Bio b. 1961, Guildford, Surrey, England. Wardell and her family emigrated to Australia in 1973. She spent her fromative years there and in due time she completed a four-year performance course in jazz and improvised music at Adelaide University. She began singing professionally and appeared at jazz festivals with Richie Cole and with James Morrison and Don Burrows. In 1989 she returned to the UK where she studied at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. While there she was heard by Norma Winstone who declared, ‘She sings without affectation, and with clarity of voice, which I love.’ Since the early 90s Wardell has worked extensively in the UK, Europe and has more recently performed in USA. Her debut album, @Why Do You Cry? in 1995, was an exceptional set of duets with pianist Liam Noble. @Straight Ahead 1998 Until The stars Fade 2001 @Noted 2006 Kinda Blue 2008 @The Road 2013 @Stars duo a 2023 A rich, expressive and agile voice allows Wardell to excel not only with the great ballad standards, which she sings with remarkable expressiveness, but also with bop classics. The guru of contemporary jazz singers, Mark Murphy, has extolled the quality of her bop singing, stating that it is ‘always so clear and accurate in its linearism’. Wardell also makes considerable use of scat singing in her programming and while many young singers launch into scat with only a faint notion of its strengths and limitations, she is an exceptionally gifted user of the form.