Leon Bridges Biography
(July 2015)
The river of soul music flows on deep and strong, and 25-year-old Leon Bridges
is immersed in its life-giving current. The Forth Worth, Texas native and
Columbia Records artist is currently preparing his debut album for release in the
summer of 2015. "I'm not saying I can hold a candle to any soul musician from
the '50s and '60s," Bridges says, "but I want to carry the torch."
Humility aside, Bridges' light is burning bright. Following the October, 2014
release of two tunes that set the on-line world aflame, and accompanied by
intimate solo shows from London to Los Angeles and Nashville to New York, the
singer and songwriter has proved himself a rare talent who can do smoldering
ballads and elemental rock'n'roll with equal aplomb. While he appears to have
emerged cut from the cloth and fully formed, Bridges explains in his dulcet voice
how he came to be here now.
"As a kid I grew fascinated with modern R&B. In high school I'd try singing songs
by Ginuwine and Usher," he explains, "and I thought well, maybe they weren't in
my range." Instead, a lithe, nimble physicality led Leon to study dance at Tarrant
County College in Fort Worth. "I'd been doing hip-hop dance since I was 11 years
old," he says. "I knew there was a dance program there, and I started diving into
ballet and jazz and modern technique and learning choreography. I thought that's
what I wanted to do."
Native inspiration soon diverted his path. "A friend of mine brought his keyboard
to school every day, and we'd have these little jam sessions, improvising, and I
started to find my voice." One day a female friend asked Bridges to look after her
guitar while she went to class. "I asked her to show me a couple chords first. And
she did: A-minor and E-minor. I fell in love with their sound, and that's when I
started writing songs, from those two chords."
That Bridges compositional bedrock began in a minor mode is revealing. At a
moment when popular music seems in thrall to major chord sing-alongs, the blue
hues of Bridges' tunes embrace a subtlety that feels wholly refreshing. "Based on
my innocence on guitar and my lack of knowledge of the technical side, my
songwriting is something I have to make on-point with melody and delivery to
make it shine," he explains.
With a few early compositions tucked under his belt, a seeming dichotomy
surfaced: Bridges’ tunes sounded less like the modern R&B he’d grown up loving
than a style he was, in fact, not very familiar with: classic soul. Furthermore,
Bridges’ sleek, fastidious fashion sensibility dovetailed with the songs he was
writing. He began a tenderfoot period of apprenticeship playing coffeehouses in
and around Fort Worth, slowly finding and refining his voice.
A turning point soon came via a pair of selvedge trousers. One night at an Austin
bar Bridges was approached by a young woman who complimented him on his
snazzy Wrangler's and said that he should meet her boyfriend, a fellow with a
comparable sense of style. Her boyfriend turned out to be Austin Jenkins of the
band White Denim. "I hadn't heard of White Denim at the time," Bridges says,
"but I went and looked them up and thought yeah, that's interesting music." After
Jenkins and his bandmate Joshua Block subsequently peeped Bridges perform
at a low-key local show, they insisted Leon enter the studio to cut a few tracks on
their burgeoning bank of vintage equipment.
That initial three-day session, with Jenkins and Block producing, yielded the
recordings that set Bridges at the center of rapturous attention from aficionados
and labels alike. The buttery, seductive "Coming Home" and the piston-driven,
doo-wop flavored "Better Man" demonstrated Bridges' versatility. Inking with
Columbia Records, whose roster includes a certain hero named Bob Dylan, was
the outcome of courtship and deliberation. "Columbia has artists I look up to like
Adele and Pharrell, as well as Raphael Saadiq and John Legend," says Bridges.
"They way they value artistry makes it feel like home."
The early 2015 release of another new song, "Lisa Sawyer," has further
burnished Bridges' promise. With its brushed snares and glowing brass, "Lisa
Sawyer" is a remarkably assured offering from so young a talent. The song,
about Bridges' mother, a woman "with the complexion of a sweet praline," has
the flavor of one of Allen Toussaint's productions for the great Lee Dorsey.
Connecting the sacred and the secular, "Lisa Sawyer" feels natural considering
Bridges' churchgoing childhood. And by writing with specificity about his own
family, Bridges is creating resonant work about the African-American experience.
"I have a lot of insecurities because I don't have a big powerhouse voice," he
admits. "I'm not a shouter. I rely on phrasing to get my feeling across." Bridges'
delivery exudes strength through tenderness. "I guess that's why I connected
with Sam Cooke."
The name Sam Cooke has appeared frequently in Bridges' early notices in the
press. The point of comparison is apt, but not initially intentional. "When I wrote
'Lisa Sawyer' I didn't know anything about old soul music," Leon says. "I was
asked 'Is Sam Cooke one of your inspirations?' I had to say no, because I only
knew Sam Cooke's 'A Change Is Gonna Come' from the movie Malcolm X, which
I'd watched with my father. But from being asked about Sam Cooke and Otis
Redding I started digging deeper into soul music from the '50 and '60s and
realizing this is really the root of what I'm doing."
What to make of the fact that Bridges is working in a tradition whose existence he
was initially only vaguely aware of? "It speaks to the gift God placed in me," Leon
says, choosing his words carefully. "It humbles and wows me to think I was
pulling from something I didn't really know about."
In the striking black-and-white images that have accompanied Leon's emergence,
one photograph stands out. It depicts Bridges sauntering down a sunlit sidewalk,
his shadow falling not behind him but stretching out in the direction of his forward
stride. The implication is that Bridges is not walking away from the past, but
moving forward with both family history and the tradition of soul music in full view.
His ancestors and antecedents walk with him. "They're with me at all times,"
affirms Bridges. Steeped in tradition, drenched with intention and desire, Leon
Bridges' soul music is happening here and now.
For more information contact Warren, Jenny, Ashley or Ed @chuffmedia.com or
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