How Drake sampled 82-year-old cockney jazz singer for hit song

When jazz vocalist Norma Winstone received an email seeking permission to sample her song “The Tunnel”, she was stunned. Mostly because the track had been released 46 years ago, by a band she was no longer a member of.

She had no idea who the artist (some rapper called Drake) was. But her son did.

“He said, ‘What?! Mum, he’s mega!’” Winstone, 82, told Radio 4’s Today programme.

“I don’t really listen to rap, because I can’t always understand what they’re saying, and it’s very important to me [that] words should be understood,” she responded, when asked if she’d ever heard of the Canadian artist.

Drake samples “The Tunnel”, from jazz trio Azimuth’s self-titled 1977 album, on “IDGAF”, a single from his latest album For All the Dogs.

It’s one of the most popular songs on the record, with over 120 million streams on Spotify. And its intro, thanks to Winstone, is certainly striking: around a minute of bloopy synths, bright plinks of piano (Winstone’s then-husband, John Taylor), cosmic noodling trumpet (Kenny Wheeler), and her enchanting, ethereal voice narrating a journey through space.

“Travelling forever in the dark,” she croons. “Darkness into blackness.”

Drake samples Kent-based jazz vocalist Norma Winstone on his new album (Getty)

Winstone was born to a working class family in Bow, east London, and is now based in Deal, Kent. Her parents adored music and saved up so she could take piano lessons; she was introduced to the London jazz scene by a colleague who heard her singing in the office.

She wrote the lyrics and improvised the melody over the instrumentation for “The Tunnel”.

“There was a lot of improvisation,” she told the Today programme.

She has no idea how Drake came across “The Tunnel” among the (approximately) 34 studio and live albums she’s appeared on in a career spanning more than 50 years.

In an interview with the Guardian, she noted she is acquainted with British producer Sam Shepherd (Floating Points) through her son, Leo, drummer for electronic band Hot Chip.

“He once mentioned that his favourite album was an obscure one: Kenny Wheeler’s Music for Large and Small Ensembles. Leo replied: ‘My mum and dad are on that.’”

She’s since listened to Drake’s track, featuring fellow rapper Yeat, and while she isn’t exactly a fan, she feels the sentiment fits with what she and her bandmates were trying to do.

“It’s strange because he’s protesting,” she said. “I thought, well, actually that’s how we felt when we recorded our music, because it was hardly what people were waiting for at the time. I don’t think they were really ready for it.”

She was pleased that Drake didn’t mess too much with the original sample: “All I can say is I’m grateful to Drake for bringing us to the attention of a wider public,” she said. “What they’re going to make of it… I don’t know!”