BIO

Jada Star is not simply creating music; she’s also carrying forward a family legacy. As the daughter of singer-songwriter Freida Parton and musician-songwriter Mark Andersen she grew up surrounded by music, but her personal musical destiny took time to manifest.

“I call myself a late bloomer,” Jada says. “I was incredibly shy as a kid — quiet and reserved with my thoughts and feelings. I wrote a lot of poetry as a way to get my feelings out, but I wanted to help other people do the same by becoming a psychiatrist or a therapist.”

Her songwriting continued to be a mostly private affair until she was in her early 30s, when her aunt, Dolly Parton, made her an offer she couldn’t refuse. “I was about to go back to school to finish my studies when Dolly offered me this great opportunity to work with the family show at Dollywood,” Jada says. “Immediately after the first show, people in the crowd started sharing their stories with us and telling us deeply personal stories about how much Dolly or our family’s music meant to them. That was it. I knew what I wanted to do.”

Jada spent almost a decade performing with her family members at Dollywood where she sharpened her performance skills and found her own songwriting voice. “I write what I’m feeling,” she says. “All my songs are very personal to me. They’re very true — either about me or a situation that I’ve watched a person I care about go through.”

In early 2021, Jada moved to Nashville, where she continued her musical journey. She explored a fusion of the traditional, high-lonesome sounds of the East Tennessee Mountains with modern pop music and an emotional confidence and honesty that has drawn comparisons to Nanci Griffith and Carly Simon.

In 2023, she appeared on the ABC television reality show Claim to Fame,  released her debut solo album, the breathtaking Tell Me I’m Your Angel, and performed at 2023 Fairport’s Cropredy Convention folk festival in the UK. Jada is returning to the UK in 2024 for a tour that will include an appearance at the Glastonbury Festival in support of her new single, “The Orchard,” a moving song on the enduring nature of family traditions she co-wrote with her cousin Richie Owens and recorded with her Aunt Dolly.   

Those deep family traditions remain the heart of her music. “We don’t get to pick the family we’re born in,” Jada says. “I say all the time I’m so thankful that the plan of the universe decided to drop me into this family. I’m so fortunate to have all the people around who have taught me so many things and have told me their stories. My grandmother taught me how to sew, and while she was teaching me, I got to hear the story of the coat of many colors from the woman who sewed it. That meant so much to me, and I want to share that feeling and inspire other people to share their stories.”