Live Music: Jonivan Jones

“We all have our path and best laid plans in life and I have been on mine as far as music goes for awhile now. Very early in my life I picked up a used and very non-functional guitar and started learning to play and writing little bits of songs. I guess to be plainly honest about myself ~ I am a songwriter originally from Arkansas, and I started re-creating and recording melodies on an old 4 track tape recorder purchased for 40$ while living in Belle Chasse, LA sometime in 2003 or 2004 (it gets a little fuzzy sometimes). So later around 2006 while living an working in Corpus Christi, TX~ I started to make music a live experience anyway and anywhere I could.

I lived a traveling lifestyle for work from the age of 19, which I used to help devote the years to experimenting with the different sounds and styles encountered along the way. So as I traveled every few years for my occupation I searched out whatever live music scene I could to hopefully connect with and make friends to share in that process. Some locales are easier than others to do this with and I was extremely lucky to have found a few places in the mainland U.S. where fellow musicians and songwriters and performers welcomed me. I do my best to keep up with them all.

South Pacific travels, Twang and Psychedelic sounds learned and performed live in South Texas to early years of learning old Folk, Blues and Cowboy campfire style songs in Arkansas helped this cook over into its rough-hewn jangly form. The musical style can also be characterized by its ragged lilts and reverence to Delta & Folk Blues. The Delta, Folk and Country Blues will always be a deeply loved and revered art form to me, and that’s probably because I spent much of my early years studying songs and any literature about that artform that I could. The music of the Delta and it’s Stories and Human struggles helped me get through some tough times in my early life and taught me to embrace some hardships that we all face.

The live performances now are a stirred-up framework of genres, creating a unique but familiar sound. Years of songwriting and random live shows amassed a catalog of unique music that is often a nod to life’s pact with the wild. I believe in writing and making music that takes on the task of embracing the blues, lifting up the forgotten or disenfranchised and finding some salvaged joy in us all.

I’m grateful to make music for folks when I can and to maybe share a smile and be released from some hardships through it. See ya out there somewhere one day I hope :)”