Po' Girl
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Po' Girl is a Canadian music group whose style derives from
folk Folk or Folks may refer to: Sociology *Nation *People * Folklore ** Folk art ** Folk dance ** Folk hero ** Folk horror ** Folk music *** Folk metal *** Folk punk *** Folk rock ** Folk religion * Folk taxonomy Arts, entertainment, and media * Fo ...
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and
jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Its roots are in blues, ragtime, European harmony, African rhythmic rituals, spirituals, h ...
. The band evolved from a series of jam sessions, in 2000, between Trish Klein of The Be Good Tanyas and Allison Russell, then of Fear of Drinking. The two met up again in 2003 and named themselves Po' Girl. Klein said at the time that the new group offered her the opportunity to write and perform her own songs. Po' Girl recorded their last album in 2010, but the members' musical careers have continued to develop, either as soloists or in other bands. Once based in Vancouver, Po' Girl is now back in the Eastern cities of Toronto and Montreal. The current band lineup is Allison Russell (singer/multi-instrumentalist), Awna Teixeira (singer/multi-instrumentalist), Benny Sidelinger (multi-instrumentalist) and Mikey "Lightning" August.


Musical style

The style of music they perform has been called "urban roots", defined by band founding member Allison Russell as "rural music with urban lyrical content and appeal, typically played on old-timey instruments...defined in its early years... s..mostly folk- and country-influenced". The band's sound has been described as having a "bit more jazz and swing" than that of the Be Good Tanyas, and "with straightforward musicianship built around Klein and Russell’s intertwining vocals, Po’ Girl delivers nice, casual music that slowly grooves into the heart." Po' Girl's music has been compared with that of
The Band The Band was a Canadian-American rock music, rock band formed in Toronto, Ontario, in 1957. It consisted of the Canadians Rick Danko (bass, guitar, vocals, fiddle), Garth Hudson (organ, keyboards, accordion, saxophone), Richard Manuel (piano, d ...
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Hazel Dickens Hazel Jane Dickens (June 1, 1925 – April 22, 2011) was an American bluegrass singer, songwriter, double bassist, guitarist and banjo player. Her music was characterized not only by her high, lonesome singing style, but also by her provoca ...
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Tracy Chapman Tracy Chapman (born March 30, 1964) is an American singer-songwriter, widely known for her hit singles " Fast Car" (1988) and " Give Me One Reason" (1995). She was signed to Elektra Records by Bob Krasnow in 1987. The following year she rel ...
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Natalie Merchant Natalie Anne Merchant (born October 26, 1963) is an American singer-songwriter. She joined the band 10,000 Maniacs in 1981 and was lead vocalist and primary lyricist for the group. She remained with the group for their first seven albums before ...
,
Elizabeth Cotten Elizabeth "Libba" Cotten ( Nevills; January 5, 1893 – June 29, 1987) was an influential American folk and blues musician. She was a self-taught left-handed guitarist who played a guitar strung for a right-handed player, but played it upside do ...
and
Norah Jones Norah Jones ( ; born Geethali Shankar; March 30, 1979) is an American singer-songwriter and musician. She has won several awards for her music and, , has sold more than 53 million records worldwide. '' Billboard'' named her the top jazz artist of ...
. It showcases melodies from instruments as diverse as
banjo The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and in modern forms is usually made of plastic, where early membranes were made of animal skin. ...
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clarinet The clarinet is a Single-reed instrument, single-reed musical instrument in the woodwind family, with a nearly cylindrical bore (wind instruments), bore and a flared bell. Clarinets comprise a Family (musical instruments), family of instrume ...
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harmonica The harmonica, also known as a French harp or mouth organ, is a free reed wind instrument used worldwide in many musical genres, notably in blues, American folk music, classical music, jazz, country, and rock. The many types of harmonica incl ...
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dobro Dobro () is an American brand of resonator guitars owned by Gibson and manufactured by its subsidiary Epiphone. The term "dobro" is also used as a generic term for any wood-bodied, single-cone resonator guitar. The Dobro was originally a gui ...
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accordion Accordions (from 19th-century German language, German ', from '—"musical chord, concord of sounds") are a family of box-shaped musical instruments of the bellows-driven free reed aerophone type (producing sound as air flows past a Reed (mou ...
, and gutbucket bass.


