Gillian Welch | |
|---|---|
 Welch performing atMerleFest in 2006 | |
| Background information | |
| Born | Gillian Howard Welch (1967-10-02)October 2, 1967 (age 58) New York City, U.S. |
| Origin | Nashville, Tennessee |
| Genres | |
| Occupation | Singer-songwriter |
| Instruments |
|
| Years active | 1996–present |
| Labels |
|
| Website | gillianwelch.com |
Gillian Howard Welch (/ˈɡɪliən/; born October 2, 1967) is an American singer-songwriter. She performs with her musical partner, guitaristDavid Rawlings. Their sparse and dark musical style, which combines elements ofAppalachian music,bluegrass,country andAmericana, is described byThe New Yorker as "at once innovative and obliquely reminiscent of past rural forms."[1]
Welch and Rawlings have collaborated on nine critically acclaimed albums, five released under her name, three released under Rawlings' name, and two under both of their names. Her 1996 debut,Revival, and the 2001 releaseTime (The Revelator), received nominations for theGrammy Award for Best Contemporary Folk Album. Her 2003 album,Soul Journey, introduced electric guitar, drums, and a more upbeat sound to their body of work. After a gap of eight years, she released a fifth studio album,The Harrow & the Harvest, in 2011, which was also nominated for a Grammy for Best Contemporary Folk Album. In 2020, Welch and Rawlings releasedAll the Good Times (Are Past & Gone), which won the 2021Grammy Award for Best Folk Album.[2] In 2024, Welch and Rawlings releasedWoodland, which would win the 2025 Grammy Award for Best Folk Album, currently making Welch and Rawlings the only duo to win the award more than once.[3]
Welch was an associate producer and performed on two songs of thesoundtrack of theCoen brothers 2000 filmO Brother, Where Art Thou?, aplatinum album that won theGrammy Award for Album of the Year in 2002. She also appeared in the film attempting to buy a Soggy Bottom Boys record. Welch, while not one of the principal actors, did sing and provide additional lyrics to the Sirens song "Didn't Leave Nobody but the Baby." In 2018 she and Rawlings wrote the song "When a Cowboy Trades His Spurs for Wings" for the Coens'The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, for which they received a nomination for theAcademy Award for Best Original Song.
Welch was born on October 2, 1967, in New York City, and was adopted by Mitzie Welch (née Marilyn Cottle)[4][5] and Ken Welch, comedy and music entertainers.[1] Her biological mother was afreshman in college, and her father was a musician visiting New York City.[1][6][7] Welch has speculated that her biological father could have been one of her favorite musicians, and she later discovered from her adoptive parents that he was a drummer.[1][6][7]Alec Wilkinson ofThe New Yorker stated that "from an address they had been given, it appeared that her mother ... may have grown up in themountains of North Carolina".[1] When Welch was three, her adoptive parents moved to Los Angeles to write music forThe Carol Burnett Show. They also appeared onThe Tonight Show.[1]
As a child, Welch was introduced to the music of Americanfolk singersBob Dylan,Woody Guthrie, and theCarter Family. She performed folk songs with her peers at theWestland Elementary School in Los Angeles.[1][8] Welch later attendedCrossroads School, a high school inSanta Monica, California. While in high school, a local television program featured her as a student who "excelled at everything she did."[1]
While a student at theUniversity of California, Santa Cruz, Welch played bass in agoth band, and drums in apsychedelicsurf band.[1] In college, a roommate played an album by the bluegrass bandThe Stanley Brothers, and she had anepiphany:
The first song came on and I just stood up and I kind of walked into the other room as if I was in a tractor beam and stood there in front of the stereo. It was just as powerful as the electric stuff, and it was songs I'd grown up singing. All of a sudden I'd found my music.[9]
