Anaïs Mitchell Performs “We Raise Our Cups”

Anaïs Mitchell is Grammy-winning folk musician best known for her Tony-winning musical Hadestown.

Born in 1981 in Montpelier, Vermont, Mitchell began writing and playing folk music in high school. She released her first album, The Song They Sang…When Rome Fell (2002), while a student at Middlebury College in Vermont, and was signed to Ani DiFranco’s Righteous Babe Records in the wake of her record-label debut, Hymns for the Exiled (2004).

In 2006, she premiered the first version of a folk opera retelling of the mythical lovers Eurydice and Orpheus. Released as her fourth album, Hadestown (2010), the recording featured guest appearances by DiFranco, folk artist Greg Brown, and Justin Vernon of Bon Iver. An expanded stage version of the musical debuted Off-Broadway in 2016, and premiered on Broadway in 2019. Nominated for fourteen Tony Awards, it won eight, including Best Musical and Best Original Score.

Mitchell released her eponymously titled sixth studio album in early 2022. She has also recorded with folk supergroups Big Red Machine and Bonny Light Horseman.