There Is No Other (CD)

Rhiannon Giddens’ latest album “there is no Other”, recorded with Italian multi-instrumentalist Francesco Turrisi, was produced by Joe Henry and tracked over an intensely productive five day period in Dublin, Ireland. “there is no Other” is at once a condemnation of “othering” and a celebration of the spread of ideas, connectivity and shared experience.

Tracing the overlooked movement of sounds from Africa and the Arabic world and their influence on European and American music, “there is no Other” illuminates the universality of music and the commonality of the human experience. The album comprises a mix of original songs penned by Giddens and a diverse set of interpretations ranging from Ola Belle Reed’s “I’m Gonna Write Me a Letter,” and Oscar Brown, Jr’s “Brown Baby,” the Italian traditional “Pizzica di San Vito” to the aria “Black Swan” by Gian-Carlo Menotti.

Rhiannon Giddens is a celebrated artist who excavates the past to reveal bold and candid truths about our present. She has performed for the Obamas at the White House, acted in two seasons of the hit television series Nashville and received a Grammy in 2010 as a member of the Carolina Chocolate Drops. Her subsequent acclaimed solo albums, Tomorrow is My Turn (along with the EP Factory Girl, produced by T Bone Burnett) and Freedom Highway, received three Grammy nominations.

Track listing
1. Ten Thousand Voices
2. I’m Gonna Write Me a Letter
3. Wayfaring Stranger
4. there is no Other
5. Trees On The Mountains
6. Pizzica di San Vito
7. Brown Baby
8. Briggs’ Forró
9. Little Margaret
10. Black Swan
11. I’m On My Way
12. He Will See You Through