After graduating from UC Santa Cruz with a degree in photography, Welch attended theBerklee College of Music inBoston, where she majored in songwriting.[10] During her two years studying at Berklee, Welch gained confidence as a performer.[1][10] Welch met her music partnerDavid Rawlings at a successful audition for Berklee's only country band.[11][12]
Upon finishing college in 1992, Welch moved toNashville, Tennessee.[13] She recalled, "I looked at my record collection and saw that all the music I loved had been made in Nashville—Bill Monroe, Dylan,the Stanley Brothers,Neil Young—so I moved there. Not ever thinking I was thirty years too late."[1] Rawlings soon followed. In Nashville, after singing "Long Black Veil," the two first realized that their voices harmonized well and they started to perform as a duo.[1] They never considered using a working name, so the duo were simply billed as "Gillian Welch."[1] A year after moving to Nashville, Welch found amanager,Denise Stiff, who already managedAlison Krauss. Both Welch and Stiff ignored frequent advice that Welch should stop playing with Rawlings and join a band.[1][8] They eventually signed a recording contract withAlmo Sounds.[8] Following a performance opening forPeter Rowan at theStation Inn, producerT Bone Burnett expressed interest in recording an album. Burnett did not plan to disturb Welch's and Rawlings' preference for minimal instrumentation, and Welch agreed to take him on as a producer.[14]
Welch gave a homemade copy of her demos toTim O'Brien who then recorded two of Welch's songs with his sisterMollie O'Brien. "Orphan Girl" and "Wichita" are featured on Tim and Mollie's albumAway Out On The Mountain (1994), standing as the first published songs of Welch's.
For the recording sessions of Welch's debut,Revival, Burnett wanted to recapture the bare sound of Welch's live performance.[14] Welch recalled, "That first week was really intense. It was just T Bone, the engineer, and Dave and myself. We got so inside our little world. There was very little distance between our singing and playing. The sound was very immediate. It was so light and small."[14] Later, they recorded several more songs and played with an expanded group of musicians: guitarist andRock and Roll Hall of Fame inducteeJames Burton, bassistRoy Huskey, Jr., and veteran session drummersJim Keltner andBuddy Harman.[14]
The album was released in April 1996 to mostly positive reviews. Mark Deming ofAllmusic called it a "superb debut" and wrote, "Welch's debts to artists of the past are obvious and clearly acknowledged, but there's a maturity, intelligence, and keen eye for detail in her songs you wouldn't expect from someone simply trying to ape the Carter Family."[15] Bill Friskics-Warren ofNo Depression praised the album as "breathtakingly austere evocations of rural culture."[14] The Arlington Heights, IllinoisDaily Herald's Mark Guarino observed thatRevival was "cheered and scrutinized as a staunch revivalist of Depression-era music only because her originals sounded so much like that era." He attributed this to the biblical imagery of the lyrics, Burnett's threadbare production, and the plainly-sung bleakness in Welch's vocals.[16]Ann Powers ofRolling Stone gaveRevival a lukewarm review and criticized Welch for not singing of her own experiences, and "manufacturing emotion."[17]Robert Christgau echoed Powers: Welch "just doesn't have the voice, eye, or way with words to bring her simulation off."[18]
The song, "Orphan Girl," fromRevival has been covered byEmmylou Harris,Ann Wilson,Karin Bergquist ofOver the Rhine,Mindy Smith,Patty Griffin,Linda Ronstadt,Tim &Mollie O'Brien,Holly Williams andCrooked Still.
Others who have recorded Welch's songs includeJoan Baez,Grace Potter,Courtney Barnett andKurt Vile,Punch Brothers,Mike Gordon,Bright Eyes,Calexico,Ani DiFranco,The Decemberists,Karl Blau, andJim James.
