We don't often travel far for gigs now (as in Manchester, Birmingham or London) but Rhiannon Giddens was considered worth the trip. We saw her three years ago in Birmingham and on the strength of that booked a hotel in Manchester. The venue was new to me - the Albert Hall, a grade 1 listed former Wesleyan Chapel. Thye venue was excellent and we got there early enough to nab second row seats. Rhiannon came on first with a violinist/vocalist Justin Robinson for one track before the rest of the band came on. They were bassist and percussionist Jason Sypher and Anonymous (I can't find his name anywhere!) who were excellent but stuck to their lane in providing a rhythm backing. Congolese guitarist Niwel Tsumbu was the fifth member. He was amazing and was given a platform on many songs to display his understated skills.
The concert was a very varied selection, not surprising given Rhiannon is self-cnfessed musical history nerd. In amongst the set was a Gaelic song, a Congolese song (as a medley) a number of tunes with Rhiannon either on Banjo or Violin and the classic Elizabeth Cotton song 'Freight Train'. Amongst the songs she wrote were my favourite of the gig - 'We Could Fly'. She also wrote 'Hope is a thing with feathers' and 'The love we almost had'. I noted that there were only a couple of songs of the recently released album - respect for not plugging it endlessly.
They finished with a spirited version of 'I shall not be moved' before coming out for an acapela encore.
Loved the gig and the venue.
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