The New Yorker Radio Hour - Chloe Bailey on Working Solo; and the Lost New Jersey Photos of Cartier-Bresson

Episode Date: March 7, 2023

When they were just thirteen and eleven years old, sisters Chloe and Halle Bailey started posting videos of themselves singing on YouTube and quickly built a following. Their covers often went viral��their version of Beyoncé’s “Pretty Hurts” even caught the attention of Beyoncé, who brought them on tour as her opening act.  Now, with two albums and five Grammy nominations behind them, the sisters are for the first time working on separate projects: Halle is starring as Ariel in an upcoming remake of “The Little Mermaid,” and Chloe is releasing a solo album, “In Pieces,” later this month. Chloe Bailey spoke with the contributing writer Lauren Michele Jackson at the New Yorker Festival in October about the mixed blessing of social-media stardom. “When we program our minds to think about being No. 1 … it really suffocates you and it stifles the process,” she says. “Right now, I’m just creating to be creating, and I have never felt more free.”  Plus, the lost New Jersey photographs of Henri Cartier-Bresson. In 1975, the French master photographer spent a month documenting New Jersey, which he called a “shortcut to America.” Why did the pictures disappear? New Yorker Radio Hour listeners, we want to hear from you.  We have a few questions about the show and how you listen to it. The survey takes about twenty minutes, and your feedback will help us make our podcast better.  Take the survey here.

This is The New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker. This is The New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick. When they were just 13 and 11 years old, Chloe and Hallie Bailey started posting videos of themselves singing on YouTube. Hey, what's right? And you all have requested so many songs, and we want to thank you for that. Yes. But the one you all have requested the most was rolling in the deep by a down. Chloe and Halley, that's how they build themselves, quickly build to following. Their cover versions of other artist's songs often went viral. A cover of Beyonce's Pretty Hertz caught the attention of Beyonce herself.

But pretty girl, it's in your head. It doesn't matter. Brush your hair and fix your teeth. But Chloe and Hallie were thinking a lot of the kids. bigger than just going viral for a hot second. They wanted to build a career, and they did so, owing in part to Chloe's producing of their songs, something that's still pretty unusual for very young female artists. Beyonce signed them to my friends because I hate you do. Beyonce signed them to

her management company and brought Chloe and Hallie on tour as her opening act. Now after two albums and five Grammy nominations, the sisters are for the very first time working on separate projects. Hallie is starring as Ariel in an upcoming remake of The Little Mermaid and Chloe is releasing a new solo album. It's called In Pieces and it comes out later this month. Chloe Bailey spoke with our contributing writer Lauren Michelle Jackson at the New Yorker festival in October. What is that like going from duo to solo? When I was creating with Hallie, I always had her by my side and I could go, Hallie, what do you think about this? What do you think about that? If I made a beat, I'll be like, do you like, do you like this? What about this lyric?

And she'll be like, yeah, yeah, it's great. And she'd kind of give me that extra boost of confidence that I needed. And now, you know, creating is the same. I never stopped creating because with our Kloyan Halley albums, I engineered and produced us and all of that. So doing it on my own, the confidence wasn't there because I was like, I don't have Hallie by my side to tell me if it's good or not. So that has been interesting because that's where you really have to step into believing in yourself and believing that your art is good enough. So when I took up producing, I think at 12 years old, you know, sis and I, we were singing all around Atlanta and there would be no producers who would take us seriously. And like, what kind of songs and tracks you're going to

make for 10 and 12 year olds, you know? So it's not that hard to believe. And I was in the house and had my computer and I started looking up on YouTube, how to produce and all of that. And it just kind of happened and flourished on its own. And I love building. I think that's why I like, I love puzzles and Legos so much. That's really all producing is. And how I layer harmonies in my head, that's how I hear the full production. So I think that's why vocal producing comes so easily to me because that's how I hear all the different instrumental parts.

I'm wondering if there are certain terms that sort of resonate with you when it comes to describing the genre of your work. Yeah, if there's one word, I'd have to put it into, I'd say, unpredictable. I'm inspired by so many different random things, and I like to put that into my music. So when it comes to genres or labels or boxes, I just create how I'm feeling that day. You know, if my heart feels happy and excited and I really want to dance, you'll get a pop record. You know, if I'm feeling really moody and grungy and sad, you know, sometimes it'll be R&B. Sometimes it'll be alternative.

