Rhiannon Giddens

Rhiannon Giddens has made a singular, iconic career out of stretching her brand of folk music, with its miles-deep historical roots and contemporary sensibilities, into just about every field imaginable. A two-time Grammy Award-winning singer and multi-instrumentalist, MacArthur genius grant recipient, Pulitzer Prize winner, and composer of opera, ballet, and film, Giddens has centered her work around the mission of lifting up people whose contributions to American musical history have previously been overlooked or erased, and advocating for a more accurate understanding of the country's musical origins through art.

A founding member of the landmark Black string band Carolina Chocolate Drops and the all-female banjo supergroup Our Native Daughters, Giddens is as much a curator as a creator. She is the current artistic director of the Silkroad Ensemble, founded by Yo-Yo Ma; hosts a PBS television show, "My Music with Rhiannon Giddens"; and has hosted two podcasts, "Aria Code" (from New York City's NPR affiliate WQXR, which ran for three seasons) and "American Railroad" (from Silkroad). Giddens has published two children's books and written and performed music for the soundtrack of "Red Dead Redemption II," one of the best-selling video games of all time. She appeared as a recurring cast member on ABC's hit drama "Nashville" and as a music history expert on Ken Burns' "Country Music" series on PBS. In 2025, she launched her own music festival, Biscuits & Banjos, in Durham, North Carolina, to celebrate Black culture outside the mainstream.

Giddens has been named one of NPR's 25 Most Influential Women Musicians of the 21st Century. Her most recent album, a collaboration with Justin Robinson, is "What Did the Blackbird Say to the Crow" (April 2025).