Doors at 6:00 pm | Show at 7:00 pm • Seated Show • $31 General Admission | All Ages
When guitarist and composer Yasmin Williams sits down to compose, she does not search her subconscious for elaborate melodies or clever chord progressions. Instead, she goes granular—fixating on a single note. She plays it again and again, sustaining it, adjusting the attack or release, subtly shifting its character. Eventually, other notes begin to gather around it, forming chords and expanding its world. Williams calls this process “ruminating,” and it is central to her writing.
“I’ve learned a little about how to sit with a note, and to give things time,” the Virginia native says. “You find some tiny idea and just play it over and over again until something else appears. You have to trust that sometimes a note will take you where it wants to go next.” That intuitive patience led to the breathtakingly tactile and quietly riveting Acadia, her Nonesuch debut. Across nine original compositions, Williams expands dramatically on the sonic landscape she began shaping with her acclaimed 2021 release, Urban Driftwood.
In addition to the crisp fingerpicked guitar that established her as a rising force in instrumental folk, Williams performs on kora, harp guitar, banjo, electric guitar, and bass with striking authority. While her earlier recordings were largely solo endeavors, Acadia finds her collaborating across a broad stylistic spectrum, including vocalist Aoife O’Donovan, violinist Darrian Donovan Thomas, folk quartet Darlingside, synthesist Rich Ruth, and jazz alto saxophonist Immanuel Wilkins.
Though the songs on Acadia evoke rolling hills and rustic rambles, they are far from traditional folk. Many unfold as intricate suites, marked by sudden shifts in mood, spontaneous reharmonizations, and extended tension-building passages more commonly associated with progressive rock.
Williams organized Acadia in three movements: an opening section that channels the exuberance of old-time music while gently stretching its conventions; a middle passage rich with layered textures and atmospheric expanse; and a final segment introducing electric guitars and drums, embracing an experimental and improvisational spirit.
Written while touring, the music carries that momentum within it. There is breath, motion, and a sense of the world unfolding in real time.
It is music that feels alive.
