Chastity Brown life and biography

Chastity Brown is a well known folk and jazz musician based out of Minneapolis, Minnesota. She has released three full-length albums that "straddle multiple genres."

"Capturing the energy of a live performance in the studio is one of the trickiest tasks in the book, and musicians across the decades have tried — and often failed — to do so."

Singer/songwriter Chastity Brown, however, makes it sound easy on her new sophomore disc, “Sankofa. ” The first time I heard tracks from it was via her MySpace page through tiny laptop speakers, and it sounded like Brown was sitting right next to me with her acoustic guitar and fiery songs. Raised in Knoxville, Tenn., Brown dabbles in soul, blues, gospel and even bluegrass and, quite often, brings to mind a 21st-century version of Nina Simone.

Brown has been active in the Twin Cities for a few years now, and in that time has shared bills with eclectic acts that range from hip-hop (No Bird Sing, Heiruspecs) to avant-indie rock (Hildur Victoria). Members of each of those groups comprise her backing band, which adds a lush and beautiful depth to her stirring compositions, and has further helped establish her presence as a solid live act. That she brought her band back home to Tennessee to record Back-Road Highways only further serves to illustrate that her roots run deep, and the record is an apt document of her enticing, ever-evolving sound.

Brown is a contributing artist to Think Out Loud, a Twin Cities effort to end homelessness through music

Albums released:

Do the Best You Can, 2007
Sankofa, 2009
High Noon Teeth, 2010
Back-Road Highways, 2012


Back-Road Highways is the best yet from Chastity. She opens with the slow, pulsing insistence of “House Been Burnin”, a cry out for our needs, then follows it up with the rocking blues of “When We Get There” and the plaintive, moving roots of “Solely”. Chastity turns it all around and brings out the joys and sorrows of love with the enormous, pleading, “Say It”, and throughout Back-Road Highways, Chastity sings it all out, gives us all a reason to keep on going one more day.

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