NPR Music - The Contenders, Vol. 17: Keaton Henson, Arvo Pärt, Julia Hamos, more

Episode Date: August 5, 2025

We update our list of the year’s best songs with new obsessions from The Antlers, polymath Keaton Henson, pianist Julia Hamos, Estonian composer Arvo Pärt and more.Featured artists and songs:1. Julia Hamos: “Ellis Island,” from Ellis Island2. The Antlers: “Carnage,” from Blight 3. Gabriela Ortiz: “El olo del Jaguar,” from Yanga 4. Keaton Henson: “Lazy Magician (feat. Julia Steiner)” (single) 5. Arvo Pärt: “Nunc dimittis,” from And I heard a voiceAll Songs Considered 25th anniversary segment: Our No. 1 songs from 2023 Weekly reset: Crows in a D.C. suburb on a summer afternoon. Enjoy the show? Share it with a friend and leave us a review on Apple or Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. Questions, comments, suggestions or feedback of any kind always welcome: [e-mail] pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

How have you been, Tom? Have you been surviving the heat? It has been scorching, hasn't it? It's so bad. I had a debate with a friend about whether or not it's any worse now, and I feel like it always gets awful in D.C. Yeah, it's slumpy. But it, I don't know, this last week just felt heavy, almost hard to breathe.

Life is heavy, right? Life is heavy. We're going to make it all better for everyone here. Welcome to All Songs Considered, the World's Greatest Podcast. whenever you're on. Tom Hisinga, welcome. Oh, thank you, Robin. It's always great to be here. This is one of our contenders episodes. We do one every other week or so. We keep this running list of the year's best songs, and we add to it throughout the year.

These are the songs that we love so much. They're in the running for a spot. They're contenders, for a spot on our best of 2025 lists. When we get to that point at the end of the year, you know, when I started to dig more into the songs that we're playing this week, Tom, My first thought was that, wow, these really get into some pretty big global, you know, world problems like immigration and the environment and religion. But the more I listened to him and set with everything, I started to think that, you know, it's really all from a very intimate and very personal point of view. Well, you mentioned immigration, and there is kind of a connection to the first piece we're going to hear. It's performed by Julia Homo. She's a young American pianist who grew up speaking Hungarian in her household.

And her debut solo album is called Ellis Island after the Meredith Monk track of the same name. So that's what we'll hear in a moment. I think it's really smartly programmed. And in its own way, it really tells the story of Julia Hamos and her family, the Hungarian side of her family, through a wide variety of composers, some that you would normally think would be on an album like this, like Bartok and Kurtag. But some non-obvious composers, too, like Charles Mingus.

Right. And Meredith Monk. So this is the title track from the album Ellis Island. And these are all solo piano pieces, yeah? They are. And what we should be listening for here is this crystalline quality that Hamas brings to the table. Every note sparkles each with its own importance,

especially when the other musical voices fold. in. You know, it's rhythmically taught, but not really uptight. And some pianists tend to just toss off pieces like this, minimalist kind of pieces like this, but not Hamosh. Her devotion really shows, and it's a terrific performance. You know, what you name a piece of music, particularly when it's an instrumental piece of music, can really shape how you hear it, right? And I suppose you could have name this song, like shopping at the Mega Mart, or something like that. But it just, Alice Island, it just conjured all these images of people bustling around and the sense of hope and a lightness to it all. Well, and that music might sound simple, but it's not. And it's not easy to pull off

with that much nuance and flare. You really have to be like a diamond cutter with this piece because all of the notes really shine there. So I wasn't familiar with this piece before you shared it. and I went back and I listened to the original Meredith Monk version. And you know how you said this Julia Homosh version is sort of crystalline and very clearly articulated? I actually thought this version was a lot warmer sounding and a little more rounded than the Meredith Monk. I thought the Meredith Monk version had a little more bite to it. And it might just be the space that it was recorded in. I mean, it's all very clearly articulated in this Homosh performance.

but it's, and it's very subtle, but it created a little more warmth, almost a feeling of empathy or something that I was hearing in this music, whereas the Meredith Monk version is maybe a little more, I don't know, a little more celebratory or something. It could be that she is feeling her roots

and feeling her, this record is a lot about family. She writes on the liner notes that three of her grandparents and her father passed away within a year's time recently. And I think this record is really, feels like an homage to them, an homage to family. And so maybe that's where some of that warmth comes in. And she says that Ellis Island is the pivot point of the record.