Revival was nominated for the1997Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Folk Album, but lost toBruce Springsteen'sThe Ghost of Tom Joad.[19]
The duo's 1998Hell Among the Yearlings continued the rustic and dark themes; the songs' subject matter varies from a female character killing a rapist, a mining accident, amurder ballad, and an ode tomorphine before death.[20] LikeRevival,Hell Among The Yearlings featured a sparse style that focused on Rawlings and Welch's voices and guitars.[20][21]
The album also received favorable reviews.Robert Wilonsky of theDallas Observer observed that Welch "inhabits a role so completely, the fiction separating character and audience disappears".[22] Thom Owens (Allmusic) stated that the album "lacks some of the focus" ofRevival, but is "a thoroughly satisfying second album" and proof that her debut was not a fluke.[23]No Depression's Farnum Brown commended the live and "immediate feel" of the album, Welch'sclawhammer banjo,[24] and Rawlings' harmonies.[19] Similar toRevival, Welch was praised for reflecting influences such as the Stanley Brothers, but still managing to create an original sound,[21] while Chris Herrington fromMinneapolis'sCity Pages criticized the songs' lack of authenticity. He wrote "Welch doesn't write folk songs; she writes folk songs about writing folk songs."[25]
Welch sang two songs and served as the associate producer for the Burnett-producedsoundtrack to the 2000 film of thesame name.[26] She shared vocals with Alison Krauss on a rendition of the gospel song "I'll Fly Away." Dave McKenna ofThe Washington Post praised their version: the singers "soar together."[27] Burnett and Welch wrote additional lyrics for the song "Didn't Leave Nobody but the Baby," sung by Welch, Emmylou Harris, and Krauss. The song is an elaboration of anold Mississippi tune discovered byAlan Lomax, and was nominated for the2002Grammy Award for Best Country Collaboration with Vocals.[28] Theplatinum album won the 2002Grammy Award for Album of the Year. The surprise success of the soundtrack gave Welch a career boost.[29][30] Welch also made acameo appearance in the film.[31]
WhenUniversal Music Group purchased Almo Sounds, Welch began her own independent label, Acony Records (named for the Appalachian wildflower,Acony Bell, subject of the song of that name onRevival).[8][16] Rawlings produced the first release on Welch's new label, the 2001 albumTime (The Revelator).[16][32] All but one song on the album was recorded in the historicRCA Studio B in Nashville.[33] "I Want To Sing That Rock and Roll" was recorded live at theRyman Auditorium in the recording sessions for the concert filmDown from the Mountain.
Welch has said the album is aboutAmerican history,rock 'n' roll, andcountry music.[34] There are songs about theassassination of Abraham Lincoln, theTitanic Disaster,John Henry, andElvis Presley.[33]Time continues Welch and Rawlings' style of mellow and sparse arrangements. Welch explained, "As opposed to being little tiny folk songs or traditional songs, they're really tiny rock songs. They're just performed in this acoustic setting. In our heads we went electric without changing instruments."[35]
Time (The Revelator) received extensive critical praise, most of which focused on the evolution of lyrics from mountain ballads.[26][35][36] For Michael Shannon Friedman ofThe Charleston Gazette, "Welch's soul-piercing, backwoods quaver has always been a treasure, but on this record her songwriting is absolutely stunning."[36] Critics compare the last track, the 15-minute "I Dream a Highway", to classics by Bob Dylan andNeil Young. Zac Johnson of Allmusic described "I Dream ..." as akin to "sweetly dozing in the [river] current likeHuck and Jim'sMississippi River afternoons".[35][36]No Depression's Grant Alden wrote, "Welch and Rawlings have gathered ... fragments from across the rich history of American music and reset them as small, subtle jewels adorning their own keenly observed, carefully constructed language."[26]Time finished thirteenth in the 2001Village VoicePazz & Jop music critic poll.[37]Time (The Revelator) appeared in best of decade lists ofRolling Stone,Paste,Uncut,The Irish Times, and theOttawa Citizen.[32][38][39][40][41] The album was nominated for the2002Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Folk Album, but lost to Bob Dylan'sLove and Theft.[42]Time peaked at No. 7 on theBillboard Independent Albumchart.[43]
The Revelator Collection DVD was released in 2002. It featured live performances andmusic videos of songs fromTime, and somecovers. The concert footage was filmed in 2001, and the music videos included Welch and Rawlings performing three songs at RCA Studio B.No Depression's Barry Mazor praised the DVD as an accompaniment forTime, calling it "one last exclamation point on that memorable and important project."[44]