Recordings

They released their self-titled debut album in 2003. One reviewer commented on the "folk-mountain fresh" vocals of Klein, the "sleepy clarinet" of Russell and similarities to The Cowboy Junkies and
Norah Jones Norah Jones ( ; born Geethali Shankar; March 30, 1979) is an American singer-songwriter and musician. She has won several awards for her music and, , has sold more than 53 million records worldwide. '' Billboard'' named her the top jazz artist of ...
. Shortly after the release of the first album, the band added a new member, Diona Davies, who was known to Klein as a skilled fiddler. In 2004, they recorded and released their second album, ''Vagabond Lullabies'', which included Davies (fiddle, piano and vocals), CR Avery, ( hip hopper) from the trio Tons of Fun University, Roey Shemesh on bass and John Raham and Shelley Okepnak on drums. The album was positively received, with Sue Keogh of the
British Broadcasting Corporation The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public broadcasting, public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved in ...
(BBC) noting that "This is a sweet little gem showcasing some of the finest
acoustic music Acoustic music is music that solely or primarily uses instruments that produce sound through acoustic means, as opposed to electric or electronic means. While all music was once acoustic, the retronym "acoustic music" appeared after the a ...
ians Canada currently has to offer," and Mike Regenstreif in '' Sing Out!'' writing that "Hip hop poet C.R. Avery effectively adds spoken word passages to a couple of songs". There were guest appearances on ''Vagabond Lullabies'' from Frazey Ford and
Ani DiFranco Angela Maria "Ani" DiFranco (; born September 23, 1970) is an American-Canadian singer-songwriter. She has released more than 20 albums. DiFranco's music has been classified as folk rock and alternative rock, although it has additional influenc ...
. One reviewer stated that ''Vagabond Lullabies'' had more "depth and maturity" than their debut album, with contrasting vocals and good harmonies, but did comment that there was "still an odd Americana-goes-pop polish that keeps Po’ Girl from sounding entirely authentic". 2006 saw the release of their ''B Side'' record, with tracks including guest appearances by Sarah Harmer,
Luther Wright Luther A. Wright Jr. (born September 22, 1971) is an American former professional basketball player, in the center position. Basketball career A native of Jersey City, New Jersey, Wright played high school ball for one season under coach Bob ...
, Shaun Brodie, Jason Mercer and Ana Egge (which could only be purchased off-stage). In 2007 came their third album, ''Home to You'', which was noted as being focused "on the band's bittersweet relationship with being away from home". One reviewer said the album was a "most nourishing slice of
Americana Americana may refer to: *Americana music, a genre or style of American music * Americana (culture), artifacts of the culture of the United States Film, radio and television * ''Americana'' (1981 film), an American drama film * ''Americana'' (20 ...
" with a mixture of folk, blues and
alt-rock Alternative rock (also known as alternative music, alt-rock or simply alternative) is a category of rock music that evolved from the independent music underground of the 1970s. Alternative rock acts achieved mainstream success in the 1990s w ...
. ''Deer in the Night'' was released in May 2009 with one reviewer noting that there were "touches of jazz idiosyncrasy in their vocal lines, echoes of French chanson, hints of the deliciously odd Nova Scotian folk, all mix dtogether into an organic whole". Russell was later to note that she had been abused by her stepfather for 10 years when she was a teenager and wrote the song "No Shame" in 2006 following his release from prison. She said she was encouraged to perform the song on stage by the other band members and the response from members the audiences—many of whom told stories of their abuse—confirmed for her that the issue was "endemic". She said that it was important to not be silent about what had happened to her. In the summer of 2009, they completed a live album consisting of recordings in venues from their favourite states. The studio album ''Follow Your Bliss'', described as a "listening experience guided by a multitude of masterfully executed instruments which sound simple in their design but intricate in their delivery", was released in 2010. Joe Breen in ''The Irish Times'' commented that the music on the album showed many influences and could "never be accused of sameness".


