NPR Music Tiny Desk Concerts

From basements to bandshells, Turnstile shows are a life-affirming mosh-pit ballet. You sweat, you smile, you stage dive, you shake what ya mama gave ya. At the band's Tiny Desk (home) concert, Turnstile's high-energy hardcore is converted into seven songs over 17 minutes, surrounded by an art installation by John Scharbach — those stuffed animals presumably pogoing and windmilling in your imagination. GLOW ON, one of NPR Music's 50 best albums of 2021, is the rambunctious sum of the band's many parts – as much Bad Brains as it is Rare Essence and Fania deep cuts – but with its wild styles fully fused as Turnstile. Filmed at drummer Daniel Fang's house in Baltimore, these songs are all power chords, compact guitar solos, cowbells and fuzz bass, with vocalist Brendan Yates accenting the melody behind the keys. At shows, Yates normally bounces around with joyous aplomb; here, his self-restraint is commendable as he mimes out his stage moves inside an invisible bubble.

Enter into esperanza spalding's safe space for healing through music and song with a Tiny Desk (home) concert of selections from her Songwrights Apothecary Lab, (S.A.L.) project. A constant iteration of evolutionary ideas, her songwriting workshop is both a bold examination of human existence and resilience and a guided research collaboration with a collective of musicians and researchers in the practices of neuroscience, psychology and music therapy.

It’s fair to say Mon Laferte is a musical chameleon. The Chilean vocalist’s output of late has covered a vast swath of musical styles from Latin America, from big-band mambo to electronic dance club jams with a hint of reggaeton, and a few stops in between. The secret to the successes of these stylistic changes is the level of imagination and creativity she infuses in each turn.

Midway through his Tiny Desk (home) concert, Cordae shares the backstory behind "RNP" from his 2019 debut album, The Lost Boy, and the early stresses he endured as a successful young rapper. It takes a comedic twist, but his father's insight sets him straight. The music industry hasn't tainted him, and he's choosing to have fun with it. There's an undeniably pure quality to his Tiny Desk. The entire performance exudes confidence, and his excitement is palpable.

For each of the three nights, Tiny Desk Meets globalFEST will present artists in intimate settings (often behind their own globe-topped tiny desks), some of whom are making their globalFEST debuts, while a few others are notable past performers. Performing from Tampere, Finland's Suistamon Sähkö whips up rambunctious experimental dance music with a primordial force. Lebanese indie stalwart Zeid Hamdan and celestially voiced Syrian singer Lynn Adib are Bedouin Burger, a rising duo from the Middle East. With one foot in the world of tradition and another in glitzy, upbeat pop, ADG7 (Ak Dan Gwang Chil) is a multi-award winning group inspired by Korea's sacred, shamanic ritual music (gut) and beloved folk songs (minyo) of Hwanghae Province in the northern reaches of the peninsula.

For each of the three nights, Tiny Desk Meets globalFEST will present artists in intimate settings (often behind their own globe-topped tiny desks), some of whom are making their globalFEST debuts, while a few others are notable past performers. Born from the rich musical and historical heritage of San Basilio de Palenque, Colombia (the first free Black town in the Americas), Kombilesa Mí fuses the traditional sounds of the community with urban pop. Northern Cree is a powwow and round dance act, based in Maskwacis, Alberta, Canada. Born and raised in the deep outskirts of Mexico City, the three Gama brothers are keeping alive the rich legacy of marimba music running through their family.

For each of the three nights, Tiny Desk Meets globalFEST will present artists in intimate settings (often behind their own globe-topped tiny desks), some of whom are making their globalFEST debuts, while a few others are notable past performers. The family members of Al Bilali Soudan, from Timbuktu, Mali, are sought-after musicians and griots. Led by Abellow Yattara, the band is a torch-bearer of quintessentially Tamasheq (or Tuareg) music, shaped by a continuous exchange between the tehardent (lute), vocals and hand percussion. Kiran Ahluwalia's original compositions embody the essence of Indian music while embracing influences from Mali and Western blues, rock, R&B and jazz. Tufan Derince, a young Kurdish musician from Diyarbakir in southeast Turkey, is a master of the elektro bağlama, an electrified version of the bağlama of Turkish folk music.

