Dianne Reeves performs with Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra in holiday concert at Orchestra Hall

For jazz singer Dianne Reeves, Christmas music has always been about family.

"I grew up in a multigenerational house," Reeves said recently from her Denver home. "We'd have family gatherings and my uncle, [famed jazz and classical musician] Charles Burrell, would bring all the records. And then he'd play bass and my great-aunt would play piano, and we would sing and dance all night."

It proved a nurturing environment for Reeves, who is regarded as one of her genre's great singers. The only five-time winner of the best jazz vocal album Grammy, Reeves is known as a brilliant improviser and interpreter of everything from the Great American Songbook to Fleetwood Mac and Bob Marley.

Now she's coming to the Twin Cities with a different branch of her family. That's how she views the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra that she'll join for a Big Band Holidays concert at Minneapolis' Orchestra Hall on Wednesday.

"I toured with them a long time ago, and it's a lot of fun," Reeves said. "So this is like coming home. A lot of times, when they would come to Denver, I'd sit in with them. And I'd cook for the entire band. So, we're like family. This is something we've been talking about for a long time, and now it's finally able to happen."

Local musicians praised Reeves.

"Her voice is unmatched," said Jearlyn Steele, a singer and WCCO radio host best known for her work with the Steeles. "She doesn't seem to try and sound like anyone other than Ella Fitzgerald, and that is great indeed. And she radiates beauty from the inside and out."

"Like Nancy Wilson, she's a song stylist," said another local jazz singer and radio host, Patty Peterson.

Reeves enjoys the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra holiday concerts.

"I've known all these gentlemen for years and, of course, worked with Wynton," she said, referring to the band's leader, Wynton Marsalis, who won't be performing in Minneapolis.

"I've seen some of their Christmas programs, and they're really amazing," Reeves said. "There are a lot of different arrangers in the band, and I love that they give an opportunity to all of them to write."

Reeves also is a huge fan of Nat King Cole's Christmas music.

"The thing that I always loved about him was you could hear every word he said," she explained. "He made you see pictures, and he took his time, the way he phrased."

Another of her holiday favorites is "Handel's Messiah: A Soulful Celebration."

"I'm on that, and I remember putting it together and the imagination that it took to make those songs sound like they do," she said.

Christmas music brings forth a special joy at any time of year, Reeves said, and she fondly recalled working on her 2004 album, "Christmas Time Is Here."

"It was in the middle of July, but we kind of draped the studio up so it looked like Christmas," she said. "And we had little things to remind us. It just brought the spirit in."

A couple of weeks later, she was driving down the street with her car windows down, listening to mixes from that album.

"This guy looks over to me and says, 'Are you listening to Christmas music?' And I said, 'Yeah.' He said, 'Right on! That's the best thing right now!' He was so excited," Reeves said.

"I just think [Christmas] music overall, whether it's religious or not, calls to mind a time when people come together and have fellowship with one another."

The Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Dianne Reeves

What: Big Band Holidays.

When: 7:30 p.m. Wed.

Where: Orchestra Hall, 1111 Nicollet Mall, Mpls.

Tickets: $52-$112, available at 612-371-5656 or minnesotaorchestra.org

Rob Hubbard is a Twin Cities classical music writer. Reach him at wordhub@yahoo.com.