And she says it's not necessarily about coming from Europe to America, but she says it could be the other way around, which is what she says she's done with her own life. She was born in New York, but she went to Europe to study with some Hungarians and then also in England as well. So again, that's the title track from the Julia Homosh album, Ellis Island, and Homosh is spelled H-A-M-O-S, pronounced Hamosh. That album is out now. It came out at the top of June. Did you say it's her debut?

It's her debut solo record. I see. Okay, yeah. And she's a pianist to keep an ear on for sure. Well, let's do another cut that I think is very personal, but also very much informed by bigger global issues and questions. It's from the band The Antlers. Were you ever into the Antlers? I was.

Yeah. So, you know, they had that incredible album back in 2009 called Hospice, which really sort of put them on the map. They really took off after they released that album. One of my all-time favorite records of any year. They've got a new one now called Blight. It's their first album in four years, and I think it's the best thing they've done since Hospice. The first song that they've shared from this new album is called Carnage, Which it really sounds terrible, doesn't it?

The album's Blight, and the song is Carnage. Yeah. Party music. Yeah, party time. But, you know, honestly, I don't think when you listen to it, I don't think it's as dystopian or, I don't know, as heavy-handed as you might think based on those names. We can talk more about it after we hear it. I might have to push back on that.

Well, we'll listen and see. Broadly, I should say that this song is about the environment and the damage that we do to it, not in any kind of grand, like, global warming scale sort of way, but in smaller ways that we don't even notice. But before we hear it, I should just say that you can think about the words, but for me, what I love is the last third of the song, which is this long, brilliant, instrumental wall of sound

with these concussive churning guitars, and then this bright little piping tune high up. in the synth, it feels very apocalyptic, but just good and crunching. I mean, okay, for sure. There's a name like carnage, grass of mold. But I think with a name like Carnage and Blight, you could go way darker and grittier than that. It still kind of shimmeres to me. Oh, yeah. It's so beautifully dark.

It's just wonderful. It's very on brand for the Antlers, too. That's sort of what has always been their trademark sound. They usually will start from a place of sadness or grief or beauty, and then there's a build, and then everything is awash in this vast sea of reverb. And even how the song starts with his... It's like an alarm clock. It's like, hello, wake up.

Something's happening here. And I think it's like, I don't think it's necessarily talking about the environment and about animals. I think it's also reflective of us. And I think it speaks to a certain amount of numbness that a lot of people are feeling right now. You know, another horrific incident happens, a mass shooting, whatever it is, rolls off our backs now. Nothing about the environment at all, just general. Yeah. And it's frightening what we've become.

Yeah. That's Peter Silberman singing and playing guitar there at the end. So he recorded this in upstate New York, and he would go for these long walks through these fields, these empty fields. And he said that it felt like he was on this abandoned planet. And that that got him reflecting on the planet, on the state of the planet. And thinking of the small ways, you know, or at least seemingly or relatively small ways that we affect the environment. like an animal getting stuck in our fence or you run over a snake in the road or whatever it is, and that we don't even notice anymore.

So I guess that, yeah, speaks to your... Or we don't care anymore. Yeah, yeah. Well, I'm so glad to have them back. Like I said, this is the first album in four years, and what I've heard of it is incredible. I think their best work since hospice. Again, the album is called Blight.

It is not out until the fall. It's scheduled for October 10th. All right, a reminder, if you want to support the show, just tell a friend about it. Share this show with a friend and leave us a review on Apple Music or Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. Also, coming up, Stephen Thompson, we'll be here to talk about our number one songs of 2023. We're going all the way back to 2020. Can you take a walk down memory lane with us? This is something we've been doing at the end of every episode this spring and summer,

talking about our favorite songs from each of the past 25 years. This is for the 25th anniversary celebration of all songs considered, or 25 this year. We're almost done, just two more years to go. I can't even remember 2024, much less. I mean, you joke, but it hasn't gotten any easier for Stephen and I to remember the music that we were listening to. That's coming up, plus your weekly reset. That's the little found sounds or ambient sounds you hear at the end of these episodes, if you've ever wondered what those are.

