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Becca Mancari explores the different facets of forgiveness on 'Left Hand'

Becca Mancari
Shervin Lainez
/
Courtesy of the artist
Becca Mancari

Updated November 3, 2023 at 5:55 AM ET

Family. No matter what your relationship is with your family — good, bad, even non-existent — your family is part of what defines you. It's part of what makes you you. For Becca Mancari, a queer person who grew up in a conservative Christian home, that family relationship has been a complicated thing to navigate.

When Mancari's family finally invited Becca's longtime partner for dinner, for instance, it came with some caveats: "We want to invite to come to our house. We don't want you to act like you're together, but we're going to allow you to come into our home."

In this session, Mancari talks about how those experiences inspired much of the songwriting on their new album. The album, called Left Hand, includes collaborations with members of what you could call Becca's chosen family — like Brittany Howard, Julien Baker, Zac Farro and co-producer Juan Solorzano.

But its title is also a nod to Becca's heritage and the Mancari family crest, in which a left hand holds a dagger aloft. Our conversation is coming up, along with live performances beginning with the song "Eternity."

Copyright 2023 XPN

Raina Douris
Raina Douris, an award-winning radio personality from Toronto, Ontario, is the host and writer of NPR's daily nationally-syndicated music interview and discovery program World Cafe. She has interviewed artists like Bruce Springsteen, Barbra Streisand, Questlove and Brandi Carlile, and was a 2022 keynote lecturer on the topic of Folk Music and music discovery at the Chautauqua Institution.
Miguel Perez
Miguel Perez is a radio producer for NPR's World Cafe, based out of WXPN in Philadelphia. Before that, he covered arts, music and culture for KERA in Dallas. He reported on everything from the rise of NFTs in the music industry to the enduring significance of gay and lesbian bars to the LGBTQ community in North Texas.