latching onto.
“I think they connect to my authenticity,” she said. “I think it really truly resonates with an audience that still appreciates and respects authentic soul music and real, true R&B.”
IF YOU WANT TO GO: Doors open at 7 p.m., March 10, Charleston Music Hall, 37 John St., Charleston. Tickets range from $53-$167: charlestonmusichall.com
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