The second visit by a Grum Project visiting artist this year brought a lively, energetic performance to the Phillips Stevens Chapel as Matt Butler, a musician and creator, performed his one-man traveling show Reckless Son. Butler’s music is inspired by his journey touring and performing in more than 100 jails and prisons across the country.
Butler’s work has been described on his website as a “21st century version of On the Road meets “Folsom Prison Blues,” and the performer brought the weight of his performance to bear during his show. The popular music magazine Spin also named Butler a 2023 Artist of the Year, and Reckless Son earned an Album of the Year nomination from it, as well. While parts of the show were edited to fit the audience, Butler still brought the raw energy that has made his show so powerful.
“The show is really an attempt to humanize and give voice to the incarcerated,” he said. “My goal is to share with people who don’t necessarily have any exposure to that population or any real understanding of that population.”
Butler’s songs contain narratives about things he’s seen on his prison tours and personal reflections about his own journey. This give-and-take of sorts is something Butler learned as he started performing in prisons.
“The way this started was I would write some songs and bring them in, perform them, and use them as ways to facilitate a conversation,” Butler said. “Songs can penetrate people’s defenses and generate intimacy and create trust almost instantaneously.”
And while the venue was different from what Butler was used to, the reaction was similar. Students and faculty alike tapped toes and nodded heads during his performance, and that connection was special for the performer.
“I’ll often feel like no one out here gets me, and that sense of alienation is why I relate to the incarcerated so well,” he said. “I feel like people don’t want to hear me. And so, to come here to Williston, which is an entirely different group of people, and to be greeted with such a gracious audience here, to connect with the people, is really affirming for me on a personal level.”
Butler’s visit included a question-and-answer segment after the show, as well, to allow students to ask questions. Butler also toured campus with his wife, Anna Mohrman ’97, and got to experience lunch in the Birch Dining Commons, just like Mohrman did as a student.
Learn more about Butler and his music on his website. The Grum Project is funded through a generation donation by a Northampton School for Girls alumna. Learn more about the Grum Project here.
