The hits keep coming for emergent Nashville artist Jobi Riccio, who recently announced her Grand Ole Opry debut on Aug. 10 this year.
The announcement comes in the wake of Riccio's many accolades for her debut album, "Whiplash," released September 2023. The album has led to her nomination as Emerging Artist of the Year for the Americana Music Association's 2024 Americana Honors and Awards, as well as her national TV debut on CBS' Saturday Sessions last November, and her Bonnaroo Music Festival debut in June. It has also garnered praise from The Nashville Scene, The New York Times, and Billboard, among others.
In fact, Riccio was already filling seats at preview shows, which earned her a John Prine Songwriting Fellowship months before her album's release.
She wrote "Whiplash" over several tumultuous years. Riccio explains: "I kept coming back to this image of someone slamming on the breaks in a car crash and this idea of emotional whiplash. That rush of stress and adrenaline felt similar to what I was experiencing as I emotionally processed my adolescence-almost as if I was being jerked around by one big life change after another."
A native of Morrison, Colorado, Riccio grew up a stone's throw away from Red Rocks Amphitheater, and surrounded by music. Of singing at the Grand Ole Opry, she said: "Playing the Opry is truly a childhood dream come true. I grew up singing along to Patsy Cline in my bedroom, wearing out the greatest hits CD my parents bought me when they noticed I had a deep love for the genre. I attended the Opry for the first time when I was 17 years old visiting Nashville looking at colleges and it is truly wild to be making my debut almost 10 years later at 26. To stand on the same stage where so many legends have performed and that has been a pivotal part of country music history through the years is beyond an honor-I hardly have the words for it."