Love those. That is your weekly reset. All of that is coming up. But Tom, what else you got cooking this week? Well, you know, last year, Robin, there was an album of works by Mexican composer Gabriel Ortiz with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Gustavo Dudamel conducting. That was my favorite classical record of 2024. I can remember that much. You remember that one.

And it ended up winning three Grammys for Ortiz. And now the same forces are back with another album of orchestral music of Gabriela Ortiz. and the standout work on the album is this new cello concerto called Zonat. And it was written for the performer that we'll hear in a moment, Elisa Weilerstein, who just plays it with, I must say, ferocious commitment. And the movement we're going to hear is called Eye of the Jaguar. And just listen to her cello. It snarls.

It acts as like a jazzy plucked bass. It acts as a percussion. instrument via this technique called Colenio where the wood of the bow bounces on the strings rather than the hair of the bow. Say the name of the concerto again. Is it Zonaut? How did you pronounce it? The name of the concerto is Zonat, and I'll spell it for you.

It's D-Z-O-N-O-T. And it's a Mayan word that describes these amazing underground caves and cisterns that populate the Yucatan region of Mexico. This movement of the concertos called Eye of the Jaguar, which is an endangered animal in the Yucatan region. And this piece is a little bit longer, but it's worth the journey. I dare say, Robin, those are some classical grooves. I dare say, it rocks, doesn't it?

Yeah, I had to say the first couple of times I listened to this piece, I found it to be kind of stressful. There's so much tension in it. I like where it settled kind of lands there at the end in that last minute or so. But this time listening through it, I don't know if I'm in a different headspace, but it's not stressful. It just kind of rocks. I love the grooves that it gets into.

And it's exhausting in the best kind of way. But can you imagine playing it? Well, that's the thing. I can't hear a piece of music like this without thinking of all the little dots on the paper that everyone's – someone had to write all that out. And it's just a staggering accomplishment. Just the level of musicianship, just the, you know, breathtaking degree of inspiration required to get this down on paper and structure it and guide everyone through it.

Incredible. And that's just one quarter. That's one movement of a four movement. Yeah. Well, so, you know, as percussive as this piece is, I actually thought the woods were doing a lot of lifting in this piece. There's some really incredible stuff with that, too. Oh, and you mentioned percussion there. are 30 different percussion instruments in this score.

I believe it. From sleigh bells to bongos to claves, cowbells, Crotales, Chinese wooden box, and Tibetan bells, just to name a few. I just have to say that I love that Gabriel Ortiz is finally getting her much-deserved recognition. She's 60. She's paid some dues, and now she is collecting three Grammys.

She's got Gustavo Dutamel and the L.A. Philharmonic, you know, A-list people championing her music. She just finished her post as a resident composer at Carnegie Hall. She's doing the same at the concert cabal in Amsterdam this upcoming season. Wow. She has arrived and I could not be happier. So the album this is from is called Yanga? The album is called Yanga.

And the title of the concerto that we just heard is called Zonat. And the movement was called The Eye of the Jaguar. Well, I wanted to play something more in the rock vein. here, just to kind of mix things up a bit. Now I kind of feel like that took care of that for us. I don't know. There's some stuff I was thinking, you know, I could go with maybe there's some stuff from the Beths out now that I'm really loving. I'll save that for another episode. Honestly, I have found that I just keep leaning more toward music that's more introspective, a little quieter. Like there's noise, but it's not like ugly noise.

I think that's what you get with this new cut from Keaton Hinson that I want to play. If you know Keaton Henson's work, he's someone who's usually very, very quiet. Were you here for his Tiny Desk concert? Did you know? Oh, I missed that one, unfortunately. So quiet. Everyone was totally silent trying to hear him. And even in the room, you could barely hear him singing.

On this new song, I think he's opening up a little bit more. It's about as big as I've ever heard him get. That's not really saying much. But it's a track called Lazy Magician. Lazy Magician. And I think, like, so much of his music, what I love about it is it's a little funny, it's a little sad, and just really, really beautiful. So that's Julius Steiner of the band Rap Boys, singing with Keaton Henson on this song,

Lazy Magician. I like that. Yeah, what do you think? Well, it's so different from his last album, some Nambulet Cycles, which is almost really almost an ambient record. Oh, yeah. Film, scores, subtleties, and... Well, and that was very different from everything he'd done before that.

