“I listen to and am inspired by a lot of music across a broad array of styles: gospel, country, jazz, Americana, rock, and neo-soul in addition to soul and blues. I resist the temptation to believe that only the music of my youth was any good, and that contemporary music is not worth my time or attention. I try to keep myself open to as much music as possible and remain just as much a fan as a practitioner.”

Billy Price: Timbres of Random Madness  

2016 Blues Music Award (BMA) winner and frequent BMA nominee Billy Price first attracted national attention during his three-year association with guitarist Roy Buchanan. Price is the vocalist on two of Buchanan’s LPs for Polydor Records, That's What I'm Here For and Live Stock. Since then, with the Keystone Rhythm Band, the Billy Price Band, and solo projects, Price has recorded and released a total of 21 albums, CDs, and DVDs. Price’s album This Time for Real, with Chicago soul singer Otis Clay, received a 2016 BMA for best soul blues album. He was nominated 11 times for BMAs between 2019 and 2025 and won the 2024 Bluebird Reviews Lifetime Career Award in the U.K. His most recent recording, Person of Interest, was nominated for 2025 BMAs for Soul Blues Album and Album of the Year. On May 1, 2026, Get Hip Records in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania will release Random Madness by award-winning soul-blues vocalist Billy Price. The new recording, produced by Grammy award-winning producer and drummer Tony Braunagel, contains 11 new songs co-written by Price. Braunagel produced Price’s acclaimed 2024 album Person of Interest, nominated by the Blues Foundation for four 2025 Blues Music Awards including Album of the Year.

(Photo: Billy Price)

Random Madness was recorded at The Vault recording studio in Price’s hometown of Pittsburgh. “For these songs,” says Price, “It was important to me to be able to work at home with the band I’ve been playing with for decades. In addition to Jim Britton on keyboards, we used my longtime bass player Tom Valentine and drummer Dave Dodd—they’ve been with me since the late 1970s—and my veteran horn section of trumpet player Joe Herndon and sax player Eric Spaulding, who appears on so many of the classic recordings from Kid Andersen’s Greaseland recording studio in San Jose, California.” Producer Tony Braunagel played drums on several of the tracks, and the album showcases two of the top guitar players in Pittsburgh, Ian Arthurs and Steve Delach, as well as acclaimed jazz trombonist Reggie Watkins and the gospel-inflected BGVs. The atmospheric title song, “Random Madness,” includes a guest appearance by trumpet great Sean Jones. Listeners of Random Madness will enjoy performances in a variety of related musical styles—soul, R&B, blues-rock, jazz, and soul-blues—anchored by Price’s distinctive vocal style and the stellar musicians of the Billy Price Band.

Interview by Michael Limnios        Archive: Billy Price, 2019 / 2022 / 2024 Interview

Special Thanks: Billy Price & Kevin Johnson (Proud Papa Promotions & Publicity)

What keeps a musician passionate after five decades in Soul & Blues music? How does your hometown that affect your music?

Increasingly over the past several recordings I’ve done, songwriting has been a focus of my attention, in addition to singing and leading my band. Music has also become more important and more central to my life as time has passed. I am fortunate to be able to work with the great musicians in my band--great people as well as talented and skillful musicians—and the strong support we receive from fans in my hometown of Pittsburgh and nearby make it possible for us to perform frequently and work on our craft in front of appreciative audiences.

How did your relationship with the Black American music come about? What musicians have continued to inspire you and your music?

I grew up in northern New Jersey in the 1950s and 1960s, and during that era, vocal-group music, sometimes now referred to as “doo-wop,” was the music that first caught my attention, along with early rock ’n roll and soul music. It was always clear to me that black artists were the most significant creators and innovators in all the musical styles that attracted me and, like many other white people creating music at that time, I borrowed freely from the innovators and interpreted their music through my own cultural sensibilities.

For a long time though, I loved the music of innovators like Ray Charles, Sam Cooke, James Brown, Bobby Bland, and others so much that I was content to stick closely to the musical forms they worked in. Of course, this resulted in music that was in most cases a pale imitation of the source material. I recall a few times in my career when people said of me, “He’s good, but he needs to develop his own voice”; the criticism stung because, despite my resistance to it, I was aware of its validity. It wasn’t until late in my career—sometime in the new millennium—that I started working earnestly on songwriting, and as time has passed, the music I’ve created and presented has begun to evolve beyond imitative conventions of blues and soul toward something more personal and idiosyncratic.

I listen to and am inspired by a lot of music across a broad array of styles: gospel, country, jazz, Americana, rock, and neo-soul in addition to soul and blues. I resist the temptation to believe that only the music of my youth was any good, and that contemporary music is not worth my time or attention. I try to keep myself open to as much music as possible and remain just as much a fan as a practitioner.

“The influence of the golden era of Soul/Blues is never far away, and my shows these days still include songs originally recorded by Otis Clay, O.V. Wright, Bobby Bland, and Tyrone Davis in addition to our own songs. Because I spent so many years firmly grounded in those musical styles, there will always be remnants of that golden era in my original music, no matter how it evolves.” (Photo: Billy Price)

How do you describe Random Madness (2026) sound and songbook? What has made you laugh and what touched you from album’s studio sessions?

