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Today, an encounter experienced by Canadian singer Holly Cole, who performs a pair of Christmas concerts in the Winspear Centre Tuesday and Wednesday with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra. It should be an extra classy affair.
Our top jazz-turned-pop chanteuse is "sort of" supporting her new album, Treasures, a compilation of songs the Holly Cole Trio recorded from 1989 to 1993. It's only available until Jan. 31 - but no, unlike Garth Brooks, she will not subsequently bury the master tapes under her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
"I just didn't want people to be tricked into thinking this was a whole new record," she explains.
Can you believe it? Holly Cole has never released a Christmas album. You'd think that with a name like Holly Cole ... but I digress.
The Toronto singer has had yet another busy year. By a long shot, she says, the greatest moment of it was getting to meet her idol Bonnie Raitt while they were both playing a few dates on Lilith Fair this summer. Cole remembers seeing Bonnie Raitt walk by in a hotel hallway. Cole was dying to talk to her, but she chickened out.
It was Raitt who accosted Cole.
"She goes, 'Oh, I'm so glad to meet you because I'm a really, really big fan and I have all your records' and all this kind of stuff. And I was like, uh, wait a minute. This is what I'm supposed to be saying.
"She invited me to hang out with her. Then she goes, 'Do you know that John Prine tune, Angel From Montgomery?' And I said, 'Well, yes I do.' 'Do you like it?' 'I love it.' She had a guitar and she goes, 'I'm going to try singing something. Why don't you try to sing this other part?' And then she says, 'Why don't we get Sarah in here? She can sing the high part.' So we ended up doing it every night. She called me and Sarah McLachlan on stage to sing Angel From Montgomery as her encore. And every night she introduced me as one of her favourite singers of all time. So that clearly blew my mind."
The relationship continued. Raitt phoned Cole in September: " 'I'm playing tonight with Eric Clapton at SkyDome. Would you like to come up and sing Angel From Montgomery?' "
You can guess what Cole's answer was: "Well, gee, I'm kinda busy. Well, OK, if I have to ...."
Raitt was not being condescending (which might not even be possible). Although Cole's fame is modest and she has yet to write her own songs, she possesses a remarkable voice. It's a sexy, powerful tone with a dark edge that can be completely captivating in the right setting - a David Lynch-style video, say. During a sold-out concert in the Winspear earlier this year, Cole sang Trust in Me from The Jungle Book and made it sound evil. She makes Tom Waits even more sinister than he already is (as you can hear on Temptation, Cole's album of jazzed-up Waits tunes). She's the anti-Doris Day singing a dramatic take on Que Sera, Sera. Her version of Joni Mitchell's River is chilling. Even the Christmas songs she chooses tend to have an odd, "unorthodox" feel. Santa Baby is her favourite Christmas song, she says - not White Christmas.
The title of Cole's last studio album - her first major foray into pop music accompanied by a toning down of the vampish gown-and-long-gloves image - sums her personality up nicely: Dark Dear Heart.
Treasures, she says, charts her growth as a vocalist.
"It was kind of when the trio was in its heyday. These long-lost tapes are from that period. As painful as it is for me, I can sort of hear myself growing musically.
"Sometimes I would make the broadest choices, to sing as loud as I possibly could, say. Things like that. It's like looking at your high school yearbook photos: I can't believe I wore that!"
Anything that really made her cringe simply wasn't included on the album.
After the current Christmas tour (despite demand from promoters in love with her name, it's not going to be an annual thing, she insists), Cole returns to the studio in January to record her next album. After that, she laughs, "Then we'll have to make a Christmas record."
Tickets to Holly Cole with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra are available at the Winspear box office. Call 428-1414 for information.