Jackie Venson: Evolution of a Legacy

Innovating in a Genre of Revolution

Words by Abby L. Johnson Photos by Eric Morales

Revolutionary blues guitarist and East Austin native Jackie Venson hears the blues every time she listens closely. To some modern music fans, that might seem improbable, but she explains that the “blues are the foundation of all modern American music; it’s inescapable. Anything anybody wants to play started with blues.” 

Jackie is drawn to the blues for this very reason, for its ubiquity and adaptability through the years. “[Blues] has always pushed the boundaries. It’s always been this ever changing conversation,” she adds that she’s trying to continue its footprint in her own music. “Every single one of my songs, no matter what you think it is, I promise you, there’s a blues lick, there’s a blues melody, there’s a blues scale somewhere in there, even if it’s reggae.” Jackie is the new face of Austin blues, keeping its legacy alive by shining a light on its influence even when it’s not obvious to the lay listener. 

With her latest album, Evolution of Joy, Jackie leans into the defining element of the blues: dynamism. Coming from a strong musical background, she only seriously picked up guitar at age 20. “I started the guitar in 2011, and I released my first EP on it in 2012. I am literally learning how to play the instrument for the first time in my life as [my] career is also being built around said instrument,” she admits, with a hint of disbelief. 

In conversation with her first EP, Evolution of Joy brings a level of skill that has yet to be heard from Jackie. She picks up the work from her 2019 release Joy and turns it into something completely new, “redoing the songs from top to bottom.” With 11 years of guitar under her belt, Evolution of Joy is the final culmination of songs that were years in the making, reworked by skilled hands. “I’m really excited for people to hear the [live] show now…I don’t think anyone has ever heard me sound like this,” Jackie smiles.

Perhaps the key ingredient in Jackie’s life that allowed her to build her career from the ground up was growing up around working musicians. Her father, Andrew Venson, made his living as a professional musician in Austin for four decades or so, and Jackie had a front-row seat to a lifestyle and work ethic that few witness. “I got to understand immediately how much [my dad] had to practice. Nobody understands that. Everyone thinks, oh, I’m going to get a guitar, blah, blah, blah. Then they get a guitar. And they’re like, this is hard. Then they give up before they can fully understand just how hard it is.” 

She also had the experience of seeing music as work, not a means to an end for attaining fame. “People think that if you’re not opening for Bon Jovi, or if you’re not Bon Jovi, then you must not have a job. There’s no work unless you’re famous.” This notion is antithetical to what she grew up seeing and believing. “People don’t understand that there is so much work for musicians,” she notes that most just don’t get to see the opportunities that extend beyond mainstream recognition. 

While some music fans might believe the blues are a dying tradition, Jackie argues this is far from the truth. The conundrum of packaging music into generic boxes is that while that can be helpful in critical settings for explaining the lineage, grouping music by genre can be limiting, excluding meaningful contributions to a tradition for eschewing some qualifying characteristic or for innovating as new tools are developed. The blues is a foundational sound, Jackie notes, adding that “for some strange reason, it has been put in a cage. [People say] it wasn’t a shuffle; it didn’t use this chord progression…so it’s not blues anymore. It’s soul, indie, [or] pop. And I’m like, no, it is blues. Because without blues, soul, indie, [and] pop wouldn’t exist.” Jackie insists, with a sly confidence in her work, “If I say it’s blues, it is.”

Have a little Jackie with your morning coffee 
Sign up for Try Hard Coffee’s limited vinyl membership subscription to receive a collectible LP of Jackie’s newest, Evolution of Joy, and a special coffee blend to go with it. Read more about Try Hard here and learn how the beloved local coffee institution supports Austin artists. 

Contact:
jackievenson.com
@jackievenson