Anaïs Mitchell

Anaïs Mitchell (/ɑːˈneɪs/; born March 26, 1981) is an American singer-songwriter and musician. Mitchell has released five albums, including Hadestown (2010) and Young Man in America (2012). She has been described as the "queen of modern folk music."

Early life

Mitchell's father is a novelist and college professor and named her after author Anaïs Nin. She grew up on a farm in Addison County, Vermont, and after traveling to the Middle East, Europe and Latin America as a child, she attended Middlebury College.

Career

Having begun writing her first songs at the age of 17, Mitchell recorded her debut album The Song They Sang When Rome Fell in a single afternoon in 2002.

In 2003 Mitchell won the New Folk award at the Kerrville Folk Festival. Her album Hymns for the Exiled was released on Chicago's Waterbug Records label in 2004. This recording attracted the attention of singer/songwriter Ani DiFranco, who signed her to the Righteous Babe Records label.

In 2006 Mitchell debuted a draft of her "folk opera" Hadestown, which she wrote in collaboration with arranger Michael Chorney and director Ben T. Matchstick. A revised version of Hadestown was staged in 2007. Her third album, The Brightness, was released that same year on Righteous Babe Records. In 2008 Mitchell was nominated for the Contemporary Artist category of the third annual Folk Alliance awards show. In September of that same year, Righteous Babe Records released country e.p., a split vinyl/CD EP Mitchell recorded with fellow musician Rachel Ries.