Jake Xerxes Fussell's Tiny Desk (home) concert opens with the eyebrow raising lyric, "I've got fresh fish this morning, ladies. They are gilded with gold and you may find a diamond in their mouths." It was originally sung by a fishmonger in Florida and captured in a field recording. Coming from Fussell, it sounds as lived-in as his worn Telecaster looks. It's immediate, but somehow out-of-time. Fussell found the tune at the Library of Congress, part of his process of collecting and curating traditional, public domain folk songs, and reinterpreting them through his own lens.

In her Tiny Desk (home) concert, singer-songwriter and producer Amber Mark expresses more than once that performing for the series is a "bucket list" moment for her. Upon our first meeting, she came with the concept for her performance entirely laid out. "The band is gonna sing backup, and we can cut to my family in the audience at the restaurant," she said. "We'll make it beautiful." With details that evoked excitement and nervousness all at once, the ideas felt massive to me. And what she delivers here is pretty grand, yet deeply intimate.

Tori Amos' Tiny Desk (home) concert debut takes place in what looks like close quarters. The singer-songwriter whose music has served as a beacon for so many listeners during her thirty-year career sits at her beloved Bosendorfer piano with a star-embellished Wurlitzer at her back. On a nearby shelf is a stack of books; one is Suzanne Simard's classic of forest ecology, Finding the Mother Tree. As Amos begins "Baker Baker," a fan favorite from her 1994 album Under the Pink, her bell-like voice fills the room. It's easy to imagine she's in a lighthouse on the cliffs of Cornwall instead of the state-of-the-art home studio where her husband, engineer Mark Hawley, ensures that the mix will be perfect. This three-song performance shows Amos both alone and reaching out, casting sonic beams to guide us in the dark.

Fatoumata Diawara is a true multi-hyphenate – an esteemed Malian singer, songwriter and actress who left her home country at 19 to pursue her artistry in France. By way of Como, Italy, she delivers a riveting performance alongside her bandmates, many of whom have toured with her since 2018. The guitarist and keyboardist here – Yacouba Kone and Arecio Smith – both contributed to her Grammy-nominated album, Fenfo.

Around this time last year, singer-songwriter and R&B royalty El DeBarge took to Instagram to take some requests and play a few hits. "I'd never done anything like that before, and the nerves were showing," he told me. That 23-minute live performance ignited a comeback of sorts, and the greats of today, many of whom he's influenced, wanted to be near him. That video reminded us of his greatness, and stars like Alicia Keys, Fat Joe, and Questlove helped make 2021 a busy year for the torchbearer of the DeBarge moniker. For his Tiny Desk (home) concert, he didn't want to veer far away from what he did on IG, and I quickly concurred. He got together with guitarist, Bennett Walker to play this intimate set of DeBarge classics.

Look around the GB's Juke Joint studio in Long Island City, N.Y. and you will see adornments from jazz singer Catherine Russell's home: a vintage Royal typewriter, a black dial phone, a red tiny desk and a striking Malian Bògòlanfini cloth that drapes the piano. Black and white photos of Billie Holiday and old-time big bands rest on the shelves and piano along with a copy of Russells' soon-to-be-released album, Send For Me, out April 1.

The opera star Anthony Roth Costanzo and the cabaret diva Justin Vivian Bond hail from opposite sides of the tracks, vocally speaking. But when the two unite in their stage show, "Only an Octave Apart," something fabulous emerges. This performance from, as Bond puts it, Costanzo's "tiny apartment," with his "tiny furniture" and his "tiny friends," gives us a glimpse of the show that opened at St. Ann's Warehouse in Brooklyn last fall and landed at the New York Philharmonic earlier this year.

In his Tiny Desk (home) concert, Too $hort asks: "How many artists you know that got relevant records in five decades?" The Oakland rapper answers by performing seven songs from his own discography, showcasing his extensive (yet still underrated) contributions to the growth of hip-hop on the West Coast. The expedition opens on a quiet, reflective note with a performance of $hort's influential 1990 single "The Ghetto" before roaring to life with 1988's "Life Is... Too $hort." From his spot in downtown LA, BoomBox Studios, $hort delivers a dynamic, funk-laden performance, seamlessly cycling through scenes of women-chasing debauchery and politically-minded meditation.

