tunesday – fill in the blanks with ruby jackson

Ahead of her stint at the upcoming Sydney International Women’s Jazz Festival, we sat down with Ruby Jackson to get her to help us fill in the blanks.

My music could be described as… A blend of R&B, soul and jazz, or a candle-lit martini bar! 

My rider consists of… Lemon and honey tea, salty and sweet popcorn, and a cheeky bottle of red. 

The first time I realised I wanted to make music was… In the later years of high school. I fell in love with writing instrumentals, like jazz tunes and themes for movies. But the first time I realised I wanted to write songs was when I started singing backing vocals for my friend’s band in 2019. The music was so soulful, and the band was filled with incredible musicians from uni, so I was super-inspired. After our first rehearsal, I went home and wrote “Simplicities”, the first single I released! 

What I’m most looking forward to about playing at the Sydney International Women’s Jazz Festival is… Witnessing all of the incredible musicians that are playing this year! And I can’t wait to be opening for Tina – I’m so keen to see her band live in action. The Vanguard is where I played my first band show, so I have fond memories of that venue.

My favourite thing about making This Love Thing was... Arranging the backing vocals and strings. This was so important to the sound of This Love Thing, and I had sooo much fun with it – especially the vocal layers. 

My favourite female and non-binary jazz musicians are… There are so many incredible jazz musicians in Sydney, like Hillary Geddes, Abby Constable, Tilly Street and Sarah Purdon to name a few – the best of the best!

If I could tour with any band or musician, it would be… Lianne La Havas.

For more rad music chats, have a squiz at our chinwag with Blondshell or take a gander at Babyccino’s playlist of nice tunes. Plus, sign up to our newsletter to stay in the music loop.