For the cover story of Keyboard magazine’s June issue in 2010, Alicia Keys is interviewed about her fourth studio album The Element of Freedom. Here she speaks on some of her musical influences for the recording: 

“At the beginning of making this record [The Element of Freedom], I really wanted to explore some interesting combinations of sound and style. Take the Police—I listen to them a lot. Obviously, they have that kind of ska vibe to them, but then they definitely still have a soulful thing, but then they still have a pop sensibility in terms of where the chord changes and melodies go. So I love that. Second, I was really into Genesis, because I just loved the darkness of it, and the way they experimented with drum machines, but also with live drums, and how they crossed between the two. Some songs start out really dark, like “Mama,” but then the choruses would just open up. I really wanted to understand what that was about. Third, I listened to a lot of Fleetwood Mac. That was because one of my closest friends invited me to see them for her birthday. At first, I was like, 'Sure.' [Rolls her eyes.] Everybody was singing along to every word, and I was the only one who didn’t know the words. I felt a little embarrassed. But it was cool, because it opened me up to a whole other sound, and drum style, and group. Of course I knew their big songs—everybody does. But to go deeper in, like the Tusk album… that was the one that I really went back and zoned on. So, those were the kinds of things I was listening to, and I did start concentrating a lot on the songwriting style, and that influenced the chords I would use, and the way I wanted the choruses to be. It was about just opening up the flow. I knew I wanted to experiment, and plus, I was in my studio collecting tons of keyboards. My engineer, Ann Mincieli, is a collection addict. So, she’d be like, ‘I saw this new…’"

 Photography by Randall Slavin.