For the 2003 release,Soul Journey, Welch and Rawlings explored new territory. Welch said: "I wanted to make it a happier record. Out of our four records, I thought this might be the one where you're driving down the road listening to it on a sunny summer day."[45] Rawlings again produced the record. The album also reflected a change in the typically sparse instrumentation: Welch and Rawlings introduced adobro, violin, electric bass and drums, and Welch later said, "Everything's not supposed to sound the same, you want it to reflect change and growth."[11]
In three songs ofSoul Journey, for the first time Welch and Rawlings recorded their own versions of traditional folk songs.[46]
Soul Journey also garnered significant acclaim.John Harris ofMojo magazine described the album as "pretty much perfect", andUncut'sBarney Hoskyns favorably compared it toBob Dylan andThe Band'sThe Basement Tapes.[47][48]Will Hermes ofEntertainment Weekly wrote that Welch has "never sounded deeper, realer, or sexier."[49]Soul Journey peaked at No. 107 on the Billboard charts, and reached No. 3 for Independent Albums.[50]
In addition to their work released under her own name, Welch and Rawlings have continued to build upon their partnership with several releases under Rawlings' name. The Rawlings releases generally feature a larger string band and more lush arrangements than their Welch material, and have usually been released under the band nameDave Rawlings Machine. Andy Gill ofThe Independent described the band’s 2009 debut albumA Friend of a Friend as "akin to one of Welch's albums, but with the balance of their harmonies swapped to favour Rawlings' voice".[51] Welch co-wrote five of the songs with Rawlings, and provided guitar and harmony vocals.[52][53] Although ostensibly Rawlings' first solo album, Alex Ramon ofPopMatters noted the similarities to Welch albums.[53]Paste Magazine'sStephen Deusner praisedA Friend of a Friend for incorporating "a wide swath of traditional American music," comments echoed byRolling Stone's Will Hermes and in thePopMatters piece.[53][54][55]
On September 18, 2015, the duo released their second album under the band title Dave Rawlings Machine,Nashville Obsolete. The band includesWillie Watson,Paul Kowert,Brittany Haas, and occasionally includesJordan Tice.
Released on August 11, 2017,Poor David’s Almanack was the first Welch/Rawlings collaboration to be released under the name David Rawlings, dropping the previous Dave Rawlings Machine moniker. The song “Cumberland Gap,” which features on the album, was nominated for the 2018Grammy Award for Best American Roots Song. It was also utilized in the opening sequence of the 2019Guy Ritchie film,The Gentlemen.[56]
In a 2007 feature inThe Guardian, critic John Harris expressed frustration that there had not been a Gillian Welch release in four years.[57]Creation Records founderAlan McGee showed optimism about Welch and Rawlings testing out some new songs while opening some concerts forRilo Kiley, and wrote in a 2009 blog entry "the long gestation period signals nothing less than a perfect album".[58] In 2009, Rawlings said that recording for the next Gillian Welch album has started, but did not give a release date.[59]
The Harrow & the Harvest was released on June 28, 2011.[60] Welch attributed the long time period between releases to dissatisfaction with the songs they were writing.[61] She explained: "Our songcraft slipped and I really don't know why. It's not uncommon. It's something that happens to writers. It's the deepest frustration we have come through, hence the album title."[61] The writing process involved "this endless back and forth between the two of us," Welch said, stating that "It's our most intertwined, co-authored, jointly-composed album."[62]
The album received praise from publications such asThe Los Angeles Times,Uncut, andRolling Stone.[63][64][65] Thom Jurek ofAllmusic wrote that the album "is stunning for its intimacy, its lack of studio artifice, its warmth and its timeless, if hard won, songcraft".[66]
The album peaked at No. 20 on the US Billboard 200 and No. 25 on theUK Albums Chart.[67][68] It was nominated for a Grammy for Best Contemporary Folk Album, as well as Best Engineered Album.[69]
Boots No 1: The Official Revival Bootleg, was released on November 25, 2016. It received the status of "universal acclaim", receiving aMetacritic score of 79 out of 100, based on reviews from 8 critics.[citation needed] The album celebrates the 20th anniversary of Welch's debut album,Revival, and includes outtakes, alternate versions, and demos of the songs featured on the original, as well as eight new unreleased tracks.
