WNYC's Soundcheck

When Yasmin Williams plays guitar, it looks like she’s trying to play something else. With the instrument laying on her lap, she attacks it from above with both hands, producing a kaleidoscopic array of sounds. Williams is also a fan of Earth Wind & Fire, and inspired by them she’s added the kalimba, or thumb piano, to her music. By taping the kalimba to the body of her guitar, she’s able to play both instruments at once ; her distinct style also leaves her tap shoe-wearing feet available for her to make beats. Yasmin Williams performs her new soundtrack to Charlie Chaplin’s silent film The Kid remotely, for the Soundcheck Podcast, from Brookfield Place.

Pearla (Brooklyn-based artist Nicole Rodriguez) makes off-kilter folk-pop that mixes reality and the surreal; in her songs, she builds a sound world through play and exploration. She's written a record about noticing things in the world and questioning her place in it, turning to music to attempt to figure it out. She and her band play new music from their strange and lovely record, 'Oh Glistening Onion, the Nighttime Is Coming', in-studio. - Caryn Havlik

Set list: "Ming the Clam", "Unglow The", "Effort"

Watch "Ming the Clam":

Watch "Unglow The":

Watch "Effort":

Grammy-winning trumpeter, composer, collaborator, and producer Nabaté Isles seeks to bring the groove and movement back to jazz, in order to get people to dance, just like at a block party. Isles, who was born and raised in New York City (Queens), takes an eclectic approach in his music which might incorporate funk, disco, Latin, and R&B, but also reflects the sounds he grew up with: new jack swing, hip hop, and Caribbean music - all in sophisticated arrangements and with improvisation. Nabaté Isles plays new music from his latest record, En Motion, in-studio, with a sweet nod to his talented young person.

Additionally, Nabaté Isles is also a producer and sports talk show host who has coveted sports trivia titles to his credit. Follow @NabateIslesSMTA . (Dear Citi Field, it would be magic to have Nabaté Isles play "Narco ," as the relief pitcher Edwin Díaz walks on the field for the Mets in the late innings.)

Set list: "The Jump Off", "Perfect Cadence", "Harlem Shake"

Watch "The Jump Off":

Watch "Perfect Cadence":

Watch "Harlem Shake":

En Motion on Bandcamp:

En Motion by Nabaté Isles

The contemporary silent film, Electric Appalachia , is a surprising, and surprisingly poignant look at how the coming of electricity changed Tennessee. Using archival footage, the film was put together by Eric Dawson, the director at TAMIS (the Tennessee Archive of Moving Image and Sound) and offers “a meditation on electricity and modernity in East Tennessee”. This silent film was created with two musicians in mind – guitarist William Tyler and harpist and synthesist Mary Lattimore, who add a moving, occasionally cosmic score. Listen to selections from their collaborative live soundtrack to Electric Appalachia , recorded at Brookfield Place.

Somebody that we used to know, Wally de Backer, Belgian-born Australian multi-instrumentalist, self-admitted “tinkerer,” and singer-songwriter (aka GOTYE), digs unusual instruments – like the rare French electronic musical instrument, the ondioline (invented in 1941.) He’ll perform tunes from the 1960's ondioline repertoire, created by the late Jean-Jacques Perrey, the instrument’s first and only virtuoso.

Brooklyn-based via San Juan band Balún came from DIY electrified bedroom pop that embraced punk on the island of Puerto Rico. Now, with an even wider range of influences, (please see their ethnomusicological, technological, punk, hardcore, and New York Philharmonic credentials ) their "dreambow" tropical electronica harnesses Caribbean rhythms, grime/jungle/IDM, Puerto Rican folk music, shoegaze and is a playfully-informed take on global pop music. Balún joins us in the studio to play music from their 2018 record, Prisma Tropical . (From the Archives.)
Balún contributed music to the first season of La Brega, and to the new season of La Brega .

Watch the individual songs below:

Watch the full session here :

The Irish singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Anna Mieke spent much of her youth traveling the world – from Spain to Bangladesh, Bulgaria to New Zealand. Her songs can conjure an expansive sense of place, and of moving through those places - touching on change, age, death, dreaming, memory, family, and perhaps an alternate reality on her latest album Theatre .

Anna Mieke’s enveloping acoustic chamber-folk can start with her borrowed 1936 Epiphone guitar, and may also involve improvisation with her core band. She’s also a bouzouki player, pianist, and a cellist who played with HEX, a Cork-based experimental outfit, and was a vocalist with the singing group, Rufous Nightjar. She’s collaborated with Irish artists Crash Ensemble, Adrian Crowley, and Linda Buckley and with New York-based artists Charlotte Greve, Grey McMurray, and Anna Roberts Gevalt; in March, Mieke will play shows with Iron & Wine.

Anna Mieke and her band stopped by on their current tour to play these recent songs, in-studio.

Set list: “Seraphim”, “Twin”, “Coralline”

Watch “Seraphim”:

Watch “Twin”:

Watch “Coralline”:

The Sudanese-American rapper Oddisee – born Amir Elkhalifa – has been making socially conscious hip hop since 2008, and in live performance he’s known for playing not with a DJ or recorded samples but with a live band, called Good Company. Oddisee has just released the 2023 album called To What End , tackling big ideas of home, race, family, and human ambition. Oddisee, and the high-caliber musicians of the band Good Company, play these tunes in-studio.

Set list: “Race”, “Already Knew”, “How Far”

Watch "Race":

Watch "Already Knew":

Watch "How Far":

New York -based UNI and The Urchins was started by “bassist/director/engineer/probably wizard” Charlotte Kemp Muhl (Bust Magazine ), and in lead singer Jack James Busa, they have an androgynous alien who brings a glorious glam rock sensibility to the band’s mix of psychedelia and post punk. The band has just released their debut LP, called Simulator , full of catchy, dance-y, sometimes cheeky songs about a world made dizzy by media and technology.

The conversation ranges from using AI – a neural network to generate lyrics, a love of David Bowie, their favorite Japanese food (the sticky, slimy kind), high school Latin, ASMR, waiting rooms, observations about the disappearing middle class, the New York music scene, growing up in the South, to tuba sound effects and more. Also, the band plays live in-studio. They play at Elsewhere in New York on March 3, and will be in Austin at South by Southwest.

Set list: “Subhuman Suburbia”, “Popstar Supernova”, “Simulator”

Watch "Subhuman Suburbia":

Watch "Simulator":

The 8-piece multicultural gypsy punk band Gogol Bordello is based here in New York, but its founder, the vocalist, songwriter and all-around ringleader Eugene Hutz, was born in Ukraine. At the best of times, Gogol Bordello wants you to dance, and party, but also to think. Now, for Ukraine and the Ukrainian diaspora, these are not the best of times, so Gogol Bordello still wants you to dance and party and think, but also to act. Hutz and company have done several benefit shows, and he even did a secret show for the troops at the front line last summer. Members of Gogol Bordello play scaled-down punk from their most recent LP Solidaritine, in-studio. - John Schaefer

Set list: "Focus Coin", "My Companjera", "Fire on Ice Floe"

Watch "Focus Coin":

Watch "My Companjera":

Watch "Fire on Ice Floe":

New Zealand pop star Kimbra plays within the confines of pop music, bending and skewing and tone painting, according to her needs. N ow based here in New York, Kimbra first made waves in 2011 when she teamed up with Gotye on his international hit “Somebody That I Used to Know.” We know her now as a Grammy winning creator of arty and experimental pop, unafraid to take risks and address macro issues from the world around, as well as more introspective internal reckonings.

