The method of creative creation makes for good storytelling. There’s the unsexy doubt and the exhilarating breakthroughs, the fortifying confirmations and the sticky pockets. It’s a messy course of. This complete inventive affair will get stickier when the artist is a band stuffed with advanced personalities and fraught relationships.
That is the central premise of David Adjmi’s play Stereophonic, which ends its Broadway run on Jan. 12. The play garnered a document 13 Tony nominations and took residence 5, together with Greatest Play. So what’s a play doing on the Tiny Desk? Nicely, the play options an album’s value of unique music from Will Butler (previously of Arcade Hearth) whose lyrics present perception into 5 folks falling aside when they need to be coming collectively creatively. The music is carried out by the unique Broadway solid members Will Brill (who received a Tony for his efficiency), Juliana Canfield, Tom Pecinka, Sarah Pidgeon and Chris Stack, who’re joined right here by composer Butler and music director and orchestrator Justin Craig.
The solid treats us to “Shiny (Quick)” that includes Pidgeon’s earthy twang, the Pecinka-led “Seven Roads,” and Canfield’s contemplative duo of “Drive,” (supported by Stack and Brill’s propulsive beat) and “In Your Arms.” All through the efficiency Butler and Craig present elaborations that assist construct out the sonic footprint of the tunes. Our unnamed band (because the viewers by no means fairly learns its precise title) closes the set with “Masquerade” in all its grooving ’70s rock grandeur.
SET LIST
- “Shiny (Quick)”
- “Seven Roads”
- “Drive”
- “In Your Arms”
- “Masquerade”
MUSICIANS
- Will Butler: piano, guitar, vocals, composition
- Justin Craig: guitar, music path
- Will Brill: bass as Reg
- Juliana Canfield: piano, vocals as Holly)
- Tom Pecinka: guitar, vocals as Peter)
- Sarah Pidgeon: vocals as Diana)
- Chris Stack: drums as Simon)
TINY DESK TEAM
- Producer: Mitra I. Arthur
- Director/Editor: Joshua Bryant
- Audio Technical Director: Josh Newell
- Host/Collection Producer: Bobby Carter
- Videographers: Joshua Bryant, Kara Body, Maia Stern, Zayhra Rodriguez
- Audio Engineer: Neil Tevault
- Manufacturing Assistant: Ashley Pointer
- Photographer: Alanté Serene
- Tiny Desk Copy Editor: Hazel Cills
- Govt Producer: Suraya Mohamed
- Collection Creators: Bob Boilen, Stephen Thompson
- VP, Visuals and Music: Keith Jenkins