In July 2020, Welch and Rawlings announcedAll the Good Times (Are Past & Gone), an album of covers and traditional songs recorded at their home during the COVID-19 lockdowns of 2020.[70]All the Good Times is notably the first album in their decades-long history of collaboration to be released jointly in both of their names.[71] The album won the2021 Grammy Award forBest Folk Album.[2]
On July 19, 2024, Welch and Rawlings announcedWoodland, to be released August 23, 2024 through Acony Records, and shared its first single, "Empty Trainload of Sky." The album is the first collection of original material from Welch since 2011'sThe Harrow & the Harvest, and the first from Rawlings since 2017'sPoor David's Almanack.[72][73] The album won the2025 Grammy Award forBest Folk Album, marking Rawling's second win of the award and making him and Welch the only two people to have won the award more than once.[74]
Welch and Rawlings incorporate elements of early twentieth century music such asold time,classic country,gospel andtraditional bluegrass with modern elements ofrhythm and blues,rock 'n' roll,jazz, andpunk rock.[1]The New Yorker'sAlec Wilkinson maintained their musical style is "not easily classified—it is at once innovative and obliquely reminiscent of past rural forms".[1]
The instrumentation on their songs is usually a simple arrangement, with Welch and Rawlings accompanying their own vocals with acoustic guitars, banjos, or a mandolin.[1] Welch plays rhythm guitar with a 1956Gibson J-50 (or banjo), while Rawlings plays lead on a 1935Epiphone Olympic Guitar.[75]The New Yorker's Wilkinson described Rawlings as a "strikingly inventive guitarist" who plays solos that are "daring melodic leaps".[1] A review inNo Depression by Andy Moore observed that Rawlings "squeezes, strokes, chokes and does just about everything but blow into" his guitar.[76]
Many songs performed by Welch and Rawlings contain dark themes about social outcasts struggling against such elements as poverty, drug addiction, death, a disconnection from their family, and an unresponsive God.[1] Despite Welch being the lead singer, several of these characters are male.[1] Welch has commented, "To be commercial, everybody wants happy love songs. People would flat-out ask me, 'Don't you have any happy love songs?' Well, as a matter of fact, I don't. I've got songs about orphans and morphine addicts."[13] To reflect these themes, Welch and Rawlings often employ a slow pace to their songs. Their tempo is compared to a "slow heartbeat", and Cowperthwait ofRolling Stone observed that their songs "can lull you into near-hypnosis and then make your jaw drop with one final revelation".[1][77]
Geoffrey Himes ofThe Washington Post described Welch as "one of the most interesting singer-songwriters of her generation".[78] In 2003, Tom Kielty ofThe Boston Globe observed that she was "quietly establishing one of the most impressive catalogs in contemporary roots music", and a 2007 piece inThe Guardian by John Harris called Welch "one of the decade's greatest talents".[57][79] CriticRobert Hilburn of theLos Angeles Times wrote, "At every turn, she demonstrates a spark and commitment that should endear her to anyone from country and folk to pop and rock fans who appreciate imagination and heart."[80]
When Welch's first two albums came out, critics questioned the authenticity of her music, as she was raised inSouthern California, but performedAppalachian themed songs.[12][21][81] ForRevival, Welch was criticized for "manufacturing emotion", and a review ofHell Among the Yearlings by Chris Herrington ofCity Pages stated, "Welch is someone who discovered old-time music in college and decided that her own sheltered life could never be worth writing about", and that she is "completely devoid of individuality".[17][25] Other critics rejected the notion that her background affects the authenticity of her music. Music criticMark Kemp defended Welch in aNew York Times piece:
