NPR Music Chloe x Halle: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [Live December 8, 2020]

 

NPR Music PJ Morton: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [Live December 2, 2020]

 

NPR Music KEM: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [Live November 23, 2020]

Recorded in his hometown of Detroit, KEM's Tiny Desk performance is light, welcoming and beautifully decorated. So is his music. After almost 20 years of recording R&B hits like "I Can't Stop Loving You" and "Love Calls," he still comforts my soul with his sultry voice and simple, yet satisfying melodies.  Fans have been waiting since 2014 for a new album and it finally dropped earlier this year. Love Always Wins is filled with his signature romantic style. With accompaniments by veteran musicians, Michael "Nomad" Ripoll on guitar and David McMurray on saxophone, we get to hear three songs from the album in this lovely set.  The first, "Friend Today," poignantly articulates a love for our fellow humans: "There's a roll like thunder / They killing our babies, Lord / They headed straight for the border / And we can no longer ignore it." KEM wrote "Not Before You," a classic romantic love song, as a dedication to his wife, Erica. "Lonely" ends the set with an upbeat, hopeful vibe: "There's a life waiting for you / In your brokenness." It's an affirmation that personal struggles can end in true happiness. --- Suraya Mohamed NPR Music

NPR Music Michael Kiwanuka: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert

Michael Samuel Kiwanuka [born 3 May 1987] is a British singer-songwriter and record producer who is signed with Polydor Records. His 2012 debut album, Home Again, went gold in the United Kingdom and his second album, Love & Hate, debuted in 2016 at number one. He has been nominated for numerous honours, including the Brit Awards, MTV Europe Music Awards, and BBC Music Awards. In January 2012, he won the BBC's Sound of 2012, and in September 2020, he won the Mercury Prize.

Courtesy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhKMsubj3bg&t=660s

NPR Music Tiana Major9: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [Live November 6, 2020 London, England]

Ascending R&B talent Tiana Major9 welcomes us into her South London home with a band she assembled for her Tiny Desk [home] concert. Tiana gained the music world’s attention in August when Adele took to Instagram to call the song “Same Space?” “absolutely stunning!!” [The post was liked more than 430,000 times.] I was lucky enough to witness a private Tiana showcase in Los Angeles several months earlier, where I was moved by the refined nature of her voice.  She begins her Tiny Desk with an ending of sorts: the devastating “Collide,” written for the final sequence of Lena Waithe’s critically acclaimed film Queen & Slim. Later, she shows off her range and timbre on “Think About You,” a stunning love song that infuses elements of jazz, alternative R&B and her Jamaican roots. The sweetness in its refrain “I need more hours in the day … just to think about you” feels like a blueprint for how to spend the third wave of quarantine. --- Courtesy: Abby O'Neill NPR Music

NPR Music Ty Dolla $ign: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [#Explicit #NSFW] [October28, 2020]

 

NPR Music Spillage Village: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [October 23, 2020] [#Explicit #NSFW]

Spillage Village is an American musical collective from Atlanta, Georgia. The group is composed of rappers, singers and producers, and was founded by the members of EarthGang. Spillage Village was primarily made up of five initial members with a split-base in both Atlanta and Baltimore.

Courtesy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spillage_Village

NPR Music Nao: Tiny Desk Concert [March 18, 2019]

 In astrology, your Saturn return is the time in life when Saturn goes back to the same spot it was at the time of your birth. As Nao explained during her appearance at NPR's Tiny Desk, "It's about leaving adolescence and going into adulthood." This crossing of the threshold that happens around your late 20s to early 30s is the inspiration for Saturn, Nao's sophomore effort and one of 2018's best albums. When the U.K. singer-songwriter brought her band and cosmic energy to the Tiny Desk — sneaking in her 2015 breakthrough track, "Bad Blood," alongside Saturn standouts — the strength and conviction of her performance had fans in the office strapped in for the emotional ride.  While Nao usually performs with synthy, electronic twinkles, her day at the Tiny Desk was stripped down by comparison. At times, her lyrics ring out with just a sparse guitar to carry them. Like a roller coaster of unexpected upheaval, Nao's distinctive vocal range on this four-song set goes from bellowing and husky to soft and coy, often within the same verse. Be it the breezy, Brazilian funk of "If You Ever," the hallowed harmony of "Orbit" (complete with prayer hands) or the valiant soul-searching of "Make It Out Alive," it's almost as if Nao duets with herself, answering her own questions, settling into her own quirks.  Saturn return can be marked with new responsibilities, confusion and poison-thorned serendipity. But by creating astral, intentional music through her growing pains, Nao ended up grounding herself.

