THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Rhiannon Giddens reunites with her former Carolina Chocolate Drops bandmate Justin Robinson on What Did The Blackbird Say To The Crow, an album of North Carolina fiddle and banjo music.
Produced by Giddens and Joseph “joebass” DeJarnette, the album features Giddens on banjo and Robinson on fiddle, with the duo playing 18 of their favorite instrumental and vocal tunes. Many were learned from their late mentor, the legendary Piedmont musician Joe Thompson; one is from another musical hero, the late Etta Baker. Giddens and Robinson recorded outdoors at Thompson’s and Baker’s North Carolina homes, as well as the former plantation Mill Prong House. They were accompanied by the sounds of nature, including two different broods of cicadas, which had not emerged simultaneously since 1803, creating a true once-in-a-lifetime soundscape.
“With the assaults on reality going on in the world today, we wanted to offer another kind of record, like walking back onto a gravel or dirt road while a stampede goes the other way,” Giddens says. “With the cicada choir, this record could’ve only happened at a certain time in the last 120 years. We doubled down on place, time, realness, and old-fashioned front porch music. It’s a reminder that another way exists, with music made for your community’s enjoyment and for dancing — not solely for commercial purposes.
“What is the role of music in our society?” she wonders. “How do we de-couple it from unfettered capitalism, where music is a product and musicians are incidental? How do we use the tools and system that we have been bequeathed in a way that reminds us of other ways of being?” Robinson adds: “Recording this album felt like being back in the saddle. Just this time Joe is not here, and his fiddle is under my chin. The album is about home, the cicadas, the storms, the music, and the people who make it feel like home.”
Thompson was one of the last musicians of his era and his community to carry on the southern Black string band tradition. He played a crucial role in the lives of Giddens and Robinson, who, along with their Carolina Chocolate Drops bandmate Dom Flemons, spent their formative years learning from Thompson in traditional apprentice/mentor relationships. His influence has guided all of their artistic journeys as well as their mission to keep the legacy of the Black string band tradition alive.
Made in 2024, What Did The Blackbird Say To The Crow was recorded in outdoor settings with just Giddens and Robinson, a couple of folding chairs, and some microphones — one placed to pick up the sounds of nature around them, “using technology in the way that we choose,” as Giddens says. While at Thompson’s house, his nephew brought out one of his uncle’s restored fiddles, which Robinson played on the recording. In a recording process full of similar bits of kismet, they experienced another magical moment at Baker’s home, when Baker’s son offhandedly mentioned that his mother had recorded Carolina Breakdown in her yard, and that a Carolina wren ended up on the recording. Robinson and Giddens were delighted to hear him tell this story, as that very recording had been their inspiration to make What Did The Blackbird Say To The Crow the way they did. The duo recorded Baker’s version of Marching Jaybird in that same yard, with Baker’s son listening.
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 Grammy–winning singer and instrumentalist, 2023 Pulitzer Prize winner, MacArthur “Genius” Grant recipient, 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. Her most recent release is 2023’s You’re The One, her first album of all original songs; her banjo can be heard on Beyonce’s Texas Hold ‘Em; and she is the artistic director of Silk Road Ensemble. In addition to her musical pursuits, Giddens has published two children’s books featuring her lyrics, hosts the Aria Code podcast, has composed music for ballet and film, and has songs featured in the hit video game Red Dead Redemption 2.
Robinson is a Grammy–winning musician and vocalist, cultural preservationist, and historic foodways expert. He has used his wide range of interests and talents to preserve North Carolina’s African American history and culture, connecting people to the past and to the world around them. Robinson learned to play the violin as a child; however, he did not enjoy playing classical music and stopped around the age of 13. It wasn’t until he was inspired by the old-time blues jams he attended as a student at UNC-Chapel Hill that he decided to approach the violin again as a fiddler. He played with Carolina Chocolate Drops, working to preserve traditional forms of music, to introduce new generations to musical legends, and to remind audiences that the fiddle was, historically, an African American instrument. He wrote the song Kissin’ and Cussin’ for the group’s Grammy–winning album Genuine Negro Jig, and continued to write music after leaving the group in 2011, releasing the album Bones for Tinder as Justin Robinson & The Mary Annettes in 2012.”
