Anais Mitchell to open for Patty Griffin at Buskirk

Folk singer Anais Mitchell will play a few well-known stories to contemporary folk music at 8 tonight at the Buskirk-Chumley Theater.

Mitchell will open for singer-songwriter Patty Griffin. General tickets are $20 and student tickets are available for $15 with a valid student ID.

Mitchell’s latest album, “Child Ballads,” was named one of the best folk albums of 2013 by NPR and nominated for best folk album and best traditional song by the BBC Radio 2.

Mitchell said being recognized by NPR was a surprise.

“I didn’t expect a (traditional) record to get that kind of recognition, the songs coming as they do from another time and another place,” she said. “Proof that these weird, beautiful, ancient stories still have the power to move people.”

The album features seven covers of 19th century scholar Francis James Child’s English and Scottish Popular Ballads. Mitchell collaborated with singer-songwriter Jefferson Hamer to create the album.

Many folk singers have covered the “Child Ballads” in the past, which Mitchell said influenced which songs they chose to record.

For instance, Mitchell said the first songs they arranged were previously-covered pieces that they admired, such as Martin Carthy’s version of “Willie’s Lady” and Nic Jones’s “Penguin Eggs.”

Mitchell said she and Hamer did not initially intend to cover only Child’s works on this album, but the more they looked at the stories, the more they wanted to arrange his works.

“A lot of these stories are love stories, stories about lovers who have to overcome great odds to be together,” Mitchell said. “Sometimes they win, sometimes they lose, but there’s always that passion. It’s fun to sing that kind of passion.”

In order to feel that passion, Mitchell said she and Hamer recorded the album without wearing headphones in the recording studio.

“It was such a lovely way to record,” she said. “Just two guitars, two voices in a room as close to each other as we could get without too much microphone bleed.”

She said while the process seemed simple, it took the two artists a long time to be able to sit down and record that way.

Hamer will not be performing or touring with her, Mitchell said.

Her performance tonight will be followed by a performance from Grammy-winning folk artist Patty Griffin.

Griffin’s album “American Kid” was also one of NPR’s best folk albums of 2013.

“She is an angel and her music is so consistent and so inspiring,” Mitchell said. “There’s no one like her.”

Mitchell last performed in Bloomington in April 2012 with the Young Man Band.

Mitchell said she has also been spending time with her daughter and husband, who are accompanying her on the tour.

“It’s a family tour,” she said.

“Child Ballads” is Mitchell’s fifth studio album. The Vermont-native started her own recording label called Wilderland Records in 2012. This is her second album with her own label.

Mitchell said she is currently working on new music for an extended release version of her 2010 folk opera-based album “Hadestown,” which she said will likely be released in August.