I mean, he really is sort of a polymath. I know that term gets thrown around a lot, but I mean, he is a poet, an illustrator. You know, he wrote and put out a graphic novel, multi-instrumentalist, great singer. His voice is just gorgeous, I think. What I like about this song is, you know, he's quite a generous duet singer when he wants to be. I mean, I love those harmonies on the second verse when, you know, Hansen sings high and Steiner sings love. That's a really effective way to do duets. I think it's a really funny song.

I mean, it's admittedly a dark comedy. But, I mean, you know, just that he's a magician who can't make anything disappear. He's an acrobat who's afraid of heights. What was the other one that he says at the end? Oh, he's like a fortune teller. Yeah, but I can see a future where I'm fine. So that's where the song takes right at the end. It takes us flip, like, you know.

Yeah, that's true. Maybe everything's going to be okay for him. Again, Keaton Hinson the song, Lazy Magician. All right, we've got your weekly reset coming up. We close every show with those. Plus, Stephen Thompson, back to talk about our number one songs from 2023.

But Tom, you have got one more cut that you want to play. I do, and it's a new recording of music by Arvo Perth, the great Estonian composer, who turns 90 on September 11th. Incredible. He's slowing down, though. Not really, I've been told he's not. not really composing anymore. And this album will be released the week before on September 5th. And the record is really just this breathtaking tribute to one of the most performed and beloved

living composers. He's one of my all-time favorite composers. His work always is so deeply moving to me, so beautiful. You got to actually meet him once. Didn't you meet him? I did. I did. It's one of the high points of my career. He came over in 2014 for a very rare visit to the States because there was a festival of his music here in Washington and in New York. And bragging rights here, I was the only journalist that he gave a face-to-face interview with. And I went to his hotel in Georgetown.

It was just a producer and myself. His wife was there, someone from the Estonian embassy. And before we even got going, I took this little big. bell because he likes bells and I rang this little bell and he says oh good I love bells and his composing style really is it's called this tintinabuli and the translation of that word is little bells oh interesting but you ask what he was like and I don't think I've ever met a person who just exuded so much inner peace and calm you just described his music a full of this sort of inner piece.

We've been going on here. We should maybe hear a little bit. What do you want to do here? Do you want to just play this piece? The album's called, and I heard a voice. Yeah, I should just tell you a little bit of what we're going to hear. It's this, all the music on the record is sacred music. And what we're going to hear is a piece called Nunk Demetes, which is part of the Christian

liturgy, and it's based on this Bible passage from the book of Luke, where this old, devout dude named Simeon was told by the Holy Spirit that he couldn't die. until he saw the Christ child. Then Joseph and Mary bring Jesus into the church, and Simmin is there and holds the baby, and he says, Now let thy servant depart in peace, which is the opening line of this piece.

And so it's this very specific and amazing moment where this dude knows that he can now die because he's seen Christ. And the music helps create this kind of supernatural portal between this world and the next and how Aravo Perit depicts it is with the utmost wonder and reverence. Well, let me tell you, when I listened to this piece for the first time, or I should say attempted to listen to this for the first time, I was supremely distracted. I was trying to do three or four other things, you know, check an email and checking my phone,

texting and answering questions. No, no, no, no. The worst way to listen to music. And I will say maybe about a minute or so into this, Everything around me started to disappear. And all of the noise in my life started to fade until this piece of music was the only thing that existed. It had the power to erase everything around me. Tears were streaming down my face.

It uncorked something in me that needed to be released. Well, his music does that. All right, we're going to go out on this. But again, keep listening after the song for our 25th anniversary segment on the music of 2023, also your weekly reset. But Tom, thanks, as always, for just coming to hang out and share all this incredible music. Always great to be here with you, Robin. All right, as I mentioned, we've been celebrating our 25th anniversary this year by looking back at our number one songs from across the years. We've been closing out the show with a different segment, a different year on each episode this spring and summer.