You never know what you're going to get. And I don't want people to ever be able to know what to expect for me. And I think that's why I'm so excited for whenever God wants the album to come out and it comes out so that you all can hear all of the different places I go to and the different vibes and the feel and the emotion. And I just kind of let my heart take the lead in what it's supposed to sound and feel like. I really just kind of want to know the practice of the cover. What is like the selection process? You know, like not everyone gets a cover from Chloe Bailey.

You know, like, It's definitely based on how I'm feeling. I've sent so many covers like, what about this one? What about this one? And, you know, I think it comes down to can I properly execute? Because I'm not trying to be dragged online as well. And there's been so many times I've redone covers. There's been so many that I haven't put out.

There's been so many that I think will pop off and didn't. There's been so many where I didn't put that much thought into it and it got crazed, like, so viral. I have a love-hate relationship with social media because if we think about it, without social media, without YouTube, without covers, my sister and I would not be here. And when I was little, I'd always be like,

I'm going to be a superstar. I don't know how, but I'm going to make it. So I'm still saying that to myself, but it's crazy that the beginning of the journey started through that. Before your songs had to pop off on TikTok, you know, it was YouTube. and the radio and all that stuff. So no matter which generation we're in,

there's always something that you want your music to like be, like lit on, right? So I think when we program our minds to think about being number one and winning all these awards, when you're creating, it really suffocates you and it stifles the process. Yes, you have to have hit songs and popping singles or whatever. That's great, but you can't let it rule you.

Right now I'm just creating to be creating, and I have never felt more free when it has come to that, and that's when you get the magic. I'm mercy. I keep passing like I do. Blackie sauce and like I do. I keep causing like I do. All these eyes up in my jeans,

you can't get up in between. You're trying to get a face with me. I can teach you how to be free. With Have Mercy, I'm going to be completely honest. I was pleasantly surprised how it popped off on TikTok because I did not make that song for TikTok. When I created the song, I was really emotional that day. And I had this beat that my friend Myrida sent me for like two weeks. And I was holding on to it because I really liked it.

But I was like, I can't mess it up. I think something online was going about me and not the most positive space. And I was so sad about it. And Have Mercy was a response to everyone. who had something negative to say about me expressing the freedom with my body. So good songs. And, you know, I didn't know it was going to be so pop or, you know, or so tongue-in-cheek.

I was saying a lot of things in those lyrics I would not say in everyday life. And who knew that just speaking from the heart you create that. So I just have to constantly speak from the heart. So now we have time for some Q&A. Let's see This one's really cute What advice do you have for siblings Looking to produce together?

Oh Okay Listen to each other And if you Have a disagreement on something Try it both ways And then listen to it And then take the vote then

There's been so many times Sis and I would butt heads on certain musical decisions on a song Like no this way's better no, this lyrics better. So we've learned to just try it both ways. Sometimes I'd be proven wrong. Sometimes she'd be proven wrong.

And I think that's the best way to see if something works. So this one asks, how much of your time is spent on vocal preservation slash maintenance? The vocal cords, it's like a muscle. So any athlete, you have to condition your body. You have to train. If you don't stretch, you pull a muscle, things like that. and I'm constantly trying to learn. I love hearing singers who are doing riffs and runs I cannot do.

Plastic on the sofa by Beyonce. That cover, that cover, it challenged me vocally, and I was grateful for it. It's like, thank you. It's like a fun puzzle, and it's like once you get the riffs and runs right, you're like, yes. I say this a lot. It was at the opening of the African-American Smithsonian Museum. and my sister and I were singing, and Mary Mary comes right after us the next song. And I'm sure you guys know I'm very open about it.

No matter whenever I perform, I get really, really nervous, like shakes and everything. But I hope it never goes away because one, it reminds me I'm alive. Two, it's like an adrenaline rush, and I think I kind of live for it. Like in the moment, even though I feel like I'm going to faint sometimes, I'm like, oh, Lord Jesus, help me. I'm like, oh, wow, that was kind of exciting. It was a thrill. So it's like that, right? Hallie's always like,

Chloe, sis, we got this. We chill, right? That's Hallie. I'm over there freaking out. Yeah, Aries. Yeah, you know. And so they turned to us and they said, don't go out there trying to sing and prove yourself to anyone.

