While your eyes might not notice Jill Butler tucked away on the edge of the spotlight, once the music starts, your ears will let you know that she is certainly there. Then, you can understand why Jill Butler is such a contribution to the many performing artists who include her in their band lineups.
“I am lucky. I have had an opportunity to perform with so many musicians of all different genres,” Butler says. “While performing live, in my head, I’m thinking about how I can infuse a little of me in the song we are playing to add that certain spice.” How Butler can do both and put on an A-plus show is mind-boggling. Other musicians have said she has an anointing.
While that may be true, Butler has played piano almost her entire life. Her parents were and still are top-notch entertainers. They made sure she developed the chops needed to have a sustainable career in music. She also has a very eclectic group of musicians who have influenced her style or encouraged her to get where she wants to be. This includes an 18-year-old genius from Bali, pianist Joey Alexander. “When I listen to Joey, I know the depths of his talent and am inspired. It’s not always about the melody…it’s about the voicing, your own special spice that you add, intertwined with the melody of the song,” explains Butler.
Recently, Butler made the decision to step out on her own and created her own R&B/jazz group called Jill Butler and the Joyride Band. “It’s been a joyful journey to perform on many stages all across the country,” she said. “As I’ve started to travel and tour on my own, I’ve been inspired to write lots of music. But it’s also a very vulnerable position to put yourself out there with your own music and hope that you will be well-received.”
Butler now has a body of work to call her own. She has brought together a core of musicians who are not only top-shelf players, but they get Butler’s style and give her room to explore beyond eight bars of music when she feels that need to just stay with a ride that’s filling her head at the moment. Butler says, “I know that I’m growing and evolving because I’m now confident enough to be that vulnerable musician.”
Having just returned from a solo East Coast tour, and performing here with Joyride for the first time this summer, Butler is now ready to begin her West Coast adventure. After that? Butler says, “My goal is to go into the recording studio and make my first Joyride album.”
While Butler considers it a privilege to perform in front of a live audience, each performance, every musician, each venue, and every audience member has given her the energy and the inspiration to flow through her and into the music she has created. “When I think about those women in Louisiana who started before me like Marcia Ball or Carol Fran, these women have a grit about them which allowed them to blaze through a very dense forest,” Butler said. In addition, Butler is inspired by the work of our local legend Marc Broussard. She says, “He can sing three words and I’m already pulled into the soul of his musicianship. This is what I want to add to my own stock, these spices of soul, tenacity, and joy. I want to find spaces in my music where I’ll surprise you.”