Incredible String Band

"For those of us who fell in love with the ISB, there was a feeling of breathing the air of a very expansive imagination indeed."
—Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury

$5 tickets for teens (ages 13-18) are available through High 5 Tickets to the Arts. Click here for details. Devoted followers from the Archbishop of Canterbury to Led Zeppelin have paid homage to the enduring charms of the Incredible String Band. Contemporary music makers such as Matmos and Animal Collective also appreciate the ISB's groundbreaking fusing of diverse genres. In their beguiling albums from the 1960s, which rivaled Sgt. Pepper's as iconic influences, the ISB combined lyrical literary allusions from ancient bardic traditions with psychedelic whimsy. Musically, they seamlessly brought together Celtic strains with Caribbean folk, Arabic street band sounds, bluegrass, and Indian drones, among other strands of world music.

It's been 30 years since the ISB last performed in the U.S., but their music has enjoyed a recent revival with an overdue series of reissues of all their classic albums, the publication of an ISB anthology (beGLAD), and the release of a brand new CD, Nebulous Nearnesses. For this tour, ISB have re-formed around founding members Mike Heron and Clive Palmer. You'll delight to ISB favorites—"Chinese White," "The Water Song," and the epic "A Very Cellular Song"—as the group enchants newcomers and longtime fans alike.

Spires That in the Sunset Rise, an all-female band of multi-instrumentalists based in Chicago, open the show.


support credits

Music season presented by National City.

Major support for the performing arts season provided by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation.

Additional season support provided by the Ohio Arts Council and the Corporate Annual Fund of the Wexner Center Foundation.