The first-person protagonist of Ms. Welch's song ("Caleb Meyer") may be a young girl from a time and place that Ms. Welch will never fully understand, but the feelings the singer expresses about rape, and the respect she displays for her chosen musical genre, are nothing if not poignantly authentic. Likewise, it matters not whether Ms. Welch has ever walked the streets of "the black dust towns ofEast Tennessee" about which she sings in "Miner's Refrain" because the sense of foreboding that she expresses for the men who once labored in coal mines with futile hopes of a better life comes through loud and clear.[82]
The Wall Street Journal's Taylor Holliday echoed this: "Stingy critics give Ms. Welch a hard time because she's a California city girl, not an Appalachian coal miner's daughter. But asLucinda or Emmylou might attest, love of the music is not a birthright, but an earned right. Listen to Ms. Welch yodel, in a tune about that no-good "gal" Morphine, and you know she's as mountain as they come."[21]
On September 16, 2015, the duo was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award for Songwriting by the Americana Music Association.
... it wasn't until I became friends with Dave and Gil, about ten years ago, that I had people who understood songwriting and could express it to me in a way that left out the guesswork.[83]
Welch emphasizes music from a previous era as her major influence. She said that "by and large I listen to people who are dead. I'm really of the tried-and-true school. I let 50 years go by and see what's really relevant."[81] Welch has acknowledged inspiration from several traditional country artists, including the Stanley Brothers, theCarter Family, theLouvin Brothers, and theBlue Sky Boys.[1][84] She explained her relationship with traditional music by saying, "I've never tried to be traditional. It's been a springboard for me and I love it and revere it and would not be doing what I do without the music of theMonroe Brothers, the Stanley Brothers and the Carter Family. However, it was clear I was never going to be able to do exactly that; I'm a songwriter."[85]
In addition to the strong country influence, Welch also draws on a repertoire of such rock 'n' roll artists asBob Dylan,Chuck Berry,Neil Young, theGrateful Dead and theVelvet Underground.[1][12][86] She has notedalternative rock bandsThrowing Muses,Pixies andCamper Van Beethoven "don't directly inform my music, but they're in there."[81][86] Her cover of "Black Star" byRadiohead became well-known and was released as a single in 2005.
Welch has recorded songs with a variety of notable artists, includingRyan Adams,Ani DiFranco,Emmylou Harris, Jay Farrar,Alison Krauss,Old Crow Medicine Show,Bright Eyes,Robyn Hitchcock,Steve Earle,Ralph Stanley,Sara Watkins,The Decemberists,Solomon Burke andMark Knopfler.[11][12][54][87][88] Welch and Rawlings' contributions on Hitchcock's albumSpooked was described by Christopher Bahn ofThe A.V. Club as "subtle but vital".[89] She later created the cover art for Hitchcock's 2014 albumThe Man Upstairs.[90] Mark Deming of Allmusic wrote that their work on Ryan Adams' albumHeartbreaker "brought out the best in Adams".[91][92]
Artists who have recorded songs written by Welch includeJimmy Buffett,Alison Krauss and Union Station,Trisha Yearwood,Joan Baez,Brad Mehldau &Chris Thile,Allison Moorer,Emmylou Harris,Miranda Lambert,Madison Cunningham,Kathy Mattea andZZ Top.[1][11][93][94][95][96]
