Basia Shows Off a Lot of Polish Polish

By DENNIS HUNT

Sept. 25, 1988 12 AM PT

“I’m a little unusual . . . No, no, let’s say I’m different . . . No, no . . . I’m . . . I’m . . . “

Unique .

That’s the word Basia, the Polish-born pop singer many people are raving about, was tap-dancing around. She obviously didn’t want to seem like a braggart.

But there’s really no one around like this effusive, enthusiastic singer--a rapid-fire talker whose hands are constantly in motion.

Can you think of another female Polish pop singer who has a hit American album--like Basia’s “Time and Tide” on Epic Records--jazzy enough to top the jazz charts but also boasting songs with enough mainstream pop feel to score on the pop charts? Can you think of another popular female Polish pop singer?

“I can’t boast about my singing,” insisted Basia, who, in the interests of simplicity, doesn’t use her last name--Trzetrzelwska. “I’m an average singer--OK but not that great.” Modesty was getting her nowhere.

She’s been hailed in jazz circles for her light, silky, glancing voice, which is often reminiscent of Astrud Gilberto’s. On her album, there’s even a song, “Astrud,” that’s a clever homage to Gilberto, right down to the Stan Getz-style licks coursing through the background.

Back in her modesty mode, Basia, 29, who’s appearing Friday at the Wiltern Theatre as part of her current American tour, explained why she’s not a jazz singer.

“Me, a jazz singer?” she asked incredulously, sitting in a restaurant shortly after jetting into town from her London home. “That’s silly. For me jazz singers are Ella (Fitzgerald) and Sarah (Vaughan) and people like that. I’m not in that league. I don’t know if I’m good enough.”

But she really is good enough--perhaps the best of the sophisticated pop singers to come along since Anita Baker emerged two years ago. And with the pioneering efforts of Sade and Baker having widened the pop mainstream to include female singers whose vocals are somewhat jazz-styled, the title single from Basia’s album is a fast-raising No. 33 on the pop Top 40.

Not that she’s had an easy road. Her album, which she co-wrote with her producer and keyboardist Danny White, came out a year ago, and, thanks to the hit single, only recently started to build significant momentum in the pop market.

Though she idolizes the top black female American jazz and soul singers (her “Time and Tide” single was inspired by an Aretha Franklin tune), Basia’s primary influence was a male: Stevie Wonder.

“I used to record his songs at home and sing them all the time,” she recalled. “I tried to sound like him, which was silly because he’s a male. But the way he sings, the way he conveys his feelings, the technical things he does, really influenced me. I feel so close to what he does. If you examine my style very closely, he’s all over it.”

Basia first surfaced in pop circles in the English band Matt Bianco, which was also crucial in shaping her style. Her road to Bianco was roundabout. After answering an ad in the British music journal Melody Maker, she joined a jazz-funk band called Bronze, which included White. Bronze bombed, but White included her in his next venture, Matt Bianco, a trio featuring Matt Riley.

Though the band’s first album did well in Europe, she wasn’t happy in the group. “I was an afterthought when they formed it,” she recalled, seething slightly. “I became part of the band by doing the demos (demonstration recordings). When record companies heard the tapes, they said I should be part of the band. But I didn’t write for the band, even though I wanted to. I wasn’t a major part of the creative process. All I had to do was arrange my backing vocals. I was really bored with the group.”

Basia bailed out of Bianco in early 1986, after just one album, and White went with her. The Bianco experience, she conceded, wasn’t all bad: “It gave me confidence in my singing. When I first came to England, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do and I didn’t have much confidence. But working in that band gave me a chance to explore some styles. Also, I learned the music business and how to deal with it. That may have been the most valuable lesson of all.”

Basia, who started out singing in Polish, was a capable enough singer as a teen-ager to make an album with an all-female group back in the ‘70s. “My mother says they play it on the radio in Poland now,” she said, shuddering at the memory of what she now considers an amateurish effort. “I wish they wouldn’t.”

She sang in Polish well enough to get a booking at a Polish-American club in Chicago in late 1979. That changed her life. She learned English, expanded her musical horizons and, spurred by a romance with a British musician, eventually relocated in London.

Though she’s become a star performer in Europe and America in the past few years, and has lived in London for the last seven years, she hasn’t forgotten Poland. Now a duel citizen of England and Poland, she goes home about twice a year.

“They think I’m a star,” she said, chuckling. “I tell them I’m not a big thing just yet. They hear my album on the radio and see the videos on TV but they can’t buy the album because it’s not sold in Poland. There’s no CBS Records there.”

Basia, from a well-to-do family in the ice cream business, is fiercely loyal to Poland and is constantly appalled at how ignorant foreigners are about her country.

“I get asked the most stupid questions,” she said. “People have asked me: ‘How did you escape; how did you manage to get out?’ They think the country is a prison. They even ask if kids can play and sing music freely. Some people think that’s not allowed by the government. How ridiculous!

“I tell people we can go and come as we please. When I wanted to go to Chicago to work it was no problem. And people do think Polish people are stupid. No, we don’t swing from trees.”

Recalling those questions, she started fuming all over again. “I used to be so mad when people said those things that I’d have tears in my eyes. When I try to explain to people they’re wrong, some don’t believe me. But I’ve learned to laugh about it. I can’t get upset about it any more.”

Then the touchy question of her politics crept into the conversation. “People assume I’m a Communist since I come from a Communist country,” she said. “If you don’t live there, they assume you’re against it. So they think I’m against Communism. But they may still think I’m a Communist.”

Throwing up her hands in a gesture of exasperation, she continued: “I have my own world view. I’m a pacifist at heart. I wish people didn’t care what I was.”

But the bottom line, she said emphatically, is this: “I’m a singer. Forget my politics, whatever they are. Accept me as a singer. That’s all I ask.”