Ani DiFranco
Ani DiFranco (born Angela Maria DiFranco on September 23, 1970) is a Grammy Award-winning singer, guitarist, and songwriter. She is known as a prolific artist and is widely celebrated as a feminist icon.
DiFranco’s guitar playing is often characterized by a signature staccato style,rapid fingerpicking and many alternate tunings. She delivers many of her lines in a speaking style notable for its rhythmic variation. Her lyrics, which often include alliteration, metaphor, word play and a more or less gentle irony, have also received praise for their sophistication.
Although DiFranco’s music has been classified as both folk rock and alternative rock, she has reached across genres since her earliest albums. She has used a variety of instruments and styles: brass instrumentation was prevalent in 1998’s Little Plastic Castle, a simple walking bass in her 1997 cover of Hal David and Burt Bacharach’s Wishin’ and Hopin’, strings on the 1997 live album Living in Clip and 2004’s Knuckle Down, and electronics and synthesisers in 1999’s To the Teeth and in 2006’s Reprieve.DiFranco has collaborated with a wide range of artists including pop musician Prince, folk musician and social activist Utah Phillips, funk and soul jazz musician Maceo Parker and rapper Corey Parker.
DiFranco herself noted that "folk music is not an acoustic guitar—that’s not where the heart of it is. I use the word ‘folk’ in reference to punk music and rap music.It’s subcorporate music that gives voice to different communities and their struggle against authority."It’s an attitude, it’s an awareness of one’s heritage, and it’s a community.
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