Sing for God, sing to God, and everything else will fall into place. please. That's Chloe Bailey speaking to Lauren Michelle Jackson at the New Yorker Festival. Her debut album, In Pieces, comes out this month. This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. Stick around. This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick. Not long ago, I was hanging around the office and I came across the New Yorker's director of photography, Joanna Milter. And on a big desk, she was laying out a series of black and white images, one after another. One of our story editors had forwarded an email to me from a man, Peter Cunningham, who claimed to have access to a cache of images that Henry Cartier-Bresson photographed in New Jersey in the 1970s.

I thought, is this real? Like, could this be authentic? You know, I mean, Cartier-Bresson is one of the most famous. documentary photographers of all time. His catalog is very well known, very famous, and how could there be this cache of unseen, unpublished images? The scenes were very recognizable to me from my youth. Commuters stuck in a traffic jam near the George Washington Bridge, beauty salons, an office, huge, sprawling power plants.

These were terrific pictures by a French photographer who was really one of the masters of the form. form, and Henri Cartier-Bresson had chosen to shoot them all in my home state in New Jersey. Kind of shortcut for America in a way. Something where you find extremes. When we mention to anybody that we're doing an essay, that means concentrating on various aspects of New Jersey, they're always surprised. Why?

But what's your interest? And it seems that they just go through on the turnpike, and it's all the industrial areas that we'd like to forget. So the story of how Peter Cunningham came to have these prints in his possession is really interesting. In the 1970s, Peter told me, his girlfriend at the time was working as a producer at a public television station in New York. Yeah, that's right. Working on a PBS show called Assignment America. as an associate producer. She came home saying that she wanted to do a show on a photographer, and who should she do?

Well, I said, I said, well, you should get only Cartier-Bresson, but he'll never do it. And so she invited Cartier-Bresson to the United States with the proposal that they make a documentary about him and that he create a body of work and that they make a documentary around that body of work. When Jean came home and told me that Cartier-Bresson had said, yes, I probably fell on the floor or jumped and touched the ceiling, it was unbelievable because Henri was and still is my hero. And then Peter, who was a young photographer, burgeoning photographer at the time, ended up with the assignment to be his assistant. We drove out of the city every day

and yacked away in the car all the way and drove all the way back and yacked all the way back. It was only when we were in the process of shooting that Henri didn't want to talk. And my job, my job, was to make all the interactions, to speak with people, and allow him to be completely, to be, to be himself in the frame. He loved living in the frame of his Leica. So who would decide where to go, and what was the conception behind it all? John Evans, in the studio at PBS at Channel 13,

did the production. So she booked us every day somewhere with the Newark Fire Department or with a nuclear power plant or with the State House in Trenton or this and that. So she planned our targets. Now, as I remember, Cardioreira-Bissan used to talk about the decisive moment. Capturing the decisive moment. That was what it was all about for him. How did you see that in action?

The decisive moment. One thing he told me, I never connected until you mentioned it, David. is that he would say to don't see what's happening now, see what's about to happen. Look, you know, focus your eyes a second or two in advance of the present tense, which is unusual kind of advice. We are all told to live in the present.

Well, he's actually living a second or two before the present. He's anticipating. I think, yeah, I think that's right, David. And did you see him, is there any moment, any photograph that you can recall? You said, now I see what he's up. up to. Here, I'll show, here's on, they're mounted on board for the, for the TV production. But this picture of Governor Brendan Byrne boxing with Jersey Joe Walcott, and Jersey Joe

has a checkered suit on. And the, I guess, PR kind of guy in the background has the same checkered suit by coincidence, I'm sure. And this was, this was a press event. There were other photographers there. but he got the he got he may be shot I have to look at the contact sheets but he got maybe shot I don't know 10 frames he didn't overshoot

like we do now with our digital cameras right where there's no limit it used to cost us 35 cents each time we press the shutter but now there's no price on it yeah it is and it changes it changes the way we do things what he did shoot

some of the pictures were more interesting than others but every single one One of them was beautifully composed, down to the little black shape in the corner. It's so true. He says at one point, Cartier-Bresson says, in photography, the smallest thing can be a great subject. A little human detail can become a light motif. So Henri said that he wanted to show Americans or New Jersey people their own culture. He said that it's very difficult to see a culture.

