Jerron Paxton

On October 18th, 2024, acclaimed blues singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Jerron Paxton released his most recent album, Things Done Changed, on Smithsonian Folkways. Once described as "virtually the only music-maker of his generation—playing guitar, banjo, piano, and violin, among other implements—to fully assimilate the blues idiom of the 1920s and '30s” by the Wall Street Journal, the thirty-five-year-old’s latest collection is his first of all original songs. “Things Done Changed is my way of honoring the culture I come from,” says Paxton. “I grew up playing for the last generation of folks who grew up listening to Black banjo players … Born from the lives of the people who raised me, I hope these songs resonate with listeners as a continuation of our shared history.” Born and raised in South Central Los Angeles, Jerron Paxton's music is steeped in the rich cultural heritage of the Great Migration. His family’s journey from Shreveport, Louisiana, to the Athens neighborhood of South LA in the 1950s laid the foundation for his appreciation of Southern Black culture. As an only child, he spent much of his upbringing absorbing the culture his family had taken with them to California from the South. Now, Paxton approaches his craft with equal part wit and reverence, with a knack for leg-pulling and cracking wise. Lick by lick, Paxton builds a bridge between generations gone and generations to come, singing the heartaches and joys of the past and present.