Martha Redbone is a vocalist, songwriter, composer, and educator. She is known for her music gumbo of folk, blues and gospel from her childhood in Harlan County, Kentucky infused with the eclectic grit of pre-gentrified Brooklyn. Inheriting the powerful vocal range of her gospel-singing African American father and the resilient spirit of her mother’s Cherokee/Choctaw culture, Redbone broadens the boundaries of American Roots music. With songs and storytelling that share her life experience as an Afro-Indigenous woman and mother navigating in the new millennium, Redbone gives voice to issues of social justice, bridging traditions, connecting cultures, celebrating the human spirit. Redbone and Whitby are the 2020 Drama Desk Award recipients for Outstanding Music in a Play and the 2020 Audelco Award recipient for Outstanding Composer of Original Music and Score for Public Theater revival for colored girls who have considered suicide when the rainbow is enuff by Ntozake Shange. Redbone/Whitby are recipients of Creative Capital Awards, NEFA, NPN, NACF, MAPFund and NYC Womens Fund for Music.

Martha Redbone and Grammy-winner Aaron Whitby are a songwriting and production team currently devising interdisciplinary musical theater work that brings to light parts of American history that have never been told. Their music production and record imprint, Blackfeet Productions, LLC has award-winning recordings included in the permanent Library Collection at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian. The team has completed commissions for New York Voices at Joe’s Pub and Public Theater, New York Theater Workshop: Plurality of Privacy with Jim Nicola, and the Goethe Institute. They composed original music for Primer for a Failed Superpower by The TEAM, directed by Rachel Chavkin. Redbone and Whitby are recipients of the NEFA Grant, NPN Creation Fund and the Native Arts and Culture Award. Redbone is a 2015/16 Fellow of the Native Arts and Cultures Foundation.