Annie & The Caldwells

Spend Easter Sunday with the group PopMatters calls “An unrepentantly soul-stirring sound capable of transcending time and place.” 

Powerhouse vocalist Annie Caldwell and her husband, guitarist Willie Joe Caldwell, Sr., founded a family band to keep their children from performing in juke joints and blues clubs. But Annie & The Caldwells ended up following the kids, pouring gospel fervor into secular songs. Hailing from West Point, Mississippi, the septet delivers a glorious book of original tunes inspired by the Gap Band, Chaka Khan, Bootsy Collins and George Clinton, all filtered through their love of the golden age gospel groups like the Ward Singers and the Soul Stirrers.  

For this Easter performance they’ll be drawing deeply from their critically acclaimed 2025 gospel album on David Byrne’s Luaka Bop label Can’t Lose (My Soul) — a masterpiece that PopMatters says “blends gospel fervor and deep grooves into a triumphant, soul-stirring album that reaches for transcendence.” 

Combining soaring gospel harmonies with grit and street savvy, the songs summon the spirit back into the sound that gave birth to soul music.