About this Performance

Thirteen years after the release of their last album together, ANOHNI and the Johnsons reunited for 2023’s My Back Was a Bridge For You to Cross. It’s an open-hearted record inspired by Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On and blue-eyed soul, an instantly approachable and vulnerable collection of songs about love, pain, and the state of the world from an artist who’s collaborated with Lou Reed, Yoko Ono, Oneohtrix Point Never, and many more. Working with producer Jimmy Hogarth, who previously worked with Amy Winehouse and Tina Turner, ANOHNI and the Johnsons developed a warm, intimate form of soul music that would’ve sounded at home in any decade since the 1970s. Anohni sings lovingly, kindly, and longingly about human connection in troubled times. “I love you, I love you, I love you,” she sings in “Sliver of Ice,” singing that simple three-word phrase with a depth of feeling that resonates deeply, long after the record is over.

When Anohni Hegarty first put her band together in 1995, she named it after Marsha P. Johnson, the Black trans performance artist and activist often credited with helping to start the Stonewall uprising, which in turn led to the gay liberation movement. The music they make together reflects Johnson’s spirit: Their albums are equal parts soulful meditation, boundary-pushing art-music, and plainspoken wake-up calls about trans and queer issues, as well as climate collapse. Her voice—maybe the most instantly recognizable of her generation among those who know it, and impossible to forget for those just encountering her—flutters with vibrato. The group’s 2005 masterpiece, I Am A Bird Now, may as well have been named for her.

Following a handful of shows in Europe this summer, ANOHNI and the Johnsons make their return to the US for their first tour together in 14 years, entitled It’s Time To Feel What’s Really Happening. That name is a challenge to apathy and cynicism. But it’s also a note of permission: Here, you can be real about what it means to be alive.

Street closures:
Saturday, September 28 at 7am through Wednesday, October 2 at 5am

• Full closure of Grand Avenue (1st to 2nd Street) adjacent to Walt Disney Concert Hall
• Westbound curb lane closure of 2nd Street from Olive Street to Grand Avenue
• Eastbound curb lane closure of 1st Street from Hope Street to Grand Avenue. An additional lane closure will be added at 12 noon on Tuesday, October 1, to accommodate valet operations/gala arrivals.

Parking: The 2nd Street entry to the Concert Hall’s garage will remain accessible from Olive Street and northbound Hope Street. The Lower Grand Avenue parking entrance will remain accessible.

Programs, artists, dates, prices, and availability subject to change. Ticket limits may apply. All sales are final.