2nd SHIFT Concert: Jake Blount

doors open 7:30, concert begins at 8PM

jakeblount.com

Jake Blount is an award-winning musician and scholar based in Providence, RI. He’s the 2020 recipient of the Steve Martin Banjo Prize—yes, THAT Steve Martin—a two-time winner of the Appalachian String Band Music Festival “Clifftop,” and a specialist in the early folk music of Black Americans. He’s justifiably won a lot of accolades by skillfully reminding us of where “American roots music” comes from, but he also understands that traditions thrive by continuing to look ahead. His latest release, 2022’s The New Faith, is an Afrofuturist concept album that reimagines and recontextualizes traditional Black religious music in the imagined aftermath of a climate crisis.

Though he typically performs accompanied by other musicians, this performance, we are lucky to have the relatively rare chance to see him in a special intimate, solo format.