On how she crafts this skewed pop, Kimbra says that “Improvisation is crucial to my process. It keeps me on the ledge. If I feel danger, if I feel a sense of the possible stumble, there’s something really powerful in that. Then watching yourself triumph.” Using her voice and a voice modulator, Kimbra wrestles with her inner demons over piano lines and carefully-chosen chords, as she plays some new songs from 'A Reckoning', in intimate arrangements, in-studio. - Caryn Havlik

Set list: "Save Me", "Foolish Thinking", "The Way We Were"

Watch "Save Me":

Watch "Foolish Thinking":

Watch "The Way We Were":

Meridian Brothers, founded by musician Eblis Álvarez, fuses a love of classic salsa with cumbia, vallenato, spacey psychedelia, and wacky samples for a playful dance party. With a body of songs containing some poignant social commentary about our obsession with technology, fear of war, police brutality, and other issues, the music hearkens to the salsa dura era (think Fania All-Stars); even the legendary Ansonia label took note and invited Meridian Brothers to be their first new signing in more than 30 years. With an interplay of sax, guitar, plenty of percussion, spoken/sung cartoon vocals (pitch-shifted and processed), and sound effects, Meridian Brothers plays their fantasy salsa-cumbia fusion, in-studio. - Caryn Havlik

Set list: “Salsa Caliente” “Puya Del Emprasario”, “Metamorfosis”

Watch "Salsa Caliente":

Watch "Puya Del Emprasari":

Watch "Metamorfosis":

The duo of Rachael & Vilray courtesy of Rachael Price, lead singer of the popular band Lake Street Dive, and the New York-based singer and guitarist Vilray may sound like classic guitar jazz right out of the 1920s-1940s; Vilray’s guitar chops dip into the style of the great “gypsy-jazz” guitarist Django Reinhardt; and Rachael Price croons into an old RCA ribbon mic, up close, warm and intimate, with no reverb. Rachael & Vilray’s new originals are equal helpings of literate and populist, with cutting observations and character studies that might be operatic and humorous, allowing for the way that people contain multitudes. Their latest record, I Love A Love Song, continues to draw on, and in their own sly way, extends the tradition of the Great American Songbook. The duo joins us in-studio to play some of their new, old-sounding songs (with one even featuring a lyric about narwhals.) - Caryn Havlik

Set list: “Is A Good Man Real?” “Hate Is The Basis (of Love)” “Join Me In A Dream”

Watch “Is A Good Man Real?”:

Watch “Hate Is The Basis (of Love)”:

Watch “Join Me In A Dream”:

The band called Ranky Tanky won the Grammy for best Regional Roots Album back in 2020. The group is based in Charleston, SC, and their regional roots are in the Gullah music of the coastal southeastern states, the Sea Island music; their name comes from a Gullah phrase for “get funky”. Gullah culture comes from the descendants of Africans captured along Africa’s rice coast [in West Africa], and while Gullah people today speak English, traditionally they’ve also spoken an African-American creole also called Gullah.

Ranky Tanky’s music is a kind of creole – a mix of jazz, American gospel, and soul, all with the through line of the original Gullah rhythms, game songs, praise songs, ring shouts, and songs of gratitude kept alive from slavery into the present day. Ranky Tanky has been nominated for another Grammy for their latest album, Live at the 2022 New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival . They play in-studio for us, with all the joy they can bring.

Set list: "Down in my Heart", "Beat 'Em Down", "Lift Me Up"

Watch "Down in my Heart":

Watch "Beat 'Em Down":

Watch "Lift Me Up":

Sax player Marcus Strickland has worked with many notable jazzers, including Roy Haynes, McCoy Tyner, Wynton Marsalis, Jeff "Tain" Watts, Dave Douglas, and Keyon Harrold. He also leads his own band Twi-Life, which inhabits an Afro-futuristic space at the crossroads of Hip Hop, Soul, and Jazz. Twi-Life's album, The Universe's Wildest Dream , conceptualized into being during the lockdown times, urges an awareness of how precious and miraculous and random and delicate our existence is here on Planet Earth, the vast universe, (and everything.)

On the album, Marcus Strickland & Charles Haynes stretch out into beat-makers and producers, fleshing out layered studio creations with found sound, guest artists, overdubs and electronics, and ultimately extend the Afro-Futurist tradition to far-out places. Strickland and Twi-Life bring a Hammond B-3 organ with hypnotic Leslie speakers into the studio to play some of the tunes, ahead of the record release, and shows in New York at the Blue Note on Jan. 17 & 18 .

Set list: “Dust Ball Fantasy” “Bird Call” “You and I, an Anomaly”

Los Angeles-based band Dengue Fever blends 60's Cambodian pop and psychedelic rock with danceable grooves and ghostly noir romanticism. Cambodian Chhom Nimol fronts the band and sings mostly in her native language, she's basically from "a family best considered as a Cambodia pop music dynasty-- a not unlike a Cambodian version of the Jacksons", (Bandcamp .) She's backed by American rockers who play guitar, farfisa (a small, Italian-made organ), bass, drums, and saxophone. Dengue Fever joins us remotely, as they are about to play globalFest 2023 on Jan. 15 at David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center .

Set list: “Silver Fish”, “Uku”, ”One Thousand Tears of a Tarantula”

Hear unpredictable and graceful melodic lines traded by sax and strings, as tenor sax superstar Joshua Redman and string quartet Brooklyn Rider, along with all-star rhythm section of Scott Colley (bass) and Satoshi Takeishi (percussion) take over the studio. It's chamber music with swoops, dives, groove and bite in original and newly-arranged music with one foot in the jazz world where sharps are optional. (This session is from the Archives, 2018.) -Caryn Havlik

Watch the full session here :

Turkish-German singer and composer Alev Lenz, who splits time between London and Germany, has had something of a hit tune with “Fall Into Me”, a song used in the series Black Mirror . That song has had a few versions, including one recorded by vocal octet Roomful of Teeth, and another as a work called “Splendid Soldiers.” Her dark (only sometimes) and thoughtful compositions and collaborations are often finding their places in films and limited series, as in the films Im Nachtlicht and Downhill , and the series Dark .

Alev Lenz has been something of a serial collaborator, working with sitarist and composer Anoushka Shankar, Lisel (Eliza Bagg), Sand Dunes, synthesist and producer Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith, French-Cuban vocal duo Ibeyi, and the aforementioned Roomful of Teeth, to name a few. During the interview, Lenz describes her creative process, and when the words might come in, and shares her experiences in the world of “sync”, when composers license their music to film and streaming series. Plus, hear Alev Lenz and pianist Vana Gierig, recorded in the studio.

Set list: "Cigarettes and Blow", "Fall Into Me", "Ivory Tower"

Watch "Ivory Tower":

Watch "Fall Into Me":

Listen to more highlights from this off-again-on-again year of live performances from the Soundcheck Podcast. These bright spots come by way of Mexican singer-songwriter and arranger Silvana Estrada, London-based tuba player Theon Cross, and the psychedelic cumbia of Combo Chimbita, recorded live at Brooklyn Bowl. Also, listen to music by Cuban-born pianist Omar Sosa and sax player Peter Apfelbaum, of the band Quarteto Americanos. Plus, playful and surreal British musician and songwriter Robyn Hitchcock riffs on an unrealized Raymond Chandler title.

ARTIST: Theon Cross
WORK: We Go Again [5:49]
RECORDING: Live for the Soundcheck Podcast, Mar. 2022
SOURCE: This performance not commercially available.
INFO: A version appears on Theon Cross’ album, Intra I

ARTIST: Omar Sosa and Peter Apfelbaum
WORK: umbo kondo [5:47]
RECORDING: Live for the Soundcheck Podcast, Sept. 2022
SOURCE: This performance not commercially available.
INFO: https://omarsosa.com/

ARTIST: Robyn Hitchcock
WORK: The Man Who Loves the Rain [3:58]
RECORDING: Live for the Soundcheck Podcast, Nov. 2022
SOURCE: This performance not commercially available.
INFO: The song appears on his 2022 record, Shufflemania!

ARTIST: Silvana Estrada
WORK: Marchita [4:35]
RECORDING: Live for the Soundcheck Podcast, Jan. 2022
SOURCE: This performance not commercially available.
INFO: The tune appears on her 2022 album, Marchita

ARTIST: Combo Chimbita
WORK: La Perla [4:35]
RECORDING: Live for the Soundcheck Podcast, Sept. 2022
SOURCE: This performance not commercially available.
INFO: The song appears on the 2022 release, Ire .

Montréal ’s Black Ox Orkestar has been making 'music of the Jewish diaspora not tied to any state' since the early 2000’s. Orkestar is a name you’ll see a lot in Balkan music; it’s simply Serbo-Croatian for orchestra or ensemble. But the musicians were also in much-admired post-rock bands like Silver Mt Zion, and Godspeed You Black Emperor, so after a while they went their separate ways, but came back together in 2021.

