Second Cup Cafe: Madeleine Peyroux

(CBS)  She has been called the best-selling jazz vocalist of the decade.

Madeleine Peyroux, best known to put her spin on songs by legendary artists like Billie Holiday and Bob Dylan, is stepping out of the shadows to prove her own material deserves to shine in the spotlight.

Peyroux exits her comfort zone with her new album, "Bare Bones," in which she co-wrote all 11 songs.

"Bare Bones" has found a solid spot on Billboard's Top 20 Jazz albums for 19 weeks and counting.

Peyroux stopped by the "The Early Show Saturday Edition"'s "Second Cup Cafe" to sing "Instead" and "I Must Be Saved" off of "Bare Bones."

"I Must Be Saved," which was written entirely by Peyroux, strikes a chord with the singer because it reflects some important life lessons she learned along the way.

She drew inspiration for the song after reading, "When Things Fall Apart: Heartfelt Advice for Difficult Times," a book by Buddhist nun Pema Chodron. In the book, Chondron writes "Can't we just return to the bare bones?"

After the death of her father, Peyroux endured different stages of grief, but eventually came to terms with her feelings; it even changed her outlook on life.

"In a lot of ways, this record is my attempt at expressing a philosophy of life," Peyroux said on her official Web site. "That's why I decided to call it 'Bare Bones' because most of these songs are a way of excavating the essence of what I think matters, so in that sense it's very personal, but the question of looking at things and saying, 'This isn't important after all,' is part of that process as well.

"Once you do get to the point where you've discovered that there are some things that are not just important but vitally important, that's a positive discovery - a beautiful, pot-of-gold revelation."

[sinibaldi1]

Some steps in the wind...

I hear, in
the strength
that always
remains, the
delicate rhymes
of a deep
sensibility, and
even a pleasure
where the
sun-rise appears...

Francesco Sinibaldi