2020 was not a great year for listening to new recordings. For me, anyway.
It’s a combination of a few things.
- The pandemic. I didn’t want to listen to new music. I was strongly motivated to listen to comfort music, and new music rarely starts out at comfort music. There’s a list of albums I leaned on this year at the bottom of this post.
- Fewer New Releases. This is also partly pandemic–artists weren’t releasing new albums because studios were closed, because they couldn’t tour to promote them, or because they were struggling with pandemic malaise and were unmotivated to create.
- Bad luck. My favorite artists generally take longer than a year between releases. In 2017-2018, that resulted in Manhattan Transfer, Take 6, The Real Group, and New York Voices all releasing an album in a span of 7 months. In 2020, that resulted in none of them releasing albums. C’est la vie. (and, c’est 2020…)
That said, not all of the music I dug into was old, or familiar to me. Here’s a few things that were heard often around my house.
Säje (Sara Gazarek, Amanda Taylor, Johnaye Kendrick, Erin Bentlage)
Säje started with a bang with their first live performance at the JEN Conference in January. I missed a chance to hear them live in March (thanks, 2020) but have been enjoying their release of new music throughout the year, and have even joined Patreon to support them. This is one of their absolute standouts, Desert Song. It is also their first Grammy nomination, for best arrangement.
Djesse Vol. 3 (Jacob Collier)
Another artist I missed seeing live in 2020, and who didn’t let the stay-at-home orders keep him from creating. (His studio is in his home, so that helps…) His third album in the four-album cycle he’s been working on explores what he calls “negative musical space.” I’m personally more attuned to the musical space he explores in Vol. 1, but there are several standout songs on this record. It’s also my 11-year-old’s favorite of his output so far, so that has kept it spinning (literally, since Santa Claus brought him a record player and a copy of the record on vinyl!).
Folklore and Evermore (Taylor Swift)
Taylor Swift’s music isn’t really written for me. But it’s incredibly potent, well-conceived and -executed, and she continues to grow in depth and complexity as a songwriter. Her two 2020 surprise albums are a leap forward for her, and have figured prominently into our house listening this year. (Part of that is thanks to my 9-year-old daughter, who is a TS superfan.
history of the entire world, i guess (Bill Wurtz)
Does this count as music? It definitely counts as one of the most remarkable music-centric creations I learned of this year. (It’s from 2017.) I have my firstborn, my 14-year-old, to thank – he’s been deep diving into Wurtz’s creative output this year, and insisted I check this out. Wurtz is mysterious, but he’s musically prodigious, and his music is at least as important as the words or the images in his creations.
Comfort Listening
As I said, there was a lot of comfort listening in 2020. For me, that includes:
- Vocal Harmony Groups (The Singers Unlimited, The Hi-Lo’s, New York Voices, The Real Group, etc.)
- Christmas Music (We went all in on Christmas music after Halloween this year, and I don’t regret a single listen.)
- The Questions (Kurt Elling) – more here.
- Unaccompanied Cello Suites (Yo Yo Ma) – especially the new version.
- Ella and Louis and Ella and Louis Again
- The Beatles, James Taylor, Simon & Garfunkel
2021 will be a year with more new music, I’m sure: I’m excited to expand and explore my musical horizons once again.
What new have you been listening to this year?