Anaïs Mitchell

Hadestown won eight awards at the 73rd Annual Tony Awards, including Best Musical. For her work, Mitchell won the Tony Award for Best Original Score and was nominated for Best Book of a Musical. She additionally won the Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album. In 2020, Mitchell published her first book, Working on a Song: The Lyrics of Hadestown, and was named by Time magazine as one of the 100 most influential people in the world. Mitchell is a member of the band Bonny Light Horseman, whose self-titled debut was released in 2020. The band's second album, Golden Rolling Holy, was released in 2022, followed by Keep Me on Your Mind/See You Free in 2024.

Anaïs Mitchell studied at Middlebury College. The recorded working language is English. The field of work recorded is music composing. Subjects and genres recorded for the work are indie folk and traditional folk music. Distinctions recorded are Richard Rodgers Awards for Musical Theatre and Tony Award for Best Original Score.

• Name — Anaïs Mitchell • Born — 26 March 1981 • Origin — Montpelier, Vermont, U.S. • Instrument — * Vocals • guitar • piano • Genre — Indie folk, Americana, country folk, pop music • Occupation — * Singer-songwriter • musician • playwright • Years Active — 2002–present • Label — * Waterbug • Righteous Babe • Wilderland • Thirty Tigers • BMG

Mitchell's father, a novelist and college professor, named her after author Anaïs Nin. She grew up on Treleven farm in Addison County, Vermont and graduated from Mount Abraham Union High School. She was raised Quaker. Her mother was Deputy Secretary of Vermont's Agency of Human Services. After traveling to the Middle East, Europe and Latin America as a child, she attended Middlebury College, where she majored in political science and graduated in 2004.

She began writing her first songs at the age of 17, around 1998. Just five years later Mitchell won the New Folk award in 2003, when she was 22, 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. Her album Hadestown, produced by Todd Sickafoose, was released in spring 2010 to favorable reviews. Described as "the story of Orpheus and Eurydice set in post-apocalyptic Depression-era America, the album includes guest appearances by Ani DiFranco, Greg Brown, Justin Vernon of Bon Iver, Ben Knox Miller of The Low Anthem, and The Haden Triplets (Petra, Rachel, and Tanya Haden). Mitchell continued quietly working on a stage version of Hadestown while also writing and recording new material. In early 2012, she released Young Man in America on Wilderland Records. Mitchell opened the North American leg of Bon Iver's autumn 2012 tour, which included two sold-out shows at Radio City Music Hall. The album was largely praised by critics as "genre-defying" and her "second consecutive masterpiece." In late 2012, Mitchell completed recording seven songs from the collection of Child Ballads, compiled by Francis James Child, with fellow musician Jefferson Hamer. The album, produced by Gary Paczosa, was released in February 2013, winning a BBC Radio 2 Folk Award for Best Traditional Song. This was followed in 2014 by xoa, for which Mitchell re-recorded a number of her older songs using only guitar and vocals. This stripped back album included some songs from Hadestown which were recorded for the first time in Mitchell's own voice, as well as three brand new songs. In summer 2016, the newly expanded theatrical version of Hadestown opened at New York Theatre Workshop with Vogue magazine predicting that "Hadestown will be your next musical theatre obsession". The following year, it received its Canadian premiere at The Citadel Theatre, Edmonton, and in April 2018, London's National Theatre announced that it would present a three-month run during the winter ahead of the show's Broadway transfer. Hadestown opened on Broadway at the Walter Kerr Theatre on April 17, 2019. In 2019, Mitchell was appearing as part of a three-piece "supergroup" called Bonny Light Horseman, consisting of herself, Eric D. Johnson of Fruit Bats and guitarist Josh Kaufman. The group's self-titled debut album was released on January 24, 2020. In June 2021, American supergroup Big Red Machine announced their second studio album, How Long Do You Think It's Gonna Last?, which features Mitchell's guest vocals in three of its tracks: "Latter Days", "Phoenix", and "New Auburn".

While at Middlebury College, Mitchell met Noah Hahn, whom she married in 2006. They have two daughters, Ramona and Rosetta.

