2021 was not, technically, the first year Allison Russell played the Newport Folk Festival. Russell had previously taken the stage at what’s long been a venerated showcase of bearers and updaters of tradition with her bands Birds of Chicago and Our Native Daughters, but never before as a solo artist. And never with as bright a spotlight as the one …
Allison Russell | Tiny Desk Concert
“I am grateful and I am proud for this circle of goddesses,” said Allison Russell during her joyful, rousing Tiny Desk set, reaching toward the six women surrounding her. Russell has cultivated this band’s harmoniousness in the year she’s been touring in support of her astounding, unclassifiable album Outside Child, which tells the singer’s life story, from her childhood escaping …