Rhiannon Giddens

Rhiannon Giddens
Giddens performing at Aarhus Festival in 2015
Background information
Born	(1977-02-21) February 21, 1977 (age 47) Greensboro, North Carolina, U.S.
Genres	Folk old-time music bluegrass country gospel blues jazz soul R&B Celtic Americana
Instruments	Vocals fiddle banjo viola
Years active	2005–present
Labels	Music Maker Nonesuch
Formerly of	Carolina Chocolate Drops The New Basement Tapes
Website	Official website

Rhiannon Giddens (born February 21, 1977) is an American musician known for her eclectic folk music. She is a founding member of the country, blues, and old-time music band the Carolina Chocolate Drops, where she was the lead singer, fiddle player, and banjo player.

Giddens is a native of Greensboro, North Carolina. In addition to her work with the Grammy-winning^[1] Chocolate Drops, Giddens has released five solo albums: Tomorrow Is My Turn (2015) and Freedom Highway (2017), 2019 and 2021's There Is No Other and They're Calling Me Home (both collaborations with Italian multi-instrumentalist Francesco Turrisi), and You're the One (2023). She appears in the Smithsonian Folkways collection documenting Mike Seeger's final trip through Appalachia in 2009, Just Around The Bend: Survival and Revival in Southern Banjo Styles – Mike Seeger's Last Documentary (2019).^[2] In 2014, she participated in the T Bone Burnett-produced project titled The New Basement Tapes along with several other musicians, which set a series of recently discovered Bob Dylan lyrics to newly composed music. The resulting album, Lost on the River: The New Basement Tapes, was a top-40 Billboard album.

In 2023, the opera Omar, co-written by Giddens and Michael Abels, won the Pulitzer Prize for Music.^[3][4]