Sunday June 2, 2024

Most members of our music family are quite familiar with Jesse; I’ve referred to him as my honorary son. When he first performed at Cozy Cabin in 2013 we had just eleven guests, but Jesse and The Cozy Cabin “grew up” together; one subsequent performance had him performing two shows in one afternoon! Jesse’s Facebook profile describes him as “Troubadour, Hubby, Dad & Wanderluster.” His seventh album When We Wander was released in the spring of 2021, his first album since becoming a parent. The John Lennon Songwriting Contest Grand Prize winner and onetime Music Row staff writer normally plays 150 shows a year – from Bonnaroo to the Philadelphia Folk Festival and AmericanaFest and everywhere in between. His music career has been a family project ever since he became a full-time touring artist fourteen years ago, which coincided with meeting his wife Jess while working on a cruise ship in the South Pacific. "As soon as we got back to the states, I proposed to her at Nashville's Bluebird Cafe in July 2010 and we packed up the car for the first tour right after that. We've been touring together full-time ever since." Now the father of two children, family is more important than ever to him, including the parental urge to love and protect, displayed in his song and beautiful children’s book, If I Were the Moon: "If I were the moon, I’d light all of your back roads, You wouldn’t need no headlights /I’d always be full." https://youtu.be/2Wo60XzPcDM Jesse spent most of April recording his new album in Nashville, which, coincidentally, features Halley Neal on vocals! I met Halley at the 2022 NERFA Conference in Asbury Park. Since then she has been sharing stages with Jesse, Craig Bickhardt, Arielle Silver, fiancé Sam Robbins and many more. She was just named one of twenty-four finalists in the 2024 Grassy Hill Kerrville (Texas) New Folk Competition for Emerging Songwriters, chosen from a record-breaking 1,341 entries! Halley has been inspired by artists like Joni Mitchell and Shawn Colvin; see if you hear those influences in Somebody Else’s daughter (and have a sneak peak at Sam Robbins, who will join us October 6: https://youtu.be/HojgYW-Ssyg My sixth sense tells me this show will be one for the ages; hope you’ll be part of it. https://www.jesseterrymusic.com/ https://halleyneal.com/