In addition to her work with the Grammy-winning[1] Chocolate Drops, Giddens has released five solo albums: Tomorrow Is My Turn (2015) and Freedom Highway (2017), 2019 and 2021's There Is No Other and They're Calling Me Home (both collaborations with Italian multi-instrumentalist Francesco Turrisi), and You're the One (2023).

[2] In 2014, she participated in the T Bone Burnett-produced project titled The New Basement Tapes along with several other musicians, which set a series of recently discovered Bob Dylan lyrics to newly composed music.

[7][8][9] Lalenja Harrington is a director for Beyond Academics, a four-year certificate program supporting students with intellectual and developmental disabilities, at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

[15] During that same time period, Giddens was also a regular caller at local contra dances and featured in a Celtic music band called Gaelwynd.

Performing as a soprano, Giddens and mezzo-soprano Cheryse McLeod Lewis formed a duo called Eleganza to release a CD in 2009.

[19][20] Late in 2013, Giddens contributed the standout a cappella track "We Rise" to the LP We Are Not For Sale: Songs of Protest by the NC Music Love Army – a collective of activist musicians from North Carolina founded by Jon Lindsay and Caitlin Cary.

[21] Giddens' protest song joins contributions from many other Carolina musical luminaries on the Lindsay-produced compilation (11/26/13 via Redeye Distribution), which was created to support the NC NAACP and the Moral Monday movement.

[22] In early 2014, Giddens recorded for Lost on the River: The New Basement Tapes alongside Elvis Costello, Marcus Mumford, Taylor Goldsmith and Jim James.

Also produced by Burnett, the album includes songs made famous by Patsy Cline, Odetta, Dolly Parton, and Nina Simone, among others.

[19][24] The Wall Street Journal said the album "confirms the arrival of a significant talent whose voice and distinctive approach communicate the simmering emotion at the core of the songs.

Musicians on Factory Girl include Burnett; fiddle player Gabe Witcher and double bassist Paul Kowert of Punch Brothers; percussionist Jack Ashford of Motown's renowned Funk Brothers; drummer Jay Bellerose; guitarist Colin Linden; veteran Nashville session bassist Dennis Crouch; and Giddens's Carolina Chocolate Drops touring band-mates, multi-instrumentalist Hubby Jenkins and beat-boxer Adam Matta.

[39] A week later, she sang with the Cincinnati Pops Orchestra for their live recording of American Originals: 1918, which explored the early development of jazz during the post WWI era.

Written and recorded with fellow artists Amythyst Kiah, Leyla McCalla, and Allison Russell, "The album confronts the ways we are culturally conditioned to avoid talking about America's history of slavery, racism, and misogyny.

"[41] Also in early 2018, the Nashville Ballet announced that Rhiannon Giddens has been commissioned to write the music for Lucy Negro, Redux, a new dance choreographed by artistic director, Paul Vasterling.

[42] Then, in March 2018, Giddens fulfilled a previously announced engagement as guest curator for the Cambridge Folk Festival by inviting Peggy Seeger, Kaia Kater, Birds of Chicago, Amythyst Kiah, and Yola Carter to perform at the event.

[43] Giddens recorded vocals for Silo Songs, an audio installation created by composer Brad Wells for Hancock Shaker Village.

[44] In 2019, Giddens released two studio albums: Songs of Our Native Daughters with Allison Russell, Leyla McCalla and Amythyst Kiah, and There Is No Other with Italian musician Francesco Turrisi.

[45][46] For the 2020 Spoleto Festival USA, Rhiannon Giddens was commissioned to create an opera based on the Arabic language autobiography of Omar Ibn Said, a highly literate and cultured Torodbe (Muslim cleric) from the Fula people of modern Senegal, who was enslaved in an intertribal war against the Imamate of Futa Toro and brought aboard a slave ship to Charleston, South Carolina in 1807.

[52] Giddens earned an Honorary Doctor of Letters from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro for her lasting impact on the UNCG community and work in music.

In 2017 and 2018, Giddens appeared in the fifth and sixth seasons of the CMT's Nashville as Hannah Lee "Hallie" Jordan, a social worker and gospel singer who is a significant character in Juliette's storyline.

Giddens is featured in the 2024 documentary Cover Your Ears produced by Prairie Coast Films and directed by Sean Patrick Shaul, discussing music censorship.

The first two books, scheduled for release in Fall 2022, are based on the lyrics of her songs "Build A House" and "We Could Fly" with illustrations by Monica Mikai and Briana Mukodiri Uchendu respectively.