August 6, 2024
Three introductions to Jacob Collier
After a lot of work, study, and silent prayer, I’ve chosen three works to help you fall in love with Jacob Collier the way I have. Unless you already have.
Photo via Anton Diaz CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
It happened by accident to me. I came across one YouTube of him — I don’t remember which one — and then fell into another, and then into another. Now if I don’t stop myself, I’ll find myself falling into one Jacob-shaped hole after another, and then two hours later I remember what I was going to be doing. I even went to his Boston concert a couple of months ago, the first live concert I’d been to since Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue in 1975 in Toronto. (JC’s bond with his audience in the exact opposite of Dylan’s.)
Anyway, here’s the Intro Playlist:
This is an excellent one hour BBC documentary that I think gives a good overall view of why and how he’s special. It also will give you a sense of his genius-level multi-instrumentality, which the two songs below don’t highlight … although his guitar work in the next one is quietly astounding. (Hint: Always pay attention to his chord-work/harmonizing.)
Little Blue is a beautiful song from his new album. There’s an official video with him on multiple instruments (and Brandi Carlile!), but this version of him singing it with only his guitar and a small chorus I think is more affecting. By the way, the singers are simply fans who responded to his open invitation, not professionals. Also, in this version he turns them into a chorus by using hand gestures; that part is unrehearsed. (Leading his audiences in this way has become a signature part of his live concerts.)
Then there’s what I think is his magnum opus (so far): A version of a Bridge over Troubled Water. I’m not crazy about the original, but JC’s version of it I find exhilarating and moving. It’s purely vocal, with JC singing all the background parts. His 2-hour walkthrough of how he created it on his Mac makes you aware of the hundreds of tiny decisions that went into it. And here’s a live version of it, with John Legend and Tori Kelly, that’s also astounding. JC is on a keyboard, called the harmonizer, he invented with Ben Bloomberg, an MIT Media Lab grad student, that turns what he’s singing into whatever keys he’s pressing. Also Tori’s runs were all written by JC, even though they sound like improvisations.
I hope you will long fall into your own Jacob shaped holes. And this is coming from someone who generally isn’t moved by music. (Some exceptions apply.)
Categories: entertainment, free culture, video Tagged with: art • culture • music