In a sparse, dimly lit Austin office building, Carl “Buffalo” Nichols stands in front of the mic stand with his steel guitar. As he finger picks into the first song “Living Hell,” the stark surroundings are juxtaposed against the warmth of his raspy vocals.

The first song in Patti LaBelle's Tiny Desk (home) concert sets the tone and quickly sums up the entire 15-minute performance. "Something Special (Is Gonna Happen Tonight)" from her 1986 album Winner In You is a highlight from one of many chapters in her fabulous career. A backstage corner of a concert hall in Austin, Texas, is transformed into Patti's world, furnished with a throne, flowers and trunks full of shoes. Options are a must, given a knack for kicking off her shoes during shows. The entire band managed to fit onto the set: thirteen people, including fierce background vocals, keys, horns and more, to recreate some of the best from the Godmother of Soul.

During a moment of testimony in her Tiny Desk (home) Concert, Pastor Shirley Caesar declares, "I'm beginning to feel something moving on the inside." It is impossible to witness a performance from the "First Lady of Gospel Music" and there not be a moment where the spirit moves her to dance, punctuated — in true gospel fashion — by a band led by her longtime organist and music director, Michael Mathis.

Dearly beloved: we are gathered here today to get through this thing called "Afro-life." Surrounded by lush greenery and soft lavender lighting, Fireboy DML makes his Tiny Desk (home) concert debut from Lagos, Nigeria. The Nigerian singer-songwriter delivers the three-song set with an earnest reverence – his warm vocals reflecting a depth of passion and devotion best attributed to being brought up in a church choir.

Violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja and pianist Joonas Ahonen, like most of us right now, are concerned about the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Kopatchinskaja hails from Moldova, which shares a border with Ukraine and declared independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. Ahonen is from Finland, which borders Russia in the east and was once under the Russian Empire until the 1917 Revolution.

It’s less a concert and more witnessing a master thoughtfully creating an atmosphere, a vibe. And for 13 short minutes, I feel seated in Abdullah Ibrahim’s home in Chiemgau, Germany, witnessing seven decades of experience slowly dripping from his fingers and touching my soul. Abdullah Ibrahim, now 87, has witnessed the horrors of apartheid. He grew up in South Africa and composed what would become known as the “anti-apartheid anthem,” “Mannenberg.” Nelson Mandela called him “our Mozart.” He also successfully made music under the name Dollar Brand, and worked with jazz legends including Duke Ellington, Max Roach, Don Cherry and Archie Shepp. In 1968, he converted to Islam and changed his name from Dollar Brand; more recently, he became an NEA Jazz Master. In my 18 years directing All Things Considered, I’d often reach for his music to play between news stories to give the audience a chance to think and reflect. His music is like that; it’s mind-opening.

When catching glimpses of his meteoric rise to global stardom and his picturesque life with partner and artist Evaluna Montaner, fans are often left to speculate on the romance of Camilo’s life. From his Tiny Desk (home) Concert in Miami, the Colombian singer-songwriter pulls back the curtain for 15 minutes of soul-baring intimacy, letting the world view his fairytale life in full bloom.

The first shot of Bonobo's Tiny Desk (home) concert is a little disorienting. What looks like the official Tiny Desk at NPR's Washington, D.C. headquarters is actually an eerily accurate miniature replication. Fit with scaled-down vinyl LPs and Bob Boilen's knickknacks, it was created by Cheronda Scott of CSpykerMiniatures and Kat Williams of Real Life Miniatures. "We couldn't be at the NPR desk, but we have brought it with us," Simon Green, aka Bonobo, says, gesturing at the tiny desk, perfect for a doll.

Our Tiny Desk (home) concert series has brought us to some very special places, but few can match the distinction of being inside Ludwig Van Beethoven’s house. Violinist Daniel Hope is the current president of Beethoven-Haus, where the great composer was born in 1770 in Bonn, Germany. Far more than a cultural curiosity, the house is, as Hope calls it, “the nerve center” for dozens of Beethoven scholars. It’s also a museum, library, publishing house and performance space. We often ask artists to perform at their own “tiny desk” of some sort. But the desk in this concert cannot be matched. On display, in front of Hope and pianist Sylvia Thereza, is Beethoven’s own traveling desk, a compact model he used to write letters and perhaps compose music.