Their new album, called Everything Returns , "connects key current issues—from refugees forced to leave their homes, to the return of fascism and exclusionary nationalism—with the legacy of modernist Yiddish poetry and song", (Bandcamp liner notes .) The songs are a melancholic twist on traditional Jewish klezmer music, with vocals mainly sung in Yiddish – with piano, violin, upright bass, clarinet and cymbalom (a stringed instrument of the dulcimer family) – taking on hues of indie rock, experimental folk and avant-jazz. Black Ox Orkestar plays both traditional and original songs for us, in-studio. - Caryn Havlik

Set list: “Tish Nign” “Body Keeps the Score”, “Mizrakh Mi Ma’arav”

Watch "Tish Nign":

Watch "Body Keeps the Score":

Watch “Mizrakh Mi Ma’arav”:

One of the marks of a dedicated and accomplished artist is that they continue to level up, testing their own limits and working to break out of habits and patterns. New York-based guitarist, singer/songwriter, and collaborator Steve Gunn is such a one; he can tap into Indian classical modes, inhabit the drone of minimalist founding father La Monte Young, pick like fingerstyle players Jack Rose and John Fahey, and coax the reclusive Japanese folk legend, guitarist and songwriter Sachiko Kanenobu, back to playing (NY Times .)

In Gunn’s songs -which float between the worlds of Philadelphia soul, British folk, DC punk, and the cosmic jazz of Sun Ra with ease- one finds unexpected chromatic lyricism, and keen lyric observations. He’s also done several challenging collaborations with a head-spinningly wide range of musical colleagues (Mary Lattimore, John Trusinski, Bridget St John, Mdou Moctar, Bing &Ruth, Kim Gordon, Kurt Vile) and continues to step outside of music into the worlds of film, line drawings, sculpture, or podcasts, in order to prevent tunnel vision (gathered from ToneGlow.substack.com . )

The ace guitarist and fingerstyle folk rocker Steve Gunn plays recent songs from Other You and its companion EP, Nakama, in-studio. - Caryn Havlik

Set list: “Fulton”, “Morning River”, “On the Way”

Watch "Fulton":

Watch "Morning River":

Watch "On The Way":

The four members of Combo Chimbita are from Colombia. But they met and formed their band here in New York. From their home base in Queens, Combo Chimbita plays a kind of tropical futurist pop that combines elements of Afro-Colombian spirituality, razor-sharp social commentary, and booty-shaking dance rhythms. Hear their set, live from the New Sounds 40 th Anniversary Party from Brooklyn Bowl, and an interview with bass/synth player Prince of Queens.

Set list:

Candela
Esto Es Real
Babalawo

Download or Listen to Part 1 :

IRE by Combo Chimbita

The Brazilian singer and guitarist named Rogê made his mark playing his own brand of samba and samba funk in the clubs of Rio de Janeiro. [Samba in Brazil is rather like the Blues in America, a statement and sound born of the forced migration of Africans, and in both styles, these musical roots grew up and out into many more kinds of popular music.] Now, L.A.-based, Rogê is preparing to release his first album outside Brazil in early 2023, in partnership with producer/guitarist Thomas Brenneck (Menahan Street Band, producer/guitarist for Charles Bradley, Sharon Jones and The Budos Band.) It’ll be called Curyman, (his given name is Roger José Cury), and even though the record has a big, almost orchestral sound at time, thanks to string arrangements by fellow Brazilian Arthur Verocai, it all starts with the voice and guitar. Samba star Rogê performs these new tunes with percussionist Stephane San Juan, in-studio.

Set list: “A Voz Que Não Se Cala”- (by Stephane San Juan), “Existe Uma Voz”, “Pra Vida”

Watch “A Voz Que Não Se Cala” - (by Stephane San Juan):

Watch “Existe Uma Voz":

Watch "Pra Vida":

Nashville-based Appalachian Road Show are veterans of the bluegrass, folk, and roots music scenes who polish the raw emotion in tunes inspired by the Civil War and America’s barn dance eras. The American roots music supergroup features Todd Phillips (bass, bowed bass, vibraslap, vocals), Zeb Snyder (guitars, slide guitar, vocals), Jim VanCleve (fiddle, vocals) and Darrell Webb (mandolin, octave mandolin, banjo, vocals.) They play for us remotely from Blackbird Studios in Nashville, and banjo player, vocalist, and whistler Barry Abernathy chats about their spirit-lifting 2022 release, Jubilation.

Set list: Gallows Pole, The Ballad of Kidder Cole

Watch "Gallows Pole":

Watch "The Ballad of Kidder Cole":

Songwriter Jesse Harris has been a standout musical figure since the 1990s in New York, as a singer and guitarist, and lately as a producer. When his friend Norah Jones swept up all the Grammys back in 2003, it was for an album featuring five of Jesse’s songs, including his Grammy winning song of the year “Don’t Know Why”; other interpreters of his songs include Willie Nelson, Smokey Robinson, and Emmylou Harris. Jesse Harris and percussionist/producer Kenny Wolleson have just birthed an unusual collection of songs called Silver Balloon , where they aimed to experiment with (and subvert) song form, play with an imaginative sound world, and maybe bend time to suit their play as they embrace unexpected chaos.

Jesse Harris and percussionist Kenny Wolleson, along with the band, play some of these new songs in-studio, and tease the forthcoming instrumental record, Cosmo , of songs without words.

Set list: “The Hanged Man” “Hummingbird” “New Year’s Day”

Watch "The Hanged Man":

Watch "Hummingbird":

Watch "New Year's Day":

Thee Sacred Souls is a group of 20-somethings who blend the sounds of Chicano soul with its Philadelphia, Memphis, and even Panama counterparts. Their debut self-titled LP, on Daptone Records, is a smooth and sultry type of timeless soul, featuring Josh Lane’s effortless crooning vocals. Their 'retro' sound is inspired by everything from trailblazing East LA Chicano band Thee Midniters to Italian library music. The band plays in-studio.

Set list: "Future Lover", "Easier Said Than Done", "Can I Call You Rose"

Thee Sacred Souls by Thee Sacred Souls

New York singer/songwriter Nick Hakim has been producing records of gently psychedelic soul here for almost a decade. Occasionally, he drops the gentle psychedelia in favor of something more obviously trippy – it happens several times on his newest album, Cometa . (The title is Spanish for “kite,” although the American-born Hakim sings in English.) He is one of those singers whose voice rarely seems to rise above a whisper – and though he’s probably sick of being compared to the ill-starred but still-mythic English folkie Nick Drake, Hakim’s songs can sound a little like Nick Drake fronting a psychedelic soul band from the early 70s. Nick Hakim and his band perform these songs in-studio. (-John Schaefer )

Set list: Vertigo, Happen, Feeling Myself

Violinist and composer Layale Chaker has done something exquisite in her music with the Ensemble Sarafand from the record, Inner Rhyme : she has gone about capturing the “shape and essence of epic testimonials on life, death, war and love that make the heart of Arabic poetry,” (Layale Chaker .) It’s an alchemical wedding of music derived from the form, rhythm and structure of Arabic sung poetry using chamber music instruments: her violin, along with piano, cello, double-bass, and hand percussion. Chaker and Sarafand perform some of these Arabic-poetry inspired, jazz-embracing chamber music works, in-studio. (From the Archives, 2019.)

Watch the session here:

Who wants to know what The Shuffle Man knows? The playful and surreal British musician and songwriter Robyn Hitchcock does. His latest batch of songs, 'Shufflemania!', is primed for the sub-personalities within - feathery serpent god, the shuffle man, vampire, scorpio tv detective. Robyn’s love of trams and Raymond Chandler are steady, as is his ability to balance the inane and the poignant in lyrics musing about inner lives, vegan casserole, crawling fish, hemlock-drinking, and the inevitability of death. Robyn Hitchcock plays songs from his latest, and a tune from his vast back catalogue, in-studio. - Caryn Havlik

Set: "The Shuffle Man", "Noirer than Noir", "The Man Who Loves the Rain", "Glass Hotel"

Watch "The Shuffle Man":

Watch "Noirer Then Noir":

Watch "The Man Who Loves the Rain":

Watch "Glass Hotel":

British singer and songwriter Beth Orton has found distinctive ways to blend her folky acoustic guitar-playing with the sounds of the electronic music world. But her latest record, Weather Alive , settles in a distinctly personal space where genres don’t so much collide as fade away, and the basis for the album wasn't guitar, but tracks she recorded on a beat-up, questionably-tuned upright piano she bought at a street market. Orton also says that she got to collaborate with herself - as she produced the record - and with that old piano, which "really spoke to me," (Pitchfork .) Additionally, in keeping with her wide ranging musical circle (she's worked with Chemical Brothers, William Orbit, Nick Cave, Emmylou Harris, Four Tet, to drop a few names), she collaborated remotely on Weather Alive with multi-instrumentalist Shahzad Ismaily, the Smile drummer Tom Skinner (Sons of Kemet), and guitarist Grey McMurray, and other folks during lockdown.

