Jonatha Brooke (born January 23, 1964) is an American folk rock singer-songwriter and guitarist from Massachusetts, United States. Her music merges elements of folk, rock and pop, often with poignant lyrics and complex harmonies. She has been a performer, writer, and artist since the late 1980s, and her songs have been used in television shows and movies.
Education
Jonatha Brooke attended Shady Hill School in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and the Commonwealth School in Boston. She graduated from Amherst College in 1985.
Career
Beginnings
Jonatha Brooke and fellow Bostonian Jennifer Kimball began playing music together in the 1980s after having met at Amherst College. They performed regularly during their college years. Their folk songs were marked by "witty wordplay and sumptuous pop harmonies," according to one music critic. Another critic suggested Brooke (the duo's principal songwriter) was the creative dynamo behind the team. Brooke was sometimes grouped with emerging 1990s talents such as the Indigo Girls, Sheryl Crow, Shawn Colvin, and Mary Chapin Carpenter. The duo were compared with artists such as Suzanne Vega and Indigo Girls.
Solo career
In 1994, Brooke pursued a solo career. Her followup 10 Cent Wings
Going Independent
The changing dynamics of the music business in the middle 1990s had a "sell-or-perish" pattern featuring a "leaner, meaner record industry," as one critic described the industry in the 1990s.
She recalled: "I realized nothing had changed. I didn't have a contract with MCA Records, and I didn't have tour support, and I wasn't going to get to make a video, which they had promised. The shows were still sold out, my audience was still there and they didn't care whether or not I was part of the Universal conglomerate. That was a really empowering and reassuring time." She moved to Malibu in 2000. Another critic described her earlier songs as "introspective, sometimes bleak Joni Mitchell-esque compositions."
The 2000s
Brooke's next album, Steady Pull (2001) reflected "relief and optimism." Later, her song "Your House" was included in the ABC series entitled Once and Again. She performed two songs on Disney's Return to Never Land (2002) soundtrack, a movie based on the Peter Pan story, contributing her original song "I'll Try" and a cover "The Second Star to the Right".
In 2003, Brooke revamped 1995's song "War" as a protest against the Gulf War. In 2004, she released Back in the Circus with new material plus song covers from songs by The Alan Parsons Project, The Beach Boys, and James Taylor. The album was also released in the United Kingdom in 2005 and combined tracks with several Steady Pull songs. In August 2006, she released a combination CD and DVD titled Live in New York. In April 2007, Brooke released Careful What You Wish For via Rykodisc distribution.
thumb|left|200px|At [[Woody Guthrie Folk Festival]]
Some Brooke songs have been sung or covered by other artists. Her tune "Because I Told You So" from Ten Cent Wings was covered by Nick Lachey on his 2006 album What's Left of Me. Her song "Inconsolable" from Plumb was featured in a TV episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer This effort was inspired by the music of late folk legend Woody Guthrie. Brooke was invited by Guthrie's daughter Nora to sift through the private archives and hunt through Guthrie's unreleased material for possible adaptations. In 2008, she participated in the music album Songs for Tibet, an initiative to support Tibetan Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso. The album was issued on August 5 via iTunes and on August 19 in stores. In 2009, she shared vocal duties with Davy Knowles on the song "Taste of Danger" on the album Coming Up For Air from Davy Knowles & Back Door Slam.
Brooke was a judge on the 10th and 11th annual Independent Music Awards. She was also a judge for the 5th and 9th Independent Music Awards. According to Brooke in an interview, her favorite collaboration with other artists was the song "Forgiven" with Chris Botti (in Chris' 2002 CD The Very Best of Chris Botti).
The 2010s
In 2010, Jonatha Brooke performed as the opening act of the French tour of Nolwenn Leroy, singing songs in English and in French, and joined Nolwenn Leroy for some duets.
In February 2014, Brooke opened in her one-woman play My Mother Has 4 Noses off-Broadway at the Duke Theater in New York City. The play, written by Brooke, recounts in words and music Brooke's relationship with her mother, who suffered from dementia. It earned favorable reviews, including a "NY Times Critics' pick" designation. She released a CD of the same title simultaneously which one reviewer described as "an intimate, string laden album full of warmth and sadness."
In October 2016, Jonatha released the album Midnight. Hallelujah. Recorded at Sweetwater Studios in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and mixed by Bob Clearmountain, the collection features a broader mix of instruments than her previous two albums. Brooke supported the release of the album with tour dates across the United States.
In February 2019, Jonatha Brooke won Overall Grand Prize in the 15th Annual IAMA (International Acoustic Music Awards), as well as Best Female Artist with her song "Put the Gun Down".
Brooke released an EP, Imposter, in 2019. In an interview for the EP, Brooke revealed that she now lives in Minneapolis.
Discography
{| class="wikitable sortable"
|+ Jonatha Brooke
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! Album
! Year
! Label
!class="unsortable"| Notes
!class="unsortable"| References
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| Grace in Gravity
| 1991
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| rowspan="2" | part of The Story
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