Jess Beck

Originally hailing from the beautiful redgum country of Mingbool (near Mt Gambier in South Australia), Jess took a detour with acting before finding her way back to her first love - music.
“My grandfather bought me a microphone when I was a little girl and I just loved hearing my voice amplified,” Jess told Encounter. “We had this old hay-carting trailer, a big wooden trailer, and I used to get up on that and pretend that it was a stage and sing out into the paddock,” she said. An older sister fuelled the precocious youngster’s enthusiasm for music. “She’d watch Rage and Video Hits,” Jess said. “From about the age of five I was putting my tape recorder up to the television, recording it and taking it to school, showing off to the kids all the latest music.”?With the encouragement of her music and drama teachers and a visit to Flinders in Year 12 with the Experience Uni program for Indigenous students from rural areas, Jess enrolled in a the Bachelor of Creative Arts (Acting) and graduated in 2005.
A turning point came in 2006 when she met Melbourne musician Tommy Spender (The Custom Kings), finding herself sitting in a King's Cross pub while Tommy jotted down everything that came into her head. Retiring to a hotel room, the pair turned the resulting material into her EP's title track, Jess improvising melodies over Tommy's guitar. “It was amazing to leave that night with a CD of a song that we had written together,” Jess enthuses. “I will never forget that feeling.”
Hometown Dress is the debut EP from Sydney-based singer-songstress Jess Beck. Inspired by the trials and tribulations of finding love, the differing pressures of life in the city and country as well as Jess' pride in her Aboriginal heritage, Hometown Dress blends jazz sophistication with the poised simplicity of roots, her band's crisp energy supporting the smooth elegance of her voice.
In 2007 she formed a Jazz Quartet with Curtis Argent (double bass), Curtis' identical twin Jeffrey Argent (drums) and their friend James McKendry (guitar). Although the group allowed her to develop her performance chops singing standards by the likes of Ella Fitzgerald and Frank Sinatra, Jess still yearned to express her own musical identity.
Collaboration is indeed central to Jess' work, subsequent songs arising through combined efforts with Curtis ('Running Around') and James ('Memoirs of a Thing') as well as emerging during jams with the whole band ('Lighthouse Song'). With the group rounded out with the addition of keyboard and accordion player Lukas Maio, Jess' songs have been lushly realised.
The Hometown Dress EP was recorded at the Gadigal Music Studio and the Brighton Boulevard Studio with assistance from Arts NSW and the Gadigal Music Label. With production by Tony Buchen (whose credits include Kid Confucious, Blue King Brown and Sarah Blasko), the recording experience was for Jess an unequivocally positive one. “Tony had many great ideas, quirky and deep,” she says. “He orchestrated us playing kitchen utensils for the song 'Hometown Dress'. We made sounds with pots, pans, metal and glass bowls – have a close listen, it’s fantastic.”
With 2012 having been brought in with style at The Dreaming (Woodford Folk Festival 2011/2012), Jess is keen to perform at as many gigs and festivals as possible before recording her debut album later in the year. Although juggling music with her day job as a project coordinator at the Sydney Opera House has its challenges, there are certain things that Jess Beck feels are necessary to sing to the world. “Don’t be walked over by anyone and stand up for yourself and others”.

Jess beck has shared the stage with Australian icons Jessica Mauboy, Archie Roach, Christine Anu, Emma Donavan, The Medics, Neil Murray and Dan Sultan