I’m so excited about Random Madness and look forward to watching how it will be perceived after it is released. Songwriting with my principal writing partner Jim Britton, keyboard player in the Billy Price Band, has been evolving steadily over the past decade or so, and the songs on Random Madness are more personal than on any album I’ve released before. I allowed myself and the band to stretch beyond the musical and lyrical constraints of the styles in which we have typically worked, and I expect that there will be some number of listeners whose expectations will be jarred by this recording. At the same time, I am as proud of this album as of anything I've ever done before.

It was a peak experience to work with the Billy Price Band on the recordings at a studio close to home rather than with studio musicians on the road. We had a lot of fun and many laughs laying down the tracks under the guidance of the great Tony Braunagel, who produced and played drums on several of the tracks. I was proud of how well we all bonded, and it was great to see how much Tony appreciated and respected the guys in my band.

How do you prepare for your recordings and performances to help you maintain both spiritual and musical stamina?

Because it is my performing band who did the recordings, I was able to introduce some of the songs into our shows before we went into the studio, which gave us all a chance to get comfortable with them in advance. I’ve found at times that I don’t discover the best way to sing and deliver a song until I’ve had a chance to sing it many times, so it was a bonus to be able to do that here.

Being excited and committed to what I am doing is my primary source of spiritual and musical stamina. In addition to that though, I take care of myself physically, don’t drink or use drugs, and meditate daily. My voice goes through phases with lesser and greater degrees of freedom and health, often depending on which bugs have invaded my system most recently and how well I’ve been able to resist them, but for the past couple of years, my voice has been mercifully cooperative. I also sing in a gospel group, the Heritage Gospel Chorale of Pittsburgh, under direction of a brilliant choral director named Dr. Herbert Jones, and that enables me to exercise my voice regularly in a way I might not if I had to rely solely on will power and discipline.

“Increasingly over the past several recordings I’ve done, songwriting has been a focus of my attention, in addition to singing and leading my band. Music has also become more important and more central to my life as time has passed.” (Billy Price / Photo by Bob Sek)

What has been the hardest obstacle for you to overcome as a person and as artist and has this helped you become a better singer/performer?

I mentioned above my evolution from an imitator to someone with the confidence to write, perform, and record songs that more honestly reflect personal feelings and experiences. A challenge I still struggle with is a tendency to compare myself to other artists who are my contemporaries and who I perceive to be receiving a greater degree of fame, notoriety, good gigs, recognition, and income than what I get. This way of thinking is a trap that I work on not getting ensnared by, but I don’t always succeed. If I’m not mistaken, I believe that envy is one of the Seven Deadly Sins. Participation in social media is often the source of this kind of fruitless brooding about the status of my career, and I do best when I don’t indulge. I place my committed energy on being the best artist I can be and to staying grateful for the many blessings that music affords me.

You’ve worked in many different settings, from clubs and open air festivals to theatres in US and Europe. How do you navigate between these different worlds and audiences?

At a certain point, all veteran musicians and performers who are able to sustain careers have to learn to treat all performances in some way the same. If my performance depends on how many people there are in the audience or how attractive or comfortable the venue is, or even how my voice feels on a given night, then I’m at the mercy of things that are outside my sphere of control. Survival requires the ability to perform as well as possible every night regardless of the circumstances.

“It was always clear to me that black artists were the most significant creators and innovators in all the musical styles that attracted me and, like many other white people creating music at that time, I borrowed freely from the innovators and interpreted their music through my own cultural sensibilities.” (Billy Price and Bobby ‘Blue’ Bland, 1974 / Photo by David Aschkenas)

How did you hook up with Roy Buchanan? How has your experience with the “golden era” of Soul/Blues influenced the way you compose and perform today?

Roy’s manager at the time was Jay Reich. Jay was originally from Pittsburgh and met Roy while he was going to school in Washington, D.C., where Roy played a lot locally. Jay had also seen me sing with my band at the time in Pittsburgh, the Rhythm Kings, and he got the idea to put the two of us together for Roy’s third album for Polydor Records, That’s What I’m Here For.

The influence of the golden era of Soul/Blues is never far away, and my shows these days still include songs originally recorded by Otis Clay, O.V. Wright, Bobby Bland, and Tyrone Davis in addition to our own songs. Because I spent so many years firmly grounded in those musical styles, there will always be remnants of that golden era in my original music, no matter how it evolves.

What are you doing to keep your music relevant today, to develop it and present it to the new generation?

I can’t say that I do anything consciously or intentionally to achieve relevance to any particular audience other than to be true to myself, which is a quality that should have intrinsic appeal to any generation. It is true though that Tony Braunagel reached out to a young neo-soul artist he knew, Kelly Finnegan, to recommend someone to mix our tracks. The result was that we had the opportunity to work with Sergio Rios. Sergio produced recent retro-sounding modern hit albums from Neal Francis, Monophonics, Say She She, and more, is the guitarist, producer, and co-founder of the band Orgone, and works closely with the great retro-soul label, Colemine Records. We love the work that Sergio did mixing our tracks, and we think that listeners will too!

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(Billy Price / Photo by David Heath)