List of albums, with selected information • Title — Album details — Peak chart positions • US Folk — US Heat — SCO — UK Amer. — UK DL — UK Indie • The Song They Sang... When Rome Fell — *Released: 2002 *Label: Self-released *Formats: CD — — — — — — — — — – — – • Hymns for the Exiled — *Released: September 21, 2004 *Label: Waterbug *Formats: CD, digital download — — — — — — — — — – — – • The Brightness — *Released: February 13, 2007 *Label: Righteous Babe *Formats: CD, digital download — — — — — — — — — – — – • Hadestown — *Released: March 9, 2010 *Label: Righteous Babe *Formats: CD, digital download, LP — 9 — 33 — — — — — – — – • Young Man in America — *Released: February 13, 2012 *Label: Wilderland, Thirty Tigers *Formats: CD, digital download, LP — 13 — 27 — — — – — – — 22 • Child Ballads (with Jefferson Hamer) — *Released: February 11, 2013 *Label: Wilderland, Thirty Tigers *Formats: CD, digital download, LP — 20 — 38 — — — — — – — 19 • Xoa — *Released: September 30, 2014 *Label: Wilderland, Thirty Tigers *Formats: CD, digital download — — — — — — — — — – — – • Anaïs Mitchell — *Released: January 28, 2022 *Label: BMG Rights Management *Formats: CD, digital download, LP — — — — — 37 — 3 — 30 — 10

List of albums, with selected information • Title — Album details • Country E.P. (with Rachel Ries) — *Released: September 2, 2008 *Label: Righteous Babe *Formats: Vinyl, CD, digital download

List of albums, with selected information • Title — Album details — Peak chart positions • US — US Indie — US Cast — UK DL — UK Indie • Why We Build The Wall (EP – Selections from Hadestown. The Myth. The Musical. Live Original Cast Recording) — *Released: October 13, 2016 *Label: Parlophone *Formats: digital download — — — — — — — — — — • Hadestown: The Myth. The Musical. (Live Original Cast Recording) — *Released: October 6, 2017 *Label: Parlophone, Warner Classics *Formats: CD, digital download — — — — — 3 — — — — • Hadestown (Original Broadway Cast Recording) — *Released: July 26, 2019 *Label: Sing It Again *Formats: CD, LP, digital download — 49 — 4 — 1 — 21 — 25

• Title — Year — Album • "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day" — 2016 — Acoustic Christmas (An Amazon Music Original) • "Woyaya" (with Kate Stables) — 2018 — Love Me Not (Amazon Original) • "By Degrees" (with Mark Erelli, Rosanne Cash, Sheryl Crow, Lori McKenna, Josh Ritter) — rowspan="2" non-album single • "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day" (with Thomas Bartlett) — 2019 • "Minnesota" (with Mick Flannery) — 2020 — Mickmas EP, Vol. 3 • "Grace Cathedral Hill" — 2021 — Stars Rock Kill (Rock Stars) • "Bright Star" — Anaïs Mitchell • "Brooklyn Bridge" • "On Your Way (Felix Song)" — 2022

List of albums, with selected information • Title — Year — Peak chart positions — Album • US AAA • "Phoenix" (Big Red Machine featuring Anaïs Mitchell and Fleet Foxes) — 2021 — 33 — How Long Do You Think It's Gonna Last?

• Title — Year — Other artist(s) — Album • "Mockingbird" — 2008 — Songs For Laura Volume One • "Quarter to Ten" — Gregory Douglass — Turning Back Beautiful • "L'Internazionale" — 2009 — Thrufters & Through-Stones: The Music of Vermont's First 400 Years • "All My Trials" — Beautiful Star – The Songs of Odetta • "Alight" — 2013 — Round Mountain — The Goat • "Even Then" — The Bengsons — Hundred Days • "Wedding Song (Live)" — Live at Caffe Lena: Music From America's Legendary Coffeehouse • "Anchors" — Kris Gruen — New Comics From the Wooden World • "Clyde Waters" — Jefferson Hamer — The Mark Radcliffe Folk Sessions 2013

• Working on a Song: The Lyrics of Hadestown (October 6, 2020; Penguin Audio)

Anaïs Mitchell is recorded as composer, singer-songwriter, guitarist, playwright and singer.