Beth Orton and her band play some of these tunes in-studio.

Set list: "Friday Night", "Fractals", "Arms Around a Memory"

Weather Alive by Beth Orton

The three singers who lead the group Say She She all like different things: 70s style New York dance music, classic soul and R&B, the swirling psychedelia of Turkish pop or Hindi film music. The resulting global pop is something close to ‘discodelic soul’ and revolves around the sweet harmonies of the three singers. Say She She has just put out a debut album called Prism , a post-disco confection built around the eclectic and thrilling harmonies of their three singers, Piya Malik, Nya Gazelle Brown, and Sabrina Cunningham. The full 7-piece band plays in-studio.

Set list: "Fortune Teller", "Blow My Mind", "Prism", "Forget Me Not"

Bonus Dance Moves in this operatic song, "Forget Me Not":

Black Feminist Punk trio Big Joanie formed in London, but are now based over various cities in the U.K. Their sound is “punk” and… also looks to Riot Grrrl jaggedness and DIY sensibilities, The Jesus and Mary Chain , and girl group harmonies. Their 2022 album, Back Home , sees the band ruminating on the ideas of home, whether that’s in the U.K., back in Africa or the Caribbean, and considering how second and third generation communities of Black & Brown folks define themselves as British people.

Borne of guitarist/vocalist Stephanie Phillips’s desire for a space “where I could be Black and be into punk and it wouldn’t be seen as a conflict”, Big Joanie began as a post on social media, (Kerry Cardoza , Bandcamp ), and is named for Phillips’ mom. Stephanie Phillips of Big Joanie talks DIY and making one’s own culture, and the band plays remotely from their London recording studio.

On a literary note, Phillips is also a writer and journalist, whose own book Why Solange Matters is out now, via University of Texas Press. Drummer/vocalist Chardine Taylor-Stone’s book, Sold Out: How Black Feminism Lost Its Soul , via Cassava Republic Press, is due out in late November of 2022. - Caryn Havlik

Set list: “Your Words”, “Cactus Tree”, “Today”

Watch "Your Words":

As a solo artist, Grammy-winning Puerto Rican singer-songwriter iLe (Ileana Cabra) has explored the rich history of classic Latin American pop music, and she contributed vocals in the popular hip hop band, Calle13, with her brothers. Her new 2022 album, Nacarile sees her mixing boleros and ballads with reggaeton and synth pop for a collection of politically- and socially-conscious art-rock tinged with some psychedelia, whose intent is to sound more like the present, despite looking to the classic styles. There are also some unusual sounds on Nacarile : the eerie and expressive theremin; the all-female Mariachi band Flor de Toloache, and other collaborators like Natalia Lafourcade and Mon Laferte, as well as background vocal arrangements with textures that are lush and airy.

The material takes on the elections in Puerto Rico as well as in the U.S., as well as that colonial legacy and its abuse of power. Also, there is a focus on the strength and power in femininity, especially in response to the patriarchy. The pioneering reggaeton star Ivy Queen makes an appearance on a protest song that speaks to the loss of women’s reproductive rights worldwide. In an interview with NPR, iLe says : “Something pretty for me is that we have our own rights, and that we should be treated respectfully and that no one can say anything about what we can or can't do with our own bodies.”

iLe and her band play some of these tunes, in-studio. - Caryn Havlik

Set list: “Donde Nadie Más Respira”, “(Escapándome) De Mí”, “Traguito”

Oregon-based songwriter Laura Veirs re-discovers her “self-sovereignty” as she calls it, on a new record, Found Light. For this album, Veirs made her first foray into producing on her own, making choices about out-of-sync guitars to create waves, adding saxophone, or calling on friends to be guest artists, and co-produce with her. Mostly, it's about keeping choices mostly simple and direct, and harnessing the power of her dad’s nylon string guitar to sublimate her raw emotions from personal upheaval. She plays these intimate songs of artistic independence, remotely. - Caryn Havlik

Set list: “Ring Song”, “Naked Hymn”, “Sword Song”, “Time Will Show You”

Watch "Ring Song":

"Naked Hymn":

"Sword Song":

"Time Will Show You":

The four members of Combo Chimbita are from Colombia. But they met and formed their band here in New York. From their home base in Queens, Combo Chimbita plays a kind of tropical futurist pop that combines elements of Afro-Colombian spirituality, razor-sharp social commentary, and booty-shaking dance rhythms. Hear their set, live from the New Sounds 40 th Anniversary Party from Brooklyn Bowl, and an interview with bass/synth player Prince of Queens.

Set list: "El Camino", "Testigo", "La Perla", "Sin Tiempo", "Ahomale", "Oya"

IRE by Combo Chimbita

Guitarist, composer, ethnomusicologist, and instrument builder Paolo Angeli plays a custom prepared Sardinian guitar, a hybrid electro-acoustic instrument that looks like a guitar crossed with a cello. Angeli’s build has been fitted cross-wise and lengthwise with additional strings: cello strings and drone strings, and has numerous other inventions attached to it, including hammers, pedals, bicycle cables, and some propellers at variable speed. Then, there’s his array of electronics and treatments...

Paolo Angeli demonstrates some of these sounds, which include percussion, organ, kora, sitar, slide guitar, cello, hammered dulcimer, fretless bass, and drone (and teases a new custom prototype in the works!) He also performs music from his latest release – a concept album about the wider Mediterranean - Rade , on his custom instrument, complete with plastic bag percussion, in-studio. - Caryn Havlik

Set list: " Baklawa", "Mare Lungo", "Rade"

Watch "Baklawa":

Watch: "Mare Lungo":

Watch "Rade":

Watch the entire session:

Banjo player, fiddler, singer, and scholar Jake Blount’s latest feat is an Afro-futurist concept album called The New Faith , where instead of shiny interstellar travel, man-made climate crises reach their logical end points, and a small community survives, staying lifted by the sacred songs of the past. Blount presents the music of this imagined community as a religious service in three sections, captured as a future field recording - one with a direct through-line to folk, gospel, the blues, and spirituals. The tie-in with Octavia Butler’s visionary 1993 work of climate/science fiction, Parable of the Sower, is explicit, says Blount, as this album may well be the first musical Afro-futurist cautionary tale (some might say dystopia, but that would imply that there was a utopia to begin with.)

The collected and re-cast songs on The New Faith have been deeply researched (just as they were on his excellent 2020 record, Spider Tales) and show profound respect invoking and honoring the ancestors: Bessie Jones of the Sea Island Singers, civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer, bluesman Skip James, and the legendary gospel singer Mahalia Jackson. There’s a full-throated electric guitar on “Didn’t It Rain” summoning guitar hero Sister Rosetta Tharpe; songs sourced from fingerstyle and Delta blues players Blind Willie McTell and Skip James, respectively; and a pervasive bass thump throughout extending from the Gullah-Geechee Ring Shout tradition of groove-keeping. Together with cleverly deployed fiddle and banjo, (please see his explainer on the banjo, and Black String Band history (!)), lots of hand claps, and call and response vocals, gospel choruses, and rapped verse from Demeanor, Blount seamlessly and instructively links up past, present, and potential future, in ways that will undoubtedly resonate. Jake Blount and his band play some of these tunes, in-studio. – Caryn Havlik

Set list: "Once There Was No Sun" "City Called Heaven" "Didn't It Rain"

Watch "Once There Was No Sun":

Watch "City Called Heaven ":

Watch "Didn't It Rain":

