Written By Ruth Ann Ruiz Features Editor
Native Texan Jesse Dayton a singer song writer has been singing and playing country, blues, rock and various other genres of music around the world and across the USA. He has played at least 100 shows this year, and he has a show coming up in Galveston on September 5th at Old Quarter Acoustic Café.
“I come from an old Beaumont family, and I spent my summers in Galveston, and I’ve played there many times,” Dayton shared.
After his show in Galveston, he and his band will hop on their tour bus and drive up to NYC for a show. From there, they will be making stops all along the Eastern Seaboard.
Born and raised in Beaumont, he made the decision as an emerging adult to head for Austin and develop his future as a musician.
He was singing and playing his guitar in Austin back in the ‘90s when he hit a lucky break as a young musician.
“Friday night in Austin I was playing, and a woman who came in heard me play. She came up to me and said she wanted me on a television show,” Dayton shared.
He went on to say how it was on that television show that he met Kris Kristofferson.
“We hit it off right away,” Dayton said of his meeting with Kristofferson.
His first encounter with a legendary musician led to another one reaching out to him.
Waylon Jennings extended a personal invitation to Dayton.
“He (Jennings) called me on the phone and asked me to play on his record. I drove over to Nashville in my truck, and when I got there, Johnny Cash opened the door,” Dayton said. “I was only 23 and that was the beginning for me. From then on, singing and writing deals were coming in for me.”
Though he says that was the beginning for him because of his time with the legends of country music, Dayton had been playing music since his days back in Beaumont. He had committed to the work of building his skills and talent before he worked with the legends.
“I grew up playing all the time,” Dayton said. “I was making a living playing music in high school.”
The way Dayton talks about his life, as a young man, he wasn’t much good at baseball but playing a guitar just came naturally for him.
“I could pretty much play the guitar right out of the gate,” Dayton shared. “I was a terrible second baseman”.
One of his earliest paying gigs, at age 15, was playing guitar with a Zydeco band in Lake Charles, Louisiana.
He has fond memories of growing up listening to his grandparents’ extensive record collection, which included a lot of honky-tonk, country and blues.
In July, though he can’t play baseball, he was on the field at Minute Maid Park for a Houston Astros baseball game singing our national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner”.
After years of writing songs, going on world music tours and singing and playing his guitar, Jesse is not stopping.
Recently he and blues singer Samantha Fish completed a duo album titled Death Wish Blues, and together they went on a world tour.
Even more recently, Dayton has put out a new album, The Hard Way Blues. This album comes from Dayton’s heart and soul and upbringing in East Texas.
I wanted “I wanted to make a guitar record, and it had to be East Texas with Blues country and rock and roll I wanted it to be music for big concerts that would translate well to a big stage,” said Dayton.
The lyrics and title evoke some of the emotions from the current state of our society and a bit of memories from the past.
“We’re just kind of losing everything that’s cool with our culture, and I’m concerned for the working-class people,” said Dayton when I asked him what he drew from in writing the lyrics.
“Talking Company Man Blues,” the third track on the album, covers the vast changes that the working class have been facing.
Though some things from the past are regrettably lost, some might best be left in the past. For example, in his song “Huntsville Prison Rodeo” Dayton vividly describes the scenes at rodeos in the prison.
As a child, he was a spectator for rodeos at the Texas State penitentiary at Huntsville, and those rodeos left a life-long impression on him.
“What I saw I can’t unsee,” Dayton said. “I was scared to death. It was crazy it was so violent. People could really get hurt. It was one of those ‘70s things we did back then. It was a normal thing. People would go to the Huntsville prison rodeo for entertainment,”
The album wraps up with the track “God Ain’t Makin’ No More of It” which he took pretty much from his East Texas roots.
“My uncle used to say, ‘Buy land in Texas. God ain’t makin’ no more of it,’” Dayton said.
The song is a reflection on living and all that we experience which will not be able to repeat.
While he is concerned about the plight of working-class people and other issues, Dayton has found his own peace in life through gratitude and humility.
“I have the best life—I have a lot to be grateful for. My gratitude list is a mile long—for me to get up and be able to play music,” Dayton explained. “I have a great wife. I travel the world. I’ve found if I stay grateful and humble when I get out of bed, that’s what makes getting out of bed worth it.”
His popularity in this part of Texas is evident. He’ll be singing and playing to what looks like a full house when he comes to Galveston. The Old Quarter Acoustic Café lists his concert as sold out.
You can still order one of his newest albums at https://www.hardchargerrecords.com/collections/jesse-dayton
