Jake Xerxes Fussell

Jake Xerxes Fussell is a singer, guitarist, and composer based in Durham, NC. His intuitive creative process often draws from traditional music and archival field recordings – incorporating elements of songs from the past into new work. He is, according to Ann Powers of NPR, “maybe the leading interpreter of American folk music right now…”

Fussell’s album When I’m Called was released to critical acclaim by Fat Possum Records in the summer of 2024. The album was produced by James Elkington and features Blake Mills (guitars), Ben Whiteley (bass), and Joe Westerlund (drums), along with additional vocals from Joan Shelley and Robin Holcomb.

His most recent recording “Close My Eyes” (a song by the late American composer/cellist/singer Arthur Russell) was released in March of 2025 as a digital single.

Fussell and Elkington also wrote and recorded the music for Rebuilding, a new feature film directed by Max Walker-Silverman that premiered at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival.

‘Fussell’s music often comes with complex citations; he is a folksinger in the truest sense, collecting ideas and melodies and lyrics from distant and disparate traditions, looking for the things that unite us in our humanity.’
The New Yorker

‘(Fussell) is one of the great magpies of American song, collecting forgotten, tarnished gems with a folklorist’s zeal… his renditions aren’t so much cover versions as composites…’
The Guardian