Classically-trained Belgian-Egyptian singer/songwriter Tamino has a voice that covers three octaves; his sultry croon and rich falsetto envelop a listener and draw inevitable comparisons to Thom Yorke and Jeff Buckley. Tamino's vocal lines and riffs sometimes incorporate Arabic quarter notes, and he now writes on the Arab oud, not unlike his grandfather, the Egyptian singer and movie star Muharram Fouad. His latest album, Sahar , “just before dawn” – suggests an in-between time, full of reflection and moments of mystery. He performs these latest baroque pop / Arab-gothic* songs, in-studio. (*Thanks, GQ Middle East for the hybrid term.) - Caryn Havlik

Set list: “A Drop of Blood” “The Longing” “The First Disciple”

With eight members, London-based caroline looks like a combination rock band and chamber music ensemble with their violins, cello, flute, guitars, bass, percussion, and drums. Their songs are a study in the balance of restraint and release, as they journey through what could sound like Appalachian folk, Midwestern emo, minimalist classical, electronic music, and post rock music. caroline writes their songs improvisationally, as a core trio, then they develop them further as the full 8-piece band. Phrases are chanted, intermittently, drones are established and then carefully moved, as the songs stretch out to suites. In live performance the band has a tendency to play in the round, as if in the middle of some private ceremony – the better to play off of one another. caroline plays in-studio. - John Schaefer/Caryn Havlik

Set list: "Dark Blue", "Skydiving onto the library roof", "BRJ"

Cover of claire rousay's "Peak Chroma":peak chroma by caroline

The singer/songwriter Denitia first attracted notice here in New York as a kind of alternative R&B singer. Her songs, either as half of Denitia & Sene or as a solo artist, often had subtle, but expansive production. But her new album, Highways , takes a turn to a more intimate, largely acoustic sound, with songs that draw on folk and even country music. Now based in the Hudson Valley, Denitia has traveled down to our studio to do some solo versions of these new songs.

Set list: "Highways", "My Weakness", "All the Sweet Tea"

Watch: "All the Sweet Tea":

The Heavy Heavy is a band out of Brighton, England – but they sound like a band that’s been time-shifted straight out of 1975. The couple at the heart of the band, Will Turner and Georgie Fuller, decided on their name after hearing an interview with David Bowie. They describe their sunny, trippy sound as “primal, yet extra,” and enjoy an expanse of sound with reverb and layered vocals, along with organ and guitars. The Heavy Heavy plays some of their psychedelic pop remotely.

Set list: “Miles and Miles”, “Go Down River”, “All My Dreams”

Watch Set list: “Go Down River”:

The party band, Red Baraat, is from Brooklyn, but their music grows out of the hard-partying tradition of Punjabi wedding bands. They're a big band full of brass instruments and drums, rock guitar, jazzy improvisations, occasionally some rap, (both the dhol and drumset keep the groove going), who bring the festivities with them wherever they go.

Hear their set, live from the New Sounds 40th Anniversary Party from Brooklyn Bowl, and an interview with drummer and composer Sunny Jain, who leads the band on dhol, the double-sided drum, one which is definitely an “outside” instrument. Hear Jain play his new, bigger, responsive Sufi dhol from Lahore, Pakistan, which suffered a strap malfunction during their set, and the band barely missed a beat. - Caryn Havlik

Set list: “Chaal Baby” “Kala Mukra” “Zindabad” “Gaadi of Truth” “Shruggy Ji” “Ishq Tera Tadpave” “Thumbs Up”

Portland, Oregon-based Marisa Anderson channels the history of the guitar and stretches the boundaries of tradition. From spacious melancholic laments to transcendent minimalism, Anderson is coming from a place between country, blues, and drone. On her 2018 record, Cloud Corner , she touches on Tuareg scales from "desert blues," the finger-style picking of so-called “American Primitive,” and chiming sad cowboy chords, while continuously moving and traveling on her guitar. She joins us in-studio.

Marisa Anderson's new 2022 record is Still, Here :

Still, Here by Marisa Anderson

Watch the individual songs below:

Lebanese-born Paris-based trumpet superstar Ibrahim Maalouf plays a custom four-valve trumpet that can not only play western music, but also accesses the quarter tones in Arab classical music. He’s played jazz, worked with rappers, global pop stars, and has collaborated with everyone from Angelique Kidjo to Wynton Marsalis, New Orleans’ Tank and the Bangas, Cuban funk-rapper Cimafunk, and actress Sharon Stone. On his latest record, called Capacity to Love , due Nov. 4, he ha s opened the doors to and between all kinds of music : classical Arab music, Western classical music, sacred music, rap, jazz, and pop music. He and his band play an intimate acoustic set in-studio ahead of a North American tour (Sept. 29-Oct. 6). -Caryn Havlik

Set list: "Feeling Good", "True Sorry", "Right Time"

Cuban-born pianist Omar Sosa has made beautiful records with musicians from West Africa, from all over East Africa, from Spain, where he's lived for many years, and now, with American friends, including sax player Peter Apfelbaum, whom we've heard over the years playing with the Kamikaze Ground Crew, the Millennial Territory Orchestra, and the Hieroglyphics Ensemble, among others. They play duo versions of music from the Quarteto Americanos project, including recorded sounds fired from a sampler pad, that Sosa has put together, in-studio.

Set list: "umbo kondo", "Move in D", "Mis Tres Notas"

From the 2022 New York Guitar Festival at The Greene Space, listen to cosmic inventions from guitarist and composer Vernon Reid together with Laraaji on zither and electronics.

Adept at metal, funk and jazz, Vernon Reid gained fame as the main songwriter for the rock band Living Colour, and as a founder of the Black Rock Coalition. Crashing this year’s guitar festival to join Vernon is the innovative ambient zither player and electronic musician Laraaji, who was also part of Brian Eno’s groundbreaking Ambient Music series back in 1981. Vernon Reid and Laraaji, together with an arsenal of electronics, in addition to their instruments, with occasional vocalizing, improvise a breathtaking longform set (perhaps taking inspiration from the Oblique Strategies card Ghost Echoes) .

Watch their improvisations here:

Lean Year is Virginia-based singer Emilie Rex and filmmaker/musician Rick Alverson, along with Erik Hall, who lives in rural Michigan, where he records and co-produces the band’s records with Alverson. The band’s latest, Sides , is heavy on dreamlike and beautiful melodies, yet the material is also meditation on grief and the processing of personal tragedy. Using mellotron, keyboards of many colors, guitar, and a tapestry of synth pads of sampled woodwinds, together with Rex’s distinctive voice, the music is “a balancing act between pathos and pop” ( Bandcamp ), which feels haunted and cinematic, while celebrating memories and embracing calm amidst the sorrow. Lean Year plays in-studio.

Set list: "Nitetime", "Marriage of Heaven and Hell", "Trouble with Being Warm"

Watch "Nitetime":

Watch "Marriage of Heaven and Hell":

Watch "Trouble with Being Warm":

Mafer Bandola, aka Maria Fernanda González, is originally from Venezuela, and is one of the few women who plays bandola and electric bandola professionally. The Bandola is a traditional 4-stringed instrument found in both Colombia and Venezuela; it is avacado-shaped, and related to the bandurria and mandolin (thanks, Wikipedia .)

In her music, she is constantly stretching and innovating within her tradition by incorporating jazz, blues, Brazilian influences, as she experiments with genres, sounds, and cross-cultural collaboration. González is also an educator, self-taught composer, journalist, and a co-founder of LADAMA, a multinational band of four women from four countries. She joins us remotely to perform original works, ahead of her appearance at Flushing Town Hall on Sept. 18 at 1PM.

Set list: “Zumba que Zumba”, “Agreste”, “Pajarillo”

Watch "Zumba que Zumba":

Watch “Agreste”:

Watch "“Pajarillo”:

Wikipedia says Bill Frisell “is an American jazz guitarist.” Well they got “American” and “guitarist” right. Frisell has indeed played jazz, but also country, rock, folk, West African, classical, and lots of less easily defined styles of music. Widely considered to be one of the great guitarists of our time, he is the subject of a new biography called Bill Frisell: Beautiful Dreamer . He plays solo acoustic in The Greene Space as part of the 2022 New York Guitar Festival. - John Schaefer

Set list: Look Out for Hope, Blues from Before, Strange Meeting, Waltz For Hal Willner

Watch the set:

Colleen is the alias of French multi-instrumentalist Cécile Schott, who has been living and working in Spain for the past few years. Her musical ax of choice was a Baroque instrument - the viola da gamba (as well as modified music boxes, melodica, classical guitar, clarinet, toy gamelan frame drum, piano, and wind chimes) electronically looped and layered; on later records, she added her voice. But on her 2017 release, she’s completely put away the viola da gamba in favor of electronic devices like the Pocket Piano and the Moogerfooger. In fact, this album, A flame my love, a frequency, is her first fully electronics-based record - 100% electronics and voice. Colleen and her synth armada are here in the studio to play these unconventional avant-pop creations in their live versions today. (From the Archives, 2017.)