Before the English band Yard Act set foot on stage at the Trades Club in Hebden Bridge, England, the band set up its instruments in the green room and performed this Tiny Desk (home) concert. It’s a fitting location for the band from Leeds, which has around 70 shows lined up to celebrate its debut album The Overload including the SXSW music festival in Austin, Texas. Yard Act’s music is filled with brash sounds aimed at capitalism, equality, or lack thereof, and all done with both venom and humor.

Setting the scene with a winding tour of the jam-packed gathering of musicians in a mystical recreation of her childhood casita, Chicago-based singer KAINA offers her Tiny Desk (home) concert viewer a temporally unhinged invitation to come over to her house after school.

Pom Pom Squad's Tiny Desk (home) concert starts with a well-placed sense of irony. The opening chords of "Drunk Voicemail" – brash and heavy – tease the band's lead-in, letting imagination conjure up images of dirty basements and scruffy dishevelment before revealing the truth: five people in cheesy, matching red outfits, led by Mia Berrin in puffy plaid. It's a presentation that reflects the ethos of Pom Pom Squad: to give the often self-serious genres of grunge and punk a much-needed dose of silly camp.

“I ain’t about to be on all that preaching s***, but Imma tell you this,” Maxo Kream says during his Tiny Desk (home) concert. “I came from nothing! The mud. Anything you wanna do, put your mind to it.” The sentiment isn’t groundbreaking, but if you’ve made it to the point in the video at which he says this, it’s impossible not to feel the passion of these words. His set is one of the first times we’ve seen the Houston native play with a band. They set up shop in an H-Town performance space, and the stripped-down aesthetic brings things that could be easily lost in his album recordings. The rawness of his voice cuts straight through the live instrumentation.

Fitting many people into a small space has been key to the Tiny Desk formula since its beginning, so it only makes sense that Madi Diaz would perpetuate the tradition as she presides over a “tiny living room” concert in her Nashville, Tenn. home. “Never have there been so many people in this apartment,” she notes between songs. Diaz’s living room may not have been designed to accommodate a four-piece string section and a drummer, but together these six musicians make beautiful work of four tracks from the singer-songwriter’s stunning 2021 sleeper History of a Feeling. Opening with “Resentment” — a song she’d originally co-written for Kesha’s 2020 album High Road — Diaz steers her four-song set toward History of a Feeling’s quieter moments, in the process coaxing new power from career highlights like “New Person, Old Place.”

“Mi padre dice asustado / Que me salga de su lado / ‘Ellos son marijuanos,’” (“My father warned me / That I shouldn’t hang out with you all / ‘They are a bunch of potheads,’”) Los Rivera Destino sings in the song “Mis Amigos.” “Pero son mis hermanos / Y los quiero asi! (“That may be, but I love those potheads anyway!”) The tongue in cheek ode to pasto (marijuana) set to the classic Latin genre bolero perfectly exemplifies how the Puerto Rican group Los Rivera Destino not only delivers impeccable musicianship and a reverential embrace of nostalgia, but also lots of humor.

Maren Morris is the country artist most gracefully poised at the spot where future thinking meets time-honored ways. Consider the setting for her second Tiny Desk performance — this time a (home) concert — and the first filmed in her hometown of Nashville, Tenn.

The Norwegian pianist Leif Ove Andsnes is binging Mozart. He's just released his second double album in a row of the composer's piano music, and for this very special Tiny Desk performance, he takes us inside Mozart's own home in Vienna, just steps away from the medieval St. Stephen's Cathedral and a couple blocks from a McDonald's. Mozart might have appreciated the convenience of the fast food chain, as the years he spent in this two-floor, four-bedroom apartment (from 1784 to 1787) were a non-stop frenzy of activities. Andsnes says the composer threw gambling parties, taught students and, above all, composed some of his most groundbreaking music in this house, including the two works heard in this recital.

A library might not be the first place that comes to mind when you picture a suitable venue for a punk band — unless, of course, you're thinking about The Linda Lindas, who shot to viral stardom after a performance in the Los Angeles Public Library's Cypress Park Branch last year. For the band's Tiny Desk (home) concert, the teen punks returned to the library — this time, playing at the Los Angeles Central Library — with several members even sporting buttons that pledge love to the LA library system. "We're playing the library once more," guitarist Lucia de la Garza says with a smile, in awe of the "cool space." (It feels fitting — after all, having artists perform an intimate, powerful set under daytime office lights is kind of the Tiny Desk's whole thing.)

