Ani DiFranco-Knuckle Down

For Knuckle Down Ani invited a fellow musician to co-produce the new record with her. That honor went to Joe Henry, an acclaimed performer and songwriter. "I invited him out to share the stage, and we just struck up a friendship and started talking about making records—which both of us do, serially [laughs]—and really hit it off. We had a real lively creative dialogue going, so I took that as my cue to step out of my solitude and work with a co-producer for the first time—invite collaboration back into my life," Ani says. Another major change: Ani composed new songs with their role in the future album in mind, "This time, I had not only a deadline, but a context to write for: the group of musicians that I was gonna work with, and the where, how, and when of the record. I knew I wanted to have string accompaniment on this record—I thought I'd get string-y with it rather than get horn-y with it like I have in the past—use those kinds of colors." On her last album, Educated Guess (2004),