Live performances

In 2005 Davies estimated that the band had been touring for at least 10 months of the previous year, and admitted that much of their material was inspired from being on the road. The band made their first tour to Scotland in 2010, playing at the
Edinburgh Festival __NOTOC__ This is a list of Arts festival, arts and cultural festivals regularly taking place in Edinburgh, Scotland. The city has become known for its festivals since the establishment in 1947 of the Edinburgh International Festival and the ...
, and followed this up with a series of concerts around UK and Ireland. Folk Radio noted at the time:
It’s impossible to put this band in a tidy little box – they’re equally at home in Douala, Cameroon playing the Massao World Music Festival, as they are at the International Jazz Festival in Montreal, the Winnipeg Folk Festival, the Woodford Music Festival in Australia or just playing for fun for the people in Vondel Park, Amsterdam.
They played Ontario in 2012 which they found "inspiring", and when interviewed before a concert in 2011, Russell said that the group was a "modern-day troupe of nomads" who had toured extensively and she was "willing to make sacrifices to see where the road would take Po’ Girl".


Ongoing musical careers of members

Russell has continued her musical career, being a member and co-director of the band
Birds of Chicago Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class (biology), class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the Oviparity, laying of Eggshell, hard-shelled eggs, a high Metabolism, metabolic rate, a fou ...
since 2012, and from 2019 has performed with and written for the band Our Native Daughters, whose debut album, '' Songs of Our Native Daughters'', was widely acclaimed. In 2021, Russell released her debut solo album '' Outside Child''. From 2006 Davies has been a member of the band E.S.L. Trish Klein has continued to work with The Be Good Tanyas, as well as having credits for recording with Frazey Ford, Ana Egge, and Bill Bourne, and on several
roots revival A roots revival (folk revival) is a trend which includes young performers popularizing the traditional musical styles of their ancestors. Often, roots revivals include an addition of newly composed songs with socially and politically aware lyr ...
compilation albums. In 2012 Awna Teixeira released a solo album, ''Where the Darkness Goes''. She was joined by Allison Russell on this recording and the music was said to show inspiration from a wide range of sources that created songs in a folk style which were observations of her "life and times and travels". In 2013, in a home recording space in Salt Lake City, Teixeira played, sang and recorded all five songs on an EP ''Thunderbird''. A full-length album, ''Wild One'', was released by Teixeira in 2015, with a reviewer Greg Johnson noting that this second album " asa work of swirling mystery steeped in sweet misery with uplifting haunting music and an eclectic palette of songs and instruments". Teixeira commented:
"When I first started writing these songs almost two years ago, I decided that I would like to somehow use this release to help raise mental health awareness. There are songs on this album that make reference to and are for some beautiful people in my life that struggle with mental illness and for some beautiful people we have lost along the way".
Because of references in one song to mental illness issues within Teixeira' family, another reviewer said the album wasn't an "easy listen."


Photo gallery

Image:Allison Russell Po' Girl.jpg, Allison Russell of Po' Girl, performing at
Wood Wood is a structural tissue/material found as xylem in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulosic fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin t ...
, 2009 Image:Awna Teixeira, Po' Girl.jpg, Awna Teixeira of Po' Girl, performing at
Wood Wood is a structural tissue/material found as xylem in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulosic fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin t ...
, 2009


Discography

*2003 '' Po' Girl'' *2004 ''Vagabond Lullabies'' *2006 ''B-side recordings'' *2007 ''Home to You'' *2008 ''Deer in the Night'' *2009 ''Live'' *2010 ''Follow Your Bliss''


References


External links


Po' Girl
at
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Po Girl Musical groups established in 2000 Musical groups from Vancouver Canadian folk music groups 2000 establishments in British Columbia