Rondi charleston band of brothers

“I just keep an awareness of the world around me,” she says in explanation of her newfound emphasis on original music. “If you’re open, you don’t have to search for songs – they come to you.

But a lot of discipline is required to turn an idea into a lyric. My approach is to immerse myself in the world of each subject.” This openness has led her to seize upon inspirations from science and nature, history and lived experience, while the discipline leads Charleston to tell stories that are shaded with poetic precision.

DNA, one of three songs in which she collaborated with guitarist Dave Stryker, blends the theoretical and the personal, and a fascination with the work of biologist James Watson that was reinforced by a visit to relatives in Norway.

“I had so much in common with my Norwegian family,” Charleston reports, “Not just physical characteristics but musicality and other traits, and I started thinking about how genetics and environment affect u