Stephen Thompson, back now. Hey, Stephen. It's good to be here, Robin. So we are almost done. We've just got a couple more years that we're going to talk about. starting with the year 2023 now and you know

as we're getting into the final stretch here I'll just remind people these are not the Billboard Hot 100 hits the number one songs like that these are just the songs that meant the most to us

from that year or take us back to that time or really you know sort of speak to the identity of all songs considered since we are celebrating the show's 25th anniversary since we are here celebrating ourselves

celebrating it's all about us what do you think of when you think of music in 2020. I've got a handful of things here, but I'll let you go first. Well, and when I think of a 2023, I think of an album that had a little bit of a slow burn and really blew up in 2024. I'm going to go with this. She was a playboy, Richard Bardot. She showed me things I didn't know. She did it right there, out on the deck. Put her K-9 teeth in the side of my neck.

Well, it's Chapel Rhone, but it's not the song I thought you were going to put. It's not necessarily the biggest hit single. This is Red Wine Supernova from Chapel Rone and her album, The Rise and Fall of the Midwest Princess. This album kind of came along at a point where a lot of the discussions around pop stars and pop music were that, like, streaming had made it so it would be impossible for us to get any new stars. Because streaming algorithms feed people, the music they've already played, it's gotten harder and harder for new artists to break through. but Chapel Rhone ended up having that giant pop star rise.

This album came out in like September of 2023, kind of perfectly timed right at the beginning of the window of Grammy eligibility, which was a very smart move. Because she had about a six-month rise to megastardom. And I'm so pleased and proud of the fact that a part of her rise was her performance at the Tiny Desk, which helped kind of introduce her to the world. as somebody who was not just somebody who had a bunch of bubble gum pop songs,

but somebody who had visuals, somebody who had thought out her persona in a kind of a 360-degree way, and had these intense and immense vocal chops. And so for me, this was kind of my favorite story of music in 2023 and 2024, a pop star who wasn't afraid to lean into some of the artier sides of a pop music persona. And still blow up. And still blow up. Yeah. It's actually gotten to the point where that's such a special thing now. It didn't always used to be that way, but it's such a special thing that I've noticed some people on the music team sort of using her name as a shorthand for any time they want an artist

to have a successful art. I want them to be chapel rowing. Can they just, can we chapel rowing them? Yeah. So, you know, again, I feel like every time you play something like that, I end up having the complete opposite song to play. But when I think of 2023, here's a song about grief. I just can't give you anything that I think is better for me personally from that year than this. Oh, this is Benfolds? Yeah, Benfolds. This is a great song. And I do know you love this song. You've played this song for me before.

Are you the same, Christine? I knew from seventh grade Oh it's definitely you Just with a new last name Someone who laughed a lot Is what I remember the most But the face in your profile Suggest maybe not so much anymore

I got the emails These last two years every day And I just don't reply because I'm not really sure what to say Christi from the South So listeners at home, they can't see us. This is not a video podcast. Thank God. But Robin, that entire song, the entire excerpt of the song that we played,

Robin's head was buried in his hands. And I thought to myself, there is a 30 to 50% chance that Robin is currently weeping. Much higher than that. I thought you were going to say 30 to 50% chance he's not going to get through this. Because this song does crush me. It's great song. It's such an incredible song. The story that he unspools, you really need to listen to the whole thing.

But it's just, I think it's so affecting to me because it speaks so much to why are we even here if we're not going to connect with each other? Why are we even here if we're not going to find joy in small ways? What are we even doing if we're not going to connect with our neighbors and our friends and share in this human experience together? And what happens to us when we don't do that and we withdraw and we become more and more isolated? I think it's a... Well, you see you're saying that song spoke to you in 2023? It continues to speak to me. You know, it's, yes, it's definitely a song for Lillian.

times. I think it's a song that would resonate at any time, but maybe especially now, because it also does talk about how when we withdraw and become isolated, the way it can kind of break our minds in a way and turn us against one another. And the refrain that he keeps repeating through the song is, you know, the world is really actually a pretty beautiful place. There's a break in the rain, perfect time for a walk. The smell of white leaves, the warm smiles and hellos. These things exist in the real world you know. What a shame, Christine.

This disease that makes strangers or friends. But if these days it's really us is anews, maybe you should just take me off both of the us lists. Because it's such a short and sad. and beautiful you ever see it that way I think the fact that that that song really

that you really relate to that song you know speaks to the fact that that's very much your worldview and I think that's why it's just never done it for me you're fine with the isolation I'm kidding I know you're kidding beautiful song

but we'll go out on this and until next time Stephen and it will be the last year that we're doing in this series thanks as always thank you Robin and for NPR music I'm Robin Hilton. It's all songs considered.