Courtesy: Sidney Madden, NPR Music

NPR Music Ozuna: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [October 16, 2020]

From a verdant room tucked away in Miami, Ozuna's Tiny Desk performance might allow you, as it did me, to forget for a moment that he's one of the most watched and listened-to artists on earth. For someone whose work often operates at galactic proportions, this performance of five songs makes room for Ozuna's sweet tenor to take center-desk in a love letter to the global communities that supported and streamed him to god tier status.   The Puerto Rican singer kicks it off with a breezy rendition of "Caramelo" that leads into a solo version of the sun-drenched "Del Mar" from ENOC, his fourth album that he's deemed a return to his roots. This pared-down performance makes good on that promise, reworking star-studded collaborations, like the ballad "Despeinada," as they should be sung: languorously and with intimacy. Even the pop smash "Taki Taki" sounds brand new, buoyed by his alchemical flow and energy.  Ozuna is a crown jewel in the global crest of Latin pop, a movement whose modern success in reggaeton and Latin trap is indebted to the Caribbean genres Ozuna heard growing up in Puerto Rico, sounds like old-school reggaeton and reggae en español, dembow, dancehall and more. From then to now, Ozuna's bare talent remains his greatest asset. It's rare to see a star of his magnitude brush the earth so closely, and when it does, it's even rarer for it to feel and sound like second nature.

Courtesy: NPR Music Stefanie Fernández https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iK1uBBv83M0

Bebel Gilberto: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [Live October 15, 2020 Rio De Janeiro, Brazil]

 

NPR Music Linda Diaz 2020 Tiny Desk Contest Winner: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [October 5, 2020]

Linda Diaz -- Winning the Tiny Desk Contest has been a surreal experience for me, not only because it's a big, big honor, but because it's all happening in the midst of a global pandemic. Even just shooting my Tiny Desk (home) concert has been a wild ride: getting the band together, getting the NPR team together, figuring out how to shoot safely with everyone in New York City. At one point, we finally had everything set and ready to go. Then, days before the shoot, I tested positive for COVID-19. I will spare you all the details (lots of tears, lots of phone calls), but I am so grateful for my band, the NPR Music team and the Javits Center for going above and beyond for me, the human as much as me, the musician.  

Even though I couldn't be at the Desk, I'm feeling lucky to have been able to share some extra little parts of my personality with my (home) concert. Like, how dope is it to be able to say that I'm not only the 2020 Tiny Desk Contest winner, but that we were the first musicians ever to perform on the top of the Javits Center?! In more ways than one, this concert is a victory and a dream come true for me.  

Through this whole process, it has felt weird to be celebrating, but what has been reiterated time and again is that it is more than OK to be Black and celebrate and mourn and organize and rest and any other number of things. Black joy is radical because it actively opposes defeat. It is necessary.

NPR Music Lila Iké: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [Live] [August 19, 2020]

 

NPR Music Tiwa Savage: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [August 31, 2020]

 

NPR Music Jhené Aiko: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [Live October 1, 2020]

 

NPR Music Jhené Aiko: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [Live October 1, 2020]

The Tiny Desk is working from home for the foreseeable future. Introducing NPR Music's Tiny Desk (home) concerts, bringing you performances from across the country and the world. It's the same spirit — stripped-down sets, an intimate setting — just a different space.

 

NPR Music Oddisee: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [September 22, 2020]

 

Tom Misch & Yussef Dayes: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [July 13, 2020]

 

NPR Music Lenny Kravitz: Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [July 20, 2020]

 

NPR Music: Protoje Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [September 8, 2020]

NPR Music: BTS Tiny Desk [Home] Concert [Sept. 21, 2020]