Folk singer and guitarist Jenn Butterworth was born in Halifax, West Yorkshire, in 1983. She took violin lessons as a child and self-taught guitar at thirteen. The daughter of a musician, she accompanied him from stage to stage, then began performing on her own, before moving to Glasgow in 2000 to study music at Strathclyde University. She met Anna Massie, with whom she played and recorded, and in 2009 joined the trio led by harpist Rachel Hair. In 2015, Jenn Butterworth joined the Songs of Separation supergroup, formed by Eliza Carthy with the likes of Karine Polwart, for a homonymous album. A regular accompanist to violinist Ryan Young and Claire Hastings, the guitarist then teamed up with mandolin player Laura-Beth Salter to form the duo Jenn & Laura-Beth, who produced the album Bound (2016). The two musicians then decided to form the Kinnaris Quintet, blending Irish and Scottish folk, bluegrass and classical harmonies on two albums released in 2018 and 2022. Meanwhile, Jenn Butterworth collaborates with harmonica player Will Pound on the album A Day Will Come (2020). Also a lecturer on traditional music at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, the musician released her first solo album, Her by Design, in 2025.
