Melody Gardot

Her career began with a tragic event. In 2003,Melody Gardotwas riding her bike in Philadelphia when the driver of an SUV failed to yield the right of way and fled the scene after the collision. The singer was hospitalized with severe head and spinal injuries and multiple pelvic fractures. During her rehabilitation, music played a central role in her recovery process. She became interested in jazz singing as part of music therapy, learned to play the guitar, and wrote songs. “I started recording because it was a way for me to remember what I had done. I had really serious problems with my short-term memory. By the evening, I couldn’t even remember how the day had started,” Gardot once said in an interview. Two years after the accident, she performed in public again, even though the accident’s aftermath left her with a sensitivity to noise and light that still forces her to wear darkened glasses today. Since then, the singer-songwriter has released several albums—some of which were Grammy-nominated—that, in their diversity—ranging from jazz and blues to French chanson and pop to Latin American music—reflect the artist’s stylistic breadth.