THE roots of Claire Martin's chamber-jazz adventure – "chazz" for short – can be traced to her daughter, Amelia.

"She was having cello lessons," recalls the York-bound jazz singer. " I say 'was' because she's given it up to be an international basketball player, and she's now playing for Sussex county basketball team.

"But at the time, she was showing real promise, so she had to choose. Sport? Money, honey! Music? Anguish! Anyway, everybody loves cello and so I went to see the Montpellier Cello Quartet in a local church and I was mesmerised. Four cellos! It was like four pints of Guinness in a line – and I thought to myself, 'my voice would go well with them'."

Amelia's cello teacher, Joe Giddey, happened to be one of the members of the Brighton quartet, so Claire struck while the iron was steaming. "I said, 'I'd love to sing with your four cellos' and Joe said 'yes. as we both thought it would be unusual to have a jazz singer performing with chamber musicians. 'Chazz', as I call it."

Set in motion in 2012, the project combines Claire's love of the Great American Songbook and popular classics with new arrangements especially commissioned from such composers as Mark Anthony Turnage, Geoffrey Keezer and the late Sir Richard Rodney Bennett, who arranged Kurt Weill's My Ship.

The results can be heard at the National Centre for Early Music in York on Sunday night, where a fresh sonic perspective will be brought to such songs as Thelonious Monk's Round Midnight and Lennon and McCartney's She's Leaving Home, the latter with backing vocals by all four cellists.

"We got together two and a half years ago and it took about a year to prepare for performances, when we then did The Stables in Wavendon, a couple of jazz festivals, jazz clubs and theatres," recalls Claire. "To promote it, we just said, 'Here's where jazz meets chamber music, as Claire Martin does one of her things'."

Claire Martin OBE, 47, has done plenty of "things", from presenting BBC Radio 3's Jazz Line-Up to myriad musical explorations.

"I've done drum and bass accompaniment; guitar; saxophone; trombone; Stephane Grappelli jazz violin music with Martin Taylor...but not country music yet, though there's time," she says.

The "chazz" fusion does not incorporate classical music, although the Montpellier Cello Quartet will perform instrumental pieces, not least "some lovely tangos", on Sunday night to complement works by Cole Porter, George Gershwin, Joni Mitchell'sTwo Grey Rooms and k.d. lang's (CORRECT) Still Thrives This Love.

Claire and the quartet went into the studio in January after signing a deal with Linn Records to record an album entitled Time And Place, with all the songs having one theme or the other or sometimes both. Released in September, with guest piano by Joe Stilgoe, it features the likes of The Man Who Sold The World, Catch Me If You Can, My Man's Gone Now, Lost For Words and Featherfall, as well as the aforementioned Weill, Beatles and Monk numbers.

Sunday's concert will be the last night of the tour.

"This will be the last chance to see us, apart from a one-off gig on Easter Monday at a lovely church," says Claire. "So, this is basically it, because we've done about 20 gigs on the road over the two years and that's all you can do in this capacity. It's a real one-hit wonder."

Claire promises champagne at the tour's finale this weekend before she turns her attention to her next collaboration.

"I have something very different lined up. Me and Ray Gelato, the king of swing, an old, old friend of mine. We'll be doing classic duets of the Forties and Fifties, playing shows next year with the Dave Newton Trio in show called A Swingin' Affair," she says.

"Ray's like the Robert DeNiro of the sax, and it'll be really nice to share the stage up front with him, and Dave Newton's such a swinging pianist too."

Claire Martin and the Montpellier Cello Quartet, National Centre for Early Music, York, Sunday, 7.30pm; box office, 01904 658338 or at ncem.co.uk

A Swingin' Affair with Claire Martin, Ray Gelato and Dave Newton Trio, King's Hall, Ilkley, March 12 2015, 7.30pm; 01274 432000 or bradford-theatres.co.uk