Annie Raines

Annie Raines was born near Boston, Massachusetts in 1969. She took up harmonica while still in high school and dropped out of her freshman year at Antioch to pursue a musical career. Fascinated by the sounds of Muddy Waters, Little Walter Jacobs, Big Walter and Sonny Boy Williamson, she spent countless hours listening to and absorbing the music of the Chicago blues masters. She began to play gigs at local Boston clubs, and later traveled to Chicago where she met and played with Pinetop Perkins, Louis Meyers, and James Cotton.

Her reputation for playing with energy, soulfulness, and taste led her to become one of the most in-demand players on the local blues circuit, where she worked with, among others, Shirley Lewis, Susan Tedeschi and the Tarbox Ramblers. She began working with Country Blues master Paul Rishell in 1992. They have been a working team since then, playing Country Blues, Chicago Blues, Southern Gospel, and their own compositions at festivals, concert halls, and clubs all over the world. They have just released Goin' Home, their third CD together (on which Annie also plays piano, mandolin, and Hammond organ) on Tone-Cool/Artemis Records.

ANNIE'S PHOTO GALLERY

click on the links to some fun photos!

Annie with Susan Tedeschi and Debbie Davies at the 2000 Handy Awards
Backstage at the Old Vienna Coffeehouse
Paul & Annie's third eye

still from Live at Woodstock video by Nevessa Productions

photo by Don Millard