Due to popular demand, Joan Baez will extend her worldwide “Fare Thee Well” 2018 tour into 2019 including a newly confirmed show at Selma, AL’s historic Walton Theatre on April 9. The intimate performance will mark Baez’s first return to the area since joining Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in Montgomery for the 1965 civil rights march. Tickets are available beginning this Friday, November 2 at 10:00am local time via www.joanbaezwalton.eventbrite.com. See below for complete 2018/2019 tour details.
Baez’s final formal tour celebrates her first album in ten years, Whistle Down The Wind, which was released earlier this spring to widespread praise on Bobolink/Razor & Tie Records (purchase here). The album debuted at #18 on Billboard’s Top Current Albums chart and #4 on the Americana/Folk Albums chart—Baez’s strongest chart position since 1975’s Diamonds & Rust. The album has also achieved considerable success internationally. Watch a recent profile on “CBS News Sunday Morning” here.
Recorded over a ten-day period in Los Angeles, Whistle Down The Wind was produced by three-time Grammy Award-winner Joe Henry (Bonnie Raitt, Allen Toussaint and others) and includes songs written by Tom Waits, Anohni, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Josh Ritter and Eliza Gilkyson. Of working with Henry, Baez says, “It was a hunch on both of our parts that we could make an album together. As it turned out it was a no brainer. We both work fast and were musically on the same wavelength. I work best with musicians who are as willing as I am to wing it and he assembled a group of players who did just that. Meaning: invent each song from scratch.”
The new music marks the first release from Baez since 2008’s Grammy-nominated album Day After Tomorrow. Its release, which ignited an extraordinary decade of achievement for Baez, coincided with the 50th anniversary of her legendary 1958 residency at the famed Club 47 in Cambridge. Milestones over the past ten years include:
- 2009: PBS American Masters premiere of her life story, Joan Baez: How Sweet The Sound, which underscored the 50th anniversary of Baez’s debut at the 1959 Newport Folk Festival.
- 2011: Baez’ seminal debut album of 1960 honored by the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences in 2011, which inducted it into the Grammy Hall Of Fame.
- 2015: Library of Congress selects Baez’s debut album to be preserved in the National Recording Registry.
- 2015: Amnesty International bestowed its highest honor on Baez, the Ambassador of Conscience Award, in recognition of her exceptional leadership in the fight for human rights.
- 2016: Baez’s 75th birthday was celebrated at New York’s Beacon Theater in January, where Paul Simon, Jackson Browne, Emmylou Harris and others joined her. The concert premiered on the PBS Great Performances series in May 2017.
- 2017: Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame induction
- 2017: Baez’s first solo exhibition of paintings, entitled “Mischief Makers,” was presented in Mill Valley, CA. The bulk of the exhibit was subsequently purchased by the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria and donated to Sonoma State University, where it will eventually be displayed at an envisioned new social justice learning center on campus.
Baez remains a musical force of incalculable influence. She marched on the front line of the civil rights movement with Martin Luther King, shined a spotlight on the Free Speech Movement, took to the fields with Cesar Chavez, organized resistance to the Vietnam War, inspired Vaclav Havel in his fight for a Czech Republic, saluted the Dixie Chicks for their courage to protest the Iraq war, stood with old friend Nelson Mandela in London’s Hyde Park as the world celebrated his 90th birthday and, most recently, protested the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline at Standing Rock Sioux Reservation. To this day, she continues to stand passionately on behalf of causes she embraces.
JOAN BAEZ: FARE THEE WELL TOUR 2019
- April 9—Selma, AL—Walton Theatre—on sale November 2, 2018
- April 10—Birmingham, AL—Alys Stephens Performing Arts Center
- April 12—Atlanta, GA—Atlanta Symphony Hall
- April 13—Mobile, AL—The Saenger Theatre
- April 16—San Antonio, TX—The Tobin Center for the Performing Arts
- April 17—Austin, TX—Paramount Theatre
- April 19—Dallas, TX—Strauss Square
- April 20—Fayetteville, AR— Walton Arts Center
- April 22—St Louis, MO—The Pageant
- April 23—Knoxville, TN—Tennessee Theatre
- April 25—Newport News, VA—Ferguson Concert Hall
- April 26—Washington, DC—Warner Theatre
- April 28—Northampton, MA—John M. Greene Hall
- April 30—Princeton, NJ—McCarter Theatre Center
- May 1—New York, NY—Beacon Theatre
- May 3 & 5—Port Chester, NY—Capitol Theater
JOAN BAEZ: FARE THEE WELL TOUR 2018
- October 30—San Diego, CA—Humphreys Concerts
- November 1—Santa Barbara, CA—Arlington Theatre
- November 2—Chico, CA—Laxon Auditorium
- November 4—Seattle, WA—Benaroya Hall
- November 5—Portland, OR—Revolution Hall
- November 7—Redding, CA—Cascade Theatre
- November 8—Eureka, CA—Arkely Center for the Performing Arts
- November 10—Los Angeles, CA—Royce Hall
- November 11—Rohnert Park, CA—Weill Hall at Green Music Center
- November 14—Davis, CA—Jackson Hall at Mondavi Center
- November 15—San Francisco, CA—The Masonic
- November 17 & 18—Oakland, CA—Fox Theater Oakland