The Polish-born Barbara Trzetrzelewska, known professionally as Basia, took the jazz-pop world by storm in the late 1980s, back when the elder George Bush was President. But she didn't exactly come out of nowhere. She'd been living in the West - first in Chicago, then in London - for a decade and trying to make it after having paid her dues in Poland, where she sang for a couple of bands in the seventies.
Her first album, Time and Tide, from 1987, was a respectable hit, reaching number 36 on the Billboard album chart and number one on that magazine's contemporary-jazz chart. It was 1989's London Warsaw New York, though, that broke her through in a big way, topping the Billboard contemporary-jazz chart like its predecessor but also reaching number 20 on the Billboard Top Two Hundred. The Latin-tinged "Baby You're Mine" and her cover of Aretha Franklin's "Until You Come Back to Me (That's What I'm Gonna Do)" were all over contemporary-jazz radio in 1989 and 1990.
After a third LP, 1994's The Sweetest Illusion, though, Basia took a long break from recording, but her follow-up, It's That Girl Again, showed that her fans still loved her when it came out in 2009. The critically acclaimed LP was a big success on the charts, reaching number five on the Billboard contemporary-jazz chart in American and going platinum in Poland, a first for her in her homeland. Needless to say, the concert tour that followed was also a success.
Since then, Basia has mostly relied on special editions of her earlier work, but she remains active in contemporary jazz.
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