Tony Butler

Tony Butler credits his father, Bill Butler’s passion for music—he was an Irish tenor—as the foundation for the family’s deep love of music. All of the Butler children became musicians: Tony’s brother Jack is a well-known guitarist in San Diego playing for many years with Jerry Raney in Glory and then with Bratz and Private Domain. His sister, Margie performs with a long-established Celtic band “The Golden Bough.” Tony first picked up the guitar in the fourth grade after Jack showed him a few chords, beginning a lifelong love affair with the instrument. He joined his first working band at 20 and still performs today with numerous groups including The Dependables, entertaining Snowbirds in Yuma during the winter. In his early career, Tony performed in area clubs and bars while frequenting swap meets, pawn shops and garage sales in search of rare guitars. At one of these, he met Jim Bass when both were eyeing the same amplifier. That encounter led to a decade-long career at Jim’s House of Guitars, where Tony became co-owner and witnessed the growth of the vintage guitar market, acquiring several instruments now on loan to the Museum of Making Music.