from, if you're a part of it, it's like being, you know, fish in water that doesn't see the water. So this picture, which is pretty ordinary, really strikes me as an example of that, because at the time, I don't remember, but I probably thought nothing of a guy standing over what we called a girl at the time and supervising her. It was a boss and a secretary. We don't have bosses and secretaries anymore. So what we're seeing here is a woman at an office seated, and she's going through some papers, and hovering above her is what,

because of the time, we presume to be her supervisor or her boss, who's a male. She looks a little scared, doesn't she? As if she can't maybe find the thing the boss is looking for. It does look almost, the office looks incredibly lifeless. I mean, it's just cold and endless.

white and you would not want to spend that much time in that room, much less 40 hours a week. One thing I learned from Henri's work as a youngster was that this was the power of the still photograph, that even more than a narrative form, the still photograph could reflect reality in ways that worked like a metaphor in the receiver's mind so that they kind of exploded with meaning. Can you give us an example of any of the... the photographs where you think that's the case? Yeah, okay. Here we are. So this is the picture that you, David,

thank you, featured as the lead picture in your piece. It's a picture from a beauty school in central Jersey. And there's a person making up another person, but he put himself in a mirror, in the corner of a mirror. Right, you can see in the lower right-hand corner of the photo. You have a photograph in a photograph. which one woman is making up another, but it's also about photography.

It's about looking. And so in the lower left-hand quadrant of this photograph, you see Henri Cartier-Bresson taking the photograph. This clearly, this is, as we now say these days, endlessly, a meta-picture, a picture about taking pictures,

capturing an image and all the rest. It's really quite remarkable. Yeah, before I worked with Henri, I used to work in that style, black and white style on the street. And afterwards, I realized, if I spent my whole life doing this, I could once in a while get a picture of his standard, but I couldn't ever achieve his level of consistent excellence. So I switched to color film and to a different thing,

to doing juxtapositions of images. I consciously changed because he was so good. He seems so ambivalent. about his own art. In fact, he would never use a flash as far as I understand. And he said that using a flash was impolite, like coming to a concert

with a pistol in your hand. Well, I completely agree. I've been a performance photographer my whole life, and it is. It's a horrible thing to use the flash. It makes the photographer be the center of the action. And in a concert hall, the person on stage is the center of the action.

Tell me what result is. from all these photographs, what was put on television at the time in the mid-70s? Gosh, David, that's a sad story. So there was a problem with the production in that the director insisted on doing it his way, despite knowing that Aure's preferences, he cropped the pictures for TV in TV format, which is whatever it is, four by five. So the show aired with the pictures cropped, which is a sin. It was a horrible scene. So Cartier-Bressel must have been furious. I was never aware of his personal reaction. He was always friendly with us afterwards. He kept writing postcards and inviting us to visit. But his agent went crazy.

That's what agents are for. Well, she did a good job. So all history of the New Jersey event disappeared. So in the timeline of Henri's career, photographing in New Jersey doesn't exist. It's not there. It was written out of history. And then you hung on to these prints and then finally brought them to the New Yorker. Well, yeah, I protected them for all those times

and I was a busy photographer myself so I didn't pay much attention that they were on my shelves gathering dust for literally 48 years. And I'm very grateful that the New Yorker picked them up because as Henri's assistant, being an assistant is, sometimes like a love affair.

The love affair can end, but you still have a kind of essence of love for somebody a whole life. And that's what I feel with Henri. I'm still his servant and I would like to do what I imagine

he would like. And in this case, I'd like to have the people of New Jersey be able to see the pictures he made of their state nearly 50 years ago. Peter Cunningham is a photographer himself, in Massachusetts, and you can see Henri Cartier-Bresson's photographs of New Jersey at New Yorker.com. I'm David Remnick. That's our program for today. Thanks for listening.

See you next time. The New Yorker Radio Hour is a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker. Our theme music was composed and performed by Merrill Garbes of Tune Arts with additional music by Louis Mitchell. This episode was produced by Max Fulton, Rita Green, Adam Howard. Calalia, David Krasnow, Jeffrey Masters, Louis Mitchell, and Ingofen in Putabuele, with guidance from Emily Boutin and assistance from Harrison Keithline and Meher Batia. The New Yorker Radio Hour is supported in part by the Cherina Endowment Fund.