From his beginnings in his father’s band, Terry Riley and The All Stars, Gyan Riley has branched out into classical music (both his own and that of composers like John Zorn), spacey electric guitar excursions, and Eastern-influenced collaborations with a wide range of artists, including recent Grammy winner Arooj Aftab. Gyan Riley plays and improvises original pieces. From the 2022 New York Guitar Festival at The Greene Space, hear g uitarist and composer Gyan Riley's post-minimalist jazz-limning new music . - John Schaefer

Set list: And then… (improvisation), Sparkling Pines, Sometimes You Go Back for More, Toucher les Nuages/Appa-tango

Watch "And then... (improvisation)":

Watch "Sparkling Pines":

Watch "Sometimes You Go Back for More":

Watch "Toucher les Nuages/Appa-tango":

Watch the entire show from Night 2 of the 2022 New York Guitar Festival:

Hear the eerie, arresting, co-composed electro-orchestral pop from Minneapolis electro band POLIÇA and Berlin new-music outfit stargaze, led by conductor André de Ridder . The two groups have worked together since the 2015-2016 season, in a “virtual residence,” commissioned by Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra’s Liquid Music series. They have arranged and adapted Steve Reich’s Music for Pieces of Wood as well as co-creating their latest, a long-form work inspired by ideas and themes in James Kunstler's book The Long Emergency .

On their 2018 record Music For the Long Emergency, s weeps of strings, French horn, flute and oboe, along with synth bass, industrial electro-percussion, and jarring electronic textures are arrayed in support of often electronically-altered vocal lines. Hear some of this music, in-studio, which Poliça frontwoman Channy Leaneagh describes in National Sawdust Log as “not a pill to swallow that calms us down.” (From the Archives, 2018.)

Read more about the long-distance collaborative romance via this interview in the National Sawdust Log .

Watch the 2018 session:

Although he has a background in rock and experimental music, fingerstyle guitarist Glenn Jones is best known as a keeper of the flame of “American Primitive,” the folk-based style associated with the 20th century guitarist John Fahey. With a variety of tunings, capos, and even specially-made half-capos, Jones’s country-blues music is full of unexpected textures. He plays new works from his 2022 record, Vade Mecum , in The Greene Space for the 2022 New York Guitar Festival. - John Schaefer

Set list: Vade Mecum, Black & White and Gray, Each Crystal Pane of Glass, Ruthie's Farewell, John Jackson of Fairfax, Virginia

Watch "Vade Mecum":

Watch "Black & White and Gray":

Watch "Each Crystal Pane of Glass":

Watch "Ruthie's Farewell":

Watch "John Jackson of Fairfax, Virginia"

Watch the whole show from Night 1 of the New York Guitar Festival:

The Austin-based minimalist instrumental ensemble Balmorhea uses acoustic instruments to create atmospheric soundscapes. Comparisons to Explosions in the Sky or Godspeed You! Black Emperor might not be too far off, but where those bands tend to build, swell and fade, Balmorhea maintains a “relaxed, clear-eyed sense of reflection” throughout their 2017 album, Clear Language .

With strings, keyboards, guitars, vibraphone, & the occasional muted trumpet, the multi-instrumentalist core of Balmorhea has crafted a record of expansive layered spacious music, painting in broad brush strokes a feeling of wide-open Americana. Balmorhea joins us in their six-piece formation to play songs from 2017's Clear Language.

RIYL: Explosions in the Sky, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, This Will Destroy Us, Friday Night Lights.

From the 2022 New York Guitar Festival, listen to the space-Americana and pastoral country stylings of guitarist William Tyler , whose music pulls in folk, country, indie, and electronic music. His latest record is Lost Futures (2021), with the experimental guitarist Marisa Anderson for Thrill Jockey, and he’s collaborated with electric harpist Mary Lattimore, pedal steel guitarist Luke Schneider, and the ambient drone project Six Organs of Admittance. He plays solo in The Greene Space for the Soundcheck Podcast.

Set list: "Waltz of the Circassian Beauties", "Missionary Ridge", "Gone Clear", "Not In Our Stars", "We Can’t Go Home Again"

Watch "Waltz of the Circassian Beauties":

Watch "Missionary Ridge":

Watch "Gone Clear":

Watch "Not in Our Stars":

Watch: "We Can't Go Home Again":

Watch the whole show from night 4 of the 2022 New York Guitar Festival:

Somewhere on the spectrum of art music and prog rock, is the band Palm. Underneath airy vocal melodies, they build out an architecturally precise combination of guitars and percussion, plus extra electronic triggered effects like steel drums, backwards samples, and other hard-to-identify noises. With strange and unusual combinations of ever-shifting meter (fives, thirteens, threes, and many other grooves that are really hard to dance to), the Bard-College born, Philadelphia-based outfit trips gaily through fun, smart, and weird pop experiments. They perform music from 2018's Rock Island in-studio. Their 2022 record, Nicks and Grazes , comes out in October.

Set list:

"Parly"
"Composite"
"Dog Milk"

Rock Island by Palm

The guitarra Portuguesa , or Portuguese guitar, looks a bit like a mandolin on steroids, and has a long history of great performers – all of them men. Until Marta Pereira da Costa showed up. She plays the double six-stringed, teardrop-shaped instrument in its traditional setting – Portuguese fado music – but has also written her own music and collaborated with artists like Iranian singer Tara Tiba and Cameroonian bass player Richard Bona.

Hear works by master player of the guitarra Portuguesa , Marta Pereira da Costa, together with pianist Alexandre Diniz, performed live in The Greene Space, for the 2022 New York Guitar Festival. - John Schaefer

Watch "Terra":

Watch "Verde Anos/Summertime":

Watch "Encontro":

Watch "Minha Alma":

Watch "Meditando /Fado Lopes" :

Watch "Alfonsina y el Mar”, “Dia de Feira":

Watch the entire concert from Night 4 of 2022's New York Guitar Festival from The Greene Space:

The singer and songwriter known as Sirintip lives here in New York, but like many musicians who are here in New York, she came from somewhere else. She was raised in Thailand, and spent her teenage years in her mother’s homeland of Sweden, before making her way to the city. Her debut LP called Tribus (due out Feb. 9) also seems to come from several places at once. There are jazz harmonies, Thai drums, electronics and singable pop all mixed together to often startling effect. Sirintip and her band play some of these songs live.

Set list:

In My Garden
Nothing in the Room/Pretend
Shut it Up

From the 2022 New York Guitar Festival at The Greene Space, hear Malian guitar virtuoso Vieux Farka Touré. The Malian singer and guitarist's career began with collaborations with two of West Africa’s most celebrated musicians: the kora player Toumani Diabate and Vieux’s own dad, the famous guitarist Ali Farka Touré. Since then he has worked with American singer Julia Easterlin and popular Israeli musician Idan Raichel, in addition to releasing five solo studio albums rooted in the sounds and rhythms of West African blues. His latest record, Les Racines (2022), addresses unrest in his home country, and marks a return to his roots – the style of his father’s playing. He and percussionist Adama Kone perform in The Greene Space. (-John Schaefer)

Set list: "Philipa", " Fafa", " Ali", " Tamala", " Ngala Kaourene", " Djaraby"

Watch "Philipa":

Watch "Fafa", " Ali", " Tamala":

Watch "Ngala Kaourene":

Watch "Djaraby":

Some time ago, Malian singer, songwriter, guitarist and actress Fatoumata Diawara did a wonderful and daring thing – inspired by her friend Rokia Traoré, she bought an acoustic guitar, and taught herself to play it. Since then, Fatoumata has put out her debut record, Fatou , collaborated with Damon Albarn's Africa Express, and contributed vocals to albums by Cheikh Lô, AfroCubism, and Orchestra Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou. Her 2018 record, Fenfo translates as “Something to Say”, and she plays some of those songs, in-studio. (Archives.)

