Diane Birch, a globetrotting preacher's daughter from Michigan looks set to find an army of converts with her stunning debut album, 'Bible Belt.' Braving the volcanic ash to fly to the UK, the 27-year-old singer/songwriter tells Black Sheep's Charles Waring the story behind her album and reveals how she came to jam with Prince.

Tall, willowy and with a penchant for stylish hats, long-haired singer and pianist, Diane Birch, was raised on a strict diet of classical music by her parents in her formative years but confessed she was something of a rebel when she reached her teens. "I got into this whole Goth scene," she says, "and I started listening to a lot of Goth bands – like The Cure, Bauhaus, Sisters of Mercy and stuff like that. I was really into Depeche Mode and Joy Division." That's hard to imagine given the musical character of Birch's assured debut, which blends easy-on-the-ear retro-styled singer/songwriter pop (think Laura Nyro meets Phoebe Snow) with old school soul and gospel flavours.

It took a long time for Birch – who travelled all over the world with her family as a youngster and lived in Zimbabwe, South Africa and Australia - to discover her own sound. It was while she was living in London in 2006 that she stumbled upon a style that suited her, although she didn't recognise it as first. "I had a song called 'Photograph' I'd made just for fun," recalls the singer. "I didn't even really take it seriously. I wrote it almost as a joke. Somebody heard it and said 'oh that song is so cool.' And I said: 'really? It's so corny; that's not cool.' They went 'no, no, actually that is cool.'"

For Birch, the realisation was a revelation: "In London I started realising that the traditional American style of pop songwriting really came naturally for me. So finally I just had to embrace that side of myself. This is the kind of stuff I write, I told myself, and said why don't you just go with it? I had to stop trying to be something that I wasn't and just finally admitted that this is what I am and this is what comes naturally. That's when it all started coming together. I just started to be honest with myself and it was a really liberating thing."

In London, Birch found a manager and then signed a publishing deal with EMI. The company sent her on a trip to Miami to hone her craft, where she met soul veteran Betty Wright. Birch's hooking up with Wright led to her meeting producer, Steve Greenberg. "I ended up playing over the phone for him and the next day I was on a plane to New York." Impressed by Birch's nascent talent, Greenberg - the boss of S-Curve, a Virgin/EMI imprint - signed the young tunesmith to his label and immediately set about putting her debut album together with Betty Wright and Mike Mangini in the producers' chairs. The supporting musicians included George Porter – bassist with the legendary New Orleans funk group, The Meters – The Roots' Adam Blackstone, former Tower Of Power sax maestro, Lenny Pickett, and Lenny Kravitz's drummer, Cindy Blackman. "More than anything I think they were just really inspiring," says Birch reflecting on the time she spent in the company of those stellar musicians. "It was an incredible learning experience working with musicians on that level. I was just so honoured that musicians of that calibre would play on my record. I walked in the studio one day and there was a 35 piece string orchestra playing on a couple of songs. I was like 'this is unbelievable' and was moved to tears. Most first artists making their first record don't make records this way you know, and in that respect I just consider myself so fortunate. It's undoubtedly one of the most rewarding things I've ever been able to complete in my life."

The album's title alludes to Birch's background as the daughter of a Christian missionary. "It's a journal of my life in a way and my experiences," explains Birch. "It was very influenced by my upbringing. I travelled around a lot as a kid. My father was a preacher and it's about the trials and tribulations of finding oneself and trying to figure your dream."

Interestingly, prior to getting her record deal, back in 2006 when she was living in LA, Birch had a remarkable one-off encounter with Prince. "He had seen me play piano at a hotel that I was playing at in Los Angeles," recollects the singer. "His security people had gotten my phone number and a couple of weeks later I got a phone call from somebody and she said Prince was wondering if I would be interested in going over to his house and jamming or just playing some music. It was like a dream. I was very confused at first but a few hours later I was in his house. He was great. He was very polite and very kind and he even got me a bottle of water. I was just in awe. I was like 'Oh, my God, I have to take this moment in: Prince is going to get me a bottle of water. This is too much!' He asked me to play some songs and at the time I hadn't really figured out my sound. I was still all over the place and my songs kind of sucked, I think, in all honesty. I was so nervous and then when I'd finished, he said to me 'oh, yeah, I heard that one on your My Space page.' I though: 'Oh my God, Prince was on my My Space page!'"

Fast-forward to 2010 and although Diane Birch has only completed her first album, she is already thinking ahead to the future. "There are a lot of colours that are inside of me that you don't see on this record," she says. "I'm just going to explore other areas of myself and just hopefully show the world other aspects of what I can do. And it will still be very much me. There's always going to be that common thread of my sound and my style. But there's a lot more things I'd like to experiment with. I'd love to do collaborations with different people; anyone from Jay-Z to David Axelrod, the arranger. I've always wanted to do something with him. I'd also like to play keys on a Snoop Dogg track and I'd like to make some disco tracks with some current interesting DJs. There are just a lot of things I'd love to do as side projects that don't necessarily have to be all-encompassing like a record. There are so many talented people out there and I just think this record will hopefully bring some of them closer to me in a way."

'Bible Belt' is out via S-Curve/Virgin on May 10th. See Diane Birch live at the Water Rats in London on Thursday May 6th.