Julie Williams sets foot on the ground with 'Tennessee Moon'

“I know I’m telling my story on this stage, but I’m also telling someone else’s story that they’re hearing at that time,” says Julie Williams. “Every time I play one of those songs I feel stronger.”

On and off stage, storytelling is a priority for the singer-songwriter. She aims to share her experiences through her sharp lyrics and silky vocals, while uplifting listeners from all backgrounds.

Williams’ goal for Tennessee moonthe EP she released on October 17 is intended to channel the ‘volatile nature’ of her twenties. Each song draws from her country influences from the 1990s and early 2000s while presenting contemporary perspectives on identity, love and self-acceptance. “It’s really an ode to all the good, the bad, all the dirt and the mess,” she says, “but also to the beauty of the last few years in Nashville.”

Williams started singing as soon as she could talk. Although music comes naturally to her, she instead went to college to study public policy, intending to build a career where she could help people and effect meaningful change. While still in college, Williams began writing songs and discovered that music could further that goal.

In 2019, she immersed herself in Nashville’s music scene for the first time. When she went to writers’ rounds, she rarely saw people of color performing. Since then, she has worked to find her feet as a queer, mixed-race country artist.

“Having been here in Nashville for five years,” Williams says, “I feel like I’m really coming into my own as who I am as an artist, my sound and what I want to say.”

One highlight of Tennessee moon is a new “Moonlight Version” of “Southern Curls,” which returns the full band arrangement of the original piece to solo piano. It’s a key song in Williams’ catalog, chronicling her experiences growing up mixed-race in Florida. “If you’ve ever had to fight to love yourself because someone else made you feel like you shouldn’t, then that song is for you,” she says. The release of the original version in 2021 led to her connection with the Black Opryleading to her performance on the main stage of the 2023 Newport Folk Festival.

“I wanted to release it with this EP because it feels (like) this closing of the chapter on ‘Southern Curls,’” Williams says. “Without that song I would never have found the Black Opry. I would never have been part of CMT’s Next Women of Country. I don’t think I would have stayed in Nashville if I hadn’t written that song.

While the EP concludes one part of Williams’ journey, it marks the beginning of another focused on introspection, acceptance and a wave of inspiration. She answered Tennessee moon with her partner and producer Jonathan Smalt, a process she describes as a “labor of love that came together when we fell in love too.”

“This record came about when I was laying on the couch,” she explains, “lighting incense in the living room and just playing records and records and going, ‘Oh wow, did you hear that piano part? Did you hear this, and did you hear that?’”

“Dirt” is one of Williams’ favorites from the EP. Co-written with Natalie Closner of the band Joseph, the song reflects the vulnerability Williams experienced during therapy experiences and her heightened self-awareness.

“If you dig up all these things from your past in that process, you’re going to be in the mud for a while,” she says. “You haven’t seen the fruits of your labor yet, and I felt that too.”

Williams is especially excited to perform “Dirt” when her tour takes her to The Blue Room at Third Man Records on Friday.

“Every time I sing or hear it live, I remind myself of its message: don’t try to live for other people.”