It's a testament to Brittany Davis that this Tiny Desk home show feels like a true live concert — one with real live energy, as if it's playing out in front of a massive crowd you can't quite see or hear. It's hard to replicate the spirit of the Tiny Desk outside of the NPR offices: You don't get the visual sense of place, you don't get NPR engineers managing the sound mix onsite and you don't get the exchange of energy between musicians and audience members who are often excitedly discovering your music for the first time. Still, this set swims in that much-missed alchemy where everyone in a given room is carried forward by the same sounds.

I find mehro's voice to be simply stunning; it reminds me of the moment I first heard Jeff Buckley. My favorite new artist of last year opens this Tiny Desk (home) concert with "chance with you," a song of regret from his 2021 SKY ON FIRE project. It's the song that first grabbed my attention and is performed so intimately here from a rehearsal space in Santa Monica. His bandmates include Dylan Bailey on guitar and Callen O'Brien on percussion and a 1921 Steinway.

The opening piano notes are barely sufficient warning to brace for the sweet and powerful voices that transport us to Samora Pinderhughes' Tiny Desk (home) concert, shot on film. "The Cry" heralds our journey into the Bay Area native's sophomore album, GRIEF. The vocalists move briefly out of frame for "Masculinity," a probing, open letter that addresses masculine stereotypes with directness and compassion. The song blooms beautifully, with Pinderhughes accompanied by strings, a background chorus, and his sister, renowned flutist Elena Pinderhughes.

Curren$y's Tiny Desk (home) concert features three key elements that make him who he is: cars, weed and, of course, music. One of the prominent champions of cannabis plays from the confines of a garage on this 4/20, a day deemed a worldwide celebration of marijuana. In front of a purple candy-coated 1965 Chevy Impala sitting on three wheel motion, the New Orleans native plays a smidgen from a catalog that spans over seventy projects to date.

Sean Carey's music often evokes the comforts of home, so it only makes sense that he'd gravitate to the quiet confines of a modest kitchen in his hometown of Eau Claire, Wis. This is a Tiny Desk (home) concert in the truest sense: S. Carey performs these four songs surrounded by household appliances and a handful of his closest collaborators. Carey's fourth solo album, Break Me Open, lends itself perfectly to confined intimacy. The record came out of an intense stretch of Carey's life in which the singer got divorced, lost his father and embarked on a period of deep introspection. But it's a record about growth as well as grief.

From the line up of traditional Colombian instruments to the card playing interlude, every second of Feid's Medellín, Colombia pool hall performance invokes the feeling of charlando and cantando, chatting and singing, with friends. Seamlessly anchoring all five tracks with a bass-emulating acoustic guitar and cajón-driven dembow, the new guard reggaeton royal brings unique instrumentation and culturally significant visuals to this Tiny Desk (home) concert for a deeply authentic portrait of a star on the rise baring a sonic piece of his soul to the world.

Rather than use the stage at Feinstein's/54 Below, the cast of A Strange Loop cram into a booth for their Tiny Desk (home) concert. The protagonist of the musical is an usher, so performing in the crowd makes sense. 54 Below played a pivotal role in the musical's rise when, in 2016, composer Michael R. Jackson performed a concert version for New Musicals at 54. Little did anyone know that the show would go on to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2020. The cast reunited at "Broadway's Supper Club" to sing a five-song medley led by the show's author to celebrate their opening at the Lyceum Theater on Broadway.

Roger Eno's home is part of what once formed an 11th-century abbey called St. Wilmott's, situated on the border of Norfolk and Suffolk near England's southeastern coast. The bucolic setting mirrors Eno's quiet, slowly evolving music which, for this Tiny Desk (home) concert, features five pieces from his new album The Turning Year.

To appreciate the magic of a performance from Thee Sinseers, you have to understand the co-mingling of Chicano and African American communities in post-World War II, Southern California. Living in the same neighborhoods, these communities created a virtual symphony of R&B, mariachi and boleros. And what you hear in this California band's Tiny Desk (home) concert, as they perform among plants in a flower shop, builds on a legacy of music that became known as "oldies but goodies" in the Chicano community.

