RISSI PALMER 

Rissi Palmer's gift lies in reaching across all musical boundaries. While she made her mark in Country Music, she is equally at home in R&B music, bringing the entire spectrum of popular music to bear on music she calls “Southern Soul.”

The daughter of Georgia natives, Rissi was born near Pittsburgh, PA and spent her adolescent years in St. Louis, Missouri. Raised in a musical family that loved both country and R&B, Rissi was a part of a singing and dancing troupe sponsored by a local television station at age 16, and by the time she was 19 years old, she had already been offered her first publishing and label deal.

In 2007, she released her debut album Rissi Palmer, charting singles, “Country Girl,” “Hold On To Me,” and “No Air.” Since then, Rissi has independently released a Christmas single, her first children’s album, Best Day Ever and an EP titled The Back Porch Sessions. Her most recent album, Revival, was released in 2019 and has been critically hailed as her most personal and uplifting work to date.

Rissi is also a Special Correspondent for CMT's Hot 20 Countdown. The weekly series airs Saturdays and Sundays on CMT at 9a/8c and features chart-topping music videos, news stories, live performances and candid interviews from country’s biggest stars.

ABOUT CARROLL V. DASHIELL, JR.

The North Carolina Arts Council, Pitt County Arts Council, and the Greenville-Pitt Convention & Visitor's Bureau named Carroll V. Dashiell, Jr. Artistic Director of The African American Music Series in 2016. Carroll Dashiell is a native of Washington, DC. A graduate of Howard University, with citations in Who's Who in Music and Down Beat Magazine, Carroll has been recognized for excellence in the music industry as a bassist, musical director/conductor and also as a composer/arranger. Affectionately known as CVD, he has been involved in academia for more than three decades serving as professor of music at the Saint Mary's College of Maryland, University of the District of Columbia and East Carolina University in North Carolina. CVD is the producer and writer of A Tribute to Motown Records, (a stage show and concert that celebrates some of the African-American's cultural contributions to the music industry, staged in the tradition of the famous touring Motown Review) that is selling out theaters and venues nation-wide. In addition to composing, writing and arranging, CVD is continuing performance as jazz bassist and is very humbled to be the Founder and Director of the Dr. Billy Taylor Jazz Festival, named in honor of his mentor.