Rhiannon Giddens, fiddle, banjo and vocals
Justin Robinson, fiddle and vocals
Jason Sypher, bass
Justin Harrington, banjo

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.

Giddens has released three albums under her own name and two in collaboration with Italian multi-instrumentalist Francesco Turrisi, all on Nonesuch Records. American Railroad, her first album in collaboration with the Silkroad Ensemble, was released in November 2024, and her most recent album, a collaboration with Justin Robinson, What Did the Blackbird Say to the Crow, released this past April.

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 Yo-Yo Ma-founded Silkroad Ensemble, hosts a TV show on PBS, My Music with Rhiannon Giddens, and has hosted two podcasts (Aria Code from New York City’s NPR affiliate station 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. This year, she launched her own music festival in Durham, NC called Biscuits & Banjos, to celebrate Black culture outside the mainstream.

As Pitchfork once said, “few artists are so fearless and so ravenous in their exploration”—a journey that has led to NPR naming her one of its 25 Most Influential Women Musicians of the 21st Century and to American Songwriter calling her “one of the most important musical minds currently walking the planet.”

Justin Robinson is a Grammy-winning musician and vocalist, cultural preservationist, and historic foodways expert. Robinson 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 grew up in Gastonia, NC. Influenced by the musical tastes of his grandparents, he grew to love a diversity of musical styles. He played with the Carolina Chocolate Drops, thereby working to preserve traditional forms of music, to introduce new generations to musical legends like Joe Thompson, 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 and the Mary Annettes in 2012.

In addition to preserving African American musical traditions, Robinson is known for his work as a culinary historian. He explores the ways that foods of the African diaspora shaped and influenced Southern foodways, and reveals how foods like rice, black-eyed peas, and okra can be traced directly to the African continent. Robinson is also committed to helping African Americans rekindle their ties to the land. He is a founding member of the Earthseed Land Cooperative, a collective in northern Durham “made up of farmers, entrepreneurs, professionals, and teachers who are currently engaged in creating alternative models for sustainability, equity, and cooperation within communities of color.”

Justin Robinson holds a BA in Linguistics from UNC-Chapel Hill and an MS in Forestry and Environmental Science from NC State University. He is a member of the Conservation Trust for North Carolina Board of Directors.

Jason Sypher is a multifaceted bassist who has had a varied career as an interpreter of folk styles and jazz, a restless creative force on the bass who can bow on the instrument like a fiddler, pluck like an old time banjo or just drive a tune into bedrock. Originally studying jazz in San Francisco and Oregon, he moved to New Orleans and immersed himself in blues, cajun, jazz and zydeco creating his style and sound up from the streets to the clubs. Within a few years he was recording and performing with legends Irma Thomas, Clifton Chenier Jr., Little Freddie King, Kermit Ruffins and Clarence Gatemouth Brown. He has lived in the mountains of North Carolina and on the canals of Amsterdam absorbing the music wherever he travels. He performed and recorded with Leon Redbone, Howard Fishman, Mike Compton, I Draw Slow, Susan McKeown and The Sweetback Sisters. He toured twice with the well-known Irish supergroup Lunasa who introduced him to Japan. In the fall of 2014 he began playing with multiple Grammy winning singer/instrumentalist Rhiannon Giddens. Over the past several years he has anchored the many iterations of Rhiannon’s musical endeavors from large electric bands to intimate acoustic trios. He resides in New York City and Japan where he continues to be an in-demand session player and performer.

Justin Harrington (aka Demeanor) is an MC, banjo and bones player from Greensboro, North Carolina. Justin studied at the College Conservatory of Music at University of Cincinnati before leaving school to join his aunt, Rhiannon Giddens, as part of her Freedom Highway Tour. He has been playing the banjo for several years, crafting an unconventional fusion of hip-hop and American roots music in an effort to break down the wall separating black Americans with their own ancestral tradition, while celebrating American folk music as an African American art form. Justin is dedicated to developing an impactful body of work, and curating empowering environments, striving to follow in the footsteps of his predecessors while establishing a new musical legacy. He received a 2020 OneBeat Accelerator Grant to fund his non-profit initiative, Haus of Lacks, which aims to connect socially-engaged artists to develop + share strategies for using art and music creation to affect direct and actionable social change in their communities.