Jenny Reynolds

Artist Information

Biography

Jenny Reynolds
**CURRENTLY RECORDING (2013) new CD at Congress House Studio in Austin, TX**
Formal Showcaser SXSW 2008
Best New Local Act – Austin Chronicle 2005 Critics Poll
Featured on ABC, CBS and NBC television

Jenny Reynolds is suspicious of all things fancy. If it shines too much, it hasn’t had any pain, it hasn’t lived, and it doesn’t know the grime of everyday life.
“For me,” says the Boston native, “songwriting is like digging in the dirt to find the debris that may or may not come out on its own. And I like being in the trenches.”

Following her mission statement of “Work hard, be nice, keep moving,” Reynolds has had significant accomplishments in music as an independent artist. An Official Showcaser at SXSW in 2008, Reynolds moved to Austin in 2003 and was named “Best New Local Act” in the Austin Chronicle’s 2005 Critics Poll. Since arriving in Texas, Reynolds has played The Old Settlers Festival and the Kerrville Folk Festival, The Cactus Café, and Threadgills World Headquarters. She has shared stages with Jimmy LaFave, Bruce Robison, Catie Curtis, Guy Forsyth, Sara Hickman, Shelley King, Michael Fracasso, Seth Walker, and Grammy Winner Terri Hendrix. When returning to her native New England, she has played Club Passim, Fox Run House Concerts, and the Circle of Friends Coffeehouse.

Reynolds latest CD, Next To You, features Ruthie Foster, Ian McLagan, Warren Hood, and Scrappy Jud Newcomb. It is her third national release. Reynolds’ music is an amalgam of Kathleen Edwards, Beth Orton and Gillian Welch. Next To You combines rockers and ballads, stories and rants, and precisely one hoot. Her music has been featured on major network television and independent film, including ABC’s All My Children and CBS’ The District. She is also the founder and producer of Austin's Williams Nite: an Annual Tribute to the Music of Hank and Lucinda Williams, an annual show that ran for five years.

Wishing to share the stage, Reynolds plays many acoustic duo gigs in Texas with Scrappy Jud Newcomb (Ian McLagan & the Bump Band, The Resentments) who also co-produced Next To You. She plays with stringed instrumentalist extraordinaire Steve Sadler when returning to New England. Full band gigs are rootsy and have included Rob Hooper on percussion. She is also an accomplished solo performer.

A trained educator, Reynolds also teaches guitar independently and with the National Guitar Workshop, and has written instructional articles for Acoustic Guitar Magazine. She is currently recording a new CD tentatively titled "Any Kind of Angel" with Mark Hallman (Eliza Gilkyson, Ani diFranco) at Congress House Studio in Austin in 2013.

Instrumentation

Scrappy Jud Newcomb - Elec/Acous.Guitar
Rob Hooper - Backing Vocals., Drums ;Percussion

Discography

**CURRENTLY RECORDING new CD in 2013**
Next To You (February 2008);
Bet on the Wind (national release 2003); Bare (Acoustic EP, 2000); Colored in Poetry (1998); The Respond CD (Signature Sounds, 1998).

Official Website

http://www.jennyreynolds.com

Audio

• Any Kind of Angel (Jenny Reynolds)
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• Dance for Me
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Lyrics

• Any Kind of Angel
• Dance for Me

Video

Photo Gallery

Press

• Texas Music 'Next To You' Review [+ Show ]
  

  Boston’s loss Austin’s gain in Jenny Reynolds, who transcends the usual and all-too-common singer-...Boston’s loss Austin’s gain in Jenny Reynolds, who transcends the usual
  and all-too-common singer-songwriter tropes to create melodically and
  lyrically full-blooded musical short stories and sing them with a
  perfectly balanced mix of authority and sensitivity. Produced with
  exquisite intelligence and imagination by Scrappy Jud Newcomb and Mark
  Addison, Next to You demonstrates her considerable mettle as a
  storyteller on the cinematic “One Red Light Town” and vocalist by
  interweaving her highly human instrument with Ruthie Foster on “Ain’t No
  Reason.” Then for good measure Reynolds finds new dimensions in the
  Lennon/McCartney classic “I’m Looking Through You.” Aspiring troubadours
  migrating to Austin is often like coal to Newcastle, but Reynolds is a
  welcome new gem. — Rob Patterson Texas Music
  

• Vintage Guitar 'Next To You' Review [+ Show ]
  

  [Next To You] is the type of CD that will have you getting out of bed in the middle of the night bec...[Next To You] is the type of CD that will have you getting out of bed in the middle of the night because you have to hear a particular song (or the whole album) right now.
  