Watch Fatoumata Diawara perform "Fenfo" in-studio:

Fatoumata Diawara: "Don do" | In Studio:

This video for the album’s first single “Nterini,” was directed by Ethiopian photographer and contemporary artist Aïda Muluneh, and filmed in the remote Afar region of Ethiopia, to which archaeologists have traced the origin of humanity.

The New York-based band Innov Gnawa performs the traditional healing music of Morocco: Gnawa - a trancey, rhythmic music that is played on an array of unique instruments — from the lute-like gimbri (sintir), to the metal qarqaba (castinets) with which the kouyos (chorus) keep time and pound out clattering, hypnotic rhythms. One of Innov Gnawa' s innovations is to collaborate with modern electronic acts like Bonobo, and continue to update “The Moroccan Blues”. Innov Gnawa performs music from their 2018 record, Aicha , in-studio. (From the Archives.)

Watch the individual songs below:

Los Angeles-based band Vintage Trouble is a powerfully fun time of old-school soul, southern rhythm & blues, sizzling dance moves, and catchy, crunchy guitar-driven rockenroll.

When describing their own sound, the band uses the term “formatted recklessness.” Yes, and that almost puts words to their timeless and appealing concoction of old-school soul, powerful riffs and high energy showmanship. Vintage Trouble joined us live in the studio in 2018 to shake the walls with their “live-wired, straight-shootin, dirty-mouth'd juke music,” at once spirited and thunderous, possessed and powerful, full of party and good-times.

Singer, songwriter, violinist, guitarist, whistler, glockenspielist, and actor (on Fargo), Andrew Bird, continues “his subversion of indie rock”, (-Schaefer) by including classical, folk, expansive violin solos, and old-time jazz; and has made a remarkable document of tilting at the windmills of his inner demons during these last few years of isolation and insularity. This latest record, 2022’s Inside Problems , sees Bird once again as an entertaining thinker who can couch dark cultural commentary in joyfully buoyant pop songs, (he prefers this exercise in contrasts.) Especially entertaining is a counting/numbers song (in the vein of Schoolhouse Rock) , “Eight”, which, he says, is his favorite number - and both this live version, and the album version of this song feature a pretty epic classic rock-length violin solo. As The Thinker, he invites us into getting literary with references to the late novelist and essayist Joan Didion (and related work by Irish poet William Butler Yeats), Greek mythology (Icarus and Orpheus), The Velvet Underground, and Beethoven.

Interestingly, Bird says that rather than compartmentalizing the various musical genres and conservatory training experiences (“I spent…four years trying not to let them educate me”, Pitchfork ), he says that he approaches melodies like folk music in the oral tradition, whether they are classical riffs of Ravel or Beethoven, old time music, Irish tunes, jazz standards, or Lou Reed/John Cale. So it makes perfect sense that when his internal jukebox kept spinning a piano reduction of Beethoven’s Allegretto from the 7th Symphony, which he’d heard in the movie, Howard’s End , he turned that theme into a bridge in his own song “Atomized.”

Over the past few years, Andrew Bird has also taken up acting (Fargo ), scored a Judd Apatow film, earned a Grammy nomination for My Finest Work Yet (2019) , and continued his wide-ranging musical collaborations. Additionally, his work, “Hover”, was performed at the most recent 2022 Ojai Festival, in an early music instrument arrangement by Emi Ferguson (Artist Propulsion Lab Class of 2022). All this to say, we are excited and honored (ok, I am BEYOND EXCITED) that Andrew Bird plays remotely and chats about his new album for the Soundcheck Podcast. – Caryn Havlik

Set list:
“Eight”, “Atomized” “Make a Picture”

Watch "Eight":

Watch "Make a Picture":

Resisting gender-specific compliments in print since 2014 (and probably before), producer, songwriter, badass, and musician Neko Case unleashed her record, Hell-On, into the world in 2018. She’s written songs that traverse a lot of ground: folk ballads, radio pop, rock anthems, a little bit of goth moodiness, honky-tonk piano, and swagger of all kinds. Her exceptional and distinct voice, “like garotting wire,” delivers wordplay of the highest o, rder on this gorgeous, daring, won't-be-a-supplicant-ever record. Neko Case brings her touring band to play some of these new tunes in-studio, (from the Archives, 2018.)

Neko Case is on tour in 2022 with her career-spanning retrospective album, Wild Creatures .

Coming from a rock and funk place, Dominican singer-songwriter Vicente García has become something of a folk pop revivalist, incorporating his love of Afro-Caribbean rhythms, from acoustic bachata to reggae on his latest record, A La Mar. Formerly the lead singer of the band Calor Urbano, the winner of Best New Artist at the 2018 Latin Grammys has been digging into Dominican folklore, despite his having relocated to Bogotá, Colombia. (He was also up for Best Tropical Song for "Bachata In Kingston, " according to alt.latino .) Vicente García joins us for an acoustic set to play some of these eclectic love songs. (From the Archives, 2018.)

Set list:

Te Soñe

Dulcito e coco
Juana Mecho

Musician, actor and doctor (otolaryngologist) Jorge Drexler grew up in Uruguay, and now lives in Spain. Listeners may be familiar with Drexler’s music because his theme song for The Motorcycle Diaries won an Academy Award (presented to him by Prince.) His 2018 album of songs, Salvavidas de Hiel o, is guitar-based, but augmented by a wide sonic palette of effects – samples, loops and beats created by different parts of guitars, dobros, and banjos. There is a song that touches on the loss of the planet’s glaciers, there’s one about how people have been migrating throughout time to stay alive – “Movimiento”, and yet another celebrating the elegance of silence. Jorge Drexler and his band play arrangements of these songs in-studio.

Set list:

"Movimiento"
"Asilo"
"Telefonía"

Pianist and composer BLKBOK, (pronounced “Black Bach”) has played with some of the biggest pop names: Rihanna, Justin Timberlake, Demi Lovato, and John Mayer. Born Charles Wilson III, he grew up in Detroit with a traditional classical foundation and pursued more musical interests including jazz, Motown, hip-hop and the blues. While he’s not conservatory-trained, he creates by channeling his thoughts and reflections, and running them through his fingers onto the piano, creating musical poems in the process.

Despite the absence of touring during the pandemic, it was a productive time for BLKBOK, who finalized the instrumental compositions that would become Black Book, a continuation of the legacy of (and inspired by) the movie Green Book , which told the story of trailblazing black classical pianist/composer Don Shirley. BLKBOK plays some of these works remotely for the Soundcheck Podcast.

Set list: “The Hustle Is Real”, “November 7, 2020”, “Amalia’s Ocean”

Watch: "The Hustle Is Real":

Watch: “November 7, 2020”:

Watch: “Amalia’s Ocean”:

The Bogotá-based Monsieur Periné has taken the the Latin music world by storm since their start in 2008. The eight piece band takes the music of their native Columbia, and infuses it with sweet swing sensibilities of the 1920's and a good dash of modern pop styles. Their upbeat and lively arrangements are engaging, detailed, and above all such a joy to move to. Their excellent musicianship and energy has not gone unnoticed; they were given a Latin Grammy award as 2015's best new artist. They have not slowed down since then and recently released the wildly popular Bailar Contigo . They perform live in-studio.

Watch the individual songs below:

The great South African a cappella choir Ladysmith Black Mambazo are a global phenomenon. With their uplifting vocal harmonies and signature dance moves, they’ve been anointed “cultural ambassadors to the world” by no less than Nelson Mandela. (Some listeners might recall them appearing on Paul Simon’s Graceland album back in 1986.) The group was formed in 1960 by Joseph Shabalala, has recorded more than 50 albums, and won five Grammys. Joseph Shabalala retired from the group in 2014, and died in February of 2020 , but his sons and other family members carry on the tradition. During their 2018 world tour, Ladysmith Black Mambazo returned to perform songs in our studio. (From the Archives, 2018.)