Welch and Rawlings have played many music festivals, including TheNewport Folk Festival,Coachella Festival, TheTelluride Bluegrass Festival, TheCambridge Folk Festival,Bonnaroo,MerleFest, TheAustin City Limits Festival, andFarm Aid.[12][85][97][98][99][100][101][102][103] They have toured North America extensively, and have played in Europe, Australia, and New Zealand.[12][24][85][104] Concert reviews have praised the chemistry between Welch and Rawlings on stage.[11][104][105] Tizzy Asher of theSeattle Post-Intelligencer wrote "there was a startling unspoken intimacy between them. They anticipated each other's movements and shifted when necessary to fit each other."[105] On August 6, 2022, they performed on theGrand Ole Opry.[106]
The Dave Rawlings Machine have toured North America, with the band originally composed of Rawlings, Welch and three members of Old Crow Medicine Show.[107] The band is currently composed of Rawlings, Welch, Wilie Watson, Paul Kowert, and Brittany Haas. Welch and Rawlings also participate in group tours with notable musicians. In 2004, they were part of theSweet Harmony Traveling Revue, a three-week US tour withPatty Griffin,Buddy Miller and Emmylou Harris.[108] In 2009, The Dave Rawlings Machine joined Old Crow Medicine Show,the Felice Brothers andJustin Townes Earle for the Big Surprise Tour, a US tour described as a "roots-music extravaganza".[109] In 2011, Welch was a support act forBuffalo Springfield, who performed and toured that year.[110]
| Year | Association | Category | Nominated work | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1997 | Grammy Awards | Best Contemporary Folk Album | Revival | Nominated |
| 2001 | International Bluegrass Music Awards | Gospel Recorded Performance of the Year | "I'll Fly Away"(withAlison Krauss) | Won |
| Recorded Event of the Year | Clinch Mountain Sweethearts(withRalph Stanley and various artists) | Won | ||
| Album of the Year | O Brother, Where Art Thou?(with various artists) | Won | ||
| Academy of Country Music Awards | Won | |||
| Country Music Association Awards | Won | |||
| Vocal Event of the Year | "Didn't Leave Nobody But The Baby"(withAlison Krauss andEmmylou Harris) | Nominated | ||
| "I'll Fly Away"(withAlison Krauss) | Nominated | |||
| 2002 | Grammy Awards | Album of the Year | O Brother, Where Art Thou?(with various artists) | Won |
| Best Country Collaboration with Vocals | "Didn't Leave Nobody But The Baby"(withAlison Krauss andEmmylou Harris) | Nominated | ||
| Best Contemporary Folk Album | Time (The Revelator) | Nominated | ||
| Americana Music Honors & Awards | Album of the Year | Nominated | ||
| Song of the Year | "I Want To Sing That Rock & Roll"(withDavid Rawlings) | Nominated | ||
| Artist of the Year | Gillian Welch and David Rawlings | Nominated | ||
| International Bluegrass Music Awards | Album of the Year | Down from the Mountain(with various artists) | Won | |
| 2012 | Americana Music Honors & Awards | Artist of the Year | Gillian Welch | Won |
| Grammy Awards | Best Folk Album | The Harrow & the Harvest(with David Rawlings) | Nominated | |
| 2015 | Americana Music Honors & Awards | Lifetime Achievement Award for Songwriting | Gillian Welch and David Rawlings | Won |
| 2018 | Grammy Awards | Best American Roots Song | "Cumberland Gap"(with David Rawlings) | Nominated Thomas Wolfe Prize[111] won |
| 2019 | Academy Awards | Best Original Song | "When a Cowboy Trades His Spurs for Wings"(with David Rawlings) | Nominated |
| 2021 | Grammy Awards | Best Folk Album | All the Good Times (Are Past & Gone)(with David Rawlings) | Won |
| 2025 | Grammy Awards | Best Folk Album | Woodland(with David Rawlings) | Won |
| Americana Music Honors & Awards | Album of the Year | Nominated | ||
| Duo/Group of the Year | Gillian Welch and David Rawlings | Won |
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