  [This is the complete review]
  What isn't folk or Americana arises again within the opening bars of the title track of Next To You (pretty okay) by Jenny Reynolds, but it really doesn't make any difference-- the material is so fully realized, the performances so perfectly arranged, idiomatics concerns are rendered silly.
  
  The Austin-by-way-of-Boston singer/songwriter set the bar way high with her previous effort, Bet on the Wind, but outstrips that gem here. Co-produced by Reynolds, keyboardist Mark Addison, and guitarist Scrappy Jud Newcomb, the CD features such other Austin stalwarts as Ruthie Foster on harmonies, Warren Hood on fiddle, Glenn Fukanaga on bass, and Newcomb's sometimes band leader Ian McLagan on keyboards. And in typical fashion, Scrappy invariably finds the sweet spot where grit intersects with taste.
  
  As for Reynolds, "singer/songwriter" (which has come to encompass every hoot-night hummer and strummer, as if it were a genre instead of a job description) seems an unfair term; she's so strong at both. This is the type of CD that will have you getting out of bed in the middle of the night because you have to hear a particular song (or the whole album) right now.
  

• 3rd Coast Music Gives Next To You 4 Stars! [+ Show ]
  

  **** [Four Stars] for Jenny Reynolds' CD Next To You "silky vocals...strong songwriting...passion...**** [Four Stars] for Jenny Reynolds' CD Next To You
  
  "silky vocals...strong songwriting...passionate delivery..."
  --John Conquest / 3rd Coast Music (San Antonio)

• --Paste Magazine [+ Show ]
  

  "... Winsome but wise ... a winning way with a hook ... CDs like Bet on the Wind are liable to give ..."... Winsome but wise ... a winning way with a hook ... CDs like Bet on the Wind are liable to give introspective a good name."
  

• Austin Critic Jim Caligiuri [+ Show ]
  

  Those looking for a melancholy waif singing syrupy folk songs should look else where; Jenny Reynol...Those looking for a melancholy waif singing syrupy folk songs should
  look else where; Jenny Reynolds sings her songs like she means them and
  each one shot through with a heart of gold.
  -- Jim Caligiuri

• 2005 Best New Local Act
  

  Critics Poll, Jim Caligiuri

• (Four stars for Reynolds’ 2002 CD, Bet on the Wind) [+ Show ]
  

  "Reynolds [has a] smooth-as-velvet voice, a gorgeous instrument that she puts to stunning use on the..."Reynolds [has a] smooth-as-velvet voice, a gorgeous instrument that she puts to stunning use on the optimistic ballad, ‘Bet on the Wind’ and a cover of Peter Gabriel’s ‘Mercy Street’

• Marilyn Rea Beyer - Music Director [+ Show ]
  

  “Her songs are melodic, literate and well-crafted…Jenny Reynolds’ personal presence is most enchanti...“Her songs are melodic, literate and well-crafted…Jenny Reynolds’ personal presence is most enchanting.”
  
  

• Performing Songwriter
  

  "Reynolds' songs...shine"

Setlist

Dance for Me (New song to be recorded)
Any Kind of Angel (New song to be recorded)
Next To You
Ain't No Reason
Exhale
Simple Man
I Forget Myself
Weary Blues from Waiting (Hank Williams)
Belong To Heaven
Bet on the Wind
She
I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry (Hank Williams)
Coming Up Blue
Eleventh Hour Love
I'm Looking through You (The Beatles)
Make Me Down a Pallet on Your Floor (Trad.)
Whiskey & Pie

Basic Requirements

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