Rhiannon Giddens talks to the audience between songs, live at SFJazz, San Francisco, Feb. 13, 2020
Rhiannon Giddens talks to the audience before playing the Italian folk dance song "Pizzica Di San Vito." She jokes about the benefits of getting up to buy merchandise ("doctors say that you should get 10,000 steps in a day, so you don't want to sit the whole intermission"), then references the recent fire that burned down Apollo Masters Corp., one of only two places in the world making the lacquer discs used in pressing vinyl records. Finally, Giddens talks about her collaboration with Lafayette, Louisiana artist Denise Gallagher, who came up with the "two-headed chicken with instruments" folk art design for the There Is No Other tour poster. Rhiannon Giddens is a Grammy Award winning singer, banjo player, and fiddle player from North Carolina who co-founded the band the Carolina Chocolate Drops. Joining her onstage were Francesco Turrisi (tamburello and piano) and Jason Sypher (upright bass). She and Turrisi have released two albums together--There Is No Other (2019) and They're Calling Me Home (2021)--and they have been in a relationship since 2019. ============================= Official Show Description Singer, violinist, banjo player, actress, Grammy-winner, and founding member of the Carolina Chocolate Drops, Rhiannon Giddens returns with music from her new Nonesuch album, There Is No Other. The Greensboro, North Carolina native has assimilated a rich diversity of music traditions, from the country songs of her youth and the world of opera she was immersed in at Ohio’s Oberlin Conservatory to Celtic music and the gamut of African American song styles with roots in the Piedmont and the whole of the rural South. Born out of the success of the trio Sankofa Strings, Carolina Chocolate Drops have rightfully become a global phenomenon, and Giddens remains the group’s sole original member and driving force. The multi-instrumentalist made a memorable step outside the group with her show-stopping performance at producer T Bone Burnett’s 2013 Town Hall concert, leading to Giddens’ Burnett-produced, Grammy-nominated full-length Nonesuch debut, Tomorrow is My Turn. On the heels of her 2017 MacArthur Foundation “Genius Grant” fellowship, her deeply rewarding sophomore album Freedom Highway, and this year’s Songs of Our Native Daughters, her collaborative project with fellow string masters Amythyst Kiah, Leyla McCalla, and Allison Russell, Giddens returns with There Is No Other. Produced by eminent singer and songwriter Joe Henry, the session traces the movement of sound from Africa and the Middle East to influence the musical traditions of Europe and the Americas, recorded in collaboration with Italian pianist and multi-instrumentalist Francesco Turrisi, who joins Giddens for these dates along with bassist Jason Sypher. ================================ Rhiannon Giddens - Live Tour Dates (2019-2020) Dec. 1 - Edinburgh, UK @ Usher Hall Dec. 3 - Utrecht, Netherlands @ TivoliVredenburg Dec. 4 - Hamburg, Germany @ Fabrik Dec. 5 - Darmstadt, Germany @ Centralstation Dec. 7 - Cologne, Germany @ Kulturkirche Dec. 8 - Leuven, Belgium @ Het Depot Dec. 9 - Paris, France @ Café de la Danse Dec. 10 - Amsterdam, Netherlands @ De Duif Jan. 17-18 - Turin, Italy @ Torino Folk Club Feb. 7 - Stanford, CA @ Bing Concert Hall Feb. 13-16 - San Francisco, CA @ SFJAZZ Center Mar. 4 - Wellington, New Zealand @ New Zealand Festival Mar. 7 - Adelaide, Australia @ WOMADelaide Festival Mar. 8 - Port Fairy, Australia @ Port Fairy Folk Festival Mar. 11 - Hobart, Australia @ Museum of Old and New Art (MONA) Mar. 14 - Melbourne, Australia @ Melbourne Recital Centre Mar. 15 - Katoomba, Australia @ Blue Mountains Music Festival Mar. 17 - Sydney, Australia @ Metro Theatre
