Diana Krall has finally come into her own

Diana Krall is happy.

Anyone who has seen the diffident, 42-year-old jazz diva in concert, who sometimes gives the impression she would like to shrink from the stage, knows this is wonderful news.

Krall has always had a quick wit, but her curt stage manner and refusal to play the kittenish role projected in her sexy publicity photos have led reviewers and fans to describe her as cold and remote, even when the music itself has been hot and immediate.

Turns out it was all just nervousness and insecurity, she reported in an interview earlier this summer with the Detroit Free Press. The singer said she has finally come into her own "as a woman and an artist."

Motherhood seems to have done the trick for the blond Canadian, who grew up in Nanaimo, B.C., and now divides her time between Vancouver and New York.

Krall's appearance at Chateau Ste. Michelle on Saturday and Sunday comes at the midpoint of her first tour since giving birth to twins last December. The father, of course, is Krall's rock-star husband, Elvis Costello, whom she married in 2003. The boys — Frank and Dexter (fraternal, not identical twins) — are with her on tour. (Costello is not.)

From the moment the tour started — in June, in Oakland — reviewers were struck by Krall's relaxed new mood. When a customer in Oakland requested "Over the Rainbow," Krall apparently laughed, saying, "I don't have the range," then inserted quotes from "The Wizard of Oz" into her next solo.

In Connecticut, she joked about trying to lose her pregnancy weight, then sang a snippet of the children's song "The Wheels on the Bus."

Krall's most recent album, "From This Moment On," which spent nine weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard jazz charts and remains at No. 5, reflects her sunny mood. Inspired by "Sinatra at the Sands" and featuring the big-band arrangements of bassist John Clayton (who plays with Krall), it features some sweetly carefree moments.

On the Irving Berlin classic "Isn't This a Lovely Day," taken slower than Fred Astaire debuted it in the film "Top Hat," you really feel the singer has suddenly opened her eyes to just how ... well, lovely, the world can be. "Day In Day Out," delivered with punchy Sinatra swing, is an ode to sheer joy.

Not that the album is all peaches and cream. Krall's edition of Antonio Carlos Jobim's "How Insensitive," the best track, is an intimate heartbreaker, her "Little Girl Blue" a sad dream.

But Krall has always had more emotional range than she's been given credit for. With deceptively simple mastery, her quicksilver changes of timbre, midphrase, can turn on a dime from a whispering nuzzle to a nakedly plain staccato to a smooth swoop up to meet the band.

Krall's initially nostalgic vision of jazz played a part in critics' underestimation of her. The first record to get much attention, 1996's "All For You," was an homage to the light-hearted pop/jazz of Nat Cole (a mode you can still hear on "Exactly Like You," on the new album). And her commercial breakthrough, three years later, the platinum-selling "When I Look Into Your Eyes," featured lushly orchestrated charts by Johnny Mandel that evoked a bygone era, as well.

Interestingly, after her mother died and she married Costello, Krall went on a songwriting binge that was more personal and stylistically up-to-date for the album "The Girl in the Other Room" — but many fans considered it a betrayal.

Those fans will no doubt be happy with her current show, which draws from her whole recorded career. Her next album, due in September, does, too. It's her first "best of" retrospective.

Krall still opens her show with the classic "I Love Being Here With You," a signature song for Peggy Lee as well as Seattle's Ernestine Anderson, whom Krall adores.

But Krall also sings old favorites, like "Frim Fram Sauce" and "If I Had You," from the Cole material; the sassy Dave Frishberg classic (by way of Blossom Dearie), "Peel Me a Grape"; Bob Dorough's "Devil May Care"; and Joni Mitchell's "A Case of You," which Krall absolutely nailed on her sensational "Live From Paris" DVD.

Krall, of course, doesn't just sing; she plays piano as part of a superb quartet: Clayton, bass; Jeff Hamilton, drums; and Anthony Wilson, guitar.

Though she would be the first to say she is merely an adequate soloist, Krall has sometimes sounded as if she were out to prove something in concert, taking longish solos and trying to play beyond her means. Apparently even that insecurity has vanished — a good thing, because Krall's swinging interactivity as an ensemble player is her real strength, and it buoys her singing.

At the Umbria Jazz Festival last summer, a hot, pregnant and grouchy Krall was happy to give Hamilton a big solo window, and he delighted the crowd with superb brushwork.

This weekend's shows at Ste. Michelle promise all of that and more, with a happy, relaxed joking mom at the piano, finally at home with herself and all of her material.

Paul de Barros: 206-464-3247 or pdebarros@seattletimes.com