The velvety sapphire of what may be the most recognizable curtains in jazz are the backdrop for this special Tiny Desk (home) concert. Dapper and distinguished in matching ties, legendary bassist Ron Carter and the members of his trio sit comfortably on the prestigious stage of The Blue Note in Manhattan. This is jazz with a capital J, complete with cocktails and "Candlelight." The first tune in this set romances us, inviting deep sighs as the lushness of the trio's intricate interplay carries us away to moments spent gazing deeply into the eyes of a lover.

Composer Alan Menken beams with pride as he introduces the Little Shop of Horrors Tiny Desk (home) concert. May 6, 2022 marks the 40th anniversary of the show's first production. Menken is joined by the stellar cast of the current off-Broadway revival, which swept the Drama Desk, Outer Critics and Drama League Awards for Best Musical Revival. They perform a joyful medley of five earworm-filled tunes from the cult classic. Over the course of the tiny concert, Menken shares anecdotes about collaborating with the show's late lyricist Howard Ashman. It's obvious how much they loved working together hearing him reminisce.

Ideally, musicians recording Tiny Desk (home) concerts adhere to the series’ core concept and perform behind some sort of desk, tiny or otherwise. But, barring that, it helps to make bookshelves your backdrop. When Aoife O’Donovan assembled her band at Portsmouth Book & Bar in Portsmouth, N.H., she made sure to note her surroundings: “It’s great to be here, surrounded by all these books.” The Bostonian singer-songwriter, who these days splits her time between a solo career and her work with the Grammy-winning supergroup I’m With Her, has a sound nicely suited for bookish locales: O’Donovan’s warm folk-pop music conjures memories of the Northeast folk boom of the ’90s, the soaring plaintiveness of Indigo Girls and the winsome lilt of modern bluegrass, elevated by a voice that’s searching and friendly.

The conflicts between Russia and Ukraine reach far and wide, even deep into this Tiny Desk (home) concert performed by the ARC Ensemble — artists from Canada's Royal Conservatory in Toronto. They offer music by the neglected composer Dmitri Klebanov, a Ukrainian Jew whose career was sidelined by the Stalin regime when his First Symphony was denounced in 1949. Klebanov wrote his Fourth String Quartet — from which the ensemble plays excerpts — three years earlier. He dedicated it to his compatriot, the composer Mykola Leontovych who, as a Ukrainian separatist, was murdered by the Soviet secret police in 1921.

"Tiny Desk at home? I kinda live on the road!" the legendary Buffy Sainte-Marie exclaims one song into her high-spirited set recorded a few miles outside Toronto at the beginning of the 81-year-old's umpteenth tour. Sainte-Marie has always been a wandering soul with a fierce sense of direction. The four songs she performs here with her touring band span her nearly 60-year career, connecting her righteous protest songs – including "Universal Soldier," as relevant today as it was when it became an anthem during the Vietnam War – to the love songs that have soundtracked countless slow dances. This set is a kind of Sainte-Marie primer, touching on her early days as the 1960s folk revival's brashest innovator and her mid-career turns writing country and pop hits like this set's smooth closer, "Up Where We Belong," which won her an Academy Award for best original song in 1983.

Filmed in Chicago’s beautiful brick Irish American Heritage Center during a recent tour, this four-song set begins with Fontaines D.C. singer Grian Chatten in the stacks at the center’s library, playing a button accordion and singing the mordant ballad “The Couple Across the Way” as cellist Maureen Dunne and violist Isaac Henry accompany him. An emotional touchstone on the band’s latest album, "Skinty Fia," it’s a taste of an unfinished Fontaines project: the Irish group originally planned to release a double set with half traditionally-styled tunes and half the searing, atmospheric post-punk that makes this third LP the band’s best.

I first saw IDK perform in 2017. An infectious ball of energy, he captivated the audience with every vigorous bar and step; his personality filled the large stage that he only shared with a DJ. There's a similar vibe at his (home) concert, actually recorded at his house, with a live audience of neighbors and friends and a palpable feeling of genuine hospitality and gratitude. Look at the deep blue paint on the walls IDK carefully selected, along with other adornments in his lovely Los Angeles home. Visually, the room is vivid yet calm, and sonically, his music has that same kind of feeling.

Korean-American rapper pH-1 radiates much of the same visual warmth of his setting. It disperses around him, highlighting his bandmates, who are planted in the fringes of an intense blue backdrop. The contrast lends a sentimentality that's emphasized by the opening lines of his 2018 hit, "Homebody." Perhaps the setting — a nod to his parents who, after immigrating to the United States, found stable work in a dry cleaning business — makes the artist just a bit more wistful than usual. The song builds around its hook with cascading keys and airy guitars, insisting that hanging out at home is just as fulfilling as going out to party. This tenderness anchors all three performances for the Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month edition of the Tiny Desk (home) concert series.

Ada Lea's Tiny Desk (home) concert opens just as her 2021 album, one hand on the steering wheel the other sewing a garden, does: with the careening, beautiful track "damn." It's the story of a turbulent New Year's Eve party, told through songwriter Alexandra Levy's stream-of-conscious delivery. Here, she and her band lean into the song's slowly simmering tension and frustration, ending on an extremely close shot of Levy's expressive face in the song's final moments.

Svaneborg Kardyb’s Tiny Desk (home) concert was recorded in the countryside of Djursland, Denmark. “You have to drive for a while on a gravel road, and then you come to a lovely old house surrounded by hills and a stream on one side and a very flat landscape on the other, where you can see 10 miles away,” the band wrote to us, describing the location of the shoot. It’s this place that inspired Svaneborg Kardyb’s second album, Haven. “‘Haven’” (means garden in Danish). Haven celebrates places we like to be,” the duo writes.

It surely was a day of joyful tears. And those joyful tears for Alisa Amador, the winner of the 2022 Tiny Desk Contest, came at a time when she had been considering putting her music career on hold. For the staff of NPR and the Tiny Desk crew, it was our first Tiny Desk concert with an audience in over 800 days, and Alisa’s captivating music surely intensified our spinning emotions. Alisa Amador opened with her Contest-winning entry “Milonga accidental,” a song about embracing your contradictions. It’s a song that our judges — iLe, Big Krit, Michelle Zauner (of Japanese Breakfast), Raveena, Nate Chinen (of member station WBGO), Tiny Desk producer Bobby Carter and I — all found to be so filled with passion. I often fall for a song because of the lyrics, and this is the first Tiny Desk Contest winner whose winning song is in Spanish. Despite the fact that I don’t speak Spanish, I felt the conflict, the yearning and the song's questioning.

Attention passengers: Please make sure your seat belts are fastened and tray tables are stored away as Adekunle Gold is ready for takeoff. The shape of the Nigerian singer-songwriter's Tiny Desk (home) concert mimics a flight pattern sonically and energetically, starting off laid back and ascending to greater heights that'll make you dance and move your feet. AG's career first picked up steam after the release of his debut single "Sade," a highlife cover of One Direction's "Story of My Life," in 2014; then, he released his debut album Gold in 2016. Three albums later, the Yoruba sensation's sound has evolved from highlife to Afropop.

A smile, laughter and a candle burning beside a delicate flower arrangement welcome us into the warm studio that is the set of James Francies’ Tiny Desk (home) concert. The young Houstonian and Blue Note recording artist begins with the hypnotic grooves of “713” — one of our picks for the best songs of 2021. This tune allows Francies’ virtuosic playing to shine, as he masterfully scales the keys during his solo. After a quick greeting, we’re whisked away by the luscious string ensemble that introduces “Rose Water.” Performed by vocalist Elliott Skinner, we’re lifted by Skinner’s voice as he sings beautifully of hope, support and growth: “I wish that you could see the light / That radiates in everyday…All the trials inside my mind / Shape me.”

British-Nigerian pop star Naira Marley opens his set with a sly smile and softly says “Marlians,” the name for his stans, a loyal group of followers who call Marley their president. Then, the first song kicks right in with a bouncy dance beat that just might get you dancing, wherever you are. It’s OK that you might not know what Marley is actually speaking about. His casual rapping style, defined by lexical tones in the Yoruba language, is enough. The first song, “Ayewada,” means “where is the time and space” and has an English language line: “They are calling you thief / You are dancing wit de goat.”

To see her is to appreciate a rare portrait. To watch her dance and hear her sing is to fall, entranced, into an uncanny haze. Both snake and its charmer, British Jamaican multidisciplinary artist FKA twigs is a new-age priestess. Surrounded by flames of offering in the hallowed halls of London's St. Matthias Church, the Grammy-nominated artist and her three-piece supporting band deliver a sermon on the perils of devotion. In her three-song Tiny Desk (home) concert -- featuring soul-baring ballads like “home with you” and “cellophane” -- she honors the strength of vulnerability; her operatic soprano ignites and delivers catharsis.

Larry June is the indie-rap hustle personified. His graduation from the streets has made way for his true purpose in rhyme: healthy living. The organic fruits and juices on the table in this performance indicate the lifestyle fervently pushed in his music. The two cell phones sitting beside him remind us that business is booming. He starts with a few signature adlibs before imploring, "Don't check me / Check the air quality." This lavish living room setting, with the Los Angeles night sky as a backdrop, sets the proper mood for Larry June's Tiny Desk (home) concert.

Hearing Ravyn Lenae’s voice resonate from behind the Tiny Desk for one of our first concerts back in the building had me entranced. With her voice raw and unamplified, Lenae and her dynamic band transformed our office into a funky, futuristic space where she was completely in her element. Hailing from Chicago, Lenae dropped her first EP, Moon Shoes, in 2015. Since then, she’s released two more EPs, her sound permeating the world of contemporary R&B and blurring the lines between soul, funk and R&B. This year Lenae reemerged with the release of her debut full length, HYPNOS, already shaping up to be one of the best albums of 2022.

Almost 30 musicians, choir members and staff of the contemporary worship music collective Maverick City Music entered the NPR lobby and crowded the security desk to undergo COVID protocols. Even through the dull process of checking vaccination cards and test results, there was a real feeling of excitement for what was about to happen. Some of the choir members were eager not only for the upcoming Tiny Desk concert but for later that evening, when they were scheduled to perform at a sold-out 20,000-seat arena nearby. A few of them had only previously performed with Maverick City Music in small venues and couldn't wait to move from the Tiny Desk to a big stage. Once upstairs, the group's enthusiasm grew during the set up and sound check. Even the NPR production staff was buzzing because we had not recorded such a large ensemble in our office in more than two years.

It's only right to think "New Monica!" when her Tiny Desk (home) concert begins. Surrounded by candlelight, dressed in pink, Monica stands ready to deliver a vibrant vocal masterclass. With her rich alto, Monica broke onto the music landscape in 1995 with her debut album, Miss Thang. In her class of '90s artists, the singer brought a mature sound, yet still tempered by youth, that made her relatable to audiences of any age who were growing into their own. Monica's albums are grounded in the here and now, the ups and the downs of life and love. For fans, she feels like a longtime friend to root for, not only for her talent, but because her realness is valued — an energy she brings to this performance.

Mezzo-soprano J'Nai Bridges is a rising star who recently won a Grammy Award and other accolades too long to list here. We're glad she accepted our invitation to record this Tiny Desk (home) concert, which features Damien Sneed on piano, Nolan Nwachukwu on bass and Christian Xavier McClendon McGhee on drums. She opens with "Habanera" from Carmen by Georges Bizet, a character she calls "one of the strongest women in all of opera." She also performs "Prayer" by Carlos Simon, a close collaborator, and "Heaven" by Duke Ellington, before closing out her set with the hymn "His Eye Is on the Sparrow."

After taking a sip of his tea towards the end of his six-song set, Denzel Curry turns to his band and exclaims: “We lowkey breezed through this b****! That’s great for two rehearsals!” From the moment Curry and his people stepped foot into NPR headquarters to record their Tiny Desk concert, the vibes were right. With a 10-piece configuration — consisting of drums, bass, keys, guitar, horns and percussion — the rapper put on a flawless and inspired live performance of songs off his latest LP as well as some of his biggest hits, all freshly arranged for the Tiny Desk.

"We celebrate Black Music Month. This has been Black magic." Truer words may have never been spoken behind the Tiny Desk as R&B goliath Usher caps off our month-long celebration of Black music, highlighting a catalog chock-full of hits spanning 25 years. It's been over two years since NPR headquarters was abuzz with chatter of a legend in the building. After an early morning rehearsal for his set at the Something in the Water Festival in Washington, D.C., he made his way over to deliver an unforgettable performance.