Jonathan Butler is one of the most popular and richest Jazz Singer who was born on October 10, 1961 in Athlone, Cape Town, South Africa. Jazz, R&B, and worship musician, as well as writer. He was part of the jazz and rock band Pacific Express and later released “Lies,” a 1987 Grammy Award-nominated single.
He played with the saxophonists He collaborated with saxophonists Kirk Whalum, Dave Koz, and Boney James., Dave Koz, and Boney James.
He began touring at the age of seven when he joined a travelling stage show, and was later signed up to perform on a string of hit recordings, turning him into a local teen idol. In 1975 his cover of “Please Stay (song)” by The Drifters reached number 2 in South Africa. The same year his cover of “I Love How You Love Me” by The Paris Sisters reached number 4. “I’ll be Home” reached number 16 in 1976.
Butler was signed to CCP Records, a predecessor to Jive Records in 1977. He left the label to join Mountain Records after a few years. The manager of Mountain Records, Paddy Lee-Thorp was also Butler’s manager and in the early 1980s they signed Jonathan to Jive Records and he moved to the United Kingdom, where he remained for seventeen years. His international breakthrough came in 1987 with his Grammy-nominated hit single, “Lies” which reached #27 on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart, and his cover version of the Staple Singers song “If You’re Ready (Come Go with Me)”, which he performed with Ruby Turner. His single “Lies”, also reached the UK Official Singles Chart, peaking at number 18, spending 12 weeks, in total, in the Top 100.
He was born within Cape Town, South Africa during the Apartheid period. The political environment that he grew up in became the main theme in his lyrics.