Feminist icon and Mexican folklorist Lila Downs’ 2018 album Salón, Lágrimas y Deseo (Dancehall, Tears, and Desire), is dedicated to strong women everywhere. Her lyrics, inviting all “dangerous” women to join her, often highlight issues relating to social justice, while spanning blues to cumbia, folk and ranchera music. Inspired by Frida Kahlo, Downs says in an interview with Remezcla that she finds being Mexican has “a lot of value, even if the world that surrounds one doesn’t believe it.” She’s joined by her band, and special guest Chilean emcee Ana Tijoux, in-studio. (From the Archives, 2018.)

New Zealand singer/songwriter Marlon Williams has a voice like butter which can be charming and flirty as in the timeless crooner soon-to-be-classic, “ Vampire Again ,” or which can convey despair and longing, see his duet with Aldous Harding - " Nobody Gets What They Want Anymore ." After his breakup from musician Aldous Harding, complicated torrents of feeling poured out in song, all delivered in a honey-smooth voice that accepts heartbreak and cultivates its beauty. Marlon Williams' 2018 record was called Make Way For Love; he plays some of those songs, in-studio. (From the Archives, 2018.)

For the better part of two decades, the Tuscon-based desert-noir band Calexico has been making Mariachi- and Cumbia-laced expansive Americana. For their 2018 record, The Thread That Keeps Us , they explore the dual nature of anxiety and hope in these volatile times with some romance and gritty dread. The band joins us to play some of these songs in our studio. (From the Archives.)
Their 2022 album, El Mirador, just out this past April, is "a hopeful, kaleidoscopic beacon of rock, bluesy ruminations and Latin American sounds" (YouTube.)

Set List:

The End of the World With You
Voices in the Field
Under the Wheels

African-American string band tradition meets Cajun/Creole and Appalachian music in a collaboration between singer, multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, actor and MacArthur Fellow Rhiannon Giddens and Dirk Powell, a multi-instrumentalist, singer, arranger, songwriter, and actor himself. Together, with banjos and fiddles, they play each other's original songs, music that takes on the slave condition of pre-Civil War times, and chat about their recent project, songs tied to the Reconstruction era culture of the Wilmington, North Carolina Massacre of 1898. (From the Archives, 2018.)

Set list:

I’m Gonna Write Me A Letter
Say Old Playmate
At the Purchaser’s Option

For the guitarist, vocalist, and bandleader of the London-based Curse of Lono , Felix Bechtolsheimer, these past few years have been steeped with loss: his father, uncle, ex-partner, and his band – whose lineup was completely overhauled to the pandemic. The band’s name comes from Hunter S. Thompson’s 1983 book of the same name, and their cinematic southern gothic country songs land somewhere between The Rolling Stones, Wilco, Lou Reed, the Doors, Leonard Cohen and Lee Hazelwood. Bechtolsheimer’s baritone guitars and baritone vocals are “a key part of the Lono sound”, which might be good for “a late-night desert drive” (GuitarWorld.com ).

Curse of Lono’s new record, People In Cars – an album named for a 2017 photo book by Mike Mandel – is introspective and at times steeped in memories of darkness and despair, and “is themed around the many roads he’s travelled and those who’ve shared the journey” (folkradio.co.uk ). Curse of Lono performs some of these songs for us remotely. - Caryn Havlik

Set list: In Your Arms, London Rain, Way to Mars

Watch "In Your Arms":

Watch "London Rain":

Watch "Way to Mars":

Dreamy slow-core folk duo Lean Year is Virginia-based singer Emilie Rex and filmmaker/musician Rick Alverson, along with contributions from Chicago musician/engineer Erik Hall and guest artists. Their musical palette is one of soft-spoken but direct vocals, a Telecaster guitar dredging through peaceful waters, baritone saxophone and clarinet parts, Rhodes, tape-warps, and waves of strings. Lean Year joins us in-studio to play some of these cutting and quiet minimalist folk tunes. (From the Archives, 2018.)

Since their inception over a decade ago, the string quintet Sybarite5 has built a global audience , from Lincoln Center to The Cutting Room and the Museum of Sex; from the Apple Store to the Library of Congress, and a music salon-like residency at NYC’s the cell, along with multiple international and national tours, residencies, and festivals.

The five players (Sami Merdinian and Sarah Whitney, violins; Angela Pickett, viola; Laura Metcalf, cello; and Louis Levitt, bass) have made it their quest to champion new music by American composers along with other tunes that excite them: arrangements of Radiohead, Taraf de Haidouks, Led Zeppelin, and Astor Piazzolla. Their 2018 record, OUTLIERS , is a collection of new works composed just for them. The quintet plays some of these tunes in-studio. (Archives, 2018.)

Set List:

Black Bend by Dan Visconti
Yann's Light by Shawn Conley
Getting Home (I must be...) by Jessica Meyer

Pow Wow singer Joe Rainey, of the Ojibwe community in Minneapolis, fuses traditional melodies and “vocables” (Philip Sherburne, Pitchfork ) with the producer Andrew Broder in something of an avant-hip hop partnership, although in addition to beats, there are field recordings, industrial-sounding processed drums, string arrangements, and vocal processing. He describes his music as being on the same river, but a different boat from other pow wow singers and groups.

Rainey’s album Niineta —the title means “Just Me” in Ojibwe, and which he further explains is “my contribution to contemporary indigenous music” – was released on Justin Vernon and the Dessner brothers’ 37d03d label, to which Rainey is signed. The music is rooted in traditional drum and dance music, where for years Rainey always had a hand-held recorder or voice memo rolling, even recording calls from incarcerated family members singing. These field recordings became part of the whole album’s unique woven fabric of voice-as-instrument pieces, combined with samples and sometimes with altered by electronic processing, all layered with Rainey’s own singing, which can celebrate or console, and “conveys a clear message: We’re still here. We were here before you were, and we never left”, (Bandcamp .) Joe Rainey and Andrew Broder perform remotely. - Caryn Havlik

Set list: “Bezhigo”, “Can Key”, “No Chants”

Watch "Bezhigo":

Watch "Can Key":

Watch "No Chants":

Niineta by Joe Rainey:

Niineta by Joe Rainey

In the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, during the 1960’s and ‘70s, the sounds of American jazz and James Brown-style funk rocketed through the clubs there, combining with Ethiopia’s own exotic scales to produce the golden age of Ethiopian pop. The New York-based 7-piece band Anbessa Orchestra draws from this era and aims to take the listener on a musical journey from Addis Ababa to Brooklyn, with the loping grooves, buoyant brass lines, moody organ, crisp guitars, and solid percussion. Their 2018 album is called Negastat, which means “Kings,” and it is full of Ethiopian-style, horn-heavy funk. And the Anbessa Orchestra is here to play some of it in-studio. (From the Archives, 2018.)

Watch "Gurage":

Watch an Ethiopian scales demo:

Watch "Yeleleu Hager Lidl" (Son of No Country):

As bands go, Anna & Elizabeth have quite the origin story. Anna & Elizabeth began thanks to a broke down car and a shared desire to explore the traditions of Appalachian roots music. The immersive, intimate combination of Elizabeth LaPrelle’s deep mountain voice (from Virginia), Anna Roberts-Gevalt’s modern one (from Vermont), their sweet harmonies, and minimalist arrangements is striking. The duo’s latest record, The Invisible Comes to Us , co-produced by Anna and Benjamin Lazar Davis (avant-pop outfit Cuddle Magic), draws on old-time traditions of home, porch, and kitchen music, and incorporates experimental pedal steel player Susan Alcorn and drummer Jim White (The Dirty Three), along with electronic elements. It brings Anna & Elizabeth to play some of these sparse, haunting ballads, stories, and lullabies for us, in-studio.

Watch "Black Eyed Susan":

Watch "Jeano" :

Watch "Odd Kimball":

Canadian indie-pop band Stars makes almost orchestral pop that has the bonus quality of being danceable. They’ve also got a knack for vividly descriptive storytelling, built around the dueling vocals of singers Torquil Campbell and Amy Millan. Formed in the early 2000’s, Stars has been “remarkably stable” over the years; they enjoy making one another laugh, they've written a play, and even fiction about themselves.

Their ninth studio album, From Capelton Hill , covers pandemic shock, explores memory – perhaps with a sepia tinge, and has a strong sense of place. Stars plays remotely for the Soundcheck Podcast.

Stars plays a Bandcamp Live-streaming set at 5PM on May 27 .

Set list: “Build a Fire”, “Capelton Hill”, "Patterns"

Watch "Build a Fire":