Jazz singer Laufey reimagines Miles Davis classic 'Blue in Green' for a new generation

Icelandic-Chinese jazz singer-songwriter Laufey says her mission is simple: get young people to fall in love with jazz.

"It's literally all I care about as an artist — having people my age or even younger care about jazz music and classical music," the 25-year-old told Reuters.

That passion led Laufey to reimagine "Blue in Green," the iconic composition by jazz legend Miles Davis, as part of celebrations marking the centennial of the trumpeter and composer, who was born in May 1926 and died in 1991. Laufey debuted her version live during a Twitch stream event in Manhattan Beach, California, last week.

Widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in jazz history, Black American musician Miles Davis spent nearly five decades at the forefront of the genre's major stylistic transformations.

Debuting on Miles Davis' 1959 album "Kind of Blue," "Blue in Green" endures as a jazz staple.

"When I was a kid, I would listen to Miles Davis and felt like no one around me understood it or cared," Laufey said ahead of the performance. "Then I realized they just hadn't been exposed to it — or exposed to it in a way that felt like it was theirs."

For Laufey, reworking "Blue in Green" became a way to bridge that gap. She added lyrics to the instrumental track, a process she compared to solving a puzzle.

After wrestling with the idea for some time, inspiration struck quickly. "When it all clicked, it felt like the clouds clearing and the sun coming out," she said, adding that the lyrics came together in about 20 minutes.

Already a classically trained cellist, Laufey - whose full name is Laufey Lín Bing Jónsdóttir - began building an audience during the COVID-19 lockdown by posting TikTok videos that introduced jazz music to younger listeners. The approach helped propel her career beyond social media.

Since then, she has released three albums and won two Grammy Awards for best traditional pop vocal album, in 2024 and 2026. In 2025, she brought jazz to the Coachella stage, performing alongside the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

-Reporting by Rollo Ross and Danielle Broadway, Editing by Rosalba O'Brien/Reuters