05/09/2025
Rhiannon Giddens played the Longworth-Anderson Series at Memorial Hall OTR Thursday. People have heard me yammer about her forever, so here's a review from my friend John London on last night's concert.
No rhyme for a while.
Not after watching her on stage again.
Not after hearing her voice travel from the depth of her soul to every yearning corner of human emotion.
Not after her gift to those within sight and sound of such enduring musicianship and pure passion.
Part hoedown, part church, part back porch creole, part Piedmont field holler.
Banjos, fiddles, guitars.
Every string seemed attached to her hands as if willed by her ancestral fathers and mothers.
Her hands.
At one point they clapped in rhythm with the bass.
It was so mesmerizing, you could have listened and watched indefinitely.
She cannot contain her joy on stage.
It erupts, volcanic.
It pleases and pierces, and leaves you almost breathless.
Yet another new place of discovery.
Roots music, blues, North Carolina mountain, African Congo, American Deep South pulpit.
“You can take my body, you can take my bones, you can take my blood, but not my soul.”
Sung with the power of a thunderclap.
Sung whispered in the fashion of a pin drop.
There is some Aretha inside of her, some Odetta, some Patsy Cline.
Definitely some Nina Simone.
String band stuff that transports one deep into the Carolina woods.
So deep you never want to emerge.
One night Ryman Auditorium, next night Memorial Hall.
She shares stage and spotlight and instruments.
Her nephew raps.
Her guitarist unpacks an old Merle Haggard gem.
She unwraps herself from a banjo and dances shoeless on stage.
Another part of her generous being.
She stands alone and delivers a mournful a ca****la rending of heart.
Every song, every note so richly beautiful you want to cry.
Nothing so trite as a rhyme must interrupt what went on.
It would be sinful.
The memory of it is a connection to a period of time from a very distant past yet part of the very immediate moment of witness.
What Did The Blackbird Say To The Crow?
The stirring of traditional songs leaves one utterly grateful.
She is testament to the river that will never cease to flow.
The water of music.
We are cleaner for it.
If you aren’t familiar with her work or her mission to honor what has come before, introducing yourself to it would be a rewarding use of time.
There’s no need for a rhyming verse.
Not when the highest level of human poetry has already been on full display.
— Original recollection, “Rhiannon Giddens”
May 9, 2025
Rhiannon Giddens's "At The Purchaser's Option," from her album, 'Freedom Highway,' out now on Nonesuch Records: https://rhiannongiddens.lnk.to/FreedomHwy"Las...
