Keys to the future: Alicia plans long career in music
By ALAN SCULLEY
Get Out

In her short career, singer/songwriter Alicia Keys has seen firsthand how creating an image is sometimes as important as the music she creates.

“I have to say that’s something I deal with every day,” she says. “And it’s really important for me to keep integrity for what I do. My music is — I’m very, very, very passionate about it, and oftentimes, things do become less about the music and more about the image or more about kind of, I don’t know, a certain political game, shall we say. Obviously that is something that comes with the territory, but I think it’s a choice that one makes, and I choose to put my music first and to have a certain integrity that goes along with what I do, and it’s something that challenges me constantly, but I think that’s what life is about.”

Her two CDs — “Songs in A Minor” and “The Diary of Alicia Keys” — have given Keys the musical credibility that many young artists have a hard time establishing. The second disc features originals such as “Karma,” “Dragon Days” and “Wake Up,” on which Keys deftly blends her love of vintage soul/R&B and pop with a modern rhythmic sensibility that draws strongly from hip-hop and jazz.

Ballads such as “If I Ain’t Got You,” “You Don’t Know My Name” and “Diary,” scale back on the rhythms and let Keys’ piano playing and vocals carry the songs. The timeless sound she crafts on “The Diary of Alicia Keys” is very much in character with the musical identity she established on “Songs in A Minor,” and the stylistic consistency between the CDs is no accident.

“I have to say that honestly my theory is it’s not broke, so don’t fix it,” Keys says. “Another theory, when I do my music — my music is very, it’s not contrived. I don’t sit there and I don’t think about how am I going to put this together that’s going to make it (acceptable).”

Keys was born 24 years ago as Alicia Augello Cook to mixed-race parents and grew up in New York City. She landed a deal with Columbia Records at age 16, but that deal soured when the label went through a management shake-up and Keys had creative differences with the new regime. Clive Davis, then president of the new label, J Records, stepped in and negotiated a deal that brought Keys, who had nearly finished “Songs in A Minor” while on Columbia, to his label. Her debut became a blockbuster success, selling more than 10 million copies worldwide, producing a massive hit in “Fallin’ ” and netting five Grammys.

“The Diary of Alicia Keys” went straight to No. 1 on Billboard magazine’s album chart when it was released in December 2003 and has since sold more than 3 million copies. Last month, it won the Grammy for best R&B album and also earned Grammys for female R&B performance for “If I Ain’t Got You” and R&B song for “You Don’t Know My Name.” While a spring tour behind “The Diary of Alicia Keys” and solidifying her audience may be among Keys’ immediate tasks, in the long run, she has other ambitious goals, including starting her own record label.

“Being able to have a brainchild of yours come into existence is very fulfilling, and it’s also very powerful,” Keys says. “There’s a certain power that you hold, where you are not only the president, you’re not just in front of the scenes, you’re behind them and you’re the one with the creative ideas kind of pulling it all together. That’s something that I definitely aspire to do.”

Such an endeavor would also allow Keys to set an example for others — particularly women — who want to be involved in the music business. “I have different conversations with different kids and stuff,” she says. “I know how the music world can appear very glamorous and that kind of thing. And a lot of time they tell me ‘I want to be a rapper. I want to be a singer,’ whatever. But sometimes we talk and I just say there’s so much more that happens behind that rapper or that singer that you can be a part of, that honestly gets you farther than that rapper or that singer will ever reach.”

Alicia Keys
With: John Legend
When: 8 p.m. Friday
Where: Dodge Theatre, 400 W. Washington St., Phoenix
How much: $48-$78
Info: