Esperanza Spalding at Ravinia
photo by Connor Burgess

new Harvard prof Esperanza Spalding making next LP live on Facebook

The multitalented Esperanza Spalding is gearing up to make a new album and you’re invited to watch. The Grammy winner’s new record, appropriately called Exposure, will be made during a 77-hour event to be streamed via Facebook Live, and will document every step of Spalding’s creative process (which also includes sleep breaks). The livestreamm which starts September 12, will also feature several guest musicians, who are yet to be announced. Once that process is over, Exposure will be available for preorder via Concord Records.

Spalding had this to say about the ambitious live event:

I foresee that creating before a live audience will add excitement and extra inspiration energy. Knowing someone is watching and listening to what you’re making seems to conjure up a sort of “can’t fail” energy. The necessity to keep going because it’s live draws up another depth of creative facility that can’t be reached when you know you can try again tomorrow.

Watch an announcement video about the project below.

In other news, Spalding is now teaching at Harvard University, where she has been named a Professor of the Practice in the Music Department. She will “teach a range of courses in songwriting, arranging, improvisation and performance, while also bringing her commitment to music as a voice for social justice.”

Folks in NYC can catch Spalding with Andrew Bird in Prospect Park on Friday (7/28) where they’ll play a free show as part of the BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Festival. The pair recently played together at Chicago’s Ravinia Festival and you can check out photos from that show above and their setlists below.

SETLIST: Esperanza Spalding @ Ravinia Festival, Chicago IL 7/23/17
Word Jungle
On On
Animal
Shine
You’re in Trouble

SETLIST: Andrew Bird @ Ravinia Festival, Chicago IL 7/23/17
Hole in the Ocean Floor
Fiery Crash
Nervous Tic
Tenuousness
Why?
Capsized
Truth Lies Low
Roma Fade
My Sister’s Tiny Hands (The Handsome Family cover)
Give It Away
Orpheo
Three White Horses
Are You Serious
Valleys of the Young
Pulaski at Night
Darkmatter
Encore:
Caravan (Duke Ellington cover) (with Esperanza Spalding)
Fake Palindromes

photos by Connor Burgess